Listed 4 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "DILESSI Small town VIOTIA" .
DELION (Ancient city) VIOTIA
Delium (Delion: Eth. Delieus), a small place with a celebrated temple
of Apollo, situated upon the sea-coast in the territory of Tanagra in Boeotia,
and at the distance of about a mile from the territory of Oropus. This temple,
which took its name from the island of Delos, is described by Livy (xxxv. 51)
as overhanging the sea, and distant five miles from Tanagra, at the spot where
the passage to the nearest parts of Euboea is less than four miles. Strabo (ix.
p. 403) speaks of Delium as a temple of Apollo and a small town (polichnion) of
the Tanagraei, distant 40 stadia from Aulis. It was here that the Athenians suffered
a signal defeat from the Boeotians in the eighth year of the Peloponnesian War,
B.C. 424. Hippocrates, the Athenian commander, had seized the temple at Delium,
which he converted into a fortress by some temporary works, and after leaving
there a garrison, was on his march homewards, and had already reached the territory
of Oropus at the distance of 10 stadia from Delium, when he met the Boeotian army
advancing to cut off his retreat. In the battle which ensued the Athenians were
defeated with great loss; and on the seventeenth day after the battle the Boeotians
retook the temple. (Thuc. iv. 90.) Socrates fought at this battle among the hoplites,
and, according to one account, saved the life of Xenophon (Strab. ix. p. 403;
Diog. Laert. ii. 22), while, according to another, his own retreat was protected
by Alcibiades, who was serving in the cavalry (Plut. Alc. 7). A detachment of
the Roman army was likewise defeated at Delium by the troops of Antiochus, B.C.
192. (Liv. xxxv. 51.) (Comp. Strab. viii. p. 368; Paus. ix. 20. § 1; Ptol. iii.
15. § 20; Liv. xxxi. 45.)
The modern village of Dhilissi, which has taken its name from Delium,
is at some little distance from the sea. It is clear, however, from the testimony
of Livy already referred to, that the temple of Apollo was upon the coast; and
hence the modern village of Dhilissi may, as Leake suggests, be the site of the
polichnion, a small town of Delium. A few Hellenic fragments have been found at
the village. (Leake, Northern Greece, vol. ii. p. 449, seq.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
A town on the coast of Boeotia, in the territory of Tanagra, near the Attic frontier, named after a temple of Apollo similar to that at Delos. Here the Athenians were defeated by the Boeotians, B.C. 424.
Greek city of Boeotia
north of Athens, along the
coast facing the island of Euboea,
not far from the border between Boeotia
and Attica.
Delium was the location of a sanctuary to Apollo in Boeotia.
During the Peloponnesian war, it played a key role in a failed attempt by Athens,
led by two generals, Hippocrates, son of Ariphron, and Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes,
to restore democracy in Boeotia
and weaken Thebes.
During the winter 424-423, the Athenians, going along with a plan
devised with the complicity of Boeotian democrats, entered Delium and other cities
of Boeotia that were supposed
to side with them. But poor synchronization and denunciation of the conspiracy
ruined the attempt. The Boeotian troops led by the Thebans defeated the Athenians
near Delium and set the siege of the city, that was still occupied by the Athenians.
The city fell seventeen days later and more than one thousand Athenian hoplites
were killed in the operation, including Hippocrates, one of the two generals who
had devised it.
According to Plato, Socrates took part in the battle of Delium.
Bernard Suzanne (page last updated 1998), ed.
This extract is cited July 2003 from the Plato and his dialogues URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
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