A GREEK METROLOGICAL KOINE: A LEAD WEIGHT FROM THE WESTERN BLACK SEA REGION IN THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM, OXFORD

Abstract

Summary. A unique commercial lead weight from the western Black Sea region is examined in its metrological and historical context. The style and combination of relief symbols on the object (Athenian owl and Kyzikene tunny) suggest a quarter mina in a market weight system used equivalently at Athens and Kyzikos by the last quarter of the fifth century BC, and developed within a long‐term process of broad commercial integration of the Aegean and Black Seas in Classical times. The authors consider such a process to have been caused by the economic motivations of individual city‐states, not the direct Athenian imperialism expressed in the so‐called Standards Decree.