Stater

Kyzikos dominated the electrum trade coinage of the fifth and fourth centuries with a consistency unmatched by any other Greek mint — the same reverse type repeated across hundreds of obverse designs, each apparently issued in small numbers before the dies were retired. The city's position on the Propontis made it the natural clearing house for Black Sea commerce, and Kyzikenoi, as these staters were known, circulated far beyond Mysia: Athenian banking records and treasure hoards from the Crimea to Egypt attest to their acceptance as a near-universal mercantile currency.

No two obverse types are identical in this series. That variety was almost certainly deliberate — possibly tied to issuing magistrates or trading seasons rather than dynastic change.