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Æ - Dios
| Issuer | Olbia |
|---|---|
| Year | 240 BC - 230 BC |
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| Currency | Drachm |
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| Obverse description | Draped bust of Demeter facing left, her hair bound in a wreath of grain ears; to the right of the main effigy, a secondary facing-left head of Perseus, rendered in lower relief. The composition is characteristic of Olbian civic bronze coinage of the mid-third century BC, with both figures sharing the obverse field in a stylistically archaic manner. |
|---|---|
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| Mint | Olbia |
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| Additional information |
Olbia, the Greek colonial city at the mouth of the Bug River on the northern Black Sea coast, had an unusual monetary tradition — it was among the earliest Greek cities to adopt cast bronze coinage rather than struck, producing the famous cast "dolphin" and "arrow" pieces centuries before this issue. By the third century BC, the city had long since transitioned to struck bronze, but retained a distinctly local pantheon in its coinage choices, reflecting Olbian civic identity under growing Sarmatian pressure from the steppe interior.
The city fell under Scythian siege and suffered significant destruction around 230 BC, making issues from precisely this window difficult to attribute with confidence to pre- or post-destruction striking.