THYRIDES
THYRIDES (
Θυρίδες), a promontory of Laconia, on the western coast of the Taÿgetic peninsula, now called
Cape Grosso. It is of a semicircular form, nearly 7 miles in circumference, and rises from the sea to the height of 700 feet.
There are many apertures and clefts in the rocks, the abodes of innumerable pigeons, and from the window-like form of these holes the whole promontory has received the name of Thyrides. Strabo describes it as a
ῥοώδης κρημνὸς, “a precipitous cape beaten by the winds,” distant 130 stadia from Taenarum (reckoning from the northern point of Thyrides); Pausanias, as a promontory (
ἄκρα), situated 70 stadia from Taenarum (reckoning from the southern point of the promontory). Pausanias likewise calls it a promontory of Taenarum, using the latter word in its widest sense, to signify the whole peninsula of
Mani. According to Strabo, the Messenian gulf terminated at this promontory. Pliny (
4.12. s. 56) mentions three islands of the name of Thyrides in the Asinaean gulf. (
Paus. 3.25.9; Strab. viii. pp. 360, 362; Leake,
Morea, vol. i. p. 302, seq.; Boblaye,
Recherches, &c. p. 91; Curtius,
Peloponnesos, vol. ii. p. 281.)
