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Cilicia

The south-eastern corner of Anatolia, under its own kings, the army's crossing point to Cyprus

Cilicia was the coastal plain and mountains of south-eastern Anatolia, facing Cyprus across a narrow sea. Its own kings, each called Syennesis by the Greeks, ruled it under the Persian King. Its harbours and plain were where the King's armies gathered to sail west, against Cyprus in 497 BCE and against Eretria and Athens in 490 BCE.

Nel gioco: The Sardis Burns level tells of the army crossing from Cilicia to win back Cyprus, and the Athos and Marathon chatter of the fleets that sailed from it. The Cilicians have their flag among the nations.

Kings called Syennesis

Racconto antico

Herodotus names a Syennesis of Cilicia who helped make peace between the Lydians and Medes after the eclipse battle, and another, son of Oromedon, who commanded the Cilician ships in 480 BCE. The name seems to have been a title the Greeks took for a personal name.

Herodotus 1.74, 7.98

Horses and silver

Racconto antico

Herodotus says Cilicia paid 360 white horses, one for each day, and 500 talents of silver a year. Of that silver, 140 talents went to the horsemen who guarded the country, and the rest to the King.

Herodotus 3.90

The crossing to Cyprus

Racconto antico

When the Cypriot towns joined the Ionian revolt in 497 BCE, Herodotus says, the Persian general Artybius brought an army by sea to Cilicia and crossed from there to Cyprus. The Phoenician fleet sailed round to Cyprus with it, and within a year the island was the King's again.

Herodotus 5.108-116

The Aleian plain, 490 BCE

Racconto antico

Datis and Artaphernes gathered their army on the Aleian plain in Cilicia, Herodotus says. There the fleet took the soldiers and horses on board, sailed to Samos and then across the Aegean by the islands, to Naxos, Delos, Eretria and Marathon.

Herodotus 6.95

A hundred ships for Xerxes

Racconto antico

In 480 BCE the Cilicians sent 100 ships to Xerxes' fleet. Herodotus says their crews wore their native helmets and carried shields of rawhide, with woollen tunics, two javelins each and swords like Egyptian ones.

Herodotus 7.91