ISAURIA, a district in the interior of Asia Minor. The nucleus of it was that section of the Taurus which lies direct ly south of Iconium and Lystra. Lycaonia had all the Iconian plain ; but Isauria began as soon as the foothills were reached. When the Romans first encountered the Isaurians (early in the st century B.c.), they regarded Cilicia Trachea as part of Isauria, which thus extended to the sea; the whole basin of the Calycad nus was reckoned Isaurian, and the cities in the valley of its southern branch formed what was known as the Isaurian Decapo lis. Towards the end of the 3rd century A.D., however, all Cilicia was detached for administrative purposes from the northern slope of Taurus; Pisidia was also detached, and made to include Icon ium. In compensation Isauria received the eastern part of Pamphylia. Restricted again in the 4th century, Isauria ended as the wild district about Isaura Palaea and the heads of the Caly cadnus. During the war of the pirates against Rome, the Isaurians took so active a part that the proconsul P. Servilius followed them into their fastnesses, and reduced the whole people to submission. The Isaurians were afterwards placed under the rule of Amyntas, king of Galatia; but it is evident that they continued to retain their predatory habits and virtual independence. In the 4th cen
tury they are described by Ammianus Marcellinus as the scourge of the neighbouring provinces of Asia Minor; but they are said to have been effectually subdued in the reign of Justinian. Isauria passed into the hands of Turcomans and Yuruks with the Seljuk conquest.
This comparatively obscure people had the honour of produc ing two Byzantine emperors, Zeno, whose native name was Tras kalisseus Rousoumbladeotes, and Leo III., who ascended the throne of Constantinople in A.D. 718, reigned till 741, and became the founder of a dynasty of three generations. The ruins of Isaura Palaea are mainly remarkable for their fine situation and their fortifications and tombs. Those of Isaura Nea have disappeared, but numerous inscriptions and many sculptured stelae, built into the houses of Dorla, prove the site. It was the latter, and not the former town, that Servilius reduced by cutting off the water-sup ply. The site was identified by W. M. Ramsay in 1901.