Lampsakos
Lampsakos ( Greek Λαμψάκος , Latin Lampsacus , also Lampsacum , today Lapseki ) was an ancient Greek port city in Mysia , on the east coast of the Hellespont (Dardanelles).
history
Originally known as Pityusa or Pityussa , the city was first founded by the Phocaans . According to the founding legend handed down by Pomponius Mela , the city got its name from the fact that an oracle, when asked by the Phocaeans where to found their city, replied: "where it first flashed (Greek: lampein )". In the early days there were border conflicts with the Milesian neighbors and the Thracian Miltiades , who, as Herodotus reports, waged war against the Lampsakeans . However, they were able to lure him into an ambush and take him prisoner and only released him after a threat from his ally Kroisos .
In the 6th and 5th centuries BC In BC Lampsakos was conquered one after the other by the Lydians , the Persians , Athens and Sparta . Artaxerxes I handed Lampsakos over to the command of Themistocles on the condition that the city would provide the Persian king with its famous wine for the rest of his life. Although the city recognized the Persian rule, it was ruled by the Lampsakener Hippocles , whose son Aeantides married a daughter of the tyrant Hippias . Her grave was a sight in the times of Thucydides .
After the Battle of Mykale, Lampsakos became part of the Delisch-Attic League and paid an annual tribute of twelve talents , which speaks for the extraordinary wealth of the city. Lampsakos presented in the 3rd century BC Chr. Gold coins; even this was only possible for the richest cities in the region. The alliance with Athens broke during the expedition to Sicily , and an uprising broke out in 411 BC. But forcibly suppressed. 405 BC The city was conquered by Lysandros for Sparta, but fell back to the Persians a little later.
In February 399 the remnants of the train of ten thousand (still about 5000 to 6000 men) came under Xenophon from Thrace to Lampsakos. From there they moved on to Pergamon (Pergamos).
362 BC For a time Lampsakos became autonomous. The initially good relations with Athens quickly cooled; as early as 355 BC The city was conquered by the Athenians under Chares . 334 BC Lampsakus was one of the numerous conquests of Alexander the Great .
196 BC Rome defended the city against Antiochus III. ; as a result, Lampsakus became an important ally of the empire. Cicero and Strabo attest to the city's continued prosperity even under Roman rule; however, according to Cicero, she is said to have suffered under Verres (80 BC).
Lampsakos was also known for the fertility cult of Priapus , who is said to have been born here. His worship was celebrated with a donkey offering.
In late antiquity Lampsakos became the seat of a bishop. The titular bishopric Lampsacus of the Roman Catholic Church goes back to the diocese .
Only the ruins of the city wall and the necropolis are preserved from the original Lampsakos near the modern re-establishment of Lapseki , in today's Turkish province of Çanakkale .
Prominent residents
sons and daughters of the town
- Adimantos of Lampsakos
- Anaximenes of Lampsakos , 4th century BC BC, rhetorician and historian
- Charon of Lampsakos , approx. 2nd half of the 5th century BC Chr., Historian
- Metrodorus von Lampsakos , philosopher and friend of Epicurus
- Timocrates of Lampsakos around 300 BC BC, Epicurean philosopher, brother of Metrodorus
- Polyainus of Lampsakos , around 300 BC Chr., Mathematician a. epicurean philosopher
- Idomeneus of Lampsakos around 300 BC BC, Epicurean philosopher
- Kolotos of Lampsakos around 300 BC BC, Epicurean philosopher
- Leonteus of Lampsakos around 300 BC BC, Epicurean philosopher
- Themista of Lampsakos around 300 BC BC, wife of Leonteus, Epicurean philosopher
- Straton of Lampsakos , around 300 BC BC, natural philosopher
- Xenophon von Lampsakos , geographer
Others
- Anaxagoras spent the last years of his life in exile in Lampsakos.
- Epicurus probably lived here for a while and got to know Metrodorus .
literature
- Peter Frisch : The inscriptions of Lampsakos ( inscriptions of Greek cities from Asia Minor , Vol. 6). Habelt, Bonn 1978. ISBN 3-7749-1443-5
- N. Arslan: Çan ve Lapseki İlçeleri Yüzey Araştırması Ön Raporu. XXI. Uluslararası Araştırma Sonuçları Toplantısı (2004) 119–126.
- N. Arslan: Lapseki (Lampsakos) ve Çan İlçeleri 2003 Yılı Yüzey Araştırması. XXII. Uluslararası Araştırma Sonuçları Toplantısı (2005) 317-324.
- Theodora Stillwell MacKay: Lampsakos (Lapseki) Turkey . In: Richard Stillwell et al. a. (Ed.): The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ 1976, ISBN 0-691-03542-3 .
Coordinates: 40 ° 20 ′ 0 ″ N , 26 ° 41 ′ 0 ″ E