Miletus

Miletus (/maɪˈliːtəs/; Ancient Greek: Μίλητος Milētos; Hittite transcription Millawanda or Milawata (exonyms); Latin: Miletus; Turkish: Milet) was an ancient Greek city on the western coast of Anatolia, near the mouth of the Maeander River in ancient Caria. Its ruins are located near the modern village of Balat in Aydın Province, Turkey. Before the Persian invasion in the middle of the 6th century BC, Miletus was considered the greatest and wealthiest of Greek cities. In other sources however it is mentioned that the city was much more modest up until the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), when the city state of Samos for example on the island of Samos opposite Miletus was considered a larger and more important city and harbor at the time. Miletus' greatest wealth and splendor was reached during the Hellenistic era (323–30 BC) and later Roman times.

Evidence of first settlement at the site has been made inaccessible by the rise of sea level and deposition of sediments from the Maeander. The first available evidence is of the Neolithic. In the early and middle Bronze age the settlement came under Minoan influence. Legend has it that an influx of Cretans occurred displacing the indigenous Leleges. The site was renamed Miletus after a place in Crete.

Miletus (genus)

Miletus is a genus of butterfly. The members (species] are found in the Eastern Palearctic ecozone, the Indomalaya ecozone and some stray east of the Wallace line. The genus was erected by Jacob Hübner in [1819] (precise year uncertain).Miletus is the type genus of the subfamily Miletinae.

Species

Miletus (mythology)

Miletus (Ancient Greek: Μίλητος) was a character from Greek mythology.

Miletus was son of Apollo and Areia, daughter of Cleochus, of Crete. When Areia gave birth to her son she hid him in a bed of smilax; Cleochus found the child there and named him Miletus after the plant. Another tradition relates that Miletus' mother by Apollo was Akakallis, the daughter of Minos. Fearing her father's wrath she exposed the child, but Apollo commanded the she-wolves to come down and nurse the child. Yet another source calls his mother Deione, and himself by the matronymic Deionides. Finally, one source gives Miletus as the son of Euxantius, himself son of Minos by a Telchinian woman Dexithea.

He was loved by both Minos and Sarpedon, but showed preference for the latter, and this became the reason why Sarpedon was expelled from Crete by his brother. Following the advice of Sarpedon, Miletus also left Crete for Samos, then moved to Caria and became the mythical founder and eponym of the city of Miletus. Myths further relate that the hero Miletus founded the city only after slaying a giant named Asterius, son of Anax; and that the region known as Miletus was originally called 'Anactoria'.