Delos

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Author: Laxman Burdak, IFS (R)
Location of Delos in the Cyclades archipelago

Delos Islands, near Mykonos , near the centre of the Cyclades archipelago, is one of the most important mythological, historical, and archaeological sites in Greece. The Cyclades are an island group in the Aegean Sea, southeast of mainland Greece. The name refers to the islands around ("cyclic", κυκλάς) the sacred island of Delos. The largest island of the Cyclades is Naxos, however the most populated is Syros.

Variants

Jat Gotras Namesake

Delu = Delos (Pliny.vi.39). Delu Gotra Jats live in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.


Delos Islands, near Mykonos , near the centre of the Cyclades archipelago, is one of the most important mythological, historical, and archaeological sites in Greece. The Cyclades are an island group in the Aegean Sea, southeast of mainland Greece.

Delian League, founded in 478 BC,[1] was an association of Greek city-states, numbering between 150 and 330,[2] under the leadership of Athens, whose purpose was to continue fighting the Persian Empire after the Greek victory in the Battle of Plataea at the end of the Second Persian invasion of Greece.[3]

The Delian League's modern name derives from its official meeting place,[4] the Island of Delos, where congresses were held in the temple and where the treasury stood until, in a symbolic gesture,[5] Pericles moved it to Athens in 454 BC.[6]

Delos was eventually abandoned around the eighth century AD.[7]

History

The excavations in the island are among the most extensive in the Mediterranean; ongoing work takes place under the direction of the Ephorate of Antiquities of Cyclades, and many of the artifacts found are on display at the Archaeological Museum of Delos and the National Archaeological Museum of Athens.

Delos had a position as a holy sanctuary for a millennium before Olympian Greek mythology made it the birthplace of Apollo and Artemis. From its Sacred Harbour, the horizon shows the three conical mounds that have identified landscapes sacred to a goddess (it is predicted that the deity's name is Athena) - in other sites: one, retaining its Pre-Greek name Mount Cynthus,[8] is crowned with a sanctuary of Zeus.

In 1990, UNESCO inscribed Delos on the World Heritage List, citing its exceptional archaeological site which "conveys the image of a great cosmopolitan Mediterranean port", its influence on the development of Greek architecture, and its sacred importance throughout Ancient Greece.[9]

Ancient Greece: Investigation of ancient stone huts found on the island indicate that it has been inhabited since the third millennium BC. Thucydides identifies the original inhabitants as piratical Carians who were eventually expelled by King Minos of Crete.[10] By the writing of the Odyssey, the island was already famous as the birthplace of the twin gods Apollo and Artemis (although some confusion seems to exist of Artemis' birthplace being either Delos or the island of Ortygia).

Between 900 BC and 100 AD, Delos was a major cult centre, where the gods Dionysus and Leto, mother of the twin deities Apollo and Artemis, were revered. Eventually acquiring Panhellenic religious significance, Delos was initially a religious pilgrimage for the Ionians.

A number of "purifications" were performed by the city-state of Athens in an attempt to render the island fit for the proper worship of the gods. The first took place in the sixth century BC, directed by the tyrant Pisistratus, who ordered that all graves within sight of the temple be dug up and the bodies moved to another nearby island. In the fifth century BC, during the sixth year of the Peloponnesian War and under instruction from the Delphic Oracle, the entire island was purged of all dead bodies. Prohibition of dying was then ordered, so that no one should be allowed to die (or give birth) on the island due to its sacred importance, and to preserve its neutrality in commerce since no one could then claim ownership through inheritance. Immediately after this purification, the first quinquennial festival of the Delian games were celebrated there.[11] Four years later, all inhabitants of the island were removed to Adramyttium in Asia as a further purification.[12]

After the Persian Wars, the island became the natural meeting ground for the Delian League, founded in 478 BC, the congresses being held in the temple (a separate quarter was reserved for foreigners and the sanctuaries of foreign deities). The league's common treasury was kept here as well until 454 BC, when Pericles removed it to Athens.[13]

During the Hellenistic period, a well-established Phoenician colony on the island had extensive trade relations.[14]

The island had no productive capacity for food, fiber, or timber, which were all imported. Limited water was exploited with an extensive cistern and aqueduct system, wells, and sanitary drains. Various regions operated agorae (markets).

Suda writes that the Greeks used the proverb "ᾌδεις ὥσπερ εἰς Δῆλον πλέων", meaning you sing as if sailing into Delos in reference to someone who is happy, light-hearted, and enjoying himself.[15]

Iamblichus writes that Delos Mysteries (similar to the Eleusinian Mysteries) were established.[16]

Roman era: Strabo states that in 166 BC, the Romans converted Delos into a free port, which was partially motivated by seeking to damage the trade of Rhodes, at the time the target of Roman hostility. In 167 or 166 BC, after the Roman victory in the Third Macedonian War, the Roman Republic ceded the island of Delos to the Athenians, who expelled most of the original inhabitants.[17] Roman traders came to purchase tens of thousands of slaves captured by the Cilician pirates or captured in the wars following the disintegration of the Seleucid Empire. It became the center of the slave trade, with the largest slave market in the larger region being maintained here.

The Roman destruction of Corinth in 146 BC allowed Delos to at least partially assume Corinth's role as the premier trading center of Greece, but Delos' commercial prosperity, construction activity, and population waned significantly after the island was assaulted by the forces of Mithridates VI of Pontus in 88 and 69 BC, during the Mithridatic Wars with Rome.[18] Before the end of the first century BC, trade routes had changed; Delos was replaced by Puteoli as the chief focus of Italian trade with the east, and as a cult centre, too, it entered a sharp decline.

Despite its decline, Delos maintained some population in the early Roman Imperial period. Pausanias (8,33,2), writing in the second century AD, states that Delos was uninhabited apart from a few custodians of the sanctuaries. Evidence has been found of Roman baths, coins, an aqueduct, residential and elite houses, multiple churches, basilicas, and a monastery all from the first to sixth centuries AD, which, however, does not suggest that the island was continuously inhabited in the period.[19][20] The pottery found indicates that produce, such as wine and oil, continued to be imported from regional centres. Also, a number of wine presses were found amidst the ruins of the ancient city that date to this period, suggesting that the population at this time was engaged in considerable viticultural endeavour.[21]

Delos was eventually abandoned around the eighth century AD.[22]

Delian League

Delian League, founded in 478 BC,[23] was an association of Greek city-states, numbering between 150 and 330,[24] under the leadership of Athens, whose purpose was to continue fighting the Persian Empire after the Greek victory in the Battle of Plataea at the end of the Second Persian invasion of Greece.[25]


Shortly after its inception, Athens began to use the League's funds for its own purposes, which led to conflicts between Athens and the less powerful members of the League. By 431 BC, the threat the League presented to Spartan hegemony combined with Athens's heavy-handed control of the Delian League prompted the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War; the League was dissolved upon the war's conclusion in 404 BC under the direction of Lysander, the Spartan commander.

Origin: The League's modern name derives from its official meeting place,[26] the Island of Delos, where congresses were held in the temple and where the treasury stood until, in a symbolic gesture,[27] Pericles moved it to Athens in 454 BC.[28]

Mention by Pliny

Pliny[29] mentions....The third circle or parallel begins at the part of India which lies in the vicinity of Mount Imaiis, and runs through the Caspian Gates and the nearer parts of Media, Cataonia, Cappadocia, Taurus, Amanus, Issus, the Passes of Cilicia, Soli, Tarsus, Cyprus, Pisidia, Side in Pamphylia, Lycaonia, Patara in Lycia, Xanthus, Caunus, Rhodes, Cos, Halicarnassus, Cnidos, Doris, Chios, Delos, the middle of the Cyclades, Gythium, Malea, Argos, Laconia, Elis, Olympia, Messenia in Peloponnesus, Syracuse, Catina, the middle of Sicily, the southern parts of Sardinia, Carteia, and Gades.

References

  1. ↑ Roisman, Joseph; Yardley, John C. (2011). Ancient Greece From Homer to Alexander: The Evidence. Malden and Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978-1-405-12776-9., p. xliii; Martin, Thomas R. (1996). Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-08493-1., pp. 96, 105–106.
  2. ↑ Nelson, Eric D.; Allard-Nelson, Susan K. (2005). The Complete Idiot's Guide to Ancient Greece. Indianapolis, IN: Alpha. ISBN 978-1-592-57273-1. p. 197.
  3. ↑ Roisman & Yardley 2011, 18: The Athenian Empire, pp. 246–266.
  4. ↑ Rhodes, Peter John (2006). A History of the Classical Greek World: 478–323 BC. Malden and Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-0-631-22565-2.
  5. ↑ Keuls, Eva C. (1993) [1985]. The Reign of the Phallus: Sexual Politics in Ancient Athens. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-07929-8.p.18
  6. ↑ Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. 1.96.
  7. ↑ DODD, EMLYN K. (2020). ROMAN AND LATE ANTIQUE WINE PRODUCTION IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN : a comparative ... archaeological study at antiochia ad cragum. [Place of publication not identified]: ARCHAEOPRESS. ISBN 978-1-78969-403-1. OCLC 1139263254.
  8. ↑ The combination -nth- is a marker for Pre-Greek words: Corinth, menthos, labyrinth, etc. A name Artemis and even Diana retained was Cynthia.
  9. ↑ "Delos". UNESCO World Heritage Convention. United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization.
  10. ↑ Thucydides, I,8.
  11. ↑ Thucydides, III,104.
  12. ↑ Thucydides, V,1.
  13. ↑ Thucydides, I,96.
  14. ↑ Boussac, Marie-Françoise (1982). "À propos de quelques sceaux déliens". Bulletin de correspondance hellénique (in French). 106 (1): 445–446. doi:10.3406/bch.1982.1923. ISSN 0007-4217.
  15. ↑ Suda, alpha, 455
  16. ↑ Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras, § 28.151
  17. ↑ Tang, Birgit (2005), Delos, Carthage, Ampurias: the Housing of Three Mediterranean Trading Centres, Rome: L'Erma di Bretschneider (Accademia di Danimarca), p. 14, ISBN 8882653056.
  18. ↑ Tang, Birgit (2005), Delos, Carthage, Ampurias: the Housing of Three Mediterranean Trading Centres, Rome: L'Erma di Bretschneider (Accademia di Danimarca), pp. 14, 32, ISBN 8882653056.
  19. ↑ DODD, EMLYN K. (2020). ROMAN AND LATE ANTIQUE WINE PRODUCTION IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN : a comparative ... archaeological study at antiochia ad cragum. [Place of publication not identified]: ARCHAEOPRESS. ISBN 978-1-78969-403-1. OCLC 1139263254.
  20. ↑ Le Quéré, Enora (2015). Les Cyclades sous l'Empire romain : histoire d'une renaissance. Impr. Université Rennes 2). Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes. ISBN 978-2-7535-4045-3. OCLC 919408437.
  21. ↑ DODD, EMLYN K. (2020). ROMAN AND LATE ANTIQUE WINE PRODUCTION IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN : a comparative ... archaeological study at antiochia ad cragum. [Place of publication not identified]: ARCHAEOPRESS. ISBN 978-1-78969-403-1. OCLC 1139263254.
  22. ↑ DODD, EMLYN K. (2020). ROMAN AND LATE ANTIQUE WINE PRODUCTION IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN : a comparative ... archaeological study at antiochia ad cragum. [Place of publication not identified]: ARCHAEOPRESS. ISBN 978-1-78969-403-1. OCLC 1139263254.
  23. ↑ Roisman, Joseph; Yardley, John C. (2011). Ancient Greece From Homer to Alexander: The Evidence. Malden and Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978-1-405-12776-9., p. xliii; Martin, Thomas R. (1996). Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-08493-1., pp. 96, 105–106.
  24. ↑ Nelson, Eric D.; Allard-Nelson, Susan K. (2005). The Complete Idiot's Guide to Ancient Greece. Indianapolis, IN: Alpha. ISBN 978-1-592-57273-1. p. 197.
  25. ↑ Roisman & Yardley 2011, 18: The Athenian Empire, pp. 246–266.
  26. ↑ Rhodes, Peter John (2006). A History of the Classical Greek World: 478–323 BC. Malden and Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-0-631-22565-2.
  27. ↑ Keuls, Eva C. (1993) [1985]. The Reign of the Phallus: Sexual Politics in Ancient Athens. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-07929-8.p.18
  28. ↑ Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. 1.96.
  29. ↑ Natural History by Pliny Book VI/Chapter 39
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