Kition, situated on the south-eastern coast of the island of Cyprus, is the Phoenician kingdom par excellence. The coin inscriptions are always in Phoenician and Phoenician elements are common in epigraphic documents and in archaeological finds, yet the coins follow the local Cypriote weight standard and not the one used in Phoenicia.
Early coinage
The earliest coins, without inscription, are shekels with a recumbent lion turning his head on the obverse and a smooth reverse. These are followed by a group composed of smaller denominations with a recumbent lion with open jaws on the obverse, and a lion seated to the right on the reverse.
We know the names of three generations of kings from epigraphic evidence, mainly from the following inscription discovered in Idalion:
Baalmilk king of Kition and Idalion, son of Azbaal king of Kition and Idalion, son of Baalmilk king of Kition
The inscription shows that the capture of Idalion by Kition occurred in the reign of Azbaal, but the date of this important event is controversial. Archaeological evidence, in particular ceramic finds, places it in 470, but numismatic evidence suggests rather a date after 450.
Coins have been attributed to all the above kings. The first of the dynasty, Baalmilk I, issued shekels and thirds with his name (B'lmlk) in Phoenician letters. The obverse type is Herakles (assimilated with the Phoenician Melqart) walking right, wearing a lion's skin on his head and holding a club and a bow; the reverse type is a seated lion with open jaws. Smaller fractions, such as twelfths, twenty-fourths and forty-eighths of a shekel, have on the obverse a bearded head of Herakles and on the reverse a seated lion.
Fourth-century coinage In the fourth century a combination of epigraphic and numismatic evidence allows us to date the reigns of the three known kings of Kition with great accuracy. The first of them, Baalrom (B'lrm), succeeded Baalmilk II around 400; he adopted the same types as his predecessor on his shekels and thirds, putting his own name on the reverse. Milkyaton (Mlkytn) succeeded as king in 392 and reigned for at least thirty years. He issued shekels and thirds on the local Cypriote weight standard and, for the first time in Kition, gold and bronze coins with the same types as those of his predecessors from Ozbaal onwards. On the other hand, some bronze coins attributed to him because of the Phoenician letter m on the obverse show for the first time at Kition a head of Aphrodite wearing a decorated stephanos.
Milkyathon was succeed by his son Pumayyaton (Pmy(y)tn), reigned until he was executed by Ptolemy in 315. We know from the numbers of the regnal years indicated on the reverse of his mainly gold coinage that he reined for at least 46 years. This is the only case in Cyprus of such numbering, though it is attested in Phoenicia from the beginning of the fourth century. A combination of epigraphic and literary evidence tells us that in the 21st year of his reign (341/340) Pumayaton was king of Kition, Idalion and Tamassos; because of debts, the king of Tamassos had sold his kingdom and the title that went with it to Pumayyaton for fifty talents. However, after his capture of Tyre in 332 Alexander the Great offered the kingdom of Tamassos to the king of Salamis, Pnytagoras.
The end of the fourth century
Numismatic evidence offers further insights into political alignments at the time of Alexander's presence in the eastern Mediterranean. The coinage of year 30 (332/331) of Pumayyaton is particularly prolific and possibly attests his preparations for war against Alexander and his intention to help his Phoenician allies.
Between his regnal years 33 (329/328) and 39 (323/322) Pumayyaton appears not to have issued coins (the mint of Kition may have been used to strike Alexander's coins), but after Alexander's death, in 322/321, Pumayyaton resumed striking coins until he was put to death by Ptolemy in his year 46 (315/314). We can also attribute to Pumayyaton a series of bronze coins formerly thought to have been issued by king Evagoras II of Salamis in the middle of the fourth century. The types figure on the obverse a lion walking left, with a ram's head in the field above, and on the reverse a horse walking left, with a star of eight rays above, and the Phoenician sign of Tanit in the left field.