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AZIRIS (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Aziris or Azilis (Aziris, Azilis, Herod., Steph. B., Callim.; Axiron,
Charax, ap. Steph. B.; Axulis or Azulis kome, Ptol. ii. 5. § 2; Eth. Azilites,
Steph. B.), a district, and, according to the later writers, a town, or village,
on the coast of Marmarica, on the E. frontier of Cyrenaica, in N. Africa, opposite
the island of Platea. Herodotus tells us that it was colonized by Battus and his
followers two years after their first settlement in Platea, B.C. 638. He describes
it as surrounded on both sides by the most beautiful slopes, with a river flowing
through it, a description agreeing, according to Pacho, with the valley of the
river Temmineh, which flows into the Gulf of Bomba, opposite to the island of
Bomba (the ancient Platea). In a second passage, Herodotus mentions it as adjacent
to the port of Menelaus, and at the commencement of the district where silphium
grows. (Herod. iv. 157, 159; Callim. in Apoll. 89; Pacho, Voyage de la Marmarique,
&c.pp. 53,86.) It appears to be the same place as the Portus Azarius (ho Azarios
limen) of Synesius (c. 4: Thrige, Res Cyrenens. p. 72).
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited July 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
EVESPERIDES (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Hesperides or Hesperis (Hesperides, Hesperis), afterwards Berenice
(Berenike: Ben Ghazi, Ru.), the westernmost city of the Cyrenaic Pentapolis, stood
just outside the E. extremity of the Great Syrtis, on a promontory called Pseudopenias,
and near the river Lathon. It seems to have derived its name from the fancy which
found the fabled Gardens of the Hesperides in the fertile terraces of Cyrenaica;
and Scylax distinctly mentions the gardens and the lake of the Hesperides in this
neighbourhood, where we also find a people called Hesperidae, or, as Herodotus
names them, Euesperidae. Its historical importance dates from the reign of the
Ptolemies and it was then named Berenice after the wife of Ptolemy III. Euergetes.
It had a large population of Jews. (Strab. xvii. p. 836; Mela, i. 8; Plin. v.
5; Solin. 27, 54; Ammian. Marc. xxii. 16; Steph. B. s. v. Hesperis; Hierocles,
p. 733, where the name is Beronike; Stadiasm. p. 446, Bernikis; Itin. Ant. p.
67, Beronice; Tab. Peut., Bernicide; Ptol. iv. 4. § 4, viii. 15. § 3.) Having
been greatly reduced by that decline of commercial importance and those ravages
of the barbarians which were so severely felt by all the cities of the Pentapolis,
it was fortified anew by Justinian, who also adorned it with baths. (Procop. de
Aedif. vi. 12.) Its name is sometimes as an epithet for Cyrenaica, in the form
of the adjective Berenicis. (Sil. Ital. iii. 249; Lucan ix.524: Beechey, Della
Cella, Pacho, Barth.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
KYRINAIKI (Ancient country) LIBYA
Cyrenaica (he Kurenaie chore, Herod. iv. 199; he Kurenaia, Strab.
xvii. p. 837; he Kurenaike eparchia, Ptol. iv. 4; Cyrenaica Provincia, Cyrenaica
Africa, and Cyrenaica simply, Mela, i. 8. § 1; Plin. v. 5, &c.: Adj. Kurenaikos,
especially with reference to the philosophic sect founded by Aristippus, he Kurenaike
philosophia, Strab. xvii. p. 837; Diog. Laert. ii. 85; Kurenaios, Cyrenaicus,
Cyrenaeus, Cyrenensis), a district and, under the Romans, a province of N. Africa,
also called, from the time of the Ptolemies, Pentapolis (Pentapolis, Ptol.; Agathem.
ii. 5), Pentapolis Libyae (Pentapolis Libues, Joseph. vii. 38; Sext. Ruf. 13),
and Pentapolitana Regio (Plin. l. c.). The former name was derived from Cyrene
the capital of the district; and the latter from its five chief cities, namely,
Cyrene, Barca, Teucheira (aft. Arsinoe), Hesperides (aft. Berenice), and Apollonia
which was at first the port of Cyrene. The names may, however, be distinguished
from one another; Cyrenaica denoting the whole district or province in its widest
sense, and Pentapolis being a collective name for the five cities with their respective
territories.
In its widest sense the term includes the whole of the country which
was subject to Cyrene, when that city was most flourishing, from the borders of
Carthage on the W. to those of Egypt on the E. On both sides, as was natural from
the character of the intervening deserts, the boundaries varied. On the E. they
seem never to have been perfectly defined, being placed at the Chersonesus Magna
(Ras-et-Tin), or at the Catabathmus Major (Marsa Sollom or Akabet et Kebira, the
present boundary of Tripoli and Egypt), according as Marmarica was included in
Cyrenaica or not. On the W. the boundary was fixed, after long disputes, at the
bottom of the Great Syrtis. On the S. the nominal limits of the country reached
as far as the oasis of Phazania (Fezzan). (Scylax, p. 45; Strab. xvii. p. 838;
Stadiasm. p. 451; Sail. Jug. 19; Mela, Plin. ll. cc.). On the N. the shore was
washed by that part of the Mediterranean which was called the Libyan Sea (Libycum
Mare), and on the W. by the Greater Syrtis.
But the district actually occupied by the Greek colonists comprised
only the table land, known as the plateau of Barca, with the subjacent coast.
It may be considered as beginning at the N. limit of the sandy shores of the Great
Syrtis at Borbum Pr. (Ras Teyonas, S. of Ben-Ghazi), between which and the Chersonesus
Magna the country projects into the Mediterranean in the form of a segment of
a circle, whose chord is above 150 miles long, and its are above 200, lying directly
opposite to the Peloponnesus, at the distance of about 200 miles.
From its position, formation, climate, and soil, this region is perhaps
one of the most delightful on the surface of the globe. Its centre is occupied
by a moderately elevated table-land, whose edge runs parallel to the coast, to
which it sinks down in a succession of terraces, clothed with verdure, intersected
by mountain streams running through ravines filled with the richest vegetation,
well watered by frequent rains, exposed to the cool sea-breezes from the N., and
sheltered by the mass of the mountain from the sands and hot winds of the Sahara.
The various terraces enjoyed a great diversity of climates, and produced a corresponding
variety of flowers, vegetables, and fruits, and the successive harvests, at the
different elevations, lasted for eight months out of the twelve. (Herod. iv. 198,
199; Diod. iii. 50; Arrian. Ind. 43; Eustath. ad Dion. Perieg. 312.) The table
land extends some 70 or 80 miles in breadth between the Sahara and the coast,
but it is only on its N. and NW. slopes that it enjoys the physical advantages
now described, and on account of which it is called to this day Jebel Akdar, i.
e. the Green Mountain. Among its products are enumerated corn, oil, wine, all
kinds of fruits, especially dates, figs, and almonds (Scyl. p. 46; Diod. iii.
49; Plin. xiii. 4. s. 9, xvii. 30. § 4; Synes. Epist. 133, 147); cucumbers (Plin.
xx. 1. s. 3), truffles (misu, Ath. ii. p. 62; Plin. xix. 3. s. 12); cabbage (Ath.
i. p. 27, iii. p. 100), box (Theophr. Hist. Plant. iii. 15), saffron (Ath. xv.
p. 682; Plin. xxi. 6. s. 17; Synes. Epist. 133), flowers from which exquisite
perfumes were extracted (Theophr. H. P. vi. 6; Ath. xv. p. 689; Plin. xxi. 4.
s. 10); and a very rare plant, for which the country was especially celebrated,
namely, Silphium, or laserpitium, the plant which produced the gum resin, called
laser (opos Kurenaios), which was in the highest esteem among the ancient physicians
(Herod. iv. 169; Dioscor. iii. 84; Theophr. H. P. vi. 3; Arrian. Anab. iii. 28;
Strab. ii. p. 131; Plin. ix. 3. s. 15, xix. 3. s. 1, xxii. 23; Plaut. Rud. iii.
2. 16; Eckhel, Doctr. Num. Vet. vol. iv. p. 119; Mionnet, Descr. de Med. vol.
vi. pp. 373, foll.: the plant, which had already become scarce in the time of
the Romans, is now found in abundance: Della Cella, Viaggio da Tripoli, &c.; Pacho,
Voyage dans la Marmarique, &c., p. 250). The district was also famous for its
honey (Synes. Epist. 147); its horses, large studs of which were kept at Cyrene
and at Barca (Pind. Pyth. iv. 2; Ath. iii. p. 100; Dionys. Perieg. 213; Synes.
Epist. 40; Diod. xvii. 49; Strab. xvii. p. 837; Steph. B. p. 155), and its ostriches
(Synes. Epist. 133). As some check upon all these advantages, the country was
terribly subject to the annual ravages of locusts (Plin. xi. 29. s. 35; Liv. Epit.
lx.; Jul. Obseq. 90; Oros. v. 11; Synes. Epist. 58); and the great abundance of
natural gifts disposed the inhabitants to luxury.
The native Libyan tribes, who are mentioned as inhabiting the country
in the earliest known times, were the Auschisae on the W., the Asbystae in the
centre, and the Giligammae on the E.; but in the time of Herodotus these peoples
had already been driven into the interior by the Greek settlers; and, during the
whole period of ancient history, Cyrenaica is essentially a part of the Hellenic
world. (A few other tribes are mentioned by Ptolemy, iv. 4. s. 10.) The first
Greek settlement, of which we have any clear account, was effected by Battus (Diet.
of Biog. s. v.), who led a colony from the island of Thera, and first established
himself on the island of Platea at the E. extremity of the district, and afterwards
built Cyrene (B C. 631). The dynasty, which he there founded, governed the country
during 8 reigns, though with comparatively little power over some of the other
Greek cities. Of these the earliest were Teucheira and Hesperides then Barca a
colony from Cyrene; and these, with Cyrene itself and its port Apollonia formed
the original Lybian Pentapolis. The comparative independence of Barca, and the
injury inflicted on the country by the Persian invasion under Cambyses, diminished
the power of the later kings of Cyrene, and at last the dynasty was overthrown,
and a republic established about the middle of the 5th century B.C. When Alexander
invaded Egypt the Cyrenaeans made an alliance with him (Diod. xvii. 49; Curt.
iv. 7). The country was made subject to Egypt by Ptolemy the son of Lagus, B.C.
321. (Diod. xviii. 19-21, xx. 40; Justin. xiii. 6.) It appears to have flourished
under the Ptolemies, who pursued their usual policy of raising new cities at the
expense of the ancient ones, or restoring the latter under new names. Thus Hesperides
became Berenice, Teucheira was called Arsinoe, Barca was entirely eclipsed by
its port which was raised into a city under the name of Ptolemais, and Cyrene
began to decay in consequence of the favours conferred upon its port Apollonia.
After these changes, the term Pentapolis, which became the common name of the
country, refers to the five cities of Cyrene, Apollonia, Ptolemais, Arsinoe, and
Berenice. The last king of the Egyptian dynasty, Apion, an illegitimate son of
Ptolemy Physcon (on whose death in B.C. 117, he had obtained the government),
left the country to the Romans by his testament, in the year B.C. 95, according
to Livy, though Appian gives a later date, apparently through a confusion with
the time of its erection into a Roman province. (Liv. Epit. lxx.; Appian. B.C.
i. 111, Mithr. 121; Justin. xxxix. 5; Eutrop. vi. 11; Sext. Ruf. 13.) At first
the Romans granted the cities their freedom, and bestowed upon them the former
royal domain, only exacting a tribute (Cic. de Leg. Agr. ii. 1. 9); but quarrels
soon broke out between the different states; and, after Lucullus had made, by
order of Sulla, a vain attempt, real or affected, to reconcile them (Plut. Lucull.
2; Joseph. Antiq. xiv. 7. § 2), the Romans applied their usual last remedy, and
reduced the country to a province, under the name of Cyrenaica (probably in B.C.
75), which was united with Crete, on the conquest of that island by Q. Metellus
Creticus, B.C. 67. In the division of the provinces under Augustus, the united
province, under the name of Creta-Cyrene, Creta et Cyrene, or Creta simply, was
constituted a senatorial province, under the government of a propraetor, with
the title of proconsul, who had a legatus, and one if not two quaestors. (Orelli,
Inscr. Nos. 3658, 3659; Bockh, Corp. Inscr. Graec. Nos. 2588, 3532, 3548; Gruter,
p. 415, no. 5, p. 471, no. 6; Eckhel, vol. iv. p. 126; Tac. Ann. iii. 38, 70;
Strab. xvii. p. 840; Senec. Controv. iv. 27; Suet. Vesp. 2; Marquardt, Becker's
Rom. Alterth. vol. iii. pt. 1, p. 223.) Under Constantine, Crete and Cyrenaica
were made separate provinces; the latter was called Libya Superior, and was placed
under the government of a praeses. (Bocking, Notit. Dign. vol. i. p. 137; Marquardt,
l. c.) It should be observed that, under the Romans, the E. boundary of the province,
which divided it from Marmarica was formed by an imaginary line drawn southwards
from Axylis, a town somewhat to the W. of the Chersonesus Magna.
The decline of the country in prosperity may be dated chiefly from
the reign of Trajan, when, the Jews, large numbers of whom had settled there under
the Ptolemies (Joseph. Ant. Jud. xiv. 7, c. Apion. ii. 4; Act. Apost. ii. 10),
rose in insurrection, massacred 220,000 Romans and Cyrenaeans, and were put down
with great difficulty and much slaughter. (Dion Cass. lxviii. 32.) The loss of
population during these bloody conflicts, and the increasing weakness of the whole
empire, left the province an easy prey to the Libyan barbarians, whose attacks
were aided by the ravages of locusts, plagues, and earthquakes. The sufferings
of the Pentapolis from these causes at the beginning of the 5th century are pathetically
described by Synesius, the bishop of Ptolemais, in an extant oration, and in various
passages of his letters (Catastasis &c.; Epist. 57, 78, 125; de Regno, p. 2),
and at a later period by Procopius (Aedif. vi. 2). In A.D. 616, the Persian Chosroes
overthrew the remains of the Greek colonies so utterly, as to leave only the gleanings
of the harvest of destruction to the Arab conquerors, who finally overran the
country in A.D. 647. (Gibbon, vol. viii. p. 227, vol. ix. p. 444, foll., ed. Milman.)
For the purposes of descriptive geography, the Cyrenaic coast must
be divided into two parts at the promontory called Boreum (Ras Teyonas), S. of
which, along the E. shore of the Syrtis Major, were numerous small and unimportant
places, whose positions are very difficult to determine (Ptol. iv. 4. § 3; Syrtes).
N. of this promontory lay Hesperides (aft. Berenice: Benghazi), upon the little
stream called Lathon the only river in the country, which took its rise in the
sand-hills called Herculis Arenae and near it the little lake called Triton, or
Lacus Hesperidum, which some of the ancients confounded with that at the bottom
of the Lesser Syrtis. Following the curve of the coast to the NE., we come to
Teucheira (aft. Arsinoe, Taukra), then to Ptolemais (Tolmeita), originally the
port of Barca, but under the Ptolemies the chief of the Five Cities: Barca itself
lay about 12 miles inland: the next important position on the coast is the promontory
and village of Phycus (Ras Sem or Ras-al-Razat), the N.-most headland of the part
of the African coast E. of the Lesser Syrtis; then Apollonia (Marsa Sousa), the
former port of Cyrene which lies inland, about 8 miles from the coast, SE. of
Phycus and SW. of Apollonia. Further to the E. was the port called Naustathmus
(Marsa-al-Halal, or Al Natroun), then the promontory Zephyrium then Darnis (Derna),
Axylis, and the Chersonesus Magna (Ras-at-Tyn), where the coast formed a bay (G.
of Bomba), in which lay the island of Platea (Bomba), the first landing-place
of the colonists from Thera. Another little island off the shore near Pr. Zephyrium
was called Laea or the Island of Aphrodite (Laia e Aphrodites nesos, Ptol. iv.
4. § Al Hiera). Ptolemy (§§ 11-13) mentions a large number of places in the interior,
most of them mere villages, and none apparently of any consequence, except Barca
and Cyrene. Of the hills which run parallel to the coast, those along the E. shore
of the Syrtis Major were called Herculis Arenae (Herakleous Thines), SW. of which
were the Velpi M. (ta Ouelpa ore), and considerably to the E., on the S. frontier,
the Baecolicus M. (to Baikolikon oros: Ptol. l. c. § 8). The oasis of Augila was
reckoned as belonging to Cyrenaica. (Della Cella, Viaggio da Tripoli di Barberia
alle Frontieri Occidentali dell' Egitto, Genoa, 1819; Beechey, Expedition to explore
the N. coast of Africa, from Tripoli E.-ward, &c., London, 1828, 4to.; Pacho,
Relation d'un Voyage dans la Marmarique, la Cyrenaique, &c. Paris, 1827-1829,
4to.; Barth, Wanderungen durch das Punische und Kyrenaische Kustenland, c. 8,
Berlin, 1849: and for the coins, Eckhel, vol. iv. pp. 117, &c.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
KYRINI (Ancient city) LIBYA
Curene or Cyrenae (he Kurene: Eth. and Adj. as those of Cyrenaica:
Ghrennah, very large Ru.), the chief city of Cyrenaica and the most important
Hellenic colony in Africa, was founded in B.C. 631 by Battus and a body of Dorian
colonists from the island of Thera. (The date is variously stated, but the evidence
preponderates greatly in favour of that now given; Clinton, F. H. vol. i. s. a.:
for the details of the enterprise, and of the subsequent history of the house
of Battus, see Dict. of Biog. s. v. Battus, and Grote, Hist. of Greece, vol. iv.
p. 39, seq.) The colonists, sailing to the then almost unknown shores of Libya,
in obedience to the Delphic oracle, took possession first of the island of Platea,
in the Gulf of Bomba, which they seem to have mistaken for the mainland. Hence,
after two years of suffering, and after again consulting the oracle, they removed
to the opposite shore, and resided in the well-wooded district of Aziris for six
years, at the end of which time some of the native Libyans persuaded them to leave
it for a better locality, and conducted them through the region of Irasa, to the
actual site of Cyrene. Though Irasa was deemed so delectable a region that the
Libyan guides were said to have led the Greeks through it in the night lest they
should settle there, the spot at which their journey ended is scarcely inferior
for beauty and fertility to any on the surface of the globe. In the very middle
of that projecting bosom of the African coast (as Grote well calls it), which
has been described under Cyrenaica on the edge of the upper of two of the terraces,
by which the table-land sinks down to the Mediterranean, in a spot backed by the
mountains on the S. and in full view of the sea towards the N., and thus sheltered
from the fiery blasts of the desert, while open to the cool sea breezes, at the
distance of 10 miles. from the shore, and at the height of about 1800 feet, an
inexhaustible spring bursts forth amidst luxuriant vegetation, and pours its waters
down to the Mediterranean through a most beautiful ravine. Over this spring which
they consecrated to Apollo, the great deity of their race (hence Apollonos krene,
Callim. in Apoll. 88), the colonists built their new city, and called it Cyrene
from Cyre the.name of the fountain. At a later period an elegant mythology connected
the fountain with the god, and related how Cyrene, a Thessalian nymph, beloved
of Apollo, was carried by him to Africa, in a chariot drawn by swans. (Muller,
Dorians, Bk. ii. c. 3. § 7.)
The site of Cyrene was in the territory of the Libyans named Asbystae;
and with them the Greek settlers seem from the first to have been on terms of
friendship very similar to those which subsisted between the Carthaginians and
their Libyan neighbours. The Greeks had the immense advantage of commanding the
abundant springs and fertile meadows to which the Libyans were compelled to resort
when the supplies of the less favoured regions further inland began to fail. A
close connection soon grew up between the natives and the Greek settlers; and
not only did the former imitate the customs of the latter (Herod. iv. 170); but
the two races coalesced to a much greater extent than was usual in such cases.
It is very important to remember this fact, that the population of Cyrene had
a very large admixture of Libyan blood by the marriages of the early settlers
with Libyan wives (Herod. iv. 186-189; Grote, vol. iv. p. 53). The remark applies
even to the royal family; and, if we were to believe Herodotus, the very name
of Battus, which was borne by the founder, and by his successors alternately,
with the Greek name Arcesilaus, was Libyan, signifying king; and we have another
example in that of Alazir, king of Barca. For the rest, the Libyans seem to have
formed a body of subject and tributary Perioeci (Herod. iv. 161). They were altogether
excluded from political power, which, in strict conformity with the constitution
of the other states of Spartan origin, was in the hands exclusively of the descendants
from the original settlers, or rather of those of them who had already been among
the ruling class in the mother state of Thera.
The dynasty of the Battiadae lasted during the greater part of two
centuries, from B.C. 630 to somewhere between 460 and 430; and comprised eight
kings bearing the names of Battus and Arcesilaus alternately; and a Delphic oracle
was quoted to Herodotus as having defined both the names and numbers. (Herod.
iv. 163.) Of Battus I., B.C. 630-590, it need only be said that his memory was
held in the highest honour, not only as the founder of the city, but also for
the benefits he conferred upon it during his long reign. He was worshipped as
a hero by his subjects, who showed his grave, apart from those of the succeeding
kings, where the Agora was joined by the road (skurote hodos), which he made for
the procession to the temple of Apollo. (Pind. Pyth. v.; Callim. Hymn. in Apoll.
77; Paus. iii. 14, x. 15; Catull. vii. 6; Diod. Excerpt. de Virt. et Vit. p. 232.)
Nothing of importance is recorded in the reign of his son, Arcesilaus I., about
B.C. 590-574; but that of his successor, Battus II. (about B.C. 574-554), surnamed
the Prosperous, marks the most important period of the monarchy; nothing less,
in fact, than a new colonization. An invitation was issued to all Greeks, without
distinction of race, to come and settle at Cyrene, on the promise of an allotment
of lands. It seems probable that the city of Apollonia, the port of Cyrene, owed
its foundation to this accession of immigrants, who arrived by sea direct, and
not, like the first colonists, by the circuitous land route from the Gulf of Bombay.
(Grote, p. 55.) The lands promised to the new settlers had of course to be taken
from the natives, whose general position also was naturally altered for the worse
by the growing power of the city. The Libyans, therefore, revolted, and transferred
their allegiance to Apries, king of Egypt, who sent an army to their aid; but
the Egyptians were met by the Cyrenaeans in Irasa, and were almost entirely cut
to pieces. This conflict is memorable as the first hostile meeting of Greeks with
Egyptians, and also as the proximate cause of the overthrow of Apries. Under Amasis,
however, a close alliance was formed between Egypt and Cyrene, and the Egyptian
king took his wife Ladice from the house of Battus. (Herod. ii. 180--181.) The
misfortunes of the monarchy began in the reign of Arcesilaus II., the son of Battus
II., about B.C. 554--544, Whose tyranny caused the secession of his brothers,
the foundation of Barca, and the revolt of a large number of the Libyan Perioeci,
in a conflict with whom no less than 7000 hoplites were slain; and the king was
soon afterwards strangled by his brother Learchus. To this loss of prestige, his
successor, Battus III. added the disqualification of lameness. The Cyrenaeans,
under the advice of the Delphic oracle, called in the aid of Demonax, a Mantineian,
who drew up for them a new constitution; by which the encroachments of the royal
house on the people were more than recovered, and the king was reduced to political
insignificance, retaining, however, the landed domain as his private property,
and also his sacerdotal functions. The political power, in which it would seem,
none but, the descendants of the original colonists had any share, was now extended
to the whole Greek population, who were divided by Demonax into three tribes:--
(1.) The Theraeans, to whom were still attached the Libyan Perioeci: (2) Greeks
from Peloponnesus and Crete: (3) Greeks from the other islands of the Aegean:
and a senate was also constituted, of which the king appears to have been president.
(Herod. iv. 161, 165.) In other respects the constitution seems to have resembled
that of Sparta, which was, through Thera, the original metropolis of Cyrene. We
read of Ephors, who punished with atimia litigious people and impostors, and of
a body of 300 armed police, similar to the Hippeis at Sparta (Heracleid. Pont.
4; Hesych. Triakatioi; Eustath. ad Hom. Od. p. 303; Grote, pp. 59, 60; Muller,
Dor. Bk. iii. c. 4. § 5, c. 7 § 1. c. 9. § 13.) After the time of Battus IlI.,
his son Arcesilaus III. and his mother Pheretime attempted to overturn the new
constitution, and to re-establish despotism. Their first efforts led to their
defeat and exile; but Arcesilaus returned at the head of a new body of emigrants,
chiefly from lonia, took Cyrene, and executed cruel vengeance upon his opponents.
Whether from a desire to confirm his position, or simply from dread of the Persian
power, he sent to Memphis to make his submission to Cambyses, and to offer him
an annual tribute, as well as a present; the 500 minae which formed the latter,
were deemed by Cambyses so inadequate, that he flung them contemptuously to his
soldiers. After these things, according to the motive assigned by Herodotus (iv.
163, 164), Arcesilaus became sensible that he had disobeyed the Delphic oracle,
which, in sanctioning his return, had enjoined moderation in the hour of success;
and to avoid the divine wrath, he retired from Cyrene to Barca, which was governed
by his father-in-law, Alazir. His murder there, and the vengeance taken on the
Barcaeans by his mother Pheretime, by the aid of a Persian army, sent by Aryandes,
the satrap of Egypt, are related under Barca. Though the Persians ravaged a great
part of the country, and extended their conquests beyond Barca as far as Hesperides,
and though they were even inclined to attack Cyrene on their way back to Egypt,
they left the city unmolested (Herod. iv. 203, 204). The effect of these events
on the constitution of Cyrene is thus described by Grote (vol. iv. p. 66): The
victory of the third Arcesilaus, and the restoration of the Battiads broke up
the equitable constitution established by Demonax. His triple classification into
tribes must have been completely remodelled, though we do not know how; for the
number of new colonists whom Arcesilaus introduced must have necessitated a fresh
distribution of land, and it is extremely doubtful whether the relation of the
Theraean class of citizens with their Perioeci, as established by Demonax, still
continued to subsist. It is necessary to notice this fact, because the arrangements
of Demonax are spoken of by some authors as if they formed the permanent constitution
of Cyrene; whereas they cannot have outlived the restoration of the Battiads,
nor can they even have been revived after that dynasty was finally expelled, since
the number of new citizens and the large change of property, introduced by Arcesilaus
III., would render them inapplicable to the subsequent city. Meanwhile another
Battus and another Arcesilaus have to intervene before the glass of this worthless
dynasty is run out. Of Battus IV., surnamed the Handsome, nothing needs to be
said; but Arcesilaus IV. has obtained a place, by the merits of the Libyan breed
of horses rather than by his owns in the poetry of Pindar, who, while celebrating
the king's victories in the chariot race (B.C. 460), at the same time expostulates
with him for that tyranny which soon destroyed his dynasty. (Pind. Pyth. iv. v.)
It seems to have been the policy of this prince to destroy the nobles of the state,
and to support himself by a mercenary army. How he came to his end is unknown;
but after his death a republic was established at Cyrene, and his son Battus fled
to Hesperides, where he was murdered, and his head was thrown into the sea; a
significant symbol of the utter extinction of the dynasty. This was probably about
B.C. 450.
Of the condition of the new republic we have very little information.
As to its basis, we are only told that the number of the tribes and phratriae
was increased (Aristot. Polit. vi. 4); and, as to, its working, that the constant
increase of the democratic element led to violent party contests (ibid.), in the
course of which various tyrants obtained power in the state, among whom are named
Ariston and Nicocrates. (Diod. Sic. xiv. 34; Plut. de Virt. Mul.; Polyaen. Strat.
viii. 38.) The Cyrenaeans concluded a treaty with Alexander the Great (Diod. xvii.
49; Curt. iv. 7), after whose death the whole country became a dependency of Egypt,
and subsequently a province of the Roman empire. The favours bestowed on Apollonia
its port, under the Ptolemies, greatly diminished the importance of Cyrene, which
gradually sank under the calamities which it shared with the whole country. Under
the Romans it was a colony, with the surname of Flavia. (Euseb. Chron.; Eckhel,
vol. iv. pp. 127, foll.)
At the height of its prosperity Cyrene possessed an extensive commerce
with Greece and Egypt, especially in silphium: with Carthage, its relations were
always on a footing of great distrust, and its commerce on the W. frontier was
conducted entirely by smuggling. At what period its dominion over the Libyan tribes
was extended so far as to meet that of Carthage at the bottom of the Greater Syrtis
is disputed [Arae Philaenorum]; some referring it to the republican age, others
to the period of the Ptolemies. (Grote, vol. iv. p. 48, holds the latter opinion.)
Cyrene holds a distinguished place in the records of Hellenic intellect.
As early as the time of Herodotus it was celebrated for its physicians (Herod.
iii. 131); it gave its name to a philosophic sect founded by one of its sons,
Aristippus; another, Carneades, was the founder of the Third. or New Academy at
Athens; and it was also the birthplace of the poet Callimachus, who boasted a
descent from the royal house of Battus, as did the eloquent rhetorician Synesius,
who afterwards became bishop of Apollonia.
The ruins of Cyrene, though terribly defaced, are very extensive,
and contain remains of streets, aqueducts, temples, theatres, and tombs, with
inscriptions, fragments of sculpture, and traces of paintings. In the face of
the terrace, on which the city stands, is a vast subterraneous necropolis; and
the road connecting Cyrene with its port, Apollonia, still exists. The remains
do not, however, enable us to make out the topography of the city with sufficient
exactness. We learn from Herodotus (iv. 164) and Diodorus (xix. 79) that the Acropolis
was surrounded with water. The ruins are fully described by Della Cella (pp. 138,
foll.), Pacho (pp. 191, foll.), and Barth (p. 421, foll.).
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LIMIN MENELAOU (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Menelai Portus (Menelaios limen, Herod. iv. 169), a harbour of Marmarica,
situated to the W. of Paraetonium (Strab. i. p. 40, xvii. p. 838), and a day's
voyage from Petras. (Scylax, 107, d.) Here, according to legend, the hero Menelaus
landed (Herod. ii. 119); and it was the place where Agesilaus died in his march
from the Nile to Cyrene, B.C. 361. (Corn. Nep. Ages. 8.) Its position must be
sought on the coast of the Wady Daphneh, near the Ras-al-Milhr. (Pacho, Voyage
dans la Marmaique, p. 47.)
MEGALI LEPRIS (Ancient city) LIBYA
Leptis Magna (he Leptis megale, Leptimagna, Procop. B. V. ii. 21 ;
also Leptis, simply; aft. Neapolis; Leptimagnensis Civitas, Cod. Just. i. 27.
2: Eth. and Adj. Leptitanos, Leptitanus: Lebda, large Ru.), the chief of the three
cities which formed the African Tripolis, in the district between the Syrtes (Regio
Syrtica, aft. Tripolitana), on the N. coast of Africa; the other two being Oea
and Sabrata. Leptis was one of the most ancient Phoenician colonies on this coast,
having been founded by the Sidonians (Sall. Jug. 19, 78); and its site was one
of the most favourable that can be imagined for a city of the first class. It
stood at one of those parts of the coast where the table-land of the Great Desert
falls off to the sea by a succession of mountain ridges, enclosing valleys which
are thus sheltered from those encroachments of sand that cover the shore where
no such protection exists, while they lie open to the breezes of the Mediterranean.
The country, in fact, resembles, on a small scale, the terraces of the Cyrenaic
coast; and its great beauty and fertility have excited the admiration alike of
ancient and modern writers. (Ammian. Marc. xxviii. 6 ; Della Cella ; Beechy; Barth,
&c.) Each of these valleys is watered by its streamlet, generally very insignificant
and even intermittent, but sometimes worthy of being styled a river, as in the
case of the Cinyps and of the smaller stream, further to the west, upon which
Leptis stood. The excellence of the site was much enhanced by the shelter afforded
by the promontory Hermaeum (Ras-al-Ashan), W. of the city, to the roadstead in
its front. The ruins of Leptis are of vast extent, of which a great portion is
buried under the sand which has drifted over them from the sea. From what can
be traced, however, it is clear that these remains contain the ruins of three
different cities.
(1.) The original city, or Old Leptis, still exhibits in its ruins
the characteristics of an ancient Phoenician settlement; and, in its site, its
sea-walls and quays, its harbour, and its defences on the land side, it bears
a striking general resemblance to Carthage. It was built on an elevated tongue
of land, jutting out from the W. bank of the little river, the mouth of which
formed its port, having been artificially enlarged for that purpose. The banks
of the river, as well as the seaward face of the promontory, are lined with walls
of massive masonry, serving as sea-walls as well as quays, and containing some
curious vaulted chambers, which are supposed to have been docks for ships which
were kept (as at Carthage) for a last resource, in case the citadel should be
taken by an enemy. These structures are of a harder stone than the other buildings
of the city; the latter being of a light sandstone, which gave the place a glittering
whiteness to the voyager approaching it from the sea. (Stadiasm. Mar. Mag. p.
453, G., p. 297, H.). On the land side the isthmus was defended by three lines
of massive stone walls, the position of each being admirably adapted to the nature
of the ground; and, in a depression of the ground between the outmost and middle
line, there seems to have been a canal, connecting the harbour in the mouth of
the river with the roadstead W. of the city. Opposite to this tongue of land,
on the E. side of the river, is a much lower, less projecting, and more rounded
promontory, which could not have been left out of the system of external works,
although no part of the city was built upon it. Accordingly we find here, besides
the quays along the river side, and vaults in them, which served for warehouses,
a remarkable building, which seems to have been a fort. Its superstructure is
of brick, and certainly not of Phoenician work; but it probably stood on foundations
coeval with the city. This is the only example of the use of brick in the ruins
of Leptis, with the exception of the walls which surmount the sea-defences already
described. From this eastern, as well as from the western point of land, an artificial
mole was built out, to give additional shelter to the port on either side; but,
through not permitting a free egress to the sand which is washed up on that coast
in vast quantities with every tide, these moles have been the chief cause of the
destruction, first of the port, and afterwards of the city. The former event had
already happened at the date of the Stadiasmus, which describes Leptis as having
no harbour (alimenos). The harbour still existed, however, at the time of the
restoration of the city by Septimius Severus, and small vessels could even ascend
to some distance above the city, as is proved by a quay of Roman work on the W.
bank, at a spot where the river is still deep, though its mouth is now lost in
the sand-hills.
2. The Old City (polis) thus described became gradually, like the
Byrsa of Carthage, the citadel of a much more extensive New City (Neapolis), which
grew up beyond its limits, on the W. bank of the river, where its magnificent
buildings now lie hidden beneath the sand. This New City, as in the case of Carthage
and several other Phoenician cities of like growth, gave its name to the place,
which was hence called Neapolis not, however, as at Carthage, to the disuse of
the old name, Leptis which was never entirely lost, and which became the prevailing
name in the later times of the ancient world, and is the name which the ruins
still retain (Lebda). Under the early emperors both names are found almost indifferently;
but with a slight indication of the preference given to Neapolis and it seems
probable that the name Leptis, with the epithet Magna to distinguish it from Leptis
Parva, prevailed at last for the sake of avoiding any confusion with Neapolis
in Zeugitana. (Strab. xvii. p. 835, Neapolis, hen kai Leptin kalousin: Mela, however,
i. 7. § 5, has Leptis only, with the epithet altera: Pliny, v. 4. s. 4, misled,
as usual, by the abundance of his authorities, makes Leptis and Neapolis different
cities, and he distinguishes this from the other Leptis as Leptis altera, quae
cognominatur magna: Ptolemy, iv. 3. § 13, has Neapolis he kai Leptis megale: Jtin.
Ant. p. 63, and Tab. Peut. Lepti Magna Colonia; Scyl. pp. 111, 112, 113, Gronov.
Nea Polis; Stadiasm. p. 435, Leptis, vulg. Leptes, the coins all have the name
Leptis simply, with the addition, on some of them, of the epithet Colonia Victrix
Julia; but it is very uncertain to which of the two cities of the name these coins
belong; Eckhel, vol. iv. pp. 130, 131; Rasche, s. v.) We learn from Sallust that
the commercial intercourse of Leptis with the native tribes had led to a sharing
of the connubium, and hence to an admixture of the language of the city with the
Libyan dialects (Jug. 78). In fact, Leptis, like the neighbouring Tripoly, which,
with a vastly inferior site, has succeeded to its position, was the great emporium
for the trade with the Garamantes and Phazania and the eastern part of Inner Libya.
But the remains of the New City seem to belong almost entirely to the period of
the Roman Empire, and especially to the reign of Septimius Severus, who restored
and beautified this his native city. (Spart. Sev. 1; Aurel. Vict. Ep. 20.) It
had already before acquired considerable importance under the Romans, whose cause
it espoused in the war with Jugurtha (Sall. Jug. 77 - 79: as to its later condition
see Tac. Hist. iv. 50); and if, as Eckhel inclines to believe, the coins with
the epigraph COL. VIC. IUL. LEP. belong mostly, if not entirely, to Leptis Magna,
it must have been made a colony in the earliest period of the empire. It was still
a flourishing and populous fortified city in the 4th century, when it was greatly
injured by an assault of a Libyan tribe, called the AURUSIANI (Ammian. xxviii.
6); and it never recovered from the blow.
3. Justinian is said to have enclosed a portion of it with a new wall;
but the city itself was already too far buried in the sand to be restored; and,
as far as we can make out, the little that Justinian attempted seems to have amounted
only to the enclosure of a suburb, or old Libyan camp, some distance to the E.
of the river, on the W. bank of which the city itself had stood. (Procop. de Aed.
vi. 4; comp. Barth.) Its ruin was completed during the Arab conquest (Leo, Afr.
p. 435); and, though we find it, in the middle ages, the seat of populous Arab
camps, no attempt has been made to make use of the splendid site, which is now
occupied by the insignificant village of Legatah, and the hamlet of El-Hush, which
consists of only four houses.
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PALIOUROS (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Paliurus (Paliouros, Strab. xvii. p. 838; Stadiasm. § 42; Ptol. iv.
5. § 2; Paliuris, Peut. Tab.; Geog. Rav. iii. 3; Paniuris, Itin. Anton.), a village
of the Marmaridae, near which was a temple to Heracles (Strab. l. c.), a deity
much worshipped in Cyrenaica. (comp. Thrigl, Res Cyren. p. 291.) Ptolemy (iv.
4. § 8) adds that there was a marsh here with bivalve shells (en hei konchulion).
It is identified with the Wady Temmimeh (Pacho, Voyage p, 52; Barth, Wanderungen,
pp. 506, 548), where there is a brackish marsh, corresponding to that of Ptolemy
(l. c.), and remains of ancient wells and buildings at Merabet (Sidi) Hadjar-el-Djemm.
It was off this coast that Cato (Lucan ix.42, where the reading is
Palinurus, with an allusion to the tale of Aeneas) met the flying vessels which
bore Cornelia, together with Sextus,, from the scene of her husband, Pompeius's,
murder.
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PARAETONION (Ancient city) LIBYA
Paraetonium (Paraitonion, Scyl. p. 44; Strab. xvii. p. 799; Pomp.
Mela, i. 8. § 2; Plin. v. 5; Ptol. iv. 5. § 4; Steph.: B.; Itin. Anton.; Hierocles),
a town of Marmarica, which was also called Ammonia. (Ammonia, Strab. l. c.) Its
celebrity was owing to its spacious harbour, extending to 40 stadia (Strab. l.
c.; comp. Diod. i. 31), but which appears to have been difficult to make. (Lucian,
Quomodo historic sit, conscribenda, 62.) Paraetonium was 1300 stadia (Strab. l.
c.; 1550 stadia,. Stadiasm. § 19) from Alexandreia. From this point Alexander,
B.C. 332, set out to visit the oracle of Ammon. (Arrian, Anab. iv. 3. § 3.) When
the world's debate was decided at Actium, Antonius stopped at Paraetonium, where
some Roman troops were stationed under Pinarius for the defence of Aegypt. (Plut.
Anton. 70; Flor. iv. 11.) The name occurs in Latin poetry. (Ovid, Met. ix. 772,
Amores, ii. 13. 7; Lucan iii.295.) Justinian fortified it as a frontier fortress
to protect Aegypt from attacks on the W. (Procop. de Aed. vi. 2.) An imperial
coin of the elder Faustina has been assigned to this place, but on insufficient
grounds. (Eckhel, vol. iv. p. 116.) When the Aoulad Aly were sovereigns over this
district, the site, where there were ancient remains, retained the name of Baretoun;
but after their expulsion by the pasha, of Aegypt, it was called Berek Marsah.
(Pacho, Voyage dans la: Marmarique, p. 28.)
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PTOLEMAIDA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
SYRTIKE (Ancient area) LIBYA
Syrtica Regio (he Surtike, Ptol. iv. 3), a tract on the coast of N.
Africa, between the Syrtis Major and Minor, about 100 miles in length. (Strab.
xvii. p. 834, sq.; Mela, i. 7; Plin. v. 4. s. 4.) After the third century it obtained
the name of the Regio Tripolitana, from the three principal cities, which were
allied together, whence the modern name of Tripoli (Not. Imp. Occid. c. 45; Procop.
de Aed. vi. 3; cf. Solinus, c. 27). Mannert conjectures (x. pt. ii. p. 133) that
the emperor Septimius Severus, who was a native of Leptis, was the founder of
this Provincia Tripolitana, which, according to the Not. Imp. (l. c.), was governed
by its own duke (Dux) (Comp. Amm. Marc. xxviii. 6). The district was attributed
by Ptolemy, Mela, and Pliny to Africa Propria; but in reality it formed a separate
district, which at first belonged to the Cyrenaeans, but was subsequently wrested
from them and annexed to Carthage, and, when the whole kingdom of the latter was
subjected to the Romans, formed a part of the Roman province of Africa. For the
most part the soil was sandy and little capable of cultivation, as it still remains
to the present day (Della Cella, Viaggio, p. 50); yet on the borders of the river
Cinyps and in the neighbourhood of the town of Leptis, there was some rich and
productive land. (Herod. iv. 198; Scylax, p. 47; Strab. xvii. p. 835; Ovid, ex
font. ii. 7. 25.) Ptolemy mentions several mountains in the district, as Mount
Giglius or Gigius (to Gigion oros, iv. 3. § 20), Mount Thizibi (to Thizibi oros,
ib.) Mount Zuchabbari or Chuzabarri (to Zouchabbari e Chouzabarrhi, ib.) and Mount
Vasaluetum or Vasaleton (to Ouasalaiton e Ouasaleton oros, ib. § 18). The more
important promontories were Cephalae (Kephalai akron, Ptol. iv. 3. § 13), near
which also, on the W., the same author mentions another promontory, Trieron (Trieron
or Trieron akron, ib.) and Zeitha (ta Zeitha, ib. § 12). The principal rivers
were the Cinyps or Cinyphus (Ptol. ib. § 20), in the eastern part of the district,
and the Triton, which formed its western boundary, and by which the three lakes
called Tritonitis, Pallas, and Libya were supplied (ib. § 19). Besides these waters
there were extensive salt lakes and marshes along the coast (Strab. l. c.; Tab.
Peut. tab. vii.) The lotus is mentioned among the scanty products of this unfertile
land (Plin. xxiv. 1. s. 1), and a peculiar kind of precious stones, called after
the country Syrtides gemmae, was found on the coast (Id. xxxvii. 10. § 67). The
tribes that inhabited the country besides the Nasamones, Psytti, and Macae, who
in the earlier times at least spread themselves over this district, were the Lotophagi
[Vol. II. p. 205], who dwelt about Syrtis Minor, and the Gindanes [Vol. I. p.
1002], who were situated to the W. of the former. Ptolemy, however, in place of
these more ancient tribes, mentions others that are heard of nowhere else, as
the Nigitimi, Samamycii, Nycpii, Nygbeni, Elaeones, Damnesii, &c. (iv. 3. § §
23-27). But Egyptian and Phoenician colonists had been mixed at a very early period
with these aboriginal Libyan tribes, whom the Greeks found there when they settled
upon the coast, and with whom, probably, they had. for some time previously had
connections. The most important towns of the Regio Syrtica were the three from
which it subsequently derived its name of Tripolitana, that is, Leptis Magna,
Oea, and Sabrata; besides which we find Tacape and other places mentioned by Ptolemy.
Opposite to the coast lay the islands of Meninx and Cercina.
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TAFCHIRA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Tauchira or Teuchira (Taucheira, Herod. iv. 171, et alii; Teucheira,
Hierocl. p. 732; Plin. v. 5. s. 5, &c.), a town on the coast of Cyrenaica, founded
by Cyrene. It lay 200 stadia W. of Ptolemais. Under the Ptolemies it obtained
the name of Arsinoe. (Strab. xvii. p. 836; Mela, i. 8; Plin. l. c.) At a later
period it became a Roman colony (Tab. Peut.), and was fortified by Justinian.
(Procop. de Aed. vi. 3.) Tauchira was particularly noted for the worship of Cybele,
in honour of whom an annual festival was celebrated. (Synes. Ep. 3.) It is the
same town erroneously written Taricha by Diodorus (xviii. 20). It is still called
Tochira. (Cf. Della Cella, Viagg. p. 198; Pacho, Voyage, p. 184.)
THAPSOS (Ancient city) LIBYA
Thapsus (Thapsos, Ptol. iv. 3. § 10), a maritime city of Byzacium,
in Africa Propria. It lay on a salt lake, which, according to Shaw (Trav. p. 99),
still exists, and on a point of land 80 stadia distant from the opposite island
of Lopadussa. Thapsus was strongly fortified and celebrated for Caesar's victory
over the Pompeians, B.C. 46. (Hirt. B. Af. 28, seq.) Shaw (l. c.) identifies it
with the present Demass, where its ruins are still visible. (Cf. Strabo, xvii,
pp. 831, 834; Liv. xxxiii. 48; Plin. v. 4. s. 3, &c.)
TRIPOLI (Ancient city) LIBYA
Oea (Pomp. Mela, i. 7. § 5; Oeensis civitas, Plin. v. 4; Tac. Hist.
iv. 50; Solin. 27; Amm. Marc. xxviii. 6; Eoa, Ptol. iv. 3. § 12), a town in the
district of the Syrtes, which, with Leptis Magna, and Sabrata, formed the African
Tripolis. Although there had probably been an old Phoenician factory here, yet,
from the silence of Scylax and Strabo, the foundation of the Roman colony ( Oeea
colonia, Itin. Anton.) must be assigned to the middle of the first century after
Christ. It flourished under the Romans until the fourth century, when it was greatly
injured by the Libyan Ausuriani. (Amm. Marc. l. c.) At the Saracen invasion it
would seem that a new town sprung up on the ruins of Oea, which assumed the Roman
name of the district--the modern Tripoli; Trablis, the Moorish name of the town,
is merely the same word articulated through the medium of Arab pronunciation.
At Tripoli there is a very perfect marble triumphal arch dedicated to M. Aurelius
Antoninus and L. Aurelius Verus, which will be found beautifully figured in Captain
Lyons Travels in N. Africa, p. 18. Many other Roman remains have been found here,
especially glass urns, some of which have been sent to England.
For some time it was thought that a coin of Antoninus, with the epigraph
COL. AVG. OCE., was to be referred to this town. (Eckhel, vol. iv. p. 131.) Its
right to claim this is now contested. (Duchalais, Restitution a Olbasa de Pisidie,
a Jerusalem et aux Contrees Occ. de la Haute Asie de trois Moonnaies Coloniales
attributes a Ocea, Revue Numismatique, 1849, pp. 97-103; Beechey, Exped. to the
Coast of Africa, pp. 24-32; Barth, Wanderungen, pp. 294, 295, 391.)
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VARKA (Ancient city) LIBYA
Barce (Barke, he polis Barkeon, Scyl., Eth. Barkaios, Barcaeus; also
in the form Barkaia, Eth. Barkaiates, Steph. B.). An inland city of Cyrenaica,
founded by a body of seceders from Cyrene, under the Battiadae, Perseus, Zacyn-thus,
Aristomedon, and Lycus, who were driven, by the treatment they received from their
brother Arcesilaus II., king of Cyrene, to renounce their allegiance, and to establish
this new city (about B.C. 554). At the same time they induced the Libyans of the
interior (tous Libuas) to join in their revolt, and from this cause, as well as
from being founded in the midst of the Libyans, the city had from the first a
Greco-Libyan character, which it always retained. (Herod. iv. 160.) An indication
of this Libyan element seems to be furnished by the name of the king Alazir (Herod.
iv. 164); and it is an interesting fact that nearly the same name, Aladdeir, occurs
in an ancient genealogical table found at Cyrene. (Bockh, Corp. Inscr. No. 5147,
vol. iii. p. 523.)
Arcesilaus II. attempted to chastise his revolted Libyan subjects.
They fled for refuge to the kindred tribes in the deserts on the east, towards
Egypt, and, as Arcesilaus pursued them, they turned upon him and utterly defeated
him, killing 7000 of his soldiers: soon after which he was strangled by his own
brother Learchus. The intestine troubles of Cyrene now gave the Barcaeans an opportunity
of extending their power over the whole of the W. part of Cyrenaica, including
the district on the coast (as far as Hesperides), where we find the important
port of Teuchira (aft. Arsinoe), belonging to them. If we are to trust traditions
preserved by Servius (ad Virg. Aen. iv. 42), they carried their arms on land far
W. over the region of the Syrtes towards Carthage, and acquired such a maritime
power as to defeat the Phoenicians in a naval battle. The terror inspired by the
Persian conquest of Egypt-induced the princes of Barca, as well as those of Cyrene,
to send presents to Cambyses, and to promise an annual tribute; and in the subsequent
constitution of the empire, they were reckoned as belonging to the satrapy of
Egypt. (Herod. iii. 13, 91.) But meanwhile the rising power of Barca had received
a disastrous overthrow. In the conflicts of faction at Cyrene, Arcesilaus III.
had fled to his father-in-law, Alazir, king of Barca; but certain exiles from
Cyrene, uniting with a party of the Barcaeans, attacked both kings in the marketplace,
and killed them. Upon this, Pheretima, the mother of Arcesilaus, one of those
incarnations of female revenge whom history occasionally exhibits, applied for
aid to Aryandes, who had been appointed satrap of Egypt by Cambyses, and retained
the office under Dareius. Herodotus was doubtless right in supposing that Aryandes
welcomed the opportunity which seemed to present itself, for effecting the conquest
of Libya. He collected a powerful army and fleet; but, before commencing hostilities
he sent a herald to Barca, demanding to know who had slain Arcesilaus. The Barcaeans
collectively took the act upon themselves, for that they had suffered many evils
at his hands. The desired pretext being thus gained, Aryandes despatched the expedition.
(Herod. iv. 164.) After a fruitless siege of nine months, during which the Barcaeans
displayed skill equal to their courage, they were outwitted by a perfidious stratagem;
the Persians obtained possession of the city, and gave over the inhabitants to
the brutal revenge of Pheretima. Those of the citizens who were supposed to have
had most share in her son's death she impaled all round the circuit of the walls,
on which she fixed as bosses the breasts of their wives. The members of the family
of the Baltiadae, and those who were clearly guiltless of the murder, were suffered
to remain in the city. The rest of the inhabitants were led into captivity by
the Persians into Egypt, and were afterwards sent to Dareius, who settled them
in a village of Bactria, which was still called Barca in the time of Herodotus
(iv. 200-204). These events occurred about B.C. 510.
The tragic history of Barca would be incomplete without a mention
of the fate of Pheretima. Returning with the Persian army to Egypt, she died there
of a loathsome disease (zosa gar euleon echezese), for thus, adds the good old
chronicler, do men provoke the jealousy of the gods by the excessive indulgence
of revenge (iv. 205) : to which the modern historian adds another reflection,
curiously illustrative of the different points of view from which the same event
may be contemplated:-It will be recollected that in the veins of this savage woman
the Libyan blood was intermixed with the Grecian. Political enmity in Greece Proper
kills, but seldom, if ever, mutilates, or sheds the blood of women. (Grote, History
of Greece, vol. iv. p. 66.)
We hear little more of Barca, till its political extinction was completed,
under the Ptolemies, by the removal of the great body of its inhabitants to the
new city of Ptolemais erected on the site of the former port of Barca. Indeed,
the new city would seem to have received the name of the old one; for after this
period the geographers speak of Barca and Ptolemais as identical. (Strab. xvii.
p. 837; Plin. v. 5; Steph. B.) Ptolemy, however, distinguishes them properly,
placing Barca among the inland cities (iv. 4. § 11); a proof that, however decayed,
the city still existed in the 2nd century of our era. In fact, it long survived
its more powerful rival, Cyrene. Under the later empire it was an episcopal see,
and under the Arabs it seems (though some dispute this) to have risen to renewed
importance, on account of its position on the route from Egypt to the western
provinces of North Africa. (Edrisi, iii. 3; Barth, Wanderungen, &c. p. 405.) Meanwhile
its name has survived to the present day in that of the district of which it was
the capital, the province of Barca, in the regency of Tripoli; and it was transferred,
under the Romans, to the turbulent Libyan people, who lived as nomads in that
district. (Barcaei: comp. Polyaen. vii. 28; Aen. Poliorc. 37.) The Barcaeans were
celebrated for their race of horses; and a Greek writer repeats a traditionary
boast that they had learnt the breeding of horses from Poseidon, and the use of
the chariot from Athena. (Steph. B. s. v.) These were the horses which gained
the last Arcesilaus of Cyrene his place in the poetry of Pindar.
The position of Barca is accurately described by Scylax (pp. 45, 46,
Hudson), who places its harbour (limen ho kata Barken) 500 stadia from Cyrene,
and 620 from Hesperides, and the city itself 100 stadia from the sea, that is,
by the most direct route, up a ravine, for the road is much longer. It stood on
the summit of the terraces which overlook the W. coast of the Greater Syrtis,
in a plain which, though surrounded by the sands of the desert table-land (Desert
of Barca), is well watered, and beautifully fertile. The plain is called El-Merjeh,
and the same name is often given to the ruins which mark the site of Barca, but
the Arabs call them El-Medinah. These ruins are very inconsiderable, which is
at once accounted for by the recorded fact that the city was built of brick (Steph.
B.), and, in all probability, unburnt brick. (Barth, p. 405.) The few ruins which
remain are supposed by Barth to belong to the Arab city, with the exception of
those of the cisterns, on which this, like the other great cities of Africa, was
entirely built, and of which three still remain. Eastward of the valley in which
the city stands the route to Cyrene lies across the desert, and through a narrow
defile, the difficulty of which may have been one cause of the ease with which
the power of Barca appears to have been established. (Beechey, De la Cella, Pacho,
Barth.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited June 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
ABROTONON (Ancient city) LIBYA
(Abrotonon). An African coasttown lying between the Syrtes. It was founded by the Phoenicians, and subsequently became a Roman colony. It was also called Neapolis; and with Oea and Leptis Magna formed the so-called African Tripolis.
Another name for Abrotonum.
AMMONIA (Ancient country) LIBYA
(Ammonioi). A people of Africa, occupying what is now the Oasis of Siwah. According to Herodotus, the Ammonians were a colony of Egyptians and Ethiopians, speaking a language composed of words taken from both those nations.
KYRINAIKI (Ancient country) LIBYA
A country of Africa, east of the Syrtis Minor and west of Marmarica.
It corresponds with the modern Barca. Cyrenaica was considered by the Greeks as
a sort of terrestrial paradise. This was partly owing to the force of contrast,
as all the rest of the African coast along Coins of Cyrene, bearing the sacred
Silphium Plant. the Mediterranean, from Carthage to the Nile, was a barren, sandy
waste, and partly to the actual fertility of Cyrenaica itself. It was extremely
well watered, and the inhabitants, according to Herodotus, employed eight months
in collecting the productions of the land; the maritime places first yielded their
fruits, then the second region, which they called the hills, and lastly those
of the highest part inland. One of the chief natural productions of Cyrenaica
was an herb called silphium, a kind of laserpitium or assafoetida. It was fattening
for cattle, rendering their flesh also tender, and was a useful aperient for man.
From its juice, too, when kneaded with clay, a powerful antiseptic was obtained.
The silphium formed a great article of trade, and at Rome the composition above
mentioned sold for its weight in silver. It is for this reason that the silphium
appeared always on the medals of Cyrene. Its culture was neglected, however, when
the Romans became masters of the country, and pasturage was more attended to.
Cyrenaica was called Pentapolis from its having five cities of note in it--Cyrene,
Arsinoe, Apollonia, Ptolemais, Berenice, and Teuchira. All of these exist at the
present day under the form of towns or villages.
This text is cited Sep 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
KYRINI (Ancient city) LIBYA
An important Greek city in the north of Africa, lying between
Alexandria and Carthage. It was founded by Battus (B.C. 631), who led a colony
from the island of Thera, and he and his descendants ruled over the city for eight
generations. It stood eighty stadia (eight geographical miles) from the coast,
on the edge of the upper of two terraces of tableland, at the height of 1800 feet
above the sea, in one of the finest situations in the world. At a later time Cyrene
became subject to the Egyptian Ptolemies, and was eventually formed, with the
island of Crete, into a Roman province. The ruins of the city of Cyrene are very
extensive. It was the birthplace of Carneades, Callimachus, Eratosthenes, and
Aristippus. The territory of Cyrene, called Cyrenaica, included also the Greek
cities of Barca, Teuchira, Hesperides, and Apollonia, the port of Cyrene. Under
the Ptolemies, Hesperides became Berenice, Teuchira was called Arsinoe, and Barca
was eclipsed by its port, which became a city called Ptolemais.
MEGALI LEPRIS (Ancient city) LIBYA
Leptis Magna or Neapolis, a city on the coast of North Africa, between the Syrtes, east of Abrotonum, was a Phoenician colony, with a flourishing commerce, though it possessed no harbour. With Abrotonum and Oea it formed the African Tripolis. It was the birthplace of the emperor Septimius Severus.
SYRTIKE (Ancient area) LIBYA
Now the western part of Tripoli; the special name of that part
of the northern coast of Africa which lay between the two Syrtes, from the river
Triton, at the bottom of the Syrtis Minor, on the west, to the Philaenorum Arae,
at the bottom of the Syrtis Maior, on the east. It was for the most part a very
narrow strip of sand, interspersed with salt marshes, between the sea and a range
of mountains forming the edge of the Great Desert (Sahara), with only here and
there a few spots capable of cultivation, especially about the river Cinyps. It
was peopled by Libyan tribes. Under the Romans it formed a part of the province
of Africa. It was often called Tripolitana, from its three chief cities, Abrotonum,
Oea, and Leptis Magna; and this became its usual name under the Later Empire,
and has been handed down to our own time in the modern name of the regency of
Tripoli.
This text is cited Sep 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
TAFCHIRA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
or Teuchira (Taucheira, Teucheira). A colony of Cyrene, on the northwestern coast of Cyrenaica, in Northern Africa. Under the Ptolemies it was called Arsinoe. It was a chief seat of the worship of Cybele, who had here a great temple and an annual festival.
THAPSOS (Ancient city) LIBYA
A city on the eastern coast of Byzacena, in Africa Propria. Here Caesar finally defeated the army of Pompey and ended the Civil War.
TRIPOLI (Ancient city) LIBYA
The district on the northern coast of Africa between the two Syrtes, comprising the three cities of Sabrata (or Abrotonum), Oea, and Leptis Magna, and also called Tripolitana Regio.
VARKA (Ancient city) LIBYA
Barca (Barke). Now Merjeh. The second city of Cyrenaica, in Northern Africa, 100 stadia from the sea. It appears to have been at first a settlement of a Libyan tribe, the Barraci, but about B.C. 560 was colonized by the Greek seceders from Cyrene, and became so powerful as to make the western part of Cyrenaica virtually independent of the mother city. In B.C. 510 it was taken by the Persians, who removed most of its inhabitants to Bactria; and under the Ptolemies its ruin was completed by the erection of its port into a new city, which was named Ptolemais.
KYRINI (Ancient city) LIBYA
Greek colony in Cyrenaica,
a province of northeastern Libya,
along the African shores of the Mediterranean.
The city of Cyrene was founded by Mynians, descendants of the Argonauts
who had migrated to Lemnos
and then to Sparta, and,
from there, had followed Theras to the island of Thera.
Obeying an oracle from the Pythoness of Delphi,
they moved from Thera to Lybia
under the leadership of Battus, a descendant of the Argonaut Euphemus.
Bernard Suzanne (page last updated 1998), ed.
This extract is cited July 2003 from the Plato and his dialogues URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
EVESPERIDES (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
Total results on 2/5/2001: 11
LIBYA (Country) NORTH AFRICA
Total results on 3/4/2001: 430 for Libya.
ABROTONON (Ancient city) LIBYA
A titular see in Tripolitana.
Sabrata was a Phoenician
town on the northern coast of Africa, between the two Syrta. With Oca and Leptis
Magna it caused the Greek name Tripolis to be given to the region. Its Phoenician
name, which occurs on coins and in an inscription at Thevesta, was hellenized
Abrotomon, though Pliny (V, 4) makes these two separate towns. Sabrata
became a Roman colony; Justinian fortified the town and built there a beautiful
church. In the Middle Ages it continued to be an important market.
The Arab writers call it Sabrat en-Nefousa, from a powerful tribe,
the Nefousa, formerly Christian. Sabrata is now represented by Zouagha, a small
town called by Europeans Tripoli Vecchia, in the vilayet of Tripoli,
fifty miles west of the town of Tripoli.
Its ruins lie a little north of the village; they consist of crumbled ramparts,
an amphitheatre, and landing-stage.
Four of its bishops are known: Pompey in 233; Nados, present at the
Conference of Carthage, 411;
Vincent, exiled by Genseric about 450; Leo, exiled by Huneric after the Conference
of Carthage, 484.
S. Petrides, ed.
Transcribed by: Ed Sayre
This extract is cited June 2003 from The Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent online edition URL below.
EVESPERIDES (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
MEGALI LEPRIS (Ancient city) LIBYA
APOLLONIA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
On the coast about 184 km NE of Benghazi (Euesperides and later Berenice).
The town served from its foundation as the port for Cyrene, whose history it shared
until achieving autonomy during Roman times, if not before, when it was recognized
as one of the five cities of the Libyan Pentapolis. As the fortunes of both Cyrene
and Ptolemais waned in later times, Apollonia grew in prestige and power, until
it was created the provincial capital in the 6th c. A.D. During Christian times
it was more commonly called Sozusa, from which it developed its modern Arab name
of Marsa Susa. Urban life ceased with the Arab invasion of A.D. 643.
Excavations fall into two phases: those of the 1920s and 1930s and
those following the Second World War. The first phase saw the clearance and restoration
of the large E basilica (6th c.), excavation of tombs, recovery of statuary, and
the documenting of some topographical features, such as the aqueduct and an extra-mural
triconch church. The latter monument, notable for traces of a triple apse at its
E end, has not been excavated.
The second phase led to the investigations of remaining important
features, underwater and land. The S edge of the walled town ran ca. 1,000 m parallel
to the coast before turning N to meet the line of the sea. While its width today
nowhere exceeds 200 m, the original town must have included a third more territory
than it does at present since its outer and inner harbor facilities, with their
moles, warehouses, docks, shipsheds, and slipways, have almost completely disappeared
beneath the sea.
The principal buildings found inside the town walls are Roman or later.
However, earlier inhabitation is documented by tombs in its SW corner and on the
acropolis, in which pottery and coins of the 5th through the 3d c. have been found.
Furthermore, pottery from a settlement of the first half of the 6th c. B.C. has
been brought to light in the lowest occupation stratum W of the acropolis in the
vicinity of the eastern basilica. In all probability Apollonia was used as the
main port for Cyrene as early as the second generation of settlers following the
foundation of the metropolis ca. 631 B.C.
The side of the town facing seaward was never walled. The defensive
system was constructed in the Hellenistic period (ca. 250 B.C.) and then extensively
overhauled and repaired in early Byzantine times. It consisted of three elements:
towers, gates, and curtain wall. Nineteen towers survive on land, two round and
the remainder rectangular. Only one major gateway survives at the W end of the
city, while traces of smaller posterns have been found by each tower along the
W and S perimeter. The original curtain consisted throughout of stone headers
and stretchers. Each tower was connected by a short line of straight curtain to
form an indented trace.
Within its walls Apollonia was divided lengthwise by a broad avenue,
which ran from the W end of town to the acropolis hill occupying the E quarter.
Here the rise in ground level halted the further progress of the decumanus, which
was crossed at right angles by narrow cardines at intervals of every 35 m, at
least in the urban center where traces of two such streets have been located.
The first monument to be encountered in the W sector is a Byzantine
mortuary chapel, built against an exterior angle of the city wall. This structure,
which has four central pillars supporting a dome, housed the remains of a saint
or bishop in a Roman sarcophagus, recut in Byzantine times. Just inside the line
of the city wall is the restored western basilica, whose apse occupies a former
rectangular wall tower. Its nave and side aisles are divided by columns of varying
types, sizes, and materials. A complex of rooms E of its narthex contained a small
baptistery with sunken baptismal tank. Both the church and baptistery date to
the 6th c. Nearby, along the inner face of the city wall, are three excavated
rooms of Byzantine date. Their design, as well as their proximity to the main
W gate and its associated small oval piazza, suggest that their function was largely
governmental and bureaucratic.
The 6th c. central basilica lies ca. 200 m E of the west gate. Its
restored interior was originally entered from the W through a small atrium, which
in turn led into a long narrow narthex with apses at either end. Local limestone
provided the material for some of its columns as well as sections of its paving.
Since the rest of its fittings were of marble, evidently pre-cut materials were
shipped to Apollonia where a structure had to be improvised for their accommodation.
A substantial Roman bath, which, prior to its conversion around A.D. 100, served
as a Late Hellenistic palazzo signorile, is located E of the church. Immediately
N are remains of the late baths, built to replace the Roman baths after the earthquake
of A.D. 365. Their construction indicates that they were never completed.
The Palace of the Byzantine Dux (ca. A.D. 500) was erected on the
hillside SE of the Roman baths. This major complex was divided into two sections,
with its W half containing the ceremonial chambers of the governor when Apollonia
was the provincial capital. These include an audience hail, guardroom, armory,
atrium, and chapel. The E wing is less monumental and appears largely residential
in nature. An early Roman villa and small houses belonging to the Byzantine period
are located ca. 100 m to the NE of the palace. Separated from the Byzantine housing
quarter is the restored E basilica (5th or 6th c.), built on top of an unidentified
Hellenistic building. The nave of this imposing monument is divided by large monolithic
columns of cipollino marble. A baptistery of triconch plan is attached to its
NE corner.
As ground rises toward the acropolis hill a rocky outcropping marks
the site of a heroon dedicated to the nymph (?) Callicrateia. Further NE are a
series of chambers, probably functioning as warehouses, hewn out of the rock ledge
facing the sea. Remains of vaulted cisterns and Byzantine houses are located close
by. The top of the acropolis hill was left open, with a series of rooms of late
date grouped around. No sure identification of this area's use has been made.
The Hellenistic theater, whose scene building was reconstructed during
the reign of Domitian, is located just outside the city walls E of the acropolis.
A small section of slipways is visible about half a kilometer off shore from the
center of the city. These once belonged to the inner harbor and today rise above
the sea in the form of an island. A second island slightly to the E preserves
traces of the base of an ancient pharos. About a kilometer W of the city are foundations
of a Hellenistic temple, as yet unidentified.
D. White, 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.
EVESPERIDES (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
The settlement lay on a low hill, now partly occupied by a cemetery,
between salt marshes that were then lagoons linked with the sea by the present
inner harbor of Benghazi. Probably settled from Cyrene early in the 6th c. B.C.,
it was replaced ca. 247 by a new city, on the coast a little to the SW, named
Berenice in honor of the wife of Ptolemy III. The change of location is almost
certainly due to the silting-up of the lagoons. Berenice ceased to exist by the
11th c. A.D., and Benghazi (named after a holy man, Ibn-Ghazi) did not arise until
the 15th c. During the period 1835-1911, when Benghazi was expanding under Turkish
rule, many stones from Euesperides were removed. In 1946 Hellenic potsherds were
found beside the salt marshes, and in 1950-51 a collection of surface sherds was
made. The ground plan of an ancient city, with streets, insulae, and houses, extending
between the Muslim cemetery on the top of the hill and the salt marshes, was revealed
by air photography, which also shows parts of the city walls, enclosing an area
ca. 750 x 350 m. The quantities of Hellenic pottery excavated in 1969 confirmed
the rediscovery of Euesperides. Stratified levels were found going back from the
Early Hellenistic period to the 6th c. B.C. Most of the houses were of mudbrick
on stone foundations.
Occasional finds of mosaic floors, etc., attested the position of
Berenice under Benghazi and its cemeteries. Excavations (1971-74) in the old Turkish
cemetery of Sidi Khrebiesh revealed remains of buildings and pottery from Hellenistic
until Byzantine times and part of a late town wall. A stele of the 1st c. B.C.
found in 1972-73 refers to civil disturbance and attacks by pirates. Inscriptions
of the 1st c. A.D., found previously, mention the separate magistrates of the
Jewish community and a synagogue.
Near Benghazi are several sites of legendary interest. The Hesperides
with their golden apples were said to have occupied a luxuriant sunken garden
for which several natural hollows in the plain about 10 km E of Benghazi provide
a plausible setting. One of them has an underground pool, which possibly accounts
for the location of the river Lethe there. Lake Tritonis is thought to be Ain
es-Selmani, and it has been suggested that the hill of Euesperides itself between
the lagoons might represent the island mentioned by Strabo (17.3.20).
O. Brogan, 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.
KYRINI (Ancient city) LIBYA
A city NE of Benghazi, ca. 176 km, and 8 km inland on the crest of
the second stage of the Gebel Ahkdar, an extended limestone plateau, 144 km long
and here nearly 622 m above sea level. In ancient times it was connected to its
port, Apollonia, 19 km away, by a road still visible in stretches along either
side of the modern highway.
Attempts to uncover traces of trading contacts between Minoan Crete
and eastern Libya have not yet met with success. While the historical annals of
dynastic Egypt occasionally refer to the hostile activities of Libyan tribesmen,
the real history of the region commences with the Greek colonization of Cyrene
ca. 631 B.C. Herodotos (4.150f) says that Delphi directed Thera to send a small
band of settlers under the leadership of Battos to found a city in Libya. After
six years of living by the sea not far from the modern town of Derna (Darnis),
Battos moved his people to Cyrene where they were assured of a constant supply
of water and the protection of the high ground. Here the colony flourished. After
a second wave of immigration from many parts of Greece organized by the grandson
of the original oecist (Battos II, ca. 583-60 B.C.), the primacy of Cyrene in
eastern Libya was established and a succession of Battiad kings assured. Political
unrest, which had broken out with depressing frequency in the intervening period,
finally put an end to the monarchy ca. 440 B.C. and a republican form of government
prevailed for the next century.
After the death of Alexander the Great the entire region of Cyrenaica
was annexed by Ptolemy I, who visited Cyrene in 322 B.C. Ptolemy's grandson Magas
succeeded the first governor Ophellas, in 300, first as governor and then after
283 as "king," a title he retained until his death in 250. The region
was thereupon reunited with Egypt. Under Ptolemaic rule the Cyrenaican cities,
including Cyrene, grew in size and were equipped with permanent defensive wall
systems. The old port of Barca was laid out on a magnificent scale and took the
regal name of Ptolemais. Euesperides (Beaghazi) was renamed Berenice, and Taucheira
(Tocra) became Arsinoe. It was perhaps during this time that Apollonia, the port
of Cyrene, first gained its independence and Cyrenaica came to be recognized as
the Pentapolis or land of the five cities. In 96 B.C. the kingdom of Cyrenaica
was willed by Ptolemy Apion to Rome.
With the arrival of the quaestor Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus in
74 B.C., Cyrenaica began its development as a Roman province. Cyrene, like the
other cities of the region, enjoyed nearly a century and a half of peace under
Roman imperial rule until the outbreak of the Jewish revolt in A.D. 115. At that
time, a certain Lucas or Andreas seized control of the city. Bands of his men
systematically destroyed most of its public buildings. The Roman general Marcus
Turbo was dispatched to suppress the rebellion, but before this could be accomplished
some 20,000 persons were said to have been killed. Property losses were also severe.
Hadrian materially aided the recovery of Cyrene by restoring many
of its ruined buildings and by bringing in new settlers to replenish its depleted
population. In 134 it was given the title of metropolis in recognition of its
importance within the province. From the time of Antoninus Pius down to Septimius
Severus, the city appears to have made a nearly full recovery from the misfortunes
of 115.
Decline set in during the troubled years of the 3d c. when Cyrene
suffered from the attack of hostile tribesmen and a crippling earthquake in 262.
Diocletian dissolved the old Province of Crete and Cyrenaica in 297 and reorganized
eastern Libya into two smaller regions.
By the end of the 4th c. the most serious problem to face Cyrene's
fast dwindling population was invasion from the desert. To meet this crisis the
Cyreneans abandoned the line of their original Hellenistic defensive walls and
drew back to improvise a new circuit. The reconquest of Africa by Justinian after
550 and his general policy of fortifying the countryside must have brought some
indirect relief at least to the hard-pressed city. But the Arab invaders led by
Amr ibn el-Aasi apparently encountered no armed resistance when they seized Cyrene
along with the other cities of the Pentapolis in 643.
The excavated, visible remains of Cyrene today belong mainly to the
Roman period and are either new constructions or remodelings of earlier buildings.
Their urban framework, however, is essentially Hellenistic, since the laying-out
of the acropolis, the agora, the lower valley street, and the Sanctuary of Apollo
had all been completed by Ptolemaic times. But the initial development of each
of these areas was begun in the early archaic period. And conversely most of the
monuments of the E third of the city, including the forum, the city center, and
the cathedral area, all belong from their inception to later times. With the exception
of the Zeus Temple the pre-Roman appearance of this part of Cyrene has yet to
be determined.
The Hellenistic defenses, which survive in only intermittent stretches,
enclose two lofty hills (max. elevation 620 m above sea level) separated by a
valley dropping away to the NW. The over-all NW-SE length of the walled city is
just under 1,600 m, while its maximum NE-SW width is approximately 1,100 m. The
SW hill (acropolis, agora, and forum) is totally free of modern buildings. However,
the NE hill is today covered by the modern town of Shahat, stands of reforested
evergreens, and cultivated ploughland. As a consequence, its ancient features
are still largely unexcavated and poorly known.
The ancient town was divided along its long NW-SE axis by two main
roads. The valley road followed the descent of the valley between the two hills
to the Sanctuary of Apollo. The road of Battos connected the acropolis with the
Roman forum. A third major artery crossed the main axis of the city at right angles
immediately E of the forum area. Gates in the city ramparts linked all three roads
with the overland routes leading to nearby Apollonia, Balagrae, Darnis, and Lasamices
(Slonta), the closest of Cyrene's ancient neighbors.
The acropolis, occupying the W end of the SW hill, has been only fractionally
excavated and is still virtually terra incognita. While it seems logical to suppose
the original band of Thereans settled on its heights, none of its exposed remains
are earlier than the Hellenistic period.
South of the city proper, at a point across the steep wadi Bel Gadir
opposite the agora, is the extra-mural Sanctuary of Demeter. The lowest levels
of this precinct, which is still in the process of excavation, have already yielded
pottery dating as early as 600 B.C. to document the activities of the early settlers
in this area. At least two sets of walls, one dating early in the 6th c. B.C.
and the other toward the century's end, comprise the earliest traces of a built
sanctuary complex. These were replaced in the later 3d-2d c. by a monumental walled
precinct, rising over some five terraced levels, which remained in active use
until destroyed by earthquake apparently in A.D. 262.
A second extra-mural discovery of marble and bronze sculptures and
architectural fragments datable to the second and third quarters of the 6th c.
was recently made outside the walls at the E end of the city. The material, which
represents favissa remains of an early sanctuary, may have been buried at this
spot after the Persians destroyed the shrine in 515-514 B.C. The massive Temple
of Zeus, which was erected late in the 6th c. as its replacement perhaps, is located
about 200 m inside the walls of the NE corner of the city. Its octostyle peripteral
colonnade and interior (presently undergoing restoration) were extensively repaired
during the reign either of Augustus or of Tiberius. Its colonnade was overturned
during the Jewish rebellion. During the ensuing hundred years its cella and porches
were put back into use. These were totally wrecked by the earthquake of 365, and
the temple was desecrated by Christian zealots.
The agora was cleared before the Second World War to bring to light
its Hellenistic-Roman phase of development. Additional work has been conducted
in this area since 1957 to expose its earlier phases. From this it has become
apparent that the E edge of the agora was used from about 625 B.C. as a sacred
area as well perhaps as the burial ground of Battos I. Constantly transformed
over the years, this area eventually was occupied by a stoa of the Doric order
and a handsome tetrastyle, prostyle Corinthian temple (early 3d c. A.D.).
Stoa constructions covered the N edge of the agora throughout most
of its history. The most splendid of these was a portico (2d c. B.C.), which during
the reign of Tiberius was flanked by an Augusteum, honoring the imperial family.
In Byzantine times prior to the invasions of 643, both sides of the agora were
transformed into impoverished private houses.
The history of the rest of the agora, an open space measuring ca.
105 x 125 m, is less well known. The N half of its W side was marked by a large
stoa of mixed orders, while the S half contained a smaller Portico of the Emperors
and Temple of Apollo. A Hellenistic naval monument and two commemorative tholoi
were erected in its open center.
The S edge of the agora was bounded by the road of Battos, connecting
the acropolis with the forum. Across the street some six civic and religious structures
have been excavated, including a capitolium and a prytaneum, both as presently
constructed belonging to the Roman period.
Continuing E, two complete insulae of the town plan were occupied
in the 2d c. A.D. by the large House of Jason Magnus, which replaced two earlier
independent structures. The W half of the house, with its central court surrounded
by mosaics and triclinium richly paved in opus sectile, preserves a more public
and official appearance than the E half, which appears mainly residential.
Across the road of Battos to the N is the House of Hesychius, a president
of the provincial council of Cyrenaica and a devout Christian living early in
the 5th c. A.D. Although small, the house attests to the continuity of urban life
in Cyrene after the disastrous earthquake of 365.
The imposing Caesareum dominates the Roman forum area ca. 150 m E
of the agora on a continuation of the SW hill. It was constructed as a rectangular
enclosure with blank exterior walls on three sides and entered by Doric propylaea
on the S and E. A complete Doric peristyle on its interior faced onto an open
central court. A small temple, perhaps dedicated to the deified Julius Caesar,
occupied the center of the court, while a large civil basilica lay immediately
to the N. In its original Hellenistic form the complex functioned as a gymnasium,
with the area taken up in Roman times by the basilica housing the traditional
closed rooms. A running track, exactly one third of a stadium in length, extended
W, paralleling the road of Battos. Its S facade, known as the Stoa of Hermes and
Herakles, consisted of a blank curtain wall, whose upper level was pierced by
windows flanked by alternating telemon figures of the two divinities providing
its name. The conversion of the gymnasium to a complex honoring the dictator is
attributed to the later years of Augustus' reign. The basilica, remodeled during
the reign of Hadrian, was probably used for law cases. Like the Caesareum, the
Stoa of Hermes and Herakles has been heavily restored. Behind it is a small covered
theater or odeon, also restored. Across the road of Battos S of the Caesareum
are a small Roman theater and a so-called Temple of Venus.
The valley road between the SW and NE hills descends to an open expanse
of leveled ground ca. 80 m below the N edge of the acropolis, developed at an
early time into the Sanctuary of Apollo. The Fountain of Apollo, which figures
prominently in Herodotos' account of the foundation of the Therean colony, still
pours forth its waters from a tunnel leading under the acropolis hill. The restored
remains of the Temple of Apollo rise in the center of the sanctuary ground. This
impressive monument was first built as a simple megaron without external columns
around 550 B.C. By the end of the century it had received its first Doric peristyle,
which was subjected over the passage of time to repeated restorations. Its currently
standing colonnade belongs to repairs following the Jewish revolt.
Immediately W of the temple is the conspicuous Altar of Apollo, remodeled
with white marble revetment in the 4th c. B.C. The S corner of the sanctuary is
occupied by the fully restored strategeion, a rectangular stone building with
pedimented roof, erected in the 4th c. B.C. by victorious Cyrenean generals to
honor Apollo. Nearby are the remains of the partially restored Greek propylaia,
again built in the 4th c. to mark the entrance into the sanctuary from the valley
road, and their later replacement, the Roman propylaia (2d c. A.D.), erected a
short distance to the W.
Aside from various minor shrines and altars grouped around the main
Temple of Apollo and cut into the rock-cliff face of the acropolis hill, the remaining
significant monuments within the sanctuary zone are the Trajanic baths and their
later Byzantine replacement. The Trajanic baths (A.D. 98) covered most of the
NE corner of the sanctuary, here extended on terracing supported by a massive
retaining wall in order to provide space for its frigidarium. After their destruction
by earthquake the baths were replaced around A.D. 400 by Byzantine baths, which
today dominate the entire NE edge of the sanctuary.
The W edge of the sanctuary is bounded by the Wall of Nikodamos, set
up perhaps in the late 2d or early 3d c. A.D. to separate its sacred monuments
from the profane zone of the theater. Here a large-scale Greek theater with its
cavea built against the N slope of the acropolis hill was radically transformed
in the Roman period into an amphitheater.
The city center was built around the intersection of the valley road
with the principal N-S cardo. Its E half is still unexcavated, while much of its
W half is obscured by the modern town of Shahat. A triumphal arch, raised in honor
of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, marked the W entrance to this area from the
valley road. A small market theater has been excavated just S of the modern road.
Remains of a market building and ornate propylon are visible close by, both probably
erected in Severan times, to judge from their windblown acanthus capitals and
the relief sculptures from the gateway.
Several ancient structures have been identified in the area ca. 200
m long and B of the modern shops of Shahat and below the old post office. The
latest is a stoa dating after A.D. 365, whose Corinthian portico ran parallel
to the N curb of the valley road. Three small temples lay across the valley road
to the S, occupying the front of a complete city block. The central temple housed
the imperial cult, the easternmost was dedicated to the eponymous nymph Kurana,
while the third is unidentified. In later times the first two were destroyed and
then ritually purified by fire by Christians. In addition the city center contained
two basilical churches, apparently 6th c. The first is in the SW corner of the
zone; the second is found E of the intersection of the valley road with the N-S
cardo.
The most important monument of the period of Christian ascendency
at Cyrene is its large cathedral, situated at the E end of the city not far from
the main east gate. The basilica proper was connected to a baptistery in its NE
corner. Its broad nave was paved with mosaics depicting animal and rural scenes.
The apse was originally placed at the E and the church entered through three doors
on the W. The church was later rebuilt so that its entrance was on the S and its
apse located at the W end. The entire structure was fortified with thicker and
loftier walls in its final stages. During these troubled times the Byzantine circuit
did not take in the cathedral, and it had to double in function as a kind of advanced
phrurion to protect the E face of the city. This sector lacked the protection
of rising ground and was especially vulnerable to attack from the interior. The
remains of a Byzantine defensive tower (Gasr Sheghia) have survived to be excavated
about 150 m to the NW. Its initial erection probably coincided with the fortification
of the cathedral. It was rebuilt in Early Islamic times.
The unexcavated hippodrome lies directly N of the cathedral just within
the circuit of the Hellenistic defenses. South of the cathedral and just exterior
to the line of the defenses is an elaborate vaulted cistern complex, built in
the Roman period.
The extensive necropoleis of Cyrene cover many square meters of territory
on all sides of the walled city. Numbering in the thousands, the burials are located
in four main groups. The N necropolis is found on either side of the road to Apollonia.
The E necropolis occupies the rolling plain between Cyrene and the modern Beida
crossroad. The S necropolis lies beside the ancient track to Balagrae (Beida).
The W necropolis is built into the steep slopes of the wadi Bel Gadir either side
of the Sanctuary of Demeter. The types of burials vary from one area to the next.
The least complicated are the simple cist burials with stone cover slabs and the
rock-cut sarcophagi with removable lids. A more elaborate form is the stepped
burial, which has a stepped pedestal carrying a stele. Then there is a rich series
of rock-cut chamber tombs with cut-stone masonry facades, which are occasionally
decorated with the Doric or Ionic order, as well as free-standing circular and
rectangular masonry tombs. All periods of urban occupation are represented, from
archaic to Christian. Many of the graves in the Hellenistic period were surmounted
by a bust of a veiled female figure symbolizing death. Occasionally these busts
are rendered faceless. In Roman times funerary portraits of the actual deceased
became extremely popular. Many examples of both classes of representations are
displayed in the local sculpture museum, as is a full selection of major sculptures
from all other phases of the clearance of the city.
D. White, 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.
PTOLEMAIDA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
About midway between Benghazi and Susa, this ancient port occupies
a narrow space (2 km wide) between the sea and the lower spurs of the Jebel el-Akhdar.
The harbor was sheltered W and N by a small promontory and two islets. A Greek
settlement, name unknown, was established here in the late 7th c. B.C. and became
the port of Barke, the rich colony of Kyrene 25 km inland on the plateau. Ptolemy
III (246-221 B.C.) refounded it as Ptolemais. It came into the hands of Rome in
96 B.C., and under Diocletian became the capital of Libya Pentapolis, but subsequently
it decayed and Apollonia (Sozusa) supplanted it as capital. Excavation began in
the 1930s and there is now a small museum on the site.
The Hellenistic city was laid out regularly, forming a rectangle roughly
1650 x 1400 m. Two major cardines run from N to S; the standard insula measures
180 x 36 m. An imposing decumanus, the "Via Monumentale," was given
a triumphal arch and a portico in the early 4th c. A.D. Little remains of the
Hellenistic wall. The standard of masonry was good, though one section of the
wall, carried a short way up the hillside to include a commanding point, was built
of rough blocks of stone. Some square projecting wall towers have been found but
the finest surviving part of the fortifications is the Taucheira Gate, built of
masonry with the marginal drafting characteristic of many Hellenistic walls. Its
inner side was altered, perhaps in the 3d c. A.D. when the walls seem to have
been rebuilt. Traces of another wall found near the sea may have been a Byzantine
circuit protecting the harbor.
Ptolemais had an amphitheater, a hippodrome, and three theaters, one
at least Hellenistic. The smallest, the Odeon, was adapted in the 4th-5th c. for
water spectacles, the orchestra and stage walls being covered with a layer of
watertight cement to form a swimming pool. Roman and Byzantine baths are known.
The public cisterns and reservoirs are impressive. A group of 17 Roman
vaulted cisterns under a porticoed space, the Square of the Cisterns, had a capacity
of 7,000 kl and may have been preceded by a Hellenistic reservoir. To the E are
two later open reservoirs, which probably received at least part of their supplies
from the catchment area provided by the lower slope of the Jebel. A Roman aqueduct,
probably Hadrianic, coming from 20 km to the E, runs towards this quarter. Outside
the town are remains of a bridge that carried the aqueduct and a road across the
wadi.
Several houses, wholly or partly excavated, are of the standard Hellenistic
type with peristyle. The "Palazzo delle Colonne," pre-Roman in its origin
but with numerous additions in the 1st c. A.D., had a large pillared court and
two impressive oeci. It stood high, with an upper story. Its height contrasts
with a large, low Roman villa. Other houses have been dug out in the N part of
the city. One excavated in 1961 has a 4th-5th c. mosaic floor with Orpheus singing
to the wild beasts. Further excavations are in process.
Fragments of an unexcavated Doric building suggest that it may have
been a pre-Roman temple. The imposing temple tomb, Qasr Faraoun, W of Ptolemais,
is Hellenistic. The chamber tombs found in great numbers in the quarries E and
W of the city have yielded a few sculptured tombstones and numerous inscriptions.
A number of sculptures and important inscriptions, including the price edict of
Diocletian and an edict of Anastasius have come to light within the city.
A fortified Christian basilica has narthex, apse, chambers on either
side of the apse, nave, aisles, and is solidly built with a single narrow doorway
on the N side. A fortified building (75 x 45 m) probably 5th c., is commonly regarded
as the headquarters of the Dux of Libya Pentapolis; its walls are faced with good
masonry and provided with stringcourses to stabilize the rubble filling. Two other
forts within the city provided some security after the old walls had decayed.
O. Brogan, 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.
SABRATA (Ancient city) LIBYA
On the coast 64 km W of Tripoli, the farthest W of the three cities
(treis poleis) that gave the region its name. Traditionally founded by the Phoenicians,
under the Carthaginians it was successively a seasonal trading post and a permanent
settlement. During the earlier empire it prospered and expanded, but in A.D. 363-65
it was sacked by the Austuriani and, though restored, it declined rapidly under
Vandal rule. Reoccupied and refortified by Justinians troops in A.D. 533, it dwindled
and was finally abandoned after the Moslem conquest of A.D. 643. The remains uncovered
comprise large stretches of the built-up area of the ancient city, including domestic
and commercial quarters, and in this respect they are complementary to the intrinsically
finer but more selectively excavated monuments of Leptis Magna.
The siting and development of the city were determined by the possession
of a small natural harbor, strengthened in Roman times by a concrete mole, and
by the lines of two intersecting roads, the main coastal road (here the "decumanus")
and a road running S from the harbor towards Cydamus (Ghadames) and the trans-Saharan
caravan route. The irregular plan of the quarter beside the harbor marks the site
of the original Punic settlement. On the landward side of this, on the site of
an earlier open market place, was superimposed the neatly rectangular Roman forum,
an early imperial creation. The city developed from this nucleus. To the S this
took place about an orthogonal grid based upon the intersecting axes of the two
main streets, and in the 2d c. there was a similar development to the E on a slightly
different alignment, based on a change of direction in the line of the decumanus.
The area W of the forum awaits excavation. To the S the orderly growth of the
city was limited by an irregular line of quarries and cemeteries. The only known
fortifications of the Roman period are a short stretch of 4th c. wall at the E
end of the excavated area. The Byzantine defenses enclosed a greatly reduced area,
some 16-18 ha in extent, around the forum and the original harborside nucleus.
The now visible remains of the forum complex were preceded by two
constructional phases: an irregular development of the harborside town to the
S, apparently in the 2d c. B.C., which was then swept away to create an open rectangular
space occupied only by temporary structures, presumably an occasional market place.
In the 1st c. A.D. this was replaced by a permanent, elongated rectangular enclosure
extending to right and left of the main street to the S and flanked longitudinally
by shops and offices, of which the foundations of some of those along the S side
are still exposed. Only three of the surviving public buildings can be shown to
belong to this early phase: a large temple, dedicated probably to Liber Pater,
which stood in the middle of the E half; a smaller temple at the NW corner, possibly
dedicated to Serapis, the slightly oblique alignment of which suggests that it
antedates the formal plan of the forum; and along the S side of the W half of
the forum a basilica. The basilica (mid 1st c. A.D.) was of the Vitruvian type,
with internal ambulatory and entered from the middle of one long side; opposite
the entrance was a rectangular tribunal containing a group of imperial statues.
The Temple of Serapis was a small, freestanding edifice of native type set in
the middle of a porticoed enclosure. That of Liber Pater, though of more conventional
Classical plan, was faced with gaudily painted stucco.
During the 2d and 3d c. this complex was gradually transformed. The
shops of the W half were replaced by porticos with Egyptian granite columns, and
the Temple of Liber Pater was enlarged and framed on three sides within a double
portico. Opposite it, at the W end was added (early 2d c.) a capitolium, a broad,
shallow pedimental building with three cellas standing on a very lofty podium,
of which the central part rose sheer from the forum and presumably served as a
rostrum. Along the N side of the W part of the forum was added a curia, of conventional
Roman plan. The tribunal of the basilica was transferred to a new range of rooms
at the W end of the basilica, and between this extension of the basilica and the
capitolium was inserted a cruciform vaulted chamber of uncertain purpose. Other
modifications and additions during the later 2d c. were the remodeling of the
Temple of Serapis on more conventionally Roman lines and the S extension of the
forum complex, replacing earlier houses by two large new temples: one dedicated
to M. Aurelius and L. Verus (A.D. 166-69), S of the Temple of Liber Pater; the
other, of unknown dedication, S of the basilica, of which it partly suppressed
the tribunal. Of all these buildings only the Temple of Liber Pater retained its
traditional structure of sandstone, stuccoed and painted; all the rest were built
or partially rebuilt in marble during the last 60 years of the 2d c.
The only other large public building in the old part of the city
is the public bath at the NE corner of the forum. Beside it is a fine public latrine.
Two more temples were situated in the new quarter to the E: one (A.D. 186-93)
a conventional prostyle building dedicated to Hercules, the other, of Flavian
date and dedicated to Isis, free-standing within an elaborately porticoed temenos
beside the sea at the E end of the excavations. This new, 2d c. quarter is dominated
by the theater, a late Antonine building of which substantial parts of the cavea
and the three orders of the marble scaenae frons have been restored, giving a
unique visual impression of the stage of a large but otherwise typical N African
theater. The figured marble reliefs decorating the front of the pulpitum include
representations of divinities, dancers, and philosophers, scenes from tragedy
and pantomime, and a group with personifications of Rome and Sabratha joining
hands in the presence of soldiers.
Characteristic of the site are the extensively excavated domestic
and commercial quarters. In the early city these were irregular and crowded, with
shops and storerooms occupying the frontages of well-to-do houses with mosaics
and painted stucco ceilings. There are many indications of upper stories of timber
and crude brick. The insulae S and E of the forum illustrate the emergence of
more orderly planning, while those of the 2d c. town are neatly squared, many
with shallow porticoed frontages, as at Timgad. The roofs were regularly flat,
and any building of substance had its own cisterns. On the periphery are several
large peristyle houses with fine mosaics, notably the House of the Oceanus Baths
near the Temple of Isis. The predominantly commercial quarters along the harbor
front include barrel-vaulted warehouses and the foundations of a large basilical
hall.
In the later 4th and 5th c. the city underwent many changes. The
fate of the individual temples is uncertain, but after the Austurian sack the
civil center was restored and remodeled. The forum itself was divided into two
by a transverse portico; the curia was restored on traditional lines, though with
an arcaded atrium; and the basilica was completely remodeled on the pattern of
the Severan basilica at Leptis, with longitudinal naves and two opposed apses.
In the 5th c. it was again rebuilt, this time to serve as a church, with a single
W apse. Two similar but smaller churches were built between the theater and the
sea, a quarter which was probably already largely depopulated, as it certainly
was in the 6th c. when the Byzantine defenses were drawn to enclose an area corresponding
approximately to that of the early 1st c. city, centered on the forum and the
harbor and excluding the later S and E extensions. The basilica underwent a final
restoration, with a baptistery installed in the adjoining cruciform building,
and a new church, with imported marble fittings and a magnificent mosaic, was
inserted between the curia and the sea. Though Arabic graffiti and remains of
hovels found in the forum area and in the theater attest some later habitation,
effective city life was extinguished by the Arab conquest.
Outlying monuments include an amphitheater, to the E; traces of an
aqueduct; remains of several villas, with mosaics and baths, mainly along the
adjacent coasts; and extensive though scattered cemeteries. The latter include
a towerlike Punic mausoleum of the 2d c. B.C. (and traces of a second), in an
area that was later incorporated in the SW outskirts of the town. This was a building
of scalloped triangular plan with several superimposed orders crowned by a pyramidal
spire. There is also a small Christian catacomb, to the E.
The museum on the site includes Classical sculpture, wall-painting;
and stuccos; the marble fittings and mosaics of the Byzantine church; and a large
series of domestic bronzes and pottery.
J. B. Ward-Perkins, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Oct 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains 8 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
TAFCHIRA (Ancient city) KYRINAIKI
A city of the Libyan Pentapolis on the coast between Berenice and
Ptolemais. The name (Hdt. 4.171) is probably Libyan. In the 3d c. B.C. the city
was named Arsinoe after the consort of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. The country around
was fertile and there were many wells, which may help to explain why, despite
its poor anchorage, Tocra became the last Byzantine stronghold in Cyrenaica.
The archaic pottery from the excavations (1963-65) in a small area
of the city by the shore, shows that there was a settlement here in the twenties
of the 7th c. B.C. within a decade of the traditional foundation of Cyrene. The
great mass of it came from votive deposits and indicates that there was already
close at hand a much frequented shrine of Demeter and Kore. Among the early sherds
are imports from Corinth, Rhodes, the Cyclades, Lakonia, and Crete. Few structural
remains were found, but there were remains of early huts and stretches of a wall
which may, it is suggested, have been part of a defensive wall protecting the
early settlement. The votive offerings continue more sparsely into the 5th and
4th c. and the beginnings of the Hellenistic period.
The most prominent remains of ancient Tocra are its Byzantine walls.
Many of the 30 great square or polygonal towers and an advance wall (proteichisma)
on the W and S sides are clearly Byzantine, but the main circuit is built on the
line of the Hellenistic walls. The walls, described and drawn by various early
travelers, form a rough square with sides of about 650 m. On the landward sides
they still stand in places several meters high, but they have almost entirely
vanished on the seaward side.
The quarries, in which numerous tombs had been cut, have yielded fine
vases. Many inscriptions, some of them Jewish, have been found among the tombs.
Among inscriptions found within the city was part of an Edict of Anastasius.
Systematic excavation within the walls was begun in 1939. The general
lines of the main streets had long been visible, showing a grid of insulae. Three
churches, each with an apse at the E end, were known, one outside the W wall.
A large, solid building near the center of the town is regarded as probably the
Byzantine governor's palace. In 1966 and 1967 a detailed survey of the town buildings
and of the walls was prepared, making use of recent air photographs. The existence
was established of three main periods of construction of the city wall and the
street system and 18 internal buildings were related to the new survey.
O. Brogan, 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.
TRIPOLI (Ancient city) LIBYA
The central one of the three cities (treis poleis) that gave the region
its name. Founded as a trading station by the Carthaginians beside a small natural
harbor, it prospered under Roman rule. In late antiquity its location in a fertile
coastal oasis saved it to some extent from the rapid decline of its neighbors,
and after the Arab conquest of A.D. 643 it was chosen to be the military and administrative
capital of the whole territory between the two Syrtes. The heart of the Classical
city, enclosed within its late antique walls, has been continuously occupied ever
since, obliterating all but a few remains of the Roman town.
The principal surviving monument is an elaborately ornamental quadrifrons
archway dedicated to M. Aurelius and L. Verus in A.D. 163, the central stone dome
of which was carried on flat slabs laid across the angles and was concealed externally
within the masonry of an attic, now destroyed. Early drawings show this attic
in turn supporting a circular pavilion, but this seems to have been a later Islamic
addition. The arch stood at the intersection of the two main streets of the town
and the adjoining streets and alleyways of the post-Classical town incorporate
many elements of an orthogonal street plan. Near the arch are the remains of a
temple dedicated to the Genius Colonine (A.D. 183-85), and the forum probably
lay nearby. There was a monumental bath on or near the site of the present castle.
The city walls, demolished in 1913, incorporated long stretches of the late antique
defenses.
Near the base of the W harbor mole was found a Punic and Roman cemetery,
and scattered burials, including a small Jewish catacomb (now destroyed), have
come to light towards the E, under the modern town. In and near the oasis are
the remains of several villas, with mosaics; also two Christian cemeteries, one
of the 5th c. at Ain Zara, and one of the 10th c., at En-Ngila.
The archaeological museum, housed in the castle, contains antiquities
from the whole of Tripolitania except Sabratha. The fine series of sculpture from
Leptis Magna includes the Julio-Claudian group from the Forum Vetus and the figured
panels of the Severan Arch. Other notable exhibits are the mosaics and the Romano-Libyan
sculpture from Ghirza.
J. B. Ward-Perkins, 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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