Pinara

From Jatland Wiki
(Redirected from Pandarus)
Author:Laxman Burdak, IFS (R)
Map of Lycia showing significant ancient cities and some major mountains and rivers. Red dots are mountain peaks, white dots are ancient cities.
Map of Turkey

Pinara was a large ancient city of Lycia at the foot of Mount Cragus (now Mount Babadağ), and not far from the western bank of the River Xanthos, homonymous with the ancient city of Xanthos (now Eşen Stream). The name Pinara has somewhat been assimilated to the name of the present-day village of Minare, half an hour below the ruins and depending Fethiye district of Muğla Province, Turkey.

Variants of name

Jat Gotras Namesake

Jat clans

Pandar - There was a cult of Pandarus, the Lycian hero of the Trojan War, in Pinara, which led some sources to conclude that he was a native of the city of Pinara.[1] Pandar Jats are descendants of Nagavanshi king Pandara (पाण्डर). (See - List of Naga Rajas).[2]

Origin of Name

There was a cult of Pandarus, the Lycian hero of the Trojan War, in Pinara, which led some sources to conclude that he was a native of the city.[3]

According to the Lycian history of Menecrates, quoted by Stephanus of Byzantium[4][5] the city was a colony of Xanthos, its original name would be Artymnesos. This name would have preceded the Lycian language name Pinara, derived from the form "Pilleñni" or "Pinale" meaning a "round hill" or simply "round",[6] based on a hypothesis of interchange of liquid consonants. The town is indeed situated on such a great round mass of rock and a more or less circular crag towers over the ruins. Another source, Panyassis, also mentions an eponymous founder by name Pinarus, son of Tremiles or Termilus, and this account is viewed by some sources as unsubstantial as the rest relating to the precedence of names.

History

The remains of several ancient temples can be seen in Pinara, as well as rock tombs including one "royal tomb", an upper and a lower acropolis, a theatre, an odeon, an agora and a church. The name Pinara has somewhat been assimilated to the name of the present-day village of Minare, half an hour below the ruins and depending Fethiye district of Muğla Province, Turkey.

The city, though not often mentioned by ancient writers, appears from its vast and beautiful ruins to have been, as Strabo asserts, one of Lycia's largest, its chief port city until the harbor silted up to form the reed-filled wetlands of today.[7]

Yet another rare mention of the city in ancient sources is in connection with the help it provided, along with several other Lycian cities, to Pixodarus of Caria. Pinara was a member of the Lycian League, in which it held three votes. The city surrendered to Alexander the Great in 334 BCE. After Alexander's death, the city fell to the kingdom of Pergamum. Pinara became a Roman city when Pergamum was willed by its last king Attalus III to the Roman Republic in 133 BCE. The city enjoyed prosperity during Roman rule, but was badly damaged by earthquakes in 141 and 240 CE. In the first occurrence, the city is recorded to have received a contribution from Opramoas for the repair of public buildings.

Pinara was Christianized early. Five bishops are known: Eustathius, who signed the formula of Acacius of Cæsarea at the Council of Seleucia in 359; Heliodorus, who signed the letter from the bishops of Lycia to the emperor Leo I the Thracian (458); Zenas, present at the Trullan Council (692); Theodore, at the Second Council of Nicaea (787); Athanasius, at the synod that reinstated Patriarch Photius I of Constantinople (the Photian Council) in 879. Pinara was the birthplace of Nicolas of Myra. Under repeated pressure from invading forces, the city lost its inhabitants in the ninth century.[8]

Scientific discovery

Pinara's ruins were identified by Sir Charles Fellows.[9] From amidst the ancient city, he says,[10] rises a singular round rocky cliff (the pinara of the Lycians), literally speckled all over with tombs. Beneath this cliff lie the ruins of the extensive and splendid city. The theater is in a very perfect state; all the seats are remaining, with the slanting sides towards the proscenium, as well as several of its doorways. The walls and several of the buildings are of the Cyclopean masonry, with massive gateways formed of three immense stones. The tombs are innumerable, and the inscriptions are in the Lycian characters, but Greek also occurs often on the same tombs. Some of these rock-tombs are adorned with fine and rich sculptures.

Ch 1.24 Alexander in Lycia and Pamphylia

Arrian[11] writes....Some of the Macedonians who served in Alexander's army had married just before he undertook the expedition. He thought that he ought not to treat these men with neglect, and therefore sent them back from Caria to spend the winter in Macedonia with their wives. He placed them under the command of Ptolemy, son of Seleucus, one of the royal body-guards, and of the two generals Coenus, son of Polemocrates, and Meleager, son of Neoptolemus, because they were also newly married. He gave these officers instructions to levy as many horse and foot soldiers as they could from the country, when they returned to him and brought back the men who had been sent away with them. By this act more than by any other Alexander acquired popularity among the Macedonians. He also sent Cleander, son of Polemocrates, to levy soldiers in Peloponnesus,[1] and Parmenio to Sardis, giving him the command of a regiment of the Cavalry Companions, the Thessalian cavalry, and the rest of the Grecian allies. He ordered him to take the wagons to Sardis and to advance from that place into Phrygia.

He himself marched towards Lycia and Pamphylia, in order to gain command of the coast-land, and by that means render the enemy's fleet useless. The first place on his route was Hyparna, a strong position, having a garrison of Grecian mercenaries; but he took it at the first assault, and allowed the Greeks to depart from the citadel under a truce. Then he invaded Lycia and brought over the Telmissians by capitulation; and crossing the river Xanthus, the cities of Pinara, Xanthus, Patara, and about thirty other smaller towns were surrendered to him.[2] Having accomplished this, though it was now the very depth of winter, he invaded the land called Milyas,[3] which is a part of Great Phrygia, but at that time paid tribute to Lycia, according to an arrangement made by the Great King. Hither came envoys from the Phaselites,[4] to treat for his friendship, and to crown him with a golden crown; and the majority of the maritime Lycians also sent heralds to him as ambassadors to treat for the same object. He ordered the Phaselites and Lycians to surrender their cities to those who were despatched by him to receive them; and they were all surrendered. He soon afterwards arrived himself at Phaselis, and helped the men of that city to capture a strong fort which had been constructed by the Pisidians to overawe the country; and sallying forth from which those barbarians used to inflict much damage upon the Phaselites who tilled the land.[5]

1. See Arrian, ii. 20 infra.

2. The Marmarians alone defended their city with desperate valour. They finally set fire to it, and escaped through the Macedonian camp to the mountains. See Diodorus (xvii. 28). As to Xanthus the river, see Homer (Iliad, ii. 877; vi. 172); Horace (Carm., iv. 6, 26).

3. Lycia was originally called Milyas; but the name was afterwards applied to the high table in the north of Lycia, extending into Pisidia. See Herodotus, i. 173.

4. Phaselis was a seaport of Lycia on the Gulf of Pamphylia. It is now called Tekrova.

5. He also crowned with garlands the statue of Theodectes the rhetorician, which the people of Phaselis, his native city, had erected to his memory. This man was a friend and pupil of Aristotle, the tutor of Alexander. See Plutarch (Life of Alex., 17); Aristotle (Nicom. Ethics, vii. 7).

p.66-68

References

  1. ↑ Strabo xiv. 665; Stephanus of Byzantium s.v. Artymnesos; Arrian, Anab. i. 24; Pliny the Elder, v. 28; Ptolemy v. 3. § 5; Hierocles p. 684.
  2. ↑ Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland, 1894 By L.A. Waddell, M.B., B.R.A.S.,pp.91-92
  3. ↑ Strabo xiv. 665; Stephanus of Byzantium s.v. Artymnesos; Arrian, Anab. i. 24; Pliny the Elder, v. 28; Ptolemy v. 3. § 5; Hierocles p. 684.
  4. ↑ Smith, William, ed. (1854). "Pinara". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray. p. 11
  5. ↑ Styephanus, s.v. Artymnesos Ἀρτύμνησος).
  6. ↑ Smith, William, ed. (1854). "Pinara". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray. p. 11
  7. ↑ Smith, William, ed. (1854). "Pinara". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray. p. 11
  8. ↑ Pétridès, Sophron (1911). "Pinara". In Herbermann, Charles. Catholic Encyclopedia. 12. New York: Robert Appleton.
  9. ↑ Smith, William, ed. (1854). "Pinara". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray. p. 11.
  10. ↑ Fellows, Sir Charles (2005) [1852]. Travels and Researches in Asia Minor, More Particularly in the Province of Lycia (reprinted ed.). p. 139. ISBN 1-4021-5278-7.p.136
  11. ↑ Arrian:The Anabasis of Alexander/1b, Ch.24

Back to Jat Places in Turkey

Retrieved from "https://www.jatland.com/w/index.php?title=Pinara&oldid=582853"