Listed 4 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "AENIANIA Ancient area FTHIOTIDA" .
A place in Thessaly, which, according to the description of Livy (xxxii. 13), would seem to have been situated at no great distance from the sources of the Spercheius. Ptolemy (iii. 13. § 17) mentions a place Spercheia between Echinus and Thebes in Phthiotis; and Pliny (iv. 7. s. 13) places Sperchios in Doris. It is probable that these three names indicate the same place, but that its real position was unknown.
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
SPERCHIES (Ancient city) FTHIOTIDA
Sperchieiai was apparently included in Dolopia rather than Ainis as
it was under Macedonian, not Aitohan, control in 198 B.C. The Aitolians crossed
Oeta, and, entering the Spercheios valley near Hypata, ravaged Sperchieiai and
Makrakome on their way N to Thessaly proper (Livy 32.13.10; see Dhranista, Metropolis).
It is presumed that the city was in the Spercheios valley, near and to the NW
of Hypata, on the way to the Yiannitsou pass, which is the presumed route of the
Aitolians over the mountains to Thessaly. In this area are three possible sites
so far discovered. South of the river, there is a site at Kastrorachi on an isolated
hill (314 m) on the river's edge, opposite to modern Vitoli. Its N side is washed
by the Spercheios, the W by an influent, the Papagourna. The circuit wall which
follows the form of the hill is in the shape of a long oval N-S with an abrupt
square extension jutting out of the E side. The wall is intermittently preserved
to a height of ca. 2 km. The masonry is of rectangular and nearly square rough-faced
blocks of varying heights, but laid in fairly regular courses.
At Helleniko is another fortress. This is 1 1/2 hours S of the last
site, on the N slope of Oeta, above the villages of Phteri and Kato Phteri and
Palaiovracha, and between them and Ano Phteri, on a height of ca. 600 m. Here
a wall circuit, perhaps 3d-2d c., of triangular shape surrounds two peaks.
Above Varibobi (now Makrakomi) on the left (N) bank of the Spercheios
is the third site. This commands the entrance to the Yiannitsou pass. Its walls
surround the peak of the hill N of the modern town. The hill is called Kastri,
and on the summit (285 m) is a Chapel of Haghios Elias. The walls are in the shape
of a long, irregular oval running N-S, the perimeter about 1550 m. The identity
of none of these sites is certain but probably Sperchieiai was at Kastrorachi
or at Varibobi.
T. S. Mackay, 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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