City
Zeugma
Belkıs ~ Birecik
Listen to the story
Zeugma, a city on the Euphrates, took its Greek name from a joining: the bridge of boats across the river beside which Seleucus Nicator founded it. Its remains lie at Belkıs, opposite Birecik in modern Turkey. Travellers came to rely on this crossing once the southern ford at Thapsacus grew unsafe through Arab raids. The map marks the city with a pair of towers, but the roads beyond it are muddled: one stretch has no line drawn, and a lone figure of twelve miles, about eighteen kilometres, cannot be tied firmly to any two places.