Scepsis was a minor Troad city with an outsized claim on intellectual history — it was where the library of Aristotle was reportedly hidden in a pit to prevent its seizure by Attalid agents, only to resurface centuries later in damaged condition. By Commodus's reign the city had long been absorbed into the Roman provincial system under the Adramyteum conventus, one of the judicial assize districts through which Rome administered western Asia Minor. Local bronze issues like this one served inter-city commerce at a scale Roman imperial coinage didn't bother with.
Scepsis was a minor Troad city with an outsized claim on intellectual history — it was where the library of Aristotle was reportedly hidden in a pit to prevent its seizure by Attalid agents, only to resurface centuries later in damaged condition. By Commodus's reign the city had long been absorbed into the Roman provincial system under the Adramyteum conventus, one of the judicial assize districts through which Rome administered western Asia Minor. Local bronze issues like this one served inter-city commerce at a scale Roman imperial coinage didn't bother with.