Book 14
1.4
These are the twelve Ionian cities,8. 7. 1. but at a later time Smyrna was added, being induced by the Ephesians to join the Ionian League; for the Ephesians were fellow-inhabitants of the Smyrnaeans in ancient times, when Ephesus was also called Smyrna. And Callinus somewhere so names it, when he calls the Ephesians Smyrnaeans in the prayer to Zeus,and pity the Smyrnaeans; and again,remember, if ever the Smyrnaeans burnt up beautiful thighs of oxen in sacrifice to thee.Callinus Fr. 2 (Bergk)Smyrna was an Amazon who took possession of Ephesus; and hence the name both of the inhabitants and of the city, just as certain of the Ephesians were called Sisyrbitae after Sisyrbe. Also a certain place belonging to Ephesus was called Smyrna, as Hipponax plainly indicates: He lived behind the city in Smyrna between Tracheia and Lepra Acte;Hipponax Fr. 44 (Bergk)for the name Lepra Acte was given to Mt. Prion, which lies above the present city and has on it a part of the city’s wall. At any rate, the possessions behind Prion are still now referred to as in the “opistholeprian” territory,i.e., in the territory “behind Lepra.” and the country alongside the mountain round Coressus was called “Tracheia.”i.e., “Rugged” country. The city was in ancient times round the Athenaeum, which is now outside the city near the Hypelaeus,A fountain. as it is called; so that Smyrna was near the present gymnasium, behind the present city, but between Tracheia and Lepra Acte. On departing from the Ephesians, the Smyrnaeans marched to the place where Smyrna now is, which was in the possession of the Leleges, and, having driven them out, they founded the ancient Smyrna, which is about twenty stadia distant from the present Smyrna. But later, being driven out by the Aeolians, they fled for refuge to Colophon, and then with the Colophonians returned to their own land and took it back, as Mimnermus tells us in his Nanno, after recalling that Smyrna was always an object of contention: After we left Pylus, the steep city of Neleus, we came by ship to lovely Asia, and with our overweening might settled in beloved Colophon, taking the initiative in grievous insolence. And from there, setting out from the Astëeis River, by the will of the gods we took Aeolian Smyrna.Mimnermus Fr. 9 (Bergk)So much, then, on this subject. But I must again go over the several parts in detail, beginning with the principal places, those where the foundings first took place, I mean those round Miletus and Ephesus; for these are the best and most famous cities.
