An island close adjoining to the coast, or an outlying tongue of land connected with the continent by a narrow isthmus, and presenting some hill sufficient for an acropolis, seems to have been considered as the most favorable situation for Grecian colonial settlement. To one or other of these descriptions most of the Ionic cities, conform.[297] The city of Milêtus at the height of its power had four separate harbors, formed probably by the aid of the island of Ladê and one or two islets which lay close off against it: the Karian or Kretan establishment, which the Ionic colonists found on their arrival and conquered, was situated on an eminence overhanging the sea, and became afterwards known by the name of Old Milêtus, at a time when the new Ionic town had been extended down to the water-side and rendered maritime.[298] The territory of this important city seems to have comprehended both the southern promontory called Poseidium and the greater part of the northern promontory of Mykalê,[299] reaching on both sides of the river Mæander: the inconsiderable town of Myûs[300] on the southern bank of the Mæander, an offset seemingly formed by the secession of some Milesian malcontents under a member of the Neleid gens named Kydrêlus, maintained for along time its autonomy, but was at length absorbed into the larger unity of Milêtus; its swampy territory having been rendered uninhabitable by a plague of gnats. Priênê acquired an importance greater than naturally belonged to it, by its immediate vicinity to the holy Pan-Ionic temple and its function of administering the sacred rites,[301]—a dignity which it probably was only permitted to enjoy in consequence of the jealousies of its greater neighbors Milêtus, Ephesus, and Samos.[302] The territories of these Grecian cities seem to have been interspersed with Karian villages, probably in the condition of subjects. [297] The site of Milêtus is best indicated by Arrian, i, 19-20; see that of Phôkæa, Erythræ, Myonnêsus, Klazomenæ, Kolophôn, Teôs (Strabo, xiv, pp. 644-645; Pausan. vii, 3, 2; Livy, xxxvii, 27-31; Thucyd. viii, 31). [298] Strabo. xiv, p. 635. [299] Strabo, xiv, p. 633; Herod. ix, 97-99. Τὸ Ποσείδιον τῶν Μιλησίων. Strabo, xiv, p. 651. [300] Strabo, xiv, p. 636; Vitruvius, iv, 1; Polyæn. viii, 35. [301] Strabo, xiv, pp. 636-638. [302] Thucyd. i, 116.