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Pisidia (; , ; ) was a region of ancient Asia Minor located north of Pamphylia, northeast of Lycia, west of Isauria and Cilicia, and south of Phrygia, The New Century Classical Handbook; Catherine Avery, editor; Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1962, p. 896: " Pisidia...a territory in Asia Minor. It was bounded by Phrygia on the N, Isauria and Cilicia on the E, Pamphylia on the S, and Lucia on the SW" corresponding roughly to the Antalya Province in Turkey. Among Pisidia's settlements were Antioch in Pisidia, Termessos, Cremna, Sagalassos, Etenna, Neapolis, Selge, Tyriacum, Laodiceia Katakekaumene, Adada (Pisidia) and Philomelium.
There is a lacuna (gap) in the text of Herodotus (7.76), but it is doubtful to surmise a reference to the Pisidians in that passage. There can be little doubt that the Pisidians and Pamphylians were the same people, but a distinction between the two seems to have been established at an early period. Herodotus, who does not mention the Pisidians, enumerates the Pamphylians among the nations of Asia Minor, while Ephorus mentions them both, correctly including the one among the nations on the interior, the other among those of the coast. Pamphylia early received colonies from Greece and other lands, and from this cause, combined with the greater fertility of their territory, became more civilized than its neighbor in the interior. Pisidia remained a wild, mountainous region, and one of the most difficult for outside powers to rule.
As far back as the Hittite period, Pisidia was host to independent communities not under the Hittite yoke. Known for its warlike factions, it remained largely independent of the Lydians, and even the Persians, who conquered Anatolia in the 6th century BC, and divided the area into for greater control, were unable to cope with constant uprisings and turmoil.
Pisidia officially passed from the Seleucids to the Attalids as a result of the Treaty of Apamea, forced on Antiochos III of Syria by the Ancient Rome in 188 BC. After Attalos III, the last king of Pergamon, bequeathed his kingdom to Rome in 133 BC as the province of Asia, Pisidia was given to the Kingdom of Cappadocia, which proved unable to govern it. The Pisidians cast their lot with pirate-dominated Cilicia and Pamphylia until the Roman rule was restored in 102 BC.
In 39 BC Mark Antony entrusted Pisidia to the Galatian client king Amyntas and charged him with suppressing a people of the Taurus Mountains known as the Homonadesians, who sometimes controlled the roads connecting Pisidia to Pamphylia.
During the Roman period Pisidia was colonized with veterans of its Roman legion to maintain control. For the colonists, who came from poorer parts of Italy, agriculture must have been the area's main attraction. Under Augustus, eight such colonies were established in Pisidia, and Antioch and Sagalassos became the most important cities. The province was gradually Latinised. Latin remained the formal language of the area until the end of the 3rd century.
Pisidia became an important early Christian centre. Paul the Apostle preached in Antioch on his first journey. and He also visited the area in his second and third journeys. After the Emperor Constantine's legalization of Christianity in 311, Antioch in Pisidia (which has various namesakes, including the Patriarchate in Syria) played an important role as the Christian metropolitan see as well as being the capital of the Roman province of Pisidia. Most Pisidian cities were heavily fortified at that time due to civil wars and foreign invasions.
The area was devastated by an earthquake in 518, a plague around 541–543, and another earthquake and Arab raids in the middle of the 7th century. After the Muslim conquest of Syria disrupted the trade routes, the area declined in importance. In the 8th century the raids increased. In the 11th century the Seljuk Turks captured the area and founded the Seljuk Sultanate in Central Anatolia. Pisidia frequently changed hands between the Byzantine Empire and the Turks. In 1176, Sultan Kılıçarslan defeated Manuel Komnenos in the Battle of Myriocephalon (thousand heads).
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