Stephanos von Byzantion über Alabanda. Zum Gründungsmythos der nordkarischen Stadt

Abstract

The first two volumes of M. Billerbeck’s new edition of Stephanus of Byzantium have again attracted attention to this Justinian author, whose importance for our knowledge of the self-conception of Asia Minor’s cities can hardly be overestimated. In his Ethnica we hit upon a considerably maltreated article concerning the Karian city of Alabanda, which cannot be brought in accordance with our knowledge of Karia’s geography and which alleges the existence of two Karian cities called Alabanda. The author of this paper argues that a passage of Stephanus’ Alabanda-article should be treated as a later insertion and consequently be removed from this text. By doing so we are able to restore an internally coherent article which mentions only one Alabanda, whose foundation story is told with recourse to Charax of Pergamon. According to local lore the city was established by Karia’s eponymous hero Kar, who did not name the city after himself, but after his son Alabandos. A daughter of the rivergod Maeander had born Kar this son, just shortly after Kar had emerged as the victor in a cavalry battle. Therefore he named his son ‹victor(y) in a cavalry battle›. According to the local traditions of Alabanda the eponymous hero Alabandos lives up to his name by being an equestrian expert and an example of courage and bravery, of which even Cicero had heard from his Alabandean teacher Molon and who is depicted on some city coins together with a horse. Even though the veneration and the cult of the hero Alabandos can be traced back to the 4th c. B.C., on account of the wrong explanation of the etymology of the name Alabandos and the misunderstanding of the Karian words used to form his name, the mythical tradition in Stephanus’ article must have arisen together with or after the disappearance of the Karian language.