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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;NewStyleKing, post: 5228005, member: 106483&quot;]The Ugly cistophorus is an intriguing coin series and is much speculated on.The dating on the first issues is controversial and any dates from 180&#039;s to mid 160&#039;s is proposed for it inception. It is an non- royal coin of the Attalid Empire at a non attic weight standard of c 12.6 gm per tetradrachm. At the time the standard royal Attic weight coinage was the Philoterai apparently systemized by Westermark. These are deemed the international coinage while the cistaphori formed a closed currency system similar to the Ptolemaic attempt to stem the bleed of silver out of egypt. The main mints appear to be Pergamum and Ephesos, but several others are known like Nysa,Adremyton,Apamia &amp; Tralleis etc. The latter are much smaller mints and are much more internal .</p><p>Some like Ephesos are dated, but, whilst Muller favours 2 distinct periods the first known period starts with the closing years of Attalos ll&nbsp; and then goes on to the years of Attalos lll. It is after that Muller breaks the dating into 2 distinct time frames and I think he is right. Cistophoric coins of the rebel Aristonicus with B A and a regnal date</p><p>(Not that rare) appear to be his coins and the transfer of the kingdom to the Romans did not probably occur to 5 years later and the dating restarted from that. A couple of other mints had dated coins but what era is not known.</p><p>However during Roman times some had well known persons sign coins,Fimbria ( Rare),Clodius,Atratinus and most collectable M Tullius. Our old friend Marcus Tullius Cicero put his name on a coin when he was a Governor in Cicilia ( Very rare also). He had a small military victory and signed himself IMP and he expected to get a triumph when he got home..it never happened-the world of Rome was changing. He also despised the Cistophorus because he was paid in it and worried that the conversion to denarii would cost him too much!</p><p>Later Mark Anthony with or without Octavia minted their type of Cistophori and after defeat it became a Roman eastern coin. Late cistaphori were recovered from the Antikythera wreck from which the famous mechanism was partially recovered.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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