| Canae Κάναι | |
| Events: | Battle of Arginusae |
| Province: | Asia |
| Nearby Water: | Aegean Sea (Dikili Gulf) |
| Coordinates: | 39.0386°N 26.8147°W |
| Map: | Turkey |
| Place Name: | Kane Promontory (Cane) |
| Location Town: | Bademli |
| Location County: | İzmir |
| Location State: | Dikili District |
| Location Country: | Turkey |
| Discovery Year: | 2015 |
Canae (Greek, Ancient (to 1453);: Κάναι; Turkish: Kane) was, in classical antiquity, a city in ancient Aeolis, on the island of Argennusa in the Aegean Sea off the modern Dikili Peninsula on the coast of modern-day Turkey, near the modern village of Bademli.[1] [2] Today Argennusa has joined the mainland as the Kane Promontory off the Dikili Peninsula. Canae is famous as the site of the Battle of Arginusae in 406 B.C.[1] [3] [4]
Canae is mentioned by the ancient writers Herodotus, Strabo, Pliny, Livy, Ptolemy, Sappho, Thucydides, and Mela.[5] [6]
According to the first-century Greek geographer Strabo, Canae was founded by Locrians coming from Cynus in eastern Greece.[5] [7] Canae was built on the island of Argennusa (also spelt Arginusa), beside a small promontory hill variously called Mount Cane (Greek, Ancient (to 1453);: Κάνη), Aega (Αἰγᾶ), or Argennon (Ἄργεννον).[5] [7] [8] The name Canae (Κάναι) means "(city) of Mount Cane"; the district that included Argennusa and the neighboring two islands of Garip and Kalem was called Canaea.[5]
According to the 5th-century B.C. Greek historian Herodotus, the massive Achaemenid army of Xerxes I passed Mount Cane on its way from Sardis to the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C.[5] [9] [10]
During the Peloponnesian War, an Athenian fleet commanded by eight strategoi unexpectedly defeated a Spartan fleet under Callicratidas off the coast of Canae in 406 B.C. in the Battle of Arginusae.[6]
During the Roman–Seleucid War, fought between the Roman Republic and Antiochus the Great in 192–188 B.C., the Roman navy wintered in Canae on their way to Chios.[5] Livy writes that "the ships were hauled on shore and surrounded with a trench and rampart."[11]
By the time of Pliny the Elder in the first century A.D., the city was deserted.[5] [12]