Writing on this world heritage site, Unesco says, ‘A colony of the Greeks of Thera, Cyrene was one of the principal cities of the Hellenic world. It was Romanised and remained a great capital until the earthquake of 356. A thousand years of history is written into its ruins…’

The country is Libya; heritage site is called Thera; the place is known as Cyrene; and it belongs to the ancient Greeks.

Libya means ‘Land of the Lavanas’ where Aenean arrived after coming from Troy or the place where Dido was living on the bank of the river Dio; Kyrene or Cyrene identifies the ancient Kuru of Indian puranas and Cyrus of history; Thera is exactly the Tyre of Alexander’s historians and Troy of Homeric epics.

The Periplus’ account on Libya reads, ‘And these market towns of Azania are the very last of the continent that stretches down on the right hand from Berenice; far beyond from these places the unexplored ocean curves around towards the west, and running along by the regions to the south of Aethiopia, and Libya and Africa, it mingles with the western sea’. Adulis defines its position very close to Libya. City of ‘No-Amon’ is not different from City of Sun as Put and Lubim are considered by scholars as same as Cyrene and Libya respectively. It was the seat of the Cyrenaics same as Pitinikias.

It was at the end of the earth that defines the position of the ancient Rome; Lavana’s children were ruling here(it fell on the hand of the Kuha or Kuhathites); he was brother of Cush and thus is identified with the land of the Romans or the Ramanaka people.

Herodotus(IV,196) writes, ‘The Carthaginians further say that beyond the Pillars of Hercules there is a region of Libya….’ Writing on Thera, Herodotus says, ‘Grinus , son of Aesanius, a descendant of Theras and King of the island of Thera, had visited Pythia, the oracle of Delpji, ….the Pythia had ordered the advice to find a new city in Libya…’. Aziris of Herodotus is Azania of the Periplus. Here the kings were called as Battus. And this is name associated with a sacred ‘tree’ itself.

Pali literature knew Cyrene as Kuru/Karuna, and Libya as Lumbini. According to this source, Kuru was one of the Sixteen Mahajanapadas of the ‘inhabited world’. Indian puranas know Troy or Thera or Tyre as Toya. Thera in Pali means a ‘Monk’. It is normally used as a ‘title-like’ to identify the Bhikshus.