Caphyae
Encyclopedia
Caphyae or Kaphyai was an ancient city of Arcadia
Arcadia
Arcadia is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the administrative region of Peloponnese. It is situated in the central and eastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. It takes its name from the mythological character Arcas. In Greek mythology, it was the home of the god Pan...

 situated in a small plain, northwest of the lake of Orchomenus
Orchomenus (Arcadia)
Orchomenus or Orchomenos was an ancient city of Arcadia, Greece, called by Thucydides the Arcadian Orchomenus , to distinguish it from the Boeotian town. Its ruins are near the modern village of Orchomenos .-Situation:It was situated in a plain surrounded on every side by mountains...

. It was protected against inundations from this lake by a mound or dyke, raised by the inhabitants of Caphyae. The city is said to have been founded by King Cepheus of Tegea, the son of Aleus
Auge
In Greek mythology, Auge a daughter of Aleus and Neaera and priestess of Athena Alea at Tegea, bore the hero Telephus to Heracles. Her father had been told by an oracle that he would be overthrown by his grandson. She secreted the baby in the temple of Athena...

, and pretended to be of Athenian
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

 origin.

Caphyae subsequently belonged to the Achaean League
Achaean League
The Achaean League was a Hellenistic era confederation of Greek city states on the northern and central Peloponnese, which existed between 280 BC and 146 BC...

, and was one of the cities of the league, of which Cleomenes III
Cleomenes III
Cleomenes III was the King of Sparta from 235-222 BC. He succeeded to the Agiad throne of Sparta after his father, Leonidas II in 235 BC.From 229 BC to 222 BC, Cleomenes waged war against the Achaean League under Aratus of Sicyon. Domestically, he is known for his attempt to reform the Spartan state...

 obtained possession. In its neighborhood a great battle was fought in 220 BC
220 BC
Year 220 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Laevinus/Catulus and Scaevola/Philo...

, in which the Aetolia
Aetolia
Aetolia is a mountainous region of Greece on the north coast of the Gulf of Corinth, forming the eastern part of the modern prefecture of Aetolia-Acarnania.-Geography:...

ns, gained a decisive victory over the Achaeans and Aratus of Sicyon
Aratus of Sicyon
Aratus was a statesman of the ancient Greek city-state of Sicyon and a leader of the Achaean League. He deposed the Sicyonian tyrant Nicocles in 251 BC. Aratus was an advocate of Greek unity and brought Sicyon into the Achaean League, which he led to its maximum extent...

. The name of Caphyae also occurs in the subsequent events of this war.

Strabo speaks of the town as in ruins in his time; but it still contained some temples when visited by Pausanias (l. c.). The remains of the walls of Caphyae are visible upon a small insulated height at the village of Chotoussa, which stands near the edge of the lake. Polybius, in his description of the battle of Caphyae, refers to a plain in front of Caphyae, traversed by a river, beyond which were trenches , a description of the place which does not correspond with present appearances. The were evidently ditches for the purpose of draining the marshy plain, by conducting the water towards the Katavóthra, around which there was, probably, a small lake. In the time of Pausanias we find that the lake covered the greater part of the plain; and that exactly in the situation in which Polybius describes the ditches, there was a mound of earth.

It is probable that during the four centuries that elapsed between the battle of Caphyae and the visit of Pausanias, a diminution of population should have caused a neglect of the drainage which had formerly ensured the cultivation of the whole plain, and that in the time of the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....

 an embankment of earth had been thrown up to preserve the part nearest to Caphyae, leaving the rest uncultivated and marshy.

Pausanias says that on the inner side of the embankment there flows a river, which, descending into a chasm of the earth, issues again at a place called Nasi
Nasi
Nāśī’ is a Hebrew title meaning prince in Biblical Hebrew, Prince in Mishnaic Hebrew, or president in Modern Hebrew.-Genesis and Ancient Israel:...

 ; and that the name of the village where it issues is named Rheunus . From this place it forms the perennial river Tragus  (modern Tara
Tara River (Greece)
The Tara River of Arcadia, Greece has been identified by some classical scholars as the modern equivalent of the Tragus river.-References:*William Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, s.v. Caphyae....

 or Daraiiko). He also speaks of a mountain in the neighbourhood of the city named Cnacalus (modern Kastania
Kastania
Kastania may refer to places in Greece:inhabited places*Kastania, Ioannina*Kastania, Laconia*Kastania, Pieria*Kastania, Trikala*Kastania, Kozanimountains*Kastania, a mountain of Arcadia, the ancient Cnacalus...

), on which the inhabitants celebrate a yearly festival to Artemis Cnacalesia
Artemis
Artemis was one of the most widely venerated of the Ancient Greek deities. Her Roman equivalent is Diana. Some scholars believe that the name and indeed the goddess herself was originally pre-Greek. Homer refers to her as Artemis Agrotera, Potnia Theron: "Artemis of the wildland, Mistress of Animals"...

.
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