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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;DonnaML, post: 7813866, member: 110350&quot;][USER=99456]@Sulla80[/USER], a great coin. I don&#039;t think these coins are ugly at all!&nbsp; If I did, I wouldn&#039;t have bought my own cistophoric tetradrachm from Tralleis, the date of which has also been brought forward by about 50 years as a result of recent scholarship (see my footnote, based in large part on sources you provided to me if I recall correctly):</p><p><br /></p><p>Lydia, Tralleis/Tralles, AR Cistophoric Tetradrachm, 78/77 BCE, Magistrate ΠTOΛ (Ptol-). Obv. Cista mystica with lid ajar and serpent emerging; all within ivy wreath / Rev. Bowcase (gorytos) with two serpents (one to left and one to right, heads at top); H [= date = Year 8 = 78/77 BCE, based on Year 1 of Sullan era being 85/84 BCE*] over ΠTOΛ [PTOL] above, between serpents’ heads, TPAΛ [TRAL] in left field; to right, Dionysos in short chiton standing facing, head left, holding thyrsos in right hand and mask of Silenos in left hand. SNG Copenhagen 662-663 <i>var.</i> [different year] [<i>Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum, Copenhagen, The Royal Collection of Coins and Medals, Danish National Museum, Part 28, Lydia Part 2</i> (Copenhagen 1947)]; BMC 22 Lydia 46-48 (p. 333) <i>var.</i> [different years] [Head, B.V., <i>A Catalogue of Greek Coins in the British Museum, Vol. 22, Lydia</i> (London, 1901); SNG von Aulock 3262-3264 var. [different year] [<i>Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum, Deutschland, Sammlung Hans Von Aulock, Vol. 2: Caria, Lydia, Phrygia, Lycia, Pamphylia</i> (Berlin, 1962)]; Pinder 159 [same year -- “H”]; see also id. 157-158 [different years] [Pinder, M., <i>Über die Cistophoren und über die kaiserlichen Silbermedaillons der Römischen Provinz Asien </i>(Berlin, 1856) at pp. 565-566]. 24 mm., 12.64 g. [probably = 3 drachms, not 4], 1 h. Ex: CNG Auction 225 (13 Jan. 2010), Lot 144.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1342846[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>*&nbsp; According to the traditional scholarship reflected in BMC 22 Lydia at p. cxxxvii, the date is Year 8 since 133 BCE, when the Pergamene kingdom passed by bequest to the Roman Republic upon the death of Attalus III, and became part of the Province of Asia. No coins minted in Tralleis had been found (as of 1901) bearing dates later than Year 8. [Since then, coins dated Year 9 have been discovered.] The author suggests that after Tralleis participated in the unsuccessful revolt against Roman rule by Aristonicus (a/k/a Eumenes III), who claimed to be the illegitimate son of Attalus III’s father Eumenes II, the Romans may have punished the city by depriving it of various privileges, including the privilege of minting silver coins. But all the more modern sources reject the idea that Tralles and the other Pergamene cities had the time (or the inclination) to start issuing coins dated by a new Roman era as soon as Attalus&#039;s will became public, particularly given the immediate rebellion of Aristonicus. Nor, given that this rebellion had been suppressed by 129 BCE, does it appear likely that such a punishment would have been imposed only after 126 BCE, when the last dated coins were issued in Year 8 (now known to have been issued even later, in Year 9).</p><p><br /></p><p>Instead, current scholarship has concluded, based on hoard and other evidence, that the Tralleian cistophori dated Years 1-9, all bearing the name of the magistrate ΠTOΛ, were, in fact, minted beginning 50 years later, in 85/84 BCE after Sulla&#039;s defeat of the Mithraditic revolt. At that time, Tralles was under the control of Lucullus, the Roman commander and the administrator of the Province of Asia after the First Mithraditic War (see generally <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucullus" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucullus" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucullus</a>). It was Lucullus who caused the cistophori to be minted during that period, at Sulla’s command, to pay the city’s taxes in arrears. See Noe, Sydney P. &amp; Fred S. Kleiner, <i>Early Cistophoric Coinage</i> (ANS, 1977) at n. 14, available at <a href="http://numismatics.org/digitallibrary/ark:/53695/nnan30795" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://numismatics.org/digitallibrary/ark:/53695/nnan30795" rel="nofollow">http://numismatics.org/digitallibrary/ark:/53695/nnan30795</a>&nbsp; (citing Regling, F., “Ein Kistophorenschatz aus der Provinz Brussa,” <i>Frankfurter Münzzeitung</i> 3 (1932) pp. 506-510); Callatay, de F., &quot;L’Histoire des Guerres Mithridatiques vue par les Monnaies, Louvain-la-Neuve&quot; (1997), p.178; Carbone, Lucia Francesca, “‘Romanizing’ Asia: the impact of Roman imperium on the administrative and monetary systems of the Provincia Asia (133 BC - AD 96)” (2016) [Doctoral thesis, Columbia University, available at <a href="https://academiccommons.columbia.edu/doi/10.7916/D8222TP0" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://academiccommons.columbia.edu/doi/10.7916/D8222TP0" rel="nofollow">https://academiccommons.columbia.edu/doi/10.7916/D8222TP0</a>], pp. 170-173 (hoard evidence “enables us to determine the presence of a Sullan age in Tralles, and allows a precise dating of the ΠΤΟΛ issues to 85-77 BC, which corresponds roughly to Lucullus’ power in the province and to the exceptional issues caused by Sulla&#039;s command that taxes be paid in arrears, proving a further element of Roman involvement in the cistophoric issues”); Leschhorn, <i>Antike Ä ren: Zeitrechnung, Politik und Geschichte im Schwarzmeerraum und in Kleinasien nördlich des Tauros</i> (Stuttgart, 1993) pp. 202-221.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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