Major Mint: Eikonion.

Isauria was located in central Asia Minor, inland from Pamphylia. A rough mountainous territory, home to bands of barbarians and robbers, the inhabitants lived in villages. These settlements were loosely confederated until Perdiccas in 325 BC destroyed their capital Isauria Vetus; henceforth all the villages were more or less independent. Publius Servilius Vatia earned the epithet Isauricus for bringing the wild tribes under Roman control in 76-5 BC.

Not, of course, that the natives suddenly settled down; their plundering activities brought grief to their neighbors well into the fifth century AD. They gained a brief period of glory when the emperor Leo used the Isaurians as a countermeasure to the German military chiefs; one of the Isaurian chiefs, Tyarasicodissa, became emperor as Zeno (474-91 AD). With the German menace dealt with, however, they became expendable, and Anastasius crushed Isaurian power for good.