Part 100

Explore Part 100 of the Civilization V guide, focusing on Maritime City States like Sidon, Tyre, and Cape Town. Learn about their founding, locations, populations, and historical significance.

The last of the city states, the Maritime city states are those that will provide food for your capital city and your other cities, which make them very useful on the map. As you can guess by the word maritime, all these nations will be found on the coast, which also make them lovely targets for a conquest, but hey, free food.

Personally, I think maritime city states are the best. Simply because when your city food generation is low, an extra 2 food can mean all the difference and don't forget, you still need food to maintain your city's population, which is all the more important.

For Maritime nations, they normally provide 2 food for your capital city, and 1 food for your other cities, although this will be increased to about 5 food for your capital and 3 food for all other cities when you have all your policies there. Note that they will only provide food for your other cities when you develop an alliance with them.

Sidon

Founded - 1250 AD

Location - South-Western Lebanon

Population - 200,000

Sidon is an ancient city located on the coast of Lebanon. Originally a fishing and trade center, in modern times Sidon serves as the Mediterranean terminus for the Trans-Arabian Pipeline from Saudia Arabia.

Sidon was founded by Phoenicia in the 3rd millennium BC.

Sidon became wealthy and prosperous in the 2nd millennium BC, famous for the quality of its glass and its purple dyes. In approximately 2700 BC, Sidon colonists founded the city of Tyre some 25 miles down the coast, and for many years the two cities competed for the seat of Phoenician wealth and power.

As Phoenicia's power waned, Sidon's wealth and strategic location made it a tempting target for conquest. During its history Sidon has been ruled by Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Alexander of Macedonia, the Seleucids, the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt, the Romans, the Ottomans, the French, and finally, Lebanon. During the Crusades the city changed hands several times, getting destroyed and rebuilt in the process. The area is littered with the remains of fortifications from throughout history. Today, Sidon is home to Sunni and Shiite Muslims as well as Christian Greek Catholics and Maronites.

The city is mentioned numerous times in the Bible. Perhaps its most famous citizen is the wicked Queen Jezebel, wife of King Ahab of Northern Israel and great aunt of Queen Dido of Carthage. According to the Bible, Jezebel was an evil and corrupt ruler, and she encouraged the worship of foreign (Phoenician) gods in Israel. For these crimes she was killed by her own eunuchs and thrown into the street to be eaten by dogs.

There are two great lessons from this story for all rulers: first, don't mess with the people's religion, and second, never trust the royal eunuchs.

Tyre

Founded - 2750 BC

Location - South-Western Lebanon

Population - 135,204

Tyre is an ancient Phoenician city located in the southern portion of Lebanon, approximately 12 miles north of the Lebanese border with Israel. Tyre was built on the mainland and a nearby offshore island. Founded in approximately 2700 BC by colonists from the city of Sidon, the city soon grew to rival and eventually surpass its sister city as a fishing and mercantile center for Phoenicia. In the 9th century BC settlers from Tyre founded the city of Carthage in North Africa.

Like Sidon, Tyre is frequently mentioned in the Bible. Relations between Israel and Tyre were generally cordial; in fact, Hiram, king of Tyre furnished building materials for Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem.

Because of its wealth and strategic location, Tyre was subjected to repeated attacks by whatever power happened to be rampaging in the area. In the 8th and 7th centuries it was under Assyrian dominance. In the 6th century it withstood a long siege by King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon, though it was captured shortly thereafter by the Persians. Then, in the third century, Alexander of Macedon happened by at the head of his army.

Alexander's siege of Tyre lasted some seven months. To defeat the stubborn defenders, Alexander completely destroyed the mainland city and used the rubble to construct a causeway out to the island. After capturing the city, the Great Alexander showed his appreciation for the citizens' valor and courage by putting 10,000 of them to death and selling 30,000 others into slavery. Though it revived somewhat under later Egyptian and Roman rule, Tyre never fully recovered from Alexander's exuberance.

Today Tyre is a city of approximately 120,000 residents. Because of its proximity to Israel, it tends to suffer whenever violence occurs along the Lebanese-Israeli border, which seems to happen with depressing frequency, as bombs, bullets and missiles from all sides make the ancient ruins even more ruined. Still, Tyre has survived worse than this - much worse - and it will hopefully live to see peace and prosperity once again.

Cape Town

Founded - 1652 AD

Location - South-Western South Africa

Population - 2,984,100

Located on the southern edge of Africa, Cape Town is the first European settlement in South Africa. In 1652 the Dutch East India Company established a refreshment station for its ships on the shores of Table Bay, a harbor just to the northwest of the Cape of Good Hope with convenient access to fresh water. Within a few years Dutch colonists ventured outside of the forts and set up farmsteads, working the fields with African slaves imported from other locations. The local native inhabitants (the Khoekhoe, whom the Dutch called "Hottentots") were not enslaved, and in fact many lived side by side wit