Sneaky Roman Empire Provincial Mint of Stratonicea in Anatolia

(January 1, 2025) This mint in Anatolia was able to mint its own coins by passing them off as coins belonging to pre-Roman times. This was discovered by their incompetent use of Druid Akkadian letter styles from an earlier time period. 

This city was one of the most important towns in the interior of ancient Caria, Anatolia, situated on the east-southeast of Mylasa, and on the south of the river Marsyas. It is now the town of Eskihisar, Muğla Province, Turkey. 

It was founded on the site of an old Carian town, Idrias, anciently called Chrysaoris, one of the first towns founded by the Lycians. Later it passed under the control of the Achaemenid Empire. According to Athens' tribute "assessment" of 425 BCE Idrias was supposed to be responsible for the payment of the considerable sum of six talents. Like many other non-Greek cities on the 425 BCE assessment Idrias is never recorded actually paying any tribute. The area was conquered by Alexander the Great becoming a Seleucid colony (312–100 BCE) before being taken over by the Romans around 100 BCE. It was during the Roman era they began minting these retro coins.

Two ancient rural sanctuaries at Lagina and and Panamara were absorbed into the territory of Stratonicea, one for a goddess and the other for a god. These were later rebuilt eventually becoming large temples in the Greek style. The Roman author Tacitus spoke of the worship of Trivia meaning "the 3-roads" among the Stratoniceans. So the goddess temple is for all of the life-power goddesess (Hekate, Ayu, Asher). The other temple has traditionally been assigned to Zeus.

The End of the Hellenstic period saw the final rebuilding of the temple to Diana. It seems to have been before the war against Eumenes III Aristonikos in 133 BCE. The temple is considered the last great monument of the "Ionian Renaissance" which began in Hecatomnid Caria with monuments like the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus. The emperor Augustus donated a significant amount to help the site recover from damage after Lagina was attacked by Quintus Labienus, a rebel with Parthian support, in 40 BCE.  Lagina continued to thrive until a catastrophic earthquake in 365 BCE. Its end came after Christianity was enforced by the Christian Roman emperors.

The town resistence against the 40 BCE Parthian supported siege entitled it to the gratitude of Augustus and the Senate. The alleged divine intervention against Quintus Labienus by Zeus at Panamara led to the elevation of that sanctuary in the hinterland of Stratonikeia,to one favoured by the city. This was the time when it would have been allowed to mint its own coins although in order for those coins to be widely accepted they were passed off as older coins.

Reference

References

https://collections.mfa.org/objects/267651/coin-of-stratonicea-with-busts-of-septimius-severus-and-juli?ctx=73ec8407-ca1e-46ce-adca-2f7ffa788df7&idx=14

Most coins from the mint

https://en.numista.com/catalogue/mint.php?id=860