(4) _Sardis_ was one of the oldest cities of western Asia. It is situated on the south side of the great valley of the Hermus, just at the point where the river Pactolus issues from the Tmolus mountains. Pottery found in the course of excavations there carries its history back to sub-Mycenæan, if not to Mycenæan, times.[335] It was the seat of the worship of Atys or Cybele, a goddess that seems to have been kindred to the mother-goddess of the Hittites. It is probable that, could we penetrate back far enough, we should find that the place was once occupied by Hittites. Herodotus traces the descent of the first dynasty that ruled over the country to the goddess just mentioned.[336] Following this dynasty was, he says, another of twenty-one kings who ruled before the dynasty founded by Gyges. The Lydian kingdom of which we know began with Gyges in 697 B. C. and ended with Croesus in 546 B. C. Lydian inscriptions found at Sardis are written in the same alphabet as Etruscan inscriptions found in Italy. This indicates that the Lydians and Etruscans were closely akin, but, as the inscriptions have not yet been deciphered, they do not throw much light on either people.[337] It is possible that both peoples were related to the Hittites, but that is at present only a hypothesis.
The mountains to the south of Sardis are composed largely of gravel deposits left there by the melting of the glaciers at the end of the last glacial period. From these gravels the Pactolus brought down gold in ancient times. This was one of the sources of the wealth of the Lydian kings, and contributed to those riches which are still celebrated in the saying: "As rich as Croesus."
The Lydian kingdom fell when Cyrus captured Sardis in 546 B. C. With the fall of the Persian empire the city passed into the hands of Alexander the Great, and subsequently into the hands of his general, Antigonous, then to the Seleucidæ of Syria, then to the kings of Pergamum, and so to the dominion of Rome.
In 17 A. D. Sardis was shaken by a great earthquake which nearly destroyed the city. A mass of gravel and conglomerate rock was then hurled from the hill of the Acropolis of Sardis down into the city toward the temple, where the work of the excavator shows that it still lies.[338] A part of the city must have been buried under it. The city recovered from this disaster and by the end of the first century a Christian church existed there (Rev. 3:1-6). Sardis continued to be a city of importance until 1400-1403 A. D., when the Tartar conqueror, Timur or Tamerlane, swept over the country destroying everything before him. From this destruction Sardis never recovered. Two or three tiny wretched Turkish villages are now all that occupy the spot.[339]
