Stater

Tarsos functioned as the administrative seat of the Persian satrapy of Cilicia during this period, and its coinage — including this stater — was produced under Achaemenid oversight while retaining distinctly local Anatolian iconographic traditions. The city sat astride the Cilician Gates, the critical mountain pass through the Taurus range, making it both strategically indispensable and commercially active enough to sustain a productive mint.

The SNG Levante reference places this piece within a tightly documented group, and the Ashmolean specimen catalogued as #1831 provides a useful die-study anchor for the series.