it is a very muddy river like all others in Ionia, and hence it alone has
filled up the whole bay of Miletus, which was several miles in breadth,
but the cleaning out of which has been neglected for thousands of years.
Accordingly the island of Lade, which Herodotus mentions there, is now
only a hill rising in the midst of marshy meadows. Such is the nature
of all the rivers of that coast, and the most beautiful countries have
thereby been changed into pestilential swamps. In the north, a range of
mountains, extending from mount Taurus to the coast opposite to Chios,
forms the peninsula on which the towns of Clazomenae and Erythrae are
situated. Chios itself is a continuation of those mountains, separated
from the rest by the sea. What Herodotus says of the nature of Ionia,
holds good also of the greater part of Aeolis: it is the pearl of
creation. The present marshes, which have been formed by the deposits
of the rivers in consequence of the neglect of barbarous ages, form the
only exceptions. Nowhere in all the world is the splendour of a southern
climate more thoroughly felt than there; nowhere are the seasons so
healthy, and yet the country suffers neither from excessive heat nor
drought; and nowhere are fruits, such as grapes, figs, and pomegranates,
produced in such perfection. The Scirocco is unknown there (though it
exists in Rhodes), but the mildest west winds prevail, and the south
winds are not in the least injurious, while at Rome they are very much
so. Hence we cannot wonder, that, during the period of the weakness
of the states in western Asia, Ionia attained to such prosperity and
greatness.
While Colophon is important to us only in legendary history, MILETUS
is the most illustrious city on the Ionian coast during the period of
accredited history. It was itself a great place, and also founded a great
number of colonies, which are said to have amounted to eighty. As the
maritime states of Greece in their colonisation, as it were, divided the
different seas among each other, so that Corinth chose the Adriatic,
Chalcis and Eretria the seas about Sicily, and Athens the Hellespont, so
we find the Milesians in the Euxine sea. There they founded Cyzicus, from
which they exercised their power over the greater part of the Propontis;
they then established themselves on all the coasts of the Euxine, and
thereby opened to themselves inexhaustible sources of wealth. The
commerce in those parts was certainly the most lucrative, and must have
yielded them immense riches. The Doric town of Byzantium might have shut
them out from the sea, but the Milesians had already become too powerful
through their colonies. The large rivers and the shallow sea yielded
them the fish which are so necessary for a Greek, and they also were the
means of conveying the supplies of corn from the Crimea, the Ukraine,
and the Dnieper, that is, from the country which now contains the great
corn-market of Odessa. But the inhabitants of those coasts not only sold
their own products, but purchased Greek merchandise with native gold
from the country of the Arimaspae, where at present gold mines are again
worked,—a fact which corroborates the tradition in Herodotus. They took
in exchange wine, Greek woollen cloth, Egyptian linen, Persian robes,
and many other costly things. Owing to this double commerce, Miletus was
wealthy and great during the time of the Lydian kings, and remained so
during the first period of the Persian dominion. Then it was plunged into
the deepest misery by misfortunes which succeeded one another in rapid
succession. Miletus had been obliged to submit to the Lydian kings, but
their rule seems to have been limited to the exacting of tribute, and
not to have disturbed its autonomy—a relation like that in which Ragusa
stood to the Turkish empire, to which it paid tribute, though otherwise
it enjoyed many advantages and privileges. This was the period of the
greatest prosperity of Miletus. It submitted to the Persians without
vehement opposition. Afterwards Aristagoras allowed himself to be tempted
by Histiaeus to induce Miletus to rise against the overwhelming power of
Persia. This insurrection was commenced without deliberation, and carried
out without a well digested design and without character: the city was
taken, and its inhabitants carried into Persia as slaves. This event
was the subject of the historical drama (Μιλήτου ἅλωσις) of Phrynichus.
Afterwards the city was again taken by Alexander, and thenceforth
remained an insignificant place; its harbour may have been filled up at
an early period.
Miletus was the original home of the Ionian philosophy: Thales,
Anaximenes, and Anaximander were born there; it was also the native
city of Arctinus, the greatest among the cyclic poets. During the Roman
period it is often mentioned on account of the woollen cloths which were
manufactured there; when Strabo wrote, it still existed indeed, but as a
place of no importance at all.
In its neighbourhood, and within the boundaries of ancient Caria, were
situated the two towns of MYUS and PRIENE, the latter of which is known
as the birth-place of Bias, who wisely advised the Ionians to unite into
one state, that they might be able to resist the barbarians.
The promontory of MYCALE is in the neighbourhood of Priene, opposite to
Samos; it is a branch proceeding from mount Taurus. There the Athenians,
under Xanthippus, gained a victory over the Phoenician fleet of the
Persians, on the same day on which the battle of Plataeae was won;
whereby the independence of the Greeks, and especially of their Asiatic
colonies, was established.
SAMOS is great in history, and, like Miletus, was for a time mistress of
the sea, but its greatness passed away early and quickly. Pythagoras,
according to tradition, was a Samian, though little reliance can be
placed upon it: Creophilus, the poet of the Οἰχαλίας ἅλωσις, too, is
called a Samian, and tradition describes him as a son-in-law of Homer.
The island was particularly celebrated at the time of Polycrates, who
ruled far and wide over the sea and the islands. After him his brother
Syloson attempted with a Persian army to conquer the island: the
expedition inflicted the first blow upon it, for the Persians carried off
a large number of its inhabitants as slaves. Samos then became connected
with Athens, but shortly before the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war
it rose against the supremacy of Athens, and being re-conquered after a
siege of ten months was severely chastised, and a portion of the island
became subject to Athens. During the latter period of the Peloponnesian
war, Samos was the head quarters of the Athenian fleet in that part of
the sea, and the scene of fearful disturbances caused by the aristocratic
or Spartan party as well as by the democratic or Athenian. Although
weakened, the Samians afterwards took part in the social war of Rhodes,
Chios, Cos, and Byzantium against Athens. I have not been able to make
out anything about the part which Samos took in that war, except that
the island was conquered and received cleruchi (Olymp. 108); it was a
lucrative possession to the Athenians, and therefore of importance to
them. After the battle of Chaeronea, Philip left them in the possession
of Samos, that they might not be driven to extremes and throw themselves
into the arms of Persia, the affairs of which were then managed by the
brave Memnon. But after the Lamian war the island was taken from them,
and restored to the Samians. Under Ptolemy Philadelphus and Euergetes,
a division of the Egyptian fleet was stationed near Samos. The most
interesting object in the island was the Heraeon, the temple of Hera,
which was rich in the finest works of art, such as statues by Myron,
Polycletus, and Praxiteles.
The island of Samos is very fertile, and was celebrated as such in
antiquity. It is strange that the wine of Samos was thought bad by the
ancients, for it is now valued very highly; no person from our northern
countries would consider the wine of Chios bad either.
The nearest city on the coast was EPHESUS, in antiquity celebrated for
its temple of Artemis, as Samos was for that of Hera. During the great
period of Grecian history, it is mentioned as a distinguished city, and
in the early times it was rich in great men: it was the native place of
the philosopher Heraclitus, the iambic poet Hipponax, and of Apelles and
Parrhasius. But notwithstanding its famous temple of Artemis, Ephesus was
not of great political importance: it was situated on the Caÿstrus, which
is very muddy, and has now changed the whole district into a pestilential
marsh. Attalus of Pergamus was well disposed towards the city, and caused
a pier to be built there, making the entrance of the harbour quite wide,
while towards the interior, it grew narrower and narrower, in order that
the current might become stronger; but his plan was ill calculated, for
the current became weaker, and the harbour was more and more filled
with mud, and only a roadstead remained. Ephesus was situated in three
different places: the most ancient town is almost mythical; the second,
near the temple, existed until the time of the successors of Alexander;
and the third, lastly, which was built by Lysimachus close to the sea,
was at a considerable distance from the temple, and the inhabitants of
the old town were forced to remove to it. This New-Ephesus was for a
long time the capital of Ionia, and was increasing even as late as the
time of Augustus and Tiberius; it was an emporium for the whole country
far and wide, though it had no longer a harbour. It was commonly the
residence of the Roman governor. The origin of Ephesus, like that of most
of the Ionian towns, is mythical. Artemis is a genuine Greek goddess,
but her temple at Ephesus was specially revered by the Persians, as
eastern nations often shewed a partiality towards foreign religions:
they altered the ceremonial of the temple, and the employment of eunuchs
in its service is of Persian origin. The temple was also known as an
asylum: whoever in times of danger wished to protect his property, might
deposit it, as we learn from Xenophon’s Anabasis,[73] in the treasury of
the temple of Ephesus, whence he might afterwards take it back without
loss. This sanctity of the temple also continued, after its restoration,
during the Macedonian period and under the Romans. In the time of the
Macedonian dominion, the city was one of high rank. When, under Ptolemy
Euergetes, the coasts of Ionia and Thrace were in the possession of the
Egyptians, the Egyptian governor had his seat at Ephesus. Antiochus Theos
and Antiochus the Great also resided there, whence we must infer that the
city contained a palace. John the Evangelist lived and died there.
In the neighbourhood of Ephesus, there were several small towns, one of
which was LEBEDOS, which, in the time of Horace, was quite desolate, and
more deserted than Gabii and Fidenae, for its inhabitants had been driven
by Lysimachus to Ephesus, when he rebuilt that city: still, however,
Horace wished to be able to spend his whole life there.
TEOS was the native place of Anacreon, and in other respects, too, of
comparative importance, as it sent out colonies, such as Abdera. It was
situated upon the isthmus.
COLOPHON was situated between Ephesus and Lebedos. I have already spoken
of its ancient greatness. We there meet with the incomparable poet
Mimnermus, the loss of whose productions is to us the most deplorable
in ancient literature, and who composed his splendid poetry at a time
when the rest of Greece was still slumbering. Thucydides, and Aristotle
in his politics, mention _Notion_ as the port of Colophon. This place
owed its origin to a feud among the citizens of Colophon, in which the
democratic party seceded and settled on the sea-coast. At the time of the
Peloponnesian war, an implacable enmity existed between the two.
ERYTHRAE on the gulf of Chios, which separates this island from the
continent, was in ancient times the seat of a Sibyl. At an early period
it carried on protracted wars with Colophon, which shows that it must
have been a powerful state.
CLAZOMENAE was situated on an island,[74] whence in the peace of
Antalcidas it became independent of Persia. Otherwise it is of no
political importance, nor did it found any colonies. It was the
birth-place of Anaxagoras.
PHOCAEA was very far removed from the other towns, Smyrna being situated
between them, though the latter did not become an Ionian city until a
later period. Phocaea refused to submit to Cyrus, and was, therefore,
besieged and finally taken by his general Harpagus. Its inhabitants,
however, had escaped to their ships; a great number of them wished to
emigrate, but some returned to Phocaea and submitted to the Persians,
while others founded Elea in Oenotria. Before this time, the Phocaeans
were among the boldest navigators; they visited more especially the
coasts of the western seas, Baetica, Tartessus, and the south of Gaul. In
the latter country they founded Massilia, which afterwards established
other colonies partly by itself, and partly in conjunction with the
Phocaeans. The foundation of Massilia has sometimes, but unjustly been
connected with the emigration in the time of Cyrus. Phocaea recovered to
some extent, and continued to exist down to the middle ages, for it was
situated in a fertile territory; but its navigation passed into the hands
of the Smyrnaeans.
CHIOS is one of the most splendid islands in the world, for with the
exception of a few desert and rough districts, it combines all the
blessings of Ionia: it has excellent wine, and its soil produces in fact
everything that agriculture demands of it; it had a beautiful harbour,
and its inhabitants have at all times been active and enterprising men.
Before the time of the Peloponnesian war, they showed wisdom in their
relation to Athens, and took no part in the senseless insurrections of
Samos and other islands, but conscientiously adhered to the treaties with
Athens and remained quiet, whence they were treated by the Athenians with
great respect. While the other towns had to pay money as contributions
towards the Athenian fleet, Chios and Lesbos still retained their navy;
Lesbos lost its fleet in consequence of its thoughtless revolt in the
Peloponnesian war, but Chios remained faithful to Athens till after the
Sicilian disaster. The Chians then wanted to place themselves at the
head of an Ionian maritime confederation, which, however, was never
realised. Afterwards they headed the the Social war (Olymp. 106). During
the Macedonian period the Chians behaved with great prudence, and, like
the Rhodians, preserved their republican independence. This state of
things remained until the war of Mithridates, when they supported him,
and were punished by the Romans in consequence. But the island soon
recovered again. The great renown of Chios arose out of the belief,
that Homer was a native of the island, and had lived there, because a
_genos_ of Homerids existed there until a late period. In my opinion,
Homer is a mythical hero; the genos of the Homerids must be viewed in
the same light as all such γένη, e.g., that of the Asclepiadae and
Butadae; a common origin of such a genos from one ancestor is altogether
out of the question.[75] The author of a great portion of the Homeric
poems, especially of the ground-work of our present Iliad, seems to have
belonged to Smyrna; the testimony of those who call him Melesigenes is,
in my opinion, entitled to the best consideration, although the author of
the Hymn on Apollo calls himself a Chian.
About SMYRNA wonderful stories were current in antiquity. According to
one of them, it was originally an Ionian settlement, and, considering its
situation between Ephesus and Phocaea, this is most probable; afterwards
it is stated to have passed into the hands of the Aeolians, from whom
it was taken again, according to Herodotus, by the Ionians. It is then
scarcely mentioned at all until after the time of Alexander. Antigonus
the one-eyed in reality built Smyrna anew; nearly all that is related
about its early history is legendary. Its site was so happily chosen,
that among all the towns on that coast it was the most imperishable,
and continually increased. Its harbour is very excellent, but had been
overlooked in an unaccountable manner ever since its destruction by
the Lydians. It was, particularly during the period that Ephesus was
governed by Egypt, that Smyrna, being under the dominion of Syria,
rose to eminence. During the unfortunate times of the Roman wars, the
Smyrnaeans behaved with great prudence, as we see particularly from their
treaty with the Magnesians. Under the Romans, and that even under the
first emperors, Smyrna, alternately with Ephesus, was often the seat
of the proconsul. The Romans procured its admission into the Ionian
confederacy as the thirteenth town. According to the ancient notions, the
Ionians would not have ventured to go beyond the sacred and established
number, and in case of emergency, they would have incorporated a
smaller town with a larger one, e.g., Lebedos with Ephesus or Colophon;
but those scruples were then easily got over, and hence we now find
thirteen Ionian towns mentioned in inscriptions, coins, etc. In like
manner, Athens, in later times, had thirteen tribes, and a senate of
the corresponding number of 650. Smyrna was often destroyed, once in a
very fearful manner by Tamerlane, but it soon recovered. The correct
orthography of the name, both with the Greeks and the Romans, is Zmyrna,
in the same manner as they wrote Zmaragdos.
The meetings of the twelve Ionian towns took place at a spot called
_Panionium_, below the promontory of Mycale, which formed about the
central point among them. These meetings gave rise to a permanent town
with a prytaneum, in which the meetings were held. This union among the
Ionians was not of a political nature, though it seems to have been the
original intention that it should be; but the autonomy of the individual
states did not permit this, and hence Panionium was only a place for
agones.
There were several more small towns in Ionia, which I will pass over
here. Mount Mimas, a branch of mount Taurus, rises precipitously above
Erythrae (ἠνεμόεις Μίμας in Homer).
AEOLIS.
The number of Aeolian towns in Asia Minor and the neighbouring islands
amounted to thirty, but they formed several separate groups. One of
these groups, the real Αἰολὶς δωδεκάπολις, had Cyme for its capital.
There was also an Αἰολὶς ἐν Ἴδῃ in the interior of the country, which
probably included Tenedos and Hecatonnesoi. Lesbos contained six towns.
These Aeolian towns (the name is applied in its most proper sense to the
first group or the dodecapolis) cannot, generally speaking, be compared
in importance with the Ionian and Dorian settlements; they were μικρὰ
πολίχνια; Smyrna’s importance belongs to the time when it had ceased to
be Aeolian. It would lead me too far here to enumerate all the Aeolian
towns whose names are mentioned only by one author or another, for they
are otherwise unimportant; hence I shall notice only the most celebrated,
and in point of fact there are only two out of the eleven (after the
separation of Smyrna) that deserve to be noticed.
The first is CYME, with the surname _Phriconis_, which cannot be
explained. The foundation of this place is assigned to an extremely
early period, the report being, that it was built soon after the Trojan
war. But not too much value must be attached to this tradition, any
more than to most of the things belonging to the time anterior to the
beginning of the Olympiads. Cyme is always spoken of as the greatest and
most important among the Aeolian towns, but history does not justify
this reputation, for the place nowhere appears possessed of power or
influence. The historian Ephorus, who was born there, sheds considerable
lustre upon it; the loss of his work is irreparable, and perhaps the
most serious that we have to lament in ancient history. He cheerfully
took the greatest pains to investigate the obscure periods of antiquity,
and must be regarded as the first critical inquirer into the early
history of Greece. He thoroughly deserves the respect paid to him by
his contemporaries, although his style, according to the testimony of
Isocrates, was dry and inferior to that of Theopompus: perhaps we should
judge differently of him if we had his work. The opinion that Hesiod was
a native of Cyme, seems to be a gross delusion, the origin of which,
however, is not clear to me.
We must also notice GRYNEON with its celebrated temple of Apollo, who is
for this reason called _Gryneus_ by Virgil and Ovid.
TEMNOS remained a somewhat important place even in later times. The other
towns are quite insignificant.
The whole history of these Aeolian colonies is involved in singular
obscurity. Penthilus, a son of Orestes, is said to have first settled
with Aeolians in Lesbos, and Gras, his son or grand-son, is reported to
have founded Cyme on the mainland; he was worshipped there as archegetes,
which, however, means nothing else, than that the foundation was ascribed
to Orestes himself. Gras here is probably nothing but the eponymus to
_Graecus_, standing to the _Graeci_ in the same relation as Helen does
to the Hellenes. The matter is so obscure that we ought to approach it
with the utmost caution; I for my part cannot understand how Agamemnon’s
grand-son should have gone into that country with such a miscellaneous
race as the Aeolians, and with a colony which is said to have consisted
chiefly of Thessalian Aeolians. I am much more inclined to believe, that
after the Trojan war the race of the Pelopids or Agamemnonids remained
behind as rulers in those parts; and this is not improbable in itself,
since the fact of the Trojan war certainly cannot be doubted: the
poetical account of Helen, of the siege, and the wooden-horse, is not
historical, but the war and its final issue cannot be denied. I suppose,
therefore, that Greeks under the Agamemnonids remained behind in the
conquered Teucrian country. If this be so, we here have another instance
of that change of the poles of a tradition, to which I have repeatedly
drawn your attention: Pelops is transferred from Phrygia to Peloponnesus,
and the Pelopids from Peloponnesus to Asia. But the chief point is this,
we must regard the Greek inhabitants of that coast as a people of the
same race as the western Hellenes, as in fact even in tradition all the
country was originally Pelasgian, whence at a later period it likewise
became identical with the Hellenic countries. The barbarous tribes on
that coast, the Mysians, Lydians and Carians, did not arrive until a
latter time. But we must not go too far in tracing this origin of the
Aeolian colonies.
The northern part of Aeolis embraced the πολίχνια ἐν Ἴδῃ, in what was
properly the Teucrian country; and to it belonged Abydos, Tenedos, and
Hecatonnesoi. Although these towns were Greek, yet they were viewed
by the ancients in a very different light. Some of them play rather a
prominent part in the later wars of the Greeks, as for example SCEPSIS,
the native place of the grammarian Demetrius, an historical commentator
of Homer; the town is mentioned in Xenophon’s Hellenica. We must here
also mention the Aeolian ILION, which arose after the destruction of
ancient Ilion. ASSOS was situated at the foot of mount Ida, shut in
between the mountains and the sea; some mysterious ruins of it are still
extant. ABYDOS stood on the narrowest part of the Hellespont, where it is
only seven stadia, about one mile, in breadth. TENEDOS was flourishing
in consequence of its situation at the entrance of the Hellespont; it
was a commercial place, populous and industrial, and derived advantages
from its situation even as late as the time of the Romans. The town in
Hecatonnesoi is mentioned only by Herodotus.
That this part of Aeolis was likewise a dodecapolis, is indeed no more
than a conjecture, for we cannot make out the names of all the towns; but
it is at least very probable partly from analogy, and partly from the
words of Strabo; for out of the number of the thirty towns which he calls
Aeolian, twelve belong to the southern dodecapolis and six to Lesbos.
LESBOS is the pearl of the Aeolian race; in the Trojan times it is
called Pelasgian, but in such a manner that the Pelasgian Macar in Homer
is an Aeolian.[76] Lesbos is a blessed country, and excellent for the
cultivation of the vine and grain, like Chios; it is only wanting in
mastix, and its wine too is somewhat inferior to that of Chios; it has,
however, no rough districts like Chios, but only pleasing hills and
numerous plains, many excellent harbours, and bays entering far into the
country. It had originally six towns, among which, however, _Arisba_ was
destroyed at an early period by the Methymnaeans; its name reminds us of
the town on the mainland known from Homer; it had disappeared as early
as the time of Herodotus. Among the remaining five, two are towns of
importance, Mitylene and Methymna; the three others are Pyrrha, Eresos,
and Antissa.