Palatye 235 



Palatye, 1365, 1390. Also known as Palatscha, la Palisia,^ 

 Turkish Balat.~ It occupies the site of the ancient Miletus, on 

 the left bank of the Meander, not far from its mouth^ {Cent. 

 Atlas, map loi, B 4). It derives its name, 'the palaces,' from the 

 ruins found in the vicinity.* As the form Palatscha and the 

 derivation show, the w^ord should be stressed Paldtia,^ not Pala- 

 tia. Pegolotti calls it Palattia di Turchia.^ It carried on com- 

 merce with the Rhodians, the Cypriotes, the Genoese, and the 

 Venetians. Within or near the city there was, in the fourteenth 

 century, a church of St. Nicholas. Its emir was a Seljuk Turk, 

 under whom slaves were dealt in and piracy practised, and who 

 had coins struck with Latin inscriptions, like the gigliati (with 

 a lilied cross) minted in Naples, for use in the trade with Italy. ''^ 

 At what stage the emirates of Palatia and Mentesche (the ancient 

 Caria) were united is uncertain — evidently as early as 1403,^ 

 and probably much before. In about September of 1365, when 

 Pierre de Lusignan was preparing to sail for the conquest of 

 Alexandria (see above, p. 216), he received ambassadors from 

 Palatia at Rhodes, and concluded a treaty with the emir, by which 

 the latter agreed to pay tribute for the safeguarding of his cities 

 and castles." In 1390 Bayezid extended his sway over this 

 region,^" and some time after an embassy was sent from Palatia 

 to Tamerlane, which exhorted him to take the field against 

 Bayezid. ^^ After the battle of Angora in 1402, in which Tamer- 

 lane conquered Bayezid, he reinstated the emirs whom Bayezid 



^Bibl, p. 502. 



''Heyd i. 594- 



'Heyd, ib. Mas Latrie (Bibl., pp. 325, 502) says that it lies north 

 of the ruins of Miletus; others that it represents the ancient Myus 

 (Leake, Journal of a Tour in Asia Minor, p. 239; Forbiger, Handbuch 

 der Alien Geographic 2. 214; Hertzberg, p. 580). 



* Chandler, Travels in Asia Minor, p. 146; Spon and Wheler, Voyage 

 d'ltalie i. 211. 



" Leake, op. cit., p. 240. 



'La Pratica dclla Mcrcatura (in Pagnini, Delia Decima, Vol. 3), pp. 

 94, 370. 



' Heyd i. 594-6. 



'Heyd 2. 353-4 (cf. I. 595). 



^ Bibl., p. 502; Chronique de Strambaldi, under A. D. 1365. 



'"Heyd 2. 353; Hammer-Purgstall i. 221; cf. Le Roulx, p. 388. 



" Heyd. ib. 



