According to the native historian Xan thus (46o B.c.) three dynasties ruled in succession over Lydia. The first, that of the Attiads, is mythical. To this mythical age belongs the colony which, according to Herodotus (i.94), Tyr senus, the son of Attis, led to Etruria. Xanthus, however, puts Torrhebus in the place of Tyrsenus, and makes him the eponym of a district in Lydia. The second dynasty was also of divine origin, but the names which head it prove its connection with the distant East. The Hittites, an Oriental people, deeply imbued with the elements of Babylonian culture, had overrun Asia Minor and established themselves on the shores of the Aegean before the reign of the Egyptian king Rameses II. Their subject allies in clude the Mysians and the Dardani of the Troad, while the Hit tites have left memorials in Lydia. G. Dennis discovered an inscription •in Hittite hieroglyphics attached to the figure of "Niobe" on Sipylus. We learn from Eusebius that Sardis was first captured by the Cimmerii 1078 B.C. ; and since it was four centuries later before the real Cimmerii (q.v.) appeared on the horizon of history, we may perhaps find in the statement a tradi tion of the Hittite conquest. As the authority of the Hittite sa traps at Sardis began to decay the Heraclid dynasty arose. After lasting five hundred and five years, the dynasty came to an end in the person of Sadyattes. The name Candaules, given him by Herod otus (i.7), meant "dog strangler," and was a title of the Lydian Hermes. Gyges (q.v.) put him to death and established the dy nasty of the Mermnads, 687 B.C. Gyges initiated a new policy, that of making Lydia a maritime power; but towards the middle of his reign the kingdom was overrun by the Cimmerii (q.v.). The lower town of Sardis was taken, and Gyges sent tribute to Assur-bani pal, as well as two Cimmerian chieftains he had himself captured in battle. A few years later Gyges joined in the revolt against As syria; the Cimmerian hordes returned, Gyges was slain in battle (652 B.c.), and Ardys his son and successor returned to his alle giance to Nineveh. Alyattes, the grandson of Ardys, finally suc ceeded in extirpating the Cimmerii, as well as in taking Smyrna, and thus providing his kingdom with a port. The trade and wealth of Lydia rapidly increased, and the Greek towns fell one after the other before the attacks of the Lydian kings. Alyattes's long reign of 57 years saw the foundation of the Lydian empire. All Asia Minor west of the Halys acknowledged his sway. The Greek cities were allowed to retain their own institutions and govern ment on condition of paying taxes and dues to the Lydian mon arch, and the proceeds of their commerce thus flowed into the imperial exchequer. The result was that the king of Lydia be came the richest prince of his age. Alyattes was succeeded by
Croesus (q.v.), who had probably already for some years shared the royal power. He reigned alone only 15 years, Cyrus the Per sian (q.v.) after an indecisive battle on the Halys, marching upon Sardis, and capturing both acropolis and monarch (546 B.c.).
The revolt of the Lydians under Pactyas, whom Cyrus had appointed to collect the taxes, caused the Per sian king to disarm them. Sardis now became the western capital of the Persian empire, and its burning by the Athenians was one of the contributing causes of the Persian War. After Alexander the Great's death, Lydia passed to Antigonus; then Achaeus made himself king at Sardis, but was defeated and put to death by Antiochus. The country was presented by the Romans to Eu menes, and subsequently formed part of the proconsular province of Asia. By the time of Strabo (xiii. 631) its old language was entirely supplanted by Greek. (See ASIANIC LANGUAGES.) The Lydian empire may be described as the industrial power of the ancient world. The Lydians were credited with introducing or inventing the game of dice and also coined money. The oldest known coins are the electrum coins of the earlier Mermnads ( Madden, Coins of the Jews, pp. 19-21), stamped on one side with a lion's head or the figure of a king with bow and quiver; these were replaced by Croesus with a coinage of pure gold and silver. The electrum coins of Lydia were of two kinds, one weigh ing 168.4 grains for the inland trade, and another of 224 grains for the trade with Ionia. The standard was the silver mina of Carchemish which contained 8,656 grains. Originally derived from Babylonia, this standard was passed on to Asia Minor during the Hittite conquest, but was eventually superseded by the Phoeni cian mina of 11,225 grains (see also NumismAncs). The inns, which the Lydians were said to have been the first to establish, were connected with their attention to commercial pursuits (Herod. i.94). Their literature has wholly perished. They were celebrated for their music and gymnastic exercises, and their art formed a link between that of Asia Minor and that of Greece. Lydian sculpture was probably similar to that of the Phrygians. Phallic emblems, for averting evil, were plentiful; the summit of the tomb of Alyattes is crowned with an enormous one of stone, about 9ft. in diameter. The tumulus itself is 281yds. in diameter and about half a mile in circumference. It has been partially ex cavated, and a sepulchral chamber discovered in the middle, com posed of large well-cut and highly polished blocks of marble. The stone basement which, according to Herodotus, formerly sur rounded the mound has disappeared.