Tarsos, Cilicia (Mazaios, satrap)

[B]Tarsos, Cilicia (Mazaios satrap; 361-334 BC.) AR Stater[/B] [u]Obv[/u]: Baal of Tarsos enthroned holding corn-ear with bunch of grapes and lotus-headed sceptre, facing left; eagle perched on corn-ear; Aramaic legend (Baal tarz) behind throne in right field and monograms below throne and grapes; all within round beaded border. [u]Rev[/u]: Lion on the back of kneeling bull, which it attacks with teeth and claws, facing left; possible ankh symbol below; Aramaic legend (Mazdai) above; all within round beaded border. [u]Attribution[/u]: BMC 49v; SNG Lev.106; SNG Fr.335v; SNG Cop.311v [u]Provenance[/u]: ex. Stacks (12/14/04, lot#178) [u]Weight[/u]: 10.84 gm [u]Maximal Diameter[/u]: 21.77 mm [u]Axis[/u]: 8 [u]Note[/u]: Mazaios (361-333 BC) - For nearly thirty years Mazaios governed Cilicia, and from 350 onwards also northern Syria (Ebernahara, ‘the country beyond the Euphrates’). Following the conquest of Cilicia by the Macedonians, Alexander III appointed Mazaios governor of Babylon from 333 to 328. His Cilician coins were mainly issued from Tarsos. His type of the lion killing a stag is copied from the coins of Citium. Tarsus, capital of Cilicia, on Cydmus fl., at one time near its mouth, but now 13 m. inland. Built "in one and the same day with Anchiale," by Sardanapalus. A celebrated seat of learning. The birth-place of St. Paul; of the stoics Antipater, Archedamus, and Nestor; of Athenodorus and Cordylion; of Nestor, the tutor of Marcellus; of Plutiades and Diogenes; of the grammarians Artemidorus and Diodorus; and of the dramatist Dionysiades (Classical Gazetteer, William Hazlit, 1851; pg. 336). GK171