This city, situate on the MÆander, about fifteen miles S. E. of Ephesus, was founded by a colony from Magnesia in Thrace, united with the Cretans. It was one of the cities given to Themistocles by the king of Persia. The Turks call it "Guzel-Hisar," or the beautiful castle.

A great battle was fought here between the Romans and Antiochus, king of Syria. The forces of the former consisted of thirty thousand men; those of Antiochus to seventy thousand foot and twelve thousand horse. The Syrians lost fifty thousand foot and four thousand horse; and the Romans only three hundred foot and twenty-five horse. This disproportion of loss, however, is incredible.

Magnesia is rendered remarkable by the circumstance of its having been, as we have before stated, the place assigned by Artaxerxes for the residence of Themistocles. The whole revenues of the city, as well as those of Lampsacus and Myunte, were settled upon him[342]. One of the cities was to furnish him with bread, another with wine, and a third with other provisions[343].

The temple of Diana at Magnesia was constructed under the direction of Hermogenes, of whom Vitruvius speaks with great veneration.

"The situation of Magnesia," says Pococke, "is delightful; for it commands a view of the fine plain of the MÆander, which is broad towards the west. The view extends to the sea, and from the height I saw the Agathonisa islands, which are near Patmos. Mount Thorax to the north is covered with snow. What adds to the prospect, is a most beautiful inclosed country to the south and west, and the fields are planted with the fig and almond trees. The modern city, also, adds to the beauty of the view; which being large, and there being courts and gardens to the houses, improved by cypress and orange trees, and some of the streets planted with trees, it makes it appear like a city in a wood."

Chandler visited this place in 1774. According to him, Magnesia surrendered to the Romans immediately after the decisive battle between Scipio and Antiochus. It was a free city in the time of Tiberius. It was selected as a place of security, in 1303, by the Emperor Michael, who at length was compelled to escape from it in the night. In 1313 it ranked among the acquisitions of Sarkhan, afterwards sultan of Ionia. In 1443, Amurath II. selected it as a place of retreat, when he resigned his empire to his son Mahomet II.

There are signs of many great buildings all over the city; but they are ruined in such a manner, that, except two or three, it is difficult to judge of what nature they were. Pococke speaks, however, of there having been in his time very great ruins to the east, which appeared to be remains of some "magnificent large palace." On the north, too, he observed the ruins of a very grand temple, which he thinks must have belonged to that of Diana Leucophryne, the largest in Asia after the temples of Ephesus and Didymi; and though it yielded to that of Ephesus in its riches, yet it exceeded it in its proportions, and in the exquisiteness of its architecture.

In the Ionic temple[344] at Magnesia, designed by that Hermogenes whose merits are highly extolled by Vitruvius, the general dimensions are the same as the dipteros; but having, in order to obtain free space under the flank porticoes, omitted the inner range of columns, he thereby established the pseudo-dipteros; but unless he continued the wooden beams of the roof over the increased space, this mode was impracticable, unless when the quarries afforded marble of very large dimensions.

A Persian writer says of this place:—"It is situated at the skirt of a mountain; and its running streams afford water of the utmost purity; and its air, even in winter, is more delightful than the breath of spring[345]."