Mount Sipylus
The first millennium BC saw the emergence in the region of "Phrygians" and "Maeonians", the accounts concerning which are still blended with myths, and finally of Lydians. Such semi-legendary figures like the local ruler Tantalus, his son Pelops, his daughter Niobe, the departure of a sizable part of the region's population from their shores to found, according to one account, the future Etruscan civilization in present-day Italy, are all centered around Mount Sipylus, where the first urban settlement was probably located, and date from the period prior to the emergence of the Lydian Mermnad dynasty. It has also been suggested that the mountain could be the geographical setting for Baucis and Philemon tale as well, while most sources still usually associate it with Tyana (Hittite "Tuwanuwa") in modern-day Kemerhisar near Niğde.