Æ37 - Septimius Severus ΕΠΙ ΑΥΡΗ ΜΑΡΚΟΥ, ΔΑΡΔΑΝΙΩΝ

Dardanus was a minor coastal polis on the Troad, strategically positioned near the narrowest point of the Hellespont — the same stretch of water where Sulla and Mithridates VI concluded their armistice in 85 BC. Under the Roman provincial reorganization of Asia, it fell within the conventus of Adramyteum, one of the administrative assize districts through which Roman judicial and civic authority was channeled. The magistrate name preserved in the legend, Aurelius Marcus, is the sole surviving record of his tenure.