Ancient Stymphalos

Ancient Stymphalos has a very long history indeed, going right back to mythological times. Homer, Pausanias (the Greek traveller who is the source of so much of our knowledge about ancient Greece) and Xenophon (the Greek military leader, philosopher and historian) all have something to tell us about the area.

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Historical information. Stymphalos has a very long history indeed, going right back to mythological times. Homer, Pausanias (the Greek traveller who is the source of so much of our knowledge about ancient Greece) and Xenophon (the Greek military leader, philosopher and historian) all have something to tell us about the area. 

Pausanias sets the ball rolling by telling us that way back in the mists of time the area was ruled by Temenus, who introduced the worship of the goddess Hera. . In mythological times  Stymphalos was actually part of Arcadia (not Corinthia), so when the mythological King Arcas divided the country between his descendants he gave his first-born son, Elatos, the lands around the mountain of Kyllini. Elatos then had five sons, three of whom, Aipytos, Kyllinas and Stymphalus are connected with the area around Lake Stymphalia.

At the beginning of the Late Helladic era, i.e. shortly after the middle of the 16th century BC, the birth of the Mycenaean civilization led to a huge expansion in culture throughout the Peloponnese. As far as we know, the area must have become a residential hub at this time.

For his part, Homer tells us in the Iliad that the Stymphalians took part in the Trojan War at the end of the 13th - beginning of the 12th century BC. And finally, several centuries later, Stymphalos is mentioned in Xenophon's work "Anabasis". 

During the Classical and Hellenistic periods, life for the city’s inhabitants seems to have been peaceful and calm. However, all good things come to an end, and in the 2nd century BC things took a drastic turn for the worse. The city was a victim of the struggle between the ancient Greeks and the Romans for control of Corinthia, and indeed for control of Greece itself. After the Romans defeated the Greek army in the Battle of Corinth in 146 BC, the legions advanced into the interior of the Peloponnese and reached ancient Stymphalos. The people of the city did their best to put up a fight but did not manage to defeat the Romans, and Stymphalos was partially destroyed. The city still existed, but never regained its former glory. Some Roman settlers came here, mainly around the middle of the 1st century BC, but over the centuries the city declined and it was probably abandoned in the Early Byzantine period. The lack of any Christian churches or medieval fortifications from this era (other than some early Christian graves dating from about 5th – 6th century AD) supports this view.

After the Peloponnese was conquered by the Franks, Roman Catholic Cistercian monks founded the Zaraka Monastery and settled close to the Northern edge of ancient Stymphalos.

Location

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