Listed 4 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for destination: "MYKALISSOS Ancient city EVIA".
A town belonging to the earliest Boiotian League, flourishing from the 6th c. until its destruction and the massacre of its inhabitants by the Athenians in 413 B.C. Strabo classed it as a village belonging to Tanagra. There are a few remains of undated walls at Rhitsona, which is generally accepted as the site of Mykalessos. Excavations have concentrated on graves, largely of the 6th c., but also 5th c. and Hellenistic, which produced material of considerable importance for the history of Greek ceramics. Pausanias mentions a Sanctuary of Mykalessian Demeter on the shore of the Euripos, which was probably near the modern village of Megalovouno above Aulis. The ancient wall which appears on both sides of the road through the Anaghoritis pass marks the Chalkis-Thebes boundary. Frazer suggested a nearby location for the Hermaion mentioned in Thucydides' account of the Athenian attack, while locating Livy's Hermaion on the Euripos at a ferry terminus.
M. H. Mc Allister, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
(Mukalessos). An ancient city in Boeotia, on the road from Aulis to Thebes. In B.C. 413 it was sacked by some Thracian mercenaries in the pay of Athens. Here was a famous temple of Demeter, who was in consequence called Mycalessia.
Mukalessos: Eth. Mukalessios. An ancient town of Boeotia, mentioned by Homer. (Il. ii. 498, Hymn. Apoll. 224.) It was said to have been so called, because the cow, which was guiding Cadmus and his comrades to Thebes, lowed (emukesato) in this place. (Paus. ix. 19. § 4.) In B.C. 413, some Thracians, whom the Athenians were sending home to their own country, were landed on the Euripus, and surprised Mycalessus. They not only sacked the town, but put all the inhabitants to the sword, not sparing even the women and children. Thucydides says that this was one of the greatest calamities that had ever befallen any city. (Thuc. vii. 29; Paus. i. 23. § 3.) Strabo (ix. p. 404) calls Mycalessus a village in the territory of Tanagra, and places it upon the road from Thebes to Chalcis. In the time of Pausanias it had ceased to exist; and this writer saw the ruins of Harma and Mycalessus on his road to Chalcis. (Paus. ix. 19. § 4.) Pausanias mentions a temple of Demeter Mycalessia, standing in the territory of the city upon the sea-coast, and situated to the right of the Euripus, by which he evidently meant south of the strait. The only other indication of the position of Mycalessus is the statement of Thucydides (l. c.), that it was 16 stadia distant from the Hermaeum, which was on the sea-shore near the Euripus. It is evident from these accounts, that Mycalessus stood near the Euripus; and Leake places it, with great probability, upon the height immediately above the southern bay of Egripo, where the ruined walls of an ancient city still remain. (Northern Greece, vol. ii. pp. 249, seq., 264.) It is true, as Leake remarks, that this position does not agree with the statement of Strabo, that Mycalessus was on the road from Thebes to Chalcis, since the above-mentioned ruins are nearly two miles to the right of that road; but Strabo writes loosely of places which he had never seen. Mycalessus is also mentioned in Strab. ix. pp. 405, 410; Paus. iv. 7. s. 12.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited June 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
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