- This article is about Zeugma in Commagene; for the ancient city called Zeugma in Seleucis, Syria, see Samandağı (city). For other uses, see Zeugma (disambiguation)
A zeugma is a figure of speech.Zeugma may also refer to:* Zeugma , an ancient settlement* Zeugma , a periodical* Zeugma Systems, a telecommunications equipment supplier...
Zeugma is an ancient city of Commagene; currently located in the
Gaziantep ProvinceGaziantep is a province in south-central Turkey. Its capital is the city of Gaziantep which had a population of 853,513 as of 2000. Its neighbours are Adıyaman at north, Şanlıurfa at east, Syria and Kilis at south, Hatay at southwest, Osmaniye at west and Kahramanmaraş at northwest.An important...
of
TurkeyTurkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey
, is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in Western Asia and Thrace in the Balkan region of southeastern Europe...
(coordinates ). It is a historical settlement which is considered among the four most important settlement areas under the reign of the kingdom of Commagene. It was named for the bridge of boats, or
zeugmaZeugma is a figure of speech describing the joining of two or more parts of a sentence with a single common verb or adjective. A zeugma employs both ellipsis, the omission of words which are easily understood, and parallelism, the balance of several words or phrases...
, which crossed the Euphrates there.
Historical background
The ancient city of Zeugma was originally founded as a Greek settlement by
Seleucus I NicatorSeleucus I , was a Macedonian officer of Alexander the Great and one of the Diadochi...
, one of the generals of
Alexander the GreatAlexander III of Macedon, popularly known as Alexander the Great , was an Ancient Greek king of Macedon who created one of the largest empires in ancient history...
, in
300 BC-Egypt:* Pyrrhus, the King of Epirus, is taken as a hostage to Egypt after the Battle of Ipsus and makes a diplomatic marriage with the princess Antigone, daughter of Ptolemy and Berenice....
. King Seleucus almost certainly named the city Seleucia after himself; whether this city is, or can be, the city known as Seleucia on the Euphrates or Seleucia at the Zeugma is disputed. The population in the city at its peak was approximately 80,000.
In
64 BCYear 64 BC was a year of the pre-Julian calendar.-Rome:* Servilius Rullus, Roman tribune, proposes an agrarian reform law.* Pompey destroys the kingdom of Pontus; Mithridates VI commits suicide after escaping to the Crimea....
Zeugma was conquered and ruled by the
Roman EmpireThe Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean. The term is used to describe the Roman state during and after the time of the first emperor,...
and with this shift the name of the city was changed into Zeugma, meaning "bridge-passage" or "bridge of boats". During Roman rule, the city became one of the attractions in the region, due to its commercial potential originating from its geo-strategic location because the city was on the
Silk RoadThe Silk Road is an extensive interconnected network of trade routes across the Asian continent connecting East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean world, as well as North and Northeast Africa and Europe...
connecting
AntiochAntioch on the Orontes was an ancient city on the eastern side of the Orontes River...
to
ChinaChina is a cultural region, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
with a quay or pontoon bridge across the river
EuphratesThe Euphrates is the longest and historically one of the most important rivers of Southwest Asia. Together with the Tigris, the Euphrates is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia...
which was the border with the Persian Empire until the late 2nd century.
In
256-Roman Empire:* Goths invade Asia Minor. Dacia is lost for the Roman Empire.* Emperor Valerian persecutes Christians.* The Franks cross the Rhine, the Alamanni reach Milan....
, Zeugma experienced an invasion and it was fully destroyed by the
SassanidThe Sassanid Empire or Sasanian Empire, known to its inhabitants as Ērānshahr, was the last pre-Islamic Persian Empire, ruled by the Sasanian Dynasty who reigned from 224 to 651 CE...
king,
Shapur IShapur I was the second Sassanid King of the Second Persian Empire. The dates of his reign are commonly given as 241 - 272, but it is likely that he also reigned as co-regent prior to his father's death in 241.-Early years:...
. The invasion was so dramatic that Zeugma was not able to recover for a long time. To make the situation even worse, a violent earthquake buried the city beneath rubble. Indeed, the city never regained the prosperity once achieved during the Roman rule.
Zeugma and environs remained part of the Roman empire. During the 5th and 6th centuries the city was ruled by the Early
ByzantiumThe Byzantine Empire or Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered on the capital of Constantinople, and ruled by Emperors in direct and de jure succession to the ancient Roman Emperors...
or Eastern Roman Empire. As a result of the ongoing Arab raids the city was abandoned once again. Later on, in the 10th and 12th centuries a small Abbasid residence settled in Zeugma.
Finally a village called
Belkis was founded in the 17th century.
Legio IV Scythica
During the Roman Era, the
Legio IV ScythicaLegio quarta Scythica was a Roman legion levied by Mark Antony around 42 BC, for his campaign against the Parthian Empire, hence its other cognomen, Parthica. The legion was still active in Syria in the early 5th century...
was camped in Zeugma. For about two centuries the city was home to high ranking officials and officers of the Roman Empire, who transferred their cultural understanding and sophisticated life style into the region. Thus the military formation acquired a Roman character and gave rise to an artistic trend of
necropolisA necropolis is a large cemetery or burial ground, usually including structural tombs. The word comes from the Greek νεκρόπολις - nekropolis, meaning "city of the dead"...
sculptureSculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard and/or plastic material, sound, and/or text and or light, commonly stone , metal, glass, or wood. Some sculptures are created directly by finding or carving; others are assembled, built together and fired, welded, molded,...
. In this respect, samples of beautiful art appeared in the form of steles, rock reliefs, statues and altars. This unique trend in sculpture and art made the newly emerging Zeugma art well recognized in whole region. Zeugma became considerably rich, owing to the liveliness created by Legion formation. At that time, there was a wooden bridge connecting Zeugma to the city of
ApameaApamea or Apameia was a Hellenistic city on the left bank of the Euphrates, opposite the famous city of Zeugma, at the end of a bridge of boats connecting the two, founded by Seleucus I Nicator . The city was rebuilt by Seleucus I...
on the other side of
EuphratesThe Euphrates is the longest and historically one of the most important rivers of Southwest Asia. Together with the Tigris, the Euphrates is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia...
, and current excavations revealed that there was a big customs and a considerable amount of border trade in the city.
The proof for this assumption came from the findings in the excavations carried out in “Iskele üstü.” In this site 65,000 seal imprints (in clay, known as “Bulla”), were found in a place which is believed to serve as the archives for the customs of ancient Zeugma. The seal imprints used in sealing papyrus, parchment, moneybags and customs bales are good indication of volume of the trade and the density of transportation and communication network once established in the region.
Recent Excavations and The Legacy of Ancient Zeugma
In 1987 the Gaziantep Museum excavated two tomb chambers which had been broken into by antiquity smugglers in the necropolis southwest of Zeugma, revealing
frescoFresco is any of several related painting types, done on plaster on walls or ceilings. The word fresco comes from the Italian word affresco which derives from the adjective fresco , which has Latin origins...
s on the walls and statues on the terraces in front of the chambers. These statues are now in Gaziantep Museum. In 1992 the watchman at the site, Nusret Özdemir, reported renewed illegal activity here, and a trench dug by antiquity hunters was discovered in the centre of the city. Excavations commenced on the same spot by a team from Gaziantep Museum led by director Rifat Ergeç uncovered a Roman villa and magnificent mosaic pavements. The 1st century AD villa consisted of galleries around an
atriumIn modern architecture, an atrium is a large open space, often several stories high and having a glazed roof and/or large windows, often situated within an office building and usually located immediately beyond the main entrance doors...
with eight columns and rooms behind the galleries. The mosaic which adorned the villa's gallery depicted the marriage of
DionysusIn classical mythology, Dionysus or Dionysos is the god of wine, the inspirer of ritual madness and ecstasy, and a major figure of Greek mythology, and one of the twelve Olympians, amongst whom Greek mythology treated him as a late arrival...
, god of wine and grapes, to
AriadneAriadne , in Greek mythology , was daughter of King Minos of Crete and his queen, Pasiphaë, daughter of Helios, the Sun-titan...
. Sadly, six of the ten figures portrayed in this mosaic were stolen on 15 June 1998.
In further excavations here, in which David Kennedy from Australia participated in 1993, part of the central panel of the mosaic pavement belonging to the terrace of another villa turned out to have been stolen long since - probably around 1965 - so the two figures are missing from the knees upwards.The missing mosaic fragment was later found to be in the
Menil CollectionThe Menil Collection, located in Houston, Texas, United States, is a museum that houses the private art collection of founders Jean and Dominique de Ménil. Dominique was an heir to the Schlumberger oil-drilling fortune, and Jean The Menil Collection, located in Houston, Texas, United States, is a...
at
Rice UniversityWilliam Marsh Rice University is a private coeducational research university located in Houston, Texas, United States...
in the city of Houston. The two figures seated side by side in this mosaic are the two legendary lovers, Metiokhos and
ParthenopeParthenope may refer to:* one of the Sirens in Greek mythology* in Greek mythology, the daughter of Ancaeus, king of Samos, and Samia, daughter of Meander, the river-god...
. At the request of the Turkish Ministry of Culture, the stolen fragment was returned, and the complete mosaic can now be seen in Gaziantep Museum.
When mosaic fragments were discovered during construction of the
Birecik DamBirecik Dam is one of the 21 dams of the Southeastern Anatolia Project of Turkey, is located on the Euphrates river 60 km downstream of Atatürk Dam and 8 km upstream of Birecik town 80 km west of Province of Şanlıurfa in the southeastern region of Turkey...
wall which commenced in 1996, Gaziantep Museum had the work halted while excavations were carried out that revealed a Roman bath and
gymnasiumThe gymnasium in ancient Greece functioned as a training facility for competitors in public games. It was also a place for socializing and engaging in intellectual pursuits. The name comes from the Greek term gymnos meaning naked. Athletes competed in the nude, a practice said to encourage...
, and 36 mosaic panels which were added to the museum collection. In 1997, on the clay quarry area in front of the dam wall a large Bronze Age cemetery was discovered and excavated. Nearly eight thousand pottery vessels were found in 320 graves going back to the early Bronze Age. The museum staff worked unceasingly through the winter of 1998-1999, uncovering such important and beautiful finds as the Akratos and Gypsy Girl Mosaic and 65,000 bulla (seal imprints in clay) in an archive room at İskeleüstü, making Gaziantep Museum possessor of the largest bulla collection in the world.
In 1999, in a building in the lower quarter of the city, mosaics depicting the head of
DionysusIn classical mythology, Dionysus or Dionysos is the god of wine, the inspirer of ritual madness and ecstasy, and a major figure of Greek mythology, and one of the twelve Olympians, amongst whom Greek mythology treated him as a late arrival...
and
OceanusOceanus was believed to be the world-ocean in classical antiquity, which the ancient Romans and Greeks considered to be an enormous river encircling the world. Strictly speaking, Okeanos was the ocean-stream at the Equator in which floated the habitable hemisphere...
and
TethysIn Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titaness and aquatic sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but no longer venerated in cult. Tethys was both sister and wife of Oceanus...
with sea creatures were discovered. From 1996 onwards, with the threat of being submerged under the waters of the new dam, salvage excavations were carried out by C. Abadie Reynal of Nantes University in
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
together with archaeologists from Gaziantep and
ŞanlıurfaŞanlıurfa , formerly cited as Edessa or in Aramaic; Riha or Urhāy, or in Armenian Urhai, Arabic الرها al-Raha) is a city with 462,923 inhabitants in south-eastern Turkey, and the capital of Şanlıurfa Province...
museums. In 1999 a mosaic pavement depicting the mythological Minos bull was discovered at Mezarliküstü, and at the end of the excavation season further mosaics were visible at the thresholds of other rooms. Not wishing to leave the mosaics at the mercy of the treasure hunters who are so active in the area, Gaziantep Museum’s acting director Fatma Bulgan decided to carry on with excavations through the winter months. Despite difficult weather conditions they went on to uncover a fountain with its own tank at a depth of three metres, and a marble figure of
ApolloIn Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo , is one of the most important and many-sided of the Olympian deities...
, as well as another mosaic pavement with nine figures depicting
AchillesIn Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greek hero of the Trojan War, the central character and the greatest warrior of Homer's Iliad.Achilles also has the attributes of being the most handsome of the heroes assembled against Troy....
being taken by
OdysseusOdysseus or Ulysses , in Greek mythology , was a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem, The Odyssey...
to fight in the
Trojan WarIn Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology and was narrated in many works of Greek literature, including the Iliad...
.
Also during salvage excavations under Mehmet Önal, an archaeologist from Gaziantep Museum, two more Roman villas were uncovered. These villas, which stood side by side, were burned and razed by the Sassanids in 252. The fact that they lay under three metres of rubble had protected them from treasure hunters, and their frescos, mosaics and other artifacts were almost completely intact. A bronze statue of
MarsMars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after Mars, the Roman god of war. It is also referred to as the "Red Planet" because of its reddish appearance, due to iron oxide prevalent on its surface....
, which aroused increased media interest in Zeugma, was found amongst storage jars in the larder of one of the villas. Altogether seventeen mosaic pavements have been revealed in the villas, whose walls were decorated with colourful frescoes. Excavations of Zeugma have been divided into three areas, initial priority being given to salvage and documentation in Zone A, which sank under the dam waters in early July. Work then moved on to Zone B, which will be submerged in October 2000 when the dam water reaches its maximum level of 385 metres. Zone C, on the other hand, consists of the higher parts of the city which will not be affected by the new dam. Zeugma is one of the foremost of
TurkeyTurkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey
, is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in Western Asia and Thrace in the Balkan region of southeastern Europe...
’s archaeological and historic sites, and the attention focused upon it from all over the world will undoubtedly continue over the years ahead.
Birtha
Birtha is presently the (Latin) name of a Roman catholic
titular seeA titular see in the Roman Catholic Church is a Diocese or Archdiocese that now exists in title only.By definition a bishop is an "overseer" of a community of the faithful, so when a priest is ordained a bishop the tradition of the Catholic Church is that he be ordained for a specific place...
in the former
Roman provinceIn Ancient Rome, a province was the basic, and until the Tetrarchy , largest territorial and administrative unit of the empire's territorial possessions outside of the Italian peninsula...
of Osrhaene, probably identical with modern Birejik (Ancient Ze(u)gma) on the left bank of the Euphrates, c. 62 miles west of
OrfaŞanlıurfa , formerly cited as Edessa or in Aramaic; Riha or Urhāy, or in Armenian Urhai, Arabic الرها al-Raha) is a city with 462,923 inhabitants in south-eastern Turkey, and the capital of Şanlıurfa Province...
(Edessa), and 95 miles north of Aleppo. Birtha (Aramæan
Bîrthâ "castle") is spoken of as a castle by ancient authors (Hierocles, 715, 2).
There was also a see called by the Greeks
Macedonopolis, the foundation of the great city being attributed by legend to
Alexander the GreatAlexander III of Macedon, popularly known as Alexander the Great , was an Ancient Greek king of Macedon who created one of the largest empires in ancient history...
(Amm. Marcell., XX, vii, 17). That Macedonopolis and Birtha are one see is proved by the subscriptions at the
First Council of NicaeaThe First Council of Nicaea was a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea in Bithynia by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in 325 CE...
, where we see that in both Syriac and Arabic lists it corresponds with Macedonopolis in Greek and Latin lists (Gelzer, Patrum Niceænorum nomina, 242). The true name of the bishop present at the council is Mareas, not Marcus. Daniel, Bishop of Macedonopolis, is said to have been present at the
Council of ChalcedonThe Council of Chalcedon is considered by the Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, the Old Catholics, and various other Western Christian groups to have been the Fourth Ecumenical Council . It was held from 8 October to 1 November 451 at Chalcedon...
(451).
From the sixth century only the name Birtha survives (Georgius Cyprius, n. 899). Emperor
AnastasiusFlavius Anastasius or Anastasius I was Byzantine Emperor from 11 April 491 until his death. He was born at Dyrrhachium no later than 430/431, the son of Pompeius, a nobleman of Dyrrachium, and his anonymous wife...
, after his victories over the Persians in 505, entrusted Sergius, Bishop of Birtha, with the work of repairing the city (Wright, ed., The Chronicle of Joshua the Stylite, XCI, lxxi), an undertaking that was completed by Justinian (Procop., De ædific. Just., II, 4). The oldest "Tacticon" of the Patriarchate of Antioch, issued under Anastasius I (599) places Birtha first among the suffragan sees of
EdessaEdessa is the historical name of a Syriac town in northern Mesopotamia, refounded on an ancient site by Seleucus I Nicator. For the modern history of the city, see Şanlıurfa.-Names:...
(Kerameus, ed., Anekdota Hellenika, lxv); the name is written
Byrte in a later redaction (ibid., lxix), and
Virchi in an old Latin translation (Tobler and Molinier, Itinera Hierosolymitana, I, 322).
Birtha was destroyed by Timour-Leng in the fourteenth century. In Ottoman times Birejik became the chief town of a
cazaThe Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area or KAZA TFCA is a conservation park that will be created by the African countries of Zambia, Angola, Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe. It should be operational by 2010. At 280,000 square km, it will be the largest national park in the world...
in the vilayet of Aleppo with 10,000 inhabitants, including 1,500 Christians, all Armenians, and one-half of whom Uniate Catholics.
- Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemaeus , known in English as Ptolemy , was a Roman citizen of Greek ancestry. He was a mathematician, astronomer, geographer, astrologer and a poet of a single epigram in the Greek Anthology. He lived in Egypt under the Roman Empire, and is believed to have been born in the town of...
(V, xviii, xix) speaks of a fortress Birtha on the TigrisThe Tigris is the eastern member of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, along with the Euphrates. The river flows from the mountains of southeastern Turkey through Iraq.-Geography:...
in Southern Mesopotamia and of another in Arabia on the Euphrates below ThapsacusThapsacus , meaning ford or passage) was an ancient town along the western bank of the Euphrates river that would now lie in modern Syria or Turkey. Thapsacus was the Greek and Roman name for the town...
. The site of the first is unknown, the latter is at Ed-Deir (Ritter, Erdkunde, XI, 691), but perhaps both are the same as Birtha or Macedonopolis.
Further reading
Sources and external links