The Armenians of Seyhan

Seyhan is the new name of the province of Adana which in the second half of the nineteenth century included the larger part of Cilicia. The name Adana (Arb. Adana, Adâna, and later Atana; Arm. Atana, and Ott. Turk. Âtana and Âdana) is explained by a Greek mythological story according to which the brothers Adanus and Sarus built Adana giving it their names; but in fact it is derived from the Hittite ‘Ataniya’, ‘Adana’. ( ¹ ) In the seventh century, at the time of the Caliph Umar b. al-Khattâb, the Arabs came to Adana and occupied it. The Byzantines kept up the fight for it and eventually conquered it in the tenth century. In the eleventh century it fell to the Seljuk rule.