View source for Caucones

{{More citations needed|date=June 2025}}{{short description|Tribe of Anatolia}}
The '''Caucones''' {{IPAc-en|k|ɔː|ˈ|k|oʊ|ˌ|n|iː|z|,_|k|ə|ˈ|k|oʊ|ˌ|n|iː|z}} ({{langx|grc|Καύκωνες}} ''Kaukônes'') were an [[indigenous peoples|autochthonous]] tribe of [[Anatolia]] (modern-day [[Turkey]]), who later migrated to parts of the [[Greek mainland]] ([[Arcadia (ancient region)|Arcadia]], [[Pylus (Triphylia)|Triphylian Pylos]] and [[ancient Elis|Elis]]). 

== Origin and early history ==

The [[phonology]] of the name Caucones has been taken as evidence for an origin in the [[Caucasus Mountains]]. It is also suggested that they are related to the [[Late Bronze Age]] ''[[Kaskians]]'', who [[Hittites|Hittite]] tablets locate along the southern shore of the Black Sea. According to [[Herodotus]] and other [[classical era]] writers, the Caucones were among the tribes displaced or absorbed by the [[Bithynia]]ns, who had migrated from [[Thrace]].

==In myth and literature ==

The ''[[Iliad]]'' lists the Caucones among the [[Troy|Trojan allies]]. In Book X, the [[Troy|Trojan]] herald [[Dolon (mythology)|Dolon]] describes their homeland as "towards the sea" and mentions them alongside the [[Carians]], [[Paionians]], [[Leleges]], and [[Pelasgians]]. In the ''[[Odyssey]]'' (3.366), [[Athena]] tells [[Nestor (mythology)|Nestor]] at [[Pylos]] that she will "go to the Caucones, where there's an old debt still owing me, not a small amount." This allusion may refer to a subgroup of Caucones who had migrated to mainland Greece, as reported by Strabo.{{cn|date=April 2023}}

Other references to the Caucones in epic tradition may have been attempts to recognize the Caucones as deserving a place in the [[Neleiad kingdom]] in southwestern Greece. Efforts were made, we are told by Pausanias (4.1.5). to 'historicize' ''Kaukon'' as the early ancestor of the Athenian ''genos'' ''Lykomidai'' around 480 BC by inventing a grandson of an earth-born Phlyus named ''Kaukon'' who taught the [[Eleusinian Mysteries]] to a royal queen Messene. His name was ''Kaukon'', a teacher of religious rites.{{cn|date=April 2023}}

Their penetration beyond [[Arcadia (region)|Arcadia]] (Strabo 7.7.1–2) and their claims to be sons of [[Lycaon (Troy)|Lycaon]] or [[Lycus (mythology)|Lycos]] (Apollodorus, ''[[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Library]]'' 3.8.1) explains their enduring presence over time in literature. [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]]' description of the carved figure of Caucon holding a [[lyre]] atop his tomb speaks to their tribal poetic literacy. Several scholars believed [[Pylia]]n Caucones (Hdt. 4.148, 1.147, 5.65) brought Neleid legends and Nestor's polemic exhortations to [[Colophon (city)|Colophon]].<ref>T. W. Allen ''JHS'' 30 (1910) 302.</ref> [[Mimnermus]] (fr. 9, 14–15, Strabo 14.1.3–4) their ancestor extended the traditional royal "we" of Homeric Nestor in his words of inspiration to [[Smyrna]]eans fighting [[Lydians|Lydian]] [[Gyges of Lydia|Gyges]] in the [[Gediz River|Hermus]] plain (Paus. 4.21.2, quoted by [[Theoclus]], Paus. 5.8.7, 9.29.4).

== Greek accounts == 

Strabo (8.3.14–15) in discussing [[Triphylia]]n Pylos lists Caucones once inhabiting [[Lepreion]], a settlement that may have had custody over [[Hades]]-[[Demeter]] shrines at Mt. Minthe that grew [[Mentha|mint]] used for the ''kukeiôn'' at [[Eleusis]] (Homer, ''Hymn to Demeter'' 209: ''glêkhôni''), as does [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] (5.5.5). These Caucones enter history with their expulsion (Hdt.4.148) and dispersion to [[Athens]] (Paus. 2.18.7–8, 7.2.1–5) and [[Ionia]]n [[Miletos]] (Hdt. 1.146-7), after contributing to the spread of the [[Eleusinian]] Great Goddesses into [[Messenia]] and [[Thebes, Greece|Thebes]] (Paus.4.1.5–9), Ephesos and Kolophon (Strabo 14.1.3). With these passages Pausanias affirms Herodotus (2.51) on the spread of Hermes and a cult of ''[[Kabeiroi]]'' throughout [[Attica]] under [[Hipparchus (son of Peisistratos)|Hipparchus]] between 528–514 BC employing inscribed square-cut figures of Hermes in marble as road markers (Plato, ''[[Hipparchus (dialogue)|Hipparchus]]'' 228b–229b). A Caucon priest [[Methapus]] had done much the same at Thebes. The [[List of ancient Milesians|Milesian]] Caucones, according to Herodotus (1.147), possessed ancestry from Pylian [[Codrus]], son of [[Melantho]]s, the very same genealogy Herodotus (5.65) assigns to the Athenian tyrant [[Peisistratos]]. Strabo (12.3.5) reported Caucones once inhabiting the southern Black Sea coast from [[Heraclea Pontica]] (modern [[Karadeniz Ereğli]]) to [[Carambis]] promontory at [[Teion]], on the [[Bartın River|Parthenios River]], their likely Homeric geography (''Iliad'' 20.328–9).

==References==
{{reflist}}

[[Category:Ancient peoples of Anatolia]]
[[Category:Ancient tribes in Greece]]
[[Category:Autochthons of classical mythology]]
[[Category:Characters in the Iliad]]
[[Category:Hellenistic-era tribes in the Balkans]]
[[Category:Legendary tribes in classical historiography]]
[[Category:People of the Trojan War]]