Sinop
Sinop
(sēnōp`), anc. Sinope, town (1990 pop. 25,537), capital of Sinop prov., N Turkey, on the Black Sea. A small port, it has an excellent harbor but lacks adequate communications with the interior of Turkey. Ancient Sinop was founded by colonists from Miletus in the 8th cent. B.C., was rebuilt after its destruction (7th cent. B.C.) by the Cimmerians, rose to commercial and political importance. One of its chief exports was cinnabar, which derives its name from Sinop. Sinop was the most important port on the Black Sea. The Romans under Lucullus captured it from Mithradates VI in the Third Mithradatic War (74–63 B.C.) and made it a free city. Sinop was occupied and devastated by Pharnaces II but was restored by Julius Caesar. Under the Roman Empire the city again reached great prosperity, which continued under the Byzantine Empire. When the Byzantine Empire broke up in 1204, Sinop joined the Greek empire of Trebizond, but within a few years it was occupied by the Seljuk Turks, and its decline began. In 1853 a Russian naval squadron surprised a Turkish flotilla there and completely destroyed it. This event served to hasten the approaching Crimean War. Sinop was the birthplace of DiogenesDiogenes, c.412–323 B.C., Greek Cynic philosopher; pupil of Antisthenes. He was born in Sinope and lived in Athens. He taught that the virtuous life is the simple life, and he dramatically discarded conventional comforts, living in a tub.
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Sinop
a city in northern Turkey, capital of Sinop Vilayet. Population, 15,000 (1970). A port on the bay known as Sinop Limani of the Black Sea, the city has food-processing and saw-milling industries. There is also handicraft production of linen and fishing.
Sinop (Sinope) was founded no later than the seventh century B.C. as a colony of the city of Miletus. An important trade and handicraft center on the Black Sea coast, it dominated the adjoining coastal regions. It minted its own coins from the sixth century B.C. to the third century A.D. The city was in nominal dependence on the Achaemenid state until the fourth century B.C. and became part of the Pontic kingdom in 183 B.C., first as the king’s residence and then as the capital. It was conquered by the Roman general Lucullus in 70 B.C. Sinop belonged to Byzantium from the late fourth century A.D. It became part of the empire of Trebizond after the latter was founded in 1204 and was part of the Konya sultanate from 1214 to 1307. Captured by Tamerlane in the early 15th century, Sinop became part of the Ottoman Empire in the middle of that century.
A battle between Russian and Turkish naval squadrons in Sinop Limani in 1853, during the Crimean War, ended in victory for the Russian fleet.
REFERENCES
Maksimova, M. I. Antkhnye goroda iugo-vostochnogo Prichernomor’ia. Moscow-Leningrad, 1956.Robinson, D. M. Ancient Sinope. [Chicago] 1906. [23–1259–]