Miletus, the greatest Greek city in the…

Miletus, the greatest Greek city in the east, is the natural outlet for products from the interior of Anatolia and has a considerable wool trade with Sybaris, in southern Italy.

Miletus is important in the founding of the Greek colony of Naukratis in Egypt and founds more than sixty colonies on the shores of the Black Sea, including Abydos, Cyzicus, Sinope (now Sinop), Olbia, and Panticapaeum.

Together with the people of the other two Ionian cities of Caria, Myus and Priene, the Milesians speak a distinctive Ionian dialect, which becomes the language of literature and learning, and Ionic architecture, sculpture, and bronze casting are influential.

The overseas expansion of Ionia in the seventh century is in part due to the need of a new population outlet after deep Ionic penetrations inland have provoked opposition and conflict with the rising power of Lydia under the Mermnads.

Little is known about Milesian government before 500 BCE.

At the beginning of the sixth century BCE, however, the city is ruled by the tyrant Thrasybulus.

The Lydian kings Sadyattes, who died in about 610 BCE, and Alyattes, who reigns from about 610 BCE to about 560 BCE, continue their attacks on Miletus.