Caption: "Greek Colonization of western Anatolia (AKA Asia Minor, modern Turkey) (i.e., First Greek colonisation) during the Greek Dark Ages (c. 1100--c. 800 BCE)." (Somewhat edited.)
Miletus (abbreviated Milet on map) was the intellectual capital of the world in the 6th century BCE with the Milesian school of Presocratic philosophers: Thales (c. 624--c. 546 BCE) (the first philosopher), Anaximander (c. 610--c. 546 BCE), and Anaximenes (c. 585--c. 528 BCE). There was a moment when there was only Miletus.
Other Ionian Presocratics include Pythagoras (c. 570--c. 495 BCE) (from Samos), Heraclitus (c. 535--c. 475 BCE) (from Ephesus), and Anaxagoras (c. 510--c. 428 BCE) (from Klazomenai).
About the same time as the Thales (c. 624--c. 546 BCE) flourished Sappho (c.630--c.570 BCE), who is NOT a Presocratic, but is a Greek lyric poet and a citizen of Lesbos,
Credit/Permission: ©
User:Alexikoua,
2014 /
CC BY-SA 3.0.
Image link: Wikimedia Commons:
File:Western Asia Minor Greek Colonization.svg.
Local file: local link: map_ionia.html.
File: Maps file:
map_ionia.html.