Definitions

The city of Syracuse is located on the east coast of Sicily and was originally a Greek colony founded by Corinth in 734 BCE. The city enjoyed a period of expansion and prosperity under the tyrant Gelon in the 5th century BCE, survived a two-year...

Aegina is an island in the Saronic Gulf, south of Athens. It was one of Greece's early maritime powers, famous for minting the earliest coins in Greece which were accepted all over the Mediterranean region. According to the classical writer...

Bactria was a province of the Persian empire located in modern Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. After the defeat of Darius III of Persia, Bactria continued to offer resistance against Alexander the Great, led by Bessus, who had...

Gaul (Latin Gallia, French Gaule) is the name given by the Romans to the territories where the Celtic Gauls (Latin Galli, French Gaulois) lived, including present France, Belgium, Luxemburg and parts of the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany...

Akkad was the seat of the Akkadian Empire (2334-2218 BCE), the first multi-national political entity in the world, founded by Sargon the Great (r. 2334-2279 BCE) who unified Mesopotamia under his rule and set the model for later Mesopotamian...

Coins were introduced as a method of payment around the 6th or 5th century BCE. The invention of coins is still shrouded in mystery: According to Herodotus (I, 94), coins were first minted by the Lydians, while Aristotle claims that the first...

The ancient Arabians, or Arabes as they were called by the Hellenes, were a Semitic people. One must note that the Arabians were not a single people but multiple smaller kingdoms and tribes. Arabia was home to great city builders and nomads...

The Greco-Bactrian kingdom refers to several dynasties and probably kingdoms of Greco-Macedonian monarchs who ruled over Bactria from 250 to 130 BCE. Foundation The Greco-Bactrian kingdom appeared in 250 BCE, when the satrap Diodotos...

The Eucratids were a Greco-Bactrian and Indo-Greek dynasty of approximately 12 kings, lasting between c.171 BC and 80-70 BC, according to numismatic evidence. The numismatic emblem which characterized it were the palm and the Dioscuri (Castor...