3. Cilt - Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı

commanding position overlooking the point in which the valley of the Hermus(between Mt. Sipylus and Mt. Sardene) comes to an end, and the river entersdefi nitively into the open plain: a natural crossing point today and perhaps also inthe past (cf. Map: 1; fi g. 1).Very little is known of the history of Temnos in the archaic age. According toPausanias, Pelops, on his way from Sipylus to Olympia, crossed the Hermus andstopped in the site where Temnos was later to be founded. There he carved axoanon – a wooden statue – of Aphrodite in a living myrtle-tree, propitiating thegoddess and asking for Hippodameia to become his bride 6 .The foundation legend reported by Stephanus of Byzantium naïvely derivesthe name Temnos from the Greek verb temnein, “to cut”, “to break”: allegedly, anoracle ordered a certain Omallos (perhaps to be emended to Malaos) to found anew town in the very place where the axle of his cart would break (a clear allusionto the abrupt location of Temnus: cf. fi gs. 2-3) 7 .According to Xenophon Temnos, thanks to its impregnable position, was oneof the very few Greek cities in Asia Minor which managed, by their own forces, tokeep their independence from the Persians 8 .Its autonomous bronze coinage begins in the IV century B.C. and continuestill the late Roman Imperial age. A hoard of about 300 coins of the III centuryB.C., chiefl y small coppers of Temnos, was found in the neighborhood of Smyrna,and was published by Milne in 1914 9 . The hoard of Tell Kotchek, on the Syrianborder, buried between 167 and 155 B.C., contained –among 604 Alexandriantetradrachms– 196 items from Temnos and 342 from Alabanda 10 . The coinage ofTemnos, among other things, gives us precious information about the local cults,the city’s pantheon 11 .6 Paus. V 13, 7.7 Steph. Byz. s.v. Τημνος; Malaos is one of the two ktistai of Cyme mentioned by Strab.XIII 1, 3; for the etymology of the place name Temnos cf. J. Manessy-Guitton, “Temenos”,Indogermanische Forschungen 71, 1966, pp. 14-38.8 Xen. Hell. IV 8, 5.9 J. G. Milne, A Hoard of Coins of Temnos, London 1914.10 IGCH 1773; cf. H. Seyrig, Trésors du Levant anciens et nouveaux (Trésors monétairesséleucides, 2), Paris 1973, nr. 15: “Trésor de Tell Kotchek”.11 The following cults are attested: Aphrodite, Apollo, Dionysus, Athena, Zeus Akraios, Nemeseis,river-god Hermus, Heracles, Tyche, Serapis.344