Ionia

Ionia was the central stretch of the western coast of Asia Minor — modern Turkey — together with its offshore islands, settled by Greeks in the migrations that followed the Dark Age. Its dozen cities, chief among them Miletus, Ephesus, and the island of Samos, formed a prosperous, cultured league enriched by trade between the Aegean and the interior of Asia.

The Ionian enlightenment

Ionia was the birthplace of Greek philosophy and science. At Miletus, Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes first sought a rational first principle of nature; Heraclitus taught at Ephesus; Pythagoras was born on Samos before emigrating west. The same spirit produced the first Greek historians and geographers, so that the earliest philosophers are often called simply the Ionians.

Between Greece and Persia

Wealthy but exposed, the Ionian cities fell under the rule of Lydia and then of Persia in the sixth century BCE. Their revolt against Persia in 499 BCE set off the chain of events that led to the Persian Wars. Ionia remained a great center of Greek culture through the Hellenistic and Roman ages.