Tralleis

The ancient city of Tralleis is located north of the province of Aydın, on a wide and high plateau on the southern slope of Kestane Mountain (Mesogis). In ancient texts the boundary being the Meander River or Mount Mesogis has sometimes caused the city to be shown as being within Caria and sometimes within the region of Lydia. Strabo says that on the left of the ancient road coming from Magnesia to Tralleis lies Mount Mesogis, on the right lies the plain of the Maiandros River, and that the surroundings of the city were settled by a people as rich as the other cities of Anatolia, and that some inhabitants of the city attained important positions in other provinces.

History of Tralleis

Founded on the fertile soils of the Meander basin, this city changed hands frequently among the Hellenistic kingdoms after being taken by Alexander. The city's name appears in ancient sources mainly as Tralleis, rarely also as Trallis. The Athenian historian Xenophon mentions the city as Tralli in his works Anabasis and Hellenica. Like other ancient cities, Tralleis was founded by the tribe of the Traller and the Argonians after the Dorian migrations and took its name from them. However, there is also the notion that the city's name derives from an Amazon named Tralla or Thiba. According to the ancient writer Pliny the Elder, the inhabitants' water needs were met by the Eudon (Bathhouse) River, formed by the confluence of the spring called Thebaid that runs through Tralleis. The only structure still standing today in Tralleis is the ruin of a gymnasium, built in the 2nd century and known as the “Three Eyes,” which was one of the leading buildings of antiquity in education, sport, and culture.

The Dedekuyusu (Deştepe) Mound on the southwest of the city of Tralleis provides information about the early history of the city. Excavations on the mound have yielded ceramics belonging to the Chalcolithic Age, Early and Middle Bronze Ages. However, our knowledge of the city's history before the Classical Period is insufficient. In 546 BC, after the Persians ended the Kingdom of Lydia, the city of Tralleis entered the administration of the Persian Empire. Tralleis was a Persian satrapy under the young Cyrus during the time of Xenophon. From the notes of documentary filmmaker Tekin Gün, who researched the ancient city of Tralleis in 2011, it is understood that after being defeated in the campaign organized in 401–400 BC to depose the Persian king Artaxerxes, the brother of the young Cyrus, Tralleis became a central location under Persian control attached to the Carian satrapy.

With Alexander the Great's defeat of Persian King Darius III in 334 BC and his entry into Anatolia, Tralleis, like many other western Anatolian cities, voluntarily accepted the dominion of the Kingdom of Macedonia. It is known that after Alexander captured Halicarnassus, before setting out for Phrygia he had catapults and other war machines transported to Tralleis, and after taking Halicarnassus he gave the satrapy of all Caria to Idaeus' wife Ada. After Alexander's death in 323 BC, during the Wars of the Diadochi (successors) among the generals the city briefly passed between Asander, Antigonus and Lysimachus. After the Battle of Corupedium in 281 BC among the Diadochi, it came under the rule of the Seleucid Kingdom and took the name Seleukeia. Our information on the city's condition during the Seleucid period is insufficient. However, at the Battle of Magnesia near Mount Sipylus (Yamanlar) in 190 BC, the people of Tralleis supported Seleucus III Antiochus (241‑187 BC) against the king of Pergamon, Eumenes II (197‑159 BC), and his Roman allies. All these events show that in 190 BC the city was a city belonging to the Seleucid Kingdom. After the defeat, the Tralleans went to the Roman consul Lucilius Cornelius Scipio to ask for pardon and to submit to Roman rule. Following the defeat of Seleucid king Antiochus III at Magnesia and the Apamea Peace in 188 BC, the political structure of western and southwestern Anatolia underwent a major change. At this time, like many other western Anatolian cities, Tralleis was left by the Romans to the Kingdom of Pergamon under Eumenes II (197‑159 BC). Tralleis remained attached to the Kingdom of Pergamon from 188‑133 BC and entered Roman dominion in 133 BC by the will of the last Pergamene king, Attalus III. In 126 BC Tralleis participated in the revolt launched by Aristonicus against Rome in Anatolia. However, after Aristonicus' defeat the city was taxed and its right to mint kistophor was taken away. The resistance of the Tralleans did not end with this event. In 88 BC the city also supported the uprising of Pontic king Mithridates VI against Rome. For this purpose, Romans and Roman supporters gathered at the Temple of Concordia and were slain by Mithridates' soldiers. After Dulla's defeat of Pontic king Mithridates, the cities that had taken part in the revolt were punished by the Romans with heavy taxes for five years. Later, under Pompeius' moderate policy, taxes were reduced and an economic recovery began. The resurgence of Tralleis was significantly aided by Pythodoros, a Nysa merchant living in Tralleis and a close friend of Pompeius, and the city resumed minting kistophor after 58 BC.