Æ19 - Septimius Severus ΚΙΛΒΙΑΝΩΝ ΤΩΝ ΑΝΩ

The Cilbiani Superiores were a small Lydian community in the Cayster River valley whose civic coinage under Septimius Severus reflects the intense local competition for imperial favor during the civil wars of 193 AD — a year that saw four emperors and required provincial cities to pick their allegiances quickly and publicly. Bronze issues naming Severus were, in part, a loyalty declaration struck in metal.

The upper Cilbiani are distinguished from their neighbors, the Cilbiani Inferiores, by the ΑΝΩΝ ethnic — a distinction the two communities maintained carefully in their coinage to preserve separate civic identities within the Ephesian conventus.