Abdera, Thrace

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Abdera, Thrace

Abdera (?ßd??a) was a town on the coast of Thrace

Thrace

Thrace is a historical and geographic area in southeast Europe. Today the name Thrace designates a region spread over southern Bulgaria , northeastern Greece , and European Turkey ....
17 km east-northeast of the mouth of the Nestos, and almost opposite Thasos

Thasos

Thasos or Thassos is a Greece island in the northern Aegean Sea, close to the coast of Western Thrace and the plain of the river Mesta River but geographically part of Macedonia ....
.

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Abdera (?ßd??a) was a town on the coast of Thrace

Thrace

Thasos

Thasos or Thassos is a Greece island in the northern Aegean Sea, close to the coast of Western Thrace and the plain of the river Mesta River but geographically part of Macedonia ....
. At coordinates , the site now lies in the Xanthi Prefecture

Xanthi Prefecture

Xanthi is one of the prefectures of Greece. It is within the East Macedonia and Thrace periphery. Xanthi has no or only one province. The capital of the prefecture is also called Xanthi....
of modern Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkans. It has borders with Albania, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the north, and Turkey to the east....
. The current municipality of Abdera, or Avdira, has 3,917 inhabitants (2001).

History

Its mythical foundation was attributed to Heracles

Heracles

In Greek mythology, Heracles or Herakles meaning "glory of Hera", or "Glorious through Hera" Alcides or Alcaeus " was a hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus....
(on behalf of his fallen friend Abderus

Abderus

In Greek mythology Abderus or Abderos was a Greek hero, reputed a son of Hermes by some accounts, and eponym of Abdera, Thrace.The paternity of Abderus differs according to the sources....
), its historical one to a colony from Klazomenai. This historical founding was traditionally dated to 654 BC, which is unverified, although evidence in 7th century BC Greek pottery

Pottery of Ancient Greece

Thanks to its relative durability, pottery is a large part of the archaeological record of Ancient Greece, and because we have so much of it it has exerted a disproportionately large influence on our understanding of Greek society....
tends to support it. But its prosperity dates from 544 BC, when the majority of the people of Teos (including the poet Anacreon

Anacreon

Anacreon was a Greece lyric poem poet, notable for his drinking songs and hymns. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list of nine lyric poets....
) migrated to Abdera to escape the Persian

Iran

Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran and formerly known internationally as Persian Empire until 1935, is a country in Central Eurasia, located on the northeastern shore of the Persian Gulf and the southern shore of the Caspian Sea....
yoke (Herodotus

Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
i.168). The chief coin type, a griffon
Griffon

Griffon is a type of dog, a collection of breeds of originally hunting dogs. There are three recognized lines of the griffon type , the griffon vend?ens, the wirehaired pointers, and the smousje ....
, is identical with that of Teos; the rich silver coinage is noted for the beauty and variety of its reverse types.

In 513 BC and 512 BC, the Persians conquered Abdera. In 492 BC, the Persians again conquered Abdera, this time under Darius I. It later became part of the Delian League

Delian League

The Delian League was an association of approximately 150 5th-century BC Ancient Greece city-states under the leadership of Classical Athens, whose purpose was to continue fighting the Persian Empire after the Greek victory in the Battle of Plataea at the end of the Greco?Persian Wars....
and fought on the side of Athens in the Peloponnesian war

Peloponnesian War

The Peloponnesian War which lasted from 431-404BC was an Ancient Greece military conflict, fought by Athens and its Athenian empire against the Peloponnesian League, led by Sparta....
.

Abdera was a wealthy city, the third richest in the League, due to its production of corn and status as a prime port for trade with the interior of Thrace and the Odrysian kingdom

Odrysian kingdom

The Odrysian kingdom was a union of Thracians tribes that endured between the 5th century BC and the 3rd century BC. It consisted largely of present-day Bulgaria, spreading to parts of Romanian Northern Dobruja, as parts of Northern Greece and modern-day European Turkey....
.

A valuable prize, the city was repeatedly sacked: by the Triballi

Triballi

The Triballi were an ancient Thracians people whose earliest home was near the junction of the Angrus and Brongus , and included towards the south the "Triballian plain", In 424 BC they were attacked by Sitalkes, king of the Odrysian kingdom, who was defeated and lost his life in the engagement....
in 376 BC, Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon

Philip II of Macedon,...
in 350 BC; later by Lysimachos of Thrace

Lysimachus

Lysimachus was a Macedonian officer and Diadochi of Alexander the Great, who became a basileus in 306 BCE, ruling Thrace, Anatolia andMacedonia....
, the Seleucids

Seleucid Empire

The Seleucid Empire /s?'lus?d/ was a Hellenistic empire, i.e. a successor state of Alexander the Great's empire. The Seleucid Empire was centered in the near East and at the height of its power included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir Mountains and parts of Pakistan....
, the Ptolemies

Ptolemaic dynasty

The Ptolemaic dynasty was a Hellenistic Macedonian royal family which ruled the Ptolemaic Empire in Egypt for nearly 300 years, from 305 BC to 30 BC....
, and again by the Macedonians. In 170 BC the Roman armies and those of Eumenes II of Pergamon

Eumenes II

Eumenes II of Pergamon was king of Pergamon and a member of the Attalid dynasty. The son of king Attalus I and queen Apollonis, he followed in his father's footsteps and collaborated with the Ancient Rome to oppose first Ancient Macedonians, then Seleucid expansion towards the Aegean, leading to the defeat of Antiochus III the Great at th...
besieged and sacked it.

The town seems to have declined in importance after the middle of the 4th century BC. The air of Abdera was proverbial in Athens as causing stupidity, but it counted among its citizens the philosophers Democritus

Democritus

Democritus was an Ancient Greek philosopher born in Abdera in the north of Greece. He was the most prolific, and ultimately the most influential, of the pre-Socratic philosophers; his atomic theory may be regarded as the culmination of early Greek thought....
and Protagoras

Protagoras

Protagoras was a Pre-Socratic philosophy Ancient Greeks philosopher and is numbered as one of the sophists by Plato. In his dialogue Protagoras , Plato credits him with having invented the role of the professional sophist or teacher of virtue....
, and historian and philosopher Hecataeus of Abdera

Hecataeus of Abdera

Hecataeus of Abdera, Thrace was a Greek historian and sceptic philosopher who flourished in the 4th century BC.Diogenes Laertius relates that he was a student of Pyrrho, along with Eurylochus, Timon , Nausiphanes of Teos and others, and includes him among the "Pyrrhoneans"....
.

The ruins of the town may still be seen on Cape Balastra; they cover seven small hills, and extend from an eastern to a western harbor; on the southwestern hills are the remains of the medieval settlement of Polystylon. Abdera is a titular see

Titular see

A titular see in the Roman Catholic Church is a Diocese or Archdiocese that now exists in title only. Until 1882, such titular sees, were distinguished by the Latin phrase in partibus infidelium or more often simply in partibus....
of the Roman Catholic Church

Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
in the province of Rhodope

Rhodope

Rhodope may mean:* Queen Rhodope, a figure of Greek mythology* Rhodope Mountains, in Bulgaria and Greece* Rhodope Prefecture, of Greece* Rhodope ...
on the southern coast of Thrace, now called Bouloustra.

Landmarks

Abdera Archaeological Museum
Abdera Archaeological Museum

Abdera Archaeological Museum is a museum in Abdera, Thrace, Greece. The museum houses archaeological artefacts found in the city which date from around 7th century B.C....

Sources

Grant, Michael. A Guide to the Ancient World. Michael Grant Publications, 1986.*

External links

"Abdera, Thrace, Greece"