Tyana (Kemerhisar)

The plain of Tyana

Tyana (Greek Τύανα; modern Kemerhisar): ancient town in southern Cappadocia.

Tyana was the main city of southern Cappadocia. Situated on a fertile plain, it had the potential to become a wealthy town, but it also controlled the route from central Anatolia to the Cilician Gate, through the Taurus Mountains, to the Mediterranean. It comes as no surprise that Tuhana or Tuwanna, to use its Luwian names, became the capital of an independent kingdom after the collapse of the Hittite Empire. A famous relief shows king Warpalas of Tyana praying to the storm god Tarhunza.

King Warpalas of Tyana, relief in the Archaeological Museum of Istanbul (Turkey). Photo Ab Langereis.

A relief of an ancient king of Tyana, Warpalas, praying in front of the storm god Tarhunza, eighth century BCE. Photo Ab Langereis (©*)

The kingdom somehow lost its independence to the Phrygians; when the Phrygian king Midas negotiated with the Assyrian ruler Sargon II, Warpalas of Tyana accompanied the envoy to the Assyrian governor of Cilicia. Later, Tyana was included in the Achaemenid satrapy of Cappadocia. Xenophon, who passed through the town, calls it Dana. Alexander the Great must have passed through the city when he was heading for the Cilician Gate.

When Alexander's empire desintegrated, Tyana was first part of the kingdom of Antigonus the One-Eyed, and - after the battle of Ipsus - of the Seleucid Empire. After more than a century, it was handed over to Cappadocia (Peace of Apamea, 188) and renamed Eusebeia near the Taurus (Εὐσέβεια ἡ πρὸς τῷ Ταύρῳ), after king Ariarathers IV Eusebes. It was the second city in Cappadocia after Mazaca.

In the Roman age, the city appears to have prospered. An aqueduct is still visible, and one of Tyana's sons, Apollonius, became a famous philosopher. There used to be a shrine for this man, which was built by the emperor Caracalla (Cassius Dio, Roman history, 78.18.4). For the sake of this sanctuary, the emperor Aurelian refrained from sacking Tyana during his war against Palmyra (Historia Augusta, Aurelian, 22-24).

In 372, the province of Cappadocia was split, and Tyana became the capital of Cappadocia Secunda. The first Christian bishop is attested in 325. Tyana became a frontier city after the Muslim conquest of Cilicia, but lost much of its former importance.