Ancient Coin Stories

During large periods of the ancient times, there wasn’t much to do. Nowadays, we play games on our phones or watch shows, but neither activity was available back then. So, what was a king to do? Well, he could sack Abdera.

Sacking Abdera was a major pastime.Philip II,Lysimachos the Ptolemies, Seleukid, and other Macedonians all sacked Abdera at one point or another. The Romans of course joined in, as did theAttalid.

Probably the reason for this was its position at the edge of Thrace. In the early 4th century it was the western-most boundary of the Odrysians and was involved in endless games between the Persians, Athenians, and Thracian

The griffin comes from Teos from whom Abdera was settled. A number of famous Teans moved to Abdera, likely to escape Persian dominance. Before that, it was settled by Klazomenai. That settlement failed due to their ruler Timesios, who legend had tried to do everything by himself and was eventually scorned by everyone. There’s probably a moral in the episode somewhere.

I have a number of coins from Abdera. The one at the top is probably the nicest and is my only silver one, but they also issued many bronzes. Many were issued in the names of various magistrates.

This one is on permanent vacation in Australia.