Alikarnasos

Halicarnassus lies on a peninsula of the same name stretching into the Gulf of Ceramus. The city was often compared to a Greek theatre, with the nearly circular enclosed harbor (λιμην κλειστός) as the dancing floor and the city rising to the surrounding hills like the seats. Originally, the city was bounded by Zephyrion in the east, where the Greeks were concentrated, and Salmacis in the west, where the Carians and possibly an even earlier population of Leleges lived. Between them lay a necropolis.

In the 4th century BC, Mausolus rebuilt the city, bringing in the people from a number of nearby villages. The new city was centered on the harbor, with a wall more than 6 kilometers (almost 10 miles) long. It had an orthogonal street plan, and the chief road was 10 stadia (about 1.76 kilometers or almost 3 miles) in length. The tomb of Mausolus would be built at the exact center of this road, which was also the exact center of the curve of the walls.

History

According to legend, the ancient Carian city welcomed Greek settlers from Troezen led by a son of Poseidon named Anthes in 1175 BC. While the Greeks probably did not arrive quite that early, they did arrive sometime in the 11th/10th century, as part of the Ionian colonization. Despite the apparent Doric origins of the city’s Greeks and the many Doric cultural institutions, Ionian Greek was always the official and vernacular language.

Initially, the Greeks settled on the island of Zephyrion, later also moving to the mainland directly opposite. At some point the island was connected to the mainland. The Carians mostly lived in Salmacis, around the sacred spring of the same name. When they wanted to trade with each other, they met in the agora near the harbor. The two populations got along relatively well, often intermarrying, but there were also tensions between the two groups into the fourth century BC.

Halicarnassus was part of the Doric Hexapolis in Asia Minor, a cultic community of six cities. The others were Lindus, Camirus, Ialysus, Cos and Cnidus. However, they were expelled from the league quite early when one of the town’s citizens, Agasicles, took home the tripod he won at the Triopian games instead of dedicating at the temple of Triopian Apollo as custom dictated.

In the mid-sixth century BC, the city probably fell under the sway of Croesus’ Lydian Empire. Croesus was soon conquered by the Persians, who established a satrap named Lygdamis in the city. He was succeeded by his daughter Artemisia I, the first truly famous Halicarnassene we know of. She sent a contingent of ships to join the invasion of Greece by Xerxes in 480 BC. She led them herself, and so distinguished herself during the Battle of Salamis, that Xerxes is said to have cried out, “My men have turned into women, and my women into men!”

After the Persian Wars, Halicarnassus joined the Delian League. In 457 BC, there was an attempted revolt against the tyrant Lygdamis, probably the grandson of Artemisia. One of the rebels who was killed was the epic poet Panyassis. His nephew, or perhaps younger cousin, was Herdotus, the famous historian also known as the Father of History. During the revolts, Herodotus had to flee to Samos, probably beginning his famous journeys.

Sometime toward the end of the Peloponnesian War, Halicarnassus fell back under Persian rule. This was confirmed in the Peace of Antalcidas in 386 BC, but the city had already been incorporated into the satrapy of Caria. The first satrap of Caria was a man named Hecatomnus of Mylasa. He was succeeded by his son Mausolus, who moved the capital of Caria to Halicarnassus and greatly expanded the city. He built a wall which encompassed Salmacis in the west and followed the hills until it reached the sea again east of Zephyrion. The streets were laid out in a Hippodamian, orthogonal grid, and Mausolus’ famous tomb would rise at the exact center of the city.

Mausolus died in 352 BC and was succeeded by his devoted sister-wife Artemisia II. She was noted for her grief at the loss of her husband. She commissioned the greatest artists to decorate his magnificent tomb, which would become one of the seven wonders of the ancient world and give us our word for any freestanding tomb: the Mausoleum. She was also said to drink some of his ashes mixed in wine every day. Still, like her namesake predecessor, she was also a warrior. She repelled an invasion from Rhodes and responded by placing the oligarchic party on that island in power and building a monument there. All of this in only two years; she died in 350 BC.

Artemisia was succeeded by her sister Ada and brother Idreius (who were also married). Sometime after the death of Idreius, Ada was deposed by her brother Pixodarus, who favored a pro-Macedonian policy. Ada retreated to the fortress of Alinda. Memnon of Rhodes made Halicarnassus one of his bases for opposing the invasion of Alexander the Great. When Alexander arrived in 334 BC, she handed the fortress over to him and adopted Alexander as her son, earning him the sympathy of many Carian cities. He recognized her as the Queen of Caria. According to Strabo, she commanded the Carian forces at the siege of Halicarnassus and captured one of the two acropoleis.

After the death of Alexander, the city was first ruled by Antigonus Monopthalmus; then became part of the empire of Lysimachus. Later, it became a province of the Ptolemaic empire, but changed to Seleucid hands before the mid-third century. Halicarnassus supported the Romans against Antiochus III. In 88 BC, the city fell to Mithridates VI; in 80 it was ravaged by Verres, the Roman governor of Cilicia; it was attacked by pirates from 62-58 BC. In 58 BC, the city was finally incorporated into the Roman province of Asia, and recovered thanks to the care of its governor, Quintus Cicero (the brother of the famous orator). The city supported Caesar in the civil wars, and followed his policy of allowing the Jews to worship freely. In AD 26, they applied to build a temple to the Emperor Tiberius, claiming that the chosen site had not been afflicted by earthquakes since the city’s founding; the application was denied.

The city slowly faded into obscurity after that. The city became part of the eastern Roman Empire in 395. In the 13th century, it was captured by the Seljuks. In 1402, the Knights of St. John of Rhodes took over and built the fortress of S. Pietro on the former island of Zephyrion. Much of their building material was taken from the already damaged Mausoleum, which was ultimately razed to the ground. In 1523, the Knights withdrew against the overwhelming forces of Suleiman the Magnificent and the city has been Turkish ever since.

Also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halicarnassus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/252472/Halicarnassus

http://www.livius.org/ha-hd/halicarnassus/halicarnassus.html