Antiquity Located a few miles from the mouth of the
Göksu River, Seleucia was founded by
Seleucus I Nicator in the early 3rd century BC, one of several cities he named after himself. It is probable that there were already towns called
Olbia (or Olba) and
Hyria and that Seleucus I merely united them giving them his name. The city grew to include the nearby settlement of
Holmi (in modern-day
Taşucu) which had been established earlier as an
Ionian colony but being on the coast was vulnerable to raiders and pirates. The new city up river was doubtless seen as safer against attacks from the sea so Seleucia achieved considerable commercial prosperity as a
CIlician port, and was even a rival of
Tarsus. The
Silifke Bridge was built by the governor L. Octavius Memor in 77 AD.
Christianity Early
Christian bishops held the
Council of Seleucia on 27 September 359. Seleucia was famous for the tomb of the virgin Saint
Thecla of Iconium, converted by
Saint Paul, who died at Seleucia, the tomb was one of the most celebrated in the Christian world and was restored several times, among others by the Emperor
Zeno in the 5th century, and today the ruins of the tomb and sanctuary are called
Meriamlik. In the 5th century the imperial governor (
comes Isauriae) in residence at Seleucia had two
legions at his disposal, the
Legio II Isaura and the
Legio III Isaura. The Christian
necropolis, west of town, which contains many tombs of Christian soldiers, likely dates from this period. According to the
Notitia Episcopatuum of the
Patriarchate of Antioch, in the 6th century, the
Metropolitan of Seleucia had 24 suffragan sees. By 732 nearly all the
ecclesiastical province of Isauria wrre incorporated into the
Patriarchate of Constantinople; henceforth the province figures in the
Notitiae of the
Patriarchate of Constantinople, under the name of
Pamphylia. In the
Notitiae of
Leo VI the Wise (ca. 900) Seleucia had 22 suffragan bishoprics, while in that of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus (ca. 940) it had 23. In 968 when Antioch was recaptured by the Byzantines, Seleucia was allocated to the
Patriarchate of Antioch. There were several metropolitans of this see, the first of whom,
Agapetus, attended the
Council of Nicaea in 325,
Neonas was at the Council of Seleucia in 358,
Symposius at the
Council of Constantinople in 381,
Dexianus at the
Council of Ephesus in 431,
Basil, a celebrated orator and writer, whose conduct was rather ambiguous at the
Second Council of Ephesus and at the beginning of the
Council of Chalcedon in 451,
Theodore was at the
Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553, and
Macrobius was at the
Sixth Ecumenical Council and the
Council in Trullo in 692. No longer a residential see, Seleucia in Isauria was included in the list of
titular sees of the
Catholic Church, which made no new appointments of a
titular bishop to this eastern see since the
Second Vatican Council.
Medieval period In 705 Seleucia was temporarily captured by the
Umayyads and was soon recovered by the
Byzantines. In the 8th century Seleucia was ruled by a
tourmarches and then under a
droungarios, as part of the
Cibyrrhaeot Theme. In the early 9th century, it appears as the capital of a
kleisoura bordering on the domains of the
Abbasid Caliphate in Cilicia. According to the
Arab geographers
Qudamah ibn Ja'far and
Ibn Khordadbeh, in the 9th century the
kleisoura comprised Seleucia as capital and ten other fortresses, with 5,000 men, out of which 500 were cavalry. The kleisoura was raised to the status of a full theme around 927-934 during the reign of
Romanos I Lekapenos, as the
Theme of Seleucia. In the 11th century, the city was sacked by the
Seljuk Turks, and was soon recaptured by the Byzantines in 1099/1100 during the reign of
Alexios I Komnenos, who rebuilt the city and fortified it. On 26 February 1180 Seleucia was conquered by the
Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. On 10 June 1190
Frederick Barbarossa drowned while trying to cross the
Calycadnus river, near Seleucia, during the
Third Crusade. In the 13th century Seleucia was in the possession of the
Knights Hospitaller, until it fell to the
Karamanids in the second half of the 13th century, and then to the
Ottomans under
Gedik Ahmet Pasha in 1471.
Modern period Until 1933, Silifke was the capital of İçel Province until the
İçel and Mersin provinces were merged. The merged province took the name of İçel but its administrative centre was at
Mersin. In 2002 the name of İçel was replaced with that of Mersin. ==Economy==