ALABANDA
(Araphisar) Caria, Turkey.
About
11 km W of the present town of Çine. It was one of the
three inland cities of Caria which Strabo considered noteworthy. According to Stephanos of Byzantium it was
named by King Kar after his son Alabandos in consequence of a cavalry victory, for in Carian
ala = horse
and
banda = victory. A god Alabandos is mentioned by
Cicero (
ND 3.50). Herodotos describes Alabanda in
one case as in Caria, in the other as in Phrygia, but
there is no doubt that the same city is meant. Stephanos'
second city of Alabanda in Caria can never have existed.
Late in the 3d c. Alabanda was colonized by the Seleucids and took the name of “Antiocheia of the Chrysaorians” in honor of Antiochos III. Under this name it was
recognized by the Amphictyonic Council as inviolable
and sacred to Zeus Chrysaoreus and Apollo Isotimos.
Despite this privilege the city and its territory was sacked
soon afterwards by Philip V of Macedon in the course
of his Caria:i expedition (201-197). Rhodian domination
after Magnesia in 190 was hardly more than nominal,
and about 170 the Alabandians obtained an alliance with
Rome. They had already at that time built a Temple of
Urbs Roma. After 129 B.C. Alabanda suffered like the
rest in the province of Asia from the provincial maladministration, and by 51 B.C. was in debt to the Roman
banker Cluvius. In 40 B.C. the city with its sanctuaries
was harshly treated by Labienus for its resistance to him.
Under the Empire Alabanda had the status of a conventus.
The site at Araphisar is said by Strabo (
660) to lie
under two adjoining hills in such a way as to resemble
a pack-ass loaded with its panniers. The city wall runs
over these hills and included also a large area of the
plain. On the hills the wall is well preserved in places,
but on the level ground it has virtually disappeared. The
masonry is a slightly bossed ashlar with rubble filling.
There are numerous towers, and half a dozen gates may
be recognized by gaps in the wall.
Excavations in 1905 brought to light the foundations
of two temples. The first of these is the Temple of Apollo
Isotimos. It was Ionic, with a peristyle (8 x 13 columns),
orientated NE-SW; the frieze showed a battle of Greeks
and Amazons. At present hardly anything remains visible. The epithet Isotimos, peculiar to Apollo at Alabanda,
is thought to mean “equal in honor (to Zeus Chrysaoreus).” In Imperial times the temple was rededicated to
Apollo Isotimos and the Divine Emperors.
The second temple stood on the slope of the hill a little
above the plain. It was Doric, with a peristyle (6 x 11
columns), and comprised a pronaos and a cella; the entrance was on the W. It is commonly called Temple of
Artemis from a figurine of Artemis-Hekate found on the
spot, but this evidence is obviously slender. The date is
probably about 200 B.C. This building too has suffered
much since the excavation.
Of the theater only the ends of the retaining wall of
the cavea are standing, in elegant bossed ashlar, with an
arched entrance on either side; the seats and stage building are gone. The cavea is large and comprises rather
more than a semicircle. This building has not been excavated.
Outside the city wall on the N stands a single arch of
an aqueduct, of the usual Roman type, but the upper
part, including the water channel, is not preserved.
The most conspicuous building on the plain is a rectangular structure in brown stone standing over 9 m in
height; it is probably a council house. The S front contained four doors and a row of windows; in the interior
a staircase on either side led up to the curved rows of
seats. In the exterior of all four sides, especially on the
S front, a horizontal row of square holes has been cut
at some later date; their purpose is not clear. Close by
are the ruins of another large building which has not
been excavated; it is thought to have been a bath building. Between this and the council house is a broad open
space, probably the agora. The excavators unearthed a
colonnaded stoa surrounding it, with an entrance at the
NW corner, but of this nothing is now visible. The street
leading to the city on the E was lined by an extensive
necropolis. The tombs are of sarcophagus type, with inscriptions frequently recording the trade or profession of
the deceased.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ethem Bey, “Fouilles d'Alabanda en
Cane,”
CRAI (1905) 443f; (1906) 407f; L. Robert,
Études Anatoliennes (1937) 434-36; G. E. Bean,
Anadolu Araştirmalari (1955) I 52-53; id.,
Turkey beyond
the Maeander (1971) ch. 15
MI.
G. E. BEAN
