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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;GinoLR, post: 26198984, member: 128351&quot;]Elymais... This was a very, very ancient country called &quot;Elam&quot;. Its capital, Susa, was a city that had existed since c. 4000 BC ! It has been a powerful kingdom in the 2nd and 1st Millenium BC. The Great Kings of the Achemenid Empire (6th-4th c. BC), though being Persians, chose to locate their imperial capital in Susa. After the fall of this empire, Elam, now called by the Greeks &quot;Elymais&quot;, became a kingdom sometimes independent or autonomous but more frequently a vassal of the Parthian Empire. </p><p>The first coins of Elymais are silver hellenistic tetradrachms but in the late 1st c. AD silver vanished and tetradrachms and drachms were made of bronze. The same phenomenon occured in the Arabian peninsula (the Lihyanite switched from silver to bronze in the late 4th c. BC, the East Arabian polities too switched to bronze at an unknown period).</p><p>In the 2nd and early 3rd c. AD, Elymais minted enormous quantites of AE drachms which circulated as small change in the Gulf area. </p><p><br /></p><p>Here are 17 drachms from the early 2nd to the early 3rd c. AD. And 1 AE tetradrachm, probably dating back to the late 1st - early 2nd c. AD. I am not certain at all of their attributions... The earlier ones have reverse legends in Greek, the later ones have reverse legends in Aramaic. Some have hellenistic style reverses with busts of Artemis-Nanaia, of radiate Belos facing, or a double-diadem, but others, of the same kings, just have dashes... </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1672871[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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