Byzantium was one of the most important cities of the ancient world. About 1,000 years after its founding, it was chosen by Emperor Constantine the Great to serve as the new capital of the Roman Empire. He thus turned Byzantium into Constantinople. But who was Byzas, the original Greek founder of Byzantium?
The legend of Byzas
According to legend, Byzas was from Megara, a city in Attica. This ties in with other records about the founders of Byzantium. Byzas himself first appears in the writings of Diodorus Siculus in the first century BCE. However, there are earlier references to the founding of the city, such as the writings of Herodotus. These agree that it was Greeks from Megara who founded the city.
When Byzas spoke to the famous Oracle of Delphi, she told him to establish a city opposite the “city of the blind.” Subsequently, Byzas arrived at the Bosporus since the Greeks were expanding into that region. There, the city of Chalcedon on the Asian side was already standing.
Byzas noticed that the opposite shore, the European side of the Bosporus, was a much more defendable position. It was so much better, in fact, that Byzas felt that the founders of Chalcedon must have been “blind,” so to speak, to miss it. Thus, he concluded that it was the very place that the Oracle of Delphi had been referring to. As a result, he founded the city of Byzantium there.
When did Byzas live?
The question of when Byzas lived is a somewhat complicated matter. The sources agree that he founded Byzantium at some point in the second quarter of the seventh century BCE. One common date is 657 or 658 BCE.
Herodotus, who does not specifically mention Byzas, supports this general date for the founding of Byzantium. He places the founding of the city seventeen years after the founding of Chalcedon. Greek colonists founded that latter city around the year 684 BCE. Thus, seventeen years later would take us to approximately 667 BCE for the founding of Byzantium. This general date is also supported by archaeology.
On the basis of this evidence, Byzas would appear to have been a figure of the early seventh century BCE. However, when we look at other information about Byzas, we see it is not so straightforward.
A contemporary of the Argonauts
Diodorus Siculus, in the earliest surviving reference to Byzas himself, presents Byzas as a contemporary of the Argonauts.
The Argonauts lived about a generation or two prior to the time of the Trojan War. The traditional date for the Trojan War is around 1184 BCE. Therefore, this would place the Argonauts in the thirteenth century BCE. Obviously, it is not possible for Byzas to have been a contemporary of the Bronze Age Argonauts and to have founded Byzantium in the seventh century BCE.
One obvious solution to this is that the Argonauts actually lived much more recently than commonly believed. One reason to think that this may be the case is that the legend of the Argonauts presents them as traveling to Colchis. This was at the eastern end of the Black Sea. Archaeology shows there was no notable Greek presence in that region until the Archaic Era, long after the Bronze Age.
There is also evidence from information about the Trojan War that suggests it may have occurred centuries more recently than commonly believed, although this remains controversial.
While it is certainly not possible that Byzas was of the same generation as the Argonauts, there is a small possibility he may have known some of them as elderly men while he was still a child.
