Cyrene, also sometimes anglicized as Kyrene, was an ancient Greek colony and Roman city near present-day Shahhat in northeastern Libya in North Africa.

It was part of the Pentapolis, an important group of five cities in the region, and gave the area its classical and early modern name Cyrenaica.

The city was attributed to Apollo and the legendary etymon Cyrene by the Greeks themselves but it was probably actually colonized by settlers from Thera (modern Santorini) in the late seventh century BC.

It was initially ruled by a dynasty of monarchs called the Battiads, who grew rich and powerful as a result of successive waves of immigration and the export of horses and silphium, a medicinal plant.

The Greeks themselves attributed the name to the legendary Thessalian princess Cyrene who supposedly founded the city with help from the sun god Apollo.

[2] Some modern scholars sometimes attribute the name to its spring Cyra (Κύρα, Kýra), which was considered sacred to Apollo by the city's Greco-Roman inhabitants.

[2][5] A Greek myth first recorded by Pindar in the early fifth century BC reports that the god Apollo fell in love with the huntress Cyrene and brought her to Libya, where she gave birth to a son Aristaeus.

[11] The sanctuary of Apollo to the north of the Acropolis, of Demeter to the south, and of Zeus to the east all go back to the seventh or sixth centuries BC.

Archaeological evidence shows that several other sites in Cyrenaica, such as Apollonia, Euesperides, and Taucheira (modern Benghazi and Tocra) were settled at the same time as Cyrene.

[12] In the first half of the sixth century BC, Battus II encouraged further Greek settlement in the city, especially from the Peloponnese and Crete.

[15] Arcesilaus was defeated by the Barcans and Libyans at the Battle of Leuco, killed by his brother and succeeded by his infant son Battus III (ca.

[17] These reforms appear to have limited the authority of the king to religious matters, vested political power in the Cyrenaean people, and divided the Cyreneans into three tribes.

[19] In the fifth century BC, perhaps as a consequence of the Persian intervention, Cyrene's influence over the other Greek cities in Cyrenaica seems to have solidified into institutionalised political control.

[27] When Alexander the Great conquered Egypt in 331 BC and marched west to visit the oracle at Siwah, the Cyreneans sent an embassy to declare their friendship; they did not come under Macedonian control.

[29] In 308 BC, Ophellas led Cyrenaean and Athenian troops west to join Agathocles of Syracuse's attack on Carthage and was immediately murdered.

[34][33] Inscribed accounts indicate severe inflation of food prices and a large fundraising campaign, possibly for repairs to the city walls.

[37] Cyrene was reduced to subject status, a garrison was installed, and a succession of Ptolemaic courtiers were appointed to the city's priesthood of Apollo.

The deuterocanonical book 2 Maccabees, is said by its author to be an abridgment of a five-volume work by a Hellenized Jew by the name of Jason of Cyrene who lived around 100 BC.

The provincial capital was on Crete, but Cyrene remained the chief city in Cyrenaica and enjoyed a highly prosperous period and much construction dates to the first century AD.

[36] In the mid-first century AD, the Roman authorities launched an extensive surveying campaign to reclaim the public land around Cyrene that had slipped into private control and stopped paying dividends to the fisc.

[48][49] According to Eusebius of Caesarea, the Jewish rebellion left Libya depopulated to such an extent that a few years later new colonies had to be established there by the emperor Hadrian to maintain the viability of continued settlement.

Cyrene was once again prosperous by the third quarter of the second century AD and several palaces date to this period, including the House of Jason Magnus.

[45] The Roman Martyrology[53] mentions under 4 July a tradition that in the persecution of Diocletian a bishop Theodorus of Cyrene was scourged and had his tongue cut out.

[60] Richard Goodchild, controller of antiquities from 1955 to 1966 moved the village of Shahat off the site and re-established it to the south; it has since expanded over much of the southern necropolis.

[69] Cyrene is now an archaeological site north of the village of Shahhat and east of Bayda, on a ridge of the Jabal Akhdar, about 600 metres above sea level.

From there, a road referred to by modern scholars as the "Street of Battus" or "Skyrotà" runs along the ridge to the southeast for around 1 kilometre, past the Agora, the House of Jason Magnus and a number of other palatial residences, the Stoa of Hermes and Heracles, the Caesareum, two theatres, a sacred area, and the caravanserai until it reaches the gates of the city.

Below the Acropolis to the north, the Springs of Apollo and Cyra emerge from the cliff-face onto a triangular plateau at the base of the Wadi Bu Turqiyah.

To the northeast, on another ridge, but still inside the city walls, is the largely unexcavated northeastern quarter, containing the Temple of Zeus, the hippodrome, and the East Church.

[75] The sanctuary to Demeter and Persephone, which includes a temple and theater complex, is located south of the Wadi Bil Ghadir ravine, outside the city walls.

During the time of this sacred activity at the Sanctuary a voluminous amount of votive material was accumulated in its interior: pottery, lamps, coinage, stone sculpture, jewellery, inscriptions, glass, as well as bronze and terracotta figurines.