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Greek & Roman Geography (ed. William Smith)

Antissa

ANTISSA (Ancient city) LESVOS
  Eth. Antissaios. A city of the island Lesbos, near to Cape Sigrium, the western point of Lesbos (Steph. B. s. v. Antissa, following Strabo, p. 618). The place had a harbour. The ruins found by Pococke at Calas Limneonas, a little NE. of cape Sigri, may be those of Antissa. This place was the birth-place of Terpander, who is said to be the inventor of the seven-stringed lyre. Antissa joined the Mytilenaeans in their revolt from Athens in the Peloponnesian war B.C. 428, and successfully defended itself against the Methymnaeans who attacked it; but after Mytilene had been compelled to surrender to the Athenians, Antissa was recovered by them also (Thuc. iii. 18, 28). Antissa was destroyed by the Romans after the conquest of Perseus, king of Macedonia (B.C. 168), because the Antissaeans had received in their port and given supplies to Antenor, the admiral of Perseus. The people were removed to Methymna. (Liv. xlv. 31; Plin. v. 31.)
  Myrsilus (quoted by Strabo, p. 60) says, that Antissa was once an island, and at that time Lesbos was called Issa; so that Antissa was named like many other places, Antiparos, Antiphellus, and others, with reference to the name of an opposite place. Pliny (ii. 89) places Antissa among the lands rescued from the sea, and joined to the mainland; and Ovid (Met. xv. 287), where he is speaking of the changes which the earth's surface has undergone, tells the same story. In another passage (v. 31), where he enumerates the ancient names of Lesbos, Pliny mentions Lasia, but not Issa. Lasia, however, may be a corrupt word. Stephanus makes Issa a city of Lesbos. It is possible, then, that Antissa, when it was an island, may have had its name from a place on the mainland of Lesbos opposite to it, and called Issa.

This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited May 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks


Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities

Antissa

A town on the west coast of Lesbos, though formerly on a small island opposite Lesbos, with which it afterwards united.

Individuals' pages

Non commercial Web-Sites

Perseus Project

Antissa

ANTISSA (Ancient city) LESVOS

The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites

Antissa

Antissa is believed to be NW of the modern town of Skalokhori, on the peninsula called Nisi, Ovriokastro, or Kastro ton Genoveson, E of the place where the river Voulgaris issues into the Tsamourliman (Mud Harbor) and ca. 9 km NE of the modern market town of Antissa which was called Telonia during the Turkish period and up to the 1930s. There are smaller ruined settlements W of Skalokhori, near Liota on the bay of Gavathas, and also farther W between the bay of Pokhi and Orphikia in the area of Lapsarna. The site of Antissa, which was excavated before WWII, may also be the location of the Byzantine castle of Ag. Theodoroi whose name appears in old maps. During its independent period, Antissa was rarely on friendly terms with the neighboring state of Methymna, but those who survived after the destruction of the city in 167 B.C. were forced to incorporate with the Methymnians.

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