Ocalea or Okalea (Ancient Greek: Ὠκαλέα, translit.Ōkalea, rarely Ὠκαλέαι), later Ocaleia or Okaleia (Ὠκάλεια), was a town in ancient Boeotia, Greece. It lay in the middle of a long narrow plain, situated upon a small stream of the same name, bounded on the east by the heights of Haliartus, on the west by the mountain Tilphossium, on the south by a range of low hills, and on the north by the Lake Copais.
Ancient Greece was a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Roughly three centuries after the Late Bronze Age collapse of Mycenaean Greece, Greek urban poleis began to form in the 8th century BC, ushering in the Archaic period and colonization of the Mediterranean Basin. This was followed by the period of Classical Greece, an era that began with the Greco-Persian Wars, lasting from the 5th to 4th centuries BC. Due to the conquests by Alexander the Great of Macedon, Hellenistic civilization flourished from Central Asia to the western end of the Mediterranean Sea. The Hellenistic period came to an end with the conquests and annexations of the eastern Mediterranean world by the Roman Republic, which established the Roman province of Macedonia in Roman Greece, and later the province of Achaea during the Roman Empire.
The Ocalea or Okalea was a river of ancient Boeotia, flowing midway between Haliartus and Alalcomenae, with the town of Ocalea upon its banks. William Martin Leake who visited the area in the 19th century, describes it as rising in the eastern part of Mount Leibethrium, and issuing through a precipitous gorge lying between the eastern end of Mount Tilphossium and a rocky peak.
Lake Copais, also spelled Kopais or Kopaida, was a lake in the centre of Boeotia, Greece, west of Thebes. It was drained in the late 19th century. The area where it was located, though now a plain, is still known as Kopaida. A one-time island in the lake was modified in ancient times into a megalithic citadel, now called Gla, though its ancient name is not known. It may be the city of Arne mentioned by Homer.
Ocalea lay roughly halfway between Alalcomenae and Haliartus, about 30 stadia (5.5 km) from each.[1] Ancient sources often mention it alongside Mantinea and Medeon, which suggests that they were close by.[2] The short distance between Mantinea and Ocalea seems to be the reason why the mythical figure Aglaïa, daughter of Mantineus, was sometimes also known as Ocalea. This town was dependent upon Haliartus.
Alalcomenae or Alalkomenai, or Alalcomenium or Alalkomenion (Ἀλαλκομένιον), was a town in ancient Boeotia, situated at the foot of Mount Tilphossium, a little to the east of Coroneia, and near Lake Copais. It was celebrated for the worship of Athena, who was said to have been born there, and who is hence called Alalcomeneis (Ἀλαλκομενηΐς) in Homer's Iliad. The temple of the goddess stood, at a little distance from the town, on the Triton River, a small stream flowing into Lake Copais. The town was by a hill which Strabo calls Mount Tilphossium. Strabo also records that the tomb of the seer Teiresias, and the temple of Tilphossian Apollo, were located just outside Alalcomenae.
Haliartus or Haliartos (Ancient Greek: Ἁλίαρτος, also known as Ariartus or Ariartos or Hariartus or Hariartos, was a town of ancient Boeotia, and one of the cities of the Boeotian League. It was situated on the southern side of Lake Copais in a pass between the mountain and the lake. It is mentioned in the Catalogue of Ships in the Iliad by Homer, who gives it the epithet ποιήεις in consequence of its well-watered meadows.
The stadion, formerly also anglicized as stade, was an ancient Greek unit of length, based on the length of a typical sports stadium of the time. According to Herodotus, one stadion was equal to 600 Greek feet (podes). However, the length of the foot varied in different parts of the Greek world, and the length of the stadion has been the subject of argument and hypothesis for hundreds of years. Various hypothetical equivalent lengths have been proposed, and some have been named. Among them are:
Most sources that discuss the origin of the town's name explain it as coming from the Greek adjective ὠκύς, "quick". The early "D" scholia on the Iliad explain this as a reference to an unnamed river flowing past it; the geographical writer Stephanus of Byzantium explains it as a reference to the brief journey from the nearby town Thespiae to Thebes.[5]
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea. It has the longest documented history of any living Indo-European language, spanning more than 3000 years of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history; other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.
Scholia are grammatical, critical, or explanatory comments, either original or extracted from pre-existing commentaries, which are inserted on the margin of the manuscript of an ancient author, as glosses. One who writes scholia is a scholiast. The earliest attested use of the word dates to the 1st century BC.
The Iliad is an ancient Greek epic poem in dactylic hexameter, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy (Ilium) by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles.
Mythology
The Hymn to Apollo narrates how the god Apollo, in his search for a place to establish his oracle, passes by Ocalea and Haliartus after crossing the river Cephissus on his way to Telphousa. Ocalea and Haliartus are named in the wrong order, since Apollo is supposed to be travelling westwards. The poem describes Ocalea as πολύπυργος, "many-towered"; but the epithet is so common as to be almost meaningless.[6]
The Homeric Hymns are a collection of thirty-three anonymous ancient Greek hymns celebrating individual gods. The hymns are "Homeric" in the sense that they employ the same epic meter—dactylic hexameter—as the Iliad and Odyssey, use many similar formulas and are couched in the same dialect. They were uncritically attributed to Homer himself in antiquity—from the earliest written reference to them, Thucydides (iii.104)—and the label has stuck. "The whole collection, as a collection, is Homeric in the only useful sense that can be put upon the word," A. W. Verrall noted in 1894, "that is to say, it has come down labeled as 'Homer' from the earliest times of Greek book-literature."
Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in classical Greek and Roman religion and Greek and Roman mythology. The national divinity of the Greeks, Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of music, truth and prophecy, healing, the sun and light, plague, poetry, and more. Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto, and has a twin sister, the chaste huntress Artemis. Seen as the most beautiful god and the ideal of the kouros, Apollo is considered to be the most Greek of all gods. Apollo is known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu.
An oracle is a person or agency considered to provide wise and insightful counsel or prophetic predictions or precognition of the future, inspired by the gods. As such it is a form of divination.
The Bibliotheca, also known as the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus, is a compendium of Greek myths and heroic legends, arranged in three books, generally dated to the first or second century AD.
Apollodorus of Athens son of Asclepiades, was a Greek scholar, historian and grammarian. He was a pupil of Diogenes of Babylon, Panaetius the Stoic, and the grammarian Aristarchus of Samothrace, under whom he appears to have studied together with his contemporary Dionysius Thrax. He left Alexandria around 146 BC, most likely for Pergamon, and eventually settled in Athens.
Heracles, born Alcaeus or Alcides was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon. He was a great-grandson and half-brother of Perseus. He was the greatest of the Greek heroes, a paragon of masculinity, the ancestor of royal clans who claimed to be Heracleidae (Ἡρακλεῖδαι), and a champion of the Olympian order against chthonic monsters. In Rome and the modern West, he is known as Hercules, with whom the later Roman emperors, in particular Commodus and Maximian, often identified themselves. The Romans adopted the Greek version of his life and works essentially unchanged, but added anecdotal detail of their own, some of it linking the hero with the geography of the Central Mediterranean. Details of his cult were adapted to Rome as well.
In Greek mythology, Alcmene or Alcmena was the wife of Amphitryon by whom she bore two children, Iphicles and Laonome. She is, however, better known as the mother of Heracles whose father was the god Zeus. Alcmene was also called Electryone (Ἠλεκτρυώνην), a patronymic name as a daughter of Electryon.
In Greek mythology, Asteria was a name attributed to the following eleven individuals:
In Greek mythology, Cinyras was a famous hero and king of Cyprus. Accounts vary significantly as to his genealogy and provide a variety of stories concerning him; in many sources he is associated with the cult of Aphrodite on Cyprus, and Adonis, a consort of Aphrodite, is mentioned as his son. Some scholars have proposed a connection with the minor Ugaritic deity Kinaru(m), the god of the lyre. The city Cinyreia on Cyprus was believed to have taken its name from Cinyras.
The name Astyoche or Astyocheia was attributed to the following individuals in Greek mythology.
Clytius, also spelled Klythios, Klytios, Clytios, and Klytius, is the name of multiple people in Greek mythology:
In Greek mythology, Megara was a Theban princess.
Nilus or Neilos, in Greek mythology, was one of the Potamoi who represent the god of the Nile river itself.
In Greek mythology, Eurypyle may refer to the following personages:
In Greek mythology, the name Chalcodon may refer to:
Nicippe, also Nikippe is a name attributed to several women in Greek mythology.
In Greek mythology, the name Laonome may refer to:
In Greek mythology, the name Coronus may refer to:
In Greek mythology, the name Orchomenus may refer to:
In Greek mythology, Ptous may refer to the following:
In Greek mythology, the name Astacus may refer to:
Lysidice is the name of several women in Greek mythology.
Thebe is a feminine name mentioned several times in Greek mythology, in accounts that imply multiple female characters, four of whom are said to have had three cities named Thebes after them:
In Greek mythology Linus was a reputed musician and master of eloquent speech. He was regarded as the first leader of lyric song.
Eutresis was a town of ancient Boeotia, mentioned by Homer in the Catalogue of Ships in the Iliad, and said to have been the residence of Amphion and Zethus before they ruled over Thebes. In the time of Strabo it was a village in the territory of Thespiae. Stephanus of Byzantium places it on the road from Thespiae to Plataea; but William Martin Leake conjectures that there is an error in the text, and that for Θεσπιῶν (Thespiae) we ought to read Θισβῶν (Thisbe), since there is only one spot in the ten miles between Plataea and Thespiae where any town is likely to have stood, and that was occupied by Leuctra. We learn from Stephanus that Eutresis possessed a celebrated temple and oracle of Apollo, who was hence surnamed Eutresites. The Periplus of Pseudo-Scylax, in its description of the coast of Boeotia, speaks of ὁ λιμὴν Εὔτρητος καὶ τεῖχος τῶν Βοιωτῶν.
In Greek mythology, Pyrrha may refer to the following women:
↑ Schol. D on Iliad 2.501; Stephanus 706 s.v. Ὠκαλέα. Herodian De prosodia catholica iii.1 p. 284 gives both explanations. Stephanus and Herodian seem to be under the mistaken impression that Ocalea lay on the route from Thespiae to Thebes; but Thespiae is some way from where the lake was.
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