ILION, or Ilias, in Ancient Geography, a name for the city of Troy, but most commonly used by the poets, and distinguished by the epithet Vetus; at a greater distance from the sea than what was afterwards called Ilium Novum, and thought to be the Ilienum Pagus of Strabo. New or modern Ilium was a village nearer the sea, with a temple of Minerva; where Alexander, after the battle of Granicus, offered gifts, and called it a city, which he ordered to be enlarged. His orders were executed by Lycurgus, who encompassed it with a wall of 40 stadia. It was afterwards adorned by the Romans, who granted it immunities as to their mother-city. From this city the Ilias of Homer takes its name, containing an account of the war carried on between the Greeks and Trojans on account of the rape of Helen; a variety of disasters being the consequence, gave rise to the proverb Ilias Malorum.