Ramsay, William Mitchell: The cities and bishoprics of Phrygia: being an essay of the local history of Phrygia from the earliest time to the Turkish conquest (Band 1,2): West and West-Central Phrygia (Oxford, 1897)

CORRECTIONS OF VIEWS IN PART I.

Pp. 35 f. In a well-weighed review of Part I in Berl. Phil. Woch,
1896 p. 465, Dr. Partsch objects to my apportioning of the river names ;
and I think he has ground for his objection. My identification of the
Laodicean rivers depended on two fundamental assumptions: (1) that
the Kadmos has been rightly identified by Arundel, Hamilton, and
A. H. Smith with Geuk-Bunar-Su (the reason being that Strabo
describes a Duclen in the former, and there is a Duden in the latter):
(a) that Pliny's account may be set aside as inexact, because it does not
originate from an eye-witness (ASP p. 5).

But, after realizing how accurate Pliny's account of the Maeander, its
course, and its tributaries is (pp. 398, 411, 452, cp. 236), I see that
I was wrong in disregarding his account of the Laodicean streams. Let
us, then, provisionally accept his statement, and see where it will lead
us. Laodiceia, as he says, V 105, imjwsila est Li/co flumini, latera aclluen-
tibus Asopo et Capro. The two streams that wash the sides of the city
are Gumush-Tchai and Geuk-Bunar-Su1; and these must be the Asopos
and Kapros. But which is which ? To answer this question, we turn
to Strabo. He says /cat 6 Kdirpos kcu 6 Avkos a-vfj.j3a.Wei r&> MaidVSpu
7rora//£>, TTorafj.bs eiixeyeOys, acp ov kcu rj irpoy rto Avku AaoStxeia Ae'yerai.
The form of this sentence is remarkable, and I think Strabo would have
expressed himself very differently, if he had meant that the Kapros was
a small stream, like Gumush-Tchai, flowing into the Lycos, and that the

1 The plan indicates a stream (Baslili- side (owing to the character of the

Tchai) nearer Laodiceia than Geuk- locality). Bashli-Tchai then flowed

Bunar-Su, which is two kilometres from through the city (or, rather, its water

the line of fortifications. But Bashli- was doubtless entirely utilized for the

Tchai is a poor stream, and, more- city), while Geuk-Bunar-Su literally

over, the city clearly extended far washed one side of Laodiceia. Finally,

beyond the narrow limits of the walls. Bashli-Tchai is a mere branch of Geuk-

Laodiceia was originally small; but it Bunar-Su ; and does not run direct into

grew great under Roman government the Lycos,
(p. 38), and spread chiefly on the eastern

VOL. I. PT. II. F f