The Mustafakemalpasha River is a river in northwestern Anatolia

Anatolia

Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...

 in the Bursa Province

Bursa Province

Bursa Province is a province in western Turkey, along the Sea of Marmara. Its adjacent provinces are Balıkesir to the west, Kütahya to the south, Bilecik and Sakarya to the east, Kocaeli to the northeast and Yalova to the north. The province has an area of 11,043 km2 and a population of 3,187,000...

 of Turkey

Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

's Marmara Region

Marmara Region

The Marmara Region , with a surface area of 67.000 km², is the smallest but most densely populated of the seven geographical regions of Turkey...

. It is named for the city of Mustafakemalpaşa

Mustafakemalpasa

Mustafakemalpaşa is the main town of Bursa Province in the Marmara region of Turkey.-History:The ancient Hittite name of the county was Kirmasti Kremastre, under the Kingdom of Bithynia. Around 300AD the town became important when a Christian Bishop made this his regional centre...

 which lies near its delta onto Lake Uluabat

Lake Uluabat

Lake Uluabat is the name of a freshwater lake in the vicinity of Bursa, Turkey. It is a large lake, covering an area of between 135 and 160 km² depending on the water level, but very shallow, being only 3 m deep at its deepest point. The lake contains eight islands and one other that is...

.

The Mustafakemalpasha was the classical Rhyndacus . The Rhyndacus was listed as a son of Oceanus

Oceanus

Oceanus ; , Ōkeanós) was a pseudo-geographical feature in classical antiquity, believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to be the world-ocean, an enormous river encircling the world....

 and Tethys

Tethys (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titaness and aquatic sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but not venerated in cult. Tethys was both sister and wife of Oceanus...

 and his daughters by Mount Didymos, the Rhyndacides, were revered as pegaeæ

Pegaeae

In Greek mythology, the Pegaeae were a type of naiad that lived in springs. They were often considered daughters of the river gods , thus establishing a mythological relationship between a river itself and its springs....

. In his Dionysiaca, Nonnus

Nonnus

Nonnus of Panopolis , was a Greek epic poet. He was a native of Panopolis in the Egyptian Thebaid, and probably lived at the end of the 4th or early 5th century....

 recorded their waters being used by Dionysus

Dionysus

Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

 to drug the nymph Nicaea

Nicaea (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Nicaea was a nymph , the daughter of the river-god Sangarius and Cybele. She was beloved by a shepherd, Hymnus, and killed him, but Eros took vengeance upon her, and Dionysus, who first intoxicated her, made her mother of Telete, whereupon she attempted to hang herself; yet she...

 after she offended the Rhyndacides by murdering the shepherd Hymnus. Upon recovering her senses, she then cursed them. Although the Rhyndacus was formerly the main artery running to the Sea of Marmara

Sea of Marmara

The Sea of Marmara , also known as the Sea of Marmora or the Marmara Sea, and in the context of classical antiquity as the Propontis , is the inland sea that connects the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea, thus separating Turkey's Asian and European parts. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Black...

 and served as the border between Mysia

Mysia

Mysia was a region in the northwest of ancient Asia Minor or Anatolia . It was located on the south coast of the Sea of Marmara. It was bounded by Bithynia on the east, Phrygia on the southeast, Lydia on the south, Aeolis on the southwest, Troad on the west and by the Propontis on the north...

 and Bithynia

Bithynia

Bithynia was an ancient region, kingdom and Roman province in the northwest of Asia Minor, adjoining the Propontis, the Thracian Bosporus and the Euxine .-Description:...

, today the Mustafakemalpasha is merely a tributary of the Simav

Simav River

The Simav or Susurluk River is a river in Anatolian Turkey. Its course is 321 km long and its basin comprises 22 400 km2. It was the classical Macestus . In the 19th century, it was known as the Mikalick....

, which then flows into the Sea of Marmara

Sea of Marmara

The Sea of Marmara , also known as the Sea of Marmora or the Marmara Sea, and in the context of classical antiquity as the Propontis , is the inland sea that connects the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea, thus separating Turkey's Asian and European parts. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Black...

.

During the First Mithridatic War

First Mithridatic War

The First Mithridatic War was a war challenging Rome's expanding Empire and rule over the Greek world. In this conflict, the Kingdom of Pontus and many Greek cities rebelling against Rome were led by Mithridates VI of Pontus against the Roman Republic and the Kingdom of Bithynia...

, Flavius Fimbria

Gaius Flavius Fimbria

Gaius Flavius Fimbria was a Roman politician and a violent partisan of Gaius Marius. He fought in the First Mithridatic War.-Partisan of Marius:...

 defeated Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI or Mithradates VI Mithradates , from Old Persian Mithradatha, "gift of Mithra"; 134 BC – 63 BC, also known as Mithradates the Great and Eupator Dionysius, was king of Pontus and Armenia Minor in northern Anatolia from about 120 BC to 63 BC...

 along the Rhyndacus in 85 BC. During the third

Third Mithridatic War

The Third Mithridatic War was the last and longest of three Mithridatic Wars fought between Mithridates VI of Pontus and his allies and the Roman Republic...

, Lucullus

Lucullus

Lucius Licinius Lucullus , was an optimate politician of the late Roman Republic, closely connected with Sulla Felix...

 again defeated him at the Rhyndacus

Battle of the Rhyndacus (72 BC)

The Battle of the Rhyndacis occurred in 73 or 72 B.C. between the Roman Republican forces under Lucullus and the army of the Kingdom of Pontus as part of the Third Mithridatic War....

 in 73 or 72 BC. Under Manuel I

Manuel I Komnenos

Manuel I Komnenos was a Byzantine Emperor of the 12th century who reigned over a crucial turning point in the history of Byzantium and the Mediterranean....

, the Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

 based their main Anatolian army at Lopadion (modern Uluabat) on the Rhyndacus. After the sack of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade

Fourth Crusade

The Fourth Crusade was originally intended to conquer Muslim-controlled Jerusalem by means of an invasion through Egypt. Instead, in April 1204, the Crusaders of Western Europe invaded and conquered the Christian city of Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire...

, the Latin emperor Henry

Henry of Flanders

Henry was the second emperor of the Latin Empire of Constantinople. He was a younger son of Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut , and Margaret I of Flanders, sister of Philip of Alsace, count of Flanders....

 won another battle there against the Nicaean Empire on October 15, 1211.