Prusa (Bithynia)
Historic town of ancient Bithynia or of Mysia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Prusa or Prousa (Ancient Greek: Προῦσα), or Prusa near Olympus or Prusa under Olympus (Προῦσα ἐπὶ τῷ Ὀλύμπῳ, Προῦσα πρὸς τῷ Ὀλύμπῳ), was a town located between Bithynia and Mysia, situated at the northern foot of the Mysian Olympus. Its site is occupied by the modern city of Bursa.[1][2]
Pliny the Elder states that the town was built with the help of Hannibal during his stay with Prusias I of Bithynia, whose name it bears.[citation needed] It is acknowledged by Dio Chrysostom, a native of the town in the 1st and 2nd centuries, that it was neither very ancient nor very large.[3] It was however, as Strabo remarks, well governed, and continued to flourish under the Roman and Byzantine periods,[4][5] and was celebrated for its warm baths that bore the name of the "royal waters".[6][7]
The town suffered much during the Ottoman conquests of the region.[8] 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.[9]
Ecclesiastical history
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.[10]
Gallery
