Greek city of Knidos in Caria -
Bronze 14mm (3.0 grams) Struck circa 300-200 B.C.
Head of Hercules right, wearing lion-skin headdress.
Thunderbolt, NIΔΕΩΝ underneath.
A city of very early foundation, and a great cultural and
commercial center, Knidos was originally sited on the south coast of the long
penisula at the south-west corner of Asia Minor. About the time of Alexander the
city was re-founded at the western extremity of the peninsula, where it
continued to flourish down to Roman times.
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Knidos or Cnidus (pronounced
/ˈnaɪdəs/) (Greek:
Κνίδος [knidos]) was an
ancient Greek city of
Caria, part of
the
Dorian Hexapolis. It was situated on the
Datça peninsula, which forms the southern side of the
Sinus Ceramicus or
Gulf of Gökova. By the fourth century BCE, Knidos was located at the site of
modern
Tekir, opposite Triopion Island. But earlier, it was probably at the site of
modern Datça (at the half-way point of the peninsula).[1]
It was built partly on the mainland and partly on the Island of Triopion or
Cape Krio. The debate about it being an island or cape is caused by the fact
that in ancient times it was connected to the mainland by a causeway and bridge.
Today the connection is formed by a narrow sandy
isthmus. By
means of the causeway the channel between island and mainland was formed into
two harbours, of which the larger, or southern, was further enclosed by two
strongly-built moles that are still in good part entire.
The extreme length of the city was little less than a mile, and the whole
intramural area is still thickly strewn with architectural remains. The walls,
both of the island and on the mainland, can be traced throughout their whole
circuit; and in many places, especially round the acropolis, at the northeast
corner of the city, they are remarkably perfect. The first Western knowledge of
the site was due to the mission of the
Dilettante Society in 1812, and the excavations executed by C. T. Newton in
1857-1858.
The agora, the
theatre, an
odeum, a temple of
Dionysus, a
temple of the Muses, a temple of
Aphrodite
and a great number of minor buildings have been identified, and the general plan
of the city has been very clearly made out. The most famous statue by
Praxiteles,
the
Aphrodite of Knidos, was made for Cnidus. It has perished, but late copies
exist, of which the most faithful is in the
Vatican Museums.
In a temple enclosure Newton discovered a fine seated statue of
Demeter,
which he sent back to the
British Museum, and about three miles south-east of the city he came upon
the ruins of a splendid tomb, and a colossal figure of a lion carved out of one
block of
Pentelic marble, ten feet in length and six in height, which has been
supposed to commemorate the great naval victory, the
Battle of Cnidus in which
Conon defeated
the
Lacedaemonians in
394 BC.
Knidos was a city of high antiquity and as a Hellenic city probably of
Lacedaemonian colonization. Along with
Halicarnassus (present day
Bodrum,
Turkey) and Kos,
and the Rhodian
cities of Lindos,
Kamiros and
Ialyssos it formed the
Dorian Hexapolis, which held its confederate assemblies on the Triopian
headland, and there celebrated games in honour of
Apollo,
Poseidon
and the nymphs.
The city was at first governed by an
oligarchic
senate,
composed of sixty members, and presided over by a magistrate; but, though it is
proved by inscriptions that the old names continued to a very late period, the
constitution underwent a popular transformation. The situation of the city was
favourable for commerce, and the Knidians acquired considerable wealth, and were
able to colonize the island of
Lipara, and founded a city on
Corcyra Nigra in the
Adriatic. They ultimately submitted to
Cyrus, and from the
battle of Eurymedon to the latter part of the
Peloponnesian War they were subject to
Athens.
In their expansion into the region, the
Romans
easily obtained the allegiance of Knidians, and rewarded them for help given
against
Antiochus by leaving them the freedom of their city.
During the
Byzantine period there must still have been a considerable population: for
the ruins contain a large number of buildings belonging to the Byzantine style,
and Christian sepulchres are common in the neighbourhood.
Eudoxus, the
astronomer,
Ctesias, the
writer on
Persian history, and
Sostratus, the builder of the celebrated
Pharos at Alexandria, are the most remarkable of the Knidians mentioned in
history.
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