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CHAP. 17. (10.)—MACEDONIA.

Macedonia comes next, including 150 nations, and renowned for its two kings1 and its former empire over the world; it was formerly known by the name of Emathia2. Stretching away towards the nations of Epirus on the west it lies at the back of Magnesia and Thessaly, being itself exposed to the attacks of the Dardani3. Pæonia and Pelagonia protect its northern parts from the Triballi4. Its towns are Ægiæ5, at which place its kings were usually buried, Beræa6, and, in the country called Pieria from the grove of that name, Æginium7. Upon the coast are Heraclea8, the river Apilas9, the towns of Pydna10 and Aloros11, and the river Haliacmon12. In the interior are the Aloritæ13, the Vallæi14, the Ph1lylacæi, the Cyrrhestæ15, the Tyrissæi, the colony of Pella16, and Stobi17, a town with the rights of Roman citizens. Next comes Antigonea18, Europus19 upon the river Axius, and another place of the same name by which the Rhœmdias flows, Scydra, Eordæa, Mieza, and Gordyniæ. Then, upon the coast, Ichne20, and the river Axius: along this frontier the Dardani, the Treres21, and the Pieres, border on Macedonia. Leaving this river, there are the nations of Pæonia22, the Paroræi23, the Eordenses24, the Almopii25, the Pelagones, and the Mygdones26.

Next come the mountains of Rhodope, Scopius, and Orbelus; and, lying along the extent of country in front of these mountains, the Arethusii27, the Antiochienses28, the Idomenenses29, the Doberi30, the Æstræenses, the Allantenses, the Audaristenses, the Morylli, the Garesci31, the Lyncestæ32, the Othryonei33, and the Amantini34 and Orestæ35, both of them free peoples; the colonies of Bullis36 and Dium37, the Xylopolitæ, the Scotussæi, a free people, Heraclea Sintica38, the Tymphæi39, and the Toronæi.

Upon the coast of the Macedonian Gulf there are the town of Chalastra40, and, more inland, Piloros; also Lete, and at the extreme bend of the Gulf, Thessalonica41, a free city; (from this place to Dyrrhachium it is 245 miles42,) and then Thermæ43. Upon the Gulf44 of Thermæ are the towns of Dicæa, Pydna45, Derra, Scione46, the Promontory of Canastræum47, and the towns of Pallene48 and Phlegra. In this region also are the mountains Hypsizorus, Epitus, Halcyone, and Leoomne; the towns of Nyssos49, Phryxelon, Mendæ, and what was formerly Potidæa50 on the isthmus of Pallene, but now the Colony of Cassandria; Anthemus51, Olophyxus52, and the Gulf of Mecyberna53; the towns of Miscella, Ampelos54, Torone55, Singos56, and the canal, a mile and a half in length, by means of which Xerxes, king of the Persians, cut off Mount Athos57 from the main land. This mountain projects from the level plain of the adjacent country into the sea, a distance of seventy-five58 miles; its circumference at its base being 150 miles in extent. There was formerly upon its summit the town of Acroathon59: the present towns are Uranopolis60, Palæorium, Thyssus, Cleonæ61, and Apollonia, the inhabitants of which have the surname of Macrobii62. The town also of Cassera, and then the other side of the Isthmus, after which come Acanthus63, Stagira64, Sithone65, Heraclea66, and the country of Mygdonia that lies below, in which are situate, at some distance from the sea, Apollonia67 and Arethusa. Again, upon the coast we have Posidium68, and the bay with the town of Cermorus, Amphipolis69, a free town, and the nation of the Bisaltæ. We then come to the river Strymon70 which takes its rise in Mount Hæmus71 and forms the boundary of Macedonia: it is worthy of remark that it first discharges itself into seven lakes before it proceeds onward in its course.

Such is Macedonia, which was once the mistress of the world, which once extended72 her career over Asia, Armenia, Iberia, Albania, Cappadocia, Syria, Egypt, Taurus, and Caucasus, which reduced the whole of the East under her power, and triumphed over the Bactri, the Medes, and the Persians. She too it was who proved the conqueror of India, thus treading in the footsteps of Father Liber73 and of Hercules; and this is that same Macedonia, of which our own general Paulus Æmilius sold to pillage seventy-two74 cities in one day. So great the difference in her lot resulting from the actions of two75 individuals!

1 Philip, the Conqueror of Greece, and Alexander, the Conqueror of Asia.

2 The original Emathia, as mentioned by Homer, is coupled with Pieria as lying between the Hellenic cities of Thessaly and Pæonia, and Thrace.

3 A tribe of the south-west of Mœsia, and extending over a part of Illyricum. According to Strabo, they were a wild race, of filthy habits, living in caves under dunghills, but fond of music.

4 A people of Mœsia, mentioned in C. 29 of the last Book.

5 Supposed by some writers to be the same place as Edessa. Ansart says it is the spot now known as Moglena.

6 Now Verria in Roumeia. St. Paul and Silas withdrew to this place from Thessalonica. The remains are very considerable.

7 Described by Livy as of great strength. It occupied the site of the modern Stagus.

8 Surnamed Lyncestis; the chief town of Upper Macedonia. It must have stood not far from the modern town of Felurina.

9 Now the Platamona.

10 Now Kitron. The Romans usually called it Citron or Citrus.

11 In the inmost recess of the Thermaic Gulf. Leake supposes it to have occupied the site of the present Palea Khora, near Kapsokhori.

12 Now the Vistritza, by the Turks called Inje-Karra. Cæsar calls it the boundary between Macedonia and Thessaly.

13 The people apparently of Aloros just mentioned.

14 Vallæ and Phylacæ appear to have been two towns of Pieria.

15 The people of Cyrrhus; probably on the site of the present Vistritza. Leake however makes a place called Paleokastro to occupy its site. Tyrissæ was probably in its vicinity.

16 Now Alaklisi, upon a lake formed by the Lydias. Philip made it the capital of Macedonia, and it was the birth-place of Alexander the Great. It was made a Roman colony under the name of Julia Augusta Pella.

17 Its ruins are still called Stoli.

18 There were two places of this name in Macedonia; one called Antigonia Psaphara in Chalcidice, and the other in Pæonia.

19 Between Idomene and the plains of Pella. As Pliny here says, it was a different place from Europus of Almopia, by which the Rhœdias flows. Of the following places nothing seems to be known.

20 Coupled by Herodotus with Pella. Eordæa seems to have been the name of the district on the river Eordaicus, identified with the modern Devol.

21 They dwelt in the vicinity of Mount Scomium. The river Axius is the modern Vardhari.

22 Or Thrace.

23 People of Paroræa in Thrace.

24 The people probably of Eordæa, already mentioned.

25 Leake thinks that Almopia was the name of the district now called Moglena.

26 The Mygdones were a Thracian people in the east of Macedonia, on the Thermaic Gulf.

27 The people of Arethusa, a town of Bisaltia in Macedonia, in the pass of Aulon. Euripides, the tragic poet, was buried here.

28 A town of Mygdonia.

29 The people of Idomene, a town about twelve miles from the pass of Stena, now Demirkapi, or the 'Iron Gate,' on the river Vardhari.

30 Their district of Doberus is supposed to have been near the modern Doghiran.

31 It has been suggested that Garescus stood on the same site as the modern Nurocopo. Many of these peoples are now entirely unknown.

32 The people of Lyncestis, in Macedonia, of Illyrian origin and on the frontiers of Illyria. Lyncus was the ancient capital, Heraclæa the more modern one.

33 Probably the inhabitants of the slopes of Mount Othrys.

34 Amantia was properly in Illyria, to the south of the river Aoüs. Leake places it at Nivitza.

35 A people of the north of Epirus, on the borders of Macedonia. They were said to have derived their name from Orestes, who, after the murder of his mother, founded in their territory the town of Argos Oresticum.

36 A Greek city of Illyria. Dr. Holland discovered its remains at Graditza on the Aoüs or Viosa.

37 The bulwark of the Macedonian maritime frontier to the south. Leake discovered its site near the modern Malathria.

38 On the right bank of the river Strymon in Thracian Macedonia. It stood on the site of the modern Zervokhori.

39 A people of Epirus on the borders of Thessaly.

40 In Mygdonia, at the mouth of the Axius—King Perseus put all its male inhabitants to death. Its site was at or near the modern Kulakia.

41 Now Saloniki. Its original name was Thermæ, but it was first made an important city by Cassander, B.C. 315, who gave it its new name in honour of his wife, the sister of Alexander the Great: S, Paul visited it about A.D. 53, and two years after addressed from Corinth two Epistles to his converts in the city.

42 Polybius says, in Strabo, B. vii., 267 miles.

43 As already mentioned, Thermæ became merged in Thessalonica, when refounded by Cassander under that name.

44 Now the Gulf of Saloniki.

45 This is probably an error. Pydna, already mentioned, lay far inland in the district of Pieria.

46 On the peninsula of Pallene. Its male inhabitants were put to death by the Athenians in the Peloponnesian war.

47 Now Capo Paliuri, the extreme point of the Isthmus of Pallene.

48 The most westerly of the three peninsulas of Chalcidice. Phlegra is generally understood to have been its former name.

49 Perhaps the same as Nyssa, between the rivers Nestus or Mestus, and Strymon.

50 Its ruins are now called Pinaka. It was a colony of the Corinthians, but refounded by Cassander, King Philip having previously destroyed the city.

51 South-east of Thessalonica, and north of Chalcidice. It was given by King Philip to the Olynthians.

52 Near Mount Athos.

53 Now Molivo, at the head of the Toronaic Gulf, part of which thence took its name.

54 The name of a promontory at the extremity of the peninsula of Si- thonia, in Chalcidice. It seems to correspond with the modern Cape Kartali.

55 In the district of Chalcidice, on the S.W. of the peninsula of Sithonia.

56 On the east of the peninsula of Sithonia. It gave its name to the Sinus Singiticus or Singitic Gulf.

57 Now Monte Santo, at the end of the long peninsula running out from Chalcidice.

58 This is a mistake. It is only forty miles in length. From Lieut. Smith (Journal of Royal Geogr. Soc. vol. vii. p. 65) we learn that its average breadth is about four miles; consequently Pliny's statement as to its circumference must be greatly exaggerated. Juvenal, Sat. x. l. 174, mentions the story of the canal as a specimen of Greek falsehood; but distinct traces have survived, to be seen by modern travellers, all the way from the Gulf of Monte Santo to the Bay of Erso in the Gulf of Contessa, except about 200 yards in the middle, which has been probably filled up.

59 Or Acrothöum. Pliny, with Strabo and Mela, errs in thinking that it stood on the mountain. It stood on the peninsula only, probably on the site of the modern Lavra.

60 Or the 'Heaven City,' from its elevated position. It was founded by Alexarchus, brother of Cassander, king of Macedon.

61 Probably on the west side of the peninsula, south of Thyssus.

62 Or "long-lived."

63 Now Erisso; on the east side of the Isthmus, about a mile and a half from the canal of Xerxes. There are ruins here of a large mole.

64 A little to the north of the Isthmus now called Stavro. It was the birth-place of Aristotle the philosopher, commonly called the Stagirite, and was, in consequence, restored by Philip, by whom it had been destroyed; or, as Pliny says in B. vii. c. 30, by Alexander the Great.

65 The name of the central one of the three peninsulas projecting from Chalcidice. The poets use the word Sithonius frequently as signifying 'Thracian.'

66 Possibly not the same as the Heraclea Sintica previously mentioned.

67 Now called Pollina, south of Lake Bolbe, on the road from Thessalonica to Amphipolis.

68 Sacred to Poseidon or Neptune. Now Capo Stavros in Thessaly, the west front of the Gulf of Pagasa, if indeed this is the place here meant.

69 On the left or eastern bank of the river Strymon, which flowed round it, whence its name Amphi-polis, "round the city." Its site is now occupied by a village called Neokhorio, in Turkish Jeni-Keni or "New- town." A few remains are still to be seen. The bay at the mouth of the Strymon, now Struma or Kara-Sou, is called the Gulf of Orphano.

70 A Thracian people, extending from the river Strymon on the east to Crestonica on the west.

71 In Mount Scomius namely, one of the Hæmus or Balkan range.

72 Under Alexander the Great. On his death his empire was torn in pieces by the contentions of his generals.

73 In allusion to the legendary accounts of the Indian expeditions of Bacchus and Hercules.

74 On the conquest of Perseus. Plutarch says that these seventy cities were pillaged in one and the same hour. They were thus punished for their support of Perseus.

75 Alexander the Great and Paulus Æmilius.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), CALETI
    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), FRISIABO´NES
    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), GA´LLIA TRANSALPINA
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    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), OLYNTHUS
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    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), PYDNA
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