Nagidos ( grc, Νάγιδος; la, Nagidus) was an ancient city of
Cilicia
Cilicia (); el, Κιλικία, ''Kilikía''; Middle Persian: ''klkyʾy'' (''Klikiyā''); Parthian: ''kylkyʾ'' (''Kilikiyā''); tr, Kilikya). is a geographical region in southern Anatolia in Turkey, extending inland from the northeastern coa ...
. In ancient times it was located between
Anemurion to the west and
Arsinoe to the east.
Today its ruins are found on the hill named ''Paşabeleni'' at the mouth of the Sini Cay (Bozyazı Dere) near
Bozyazı in
Mersin Province
Mersin Province ( tr, ), formerly İçel Province ( tr, ), is a province in southern Turkey, on the Mediterranean coast between Antalya and Adana. The provincial capital and the biggest city in the province is Mersin, which is composed of f ...
,
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
. It lies at a distance of ca. 20 km to the east of
Anamur
Anamur is a town and district in Mersin Province, Turkey, the westernmost district of that province, bordering on Antalya Province. Anamur contains Anatolia's southernmost point, It is a coastal resort known for its bananas and peanuts.
Etym ...
. Like its eastern neighbor
Kelenderis, it was a colony of
Samos
Samos (, also ; el, Σάμος ) is a Greece, Greek island in the eastern Aegean Sea, south of Chios, north of Patmos and the Dodecanese, and off the coast of western Turkey, from which it is separated by the -wide Mycale Strait. It is also a se ...
.
The small island of Nagidoussa is opposite Nagidos; on it are the ruins of an
Ottoman fortress.
History
The details of the foundation and eventual abandonment of the city are unknown. From the end of the fifth century BC, the town minted
stater
The stater (; grc, , , statḗr, weight) was an ancient coin used in various regions of Greece. The term is also used for similar coins, imitating Greek staters, minted elsewhere in ancient Europe.
History
The stater, as a Greek silver curre ...
s that had both
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
and
Aramaic
The Aramaic languages, short Aramaic ( syc, ܐܪܡܝܐ, Arāmāyā; oar, 𐤀𐤓𐤌𐤉𐤀; arc, 𐡀𐡓𐡌𐡉𐡀; tmr, אֲרָמִית), are a language family containing many varieties (languages and dialects) that originated in ...
inscriptions, one of which bears the name of the Persian
satrap Pharnabazus. The Nagidos mint used a grape cluster as a symbol on the
reverse.
The goddess
Aphrodite
Aphrodite ( ; grc-gre, Ἀφροδίτη, Aphrodítē; , , ) is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, and procreation. She was syncretized with the Roman goddess . Aphrodite's major symbols inclu ...
appears most often on the coins of Nagidos, indicating that her sanctuary must have been the most important in the city.
The Hellenistic period and the foundation of Arsinoe
In 333 BC the city was conquered along with the rest of Cilicia by
Alexander the Great
Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to ...
.
After his death Cilicia briefly came under the control of the
Seleucid Empire. Together with
Mallos the city participated in the foundation of
Antioch on the Maeander somewhere between 281 and 270 BC. In approximately 270 BC Cilicia was conquered by the
Ptolemaic Empire during the
Syrian Wars.
In this period the city of
Arsinoe was founded between 279 and 260–253 BC
on land taken from Nagidos by Aetos, the Ptolemaic ''
strategos'' or military governor of Cilicia. Aetos was succeeded as ''strategos'' by his son Thraseas. At that time the Nagidians still refused to recognize the settlers of Arsinoe as the new owners of the land. To resolve the dispute Thraseas requested Nagidos to cede the land to Arsinoe, which the city agreed to. In exchange the citizens of Arsinoe became ''
apoikoi'' of Nagidos, which meant that their city would be independent from Nagidos. Both cities exchanged ''
isopoliteia'' so that the citizens of both cities enjoyed a single citizenship.
Designating the citizens of Arsinoe as ''apokoi'' of Nagidos meant that Nagidos was treated as the mother city of Arsinoe.
Christian Habicht interprets this as a diplomatic move of Thraseas to appease Nagidos for its loss of territory. John K. Davies gives a slightly different chronology, estimating the foundation of Arsinoe to have taken place probably in the 260s BC. He writes that Cilicia was then temporarily lost to the Seleucids but retaken by Ptolemaics in the 240s. According to him the dispute over the land occurred after the reestablishment of Ptolemaic control and the Arsinoeis appealed to Thraseas some time after 238 BC.
Along with the rest of Cilicia, Nagidos came under Seleucid rule in 197 BC.
Excavations have shown that the city was abandoned towards the middle of the second century BC. Possibly this was a consequence of the activities of the
Cilician pirates
Cilician pirates dominated the Mediterranean Sea from the 2nd century BC until their suppression by Pompey in 67–66 BC. Because there were notorious pirate strongholds in Cilicia, on the southern coast of Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey), the ter ...
.
Excavations
Ancient sources gave an important clue to the location of Nagidos because they mention the island Nagidoussa lay offshore from the city. This allowed the
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
n archaeologists
Rudolf Heberdey and Adolf Wilhelm to identify the site at its current location in 1891. In the 1930s a Swedish expedition carried out explorations. In 1986 the
museum of Anamur discovered 24 graves, the oldest dating back to the fifth century BC.
References
Sources
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Further reading
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External links
Coins of Nagidos on WildWindsThe Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites
{{Former settlements in Turkey
Ancient Greek archaeological sites in Turkey
Former populated places in Cilicia
Populated places in ancient Cilicia
Samian colonies
History of Mersin Province
Bozyazı District