Listed 3 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "AMAXITOS Ancient city TURKEY" .
AMAXITOS (Ancient city) TURKEY
Hamaxitus (Hamaxitos), a town on the southwestern coast of Troas,
50 stadia south of Larissa, and close to the plain of Halesion. It was probably
an Aeolian colony, but had ceased to exist as early as the time of Strabo. (Scyl.
p. 36; Thucyd. viii. 101; Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 1. § 13; Strab. x. p. 473, xiii.
pp. 604, 612, 613.) According to Aelian (Hist. An. xii. 5), its inhabitants worshipped
mice, and for this reason called Apollo, their chief divinity, Smintheus (from
the Aeolian smintha, a mouse). Strabo relates the occasion of this as follows:
When the Teucrians fled from Crete, the oracle of Apollo advised them to settle
on the spot where their enemies issued from the earth. One night a number of field-mice
destroyed all their shields, and, recognising in this occurrence the hint of the
oracle, they established themselves there, and called Apollo Smintheus, representing
him with a mouse at his feet. Daring the Macedonian period, the inhabitants were
compelled by Lysimachus to quit their town and remove to the neighbouring Alexandria.
(Comp. Steph. B. s. v.; Plin. v. 33.) No ruins of this town have yet been discovered
(Leake, Asia Minor, p. 273); but Prokesch (Denkwurdigk. iii. p. 362) states that
architectural remains are still seen near Cape Baba, which he is inclined to regard
as belonging to Hamaxitus.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
(Hamaxitos). A small town on the coast of the Troad.
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