Hekte

Kyzikos dominated electrum coinage in the Greek world for roughly two centuries, and its hektes circulated far beyond the Propontis region — hoards have turned up across the Aegean, in Thrace, and as far as the Black Sea littoral. The city's issues functioned less as local small change than as a trusted international trading medium, their consistent electrum alloy a deliberate commercial guarantee. The tuna fish incorporated into nearly every reverse type was not decorative convention but a mark of civic identity tied to the city's lucrative tunny fishery, which controlled migratory runs through the straits.