Stater - Sophytes

Sophytes governed a territory somewhere in the Punjab or eastern Bactria — ancient sources are frustratingly vague — and appears to have submitted voluntarily to Alexander before continuing to rule as a subordinate dynast. His coinage is among the earliest struck in the region under Macedonian influence, predating the Seleucid consolidation of the east and the eventual breakaway Bactrian kingdom by generations.

The SNG ANS 1 specimen is the anchor piece for the entire series. Sophytes remains one of the most obscure figures to have struck coins in his own name in the ancient world.