Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Seleucia

SELEUCIA, or Seleuceia (Σελεύκεια). Of the numerous ancient towns of this name the most famous are—(1) the great city on the Tigris founded by Seleucus I. Nicator (see vol. xviii. p. 587), of the greatness and decay of which an account has been given in vol. xviii. p. 601; (2) a city on the northern frontier of Syria towards Cilicia, some miles north of the mouth of the Orontes, also founded by Seleucus I., and forming with Antioch, Apamea, and Laodicea the Syrian Tetrapolis. It served as the port of Antioch (Acts xiii. 4). Considerable ruins are still visible, especially a great cutting through solid rock, about two-thirds of a mile long, which Polybius speaks of as the road from the city to the sea.