Search

This study examines the participation of Cilician Armenians in the Mongol Ilkhanate's Syrian invasions in 1259–1260. Drawing upon data from mediaeval sources and various perspectives in scholarly literature, this paper addresses the following key questions: 1. Where were the troops of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia and their allied countries consolidated? 2. To what extent did the troops of the Armenian King Het'um I join forces with the Mongols? The inquiry also presents the specific details of the capture of Syrian cities and explores the likelihood of Armenian troops' involvement in these operations. In the final section, the paper delves into the events surrounding the famous Battle of Ain-Jalut and examines the potential participation of Armenians in this pivotal conflict, in which the allies suffered defeat and were subsequently compelled to retreat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Adalya is the property of Koc University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper argues that the unusual determinative MANUS+MANUS of the goddess Pahalati in Hama that resisted explanation until now can be understood due to its new attestation in the logographic spelling of a Cilician toponym. It will be shown that an earlier attempt that identified MANUS+MANUS as a variant of MAGNUS, the city as Urušša, and the name of the goddess as a Phoenician-Luwian mixed phrase meaning 'Great Lady', is palaeographically, linguistically, and geographically impossible. A clue to the decipherment of MANUS+MANUS is provided by the homo(io)phonous settlement in Cilicia, Pahra-, which explains how the same sign could have been used both as a determinative and as a logogram in accordance with the regular rules of the usage of the determinatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jean d'Arras's romance Mélusine (1393) has been referred to as a "Founding Fiction" of medieval France. Around 1500 it was translated into English. Focusing on the Cilician Armenian episode, this paper finds that the colonizing imperative of d'Arras's text is resisted in the English translation. A comparison of the two versions reveals that the love relation depicted as seamless in d'Arras's version is fractured in the English translation, destabilizing the hegemonic identities of the chivalric hero and courtly heroine. The failure of the love relation and the sacrifice of the courtly heroine in the English text can be read as resistance to the sanitization of Lusignan ascendancy and the imagined community of a unified Christian/Lusignan world that d'Arras's text presents. Reading the relationship crisis through the lenses of Monique Scheer's practice theory of emotions, and Luce Irigaray's and Homi Bhabha's theorizations of mimicry, this essay argues that the English text invites a comparison with history. In this way the English text makes a space for local Cilician Armenian histories, which d'Arras's version appropriates and instrumentally consumes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arkeoloji Dergisi is the property of Ege University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Mediterranea - Ricerche Storiche is the property of Mediterranea-Ricerche Storiche and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Arkhaia Anatolika: The Journal of Anatolian Archaeological Studies is the property of Arkhaia Anatolika and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Nersēs of Lambron (d. 1198) was a prolific Armenian writer whose works contain several colophons, of which five have a bearing on the Third Crusade. While some colophons serve as prefaces to his writings, others are addenda on circumstances at the time of writing or on later events. The scant history of scholarship devoted to them reveals an unwarranted assumption that has led early scholars to conclude that Nersēs was in Jerusalem when the city fell to Saladin in 1187. The article focuses on the five colophons in chronological order, offering a literary-historical analysis. The colophons composed in quatrains are of particular interest, as are others where a continuator's hand is discernible—whether on the piety of Benedictine monks in the Holy City or on naval movements around Acre. While the study disproves the assumption that Nersēs was in Jerusalem then (or at any time), it underscores the historical significance of these colophons in reflecting Armeno-Cilician sentiments during the period—such as toward the apparently unsatisfactory outcome of the battle of Arsuf (1191). Subsequent hopes of victory and the eventual redemption of Jerusalem were hence anchored in the nascent kingdom of Cilician Armenia (1199–1375). The conclusion draws attention to the absolute necessity of scrutinizing 'eyewitness' accounts surrounding the crusades and to the need of reading the rest of Nersēs's colophons critically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to show how local civic communities, nominally subject to the Seleucid dynasts, integrated Roman magistrates into an existing framework of authority during the late second and early first centuries BCE. I argue that as Roman magistrates played an increasingly significant role in the region, cities initially framed them in quasi-regal terms, which their interlocutors consciously accepted. Through a close reading of two Roman letters to the Cilician city of Mopsuestia, dated to 87 BCE (SEG 44.1227), and analysis of literary, epigraphic, and numismatic evidence for the final collapse of Seleucid authority in the early 60s BCE, I reveal that this was a locally driven process. Consequently, local agents played a critical role in both legitimising Roman hegemony in local contexts and encouraging Roman intervention within the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of CEDRUS is the property of Mediterranean Civilisations Research Institute and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper presents the results of the analysis of over 30 clay coffins of the Roman period, most of which originate from central and eastern Cilicia on the south-eastern coast of Turkey and are kept in the museums of Anamur, Mersin, Tarsus, and Adana. After a short review of the use of terracotta sarcophagi in various parts of the ancient Near East (from Egypt to Anatolia), a survey of terracotta sarcophagi in Turkey is provided, followed by a typology of clay coffins in central and eastern Cilicia and their chronology. The catalogue presents each coffin individually. It appears that burials in clay coffins were popular in central and eastern Cilicia especially in the second and third centuries ad. They mainly occur in an area stretching from Elaiussa Sebaste in the west to the Plain of Adana in the east, with a clear concentration in Tarsus, i.e. the Roman metropolis of the Province of Cilicia. At least some of them must have been locally produced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arkhaia Anatolika: The Journal of Anatolian Archaeological Studies is the property of Arkhaia Anatolika and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The paper addresses several issues concerning interpretation of two Hieroglyphic- Luwian inscriptions from Cilicia (the KARATEPE and ÇİNEKÖY bilinguals). It is suggested that ÇİNEKÖY §§ 8–10 (new numbering) describes drainage of marshlands, with the hieroglyphic combination FONS.*311 concealing luliyasḫa- 'marshland'. A similar interpretation can be further proposed for KARATEPE §§ 11–13 in which the old crux (*255)mara/i-ia-ní- is interpreted as a reflex of PIE *mori- 'sea, lake' and verb ARḪA ma-ki-sa- as 'drain' (etymologically connected with PIE *mok- 'wet'). A separate section (§ 3) discusses the semantics of the suffix -an- seen in mariyani- and its relationship to the 'Hoffmann suffix' (-Hon-). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arkeoloji Dergisi is the property of Ege University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Situated within the sphere of influence of the major core areas of the ancient Near Eastern civilizations, the plain of Cilicia can easily be defined as a border zone where different systems interact. The early first millennium BC was a period of deep social and political interaction in the region which took place among groups of populations of different origins, including Luwian-speakers, Phoenicians, Cypriots and, probably, Greeks. Delimited by the Taurus and the Amanus ranges, and the Mediterranean coast, it constituted the Neo-Hittite state of Que, the capital of which was ancient Adana. The results of the cultural mixing are clearly visible in the material culture assemblages that are known from the major centres of the region, among which Misis, the site of ancient Mopsouestia, must be counted. The purpose of this paper is to focus on the phenomena of entanglement in Iron Age II Misis and their relevance for a better understanding of the making of the local social fabric. It also intends to show how a condition of extended multiculturalism contributed to shaping the cultural identity and the social practices of the Cilician city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of CEDRUS is the property of Mediterranean Civilisations Research Institute and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

At some time around August 324 b.c., Antipater, the regent of Macedonia received orders from Alexander the Great that he was to be replaced with another eminent officer in the Macedonian court, Craterus. In addition to his removal from office, Antipater was ordered by Alexander to leave Macedonia for the East, bringing with him fresh levies to replenish those that comprised Craterus' own contingent of veterans from Opis. Though Craterus left Alexander's court shortly thereafter, neither man can be said to have made the journey speedily or directly. A range of reasons has been given to explain Craterus' slow advancement, including the construction of infrastructure to allow the transportation of military resources from east to west, the poor state of his health, and the need to recruit more men. By the time of Alexander's death in June of 323, Craterus and his forces had only reached the province of Cilicia in southeastern Anatolia. Antipater's immediate reaction to his new role is not recorded, but what is known is that he remained steadfast in Macedonia, seemingly in defiance of Alexander's orders. It is the purpose of this paper to evaluate Antipater's refusal to depart from Macedonia, to explore whether tensions between Antipater and his replacement could account for Craterus' sluggish advance and to highlight the impact that Greek domestic politics had on Antipater's position in Macedonia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the subject of wines from Cyprus and Cilicia during Antiquity, on the basis of literary and archaeological (amphoras) evidence. It focuses upon organoleptic characteristics of these wines as well as their exportation in the Mediterranean. The author attempts to estimate the scale of their consumption in three important centres in the Mediterranean (Alexandria, Ephesus and Rome) during the late Hellenistic and Roman Age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pompey does not accept defeat at Pharsalus. Rather, in an effort to gain support from powers beyond Rome, he makes for Egypt and, unbeknownst to him, his decapitation. As narrated in Lucan's Bellum ciuile, after deliberating in Cilicia with his senatorial advisers (8.259–455), Pompey stops at the island of Cyprus (8.456–9): tum Cilicum liquere solum Cyproque citatas immisere rates, nullas cui praetulit aras undae diua memor Paphiae, si numina nasci credimus aut quemquam fas est coepisse deorum. Then they left the Cilician soil and steered their vessels in haste for Cyprus—Cyprus which the goddess, mindful of Paphian waves, prefers to any of her shrines (if we believe that deities have birth, or if it is lawful to hold that any of the gods had a beginning). In Lucan, Pompey's trip to Cyprus is brief and includes a somewhat curious reference to Venus (diua), her origins (undae ... Paphiae) and the birth of the gods. Other authors also record Pompey's visit to Cyprus, although the details vary. Some, including Julius Caesar, set his deliberations not in Cilicia but on Cyprus itself (Caes. BCiu. 3.102.3.1–8.1; cf. Plut. Vit. Pomp. 77.1.1–2.1). Others, it seems, provide few if any details of Pompey at the island, for example the scanty evidence from Livy, Per. 112.1–10. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The site of Sirkeli Höyük in the province of Adana in modern Turkey is one of the largest settlement mounds in Plain Cilicia. In 2012, a geophysical survey revealed that the ancient settlement was not confined to the höyük, but also encompassed an extensive lower town to the southeast of the main mound. To gain information on the dating and development of this part of the settlement, an excavation area ("Sector F") was opened at a spot where the magnetometry survey suggested the presence of a city gate. Since then, archaeological work in this area has continuously produced new discoveries that help us understand how this residential area and its inhabitants developed throughout the periods of its occupation. Especially the Iron Age (Neo Cilician period) levels, which cover approximately the 11th–7th centuries B.C., provide important information on how this urban center of the Neo Hittite kingdom Hiyawa/Que changed over time and to which extent historical events impacted the people living in one of its residential areas. This contribution discusses the stratigraphic sequence, the pottery, and the archaeobotanical remains discovered in Sector F during the 2013–2019 campaigns, and concludes with a synthesis of the development in this area from a historical perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between the Luwian and Phoenician versions of the bilingual texts emanating from Cilicia has never been systematically studied from the philological viewpoint. In this paper I endeavour to demonstrate that a converging set of formal arguments supports the primary character of the Phoenician versions of the ÇINEKÖY and KARATEPE 1 bilinguals and the secondary character of their Luwian versions. I interpret this as a metaphor for the relationship between two ethnic constituents of the Neo-Hittite principality of Que, whose coexistence was earlier argued for on independent grounds. According to the proposed interpretation, the Phoenician language was emblematic of the rulers of Que, who claimed Greek descent and therefore attempted to distance themselves from the traditional elites of the neighbouring Neo-Hittite states. The use of the Luwian language was a concession to the indigenous population of Que. The adoption of Phoenician as a language of written expression by the Greek colonists in Cilicia happened at the point when the Linear B script had been forgotten and represented the first step toward the creation of the Greek alphabet. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The terracotta rhyton in the form of a bull's head presented in this brief communication, dated most probably to the 1st century BC, is of unknown provenance, in the collection of the Museum of Tarsus since 1973. It is in very good condition and shows an admirable level of craftsmanship. Rhyta were ceremonial vessels that had taken on a votive function in the Hellenistic period when they were frequently deposited in the tombs as part of the grave goods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European medieval scholarship has generally overlooked the topographical and geographical descriptions relating to the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. This study examines Medieval Arabic historiographies and collates the geographical treatises that contain information related to the history of a harbor fortress in Cilicia, on which Armenian sources are virtually silent. The fortification was named "Canamella" or "Caramella" by the Franks. In Arabic historiography it was called al-Tīnī or Ḥiṣn al-Тīnāt. An attempt is made to gather and collate all data preserved in Muslim and other foreign historical and geographical works, travel accounts, documents and maps of X-XIV cc. about this port town. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of CEDRUS is the property of Mediterranean Civilisations Research Institute and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista de Estudios Sociales is the property of Universidad de los Andes and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Afyon Kocatepe University Journal of Social Sciences / Afyon Kocatepe Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi is the property of Afyon Kocatepe University (AKU) Sosyal Bilimler Enstitusu and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In 1937, British archaeologist John Garstang (1876-1956) excavated several trenches at the site of Kazanlı Höyük as part of the Neilson Expedition in Cilicia. The site is located in Plain Cilicia, approximately 2 km from the modern coastline (ca. 11 km east of modern-day Mersin, and 17 km west of Tarsus, roughly located by the ancient/modern road connecting these two cities). After these short trial excavations, however, Garstang's interest shifted to the site of Mersin/Yumuktepe, where he then excavated for a number of years. Apart from two very brief preliminary reports on his excavations at Kazanlı Höyük, which were published in the journal "Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology of the University of Liverpool," not much is known about his work at the site. Unpublished photographs kept in the Special Collections of the University College London (UCL) shed new light on Garstang's work at the site. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent excavations at Kinet Höyük, an ancient Cilician seaport in the northeastern Mediterranean, document the cultural transformations that were exerted by the Late Bronze Age Hittite state to secure its peripheral territories. During the Middle Bronze Age, Kinet Höyük had maintained its regional identity while prospering from the maritime commercial network that flourished along the Levantine coast. This regional profile changed when Kinet Höyük and its Cilician neighbors came under Hittite pressure ca. 1500 b.c.e., and adopted the material culture of central Anatolia. As the Hittite seaport Izziya, Kinet Höyük shows that the Anatolianizing process was sudden, effective, and enduring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distribution of crustaceans in 3 transects (including depths of 10, 25, 50, 75, 100, and 200 m) of oligotrophic soft bottoms of the Levantine Sea shelf located near Kumkuyu, Limonlu, and Erdemli was studied in 2000 to show its association with depth-dependent environmental parameters in representative months of each season (winter, spring, summer, and autumn). A total of 90 crustacean species was found; species richness was highest in winter and autumn and between 50 and 100 m in depth. There was a peak value in abundances in the warm season and at a depth interval of 10 to 50 m, whereas highest values of biomass were recorded in May and August and at a depth of 25 m. A seasonal variation at depths shallower than 75 m was observed for evenness values, which were more stable in deeper waters in all seasons. Two main crustacean assemblages were determined, the first corresponding to shallow bottoms (10, 25-100 m) and the other to deeper bottoms (150-200 m). Besides the grain size and total organic carbon content of the sediment, depth is the most important factor in determining the crustacean assemblage. Hydrographic characteristics of the water column made up 2 seasonal crustacean assemblages: the first in February and May, and the other in August and November. Therefore, all factors governing the crustacean distribution were found to be related to the bottom depth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the collapse of the Hittite Empire in about 1200 B.C.E., the social transition into the Iron Age, and the discovery of epigraphic artifacts. The relocation of political power from the Hittite kingdom of Hattusa to the kingdoms of Karkamish and Tarhuntassa, seal impressions for Karkamish's king Kuzi-Teshub whose genealogy is noted, and the end of the Bronze Age are mentioned. The continuation of Hittite imperial tradition in the formation of Neo-Hittite states after the empire's dissolution and in the inscriptions written in Hieroglyphic script and Luwian language is discussed. A description is given for artifacts such as the Storm God sculptures found in the Assyrian province of Cilicia and at the Aleppo citadel.

This article examines the petitions, letters, opinion pieces and scholarly works that Armenian intellectuals generated to convince French decision-makers to carve an Armenian nation-state out of Cilicia (present-day southern Turkey). This colonial encounter took place within the process by which European powers dismembered the defeated Ottoman state following the First World War. These "geo-texts"—textual representations of territory and population—were strategic attempts at adjusting the parameters of French imperialism, and thus tapped into French notions of history and ethnology to make a case for an Armenian state. First, I show how Armenians adopted and inflected French epistemologies to depict their ancient homeland. Then, I trace the shift from a representation based on historical commonalities between the Armenians and French to one that stressed the ethnological specificities of Armenian nation and territory. Finally, I argue that the static notions of territory, text and population that lobbyists produced continue to fuel scholarly debate over the confessional and ethnic make-up of Cilicia. This study on "geo-texts" provides insights into how, at a certain historical moment, differences and similarities among people, both within a society and between societies, are established in text. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]