Cilicia

Cilicia as a province of the Roman Empire

Cilicia was an ancient Roman province located in the eastern half of southern Asia Minor in Turkey. It was bordered on the north by Cappadocia and Laconia , east through Pisidia and Pamphylia , on the south by the Mediterranean and south-east by Syria.

It roughly corresponds today to the province of Adana : the area between the Taurus Mountains , the Amanos Mountains and the Mediterranean.

For Herodotus ^(fifth century BC.) Cilicia () is one satrapy Persia whose scope is larger than in the subsequent data to accept the name. To the north it goes up on the course of Halys ( Kzlrmak ). To the east it extends to the Euphrates and south to near the mouth of the Orontes and the plain of Cilicia called Plain Alienne ^, . The plain Alienne Herodotus probably corresponds to the marshes by the sea, formed by sediments from two rivers Seyhan and Ceyhan which corresponds to the word Turkish ukurova . The course of these two rivers has changed several times. At certain times, they had a common entrance which is why the Seyhan is sometimes cited as a tributary of the Ceyhan . Currently their mouths are separated by more than 60 km.

According to the geography of Strabo (late ^first century BC., early ^first century) Cilicia starting to Alanya (Coracesium ) to the west and to Tarsus it 's called Cilicia Trachea because of the steep shores and poverty of its villages or Trachotide . Strabo reports a little further in the text that "some authors" do not start Cilicia in Alanya, but Aydnck (Celenderis) is nearly 130 km to the east. Conversely, Pliny the Elder up the western boundary of Cilicia on the river Melas ( Manavgat Nehri ) is 55 km to the west . At Tarsus (Tarsus ), or more precisely Mezitli (Soli / Soles ; Pompeiopolis called then) we enter the plain of Cilicia, Cilicia called pedicle , called ukurova by the Turks. In this description of Strabo, Cilicia Trachea includes the districts of Alanya and Gazipaa in the province of Antalya and el ( Mersin province ) except the districts of Anamur and Bozyazi considering that western boundary of Cilicia is Aydnck. The southern districts of the province of Adana in Cilicia Pedicle form. The coastal districts of Erzin , Drtyol and Iskenderun in Hatay form Cilicia Issique .

Between the years 1851 and 1853, Victor Lee, a voyage in Cilicia and the Taurus by order of Emperor Napoleon III. This travelogue solves many problems associated with changes names .

Antiquity

Around 27 AD. AD under the emperor Tiberius , Cilicia is attached to the province of Syria. Some parts of the region remain nevertheless ruled by local rulers to complete the annexation by Vespasian in 74 AD. BC The province is large enough that a proconsul to be named.

Around 297 , Emperor Diocletian makes a reform provinces. Cilicia is then divided into three parts: The Isauria south of Iconium ( Konya ), about the Turkish provinces of Konya and Antalya , with its capital prima Cilicia Tarsus and other cities like Adana and Pompeiopolis ( Soles ) approximately the Mersin province and part of the province of Adana , Cilicia secunda with its capital Anazarbe ( Aali ) and as cities Mopsuestia ( Yakapinar ), Aegean ( Yumurtalik ) and Issus of Alexandria (circa of Iskenderun ), approximately eastern province of Adana and the maritime districts of the province of Hatay.

Middle Ages

Armenian Cilicia, 1080-1375.

Many Armenians have come under the leadership of the Byzantine Empire , took refuge in Cilicia after the invasion Arabic of Armenia. These Armenians were originally supposed to military settlers block the Taurus Mountains.

Around 1070, the Armenian Philaretos Brakhamios dominates a principality which includes Cilicia, Antioch and Edessa. During the period of the Crusades , the small Armenian state in Cilicia managed to take its independence ( 1198 ). Will therefore constitute the Armenian kingdom of Cilicia headed his first king : Levon II the Great , recognized by the Pope and the sovereigns of the West.

The ^thirteenth century is the century's most flourishing kingdom. In the first third of the century, the king to enter into the problem of succession of the Principality of Antioch. The arrival of the Mongols in Great Armenia in the 1230s, will push the kingdom to be put under the protection of the Mongols. King Hethum itself will make the trip to the Khan Mongolian to conclude a military alliance in the 1250s. In 1258, the Mongols seized Baghdad. This event listing attacks on Syria which will punctuate the end of the thirteenth century. The first attack took place in 1260. The Armenian kingdom sends troops participating in the taking of Aleppo and Damascus. King managed to enlarge its territory by taking several strongholds of northern Syria by the Mongols.

In 1266, the Mamluks to reach their first foray into the Armenian kingdom. Their attacks followed and gradually deplete the kingdom. The kingdom finally going to the family of Lusignan , then to Cyprus. The last king, Leo V , was captured in his capital of Sis in 1375, and taken prisoner to Cairo. He tells his story and that of his kingdom to the monk Jean Dardel.

From the Ottoman Empire in Turkey

In the ^sixteenth century , the Ottomans invaded the region. In the early ^nineteenth century , the success of the revolt of the Pasha of Egypt, Mehemet Ali , against the Sultan Ottoman allowed his son Ibrahim Pasha to conquer Syria and Cilicia in 1832. Less than a decade later, the gunboat diplomacy of the British , aided by the neutrality of France , imposed at Pacha abandoning these conquests against the recognition of independence of Egypt. This period is a prelude to the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire with the Adana massacres of April 1909 .

After the dismantling of the Ottoman Empire , the region was incorporated into the French mandate in Syria as part of the campaign of Cilicia , before being ceded to Turkey emerging as 1920.

References

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