Province: Kyrenaia
Traveller’s Log
The traveller arrives from the sea, leaving Egypt and therefore Asia in the east, thus arriving in Libya (Africa) and making landfall in the heavily forested uplands of the eastern Libyan coast, at Apollonia. Nestled in this mountainous plateau in a fertile valley to the southwest of the port town is the principal settlement and seat of power, the Greek polis of Kyrene. It leads the five mighty Greek cities of the Pentapolis, which dominate the western side of Kyrenaia, and besides the capital include Taucheira, Euesperides, Balagrae and Barca. They are clustered in a region called Irasa. To the east is Marmarica, a much drier region of a sparsely populated villages where the desert reaches almost to the coast. Salt collection and sponge fishing are more important sources of income than agriculture here. This extends as far south as the oasis of Ammonium, a sanctuary to Ammon and home of a famed oracle.
Geography
Libya was the Greek term for the entire continent of Africa, consisting of all the landmass that was not Egypt (which itself was considered part of Asia). According to Herodotus, it was first circumnavigated by the Phoenicians at the behest of the Egyptian king Necos. Kyrenaia equates to the eastern half of the modern state of Libya, rising steeply from the Mediterranean sea in the north and falling gradually inland. The landmass is divided into two main blocks.
First is the Jebel Akhdar (called Irasa by the colonists), a plateau which extends along the coast from the Gulf of Sirte in the west to the Gulf of Timimi in the east, has no continuous coastal plain. Further eastwards along this strip, the land is almost entirely mountainous, and turns to desert. The Jebel Akhdar experiences a great deal of rainfall and has a climate comparable to other forested regions bordering the southern Mediterranean - hot, dry summers are moderated by mild, wet and rainy winters. An escarpment separates the coastal region from the interior plateau, which is level and covered with forest and shrub. Wheat and barley grow in abundance in patches of red soil on this plain and there is plenty of water issuing from highland springs.
The southward slopes of the plateau are a transitional region, the climate becoming hotter and drier as you approach the great desert to the south. To the south and east is the lower Jebel el-Akabah, two highlands separated by a depression. This eastern region is much drier than the Jebel Akhdar, the Sahara extending to the coast. South of the coastal highlands of Cyrenaica is a large east-west running depression, extending eastward from the Gulf of Sirte into Egypt.
The People, Society and Government
The native peoples of Africa were referred to by the Greeks as “Libyans”, after the tribes of the Libu, a Berber people who inhabited north Africa. The Berber tribes of Kyrenaia, running from east to west are recorded as the Adyrmachidae, in the eastern area bordering with Egypt; the Gilligammae in the bulk of Marmarica; the Asbystae and Auschisae share Irasa with the Greeks of the Pentapolis, along with the smaller tribe of the Cabalians. To the immediate south and west of the Pentapolis are the numerous Nasamonians, bordering on the southern desert and lands of the Garamantians (whom Herodotus claims were not warlike and avoided contact). Further west still along the coast are others, the Macae, the Gindae, the Lotophagi, the Machlyans and the Auseans.
While the Asbystae and Auschisae were largely settled and Hellenised, the other tribes were primarily nomadic hunter gatherers, living off their goats, camels and other livestock while hunting and gathering at the same time. Milk, meat, hides and wool were gathered from their livestock for food, tents and clothing. Ancient Egyptian sources describe Libyan men with long hair, braided and beaded, neatly parted from different sides and decorated with feathers attached to leather bands around the crown of the head while wearing thin robes of antelope hide, dyed and printed, crossing the shoulder and coming down until mid calf length to make a robe. Older men kept long braided beards. Women wore the same robes as men, plaited, decorated hair and both genders wore heavy jewelry. Weapons included, hatchets, spears and daggers. Herodotus says polygamy was common, oaths were sworn upon tombs of the revered dead, and divination was undertaken by dreaming while lying upon those same graves. Oaths were pledged between men by drinking out of each others’ hand. Sacrifices were made to the sun and moon, by breaking an animal’s neck, rather than cutting its throat.
Agriculture was a major source of income for the region, producing barley, wheat, olive oil, wine, figs, apples, wool, sheep, cattle, and silphium. The last was a herb with medicinal values, which has since been farmed to extinction. Cyrene became one of the greatest intellectual and artistic centers of the Greek world, famous for its medical school, learned academies, and architecture, which included some of the finest examples of the Hellenistic style. The Cyrenaics, a school of thinkers who expounded a doctrine of moral cheerfulness that defined happiness as the sum of human pleasures, were founded by Aristippus of Cyrene. Other notable natives of Cyrene were the poet Callimachus, the philosopher Hegesias and the mathematicians Theodorus and Eratosthenes.
Many Greeks settled in the Pentapolis. Each of the cities was ruled by its own king, with the basileus of Kyrene ruling over the whole. When their independence ended, they were ruled from Egypt, first by the Persians, then the Ptolemaic empire.
History
The founding of Kyrene is described in Herodotus’ Histories (part IV), when in 7th century BC, Greek immigrants from the island of Thera landed in the Gulf of Timimi. They stayed for several years in a place called Aziris, but their leader Aristoteles, on the advice of the god which inspired the original migration, moved the settlement westwards and founded Kyrene. He took the Libyan name Battos when he became king of Kyrenaia, founding the Battaid dynasty which ruled over Kyrenaia. Initially conflict with the native Libyans led to their sending an embassy to Egypt to request aid against the colonists, but the Egyptian army was defeated forcing conciliation.
Later dynastic strife led to the founding of the city of Barca by dissidents against the second Battaid ruler, and later a war between Kyrene and Barca. Eventually an arbitrator was sought from Hellas, one Demonax of Arcadia, who reduced the power of the king. The heir, Arcesilaus, and his mother tried to seize power and when their coup failed, they fled to Samos and Cyprus. In Samos Arcesilaus gathered an army to retake Kyrene, and the sending to the oracle at Delphi was told that his family would hold power only for eight generations. He was warned not to attempt to extend their reign beyond this time, nor to punish those currently in power. He ignored the oracle, persecuted his enemies; some escaped but others fled into exile. He moved his court to Barca, but was assassinated in the forum by exiles.
In the strife that followed, Kyrenaia was conquered by the Persians, who had recently taken Egypt in around 525BC. Alexander the Great received tribute from Kyrenaia in 332BC after his conquest of Egypt, with the region formally being annexed by Ptolemy shortly after securing his satrapy in 323BC. Kyrenaia briefly regained independence in 276BC under Ptolemy’s stepson, Magas of Kyrene. He attempted to seize all of Egypt, but was diverted by a Libyan rebellion at home. Eventually his daughter married Ptolemy III and Kyrenaia was reabsorbed into the Ptolemaic empire on his death in 250BC.
In 163BC, in order to settle a disputed partition of the Ptolemaic holdings, Kyrenaia was separated from the kingdom and given to Ptolemy VIII. He passed it on to his son, Ptolemy Apion, who died without heirs in 96BC and bequeathed his kingdom to the Roman Republic. The exact territory Rome inherited was somewhat confused, but by 78BC it was organised into a province with Krete (Creta et Cyrenaica) and administered from Gortyn on Krete. It became a senatorial province, like Africa, in 20BC.
Strategy
Kyrenaia is sandwiched in between two powerful empires, Karthadast to the west and Ptolemaic Egypt to the east. It commands both the trade routes across the Sahara and rival sea lanes into the Mediterranean, making it a valuable prize. At the start of the game the province is nominally independent, under the rule of Ptolemy’s stepson. This makes it an obvious candidate for either of the two empires to seize, and is often the battleground between them. A third possibility is for a Greek faction to launch a naval expedition to take Kyrene (especially from Krete or Sicily), but while profitable it would earn the emnity of two powerful factions. If you were to take this gamble, you’d have to be prepared to content with powerful pikemen, heavy infantry, heavy cavalry and elephants of both.
Re: Regional Descriptions: Help the EBII Team
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Originally Posted by spade
-Silentium... mandata captate; non vos turbatis; ordinem servate; bando sequute; memo demittat bandum et inimicos seque;
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