Listed 6 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "PANIONION Ancient sanctuary TURKEY" .
Panionium (Panionion), a place on the western slope of Mount Mycale, in the territory of Priene, containing the common national sanctuary of Poseidon, at which the Ionians held their regular meetings, from which circumstance the place derived its name. It was situated at a distance of 3 stadia from the sea-coast. (Strab. xiv. p. 639; Herod. i. 141, foll.; Mela, i. 17; Plin. v. 31; Paus. vii. 5. § 1.) The Panionium was properly speaking only a grove, with such buildings as were necessary to accommodate strangers. Stephanus B. is the only writer who calls it a town, and even mentions the Ethnic designation of its citizens. The preparations for the meeting and the management of the games devolved upon the inhabitants of Priene. The earlier travellers and geographers looked for the site of the Panionium in some place near the modern village of Tshangli; but Col. Leake (Asia Minor, p. 260) observes: The uninhabitable aspect of the rocks and forests of Mycale, from Cape Trogilium to the modern Tshangli, is such as to make it impossible to fix upon any spot, either on the face or at the foot of that mountain, at which Panionium can well be supposed to have stood. Tshangli, on the, other hand, situated in a delightful and well watered valley, was admirably suited to the Panionian festival: and here Sir William Gell found, in a church on the sea-shore, an inscription in which he distinguished the name of Panionium twice. I conceive, therefore, that there can be little doubt of Tshangli being on the site of Panionium.
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
A spot on the north of the promontory of Mycale, with a temple to Poseidon, which was the place of meeting for the cities of Ionia.
Total results on 30/5/2001: 21 for Panionium, 12 for Panionion.
Near Guzelcamli in Ionia, 17 km S of Kusadasl. Here was the Sanctuary
of Poseidon Helikonios, the religious place of assembly of the Ionian League.
The site was unknown until quite recently; Herodotos (1.148) places it on Mt.
Mykale facing N; Strabo (639) calls it the first place after the Samos strait
going N, three stades from the sea. This region was disputed between Priene and
Samos, but the priesthood belonged to the Prienians. The assembly was accompanied
by a festival, the Panionia, held on the ample plain to the N. According to Diodoros
(15.49.1) the festival was transferred, because of the constant wars, to a safe
place near Ephesos, and it seems to be referred to as the Ephesia by Thucydides
(3.104). It was suspended under Persian rule and revived after the time of Alexander.
The sanctuary lay on the summit of a low hill called Otomatik Tepe
(formerly the hill of St. Elias) at the foot of the mountain; the remains are
scanty in the extreme. From one to three courses of the enclosing wall may be
seen, with an entrance on the W; in the middle are traces, mostly cuttings in
the rock, of a structure some 18 by 4 m; this is evidently the altar of Poseidon,
dated by the excavators to the end of the 6th c. B.C. No temple was found, and
none is mentioned in the ancient authorities, who refer only to sacrifices (Diod.
l.c.; Strab. 384).
At the SW foot of the hill is the council chamber of the Ionian League,
a theaterlike building some 30 m in diameter with 11 rows of seats. There is no
speaker's platform, but only the leveled rock. Diodoros says that nine cities,
not twelve, shared in the assembly, and the excavators see some confirmation of
this in the arrangement of the front row of seats; the historian's statement has
generally been regarded as a mistake.
Between the council chamber and the sanctuary is a large cave in the
hillside. This may well have played a part in the cult of Poseidon, though nothing
of interest has been found in it.
G. E. Bean, 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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