The tiny kingdom of Lycia, today located in southwestern Turkey,
comprises a chain of rocky coves backed by the magnificent upsweep
of the Taurus Mountains. This impenetrable and inhospitable
landscape allowed Lycia to stand aloof from major events occurring
in the eastern Mediterranean during the first half of the first
millennium BC, although the region was featured in the mythology
of the Greeks to the west. Homer relates that Lycia was the
home of Sarpedon, one of the greatest warriors of the Trojan
War, and it was in Lycia that Bellerophon with the assistance
of the winged horse, Pegasus, defeated the monstrous fire-breathing
Chimera. In the year 546 BC, however, Lycia was wrenched from
the dreamy world of myth and thrown into the harsh realities
of war when the Persians invaded western Anatolia. Having already
easily defeated the Greeks along the west coast, the Persian
general Harpagus turned his sights on Lycia. But where the Greeks
had given in to the Persians with hardly a fight, the Lycians
were determined not to submit.
As
the Greek historian Herodotus tells us, the men of the main
city of Lycia, Xanthos, locked their women and children within
the walls of their acropolis and set it on fire. Then they marched
out to meet the Persian enemy. Greatly outnumbered, they died
to a man.
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The tragedy of this tale is somewhat leavened by the fact that
during the subsequent centuries Lycia, as the westernmost addition
to the Persian Empire, thrived. The Persians left direct rule
of Lycia in the hands of a local dynasty, which, mindful of
its overlords, mimicked many aspects of Persian court life.
Lycia also developed strong trade networks with their Greek
neighbors and thus was exposed to Hellenic culture along with
Greek goods. As a result, this once isolated backwater became
a nexus where Greek, Persian and native Lycian art forms and
lifestyles met and combined to create a truly unique and fascinating
culture. The Lycians never lost their fierce love of freedom,
however. In the first century BC they defended themselves bitterly
against an invading army of Romans under Julius Caesar’s
assassin Brutus. They maintained their independence for another
150 years before becoming the last independent territory of
the Mediterranean to come under Roman rule.
Today
the spectacular ruins of such Lycian cities as Xanthos and neighboring
Lymera present vivid testimony to this freedom-loving people
and their sophisticated multicultural society.
Join Dr. Jennifer Tobin in June 2007 on Greece
& Turkey: Voyage Through History, a sailing trip through
the remote Dodecanese Islands of Greece and along the southern
coast of Turkey.
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