Territorio e formazione dell'identità nella regione tra il Caico e l'Ermo

(1) Methodology. The paper is an ‘archaeology’ of local myths split into two parts. A discussion of some topographical questions will lay the groundwork for an argument that certain myths have a local origin which is revealed by how they are precisely rooted in the landscape of Southern Aeolis. (2) Topography. Larisa ad Hermum is at Yanıkköy not Buruncuk. Neonteichos (formerly located at Yanıkköy) should probably be sought along an upland route between Temnos and Kyme on Dumanlı Dağ. The remains at Buruncuk are probably of Kyllene. Nollé, Chiron 2012 is wrong about the location of Boione. Locations of Kallipatrai, Melampagos, Palaudis, Killa, and Herakleia. (3) Myths in the landscape. The story of Pelops journeying from Magnesia ad Sipylum to the coast follows the upland route already discussed. The myth establishes the authenticity and chronological priority of the Greek identity of Aiolian communities along this route. (4) Elaia manipulates the myth of Telephos as found in the Kypria to make it topographically specific to the city. This is not a late invention, but something which the new Archilochos shows was already going on by the 7th c. BC. (5) The story about King Teuthras and the cult of Artemis Orthosia in Ps-Plutarch, De Fluviis 21 (the Kaikos) is not pure invention, but instead rooted in cult and myth local to the lower Kaikos valley. Probably the myth has its origins in Demaratid control of this region.