Abydos (1)Abydus

A Greek city on the Asian side of the Hellespont; the city of Sestos lies across the Hellespont on the European side of the narrow channel.

Abydos was the home of a young man named Leander who was in love with a priestess of Aphrodite named Hero; Leander would regularly swim the channel at night in order to meet with Hero in Sestos but one night he lost his way and drowned; this tale from antiquity has inspired many young adventurers to swim the strait to duplicate Leander’s feat.

There is a point of land jutting into the Hellespont from the European side of the waterway and it was at this spot, in 480 BCE, that the Persian king, Xerxes, built a pontoon bridge by lashing ships together and crossing the Hellespont from Abydos to Sestos.

Before he arrived at Abydos, Xerxes instructed the townspeople to construct a platform of stones on a hill so that he could stand atop it and survey the massive army and navy he had assembled for the invasion of Greece.

The other Greek cities of the Hellespont were required to supply soldiers and ships for Xerxes’ invasion forces but the people of Abydos were ordered to stay at home and protect the pontoon bridge from attack; the bridge was not harmed by any enemy of the Great King but, when Xerxes retreated back to Abydos after his invasion of Greece had failed, the waves and wind had made the pontoon bridge unstable and unusable; Xerxes and his army crossed from Sestos to Abydos via ship.

When the people of Abydos and Sestos learned that the Greeks who had not allied themselves with the Persians were approaching the Hellespont, they dismantled the pontoon bridge and stored the gear at Sestos; when the Greeks arrived, they focused their attention on punishing the traitor-Greeks on the European side of the Hellespont and left Abydos alone.

Because of its strategic location, Abydos played a major role in the long and brutal Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE); many sea battles were fought in the narrow channel between Abydos and Sestos.

Abydos is now known as Canakkale, Turkey.

Approximate east longitude 26.40 and north latitude 40.15.

• Histories, book 5, chapter 117; book 7, chapter 33-37, 44-45, 95, 147; book 8, chapter 117; book 9, chapter 114