Lycaonia

LYCAONIA, a Province of Asia Minor, which makes Part of Cappadocia, having Galatia to the North, Pisidia to the South, Cappadocia to the East, and Phrygia to the West. Saint Paul preached in Lycaonia, in the Cities of Iconium and Lystra¹.

Lycaonian Language. Saint Paul preaching at Lystra, a City of Lycaonia in Asia Minor, by his Command only cured a Man who had been lame from his Mother’s Womb, and had never walked; whereupon the Inhabitants of Lystra lift up their Voices, saying in the Speech of Lycaonia, the Gods are come down to us in the Likeness of Men: And they called Barnabas, Jupiter; and Paul, Mercurius, because he was the chief Speaker. The Question is, what this Speech of Lycaonia was It is generally believed to have been a corrupt Greek; and it is certain that Greek was spoken in Asia Minor; but, as is common in Provinces remote from the Center of good Taste and Purity, Languages vary, and are far from the Politeness of large Cities and Places, where Studies flourish.

Paul Ernest Jablonski has written a learned Dissertation on the Lycaonian Tongue; he supposes it to be the same with the Cappadocian, which was Greek mingled with a great deal of Syriac; an Opinion, which has been followed by Grotius, and is very probable, by Reason of the Neighbourhood of Syria, Cappadocia, and Lycaonia; and if there had been no more in it, than the signifying a Difference of Dialect, Saint Luke never would have said, that these People cried in the Speech of Lycaonia; a Dialect is no particular Language.

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