Anonymous Æ Triens Overstruck on Akarnanian Federal Coinage Ex RBW

Anonymous Æ Triens, 211-208 B.C. 5.38g, 24mm.
O: Helmeted head of Minerva right; four pellets above
R: Prow right
Overstruck on Akarnanian Federal Coinage (Akarnanian Confederacy) of Oiniadai.
O: Zeus
R: Head of river-god Acheloüs, trident above.
- Crawford 95a From the RBW Collection

This triens comes from the CA series thought to have been struck in Canusium, modern-day Canosa, Italy. You can't see the CA on this example but the style is entirely consistent with the CA series and the CA tridents which apparently always come overstruck on bronzes of Acarnania and Oeniadae. So, why would a series struck in Southeast Italy have so many known overstrikes on undertypes from far away across the Adriatic?

The answer is that Marcus Valerius Laevinus had earlier driven the Macedonians from this region and this issue from Canusium represents booty captured during this fighting and brought back with the fleet when M. Valerius landed in Southern Italy circa 210-209 B.C.. The trientes are all overstruck likely because many of the captured coins were close enough to the necessary weight and the rest of the denominations were probably largely struck on flans whose bronze came from melting down and recasting of the captured booty, with a small number being overstruck on earlier coins that were the correct size. Since this issue contains no precious metal coinage, it is likely that if any precious metal was captured it was either sent back to Rome or used by one of the other Roman field mints operating in Apulia.