Stater

Kyzikos was the dominant source of electrum coinage in the ancient Greek world for well over a century, and its staters functioned as a de facto international trade currency across the Black Sea littoral and into the Aegean. The city's position on the Propontis made it the natural clearinghouse for grain moving south from Scythian territories, and these coins moved with that trade. Athenian merchants accepted them readily despite Athens minting its own silver.

Von Fritze's typology catalogued over a hundred distinct reverse types for Kyzikene staters, each issue differentiated by its obverse device while sharing the characteristic tunny fish.