v59_0109 - IONIA - IONIAN ISLANDS - CHIOS Drachme

IONIA - IONIAN ISLANDS - CHIOS

(4th - 3rd century BC)

The island and town of Chios was located opposite the city of Eritrea. Coinage began in the middle of the 6th century BC and lasted, for the archaic style, until the middle of the 4th century BC. Chios was a famous port and commercial centre. The city seems to have participated in the revolt of Ionia against the Persian yoke at the beginning of the 5th century BC (500-494 AC.), (Herodotus VI. 26). A decade later, she sends a fleet of seventeen ships to Xerxes who is about to invade Greece (Herodotus, VII. 95). The island seems to have belonged to the league of Delos after 477 BC. The city is the ally of Athens. Chios left the alliance in 412 BC. From the 3rd century, Chios lost its autonomy, which it only regained after the Peace of Apamea in 188 BC. The city was ravaged by Mithridates VI du Pont in 86 for having supported the Romans. Sulla restored the city in 84 BC and declared it an ally of Rome.