The Cydnus originally flowed through the heart of Tarsus, as many authorities mention. But, w hen a flood in the river had done great harm in the cily, Justinian (."i27-5()3) cut an artificial channel to carry part of the water round the east side of the city. It would ajipear that gradually the branch of the river that flowed through the citj' grew sm.aller as its bed became choked, and in modern limes almost the whole of the water passes through Justinian's channel. II In 1432 the i.Tuer branch is described as a tiny stream ; and in 1473 the eastern branch is spoken of as the only one (see the quotations in Ritter's Klcinasicn, ii. p. 184 f.). The falls of the Cydnus beside the northern entrance to the city are still very pictur- esque, though only a few feet high.
Tarsus possessed almost all tho qualifications required for a great commercial city. Not merely dia it possess a safe and good harbour and a ridi territory, it was also placed in front of the
•'Krfut, Strabo, p. 672.
t Xif*¥iiivit Tc-ro;, a]tpitretit1y a broadening of the river so as to look like a lake, Stralio, p. 072.
t A marsh .SO miles id circumtercnce (Barker, iMrtt and Peniilet, p. 137).
5 .strabo, p. 671.
I Hitter, KleiiMKien, ii. 202 ; Steph. Byi. ».t>. AiX«i.
*| Barker says that a canal from the Cydnus passes through Tarsus, and formerly flowed into the marsh, but was recently diverted to rejoin the river. This may be the old cVannel.
t>86
TARSUS
TARSUS
southern end of the great trade and war route across Mount Taurus, Ihroujjh the Ciliciau Gates, to Cappadocia, Lycaouia, and inner Asia Minor generally. Such a situation made it a great city from time immemorial.
ii. Tarsus the Oriental City.— Its foundation was attributed by legend to Sardanapalus, who was said to have built Tarsus and Andiialos in one day, and whose tomb is said to have been at the latter place. A more Oriental form of the legend, as reported by Eusebius (Chron. i. p. 27*), named Sennacherib, king of Nineveh, as the founder. When Tarsus became a Greek city, a centre of Greek civilization and seat of a university, it could not be satisfied with such an origin, but invented a Greek foundation. Perseus or Herakles was named by the Tarsians as founder of the city (see Dion Chrysostom's Oratio xxxiii. ad Tars.; Libanius, Or. xxviii. 620) ; but this is only the Assyrian legend in a slightly Grecized form, for Perseus was a peculiarly Oriental and Assyrian hero (Herod, vi. 54), connected with the mythology and religion of many places in the eastern parts of Asia Minor ; and Herakles was the Tyrian god, the founder of colonies. These legends contain a memory of the time when the AssjTian power extended over Syria and Cilieia, and Tarsus was their western capital. Tarsus is mentioned on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser among the towns which he captured in the middle of the 9th cent. B.C. Athenodorus, the Tarsian, said that the city was originally called Parthenia, from Parthenius, son of Cydnus, and grandson of Anchiale, daughter of Japetus : here, too, fancy is giving a Greek colour to local Asiatic legend.
Tarsus continued for a long time an essentially Oriental town. Its early coinage was struck, not by a municipal government like that of a Gretk city, but by native kings or Persian satraps, who used Tarsus as their capital. It is true that at an early time considerable influence was exerted on the city by Greek trade and civilization. Thus Greek letters were sometimes engraved on the early coins, and the coinage as a whole was modelled after Greek coins, and was probably made by Greek artisans employed by the rulers of Tarsus. Yet even in the Koman period, after Tarsus had for centuries been transformed (at least externally) into a Greek city, marked Oriental characteristics are apparent. A deity standing on a homed lion, thoroughly non-Greek and Asiatic in character, probably the god Sandon, often appears on coins under the empire ; and a monument at Anchialos, inscribed with letters believed to be Assyrian, is often mentioned t by Greek WTiters. larsus therefore was never so thoroughly Hellenized as to lose or to forget its Asiatic character and origin ; even as a Greek city it was far from being wholly Greek. Its population, doubtless, was very mixed (as it is at the present day) ; and even to a greater degiee than Syrian Antioch it may be regarded as a meeting-place of Greeks and Orientals.
In the Assyrian and afterwards in the Persian period hardly anything is known of Tarsus. When the central government was strong, presumably the city was governed by Witraps. When the central government was weak, the satraps teinlfd to become more and more independent, and even a dynasty of native kings seems to have held Tarsus during part of the 5th and 4th cents. B.C.
In the Anabasis of Xenophon, Tarsus is described about B.O. 400 as a great and wealttiy city, containing the palace of Syennesis the Citician king, but its coinage is much older. E^ectrum coins of the 6th cent, have been assigned to it, though not with great probability. The kings or satraps of Cihcia struck coins at Tarsus throughout the &th and 4th cents., with legends mostly Aramaic, but partly Greek, frequently with