CHAPTER VI.
SUCH is the description of Tatta. The places around
Orcaorci, Pitnisus and the mountainous plains of Lycaonia,
are cold and bare, affording pasture only for wild asses; there
is a great scarcity of water, but wherever it is found the wells
are very deep, as at Soatra, where it is even sold. Soatra is
a village city near Garsabora (Garsaura?). Although the
country is ill supplied with water, it is surprisingly well
adapted for feeding sheep, but the wool is coarse. Some
persons have acquired very great wealth by these flocks alone.
Amyntas had above three hundred flocks of sheep in these
parts. In this district there are two lakes, the greater Coralis,
the smaller Trogitis. Somewhere here is Iconium,
1 a small
town, well built, about which is a more fertile tract of land
than the pastures for the wild asses before mentioned. Polemo
possessed this place.
Here the Taurus approaches this country, separating Cappadocia and Lycaonia from Cilicia Tracheia. It is the boundary of the Lycaonians and Cappadocians, between Coropassus,
a village of the Lycaonians, and Gareathyra (Garsaura), a
small town of the Cappadocians. The distance between these
fortressess is about 120 stadia.
[
2]
To Lycaonia belongs Isaurica, near the Taurus, in which
are the Isaura, two villages of the same name, one of which is
surnamed Palæa, or the Old, the other [the New], the latter is
well fortified.
2 There were many other villages dependent
upon these. They are all of them, however, the dwellings of
robbers. They occasioned much trouble to the Romans, and
to Publius Servilius, surnamed Isauricus, with whom I was
acquainted; he subjected these places to the Romans, and
destroyed also many of the strong-holds of the pirates, situated
upon the sea.
[
3]
Derbe,
3 the royal seat of the tyrant Antipater, surnamed
Derbætes, is on the side of the Isaurian territory close upon
Cappadocia. Laranda
4 also belonged to Antipater. In my
time Amyntas attacked and killed Antipater Derbætes, and
got possession of the Isaura and of Derbe. The Romans
gave him the Isaura where he built a palace for himself, after
having destroyed Isauria Palæa (the Old). He began to build
in the same place a new wall, but before its completion he was
killed by the Cilicians in an ambuscade, when invading the
country of the Homonadeis.
[
4]
For being in possession of Antiocheia near Pisidia, and
the country as far as Apollonias,
5 near Apameia Cibotus,
6 some
parts of the Paroreia, and Lycaonia, he attempted to exterminate the Cilicians and Pisidians, who descended from the
Taurus and overran this district, which belonged to the
Phrygians and Cilicians (Lycaonians). He razed also many
fortresses, which before this time were considered impregna
ble, among which was Cremna, but he did not attempt to take
by storm Sandalium, situated between Cremna and Sagalassus.
[
5]
Cremna is occupied by a Roman colony.
Sagalassus is under the command of the same Roman governor, to whom all the kingdom of Amyntas is subject. It
is distant from Apameia a day's journey, having a descent of
nearly 30 stadia from the fortress. It has the name also of
Selgessus. It was taken by Alexander.
Amyntas made himself master of Cremna and passed into
the country of the Homonadeis, who were supposed to be the
most difficult to reduce of all the tribes. He had already got
into his power most of their strong-holds, and had killed the
tyrant himself, when he was taken prisoner by an artifice of
the wife of the tyrant, whom he had killed, and was put to
death by the people. Cyrinius (Quirinus)
7 reduced them by
famine and took four thousand men prisoners, whom he settled
as inhabitants in the neighbouring cities, but he left no person in the country in the prime of life.
Among the heights of Taurus, and in the midst of rocks
and precipices for the most part inaccessible, is a hollow and
fertile plain divided into several valleys. The inhabitants
cultivate this plain, but live among the overhanging heights
of the mountains, or in caves. They are for the most part
armed, and accustomed to make incursions into the country of
other tribes, their own being protected by mountains, which
serve as a wall.
