Listed 7 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "KRANONAS Municipality LARISSA" .
KRANNON (Ancient city) THESSALIA
Kranon, Krannon; the name is written indifferently with the single
and double n in inscriptions and coins, as well as in ancient authors: Eth. Kranonios).
A town of Pelasgiotis, in Thessaly, situated S.W. of Larissa, and at the distance
of 100 stadia from Gyrton, according to Strabo (vii. p. 330, frag. 14). Its most
ancient name is said to have been Ephyra; and Homer, in his account of the wars
of the Ephyri and Phlegyae, is supposed by the ancient commentators to have meant
the people afterwards called Crannonians and Gyrtonians respectively. (Il. xiii.
301; Strab. l. c. ix. p. 442; Steph. B. s. v. Krannon). Pindar likewise speaks
of the Crannonii under the name of Ephyraei (Pyth. x. 85). Crannon was the residence
of the wealthy and powerful family of the Scopadae, whose numerous flocks and
herds grazed in the fertile plain surrounding the city. (Theocr. xvi. 36.) Diactorides,
one of the Scopadae of Crannon, was a suitor for the hand of the daughter of Cleisthenes
of Sicyon. (Herod. vi. 127.) Simonides resided some time at Crannon, under the
patronage of the Scopadae; and there was a celebrated story current in antiquity
respecting the mode in which the Dioscuri preserved the poet's life when the Scopadae
were crushed by the falling in of the roof of a building. (Cic. de Orat. ii. 86)
In the first year of the Peloponnesian War (B.C. 431) the Crannonians,
together with some of the other Thessalians, sent troops to the assistance of
the Athenians. (Thuc. ii. 22.) In B.C. 394 they are mentioned as allies of the
Boeotians, who molested Agesilaus in his march through Thessaly on his return
from Asia. (Xen. Hell. iv. 3. 3) In B.C. 191 Crannon was taken by Antiochus. (Liv.
xxxvi. 10.) It is mentioned again in the war with Perseus. (Liv. xlii. 65.) Catullus
(lxiv. 35) speaks of it as a declining place in his time: - Deseritur Scyros:
linquunt Phthiotica Tempe, Cranonisque domos, ac moenia Larissaea.
Its name occurs in Pliny (iv. 8. § 15). Its site has: been fixed by
Leake at some ruins called Palea Larissa, situated half an hour from Hadjilar,
which is distant 2 hours and 27 minutes from Larissa. At Palea Larissa Leake found
an ancient inscription containing the name of Crannon. The name of the ruins shows
that they were once more considerable than they are at present; but even now some
foundations of the walls of the town, or more probably of the citadel, may be
traced along the edge of a quadrangular height called Paleokastro, which is nearly
a mile in circumference, and towards the upper part of which are some vestiges
of a transverse wall, forming a double inclosure. This height, and all the fields
around, are covered with pottery; and on the side of the height, or on the rise
of the hills behind it, are eight or nine small tumuli.
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
(Kranon) or Crannon (Krannon). A city of Thessaly on the river
Onchestus, southeast of Pharsalus. Near it was a fountain, the water of which
was fabled to warm wine when mixed with it, so that the heat remained for two
or three days.
Ephure. Probably an Aeolic form of Ephora (ephorao, ephoroi), and equivalent to
Epope, 'a watchtower.' This descriptive name was naturally applicable to many
places; and we find no less than eleven of the name enumerated (Pape, Dict.s.v.).
But of these there are but three, or at most four, that come into the Homeric
poems.
(1) The city afterwards called Corinth, Il.2. 570; 6. 152, which of course is
not intended in the present passage:
(2) A town in Thessaly, known in later times as Crannon, cp. Il.13. 301, with
the interpretation of Strabo (9. 442). But for the Ephyra in the Odyssey the question
lies only between
(3) a town in Thesprotia, called later Kichuros ( Il.2. 659), and
(4) an old Pelasgic town in Elis on the river Selleis (Strabo 7. 328; 8. 338).
Nitzsch declares in favour of (3), because in this passage Athena,
in the character of Mentes king of the Taphians, represents Odysseus as having
touched at Taphos on his return (anionta) from Ephyra to Ithaca; and in a direct
line Taphos lies between Thesprotia and Ithaca; but a ship sailing round the Leucadian
promontory to Ithaca would avoid Taphos altogether, and Leucas had not yet been
made into an island by the channel dug across the neck, for Homer calls it akte
epeiroio Od.24. 378.But if, following the Schol. on Ap. Rhod.1. 747, we place
the Taphian isles among the Echinades and so much further S. , we shall get an
equally good argument in favour of the Eleian Ephyra, as Taphos would then lie
between Ephyra and Ithaca. Another argument in favour of the Eleian town is the
mention ( Il.11. 741) of Agamede, daughter of Augeias king of Elis, as a sorceress,
he tosa pharmaka eide hosa trephei eureia chthon, which suits well with the description
here of the androphonon pharmakon and thumophthora pharmaka in Od.2. 329.In the
latter passage, Ephyra is named along with Pylos and Sparta, as if all three places
were in the Peloponnese.
Again, in Il.3. 627, Meges son of Phyleus is said to have been the
leader of the contingent from Dulichium and the Echinades, hai naiousi peren halos
Elidos anta, and in Il.15. 530, Phyleus is described as having bought a corslet,
ex Ephures potamou apo Selleentos. The statement of the Scholiast that Ilus son
of Mermerus was great grandson of Jason and Medea, and was king of Thesprotia,
is given on the authority of Apollodorus. Eustath. also mentions a story which
makes Medea to have lived for a while in Elis; either story doubtless being invented
or acknowledged by those who maintained the claims of the Thesprotian or Eleian
Ephyra respectively. See Buchholz, Hom. Real. 1. 1. p. 90.
City of Thessalia.
Crannon was one of the leading cities of Thessalia
in the Vth and IVth centuries B. C. It is mentioned by Thucydides in his Histories,
II, 22, 3 among the Thessalian cities that sent troops to help Athens
against Sparta in 431, at
the beginning of the Peloponnesian war.
Crannon was said to owe its name to the mythological hero Cranon,
a son of Pelasgus, the eponym of the Pelasgians. The name of the city was formerly
Ephyra, but it was changed to Crannon by its citizens after their king, Cranon,
had been killed by Oenomaus in Pisa,
during his failed attempt to win the hand of his daughter Hippodamia.
Bernard Suzanne (page last updated 1999), ed.
This text is cited July 2003 from the Plato and his dialogues URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
Total results on 21/3/2001: 19 for Crannon, 9 for Krannon.
The ancient city lay on a plateau in the hills of the central part of the region. Successor to pre-Thessalian Ephyra, it was important only in the 6th and 5th c. B.C., after which time it was absorbed by Larissa to the E. As one of the eight principal Thessalian cities, it was already issuing coins in 480 B.C. Literary references mention cults of Helios, and Sarapis and Isis, while the state archives were said to be kept in the Temples of Athena and Asklepios. Present-day remains are limited to the foundations of the upper city wall on a height called Paleokastro, and a number of grave mounds and built tombs.
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.
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