Ionia, in ancient geography, a country on the W. coast of Asia Minor, lying mainly between the river Hermus on the north and the Maeander on the south, and including the islands of Chios and Samos. This district was named after the Ionians, who returned from Attica to these shores, from which they had previously emigrated to European Greece, and founded here the 12 cities, Miletus, Myus, Priene, Ephesus, Lebedus, Colophon, Teos, Erythrae, Clazomenae, Phocaea, Chios, and Samos, which were designated as the Ionian Dodecapolis. (See Ionians.) The new colonists settled among kindred Greek tribes engaged in fishing and navigation, and the Lydians seem to have allowed their settlements on the coast without regarding them as an encroachment. The Ionians demanded rights of supremacy and the best localities for the foundation of cities for themselves, and drove the old inhabitants out of their seats. The legends speak of their struggles with the Carians and Leleges. The religious and political centre of the Dodecapolis was the Panionium, which was a temple of Neptune, on the N. slope of Mount Mycale, near Priene, where the common affairs of the independent republics were discussed at regular meetings.

About 700 B. C. Smyrna, which until then had belonged to AEolis, became by treachery a member of the Ionian confederacy, which subsequently consisted of 13 cities. The country soon attained great prosperity. Before the middle of the 6th century, however, the Ionian cities became subject to Lydia, and on the fall of Croesus they were annexed to the Persian empire by Cyrus. In 501 and 494 the Ionians made unsuccessful efforts to regain their independence, and they assisted the Greeks against the Persians at the battle of Mycale (479). The Persian yoke was at length shaken off by the victory at the Eury-medon, but the peace of Antalcidas (387) renewed it. On the overthrow of the Persian empire by Alexander, Ionia became subject to. Macedon, subsequently to the Syrian and Per-gamene kingdoms; and in 133 it fell into the hands of the Romans by the bequest of Atta-lus III. of Pergamus. The Ionian cities soon lost their importance, and under the Turkish supremacy all but Smyrna disappeared or sank into total insignificance.

Though Ionia never possessed great political power, the commerce of its cities extended to the shores of the Black sea and the sea of Azov, as well as to the coasts of the Mediterranean. Ionia was the cradle of Greek epic and elegiac poetry, history, philosophy, medicine, and other sciences; it developed a new style of architecture, and it was the birthplace of several celebrated painters.

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Ionia, a S. county of the southern peninsula of Michigan, drained by Grand river; area, 576 sq. m.; pop. in 1870, 27,681. It has an undulating surface, about half of which is densely wooded. Red sandstone is quarried. The soil is rich, and much of it alluvial. The Detroit and Milwaukee, and the Detroit, Lansing, and Lake Michigan railroads pass through it. The chief productions in 1870 were 665,521 bushels of wheat, 366,811 of Indian corn, 284,314 of oats, 316,487 of potatoes, 32,825 lbs. of hops, 120,870 of maple sugar, 317,261 of wool, 656,-369 of butter, and 34,271 tons of hay. There were 6,514 horses, 7,424 milch cows, 1,844 working oxen, 8,093 other cattle, 78,541 sheep, and 10,686 swine; 12 manufactories of agricultural implements, 10 of carriages, 6 of cabinet furniture, 10 of iron castings, 8 of saddlery and harness, 9 of sash, doors, and blinds, 3 of woollen goods, 2 planing mills, 19 saw mills, and 9 flour mills. Capital, Ionia.