Cichyrus

39°14′33″N20°31′53″E / 39.242391°N 20.53143°E / 39.242391; 20.53143

Cichyrus (Ancient Greek: Κίχυρος, Kichyros), earlier called Ephyra (Ἐφύρα or Ἐφύρη),^[1] was the capital of ancient Thesprotia, according to the myth built by the Arcadian leader Thesprotos. Thucydides describes it as situated in the district Elaeatis in Thesprotia, away from the sea.^[2] At its site is the famous Necromanteion (Νεκρομαντεῖον, "Oracle of the Dead"). First settled during the Bronze Age and resettled in the 14th century BC by colonists most probably from Chaonia and the west Peloponnese region, the city is about 800 m north of the junction of the Kokytos River with the Acheron, and about 4.5 km east of the bay of Ammoudia. Near it was the outlet into the sea of the Acherusian Lake. Strabo (7.7.5) gives the same information and adds that in his time Ephyra was called Kichyros. The name had been changed from Ephyra back to the more ancient name about 200 years earlier.^[3]

According to legend, Cichyrus was named after – and founded on – the spot where Cichyrus, the son of the Chaonian king, died after falling from his horse into a ravine. He had been overcome by the shock and stress of accidentally killing a girl named Anthippe, while hunting a leopard that had hidden in the same bush as Anthippe and her lover.^[4]

In Greek mythology, Neoptolemos was said to have landed at Kichyros (Ephyra) on his return from Troy (Pind. Nem. 7.37-39) and Odysseus went there earlier, before leaving for Troy (Od. 1 .210-211) to get poison for his arrows (Od. 1 .259f).^[5]Theseus and Perithoos came to snatch away Persephone, wife of Aidoneus, King of Ephyra. These were none other than Persephone and Hades, the gods of the underworld, who had a shrine and an oracle at Ephyra.^[6]Heracles subjugated Ephyra and fathered a child by Princess Astyoche, Tlepolemus, who became king of Rhodes.^[7]Thyestes came there looking for his brother, Atreus. Atreus was not there, but the daughter of Thyestes, Pelopia, was there, and Thyestes, not recognizing her, took her as a wife. Their union produced Aegisthus.^[8]

The Thesprotian Kichyros/Ephyra appears to be the town mentioned in two passages of the Odyssey (i. 259, ii. 328). The Ephyri, mentioned in a passage of the Iliad (xiii. 301), were supposed by Pausanias to be the Thesprotians inhabitants of the town.^[9] but Strabo maintained that the poet referred to the Thessalian Ephyra (Strab. ix. p. 442). Some commentators even supposed the Ephyra on the Selleeis^[10] to be the Thesprotian town, but Strabo expressly maintains that Homer alludes in these passages to the Eleian town.^[11] Pausanias represents Cichyrus as the capital of the ancient kings of Thesprotia, where Theseus and Peirithous were thrown into chains by Aidoneus; and its celebrity in the most ancient times may also be inferred from a passage of Pindar.^[12]

El emplazamiento de Éfira se confirma con la excavación del antiguo oráculo de los muertos, Necromanteion , en la colina de Agios Ioannis, cerca del pueblo de Mesopotamo , a 150 m al norte de la confluencia del Kokytos con el Aqueronte . Los restos de tres antiguos circuitos de murallas se conservan en la cercana colina caliza de Xylokastro. Los hallazgos dentro de la acrópolis, principalmente fragmentos de cerámica local de la Edad del Bronce y fragmentos micénicos , junto con el culto a la diosa ctónica Perséfone . Después de la rendición de las colonias eleas en Casapaia a Filipo II de Macedonia en 343-342 a. C. (Dem. 7.32) y su sometimiento a los tesprotos , Éfira parece haber vuelto a su nombre original, Kichyros, que se había mantenido vivo en algún asentamiento tesproto vecino. ^{[ 13 ]} Algunos hallazgos, principalmente cerámica del siglo I a.C., confirman la afirmación de Pausanias (1.17.5) de que Kichyros existía en su época.

Los restos de la antigua Ephira se encuentran cerca de la actual Ioannina . Entre 1958 y 1987, un equipo de la Universidad de Ioannina realizó varias excavaciones que posteriormente se ampliaron entre 2006 y 2008. En ellas, los arqueólogos hallaron restos de la única acrópolis micénica cuya existencia se ha confirmado en la región de Epiro. Dos de los tres muros de la fortificación hallados en la parte sur de la acrópolis fueron construidos en piedra con estilo ciclópeo en el siglo XIV o principios del XIII a. C., mientras que el tercero es mucho más reciente, del período helenístico . Por otro lado, en una meseta al oeste de la acrópolis, se han encontrado tres grandes túmulos funerarios del siglo XII a. C. ^{[ 14 ]}  

• Lista de ciudades de la antigua Grecia
• Lista de ciudades del antiguo Epiro

• La Enciclopedia Princeton de Sitios Clásicos