Assesos

Assesos, also written Assesus, was a small ancient Greek town in the region of Caria in Asia Minor, in the territory of Miletus, and the site of a sanctuary of Athena Assesia. Herodotus mentions it in the first book of his Histories, in the account of the war between the Lydians under Sadyattes and the Milesians in the late 7th century BC, when Lydian troops destroyed the sanctuary with fire. Herodotus adds that after a peace was made, Alyattes of Lydia built two temples to Athena at the city, following the advice of the Pythia. Archaeologists have identified the site of the ancient settlement at the modern location of Mengerev Tepe, some 7 kilometres south-east of ancient Miletus, where Assesos was discovered in 1992. The record is deliberately limited to the sanctuary, the Herodotus episode and the identification of the site.