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Æ - Sariakes
| Issuer | Kings of Skythia |
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| Year | 180 BC - 167 BC |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Reference(s) | Coinage#1038-1061 3.2#2042 Stancomb#327 1#G0520 |
| Obverse description | Bare-headed bust of Hermes facing right, wearing a broad-brimmed petasos pushed back on the head, rendered in a bold, somewhat provincial Hellenistic style. The facial features — including a prominent nose and strong jawline — are clearly delineated in relatively high relief against a plain, unadorned field. No legend or inscription appears on the obverse. |
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| Reverse description | A caduceus — the herald's staff of Hermes — depicted upright and centrally placed in the field, with two intertwined serpents rising along the shaft and wings spread at the top. The abbreviated Greek royal legend is distributed around the caduceus in two segments, reading ΒΑΣΙ to the left and ΣAPI to the right, denoting 'King Sariakes'. The lettering is irregularly spaced and rendered in a somewhat crude, provincial hand consistent with Skythian bronze coinage of the period. |
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| Additional information |
Sariakes is among the most obscure rulers in the Scythian dynastic sequence, known almost exclusively through his coinage rather than any surviving literary source. His bronze issues were struck somewhere in the northwestern Pontic region, likely in proximity to Olbian commercial networks, during a period when Scythian political authority was fragmenting under pressure from both Sarmatian encroachment from the east and the expanding reach of Pontic client relationships to the west.
The reign dates themselves — reconstructed entirely from hoard evidence and die studies — remain contested by as much as a decade in either direction.