Saitta was a minor Lydian city whose civic coinage under the joint reign of Valerian I and Gallienus represents one of the last gasps of provincial bronze production in the Greek east. The magistrate named in the obverse legend — Julius Phaeseinous — is otherwise unattested outside this coinage, making these bronzes the sole surviving evidence of his tenure. The Conventus of Sardis administered a sprawling network of such communities, each competing for the prestige of issuing coins bearing the imperial portrait alongside local civic identity.
Provincial civic bronze coinage in Asia Minor effectively ceased within a decade of this issue, killed off by the monetary chaos of the 260s.
Saitta was a minor Lydian city whose civic coinage under the joint reign of Valerian I and Gallienus represents one of the last gasps of provincial bronze production in the Greek east. The magistrate named in the obverse legend — Julius Phaeseinous — is otherwise unattested outside this coinage, making these bronzes the sole surviving evidence of his tenure. The Conventus of Sardis administered a sprawling network of such communities, each competing for the prestige of issuing coins bearing the imperial portrait alongside local civic identity.
Provincial civic bronze coinage in Asia Minor effectively ceased within a decade of this issue, killed off by the monetary chaos of the 260s.