Stater

The attribution of this piece to an uncertain Ionian mint reflects a broader problem in early Greek numismatics: the cities of western Anatolia adopted coinage in the late seventh and early sixth centuries BC without consistently identifying themselves as issuers. Lydia's influence was decisive — the technology and the metal both flowed outward from Sardis — but individual poleis adapted the medium independently, producing types that resist clean attribution even after a century of scholarship.

The Rosen collection, assembled by Jonathan Rosen and studied extensively before its dispersal, remains one of the principal reference points for archaic electrum precisely because it gathered so many of these unresolved attributions in one place.