Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/614

 596 CHALA. town. pAasaaias does not mention the temple of this deity ; bat he states that the principal object of veneration in bis time was ibe sceptre of Zeus, once borne by Agamemnon, and which was considered to be the undoubted work of the god Hephaestus. At the foot of the theatre there rises a small torrent, which flows into the Gephissos. It was called in an- cient times Haemon or Thermodon, and its water was dyed by the blood of the Thebans and Boeotians in their memorable defeat by Philip. (Pint Dem, 19 ; Leake, Northern Greece^ vol ii. pp. 112, seq., 192, seq. ; Mare, Tow in Cfreece^ yol. i. p. 212, seq.; Ulrichs, Reisen in Griechenlandj p. 158, seq.) CHALA (Xdka^ Isid. Char. p. 5), a town in the eastern part of ancient Assyria, probably the capital of the district called Chalomtis, a name which is preserved in that of the river oiUolwan (Xa/iomris, Strab. zi. pp.529, 736; Dionys. Perjeg. 1015; Plin. vi. 26. s. 30 ; KaAwwTir, Polyb. v. 54). Ohala is within a short distance of the M. Zagroe. Diodorus (xviL 110) relates that Xerxes, on his return from Greece, placed a colony of Boeotians in this neighboarhood, which was called from their native town Celonab (K4x»vai). They were most likely placed along the banks of the Hohoan river. Chalk has been sometimes connected with Colacene, but its position does not answer to this identificaticm. Plioy erred in placing the district Chalonitis on the Tigris, as it was clearly to the £. close to the mountains. [V.l CHALAEUM (Xd^MLOv, in Ptol iii. 15. § 3, XaKt^s : Eth. XoAaios), a town upon the coast of the Locri Ozolae, newr the borders of Phods. Leake places it at Lamdki. Pliny erroneonsly calls it a town of Phocis, and says that it was situated seven miles from Delphi : it is not improbable that he con- founded it with Cirrha, which is about that distance from Delphi. (Thuc iiL 101 ; Hecataeus, ap. Steph. a. V, ; PUn. iv. 3. s. 4 ; Leake, Northern Greece^ vol. ii. p. 594.) CHALASTRA {XtOJurrpa, Strab. vii. p. 330; XsLKiifTpnn^ Herod. viL 123 ; XaXcuVrpa, Plat. Alex. 49; Plin. iv. 10. § 17, xxxi. 10. § 46). a town of Mygdonia in Macedonia, sitnated on the Thermaean gulf at the right of the month of the Axius, which belonged to the Thracians and pos- sessed a harbour. (Steph. B. s, v.) Persons, king of Macedonia, barbarously put all the male in- habitants to death. (Diod. Excerpt 308.) After- wards the population, with that of other towns of Mygdonia, was absorbed in great measure by Thes- salonica on its foundation by Cassander. It cannot, therefore, be expected that many remams should be existing. The site may, howcTer, be considered to be at or near the modem Kuhkid, (Tafel, Thes- salon. p. 277; Leake, Northern Greece^ vol. iii. p. 450.) [E. B. J.] CHALCEDON (Xoin?Wv: Eth. Xa/ucriMrios or XoAictSeiJs), ** a city of Bithynia, at the entrance of the Pontus, opposite to Byzantium," as Stephanas («. V. XaKTi^tiv) describes it ; and a colony of the Megareis. (Thuc. iv. 75.) The tract about Chalcedon was called Chaloe- donia. (Herod, iv. 85.) According to Menippus, the distance along the left-hand coast from the temple of Zeus Urios and the mouth of the Pon- tus to Chalcedon was 120 stadia. All the coins of Chalcedon have the name written KoAx^Swr, and this is also the way in which the name is written in the best MSS. of Herodotos, Xenophon, and other writen, by whom the place is mentioned. CHALCEDON. The distance from Chalcedon to Byzantiam was reckoned seven stadia (Plin. v. 32), or as it is stated by Pliny elsewhere (ix. 15), one Roman mile, which is eight stadia. Polybius (iv. 39) makes the distance between Chalcedon and Byzantiam 14 stadia; which is much nearer the mark. But it is difficalt to say from what points these different measarements were made. The distance from Scutari (Chiysopolis) to the Seraglio point in Constantinople (according to a survey in the Hydrographical office of the Admiralty) is nearly one nautical mile. In the same chart a place Caledonia is marked, but probaby the indica- tion is not worth much. Chalcedon, however, must have been at least two miles soath of &itfari, perhaps more ; and the distsAce from Chalcedon to the nearest point of the European shore is greater even than that which Polybius gives. Chry^polis, which Strabo calls a vilhige, and which was in the Chalcedonia (Xenophon, Anah. vi. 6, 38), was really at the en- trance of the Bosporus on the side of the Propontis, but Chalcedon was not It is stated that the modem Greeks give to the site of Chalcedon the name Chalkedon, and the Turks call it Kadi-KioL The position of Chalcedon was not so favourable as that of the opposite city of Byzantiam, in the opnion of the Persian Megabazos (Herod, iv. 144), who is reported to have said that the founders of Chalcedon must have been blind, for Chalcedon was settled seventeen years before Byzantium; and the settlers, we mast suppose, had the choice of the two places. It was at the moath of a small river Chalcedon (Eostathius ad Dionys. Perieg. v. 803) or Chalds. Pliny (v. 32) states that Chalcedon was first named Prooerastis, a name which may be derived from a point of land near it: then it was named Colposa, from the form of the harboor probably; and finally Caecorum Oppidum, or the town of the blind. The story in Herodotus does not tell ns why M^abazns condemned the judgment of the founders of Chalce- don. Strabo (pi 320) observes that the shoals of the pelamjTs, which pass from the Euxine through the Bosporus, are frightened from the shore of Chalcedon by a projecting white rock to the opposite ^de, and so are carried by the stream to Byzantiam, the peo]de of which phice derive a great profit fnxn them. He also reports a story that Apollo advised the founders of Byzantiam to choose a position opposite to the blind; the blind being the settlers from M^ara, who chose Chalcedon as the site of their city, when there was a better place opposite. Pliny (ix. 15) has a like story about the pelamys being frightened from the Asiatic shore ; and Tacitus (Jfin. xii. 63) has the same story as Straba The remarks of Pdybios on the position of Byzantium and Chalcedon are in his fourth book (c. 39, &c). Chalcedon, however, was a place of considerable trade, and a flourishing town. It contained many temples, and one of Apdlo, which had an orade. Strabo reckons his distances along the coast of Bithy- nia from the temple of the Chal^onii (p. 643, and p. 546). When Darius had his bridge of boats made for crossing over to Europe in his Scythian expedi- tion, the architect constructed it, as Herodotus sup- poses, half way between Byzantium and the temple at the entrance of the Pontus, and on the Asiatic side it was within the territory of Chalcedon (Herod, iv. 85, 87). But the Chalcedonia extended to the Euxine, if the temple of the Cbalcedonii of Strabo (pp. 3 19, 563) is the temple of ZeusUrius as it seems to be. The territory of Chalcedon therefore occupied the Asiatic side of the Bosporus. Stnibo^ aifter