Tetradrachm ѳορ, MΣ

Arados — the ancient Phoenician city built on a small island off the Syrian coast — maintained its own civic era dating from 259/258 BC, which allows its tetradrachm issues to be dated with unusual precision for the Hellenistic world. The date ѳορ (year 179) places this piece in 81–80 BC, a moment when Seleucid authority over the Levant had effectively collapsed and Arados was operating with genuine autonomy, striking under its own name rather than in the name of any king.

BMC Greek 244 is a well-documented type within the Aradian civic series, part of a long run that scholars use as a chronological anchor for broader Syrian numismatic sequences.