Kedreai
City in Caria, on the island of Şehiroğlu or Sedir Ada, 16 km N of Marmaris. The city was independent in the 5th c. B.C., paying a tribute of half a talent, later reduced to a third, in the Delian Confederacy. In 405 it was attacked by Lysander, who captured it at the second attempt and enslaved the inhabitants; these are described by Xenophon (2.1.15) as semibarbarian. At an uncertain date in the Hellenistic period Kedreai was incorporated into the Rhodian Peraea, and formed one of the more important Rhodian demes. So far as is known the independent city issued no coinage. The principal deity was Apollo, with the epithets Pythios and Kedrieus.
The island is less than 1 km long, divided in the middle by a narrow isthmus. The W half is bare; the E is surrounded, just above the water, by a strong ashlar wall with towers. Near the summit stood a Doric temple, apparently that of Apollo, but only the foundations are preserved; it stands on a terraced platform with a solid wall. The site was later occupied by a Christian church. On the N slope is the theater, well preserved but overgrown and partly buried; the cavea had nine cunei but no diazoma. The agora also is overgrown, but its supporting wall remains in fine condition. On the mainland opposite the island, across some 200 m of water, is a fairly extensive necropolis comprising built tombs and sarcophagi. The stadium whose existence is implied by the agonistic inscriptions has not been located. Like most of the Peraean demes, Kedreai was neglected by the ancient geographers, though Stephanos quotes it from Hekataios, and it does not appear in the Byzantine bishopric lists.
BIBLIOGRAPHYE. Diehl & G. Cousin, BCH 10 (1888) 423-28; G. Guidi & A. Maiuri, Annuario 4-5 (1921-22) 378-84; P. M. Fraser & G. E. Bean, The Rhodian Peraea (1954) 67, 95-97; Bean, Turkey beyond the Maeander (1971) 156-57.
G. E. BEAN