Sisouan ou lArméno-Cilicie

  La seconde et principale partie des plages occidentales de la Cilicie, s'étend des frontières de la Pamphylie, c'est-à-dire, du sud des monts Imbar et du cap de Coracésium, jusqu'au cap Sarpédon, aux frontières de la Séleucie. Elle occupe l'espace moyen le plus vaste et le plus méridional de cette terre, qui en forme d'arc s'enfonce dans la Méditerranée et elle est elle-même le point le plus méridional de toute l'Asie Mineure.

A deux ou trois lieues au sud-est du promontoire de Leucothée, on en trouve un autre plus grand, en forme de presqu'île, qui sépare la Pamphylie de la Cilicie Pierreuse, et marque le commencement de cette dernière; c'est le cap Coracésium ( Κοραχήσιον ). Ce nom paraît provenir d'une racine arienne, Corax ou Corak. Les monnaies anciennes portent avec les effigies impériales le nom des habitants de la contrée, ΚΟΡΑΚΗ C ΙΩΤΩΝ. Le pays est remarquable par sa position et par sa beauté naturelle; nous rapportons ici les propres paroles de l'amiral Beaufort, voyageur anglais:

«The promontory of Alaya forms a natural forteress, that might be rendered impregnable, and the numerous walls and towers prove how anxiously its former possessors laboured to make it so. It is separated from the adjacent mountains by a broad plain, and a low sandy isthmus, from which it abruptly rises. Two of its sides are cliffs of great height, and absolutely perpendicular, and the eastern side, on which the town is placed, is so steep, that the houses seem to rest on eachother. Its present importance, however, is not great, though the capital of a pashalik: the streets and the houses are miserable; there are but few mosques, and they are very mean; there were no signs of commerce; nor can the population exceed fifteen hundred, or two thousand at the almost. The bay is open to southerly winds; the anchorage is indifferent; and there is no harbour or pier. But, wherever the industrious colonists of ancient Greece formed a maritime settlement, they endeavoured by art to supply the deficiencies of nature; and it is not probable that a place of such strength and consequence should have been destitute of some shelter for its vessels. The situation in which a mole might have been placed was obvious; but it lay so immediately in view from the houses, that a scrupulous anxiety not to give offence to the peevish prejudices of the inhabitants, restrained me from searching for its remains. (p. 369- Promontoire de Coracésium-Alaya, et plan de la ville)

The cliffs of Alaya are from five to six hundred feet high above the sea, and continue equally perpendicular to sixty or seventy feet below it. At a little distance from the shore they are lost under the lofty mountains of the interior; but close in, they have a magnificent appearance. They consist of a compact white limestone, tinged by a red drip on the outside; thus agreeing in character with the rocks to the westward of the gulf of Adalia: on the north side of the promontory the brown schistus base rises up from beneath the limestone».

Il faut noter dans ce passage de Beaufort que s'il n'a pas osé trop s'approcher du port pour examiner ces débris, ce fut parce qu'ils étaient très proches des maisons, ce qui lui fit craindre de faire naître les soupçons des habitant.