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Listed 13 sub titles with search on: History for destination: "METHANA Small town GREECE".


History (13)

Alliances

Achaean League

TRIZIN (Ancient city) GREECE
The league, however, did not acquire any great strength until B.C. 251, when Aratus united Sicyon, his native place, with it, and some years later also gained Corinth for it. Megara, Troezen, and Epidaurus soon followed their example. Afterwards Aratus prevailed upon all the more important towns of Peloponnesus to join the confederacy, and Megalopolis, Argos, Hermione, Phlius, and others were added to it. In a short time the league thus reached its highest power, for it embraced Athens, Aegina, Salamis, and the whole of Peloponnesus, with the exception of Sparta, Tegea, Orchomenus, Mantinea, and Elis.

Antiquity

POROS (Island) GREECE
  Poros was known in ancient times as Kalavria. Sferia, where the city of Poros is situated today, was uninhabited. Neolithic findings have been located on the Methana peninsula and in Poros near the Poseidon sanctuary.
  Kalavria was the sacred site, where Poseidon and Apatouria Athena were worshipped and where the amphictiony (confederation of states) of Kalavria was developed. In the particular amphictyony (alliance) participated the seven most important city-states of the area: Athens, Aegina, Epidaurus, Hermione, Prasies, Nauplion, Orchomenos and enjoyed its acme from the last prehistoric years until the 5th century B.C.
  However, the Poseidon Temple continued to be a site of cult and inviolable asylum for fugitives. The most famous of them, the orator Demosthenes, was opposed to the Macedonian imperialism and tried to turn his compatriots against Alexander the Great. When Athens was dominated by the Macedonians, he was accused of misappropriation and not being able to pay the fine, he escaped to Aegina and from there he continued his opposition. He was then sentenced to death, and took refuge to the sanctuary of Poseidon in Poros, but his opponents discovered him and he committed suicide poisoning himself.
This text (extract) is cited December 2003 from the Galata & Poros Rented Apts & Rooms Association tourist pamphlet.

Kalauria

  Island in the Saronic Gulf to the NE of Troizen. It was known as Kalauria (Strab. 8.6.14) and Kalaureia (Apoll. Rhod. III 1243) in antiquity. Chanddler (Voy. As. Mm. Grece I 228) identified Poros as Kalauria. The ancient city was located at the highest part of Poros. At first it was independent, with a high magistrate called tamias but later came under the dominion of Troizen. The area was inhabited from the Early Helladic period. The city preserves sections of the Hellenistic walls, a contemporary stoa and an unidentified heroon that lie at the agora. The harbor of the city was named Pogon. A street led from it to the Temple of Poseidon through a propylon. The cult on the area dates to the beginning of the 8th c. B.C. The temple, enclosed in a peribolos, is a Doric peripteros (6 x 12 columns) and dates to ca. 520 B.C. Between the temple and the propylon there were three stoas dating in the 4th c. B.C. and a fourth dating ca. 420 B.C. Another long stoa and a rectangular building lie SW of the hieron. The latter has been associated with the convention of the maritime amphictyony of Kalauria (Strab. 8.6.14). The tomb of Demosthenes, who poisoned himself at the sanctuary in 332 B.C., was still preserved in the time of Pausanias (2.33.3).

D. Schilardi, 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 12 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.


Calaurea

   The modern Poro; a small island in the Saronic Gulf off the coast of Argolis and opposite Troezen, possessing a celebrated Temple of Poseidon, which was regarded as an inviolable asylum. Hither Demosthenes fled to escape Antipater, and here he took poison, B.C. 322. His tomb was one of the sights of the island.

This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks


Sphaeria, Sphairia

Now Poros; an island off the coast of Troezen, in Argolis, and between it and the island of Calauria.

Calauria League

  Troezen is sacred to Poseidon, after whom it was once called Poseidonia. It is situated fifteen stadia above the sea, and it too is an important city. Off its harbor, Pogon by name, lies Calauria, an isle with a circuit of about one hundred and thirty stadia. Here was an asylum sacred to Poseidon; and they say that this god made an exchange with Leto, giving her Delos for Calauria, and also with Apollo, giving him Pytho for Taenarum. And Ephorus goes on to tell the oracle: "For thee it is the same thing to possess Delos or Calauria, most holy Pytho or windy Taenarum." And there was also a kind of Amphictyonic League connected with this temple, a league of seven cities which shared in the sacrifice; they were Hermion, Epidaurus, Aegina, Athens, Prasieis, Nauplieis, and Orchomenus Minyeius; however, the Argives paid dues for the Nauplians, and the Lacedaemonians for the Prasians. The worship of this god was so prevalent among the Greeks that even the Macedonians, whose power already extended as far as the temple, in a way preserved its inviolability, and were afraid to drag away the suppliants who fled for refuge to Calauria; indeed Archias, with soldiers, did not venture to do violence even to Demosthenes, although he had been ordered by Antipater to bring him alive, both him and all the other orators he could find that were under similar charges, but tried to persuade him; he could not persuade him, however, and Demosthenes forestalled him by suiciding with poison. Now Troezen and Pittheus, the sons of Pelops, came originally from Pisatis; and the former left behind him the city which was named after him, and the latter succeeded him and reigned as king. But Anthes, who previously had possession of the place, set sail and founded Halicarnassus; but concerning this I shall speak in my description of Caria and Troy.

This extract is from: The Geography of Strabo (ed. H. L. Jones, 1924), Cambridge. Harvard University Press. Cited Oct 2003 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains comments & interesting hyperlinks.


Catastrophes of the place

By the Athenians

TRIZIN (Ancient city) GREECE
Putting out from Epidaurus, they (the Athenians) laid waste the territory of Troezen, Halieis, and Hermione, all towns on the coast of Peloponnese, and thence sailing to Prasiai, a maritime town in Laconia, ravaged part of its territory, and took and sacked the place itself; after which they returned home, but found the Peloponnesians gone and no longer in Attica.

By the Argives (419 BC)

...In this year (419 BC) the Argives, charging the Lacedaemonians (1) with not paying the sacrifices to Apollo Pythaeus,(2) declared war on them; and it was at this very time that Alcibiades, the Athenian general, entered Argolis with an army. Adding these troops to their forces, the Argives advanced against Troezen, a city which was an ally of the Lacedaemonians, and after plundering its territory and burning its farm-buildings they returned home. The Lacedaemonians, being incensed at the lawless acts committed against the Troezenians, resolved to go to war against the Argives... (Diod. 12.78.1)
Commentary:
1. The Epidaurians, not the Lacedaemonians (see Thuc. 5.53); but Diodorus frequently uses the term "Lacedaemonian" in a wide sense to refer to any ally of Sparta.
2. The temple is likely the one in Asine, which was the only building spared by the Argives when they razed that city (cp. Paus. 2.36.5; Thuc. 5.53.1).

By Epameinondas

...Epameinondas, who had with him the bravest of the Thebans, with great effort forced back the Lacedaemonians, and cutting through their defence and bringing his army through, passed into the Peloponnese, thereby accomplishing a feat no whit inferior to his former mighty deeds. Having proceeded straightway to Troezen and Epidaurus, he ravaged the countryside but could not seize the cities, for they had garrisons of considerable strength... (Diod. 15.68.5-69.1)

Participation in the fights of the Greeks

Naval Battle of Salamis

The following took part in the war: from the Peloponnese... the Troezenians furnished five ships...

(Hdt. 8.43.1)
It was the plan of the Peloponnesians to retire within the peninsula, and to build a wall across the isthmus,and the fleet had withdrawn to Salamis only at the entreaty of the Athenians to allow them time to remove their women and children from Attica. An answer of the oracle of Delphi had advised the Athenians to defend themselves with wooden walls, and Themistocles, who may have suggested the answer of the oracle, also gave it an interpretation, saying that they must take refuge in their fleet. Accordingly he recommended that Athens should be left to the care of its tutelary deity, and that the women, children, and infirm persons should be removed to Salamis, Aegina, and Troezen, which was done. The people of Troezen received most hospitably the fugitives, and provided for their maintenance at the public expense. The united fleet of the Greeks was now assembled at Salamis, consisting both of ships from Artemisium and the navy which was stationed at Troezen; in all three hundred and seventy-eight ships, besides penteconters (Herod. viii. 48).
A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology (ed. William Smith)

Battle of Plataea

. . . By these one thousand Troezenians were posted, and after them two hundred men of Lepreum

Naval Battle of Artemisium

The Troezenians furnished five ships

Battle of Mycale

Those who fought best after the Athenians were the men of Corinth and Troezen and Sicyon.

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