- Halicarnassus
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—Halicarnassian, Halicarnassean, adj./hal'euh kahr nas"euhs/, n.an ancient city of Caria, in SW Asia Minor: site of the Mausoleum, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
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Ancient Greek city, western Anatolia.Located in modern Turkey on a peninsula in the Aegean Sea, it became the capital of Caria (с 370 BC) under the Persian satrap Mausolus, who built a great wall, public buildings, and a secret dockyard and canal. His widow erected (с 350 BC) a great tomb (the Mausoleum) in his memory. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, and its remains are now in the British Museum. Halicarnassus was the birthplace of the Greek historian Herodotus. It came under Roman rule in 129 BC, and in early Christian times was a bishopric. The ruins of the castle of the Knights of St. John, founded с AD 1400, dominate the ancient site.* * *
▪ ancient city, Turkeyancient Greek city of Caria, situated on the Gulf of Cerameicus. According to tradition, it was founded by Dorian Troezen in the Peloponnese. Herodotus, a Halicarnassian, relates that in early times the city participated in the Dorian festival of Apollo at Triopion, but its literature and culture appear thoroughly Ionic. The city, with its large sheltered harbour and key position on the sea routes, became the capital of the small despotate, the most famous ruler of which was a woman, Artemisia, who served under Xerxes in the invasion of Greece in 480 BC. Under Mausolus, when it was the capital of Caria (c. 370 BC), it received a great wall circuit, public buildings, and a secret dockyard and canal, while its population was swollen by the enforced transference of the neighbouring Lelegians. On the death of Mausolus in 353/352, a monumental tomb, the Mausoleum, considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World, was built by his widow in the city.Under Memnon of Rhodes, a commander in Persian service, the city resisted Alexander the Great in 334 BC. It was subject to Antigonus I (311), Lysimachus (after 301), and the Ptolemies (281–197), but thereafter was independent until 129 BC, when it came under Roman rule. In early Christian times it was a bishopric.The site, extensively excavated in 1856–57 and 1865, retains much of its great wall, remnants of the gymnasium, a late colonnade, a temple platform, and rock-cut tombs. The ancient remains are somewhat overshadowed by the spectacular pile of the castle of the Knights of St. John, founded about AD 1400. The site is occupied by the modern town of Bodrum, Tur.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
