Analyzed coins Analysis

Analyzed coins

Coin catalogue sections:	Anemourion, Aphrodisias, Holmoi, Kelenderis, Nagidos, Pseudo-Kelenderis Mints
Coin corpus datasets:	Anemourion, Aphrodisias, Staters, Holmoi, Group 1, Holmoi, Group 2, Kelenderis, Staters – Group 1, Kelenderis, Staters – Group 2, Kelenderis, Staters – Group 3, Nagidos, Staters – Group 1, Nagidos, Staters – Group 2, Nagidos, Staters – Group 3, Pseudo-Kelenderis Mints

The numbers of analysed coins are given in Table 1. Those coins that are listed in the coin corpus without weights or that are marked there as too corroded or damaged are excluded from the analysis.

Corpus	Number of coins as of 11 January 2025
	Total	Excluded	Analyzed
Anemourion	2		2
Aphrodisias, Staters	5		5
Aphrodisias, Obols	21		21
Holmoi, Group 1, staters	9		9
Holmoi, Group 1, third staters	1		1
Holmoi, Group 1, obols	1		1
Holmoi, Group 2, staters	7	1	6
Holmoi, Group 2, obols	57	3	54
Holmoi, Group 2, hemiobols	3		3
Kelenderis, Staters – Group 1	14	1	13
Kelenderis, Staters – Group 2	229		229
Kelenderis, Staters – Group 3	246	1	245
Kelenderis, Third staters	35	1	34
Kelenderis, Obols	201	2	199
Kelenderis, Hemiobols	48	1	47
Nagidos, Staters – Group 1	138	1	137
Nagidos, Staters – Group 2	246	1	245
Nagidos, Staters – Group 3	198	7	191
Nagidos, Third staters	12		12
Nagidos, Silver fractions, obols	221	1	220
Nagidos, Silver fractions, hemiobols	3	1	2
Pseudo-Kelenderis mints	21	3	18

Table 1: Numbers of analyzed coins

Analysis

In Section Staters of Cilicia Trachea, the staters of the mints of Anemourion, Aphrodisias, Holmoi, Kelenderis, Nagidos and Pseudo-Kelenderis are divided into two phases representing the basic development of the weight standard. See the column ‘Staters’ in Table 2. Based on the Coin Catalogue and the weight analyses of these mints, lower denominations can also be distributed into these two phases, as shown in the columns ‘Third staters’, ‘Obols’ and ‘Hemiobols’ in Table 2.

The grey shaded cells in Table 2 indicate combinations of mints and denominations for which no coins are known. For the distribution of the Kelenderis and Nagidos obols into subgroups 5A, 5B and 5C, see the respective weight analyses Kelenderis, Obols and Nagidos, Silver fractions. Note that the tetartemorion is represented in the coin corpus by a single specimen that comes from the Nagidos mint, and therefore this denomination is not included in Table 2 and the following analysis. Lower silver denominations than the tetartemorion are not known from these mints.

		Staters	Third staters	Obols	Hemiobols
Phase 1	Anemourion
	Aphrodisias
	Holmoi	Group 1	Type 1.3	Types 1.4, 2.2–3	Type 2.4
	Kelenderis	Groups 1–3B	all types	Groups 5A–B	all types
	Nagidos	Groups A–B	all types	Groups 5A–B	all types
	Pseudo-Kelenderis	Group 1
Phase 2	Anemourion	Type 1
	Aphrodisias	Type 1		Type 2.2
	Holmoi	Group 2
	Kelenderis	Group 3C		Group 5C
	Nagidos	Group C		Group 5C
	Pseudo-Kelenderis	Group 2

Table 2: Distribution of coins into Phases 1 and 2

The numbers of analysed coins (i.e. coins in the Coin Corpus that are included in the weight analyses of individual mints) for each combination of mints and denominations, as well as the total number of coins for each denomination in each phase of the development of the weight standard, are shown in Table 3.

		Staters	Third staters	Obols	Hemiobols
Phase 1	Anemourion
	Aphrodisias
	Holmoi	9	1	55	3
	Kelenderis	444	34	186	47
	Nagidos	364	12	201	2
	Pseudo-Kelenderis	17
	Total	834	47	442	52
Phase 2	Anemourion	2
	Aphrodisias	5		21
	Holmoi	6
	Kelenderis	43		13
	Nagidos	209		19
	Pseudo-Kelenderis	1
	Total	266		53

Table 3: Numbers of coins

Table 4 shows the basic descriptive statistics of the denominations in both phases of the development of the weight standard (Std. Dev. denotes the standard deviation, IQR the interquartile range and CV the coefficient of variation). Not surprisingly, the coefficient of variation (CV) is higher the lower the denomination.

		Staters	Third staters	Obols	Hemiobols
Phase 1	Count	834	47	442	52
	Mean	10.64	3.43	0.73	0.36
	Median	10.68	3.47	0.72	0.36
	Std. Dev.	0.20	0.16	0.09	0.06
	IQR	0.19	0.14	0.11	0.10
	CV	0.02	0.05	0.12	0.16
Phase 2	Count	266		53
	Mean	9.94		0.58
	Median	9.99		0.57
	Std. Dev.	0.27		0.09
	IQR	0.28		0.10
	CV	0.03		0.15

Table 4: Descriptive statistics of denominations

An analysis of the relationship between the weights of staters and lower denominations is presented in Table 5. The column ‘Denomination ratio’ indicates the theoretical weight ratio of staters to individual denominations according to the Persian weight standard, i.e. 1 stater = 3 third staters (tetrobols) = 12 obols = 24 hemiobols. The ‘Ratio’ columns show the ratio of the average weight of the staters to the average weight of the given lower nominal. The ‘Seigniorage’ columns show by how many percent this weight ratio is higher than its theoretical value given in the „Denomination ratio“ column (the values are rounded to one decimal place).

For example, the average weight of staters in Phase 1 is 10.6367 g and the average weight of obols in Phase 1 is 0.7272 g (the values in Table 4 are rounded to two decimal places, i.e. to 10.64 and 0.73), so their ratio is 10.6367/0.7272 = 14.6269, i.e. 14.63 after rounding. Thus, approximately 14.63 obols were struck from the amount of metal corresponding to one stater instead of the theoretical number of 12 obols, i.e. 2.63 obols more, which corresponds to the seigniorage (the mint’s gross profit) of 2.63/12 = 21.9%.

Table 5 shows that the lower the denomination, the higher the seigniorage was, and also that this mint margin increased in Phase 2. However, these are preliminary very rough estimates, and to refine them it is necessary to take into account the different relative weight loss of higher and lower denominations due to wear and corrosion. A more thorough analysis will be published later.

	Denomination ratio	Phase 1		Phase 2
		Ratio	Seigniorage	Ratio	Seigniorage
Staters / Third staters	3	3.10	3.2%
Staters / Obols	12	14.63	21.9%	17.16	43.0%
Staters / Hemiobols	24	29.51	23.0%

Table 5: Weight ratios and seigniorage