Heraclea at Latmus
Coordinates | 37°29′51″N 27°31′37″E / 37.49759°N 27.52707°E |
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History | |
Periods | Hellenistic Greece |
Heraclea at Latmus or Heraclea under Latmus (
Substantial remains of the city and its fortifications still survive.History
The city, which was known as Latmos during the Archaic and Classical periods, was originally located approximately 1 km east of the later city of Herakleia, where a smaller set of fortifications and remains of houses and other buildings have been found, together with pottery of the 6th and 5th centuries BC.[3][4][5] During the 5th century BC Latmos was a member of the Delian League, with a tribute assessment of one talent.[6][3] The city was conquered by Mausollos in the 4th century BC, and at some point thereafter, probably in the late 4th or early 3rd century BC, a new city was laid out on the site further west and renamed Herakleia.[6][7] Stephanus of Byzantium records that it was also briefly known as Pleistarcheia, after Pleistarchos, the son of Antipater and brother of Cassander, who ruled Caria for several years following the battle of Ipsos in 301 BC.[7][8]
Herakleia is thought to have been Christianised early, as an early bishopric is attested.[
Archaeology
The Hellenistic city was built on a Hippodamian grid plan, with streets aligned to the points of the compass.[6][10] Near the center of the city was the agora, an open square 60 m × 130 m, built on a terrace supported on the south side by a well-preserved building with two levels of shops, the upper opening onto the agora itself, the lower entered from the area below. At the northeast corner of the agora is a bouleuterion, similar in plan to the bouleuterion at Priene.[6][3]
On a rocky eminence immediately west of the agora stands the temple of
Near the southern end of the city is an unusual structure built into a rocky outcrop, facing southwest and not aligned with the urban grid. It consists of a horseshoe-shaped chamber, 14 m across, its walls partly built of masonry, partly incorporating the existing bedrock, closed off by a cross wall with a central door, in front of which was a facade consisting of a square pier at each corner and five or six columns in between. It has been suggested that this was a shrine to Endymion, the shepherd or hunter loved by the goddess Selene, who in some versions of the myth lived on Mount Latmos and passed his perpetual sleep in a cave on the mountain.[3][6] According to Pausanias there was an adyton of Endymion somewhere on Latmos;[12] Strabo places Endymion's tomb a short distance away, across a small river.[13]
Among the other buildings whose remains have been identified are three other temples, a theater, a nymphaeum, and a Roman bath.[6][10] On the slopes of the peninsula at the southern end of the city (now occupied by a Byzantine fort) many rock-cut tombs are visible, some of them underwater because of the rise in the level of the lake.[3][6] In the Hellenistic period the old city of Latmos, east of Herakleia, also served as a necropolis; some burials there were made in chamber tombs with marble architectural decoration.[4]
The city wall of Herakleia is among the best preserved Hellenistic fortifications in the Greek and Roman world.
References
- ISBN 978-0-691-03169-9.
- ^ Lund University. Digital Atlas of the Roman Empire.
- ^ a b c d e f Bean, George (1979). "Heracleia under Latmus". Aegean Turkey (2nd ed.). London: Ernest Benn. p. 211-216.
- ^ S2CID 246044969.
- ISBN 9783110182385.
- ^ a b c d e f g h MacDonald, W. L. (1976). "Herakleia under Latmos (Caria, Turkey)". Princeton Encyclopeda of Classical Sites. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- ^ ISBN 9781444338386.
- JSTOR 4436360.
- ^ Catholic Hierarchy
- ^ a b c "Herakleia under Latmus (Site)". www.perseus.tufts.edu. Retrieved 2021-12-09.
- ISBN 9781785708367.
- ^ Pausanias 5.1.5.
- ^ Strabo 14.1.8 (C 636).
- ^ doi:10.11588/diglit.51765.)
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link - S2CID 131581997.
- ^ ISBN 9780198132288.