page_title: Ionia
section_title: Satrapy again (387-335 BC)
hierarchical_section_title: Ionia / History / Satrapy again (387-335 BC)
caption_attribution_description: English: IONIA, Achaemenid Period. Uncertain satrap. Circa 350-333 BC
context_page_description: Ionia was an ancient region on the central part of the western coast of Anatolia in present-day Turkey, the region nearest İzmir, which was historically Smyrna. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. Never a unified state, it was named after the Ionian tribe who, in the Archaic Period, settled mainly the shores and islands of the Aegean Sea. Ionian states were identified by tradition and by their use of Eastern Greek.
  Ionia proper comprised a narrow coastal strip from Phocaea in the north near the mouth of the river Hermus, to Miletus in the south near the mouth of the river Maeander, and included the islands of Chios and Samos. It was bounded by Aeolia to the north, Lydia to the east and Caria to the south. The cities within the region figured large in the strife between the Persian Empire and the Greeks.
  According to Greek tradition, the cities of Ionia were founded by colonists from the other side of the Aegean. Their settlement was connected with the legendary history of the Ionic people in Attica, which asserts that the colonists were led by Neleus and Androclus, sons of Codrus, the last king of Athens.
context_section_description: Ionian cities appear to have retained a considerable amount of freedom until the conquest of Asia Minor by Alexander the Great.
caption: Ionia, Achaemenid Period. Uncertain satrap. Circa 350-333 BC
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