Aeolis (; grc, Αἰολίς, Aiolís), or Aeolia (; grc, Αἰολία, Aiolía, link=no), was an area that comprised the west and northwestern region of Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey), mostly along the coast, and also several offshore islands (particularly Lesbos), where the

Aeolian Aeolian commonly refers to things related to either of two Greek mythological figures: * Aeolus (son of Hippotes), ruler of the winds * Aeolus (son of Hellen), son of Hellen and eponym of the Aeolians * Aeolians, an ancient Greek tribe thought to ...

Greek city-states were located. Aeolis incorporated the southern parts of Mysia, and is bounded by it to the north,

Ionia Ionia () was an ancient region on the western coast of Anatolia, to the south of present-day Izmir. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. Never a unified state, it was named after the Ionian ...

to the south, and

Lydia Lydia (Lydian language, Lydian: ‎𐤮𐤱𐤠𐤭𐤣𐤠, ''Śfarda''; Aramaic: ''Lydia''; el, Λυδία, ''Lȳdíā''; tr, Lidya) was an Iron Age Monarchy, kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the mod ...

to the east.

Geography

Aeolis was an ancient district on the western coast of Asia Minor. It extended along the Aegean Sea from the entrance of the

Hellespont The Dardanelles (; tr, Çanakkale Boğazı, lit=Strait of Çanakkale, el, Δαρδανέλλια, translit=Dardanéllia), also known as the Strait of Gallipoli from the Gallipoli peninsula or from Classical Antiquity as the Hellespont (; ...

(now the Dardanelles) south to the

Hermus River In Greek mythology, Hermus or Hermos (Ancient Greek: Ἕρμος) is a name attributed to multiple characters: * Hermus, god of the river Hermus (modern Gediz river) located in the Aegean region of Lydia (modern Turkey). Like most of the river ...

(now the Gediz River). It was named for the Aeolians, some of whom migrated there from Greece before 1000 BC. Aeolis was, however, an ethnological and linguistic enclave rather than a geographical unit. The district often was considered part of the larger northwest region of Mysia.

History

According to Homer's ''Odyssey'',

Odysseus Odysseus ( ; grc-gre, Ὀδυσσεύς, Ὀδυσεύς, OdysseúsOdyseús, ), also known by the Latin variant Ulysses ( , ; lat, UlyssesUlixes), is a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the ''Odyssey''. Odysse ...

, after his stay with the Cyclopes, reached the floating island of Aeolia, where

Aeolus In Greek mythology, Aeolus or Aiolos (; grc, Αἴολος , ) is a name shared by three mythical characters. These three personages are often difficult to tell apart, and even the ancient mythographers appear to have been perplexed about which A ...

son of Hippotas provided him with the west wind

Zephyr In European tradition, a zephyr is a light wind or a west wind, named after Zephyrus, the Greek god or personification of the west wind. Zephyr may also refer to: Arts and media Fiction Fiction media * ''Zephyr'' (film), a 2010 Turkish ...

By the 8th century BC the Aeolians' twelve most important cities were independent. They formed a league of twelve cities (a Dodecapolis): Cyme (also called Phriconis);

Larissa Larissa (; el, Λάρισα, , ) is the capital and largest city of the Thessaly region in Greece. It is the fifth-most populous city in Greece with a population of 144,651 according to the 2011 census. It is also capital of the Larissa regiona ...

;

Neonteichos Neonteichos ( grc, Νέον τεῖχος, lit. 'new wall'), was an Aeolian town not far from the coast of Mysia, situated between the Hermus and the town of Larissa, from which its distance was only 30 stadia. It is said to have been founded by ...

; Temnus;

Cilla (city) Cilla or Killa ( grc, Κίλλα) was a town of ancient Aeolis and later of ancient Mysia, mentioned by Homer in the ''Iliad'', alongside the cities Chryse and Tenedus. The city is mentioned by other Greek writers. Herodotus counted Cilia as on ...

; Notion;

Aegiroessa Aegiroessa or Aigiroessa ( gr, Αἰγιρόεσσα) was a city of ancient Aeolis, which Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Emp ...

; Pitane; Aegae; Myrina; Gryneion; and Smyrna. The most celebrated of the cities was Smyrna (modern Izmir, Turkey), but in 699 BC, Smyrna became part of an Ionian confederacy. This league or confederation, known as the '' Ionian League'', also called the ''Panionic League'', was formed at the end of the Meliac War in the mid-7th century BC.

Croesus Croesus ( ; Lydian: ; Phrygian: ; grc, Κροισος, Kroisos; Latin: ; reigned: c. 585 – c. 546 BC) was the king of Lydia, who reigned from 585 BC until his defeat by the Persian king Cyrus the Great in 547 or 546 BC. Croesus was ...

, king of

(reigned 560-546 BC), conquered the remaining cities. Later they were held successively by the Persians, Macedonians, Seleucids, and Pergamenes. Attalus III, the last king of Pergamum, bequeathed Aeolis to the Roman Republic in 133 BC. Shortly afterwards it became part of the Roman

province of Asia The Asia ( grc, Ἀσία) was a Roman province covering most of western Anatolia, which was created following the Roman Republic's annexation of the Attalid Kingdom in 133 BC. After the establishment of the Roman Empire by Augustus, it was the ...

. At the partition of the Roman Empire (395 AD), Aeolis was assigned to the East Roman (Byzantine) empire and remained largely under Byzantine rule until the early 15th century, when the

Ottoman Turks The Ottoman Turks ( tr, Osmanlı Türkleri), were the Turkic founding and sociopolitically the most dominant ethnic group of the Ottoman Empire ( 1299/1302–1922). Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks remains scarce, ...

occupied the area. Smyrna fell to the

Seljuk Turk The Seljuk dynasty, or Seljukids ( ; fa, سلجوقیان ''Saljuqian'', alternatively spelled as Seljuqs or Saljuqs), also known as Seljuk Turks, Seljuk Turkomans "The defeat in August 1071 of the Byzantine emperor Romanos Diogenes by the Turk ...

Tzachas in 1076, to the Turkish

Beylik of Aydın The Aydinids or Aydinid dynasty (Modern Turkish: ''Aydınoğulları'', ''Aydınoğulları Beyliği'', ota, آیدین اوغوللاری بیلیغی), also known as the Principality of Aydin and Beylik of Aydin (), was one of the Anatolia ...

about 1330 and to the Turco-Mongol Timur in 1402 (after the Siege of Smyrna).

Notable people

* Autolycus of Pitane * Andriscus *

Elias Venezis Elias Venezis ( el, Ηλίας Βενέζης) (March 4, 1904 - August 3, 1973) is the pseudonym of Elias Mellos (), a major Greek novelist. He was born in 1904 in Ayvalık (Kydonies) in Asia Minor and died in Athens in 1973. He wrote many boo ...

Notes

References

*Pierluigi Bonanno, ''Aiolis. Storia e archeologia di una regione dell’Asia Minore alla fine del II millennio a.C.'', USA, 2006 {{coord, 39.2, 26.7, dim:200km, display=title States and territories established in the 8th century BC States and territories disestablished in the 6th century BC Ancient Greek geography Asia (Roman province)

Geography

History

Notable people

See also

Notes

References