Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Maps and Figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Map 1 The Maeander valley
- 1 The valley
- 2 Hydrographic heroes
- 3 The nature of Roman Apamea
- 4 The fortress at Eumenea
- 5 The pastoral economy
- 6 The nobility of Mt Cadmus
- 7 The rural economy
- 8 The bounty of the Maeander
- Epilogue The historical geography of the Maeander valley
- Bibliography
- Index
2 - Hydrographic heroes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 October 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Maps and Figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Map 1 The Maeander valley
- 1 The valley
- 2 Hydrographic heroes
- 3 The nature of Roman Apamea
- 4 The fortress at Eumenea
- 5 The pastoral economy
- 6 The nobility of Mt Cadmus
- 7 The rural economy
- 8 The bounty of the Maeander
- Epilogue The historical geography of the Maeander valley
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The shepherd-poet of Smyrna, after mentioning a cave in Phrygia sacred to the Nymphs, relates, that there Luna had once descended from the sky to Endymion, while he was sleeping by his herds; that marks of their bed were then extant under the oaks; and that in the thickets around it the milk of cows had been spilt, which men beheld still with admiration; for, such was the appearance, if you saw it very far off; but, that from thence flowed clear or warm water, which in a little while concreted round about the channels, and formed a stone pavement. The writer describes the cliff of Hierapolis, if I mistake not, as in his time; and has added a local story, current when he lived. It was the genius of the people to unite fiction with truth; and, as in this and other instances, to dignify the tales of their mythology with fabulous evidence, taken from the natural wonders, in which their country abounded.
Setting the scene: Claudian's Phrygia
In the spring of ad 399, the highlands of Phrygia saw a sudden and violent uprising by Gothic settlers in the region, under the leadership of a certain Tribigild. These were the survivors of the great Gothic army brought across the Danube by Odotheus thirteen years earlier, whom the emperor Theodosius I, after a decisive victory at the Danube, had settled in Phrygia in dispersed units as laeti, barbarian settlers tied to the soil and liable for military service. With Tribigild's rebellion began the dramatic sequence of events which would lead to the fall of the eunuch Eutropius and the short-lived coup of Gainas at Constantinople in ad 400.
The poet Claudian dedicates the greater part of his second invective against Eutropius to a spectacular and overwrought narrative of the Gothic uprising. The Gothic settlement in Phrygia serves as the occasion for a long geographical excursus on the Phrygians, including a beautiful thumbnail sketch of the topography and mythology of Phrygia. Claudian begins by marking out the cultural boundaries of the Phrygians: to the north lies Bithynia, to the west Ionia, and to the east the Galatians. The Lydians, not fitting neatly into this schema, are located, vaguely, ‘on both sides’; to the south live the ferocious warriors of Pisidia. Claudian then turns to the mythological and natural riches of Phrygia.
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- Information
- The Maeander ValleyA Historical Geography from Antiquity to Byzantium, pp. 50 - 98Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011