Les inscriptions de la Perse achéménide. [Paris]: Gallimard.
10 Lorenz, J. 2008. Nebukadnezar III/IV: Die politischen Wirren nach dem Tod des Kambyses im Spiegel der Keilschrifttexte. Dresden: Islet Verlag.
11 Luschey, H. 1968. “Studien zu dem Darius‐Relief von Bisitun.” AMIran 1: 63–98.
12 Root, Margaret Cool. 1979. The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art: Essays on the Creation of an Iconography of Empire. Leiden: Brill.
13 Root, Margaret Cool. 2013. “Defining the Divine in Achaemenid Persian Kingship: The View from Bisitun.” In Every Inch a King: Comparative Studies on Kings and Kingship in the Ancient and Medieval Worlds, edited by Lynette G. Mitchell and C. P. Melville, 23–65. Leiden: Brill.
14 Schmitt, Rüdiger. 1991. The Bisitun Inscriptions of Darius the Great: Old Persian Text. London: SOAS.
15 Seidl, Ursula. 1999. “Ein Monument Darius’ I. aus Babylon.” ZA 89: 101–14.
16 Trümpelmann, L. 1967. “Zur Entstehungsgeschichte des Monumentes Dareios’ I. von Bisutun und zur Datierung der Einführung der altpersischen Schrift.” AA 82: 281–98.
17 Vallat, François. 2013. “The Inscriptions of Darius at Bisitun.” In The Palace of Darius at Susa: The Great Royal Residence of Achaemenid Persia, edited by Jean Perrot, translated by Dominique Collon and Gerard Collon, 479–84. London: I. B. Tauris.
18 Voightlander, Elizabeth von. 1978. The Bisitun Inscription of Darius the Great: Babylonian Version. London: Lund Humphries.
19 Wiesehöfer, Josef. 2001. Ancient Persia from 550 BC to 650 AD, translated by Azizeh Azodi. London: I. B. Tauris.
20 Zawadzki, Stefan. 1994. “Bardiya, Darius and Babylonian Usurpers in the Light of the Bisitun Inscription and Babylonian Sources.” AMIran 27: 127–45.
BISTONES (Βίστονες, οἱ)
CHRISTOPHER BARON
University of Notre Dame
Thracian tribe living east of the NESTUS RIVER in northern Greece (BA 51 D2). XERXES led his Persian invasion force through Bistonian territory in 480 BCE and compelled them to join the army (7.110). The Bistones are not well‐attested historically (Strabo 7 F18a Radt; Ps.‐Scymnus 673–75), though the name is used by Hellenistic (and, later, Roman) poets to refer to THRACE (e.g., Ap. Rhod. 2.704). In Greek MYTH, DIOMEDES was said to have ruled over the Bistones until he was killed by HERACLES (Eur. Alc. 485; Apollod. Bibl. 2.5.8).
SEE ALSO: Bistonis (Lake)
FURTHER READING
1 Vasilev, Miroslav Ivanov. 2015. The Policy of Darius and Xerxes towards Thrace and Macedonia, 172–73. Leiden: Brill.
BISTONIS, LAKE (ἡ Βιστονίς λίμνη)
CHRISTOPHER BARON
University of Notre Dame
Lake Bistonis (modern Vistonida), near the ancient city of DICAEA in THRACE, occupying the gap between the AEGEAN coast and the foothills of Mt. RHODOPE (BA 51 E2; Müller I, 44–45). Herodotus mentions Bistonis as XERXES’ invasion army passes by (7.109.1). He describes it as “well‐known” (cf. Arist. Hist. an. 598a24) along with Lake ISMARIS, and notes that the TRAUSOS and COMPSATUS rivers empty into Lake Bistonis.
SEE ALSO: Bistones; Persian Wars
FURTHER READING
1 Tuplin, Christopher J. 2003. “Xerxes’ March from Doriscus to Therme.” Historia 52.4: 385–409.
BITHYNIAN THRACIANS (Θρήικες οἱ βιθυνοί)
CHRISTOPHER BARON
University of Notre Dame
Thracian tribe living in northwest Anatolia (BA 52 F4; Müller II, 790–91). Herodotus mentions the Bithynians twice. First, they are among the peoples west of the HALYS RIVER conquered by the Lydian king CROESUS (1.28). Later, in his CATALOGUE of XERXES’ invasion force, Herodotus describes the equipment of the “Thracians of Asia” and says they came to be called Bithynians when they crossed to ASIA from EUROPE, having previously been called Strymonians according to their own account (7.75). Their small shields or peltai were typical of Thracian fighters; the increasing use of Thracians as MERCENARIES in the late fifth century BCE led to the incorporation of peltasts (light‐armed infantry) into many Greek ARMIES. In the classical period the Bithynians were feared by Greek travelers through the region (Xen. An. 6.4.2). During the wars between Alexander’s successors (323–276), an independent Bithynian kingdom emerged and played a role in Hellenistic affairs until 75/4 BCE, when the last king ceded his realm to the Romans.
The presence of a Thracian tribe in Anatolia was already known to Pherecydes in the second quarter of the fifth century (BNJ 3 F27, though he includes the PAPHLAGONIANS as Thracian). The legend of a Teucrian and Mysian invasion of Europe which forced the Strymonians to move and change their name, however, is an attempt to explain passages of HOMER which include Thracians as Trojan ALLIES (Asheri 1990, 153–54).
SEE ALSO: Migration; Mysia; Strymon; Teucrians; Thrace; Thynians; Weapons and Armor
REFERENCE
1 Asheri, David. 1990. “Herodotus on Thracian Society and History.” In Hérodote et les peuples non grecs, edited by Giuseppe Nenci, 131–69. Geneva: Fondation Hardt.
FURTHER READING
1 Vannicelli, Pietro, and Aldo Corcella, eds. 2017. Erodoto. Le Storie, libro VII: Serse e Leonida, 386–87. Milan: Mondadori.
BITON, see CLEOBIS AND BITON
BITUMEN (ἄσϕαλτος, ἡ)
JOHANNES ENGELS
University of Cologne and University of Bonn
Ancient Greek and Roman authors often do not precisely differentiate in their nomenclature between several bituminous substances, such as native asphalts or bitumens, petroleums, types of pitch and tar. Bitumen durum in many Latin sources corresponds to Greek asphaltos (or naphtha xeron), bitumen liquidum to Greek naphtha. Herodotus especially mentions the use of hot bitumen (asphaltos) for purposes of ENGINEERING and construction of buildings or WALLS, as well as several places in Mesopotamia and Greece where bituminous natural resources were found and exploited by local people. These substances were also widely appreciated for making ships watertight and for medical or religious purposes. For fear of uncontrollable FIRES bituminous substances were only rarely used in ancient times for heating purposes. Herodotus especially mentions (1.179.2) the famous wall around BABYLON which was made of bricks using hot bitumen for cement. This substance came from the river IS (1.179.4, Hit in modern Arabic), a tributary of the EUPHRATES. After their capture in the PERSIAN WARS during the reign of DARIUS I, the Eretrians were deported to ARDERICCA in Mesopotamia about 210 stades (about 25 miles) away from SUSA (6.119), where local people exploited asphalt, salt, and oil as natural resources. As an example of strange mirabilia, Herodotus also refers (4.195.3) to pitch drawn from the water of a pool in ZACYNTHUS.
SEE ALSO: Medicine; Ships and Sailing; thōmata
FURTHER READING
1 Engels, Johannes. 2012. “Asphalt, Naphtha, Bitumen, Peche und Teere. Vorkommen, Gewinnung und Nutzung in der griechisch‐römischen Welt.” In Die Schätze der Erde: Natürliche