Æ25 - Caracalla ΕΚΤΩΡ ΙΛΙΕΩΝ

Ilium — the city built over the ruins of Troy — maintained an aggressive civic identity rooted in its Homeric heritage throughout the imperial period, and coins invoking Hector were central to that project. The city claimed descent from Aeneas and by extension a special relationship with Rome itself, a mythology Roman emperors found politically useful enough to indulge. Caracalla visited the site during his eastern campaign of 214 AD, reportedly offering sacrifice at what locals identified as Achilles' tomb — a gesture that speaks directly to the ideological traffic these coins were meant to facilitate.