The Mariandyni () were an ancient tribe in the north-east of Bithynia. Their country was called ''Mariandynia'' (Μαριανδυνία,

Stephanus of Byzantium Stephanus or Stephen of Byzantium (; , ''Stéphanos Byzántios''; centuryAD) was a Byzantine grammarian and the author of an important geographical dictionary entitled ''Ethnica'' (). Only meagre fragments of the dictionary survive, but the epit ...

s. v.) and Pliny speaks of a ''Sinus Mariandynus'' ("Mariandynian Gulf") on their coast. Greek myths have Mariandynus as their presumed

eponym An eponym is a noun after which or for which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. Adjectives derived from the word ''eponym'' include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Eponyms are commonly used for time periods, places, innovati ...

ous hero. The Mariandyni inhabited the region between the rivers Sangarius and Billaeus, on the east of the territory occupied by another tribe called Thyni or

Bithyni The Bithyni (; ; ) were a Thracian tribe who lived in Bithynia. History The Bithyni originally lived in the area of the lower Strymon river, due to which the ancient Greeks claimed that they were originally called the Strymoni (; ). Around , ...

. According to Scylax of Caryanda,Scylax, p. 34 they did not extend as far west as the Sangarius, for according to him the river Hypius formed the boundary between the Bithyni and Mariandyni. Ancient sources are vague as to the ethnic affiliation of the Mariandyni.

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

expresses a belief that the Mariandyni were a branch of the Bithynians, a belief which cannot be well reconciled with the statement of

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

, who clearly distinguishes the Mariandyni from the

Thracia Thracia or Thrace () is the ancient name given to the southeastern Balkans, Balkan region, the land inhabited by the Thracians. Thrace was ruled by the Odrysian kingdom during the Classical Greece, Classical and Hellenistic period, Hellenis ...

ns or Thyni in

Asia Minor Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

. Elsewhere, Strabo states that Mariandyni are

Paphlagonia Paphlagonia (; , modern translit. ''Paflagonía''; ) was an ancient region on the Black Sea coast of north-central Anatolia, situated between Bithynia to the west and Pontus (region), Pontus to the east, and separated from Phrygia (later, Galatia ...

ns. The descriptions provided by Herodotus suggest that in the Persian army they appeared quite distinct from the Bithyni, and their armor resembled that of the Paphlagonians, which was quite different from that of the Bithyni. The chief city in their territory was Heraclea Pontica, the inhabitants of which reduced the Mariandyni, for a time, to a state of servitude resembling that of the

Cretan Crete ( ; , Modern Greek, Modern: , Ancient Greek, Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the List of islands by area, 88th largest island in the world and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, fifth la ...

Mnoae, or the Thessalian Penestae. According to modern researcher John Hind,

"...the Mariandyni may have initially ceded some coastal territory o the Heracleot colonistsfairly peacefully, being in need of protection from... the Bebrykes and the Paphlagones. In time the Herakleots acquired the Lycus Valley as the basis of their prosperity, and the Mariandyni entered a form of collective serfdom in which the saving grace was that they could not be dispersed or sold abroad. How this state of affairs was arrived at is not clear, but the people may have been sold into it at a time of weakness by their chieftains, or may have slowly descended into it as a result of "being protected out of all they owned" by the Herakleots... The vigorous expansion of the Herakleot territory resulted in the locking of the Mariandyni into their agricultural villages as a dependent people, subject also to impressment as rowers in the fleet."

In the early 5th century they seem to still have been an independent people, paying tribute directly to Lydian king Croesus, and to have been at war with Heraclea. Pausanias, ''Description of Greece'', 5. 26. 7; Justinus, 163. 8 In the division of the Persian empire they formed part of the third Persian satrapy.

Notes

Sources

*Hind, John. Megarian Colonization in the Western Half of the Black Sea (Sister- and Daughter Cities of Herakleia). In: Tsetskhladze, Gocha R. (ed.) The Greek Colonization of The Black Sea Area. Historical Interpretation of Archaeology. Stuttgart : Franz Steiner Verlag, 1998, pp. 131 – 152 {{SmithDGRG, title=Mariandyni Bithynia Ancient peoples of Anatolia Heraclea Pontica