Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Hekte
| Issuer | Kyzikos |
|---|---|
| Year | 550 BC - 450 BC |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Round (irregular) |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Forepart of a goat's head in left profile, rendered in high relief with clearly articulated horns curving backward; the eye and facial musculature are naturalistically detailed in the archaic Greek tradition. To the right of the goat's head, a tunny fish is depicted upright in the field, its characteristic dorsal ridge and body markings incised with precision. The tunny, a hallmark device of Kyzikene coinage, serves as the city's identifying symbol and appears consistently across the electrum hekte series. The design is set within a plain circular border on an irregular flan typical of the archaic hammered technique. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Plain |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
Kyzikos was the dominant source of electrum coinage in the Greek world during the fifth century, and its hektes functioned as a near-universal trade currency across the Black Sea and Aegean networks. The city's position on the Propontis gave it access to both the Lydian electrum supply and the merchant traffic that demanded a trusted, portable medium of exchange. Unlike most civic coinages of the period, Kyzikene hektes carried no ethnic legend — identity was embedded in the tunny fish device alone, which made them immediately recognizable regardless of the issuing year or design type.