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Topography of Thermopylae
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Unless otherwise indicated,
pictures on this page © Marco Prins and Jona Lendering. Photos can
be downloaded and used for non-commercial purposes, but you have to acknowledge
Livius. |
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In the seventh book of his Histories,
Herodotus offers a description of the topography of the battlefield of
Thermopylae.
The interpretation poses no problems, but there is one oddity. The road
is essentially from the west to the east, but Herodotus presents it as
if it is from the north to the south. |
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This is not as strange as
it seems, however, because any traveler visiting Thermopylae was moving
from Thessaly and Malis in the north to Doris and Locris in the south (or
the other way round).
[199] From the river
Melas, it is a distance of about a kilometer to the city of Trachis. The
parts on which Trachis is situated are the widest portion of the entire
region, as regards the space from the mountains to the sea; for the plain
has an extent of 2200 hectare.[1] In the mountain-range
which encloses the land of Trachis there is a cleft to the south
of Trachis itself; and through this cleft the river Asopos flows, and runs
along by the foot of the mountain.[2]
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[200] There is also
another river called Phoinix, to the south of the Asopos, of no
great size, which flows from these mountains and empties itself into the
Asopos. Behind the river Phoinix is the narrowest place, for here has been
constructed a road with a single wheel-track only. Then from the river
Phoinix it is a distance of three kilometer to Thermopylae; and between
the river Phoinix and Thermopylae is a village called Anthela. The river
Asopos flows along Anthela before it runs out into the sea. |
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Behind this village is a wide space [near a sulfurous spring]
in which is set up a temple dedicated to [the goddess] Demeter of the Amphictyons,
and there are seats for the Amphictyonic councilors and there is a temple
dedicated to Amphictyon himself. |
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In his narrative about the
battle, Herodotus tells more about the topography of Thermopylae (pictures
of the battlefield itself and the mountain path that was used to attack
the Greeks in the rear can be found here).
On this photo, you can see the battlefield from the east. In Antiquity,
the sea reached as far inland as the road on the right-hand side. In the
background is the Trachinian plain. Behind the position of the photographer
(who climbed into an electric pylon) is a rock called "Black Buttocks",
which is mentioned in the description of the mountain path. |
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[216] This path lies
as follows: it begins from the river Asopos, which flows through the cleft,
and the name of this mountain and of the path is the same, namely Anopaia;
and this Anopaia stretches over the ridge of the mountain and ends by the
town of Alpenos, which is the first town of the Locrians towards Malis,
and by the stone called Black Buttocks and the seats of the Kercopes,
where is the very narrowest part. |
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The Kercopes may not be
familiar to everyone. Two kobolds were living in the mountains, did evil
to humans and knew that they had no one to fear, except for an enemy with
dark hinder parts. One day, they were captured by Leonidas' ancestor Heracles,
who hung them upside from a yoke he carried on his shoulders. From this
uncomfortable position, shown here on a metope from Selinus (Sicily)
that is now in the the Museo Archeologico Regionale "Antonio Salinas" in
Palermo, the Kercopes found out that Heracles was the enemy against whom
mother had warned them. |
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Notes
[1]
This plain became the site of the Persian camp.
[2]
The picture shows the cleft and a road that is still shown on many
maps, but was destroyed by explosives. The modern road is more to the east.
[3]
Phoinix means 'the purple one' and indeed, the water has a reddish
color, as you can see on the photo.
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Jona Lendering
© 2005
Latest revision: 31 March
2006
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