200 
P H R Y G I A 
having fent to confult an oracle in order to know how 
they might put an end to the inteftine broils which rent 
their country into many factions and parties, received for 
anfwer, that the moft effectual means fo deliver them- 
felves and their country from the calamities they groaned 
under, was to commit the government to a king. This 
advice they followed accordingly, and placed Gordius on 
the throne. 
Apamea was the chief emporium of all Ada Minor. 
Thitherreforted merchants and traders from all parts of 
Greece, Italy, and the neighbouring iflands. Befides, we 
know from Syncellus, that the Phrygians were for fome 
time matters of the fea ; and none but trading nations 
ever prevailed on that element. The country produced 
many choice and ufeful commodities, which afforded 
confiderable exports. They had a fafe coaft, convenient 
harbours, and whatever may incline us to think that they 
carried on a confiderable trade. But, as moft of the Phry¬ 
gian records are loft, we will not dwell on conjectures fo 
difficult to be afcertained. 
Some have been of opinion that the Phrygian language 
bore a great refemblance to the Greek; but the contrary 
ismanifeft from the few Phrygian words which have been 
tranfmitted to us, and carefully collected by Bochartand 
Rudbeckius. To thefe we may add the authority of 
Strabo, who, after attempting to derive the name of a 
Phrygian city from the Greek, concludes, that it is a dif¬ 
ficult matter to difcover any fimilitude between the bar¬ 
barous words of the Phrygian language and the Greek. 
The Phrygian tongue, after the experiment made by 
Pfammetichus king of Egypt, was looked upon by the 
Egyptians as the moft ancient language of the world. 
But other nations, particularly the Scythians, refufed to 
fubmit to their opinion, as founded on an argument of 
no real weight. “ As the two children (fay they) had 
never heard the voice of any human creature, the word 
lec, or lelthos, the firft they uttered, was only an imita¬ 
tion of the goats that had fuckled them, and happened 
to be a Phrygian word fignifying bread." Goropius Be- 
canus makes ufe of the fame argument to prove that the 
High Dutch is the original or mother tongue of the world, 
becaufe the word leker in that language fignifies a baker ! 
We have already faid that the ancient Phrygians were 
much addicted to fuperftition. They had many idols : 
but their principal deity feems to have been Cybele. 
They alfo worfhipped feveral other idols, viz. Bacchus, 
Adagyus, and the Cabiri. In folemnizing the feftivals of 
their gods, and on other occafions, they had dances and 
longs, which they called lityerfes, from Lityerfes, fon of 
Midas. king of Phrygia. Hefychius mentions certain 
Phrygian dances, called by him bricigmata, derived with¬ 
out doubt from, the word Bryges, the ancient name of 
the Phrygians. 
The kings of Phrygia whofe names are recorded were, 
Nannacus, Annaeus, or Cannacas, who is the firft king 
mentioned in hiftory ; Midas, Marcis, Gordius, Gordius 
II. Otreus, Lityerfes, Midas II. Gordius III. Midas III. 
and Midas IV. with whom ended the royal family of 
Phrygia, which became a province of the Lydian monar- 
chy, and continued in that ftate till Crcefus was conquered, 
and all Lydia was reduced by Cyrus. 
Phrygia Minor wqs divided into two parts; the ma¬ 
ritime, called Hellefpontiaca, and the Mediterranean, 
termed Epittetits. The former borrowed its name from 
the Hellelpont, and extended along the coaft from the 
town of Percote to the promontory LeCtum, or LeCIon, 
oppofite to the N. W. fide of the ifland of Lefbos. This 
part. was. properly called Troas or Troia, though the 
Trojan kingdom, extended from the river Afopus to the 
banks of the Caicus, including not only Troas, but alfo 
the Greater and Lefs Myfia. EpiCtetus, or the inland 
part of Phrygia Minor, extended to the neighbourhood 
of Mount Olympus, in the Greater Myfia. This part at 
firft belonged to Prufias king of Bithynia, who yielded it, 
by agreement, to Eumenes king of Pergamus, whence it 
was called Epidelus, that is, ‘ acquired.’ However, thefe 
appellations are frequently confounded, and both attri¬ 
buted to Phrygia Minor. 
Phrygia Minor lay between the 40th and 42ft degrees 
of N. lat. and in longitude was of fmall extent. In ge¬ 
neral it may be faid, that Phrygia Minor, as comprehend¬ 
ing both the Hellefpontiaca and EpiCtetus, was bounded 
by the Propontis on the north, by the vEgean Sea on the 
fouth, by Myfia Minor on the eaft, and the Hellefponton 
the weft. On the fea-coaft were the cities of Percote, 
Abydus, Arifba, Dardanum, Rhetuin, Sigeum, Troy or 
Ilium, Larifta, Colonae, Alexandria, Troas, &c. Of the 
rivers that watered Troas, or Phrygia Minor, we need only 
mention the Scamanderand Simois, which fee refpeCtively. 
The only mountain of this country that deferves notice 
was mount Ida, being a ridge of hills extending from the 
city of Zeleia, near the borders of Myfia Minor, to the 
promontory LeCtum. The foil of this diftriCt was an¬ 
ciently reckoned extremely fertile; and it has even now 
figns of fertility, though in a great meafure negleCted and 
uncultivated. Modern travellers deferibe the Afiatic 
coaft of the Hellefpont, as a moft beautiful and fertile 
trait of land ; the hills being covered with vineyards and 
olive-plantations, and the vales productive of all forts of 
grain. 
The inhabitants of Phrygia Minor,orTrojans, focalled 
from Troy, the metropolis of that country, were un¬ 
doubtedly a very ancient people; but authors are not 
agreed about their origin. Some reprefent them as by 
defeent Samothracians; others fay they were Greeks; 
fome again derive them from the ifland of Crete, whence 
they fuppofe Phrygia Minor to have been peopled ; others 
fay, that they were defeended from the Arcadians ; and 
there'are writers who maintain that they originally came 
from Italy, in which opinion Virgil concurs. 
As to their government, it was unqueftionably mo¬ 
narchical and hereditary ; for, from Dardanus to Priam, 
the father was conftantly fucceeded by the fon, or the elder 
brother by the younger. Their country was at firft par¬ 
celled out into feveral fmall kingdoms ; but the fove- 
reignsofall thefe were, in length of time, either expelled 
or made tributary by the Trojan kings; infomuch that 
Strabo enumerates nine fmall kingdoms or principalities, 
fubjeCt to Troy, befides the ifland of Lefbos. On this ac¬ 
count the Trojan war was fo protraCted ; becaufe all thefe 
countries were to be fubdued before Troy could be in¬ 
verted. Of their laws no particular fyftem remains. 
Their religion was fubftantially the fame with that of the 
inhabitants of Greater Phrygia. Their principal deities 
were Cybele, “the grand-mother of the gods,” as they 
ftyled her, Apollo, Minerva or Pallas, Venus, and Apollo 
Sminthius. The Trojans are celebrated as one of the 
moft polite and civilized nations of thofe days; and in 
the reigns of their later kings they rofe to a very confider¬ 
able pitch of fplendour and magnificence. Their lan¬ 
guage was probably the fame that was fpoken by the in¬ 
habitants of Greater Phrygia. Their trade can only be 
guefled at from their fituation, which probably drew 
merchants from all the neighbouring parts to traffic in 
their country, as well for their own growth as for foreign 
productions. Their country abounded with the neceffa- 
ries of life, as we may conclude from their having flip- 
ported two very confiderable armies for many years. 
Their fettlements in Thrace, Peloponnefus, Sicily, Italy, 
Egypt, and Africa, afford fufficient proof that they ap¬ 
plied themfelves at an early period to trade and naviga¬ 
tion, which, moft probably, were the fources of the riches, 
'blendour, and power, in which they far excelled all the 
neighbouring ftates. 
Troas, or Phrygia Minor, was, in all probability, go¬ 
verned by kings before the reigns of Teucer and Darda¬ 
nus ; but the Trojan hiftory of that period is either fa¬ 
bulous or uncertain. Teucer, as fome fay, was the firft 
fovereign ; he was the fon of Scamander and Ida, that is, 
born in Phrygia, near the river Scamanderand mount Ida, 
3 and 
