These standards differed in the weight of the main monetary unit and also in the denominational structure of the coinage.
Modern numismatists have assigned names to these standards, based on the most prominent city-state that minted on them or the region where they are most common.
[1] In practice individual coins tend to vary from their ideal weights, due to a lack of precision during manufacture and the loss of weight over time through wear.
[2][3] Many of these standards derived from systems of weight that existed in individual city-states when they began to use coinage in the sixth and fifth centuries BC.
Most Greek states had ceased to mint silver coinage by the reign of Augustus, but a few standards continued in use throughout the Principate, like the cistophori.