The Tradition of the Ionian Colonisation of Asia Minor: Remarks on the Sources

Summary

Atheniensium res gestae,

sicuti ego aestumo, satis amplae magnificaeque fuere,

verum aliquanto minores tamen quam fama feruntur.

Sed quia provenere ibi scriptorum magna ingenia,

per terrarum orbem Atheniensium facta pro maxumis celebrantur.

Sallustius, Bellum Catilinae 8

Abstract: This article discusses the tradition of the Ionian colonisation preserved in ancient literary sources. The author focuses on the time and circumstances in which the view that the Athenians were responsible for the Ionian colonisation emerged. He also examines whether there is any support in the sources for the opinion expressed by some historians that such a belief was already strong in the Archaic period.

Key words: colonisation, Ionia, Athens, Euripides, Thucydides, Herodotus.

Ionian migration is a familiar term in historiography. Certainly, there is an ongoing debate about the extent to which accounts about the Ionians' arrival from Attica in Asia Minor reflect the actual events at the turn of the 1^st millennium BC. However, it is generally accepted that as early as the 6^th century BC the myth of the Ionian migration played a significant role in forming a bond between Athens and the Greek cities in Asia Minor. This paper is an attempt to critically re-examine the problem. We will start our examination by quoting a fragment of the Compendium of Roman History by Velleius Paterculus, who wrote at the turn of the eras:

Subsequenti tempore magna vis Graecae iuventutis, abundantia virium, sedes quaeritans in Asiam se effudit. […]