Struck during the time of Alexander the Great, this coin was intended to help finance the initiation of his extensive conquests. Alexander supposedly issued a plea to the Peloponnesian city in 334 BC for coinage to help pay his soldiers. Sicyon intended this series, along with staters bearing A or I control marks on the reverse, to provide Alexander's soldiers with a signing-bonus. The city most likely was able to issue this series, only after either melting or restriking earlier issues. Prominently displaying a Chimera, with "the fore part a lion, in the hinder a serpent, and in the midst a goat, breathing forth in terrible wise the might of blazing fire" (Homer, Iliad 6.179-182), this design was an aggressive choice for a coin intended to finance a war!