Hierapolis
- A city of Great Phrygia, now Pambouk Kaleh, Vitr. 8, 3, 10; Plin. 2, 93, 95, § 208; Vulg. Col. 4, 13.—Hence,
- 1 Hĭĕrāpŏ-lītae, ārum, m., the inhabitants of Hierapolis, Plin. 5, 29, 29, § 105.—
- 2 Hĭĕrā-pŏlītāni, ōrum, m., the same, Macr. S. 1, 7; Dig. 43, 20, 1.
HIERA´POLIS(Ἱεράπολις: Eth. Ιεραπολίτης).
1.A considerable town in Phrygia, situated upon a height between the rivers Lycus and Maeander, about five miles north of Laodiceia, and on the road from Apameia to Sardis. It was probably founded by the Greeks, though we have no record of the time or circumstances of its foundation. It was celebrated for its warm springs and its Plutonium, to which two circumstances it appears to have owed its sanctity. The warm springs formed stalactites and incrustations. (Strab. 13. p. 629;Vitr. 8.3.) The Plutonium was a deep cave with a hollow opening, from which a mephitic vapour arose, which poisoned any one who inhaled it, with the exception of the Galli, who are said to have received no injury from it; but it appears to have lost its poisoning influence in the time of Ammianus. (Strab. l. c.;Plin. Nat. 2.93. s. 95; Dio Cass.; Amm.Marc. 23.6.) The waters of Hierapolis were much used for dyeing. (Strab. 13. p. 630.) Among the deities worshipped in Hierapolis the Great Mother of the Gods is especially named. (Plin. Nat. 2.93. s. 95.) There was a Christian church in this town as early as the time of St. Paul. ( Coloss. 4.13.) At a later time it claimed the title of metropolis of Phrygia. (Hierocles, p. 665, with Wesseling's notes.) It was the birth place of the philosopher Epictetus. The ruins of Hierapolis are situated at an uninhabited place called Pambuk-kalessi. They are of considerable extent, and have been visited and described by several modern travellers,who have also noticed the stalactites and incrustations mentioned by Strabo. Chandler speaks of a cliff as one entire incrustation, and describes it as an immense frozen cascade, the surface wavy, as of water at once fixed, or in its headlong course suddenly petrified.(See the Travels of Pococke, Chandler, Arundell, Leake Hamilton, and Fellowes.) COIN OF HIERAPOLIS IN PHRYGIA.
COIN OF HIERAPOLIS IN PHRYGIA.A city of Cilicia, known only from coins, from which however we learn that it was situated upon the river Pyramus (Ἱεροπολίτων τῶν πρὸς τὧ Πυράμὡ : see below). The name of this city is always written Hieropolis, while that of Phrygia is Hierapolis. From the absence of all mention of this Cilician town by the ancient writers, Eckhel conjectures that it is a more recent name, and that it is perhaps the same place as Megarsus, since we find upon the coins of the latter Μεγαρσῶν τῶν πρὸς τὧ Πυραμὧ. (Eckhel, vol. 3. p. 57.) COIN OF HIERAPOLIS IN CILICIA.
HIERA´POLIS(Ἱερὰ πόλις), the Sacred Cityof Cyrrhestica in Syria, situated on the high road from Antioch to Mesopotamia, 24 M. P. to the W. of the Euphrates and 36 M. P. to the SW. of Zeugma ( Pent. Tab. ), 2 1/2 days' journey from Beroea, and 5 days' from Antioch (Zosim. 3.12).
Hierapolis, or Hieropolis as it is called always on coins and in Stephanus of Byzantium, obtained its Hellenic name from Seleucus Nicator (Aelian, Ael. NA 12.2), owing to the circumstance of BAMBYCE(Βαμβύκη), as it was called by the natives, being the chief seat of the worship of the Syrian goddessAstarte, or personification of the passive powers of Nature. (Lucian, de Dea Syr. c. i.)
Bambycen quae alio nomine Hierapolis vocatur; Syris vero Magog. Ibi prodigiosa Atargatis, Graecis autem Deeceto dicta, colitur,Plin. Nat. 5.19. Sillig (ad loc.) has in his text Mabog,which is the correct reading, and appears in the Oriental forms Munbedj(Jaubert, Géog. d'Edrise, vol. ii. pp. 138, 155), Manbesja,Manbesjum(Schultens, Vita Salad. ), Menba,Manba(Schultens, Index Geogr. ), Manbegj(Abú--l-fedá, Tab. Syr. p. 128), and the modern name Kará Bambuche, or Bugúk Munbedj. Under the Seleucidae, from its central position be-tween Antioch and Seleuceia on the delta of the Tigris, it became a great emporium. Strabo (16. p. 748) has given an interesting account of the passage of the caravans from Syria to Seleuceia and Babylon; the confusion of Edessa and Hierapolis is an error probably of the transcriber (comp. Groskurd, ad loc.). Crassus plundered the rich temple of the goddess, who presided over the elements of nature and the productive seeds of things, and seized upon the treasures, which it took several days to weigh and examine. And it was here that an ill omen befel him. (Plut. Crass. 17.)
Under Constantine, Hierapolis became the capital of the new province Euphratensis. (Malal. Chron. 13. p. 317.) Julian, in his Persian campaign, appointed Hierapolis as the rendezvous for the Roman troops before their passage of the Euphrates. He has given an account of his march to it, which took up five days, in a letter to Libanius ( Ep. xxvii.), and remained there three days, at the house of Sopater, a distinguished pupil of Iamblichus. At Hierapolis one of those unlucky signs which Ammianus (23.2.6) has so carefully recorded, took place at his entrance into the town. (Comp. Gibbon, c. xxiv; Le Beau, Bas Empire, vol. 3. p. 58.)
With the establishment of Christianity, Hierapolis recovered its ancient, indigenous Syrian name, but lost its splendour and magnificence by the downfall. of the old worship (A.D. 540). Buzes, who commanded during the absence of Belisarius in the East, concentrated his forces at Hierapolis, but it only escaped being pillaged by Chosroes by the payment of tribute. (Procop. B. P. 2.6; Gibbon, c. xlii.; Le Beau, vol. 9. p. 12.)
A.D. 1068 it was captured by the emperor Romanus Diogenes, in his valiant efforts to resist the progress of the Turks. (Zonar. vol. 2. p. 279; Le Beau, vol. 14. p. 472.)
It does not fall within the province of this article to trace the connection between Bambyce == Bombycina urbs,Bombyciis copiis gaudens,and the introduction of the silk-worm from the East; much curious information on this point will be found in Ritter ( Erdkunde, vol. x. pp. 1056--1062).
The ruins of this city were first discovered and described by Maundrell ( Journal, p. 204) and by Pococke ( Trav. vol. ii. pt. 1. p. 166). But it was not till the period of Colonel Chesney's Expedition. that the position was accurately fixed.
At a distance of 16 miles W. by S. of the passage of Kal‘--at-en-ejm, at about 600 feet above the Euphrates, the ruins of Hierapolis occupy the centre of a rocky plain, where, by its isolated position, the city must not only have been deprived of running water, but likewise of every advantage which was likely to create and preserve a place of importance.
Some ruined mosques and square Saracenic towers, with the remains of its surrounding walls and ditches, mark the limits of the Muslim city, within which are four large cisterns, a fine sarcophagus, and, among other ancient remains, the scattered ruins of an acropolis and two temples.
Of the smaller, the inclosure and portions of seven columns remain; but it seems to possess little interest compared with the larger, which may have been that of the Syrian Queen of Heaven.Among the remains of the latter are some fragments of massive architecture, not unlike the Aegyptian, and 11 arches form one side of a square paved court, over which are scattered the shafts of columns and capitals displaying the lotus.
A little way to the W. of the walls there is an extensive necropolis, which contains many Turkish, with some Pagan, Seljukian, and Syriac tombs; the last having some almost illegible inscriptions in the ancient character. (Chesney, Exped. Euphrat. vol. 1. p. 516.) Hierapolis was the ecclesiastical metropolis of the province Euphratensis. (Neale, Hist. of East. Church, vol. 1. p. 134.)
Eckhel (vol. 3. p. 261) has noticed the fact, that the coins of Hierapolis copy the type of those of Antioch: they are Seleucid, autonomous, and imperial, ranging from Trajan to the elder and younger Philip.
[E.B.J](Ἱεράπολις). (1) A city of Great Phrygia, near the Maeander, and an early seat of Christianity, mentioned in St. Paul's Epistle to the Colossians (iv. 13). Here Cybelé was worshipped. Epictetus was a native of Hierapolis.
(2) Formerly Bambȳcé (Βαμβύκη), a city in the northeast of Syria, one of the chief seats of the worship of Astarté.
Town in Phrygia, 18 km N-NE of Denizli. Founded during the Hellenistic period, probably by the Pergamene kings, and most likely by Eumenes II; the earliest inscription found there is a decree in honor of his mother Apollonis. The earliest coins, down to the time of Augustus, give the city's name as Hieropolis, which suggests that the site was previously occupied by a temple village. Stephanos Byzantios, although he quotes the name as Hierapolis, explains it by the many temples in the city. A derivation from Hiera or Hiero, wife of Telephos, has been suggested, but this idea was evidently not current in antiquity.
Hierapolis has virtually no history, apart from a series of earthquakes and visits from the emperors. The worst earthquake occurred under Nero in A.D. 60, and seems to have necessitated extensive rebuilding. Christianity was introduced early, and the apostle Philip ended his life at Hierapolis, where his martyrium has recently been rediscovered. Coinage extends from the 2d c. B.C. to the emperor Philip, though alliance coins continue a little later.
The white cliffs of Pamukkale (Cotton castle), like petrified cascades, have long been famous. They were and are being formed by heavily lime-charged streamlets issuing from a hot pool fed from the hill above. The city lies on the plateau above the cliffs, and stood in large part not on soil but on the calcareous mass deposited by the streams. Its cardinal feature is a straight street over a mile long, running N-S through the center. At either end stood a monumental three-arched gateway flanked by round towers; that on the N is still well preserved, and is dated by its dedication to Domitian in A.D. 84-85. These gates stood some 150 m outside the city wall, in which was a second, simpler gate. The wall itself surrounds the city except on the side of the cliffs; it is low and of indifferent masonry, no earlier than the Christian era. The original city was apparently protected only by its sanctity.
The great baths, close to the edge of the cliffs, stand almost to their original height. In front is an open courtyard flanked on each side by a chamber entered through a row of six pilasters; behind this is a complex of a dozen rooms, with arches up to 16 m in span, and an even larger central arch. Identification of the individual rooms is hindered by the stonelike floor deposited since antiquity. In many places the walls show the holes for fixing the marble veneer, and traces of stucco are visible on the arches. The hot pool, commonly called the sacred pool, has a temperature somewhat under blood heat. In it lie numerous ancient blocks and column drums. The streamlets issuing from it deposit their lime as they go, forming self-built channels 0.3 m or more wide which change their position from time to time. Along the N part of the main street they have formed walls up to 2 m high.
Up the slope E of the pool is the Temple of Apollo, newly excavated. In its present form it is no earlier than the 3d c. A.D., but it appears to have replaced an earlier building. The SW front, approached by a flight of steps, stands on a podium about 2 m high; the back part rests on a shelf of rock. It contains a pronaos and cella, and had a row of columns, probably six, on the front only.
Adjoining the temple on the SE is the Plutoneion, which constituted the city's chief claim to fame. It was described by Strabo (629-30) as an orifice in a ridge of the hillside, in front of which was a fenced enclosure filled with thick mist immediately fatal to any who entered except the eunuchs of Kybele. The Plutoneion was mentioned and described later by numerous ancient writers, in particular Dio Cassius (68.27), who observed that an auditorium had been erected around it, and Damascius ap. Photius (Bibl. 344f), who recorded a visit by a certain doctor Asclepiodotus about A.D. 500; he mentioned the hot stream inside the cavern and located it under the Temple of Apollo. There is, in fact, immediately below the sidewall of the temple in a shelf of the hillside, a roofed chamber 3 m square, at the back of which is a deep cleft in the rock filled with a fast-flowing stream of hot water heavily charged with a sharp-smelling gas. In front is a paved court, from which the gas emerges in several places through cracks in the floor. The mist mentioned by Strabo is not observable now. The gas was kept out of the temple itself by allowing it to escape through gaps left between the blocks of the sidewalls.
Just N of the temple is a large nymphaion, of familiar form, with a back wall and two wings enclosing a water basin, and a flight of steps in front. Five semicircular recesses in the walls are surmounted by rectangular niches; in the central niche is a pipe-hole. The walls were decorated with moldings, statues, and reliefs.
Higher up the slope to the E is the theater. This is large for the size of the city, reflecting the large numbers of visitors to the warm baths and the Plutoneion. The cavea, ca. 100 m wide, is well preserved, with some 50 rows of seats, one diazoma, a semicircular Royal Box, and a vomitorium on either side. The stage building is also standing in large part; it had three rows of columns one above another, and was adomed with statues and a Dionysiac frieze, but most of the decoration has fallen. The stage itself was rather less than 4 m high. The orchestra, some 20 m in diameter and surrounded by a wall ca. 2 m high, is being cleared of the mass of fallen masonry. The building as a whole is of Graeco-Roman type, dating from the Roman period; some vestiges of an earlier Hellenistic theater may be observed in a hollow of the hill N of the city.
Farther up the hill to the NE is a rectangular walled reservoir, and beyond this again is the newly excavated and elaborate martyrium of St. Philip. This is a square building, approached from the SE by a broad flight of steps; it has an octagonal central chamber containing the semicircular synthronos; from this six other chambers open off, and round the exterior are rows of smaller chambers entered from the outside. The apostle's tomb has not been discovered. The building is supposed to have been used for commemorative services on the saint's feast day; it dates from the early 5th c. A.D.
The necropolis, containing well over 1000 tombs, has two main groups, one on the hillside beyond the city wall on the E, the other lining the street outside the city on the N. The earliest are of tumulus type, with a circular wall at the base, a cone of earth above surmounted by a phallos stone, and the burial chamber in the interior with its own door; some also have a door in the semicircular wall. There are some house tombs, but most of the tombs are simply sarcophagi, set in many cases on a solid substructure; there are also a few large built tombs. The tomb of Flavius Zeuxis stands W of the N monumental gate; the inscription records that Zeuxis had made 72 voyages round Cape Malea to Italy.
BIBLIOGRAPHYR. Chandler, Travels in Asia Minor (1817; repr. 1971) 186-92; C. Fellows, Asia Minor (1839) 283-85; C. Humann et al., Altertümer von Hierapolis (1898) MI; excavation reports, Annuario (1961-); G. E. Bean, Turkey beyond the Maeander (1971) 232-46.
G. E. BEAN