Lyctus or Lyttos was one of the most considerable cities in ancient Crete

Crete

Crete is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, and one of the thirteen administrative regions of Greece. It forms a significant part of the economy and cultural heritage of Greece while retaining its own local cultural traits...

, which appears in the Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

ic catalogue. Lyttos is now a village in the municipality of Minoa Pediada

Minoa Pediada

Minoa Pediada is a municipality in Heraklion peripheral unit, Crete, Greece. The seat of the municipality is the village Evangelismos.-Municipality:...

.

Lyctus in mythology

According to Hesiod

Hesiod

Hesiod was a Greek oral poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer. His is the first European poetry in which the poet regards himself as a topic, an individual with a distinctive role to play. Ancient authors credited him and...

, Rhea

Rhea (mythology)

Rhea was the Titaness daughter of Uranus, the sky, and Gaia, the earth, in Greek mythology. She was known as "the mother of gods". In earlier traditions, she was strongly associated with Gaia and Cybele, the Great Goddess, and was later seen by the classical Greeks as the mother of the Olympian...

 gave birth to Zeus

Zeus

In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...

 in a cave of Mount Aegaeon, near Lyttos. The cave has been identified since the late nineteenth century as Psychro

Psychro

Psychro Cave is an ancient Minoan sacred cave in the Lasithi district of eastern Crete. Psychro is associated with the Diktaean Cave, the putative site of Zeus' birth...

. The inhabitants of this ancient Doric city called themselves colonists of Sparta

Sparta

Sparta or Lacedaemon, was a prominent city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the banks of the River Eurotas in Laconia, in south-eastern Peloponnese. It emerged as a political entity around the 10th century BC, when the invading Dorians subjugated the local, non-Dorian population. From c...

, and the worship of Apollo

Apollo

Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in Greek and Roman mythology...

 appears to have prevailed there.

History

In 344 BCE, Phalaecus

Phalaikos

Phalaikos was the ruler of Phocis in Greece before he was ousted. After he was ousted he became the leader of a group of mercenaries whose services were sought by Knossos in Crete. Once in Crete. The leaders of Knossos ordered him to attack their enemy, the city of Lyttus. The Lyttians appealed to...

 the Phocian

Phocis

Phocis is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the administrative region of Central Greece. It stretches from the western mountainsides of Parnassus on the east to the mountain range of Vardousia on the west, upon the Gulf of Corinth...

 assisted the Cnossians

Knossos

Knossos , also known as Labyrinth, or Knossos Palace, is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and probably the ceremonial and political centre of the Minoan civilization and culture. The palace appears as a maze of workrooms, living spaces, and store rooms close to a central square...

 against their neighbors the Lyctians, and took the city of Lyctus, from which he was driven out by Archidamus

Archidamus

Archidamus may refer to:*one of several kings of Sparta:**Archidamus I **Archidamus II **Archidamus III **Archidamus IV **Archidamus V...

, king of Sparta. The Lyctians, at a still later period, were engaged in frequent hostilities with Cnossus, and succeeded in creating a formidable party in the island against that city. The Cnossians, taking advantage of their absence on a distant expedition, surprised Lyctus, and utterly destroyed it. The citizens, on their return, abandoned it, and found refuge at Lampa. Polybius

Polybius

Polybius , Greek ) was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic Period noted for his work, The Histories, which covered the period of 220–146 BC in detail. The work describes in part the rise of the Roman Republic and its gradual domination over Greece...

, on this occasion, bears testimony to the high character of the Lyctians, as compared with their countrymen. They afterwards recovered their city by the aid of the Gortynians, who gave them a place called Diatonium, which they had taken from the Cnossians. Lyctus was sacked by Metellus

Quintus Caecilius Metellus Creticus (died 55 BC)

Quintus Caecilius Metellus Creticus was a politically active member of theRoman upper class. He was praetor in 74 BC and pontifex from 73 BC until his death...

 at the Roman

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

 conquest, but was existing in the time of Strabo

Strabo

Strabo, also written Strabon was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher.-Life:Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus , a city which he said was situated the approximate equivalent of 75 km from the Black Sea...

 at a distance of 80 stadia from the Libyan sea. The site still bears the name of Lytto, where ancient remains are now found. In the 16th century, the Venetian manuscripts describe the walls of the ancient city, with circular bastions, and other fortifications, as existing upon a lofty mountain, nearly in the centre of the island. Numerous vestiges of ancient structures, tombs, and broken marbles, are seen, as well as an immense arch of an aqueduct, by which the water was carried across a deep valley by means of a large marble channel. The town of Arsinoe

Arsinoe (Crete)

Arsinoe was an ancient city of Crete assigned to Lyctus, adjacent to the older city of Rhithymna. Berkelius supposes that an error had crept into the text, and that for we should read . Its identification with Rhithymna was first proposed by Eckhel...

 and the harbor of Chersonesos

Chersonesos (Lyctus)

Chersonesos or Chersonesus , is an ancient city of Crete, Greece. It was the haven of Lyctus, with a temple of Britomartis 16 M P. from Cnossus...

are assigned to Lyctus. The type on its coins is usually an eagle flying, with the epigraph "ΛΥΤΤΙΩΝ".