Alalkomenai (Boiotien)
Alalkomenai ( Greek Ἀλαλκομεναί ) was an ancient place in the Greek countryside of Boiotia . It was to the north at the foot of the Helikon near the now dried up Lake Kopais . It is believed to be in the present-day Solinari, west of Mount Tilphossion . About 9 km east of the place was Haliartos and about 5.5 km southeast of Okalea . Today's Alalkomenes is about 3 km north of Solinari.
In the local myth, the namesake of the city is said to have been either Alalkomeneus , the mythical tutor of the goddess Athena , or Alalkomenia , the daughter of Ogygos . At the course of a stream called Triton (Greek Τρίτων ) was a sanctuary of the Athene Alalkomeneis , already attested by Homer , which was considered the birthplace of Athena by the residents of Alalkomenais. Since she is said to have been born on the Triton, she was also nicknamed Tritogeneia. This temple, which was outside of Alalkomenai, was considered one of the oldest shrines in Greece. For this reason, Strabo also suspected that the city was not listed in the ship catalog of the Iliad , since the inhabitants, as consecrated, were freed from fighting. The Temple of Athena is believed to be below the village of Solinari. Here one found polygonal foundation walls of an enclosure wall and pillars of a temple.
Diodorus reports that the inhabitants of Thebes fled to Alalkomenai and the Tilphossion after their city was conquered by the Epigones . After Sulla in 87/86 BC. BC robbed the ivory cult image from the temple, the sanctuary was considered abandoned by Athena and was left to decay. At the time of Pausanias in the 2nd century it was overgrown with ivy, which was already pushing the stones apart. Pausanias mentions an oak forest near the place Alalkomenai, in which very old trees stood.
literature
- Gustav Hirschfeld : Alalkomenai 1 . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume I, 1, Stuttgart 1893, Col. 1275 f.
- William Smith: Alalcomenae . In: William Smith : Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London 1854.
- Mogens Herman Hansen, Thomas Heine Nielsen: An Inventory of Archaic and Classical Poleis , Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-814099-1 , p. 438
Individual evidence
- ↑ Homer Iliad 4: 8, 8.
- ↑ Hesiod , Eoien , 343.12
- ↑ Libraries of Apollodorus , 1:20
- ↑ Strabo: Geographica , 9,2,36 (p. 413)
- ↑ Diodor: Bibliothéke historiké , 19,53,7
- ↑ Pausanias 9:33 , 5-7.
- ^ Pausanias: Travels in Greece , 9.3.4
Coordinates: 38 ° 23 ′ 5 ″ N , 22 ° 59 ′ 35 ″ E