Gortyna, according to Ptolemy (iii, 17,10), was situ- ated in 54° 15' and 34° 50'. Simon proposes a Shemit- ic etymology for the name (Ownn. p. 50 ; but see Sick- ler, Handhiich, p. 470). Next to Cnossus, it was the most important city in the island for power and mag- nilicence. At one time Gortyna and Cnossus in union held the whole of Crete in their power except Lyttus (Polyb. iv, 53, 54). In later times thej^ were in a con- tinual state of warfare (Strabo, x, Didot. ed., p. 410). Gortj'na was founded by a colony from Gortys of Ar- cadia (Plato, Tj'gcs, iv, Didot. ed., p. 320). It was of very considerable size, its walls being tifty stadia in circuit, whilst those of its rival, Cnossus, were rot more than thirty (Strabo, x, Didot. ed., p. 409-411). Homer bestows upon it the epithet "walled" (rtixa'xrjaa, II. ii, 646). It was situate on the south side of the island, on the river Lethseus (Messara), and at a distance of ninety stadia from the Libj'an Sea (Strabo, I. c). In the Peloponnesian war Gortyna seems to have had some relations with Athens (Thuc. ii, 85). Its connec- tion with Piiilopoemen in 15. C. 201 is shown by the Goritynians having invited him to take the command of their army (Plutai'ch, Philop. 13). When the AchiB-
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an League was in alliance with the Romans, B C. 197, against Philip V of Macedon, 500 Gortynians joined Quinctius Flamininus when on his march to Thessaly, previous to the battle of Cynoscephalie (Livy, xxxiii, 3). It is on\j recently that a coin bearing the well- known tj'pes of the League has been found, struck at Gortyna. The late Col. Leake has shown that the coin 'with the legend KOPTVNIQN AXAIQN, which had previously been assigned to Gortys in Arcadia hy the late Mr. Burgon {Num. Chron. xix, 235-36), cer- tainly belongs to the Cretan Gortj-na {Supp. Num.
Coin of Gortyna. Hell. p. 110), thus proving that cities beyond the con- tinent were admitted into the League (K. S. Poole, Num. Chron., new ser., i, 173). About the same period there are evidences of an alliance, political or commer- cial, between Athens and several of the Cretan towns. Some of the coins of six of these — Cnossus, Cydonia, Gortyna, Hierapytna, Polj-rrhenium, and Priansus — are tetradrachms, with exactly' the types of those of Athens of the same age, but distinguished b}' having the distinctive badges of the Cretan towns. They were probabh- struck bj' the Cretan cities of the great alliance against Philip V of Macedon about B.C. 188 (Pausan. i, 36, 5, 6; comp. Eckhcl, I)oct. Num. Vet. ii, 221 ; Leake, Num. Hell. Insular Greece, \). 19 ; Poole, I. c). As Cnossus declined, Gortjma rose to eminence, and became the metropolis of Crete. About A.D. 200 a brother of Septimius Severus held at Gortyna the oiHce of proconsul and quajstor of the united provinces of Crete and Cj'rene (Bockh, No. 2591). In the ar- rangement of the provinces by Constantine, Gortj-na was still the metropolis of Crete (Ilierocl. Synecd. p. 649 ; comp. Leake, Supj). Num. Hell. p. 157).
The remains of Gortyna near Aghius Dheka (the ten Saints), and the cavern in the mountain, have been described by Tournefort {Relation d'un Voyage du Le- ranf) and Pococke {Description of the Easf), and the cavern, more recently, liy Mr. Cockerell (\A'alpule, ii, 402). The modern Gortjmians hold this cavern to be the Labyrinth, thus claiming for themselves the lien- ors of the myth of the IMinotaur; but it does not ap- pear from the Gortynian coins, which date from the time of the Persian war to that of Hadrian (and there are none later), that their ancestors ever entertained such an idea (Leake, Num. Hell. Insvlar Greece, p. IS). The famous Laliyrinth is represented on the coins of Cnossus, and Col. Leake says that "it is difficult to reconcile this fact with the existence of the Labyrinth near Gortyna, for that the excavation near Aghius Dheka, at the foot of ]\Iount Ida, is the renowned Cre- tan labyrinth, cannot lie doubted after the description of Tournefort, Pococke, and Cockerell" {Snpp. Num. Hell. p. 156). This opinion is given notwithstanding the assertion of Pausanias (u 'ti' Kjnoacroi Xafivpit'Ooc, i, 27, 9). One of tlie coins of Cnossus bears, besides tlie Labj-rinth on its reverse, the JMinotaur on the ob- verse. It cannot be much later than the expedition of Xerxes, and thus affords evidence of the antiquitj' of the tradition of the Labyrinth, if not of its real ex- istence ; whereas Hock {Kreta, i, 56 sq.), reiving on tlie silence of Hesiod and Herodotus, and the assumed silence of Homer — though tlie Iliad contains wiiat looks very like an allusion to the Cretan wonder (//. xviii, 590 sq.) — has supposed it to have been an invention of the later poets borrowed from Egypt (Poole, ut sup. i, 171-72). A full account of the remains of the old site and the modern place is given in the Museum of Clas-
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sical Antiquities (ii, 277-286). Jlr. Falkoner here de- scribes the cavern near Gortyna from Sieber, who spent three days hi examhiing it, and saj's that cer- tainly it had been nothing more tlian a quarry, which probably supplied the stone for building; the city {Reise nach Jer Insel Kreta, i, 511-520). Hock seems to hold similar views (Kretci, i, 447-454). — Kitto, s. v. See Crete.