Smyrna

SMYRNA (Ismir), in ancient times one of the most important and now by far the greatest of the cities of Asia Minor, has pre served an unbroken continuity of record and identity of name from the dawn of history to the present time.

I.

The Ancient City.—It is said to have been a Lelegian city before the Greek colonists settled in Asia Minor. The name, which is said to be derived from an Amazon called Smyrna, is indubitably Anatolian, having been applied also to a quarter of Ephesus, and (under the cognate form Myrina) to a city of Aeolis, and to a tumulus in the Troad. The Aeolic settlers of Lesbos and Cyme, pushing eastwards by Larissa and Neonteichos and over the Hermus, seized the valley of Smyrna. It was the frontier city between Aeolis on the north and Ionia on the south, and was more accessible on the south and east than on the north and west. By virtue of its situation it was necessarily a commercial city, like the Ionian colonies. It is therefore not surprising that the Aeolic element grew weaker ; strangers or refugees from the Ionian Colo phon settled in the city, and finally Smyrna passed into the hands of the Colophonians and became the thirteenth of the Ionian states. The change had taken place before 688, when the Ionian Onomastus of Smyrna won the boxing prize at Olympia, but it was probably then a recent event. The Colophonian conquest is men tioned by Mimnermus (before 600 B.c.), who counts himself equally a Colophonian and a Smyrnaean. The Aeolic form of the name, was retained even in the Attic dialect, and the epithet "Aeolian Smyrna" remained long after the conquest. The situation of Smyrna on the path of commerce between Lydia and the west raised it during the 7th century to the height of power and splendour. It lay at the head of an arm of the sea, which reached far inland and admitted the Greek trading ships into the heart of Lydia. One of the great trade routes which cross Anatolia descends the Hermus valley past Sardis, and then diverging from the valley passes south of Mt. Sipylus and crosses a low pass into the little valley, about 7 m. long and 2 broad, where Smyrna lies

between the mountains and the sea.

When the Mermnad kings raised the Lydian power and aggres siveness Smyrna was one of the first points of attack. Gyges (c. 687-652) was, however, defeated on the banks of the Hermus; the situation of the battlefield shows that the power of Smyrna extended far to the east and probably included the valley of Nymphi (Nif). A strong fortress, the ruins of whose ancient and massive walls are still imposing, on a hill in the pass between Smyrna and Nymphi, was probably built by the Smyrnaean Io nians to command the valley of Nymphi. According to Theognis (about 50o B.c.), "pride destroyed Smyrna." Mimnermus laments the degeneracy of the citizens of his day, who could no longer stem the Lydian advance. Finally, Alyattes III. (609-56o) conquered the city, and Smyrna for 30o years lost its place in the list of Greek cities. It did not cease to exist, but the Greek life and political unity were destroyed, and the Smyrnaean state was organ ized on the village system iccoAno6v.) It is mentioned in a fragment of Pindar, about 500 B.C., and in an inscription of 388 B.C. A small fortification of early style, rudely but massively built, on the lowest slope of a hill N. of Burnabat, is perhaps a fortified village of this period. Alexander the Great conceived the idea of restoring the Greek city ; the two Nemeses who were wor shipped at Smyrna are said to have suggested the idea to him in a dream. The scheme was, according to Strabo, carried out by Antigonus (316-301), and Lysimachus enlarged and fortified the city (301-281). The acropolis of the ancient city had been on a steep peak about 1,250 ft. high, which overhangs the north-east extremity of the gulf ; its ruins still exist, probably in much the same condition as they were left by Alyattes. The later city was founded on the modern site partly on the slopes of a rounded hill called Pagus near the south-east end of the' gulf, partly on the low ground between the hill and the sea.