Saguntum's allegiance to Rome made it the flashpoint for the Second Punic War — Hannibal's siege of the city in 219–218 BC gave Rome its pretext for conflict with Carthage. Coinage from Arse, the Iberian name for the settlement, was struck in the decades immediately preceding that siege, when the city functioned as one of the most commercially active Edetani centers on the Valencian coast.
The hemidrachm denomination reflects deliberate alignment with Greek weight standards, almost certainly adopted to facilitate trade with Greek merchants operating out of Emporion to the north.
Saguntum's allegiance to Rome made it the flashpoint for the Second Punic War — Hannibal's siege of the city in 219–218 BC gave Rome its pretext for conflict with Carthage. Coinage from Arse, the Iberian name for the settlement, was struck in the decades immediately preceding that siege, when the city functioned as one of the most commercially active Edetani centers on the Valencian coast.
The hemidrachm denomination reflects deliberate alignment with Greek weight standards, almost certainly adopted to facilitate trade with Greek merchants operating out of Emporion to the north.