COLOPHON, an ancient city of Asia Minor, situated a short distance from the coast, and about eight miles north of Ephesus. It was founded by the Ionians, but did not take part in the great political festival of the Apaturia, The principal facts in its history are its capture by the Persians and its depopulation by Lysimachus. At a later date the name was not unfrequently applied to the contiguous city of Notium, which continued to flourish till the time of Cicero at least. The site of Colophon is easily determined, but there are hardly any traces of its buildings. It claimed to bé the birthplace of Homer, and, besides various lesser names, it numbered among its celebrities Mimnermus the elegiac poet, and Nicander the author of the Theriaca. Its name was given to a resin obtained from the pines on the neighbouring Mount Gallesus, and is still recognizable in “colophony,” and in the French colophane. The ancient proverb, τbv Koλoφωvα επεθηκev (he has put the Colophon to the matter), has likewise left its trace in the modern languages, and more particularly in the vocabulary of bibliography, where the word “colophon” is employed to designate the concluding lines of early printed works, containing the title, date, &c. The adage is said to have arisen either from the decisive influence of the Colophonian cavalry in a contest, or from the fact that the citizens had the casting vote in the great Ionian assembly.