Issus

Issus (Latin; Phoenician: Sissu) or Issos (Ancient Greek: Ἰσσός, Issós, or Ἰσσοί, Issoí) was an ancient settlement on the strategic coastal plain straddling the small Pinarus River (a fast melt-water stream several metres wide) below the navigationally difficult inland mountains towering above to the east in the Turkish Province of Hatay, near the border with Syria. It can be identified with Kinet Höyük in the village of Yeşilköy near Dörtyol in Turkey's Hatay Province. Excavations on the mound occurred between 1992 and 2012 by Bilkent University. It is most notable for being the place of no fewer than three decisive ancient or medieval battles each called in their own era the Battle of Issus: