AMATHUS  , an

ancient city of Cyprus, on the S. coast, about 24 M . W. of Larnaka and 6 in . E. of Limassol, among sandy hills and sand-dunes, which perhaps explain its name in Greek (fiµaaos, sand) . The earliest remains hitherto found on the site are tombs of the early Iron Age period of Graeco-Phoenician influences (l000–600 B.C.) . Amathus is identified by some (E . Oberhummer, Die Insel Cypern, i., 1902, pp . 13-14; but see CIinrIl) with Kartihadasti (Phoenician " New-Town ") in the Cypriote tribute-list of Esarhaddon of Assyria (668 B.C.) . It certainly maintained strong Phoenician sympathies, for it was its refusal to join the phil-Hellene league of Onesilas of Salamis which provoked the revolt of Cyprus from Persia in 500–494 B.C . (Herod. v . 105), when Amathus was besieged unsuccessfully and avenged itself by the capture and execution of Onesilas . The phil-Hellene Evagoras of Salamis was similarly opposed by Amathus about 385-380 B.C. in conjunction with Citium and Soli (Diod . Sic. xiv .

98); and even after

Alexander the city resisted annexation, and was bound over to give hostages to Seleucus (Diod . Sic. xix . 62) . Its political importance now ended, but its temple of Adonis and Aphrodite (Venus Amathusia) remained famous in Roman time . The wealth of Amathus was derived partly from its corn (Strabo 340, quoting Hipponax, fl . 540 B.C.), partly from its copper mines (Ovid, Met. x . 220, 531), of which traces can be seen inland (G . Mariti, i . 187; L . Ross, Inselreise, iv . 195; W . H .

Engel, Kypros, i. n r ff.) . Ovid also mentions its sheep (Met . X . 227); the epithet :tmathusia in Roman poetry often means little more than "Cypriote," attesting however the fame of the city . Amathus still flourished and produced a distinguished patriarch of Alexandria (Johannes Eleemon), as late as 6o6–616, and a ruined Byzantine church marks the site; but it was already AMAZON 783 almost deserted when Richard Coeur de Lion won Cyprus by a victory there over Isaac Comnenus in 1191 . The rich necropolis, already partly plundered then, has yielded valuable works of art to New York (L . P. di -Cesnola, Cyprus, 1878 passim) and to the British Museum (Excavations in Cyprus, 1894 (1899) passim) ; but the city has vanished, except fragments of wall and of a great stone cistern on the acropolis . A similar vessel was transported to the Louvre in 1867 . Two small sanctuaries, with terra-cotta votive offerings of Graeco-Phoenician age, lie not far off, but the great shrine of Adonis and Aphrodite has not been identified (M . Ohnefalsch-Richter, Kypros, i. ch.1) . {J . L .