Listed 5 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "BANIAS Town SYRIA" .
KESSARIA PHILIPPI (Ancient city) SYRIA
Paneas, Panias, or Paneias (Paneas, Panias, Paneias, Hierocl. p. 716),
more usually called either Caesareia Paneas (Kaisareia Paneas or Panias, Joseph.
Ant. xviii. 2. § 3, B. Jud. ii. 9. §1; Ptol. v. 15. § 21; Plin. v. 15. s. 15;
Sozom. v. 21; on coins, K. hupo Paneioi and pros Paneioi; in Steph. B. incorrectly
pros pei Paneadi) or Caesareia Philippi (K. he Philippou, Matth. xvi. 13; Mark,
viii. 27; Joseph. Ant. xx. 8. § 4, B. J. iii. 8. § 7, 2. § 1; Euseb. H. E. vii.
17), a city in the north of Palestine, called by Ptolemy and Hierocles (ll. cc.)
a city of Phoenicia, situated upon one of the sources of the Jordan, at the foot
of Mt. Panium, one of the branches of Lebanon. Mt Panium contained a cave sacred
to Pan, whence it derived its name. (Philostorg. vii. 7.) At this spot Herod erected
a temple in honour of Augustus. (Joseph. Ant. xv. 10. § 3, B. J. i. 21. § 3.)
Paneas was supposed by many to have been the town of Laish, afterwards called
Dan; but Eusebius and Jerome state that they were separate cities, distant 4 miles
from each other. (Reland, Palaestina, p. 918, seq.) Paneas was rebuilt by Philip
the Tetrarch, who called it Caesareia in honour of the Roman emperor, and gave
it the surname of Philippi to distinguish it from the other Caesareia in Palestine.
(Joseph. Ant. xviii. 2. § 3, B. J. ii. 9. § 1.) It was subsequently called Neronias
by Herod Agrippa in honour of the emperor Nero. (Joseph. Ant. xx. 8. § 4; Coins.)
According to ecclesiastical tradition it was the residence of the women diseased
with an issue of blood. (Matth. ix. 20; Euseb. H. E. vii. 18; Sozom. v. 21; Theoph.
Chronogr. 41 ; Phot. cod. 271.) Under the Christians Paneas became a bishopric.
It is still called Banias, and contains now only 150 houses. On the NE. side of
the village the river, supposed to be the principal source of the Jordan, issues
from a spacious cavern under a wall of rock. Around this source are many hewn
stones. In the face of the perpendicular rock, directly over the cavern and in
other parts, several niches have been cut, apparently to receive statues. Each
of these niches had once an inscription; and one of them, copied by Burckhardt,
appears to have been a dedication by a priest of Pan. There can be no doubt that
this cavern is the cave of Pan mentioned above; and the hewn stones around the
spring may have belonged perhaps to the temple of Augustus. This spring was considered
by Josephus to be the outlet of a small lake called Phiala, situated 120 stadia
from Paneas towards Trachonitis or the NE. Respecting this lake see Vol. II. p.
519, b.
(Reland, Palaestina, p. 918, seq.; Eckhel, vol. iii. p. 339, seq.; Burckhardt,
Syria, p. 37, seq.; Robinson, Bibl. Res. vol. iii. p. 347, seq.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
BANIAS (Town) SYRIA
An ancient town mound on the coast between two natural harbors 37
km S of Latakia, identified as Bronze Age Shuksu on the S frontier of the kingdom
of Ugarit. The modern village lies 600 m E of the mound.
Excavation has shown that the first occupation of the site was in
the Neolithic period (7th millennium B.C.), that in the Late Bronze Age and Early
Iron Age the town was touched by Mycenaean trade, and that in the NE quarter there
were remains of a sanctuary. At the end of the Early Iron Age Greek pottery of
the 8th c. B.C. appeared, a sign of the settling of Greek traders. The following
period saw the establishing of a Greek sanctuary, together with a renewal of the
old cult place. Apparently the town was destroyed at the beginning of the 5th
c. B.C. (perhaps in 498) and lay in ruins until ca. 380, when it was refounded
as a Neo-Phoenician town. The earthquake of 69 B.C. probably put an end to it;
the few Roman finds date from the 3d and 4th c. A.D.
The town mound became a fortress, constructed by the Byzantines, enlarged
by the Crusaders, occupied by the Muslims, and deserted in the 14th c. Ancient
cemeteries have been identified N and S of the harbors; at the S harbor there
was also a Neo-Phoenician sanctuary. Most of the finds are in the National Museum,
Damascus.
P. J. Riis, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
KESSARIA PHILIPPI (Ancient city) SYRIA
City on the NW slope of Mt. Hermon on one of the tributaries of the
Jordan. Its great god was Pan, who was identified with Zeus and associated with
the Nymphs. The city was refounded under the name Caesarea by Philip the Tetrarch,
son of King Herod the Great, in 2-1 B.C., and renamed Neronias under Agrippa II.
The site has not been excavated. Remains of ramparts with towers were
visible some time ago, as well as numbers of column shafts scattered in the orchards
or incorporated in the mediaeval fortifications, and Doric frieze fragments reused
in the parapet of the bridge on the Nahr es-Saari.
The Sanctuary of Pan and the Nymphs was a grotto from which the river
emerged under an arched opening; it was set among plane trees and poplars. Niches
with shells, framed by fluted pilasters to form little chapels, were carved in
the rock face. Dedicatory inscriptions in Greek indicate that two of the niches
held statues of Hermes and the nymph Echo. Two columns in front of the grotto
may have supported a canopy. Gratings or openwork metal gates protected these
rustic sanctuaries, which date from the Roman period.
J. P. Rey-Coquais, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
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