Drachm - Lysimachus In the name of Alexander III, Abydus

Lysimachus began striking coins in Alexander's name — rather than his own — as a deliberate political posture, leveraging the dead conqueror's legitimacy while he consolidated control over Thrace and northwestern Asia Minor after Ipsus in 301 BC. Abydus, commanding the Hellespont crossing, was strategically indispensable: whoever held it controlled movement between Europe and Asia. The mint's output during this narrow window reflects the urgency of that consolidation. Price's attribution to this specific issue places it among the earliest phase of Lysimachean coinage before he finally adopted his own royal portrait types after approximately 297 BC.