The Mamertinoi were Campanian mercenaries who seized Messana around 288 BC after the death of Agathokles of Syracuse, slaughtering the male population and taking their wives and property. Their later appeal to Rome for protection against Hieron II of Syracuse in 264 BC became the immediate trigger for the First Punic War. By the time this bronze was struck, Messana had been a Roman ally for decades, and the community was threading an awkward line between its mercenary origins and a now-institutionalized civic identity expressed partly through a continued independent bronze coinage.
The Mamertinoi were Campanian mercenaries who seized Messana around 288 BC after the death of Agathokles of Syracuse, slaughtering the male population and taking their wives and property. Their later appeal to Rome for protection against Hieron II of Syracuse in 264 BC became the immediate trigger for the First Punic War. By the time this bronze was struck, Messana had been a Roman ally for decades, and the community was threading an awkward line between its mercenary origins and a now-institutionalized civic identity expressed partly through a continued independent bronze coinage.