Hekte Erythrai

Erythrai, an Ionian Greek city on the Aegean coast of Anatolia, was among the earliest poleis to strike electrum coinage — a practice almost certainly borrowed from neighboring Lydian monetary tradition before Lydia's conquest by Cyrus the Great in 547 BC accelerated Greek adoption of coined money across the region. The hekte, a sixth-stater denomination, was the workhorse of early Ionian trade finance.

The Boston MFA pair catalogued as 1806–1807 represent two of the better-documented specimens from this scarce civic issue.