2 1/2 Litrai - Syrakosioi

Syracuse's fractional silver coinage of the late third century BC was produced under extraordinary pressure — the city cycled through Pyrrhic intervention, a mercenary crisis following the First Punic War, and ultimately the long reign of Hieron II, whose careful diplomacy kept Syracuse nominally independent while Carthage and Rome ground each other down around it. Small denominations like this one likely handled the granular daily commerce of a city that remained one of the Mediterranean's largest throughout this period.