Abdera Άβδηρα
Ruins of the ancient city of Abdera
Location
Abdera, Thrace
Coordinates	40°57′N 24°59′E / 40.95°N 24.983°E / 40.95; 24.983Coordinates: 40°57′N 24°59′E / 40.95°N 24.983°E / 40.95; 24.983
Government
Country:	Greece
Periphery:	East Macedonia and Thrace
Prefecture:	Xanthi
Population statistics (as of 2001[1])
City
- Population:	3,917
Other
Time zone:	EET/EEST (UTC+2/3)
Auto:	AH

Abdera (Greek: Ἄβδηρα) was a city-state on the coast of Thrace 17 km east-northeast of the mouth of the Nestos, and almost opposite Thasos. The site now lies in the Xanthi Prefecture of modern Greece. The municipality of Abdera, or Ávdira (Greek: Άβδηρα, IPA: [ˈavðiɾa]), has 3,917 inhabitants (2001).

[edit] History

Location of Abdera and its two successive metropolises, Clazomenae and Teos.

The chief coin type, with griffon.

Its mythical foundation was attributed to Heracles (on behalf of his fallen friend Abderus), its historical one to a colony from Klazomenai. This historical founding was traditionally dated to 654 BC, which is unverified, although evidence in 7th century BC Greek pottery tends to support it.^[2] But its prosperity dates from 544 BC, when the majority of the people of Teos (including the poet Anacreon) migrated to Abdera to escape the Persian yoke (Herodotus i.168). The chief coin type, a griffon, is identical with that of Teos; the rich silver coinage is noted for the beauty and variety of its reverse types.

In 513 BC and 512 BC, the Persians conquered Abdera. In 492 BC, the Persians again conquered Abdera, this time under Darius I. It later became part of the Delian League and fought on the side of Athens in the Peloponnesian war.

Abdera was a wealthy city, the third richest in the League, due to its production of corn and status as a prime port for trade with the interior of Thrace and the Odrysian kingdom.^[2]

A valuable prize, the city was repeatedly sacked: by the Triballi in 376 BC, Philip II of Macedon in 350 BC; later by Lysimachos of Thrace, the Seleucids, the Ptolemies, and again by the Macedonians. In 170 BC the Roman armies and those of Eumenes II of Pergamon besieged and sacked it.

The town seems to have declined in importance after the middle of the 4th century BC. The air of Abdera was proverbial in Athens as causing stupidity,^[3] but it counted among its citizens the philosophers Democritus, Protagoras and Anaxarchus, and historian and philosopher Hecataeus of Abdera.

The ruins of the town may still be seen on Cape Balastra; they cover seven small hills, and extend from an eastern to a western harbor; on the southwestern hills are the remains of the medieval settlement of Polystylon. Abdera is a titular see of the Roman Catholic Church in the province of Rhodope on the southern coast of Thrace, now called Bouloustra.

[edit] Landmarks

• Archaeological Museum of Abdera

[edit] References

[edit] Sources

• Grant, Michael. A Guide to the Ancient World. Michael Grant Publications, 1986.
• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• This article incorporates text from the entry Abdera in the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913.

[edit] External links

• Richard Stillwell, ed. Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites, 1976: "Abdera, Thrace, Greece"
• Hellenic Ministry of Culture on Abdera
• Avdera.gr (Greek)

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Abdera.