Prusa (Bithynia)

Prusa or Prousa (Ancient Greek: Προῦσα), or Prusa near Olympus or Prusa under Olympus (Προῦσα ἐπὶ τῷ Ὀλύμπῳ, Προῦσα πρὸς τῷ Ὀλύμπῳ), was an ancient Greek city located between Bithynia and Mysia, situated at the northern foot of the Mysian Olympus. Its site is occupied by the modern city of Bursa.

History

Mythology

Further information: Cius

According to Pliny the Elder, the city was originally named Cius, after the Argonaut of the same name, who founded the city after returning from Colchis at the place where the nymphs took away Hylas:

And here is the scene of the myth of Hylas, one of the companions of Herakles who sailed with him on the Argo, and who, when he was going out to get water, was carried off by the nymphs. [...] And still to this day a kind of festival is celebrated among the Prusians, a mountain-ranging festival, in which they march in procession and call Hylas, as though making their exodus to the forests in quest of him.

According to Apollonius of Rhodes though, the city was named after a nearby river and was founded by the Argonaut Polyphemus.

Antiquity

Bronze statue of the goddess Athena

Coin depicting Prusias I

During the Cretan War, Cius was rased to the ground by Phillip V of Macedon and Prusias I of Bithynia. Prusias was appointed by Philip to rule the region, and he rebuilt the city with the help of Hannibal, which he renamed after himself. Dio Chrysostom, a native of the city in the 1st and 2nd centuries, remarked in his Orations that:

[...] although Prusa is not the largest of our cities and has not been settled for the longest time, it is more illustrious than many, even in the estimation of the outside world, and that it has long caused its citizens to rank, not last, or even third or second, in competition with virtually all Greeks everywhere.

During the Roman period, the city retained its freedom and continued to flourish. It was celebrated for its warm baths that bore the name of the royal waters or the royal fountain.

Middle Ages

During the Byzantine period Prusa prospered, becoming famous for its numerous Roman and Byzantine baths, while still retaining a pagan element, as feasts dedicated to Artemis were held in the gardens surrounding the city even as far as the year 450. The Byzantine Emperor Justinian I built a palace in Prusa, settled Goths there, and transformed it into a garrison city in 562, where imperial guards were stationed. He also built the foundations that would transform Prusa into a famous silk textile manufacturing centre at the end of the Silk Road by the middle of the 6th century. Justinian II settled Slavs in the city in 688.

The city suffered much during the Ottoman conquests of the region. It fell into their hands in 1326, following a lengthy siege, serving as their capital for more than a century . The name Prusa evolved into Mprusa, which later became the modern name of the city of Bursa.

Ecclesiastical history

Byzantine depiction of a seraph

By 1318 the metropolis of Prusa was described as being "under heavy pressure" because of Ottoman invasions. In the same year, it assumed the administration of the archbishopric of Apamea Myrlea and the monastery of Hosius Eustratius. In 1327 and in 1331 the metropolitan of Prusa appears as Proedros of the church of Bizye, and a legitimate metropolitan appears only in 1347. Between 1347 and 1386 Prusa had no metropolitan, and Nicaea was to receive the metropolis in 1381 as per decision of a synod. However, in 1386 a new metropolitan assumed the seat of Prusa, and the metropolis would go on to administer the metropolis of Kotyaion in the same year, and the metropolis of Nicomedia in 1401.

Notable people

• Dio Chrysostom (c. 40–115 AD), Greek orator, writer, philosopher and historian.
• Flavius Archippus (1st century AD), Greek philosopher.
• Saint Timotheos (died 363 AD), bishop of Prusa and Christian martyr.
• Saint Patrikios (3rd century AD), bishop of Prusa and Christian martyr.
• Saints Acacius, Menander and Polyainus (3rd century AD), friends of Patrikios and Christian martyrs.

Gallery

• 
  Ancient Greek hydria
• 
  Herm of the god Attis
• 
  Bursa Treasure displayed in the British Museum
• 
  Bronze statue of the god Apollo
• 
  Byzantine box with Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki
• 
  Byzantine box with a skull

See also

• List of ancient Greek cities
• Bursa Treasure

Bibliography

• "Apollonius Rhodius' The Argonautica Book I". Project Gutenberg. Archived from the original on 4 October 2025. Retrieved 29 December 2025.
• Talbert, Richard, ed. (2000). Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-03169-9, with accompanying Map-by-Map Directory.
• Corsten, Thomas (1991). Die Inschriften von Prusa ad Olympum. Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. ISBN 9783774925168.
• "Discourses by Dio Chrysostom. The Forty-fourth Discourse: An Address of Friendship for his Native Land on its Proposing Honours for him". University of Chicago. Archived from the original on 25 October 2010.
• Dumper, Michael; Stanley, Bruce E. (2007). Cities of the Middle East and North Africa. ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-1-57607-919-5. Retrieved 27 October 2022 – via Internet Archive Books.
• "Bursa, Turkey". Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on 23 March 2025. Retrieved 9 October 2025.
• Klaus, Belke (2020). Bithynien und Hellespont. Part 2. Tabula Imperii Byzantini. Vol. 13, 2. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. ISBN 978-3-7001-8329-7.
• Meinekii, Augusti (1849). Stephani Byzantii Ethnicorum Quae Supersunt. Berolini.
• Melmoth, WIlliam (1915). Pliny Letters. Vol. 2. William Heinemann.
• Pliny Natural History II Libri III-VII. Translated by Rackham. Harvard University Press. 1967.
• "Strabo's Geographica Book XII.4.3". LacusCurtius. Retrieved 9 November 2025.
• Vryonis, Speros (1971). The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the Eleventh through the Fifteenth Century. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-01597-5.
• Yonge, Charles Duke (1854). The Deipnosophists or Banquet of the Larned by Athenæus. Vol. 1. Henry G. Bohn.