Phaistos, one of the oldest cities on Crete, had already been a significant Bronze Age center for over a millennium before this stater was struck — the site's Linear A tablets predate the coin by roughly 1,500 years. By the early third century the city was in political decline, increasingly overshadowed by Gortyn, and would be destroyed by its neighbor sometime around 220 BC. These staters represent the tail end of an independent civic coinage that effectively ceased with the city itself.
The fabric is notably thick for the diameter — a consequence of the heavy Aeginetan-derived weight standard Cretan mints favored over the broader Attic norm.
Phaistos, one of the oldest cities on Crete, had already been a significant Bronze Age center for over a millennium before this stater was struck — the site's Linear A tablets predate the coin by roughly 1,500 years. By the early third century the city was in political decline, increasingly overshadowed by Gortyn, and would be destroyed by its neighbor sometime around 220 BC. These staters represent the tail end of an independent civic coinage that effectively ceased with the city itself.
The fabric is notably thick for the diameter — a consequence of the heavy Aeginetan-derived weight standard Cretan mints favored over the broader Attic norm.