Phthiotic Thebes
Phthiotic Thebes ( or Φθιώτιδες Θήβες or Φθιώτιδος Θήβες; ) or Thessalian Thebes (Θῆβαι Θεσσαλικαἰ, Thebai Thessalikai) was a city and polis in ancient Thessaly, Greece; its site north of the modern village of Mikrothivai. History The city was located in the northeastern corner of the district of Phthiotis at the northern end of the ancient Krokian Plain, to the north of the Pagasetic Gulf, at the distance of 300 stadia from Larissa. Evidence of human habitation on the site dates back to the Stone Age, but the city is not mentioned by name until the 4th century BCE. Strabo placed it at 20 stadia distant from Pyrasus and near Phylace. Its territory was bounded on the north by Pherae, on the northeast by Amphanae, on the east by Pyrasus, on the south by Halos, southwest with Peuma, and west with Eretria and Pharsalus. There was a sanctuary of Athena in the border territory with Halos, a city with which Thebes shared it. An inscription of the late fourth century BCE attests to the presence of a cult of Athena Polias. Furthermore, Athena Ileia, Demeter Panachaea, Protesilaus, Nike, and Leucothea were worshipped. In the late 4th century BCE, the city was joined (synoecism) with the neighbouring cities of Phylace and Pyrasos. The new conurbation retained the name of Phthiotic or Thessalian Thebes, and became the main city of the Phthiotic Achaean League until it joined the Aetolian League in the late 3rd century BCE. Professor John Grainger of the University of Birmingham concluded, from evidence relating to the election of men from Thebes to office in the Aetolian League, that the city became a member of the League in the 220s BCE. It is not mentioned in the Iliad, but it was at a later time the most important maritime city in Thessaly, till the foundation of Demetrias, by Demetrius Poliorcetes, about 294 BCE. In the war between Demetrius Poliorcetes and Cassander, in 302 BCE, Thebes was one of the strongholds of Cassander. It is mentioned in 282 BCE, as the only Thessalian city, except Pelinnaeum, that did not take part in the Lamian War. It became at a later time the chief possession of the Aetolians in northern Greece; but it was wrested from them, after an obstinate siege, by Philip V of Macedon in 217 BCE, who changed its name into Philippopolis. Its inhabitants were enslaved, and the city became a Macedonian colony. Polybius tells how Philip laid siege to the city, first building three camps and then joining them up with lines of circumvallation. Though initially the city offered determined resistance the citizens surrendered when a section of the wall that Philip had mined collapsed. It was attacked by the consul Titus Quinctius Flamininus, previous to the Battle of Cynoscephalae, 197 BCE, but without success. Following Philip's defeat by the Roman Republic in the Second Macedonian War, in 189 BCE Phthiotic Thebes again became capital of the restored Phthiotic Achaean League. The name of Philippopolis was gradually