# Amantia

Amantia (Ancient Greek: Ἀμάντια, Ἀβάντια; Latin: Amantia) was an ancient city near the modern village of Ploçë, Vlorë County, Albania.
It was the main settlement of the Amantes. In Hellenistic times the city was either part of Illyria or Epirus. In Roman times it was included within Epirus Nova, in the province of Macedonia.
The massive walls of Amantia were built before the end of the 4th century BC, and literary sources report them as an Illyrian rather than Epirote or Macedonian foundation. Later Amantia acquired the trappings of a Hellenistic town. In 230 BC Amantia became part of the Koinon Epirus. Amantia received sacred ancient Greek envoys, known as theoroi, around the early 2nd century BC, which only cities that were considered Greek were eligible to receive. The time duration that passed before Illyrian cities were documented on a list of theorodokoi clarifies that acculturation did take place in southern Illyria; however, it indicates that the process was gradual.
Amantia occupied an important defensive position on a high hill 600m above sea level and overlooking the Aoos/Vjosë river valley to the east, and the road to the coast and the Bay of Aulon. A temple dedicated to Aphrodite, a theatre, and a stadium have also been found.
Amantia was designated as an archaeological park in 2003.

## Etymology

Pseudo-Skylax (Periplus. 26) and Lycophron (Alexandra. 1043) recorded the toponym Ἀμάντια, Amantia. The Delphic list of theorodokoi reported the form Ἀβάντια, Abantia. The city-ethnic is recorded as Ἀμάντιεύς, Amantieus by Pseudo Skylax (27). The town's demonym was Amantieus (Ancient Greek: Ἀμάντιεύς).
The name Amantia and the tribal name Amantes have been connected with the Albanian term amë/ãmë ("river-bed, fountain, spring"). It has been suggested that the root morpheme *Amant- was perhaps a "barbarized" version of *Abant- in relation to the Abantes. The name Amantia is generally accepted as Illyrian. The toponym corresponds to Amantia in southern Italy which is linked to the Illyrian movements via the Adriatic (Iapygians) in antiquity. A homonymous Illyrian tribe lived in eastern Slavonia.

## History

The city was built around 450 BC on the site of a proto-urban Illyrian settlement. From the beginning it had a fortified acropolis surrounded by a 2.1 km long wall, with also a lower town. The original walls made of irregular limestone blocks were renewed in the 4th century with isodomic ashlars. By the 4th century or later, the indigenous site became a town organised on a Greek model, acquiring the trappings of a Hellenistic city. It has been suggested that in terms of fortifications, masonry and general architecture, language and religion, Amantia shares the same features as the rest of the settlements of the Greek world of that time. But it has been also assumed that like other Illyrian cities Amantia was not a polis of the Greek type.
A tradition reported by Pausanias (2nd century AD) alleges that the settlement was founded by Locrians from nearby Thronium and Abantes from Euboea. Stephanus Byzantius (based on Pausanias) mentions that Amantia was founded on Illyrian territory by the Euboean Abantes "returning from the Trojan war". According to another legend reported by Lycophron in his Alexandra, Elpenor (who actually died at Troy) and the Abantes from Euboea went to the island Othronos and were driven by swarms of snakes to the land of the Atintanes towards the city of Amantia. It has been suggested that the data from Pausanias is more in accordance with the settlement of the Euboean colony in Thronion in the coastal site of Triport in front of the Acroceraunian Mountains northwest of Aulon, not in Amantia. Pausanias' data have been compared with the information provided by an Apollonian commemorative monument, suggesting an "oppositional ethnicity" between the Greek colonial associations of the Bay of Aulon (i.e. the area called Abantis), and the barbarians of the hinterland.
The earliest of the written sources that recorded the toponym Amantia is the Periplus of Pseudo-Skylax (4th century BC), mentioning it as a city in Illyria. The inhabitants were called Epirotes by Proxenos (3rd century BC) and by Hesychius, and as barbarians by Pliny the Elder. By listing it as the only site between the two poleis of Apollonia and Orikos, the account of Pseudo-Skylax suggests that Amantia was somehow important. It seems that in the Periplus the toponym Amantia denotes the territory rather than the urban centre of the polis. It has been suggested that in the Periplus Orikos is identified as a Greek city placed in the territory of Amantia. Lycophron's Alexandra (3rd century BC) attests Amantia as a polis in the urban sense.
In the second half of the 4th century Amantia received sacred theoroi ambassadors from Argos, southern Greece, indicating that the locals were treated as Greek.
In 230 BC Amantia joined the Epirote League and was among the main cities and tribal centres of Epirus during the Hellenistic period. The town experienced an economic and cultural boom during this period, and minted its own coins from 230 BC. Amantia was invited by the Theorodokoi of Delphi to take part in the Delphic games in 220-189 BC, along with other important centres of Southern Illyria and Epirus.
In 168 BC during the 3rd Illyrian-Roman War Amantia supported the Roman side. In the middle of the 2nd century BC Amantia was in alliance with Apollonia, most probably as part of a united pro-Roman policy against various Illyrian states. Following the Roman annexation of the region (148 BC), the city became part of the Roman province of Macedonia and then Epirus Novus. The stadium, dated to the 2nd century BC, and finds of 317 Hellenistic coins and numerous bronze figurines indicate that Amantia was among the thriving settlements of Epirus during the last two centuries BC. Throughout the Roman period, Amantia was a civitas libera (free city).
Under Roman rule, during the civil war between Caesar and Pompey, Amantia supported Caesar.
In late antiquity the city walls were restored by Justinian (527-565) and the paleochristian basilica dates from this period. Eulalius, one of the Eastern bishops at the Council of Sardica who refused to recognize its right to revoke the condemnation of Athanasius of Alexandria and withdrew in a body to Philippopolis, was probably bishop of this town, but some think he was bishop of Amasea. During the early 4th century a basilica was erected. No longer a residential bishopric, Amantia is today listed by the Catholic Church as a titular see.

## The site

The city walls of the first half of the 4th century BC include an area of about 20 ha and have 5 gates. There are few towers as the hill ensured strong natural protection. The wall is built of closely-fitting polygonal blocks without mortar. The thickness of the wall ranges between 1.8 m and 3 m.
The most monumental and better part is the southern part of about 28 m in length and 8 m in height, of which 8 rows of blocks have been preserved.
The stadium was excavated in 1950-60 and is 55 m long with a track width of 12.5 m dating the 3rd century BC. It was used for athletics such as running, wrestling, boxing, etc. Like many public buildings elsewhere, it was built outside the walls below the ancient city using the hillside on one side to support 17 banks of seats. The opposite 8 banks of seating were built on an artificially raised ground. The stairs were equipped with smaller stairs for the sake of circulation of spectators. The names of public officials or important citizens were engraved on the front row seats. Epigraphic sources testify that an Agonothetes managed public funds for sports games.
Rich monumental tombs lined the road from the city, several of which have been revealed.

## Culture

The culture of the region had a language that is not well known, and it seems to have not had its own writing system. Amantia's urban organization occurred at a period of wider evolution among the settlements of the broader area of Epirus as a result of the previous development among Molossian cities. The first inscriptions in Amantia appear in the 4th century BC, during the Hellenistic era, and are in Greek. The onomastics are mainly Greek, with some non-Greek names. The local culture readily borrowed iconography and technique from the Greeks. Many cults of Amantia are of the typical Greek pantheon, such as Zeus, Aphrodite, Pandemos and Pan. The cult of Aphrodite probably dates from the archaic era – with Amantia being in such a case among the first settlements in the region to worship the goddess – or from the Hellenistic era along with the cult of Athena. The temple of Aphrodite in Amantia is an example of the Hellenistic influence in present-day Albania via contact with the nearby Greek colonies. The cult of Heracles has been also confirmed in the city. Apollo was also among the prominent deities worshipped in Amantia as in the nearby Corinthian colonies and surrounding settlements in today's northweestern Greece and southern Albania, but also in nearby Molossian towns.
Other cults like that of the male fertility deity are common of southern Illyria. It seems that the iconographies of this deity were derivations of Egyptian or Italic iconographies (Bes-Silenus), mainly from the Greek colony of Taras, which were widespread in the region from the 4th century BC, but enriched with very stylistic innovations. In the Roman period this deity has undergone transformations mainly of Eastern influence. Some label this deity as the Illyrian god of fertility. In reality, it is futile to approach ancient cults in ethnic or national terms. The South of the Adriatic is clearly a region of religious exchanges, in which facts must be shifted, before considering them to belong to just one culture. The Illyrian-Greek cult of the nymphs was widespread in the region as well as in Amantia. An ancient sanctuary of the eternal fire called Nymphaion was located in an area near Amantia and the Amantes. Amantia's prosperity during the Hellenistic era could explain the bilingualism of the settlement in that period.
On the basis of language, institutions, officials, onomastics, city-planning and fortifications it has been described as a Greek city by historians N.G.L. Hammond (1989), Šašel Kos (1986), Hatzopoulos (1997), Rudolf Haensch (2012), and as a Greek city in southern Illyria, in the territory of the Illyrian tribe of Amantes by Fanula Papazoglou (1986). It has been described as a Hellenized Illyrian city-state by Eckstein (2008), and Lasagni (2019), and as an Illyrian city by Olgita Ceka (2012), and Jaupaj (2019). Winnifrith considered the massive walls of Amantia as of Illyrian rather than Epirote or Macedonian foundation, and that the site later acquired the trappings of a Hellenistic city. Mesihović (2014) has described Amantia as an Illyrian city built and governed according to the Greek model. Papadopoulos (2016) described it as an indigenous site that by the 4th century BC or later developed into a city very much organised on a Greek model. According to Lippert and Matzinger (2021), like other Illyrian cities, Amantia was not a polis of the Greek type.
In the Roman era, the use of Greek by the Romans to address the natives was seen not only as a gesture of good will, but also as an effort to promote rapprochement between those communities. A 2nd century AD bilingual inscription in Greek and Latin dating back to Imperial times is found above the fountain of Ploça village. It shows that the establishment of the Roman province of Macedonia in 148 BC led to the installation of Latin-speaking populations as far as Amantia. The bilingual inscription can also testify that in the ancient site of Ploça there was a Latin enclave and that the city prospered around 200 AD; it could also be the nature of the text that required the use of both languages.

### Coinage

The numismatic material unearthed at Amantia shows that the more numerous coins were of republican Epirote origin, followed by coins with the local legend, which were fewer in number. The territorial proximity to the koinon of the Epirotes explains the predominant role of the coins of this neighbouring state. The symbols that appear on the bronze coins of Amantia are Zeus / thunderbolt, Dione / trident, and Artemis / spearhead, which were taken from Epirus. The community of the Amantes seceded from the Epirote state only at the moment of the fall of the monarchy. At the time of Pyrrhus, his son Alexander II and his descendants, Greater Epirus was still strong and controlled both southern Illyria in the north and part of Acarnania in the south. In this context it is no wonder that the bronze coins of Amantia, starting from 230 BC, used symbols of the Epirote tradition with which the inhabitants of the city were accustomed, and only the legend on the coins was changed from ΑΠΕΙΡΩΤΑΝ (of the Epirotes) to ΑΜΑΝΤΩΝ (of the Amantes), both written in Greek letters.

## Institutions

Amantia adopted a political structure similar to that of Apollonia and Epidamnus-Dyrrachium. The local official titles and institutions display typical names of a Greek settlement of that time, such as: prytanis (main magistrate). There was a city council or boule and a council secretary or grammateus. The city also had an Agonothetes who organised athletics.
Amantia was also the administrative centre of the community located between Vjosë and Shushicë, which include fortified centres such as Kanina, Triporti, Cerja, Armeni, Matohasanaj, Haderaj and Olympe in Mavrova.

## Gallery

* Tomb
* Sculpture of the fertility deity
* Acropolis