According to Conon,[551] the earliest inhabitants of Rhodes were the Heliades, whom the Phoenicians expelled.

The Phoenicians themselves were at a later date expelled by the Carians, and the Carians by the Greeks.

Ergeias, however, the native historian, declared[552] that the Phoenicians remained, at any rate in some parts of the island, until the Greeks drove them out.

Ialysus was, he said, one of their cities.

Dictys Cretensis placed Phoenicians, not only in Ialysus, but in Camirus also.[553] It is the conclusion of Kenrick that "the Phoenician settlement in Rhodes was the first which introduced civilisation among the primeval inhabitants, and that they maintained their ascendancy till the rise of the naval power of the Carians.