AE´OLIS
AE´OLIS (
Αἰολίς, Aeolia), a district on the west coast of Asia Minor, which is included by Strabo in the larger division of Mysia.
The limits of Aeolis are variously defined by the ancient geographers. Strabo (p. 582) makes the river Hermus and Phocaea the southern limits of Aeolis and the northern of Ionia.
He observes (p. 586), that “as Homer makes one of Aeolis and Troja, and the Aeolians occupied the whole country from the Hermus to the coast in the neighbourhood of Cyzicus and founded cities, neither shall I imperfectly make my description by putting together that which is now properly called Aeolis, which extends from the Hermus to Lectum, and the country which extends from Lectum to the Aesepus.” Aeolis, therefore, properly so called, extended as far north as the promontory of Lectum, at the northern entrance of the bay of Adramyttium.
The bay of Adramyttium is formed by the S. coast of the mountainous tract in which Ilium stood, by the island of Lesbos, and by the coast of Aeolis S. of Adramyttium, which runs from that town in a SW. direction.
The coast is irregular. South of the bay of Adramyttium is a recess, at the northern point of which are the Hecatonnesi, a numerous group of small islands, and the southern boundary of which is the projecting point of the mainland, which lies nearest opposite to the southern extremity of Lesbos.
The peninsula on which the town of Phocaea stood, separates the gulf of Cume on the N. from the bay of Smyrna on the S.
The gulf of Cume receives the rivers Evenus and Caïcus.
The territory of the old Aeolian cities extended northward from the Hermus to the Calïcus, comprising the coast and a tract reaching 10 or 12 miles inland. Between the bay of Adramyttium and the Caïcus were the following towns:--Cisthene (
Κισθήνη, Chirin-koi), on a promontory, a deserted place in Strabo's time.
There was a port, and a copper mine in the interior, above Cisthene. Further south were Coryphantis (
Κορυφαντίς), Heracleia (
Ἡρακλεία), and Attea (
Ἅττεα, Ajasmat-koi). Coryphantis and Heracleia once belonged to the Mytilenaeans. Herodotus (
1.149) describes the tract of country which these Aeolians possessed, as superior in fertility to the country occupied by the cities of the Ionian confederation, but inferior in climate.
He enumerates the following 11 cities: Cume, called Phriconis; Lerissae, Neon Teichos, Temnus, Cilla, Notium, Aegiroessa, Pitane, Aegaeae, Myrina, and Grynexa. Smyrna, which was originally one of them, and made the number 12, fell into the hands of the Ionians. Herodotus says, that these 11 were all the Aeolian cities on the mainland, except those in the Ida; “for these are separated” (1.151); and in another place (5.122) Herodotus calls those people Aeolians who inhabited the Ilias, or district of Ilium.
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