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Roman Roads in Lycaonia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

M. H. Ballance
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Extract

The following article is an attempt to reconstruct the Roman road-system of Eastern Lycaonia from the Peutinger Table (the only ancient itinerary that refers to this region), from published and unpublished milestones and from impressions received on journeys there in 1956 and 1957. I am indebted especially to Sir William Calder for his help at all stages, including the use of his note-books, and also to Messrs. A. S. Hall and J. G. Macqueen, who travelled with me in 1957.

The area covered is in the main that between Laodiceia Combusta on the west and the foot of Hasan Dağ on the east. It is divided into two parts by the great sweep of Boz Dağ, a quarter circle of mountains rising some 500 m. above the surrounding country and separating the fertile and monotonously flat plain of Iconium from the undulating steppe to north and east (map, fig. 1). In Strabo's time the area outside Boz Dağ was a semi-arid waste grazed by vast flocks of sheep and even wild asses, and until the introduction of mechanised methods of farming in the last few years, sheep have always been the principal livelihood of the local population. Water is scarce and many of the wells are over 50 m. deep.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anatolian Studies , Volume 8 , December 1958 , pp. 223 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute at Ankara 1958

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References

1 Strabo 568.

2 Ramsay, W. M., Historical Geography of Asia Minor (R.G.S. Suppl. Papers, vol. IV), 1890, pp. 357 ff.Google Scholar; Jahresh. d. Öst. Arch. Inst., VII, 1904Google Scholar, Beiblatt, cols. 80, 89, etc.

3 A.J.A., XXXVI, 1932, pp. 460 ff.Google Scholar; Monumenta Asiae Minoris Antiqua, vol. VII, pp. xxii ffGoogle Scholar.

4 Perta was first fixed by two inscriptions published by Callander, T. and Ramsay, W. M., Classical Review, XXIII, 1909, pp. 7–9Google Scholar. Inscriptions discovered at Giymir since that date confirm its identity with Perta beyond all doubt.

5 SirRamsay, W. M. and Bell, Gertrude, The Thousand and One Churches, London 1909, pp.382 ffGoogle Scholar.

5a See Pl. XXXVa.

6 A number of apparent exceptions to this rule do however exist. They include MAMA. I, 170aGoogle Scholar; IV, 334; VI, 216 and an epitaph of two Βρουζηνοί, found by the present writer in 1955 at Kara Sandiklı, the site of Brouzos.

7 These distances are measured on the map. From Giymir to Malır the ground is flat or slightly rolling and there was no need for the road to deviate from the direct line; between Malır and Gideriç it is more broken and this could account for the discrepancy between the xxix m.p. of the Table and the 25 m.p. of the map.

8 The following bibliographical abbreviations are used in this table:—WMC, Sir William Calder's note-books (with date of journey); MHB, the writer's note-books (with date of journey); AMR, Ramsay, A. Margaret, Report to the Wilson Trustees for 1909, privately printed 1910, pp. 10 ff.Google Scholar; MAMA., SirCalder, William and others, Mommenta Asiae Minoris Antiqua, vols. I, VIIGoogle Scholar and (in course of publication) VIII, 1928–; JHS., Journal of Hellenic Studies; JRS., Journal of Roman Studies; SERP., Ramsay, W. M. (editor) Studies in the History and Art of the Eastern Provinces of the Roman Empire, Aberdeen 1906Google Scholar; CIL., Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, Vol. III, Supplement, pt. ii, 1902Google Scholar.

9 The following abbreviations are used in this table to indicate roads to which milestones belong:—NLR, North Lycaonian Road; SLR, South Lycaonian Road; A–I, Ancyra–Iconium; I–S, Iconium–Savatra; A–A, Ancyra–Archelais; L–I, Laodiceia Combusta–Iconium.

10 The inscription has trib.pot. iiiii, (i.e. 142), perhaps a mistake for iiii (141).

11 The traces shown in Sir William Calder's copy are consistent with αρ′, λρ′, -]λρ′ or perhaps even -]αρ′. The only one of these that is readily explicable is λρ′ (130), which may be a distance from Abrostola along the North Lycaonian Road (cf. no. 15).

12 The inscription is very worn and the reading dubious. There can however be no doubt of its being a milestone.

13 This apparently belongs to an alternative road from Ancyra to Iconium, via Laodiceia Combusta (see MAMA., loc. cit.).

14 Ramsay's identification of Caballucome with the Byzantine Caballa (Historical Geography of Asia Minor, p. 359) seems an unnecessary complication of the issue.

15 The evidence for attribution to Atticius Strabo is slight. Sir William Calder's copy of 1908 shows that there is some resemblance in the form of the letters to that in other milestones of this governor.

16 Published by Pace, B. in Annuario d. R. Scuola Arch. d. Atene etc., III, 1916–1920, p. 51Google Scholar, no. 39 and re-copied (with impression) by the writer in 1956. Line 6 reads trib. pot. VI iṃ. I coṣ. [II] (A.D. 198). Callander, T. (in SERP., p. 173Google Scholar) mentions another milestone of Atticius Strabo on the same road but W of Apollonia, but neither he nor Ramsay (in SERP., p. 234 and JRS. XVI, 1926, p. 105Google Scholar) gives either a text or a reference to one.

17 On the distance from Ankara to Zıvarık, see MAMA., I, p. 193Google Scholar, note 1. An alternative possibility is that the distance given on the stone was measured along the North Lycaonian Road from Abrostola. The distance, measured on the map, via Sülüklü and Çeşmeli Zebir, is about 105 m.p.

18 Magie, D., Roman Rule in Asia Minor, Princeton, 1950, vol. I. p. 677Google Scholar.

19 See MAMA. VII, p. xixGoogle Scholar and no. 193, a milestone of Trajan that probably records the building of this road.

20 Anderson, J. G. C., in JHS. XIX, 1899, p. 109Google Scholar.

21 The stations on the Peutinger Table are out of order and incomplete.