A city of Achaia
Phthiotis, situated on the W side of the Gulf of Pagasai,
3 km from the shore by a deep bay (modern Sourpi)
which is sheltered except from the N by Cape Zelasion
(modern Halmyrou, or Perikli). The city lay on the
rough shore road which runs from the Gulf of Pagasai to
the Maliac gulf around the foot of Mt. Othrys. It controlled the S part of the fertile coastal plain (Krokion);
the part around it being called Athamantion. Halos was
a seaport (the main one?) for Thessaly in the 5th c. B.C.,
issued coinage in the 4th, was taken by Philip II of Macedon in 346 B.C. and given to Pharsalos. The city issued
coinage again in the 3d c., being probably then free of
Pharsalos, and was important in the post-196 B.C. Thessalian League (Hdt. 7.173
, 197; Strab. 9.432
, 433; Steph.
Byz. s. v.; Dem. 19.36
, 163; 11.1).
There are city walls above the coastal plain on a spur
projecting N from a N peak (Haghios Elias) of Mt.
Othrys. On a peak (208 m) near the end of the spur are
the walls of a small round fort of Cyclopean masonry,
2 m thick. Around this peak and around the end of the
spur to the NE are Classical walls, built of rectangular
and trapezoidal blocks of irregular heights, preserved in
places to two courses high. There were towers irregularly
spaced along the circuit. The NE end of the circuit is
missing. A wall of polygonal masonry runs N from the
circuit wall down towards the plain, and one of rectangular blocks down to the E, but the ends of these walls
cannot be seen. Leake thought they joined the city walls
on the hill with those in the plain (see below). The walls
on the hill are probably of the 4th c. B.C. No remains
of buildings are visible within this circuit.
At the N foot of the spur is a copious, brackish spring
(Kephalosis). In the plain five minutes E of the spring
are city walls in the form of a rectangle, 750 x 710 m,
aligned roughly N-S. The walls are of good Hellenistic
masonry, double faced and stone filled, the faces constructed of heavy, rough-faced rectangular blocks laid in
regular courses. The wall is some 3 m thick, and had 15
square projecting towers on a side, not including the
tower at every corner. The E wall and much of the N
is missing; the W and S walls are in good shape, preserved to two to three courses high (1924). There are
no gates in the W side; the S and N sides each had a
gate flanked by towers and small portals (one? in the N,
two in the S). The stream from the spring Kephalosis
flows by the N wall and may be the ancient river Amphrysos referred to by Strabo (9.433
) as being in this position,
although elsewhere he says it flows through the middle of
the plain (Krokion), a position better described by the
modern Platanos river. The area inside the walls is thick
with sherds, and, according to Leake, foundations of
buildings. The ruins on the hill are probably those of the
Halos of the Trojan War (Il
. 2.282), taken in 346 B.C.;
the walls in the plain, those of a refounding of the city,
possibly connected with Demetrios Poliorketes' activities
In the plain to the NE of the acropolis, N of the
Kephalosis stream, are several tumuli. One of these was
excavated in 1912 and contained burials of the Geometric
period. NE of the city, on the shore by Paralia 2 hours
SE of Halmyros, were visible, according to Vollgraff in
1906, the scanty ruins of a large building of the Classical
period within a rectangular temenos wall, apparently a
temple belonging to Halos. A brief trial excavation
turned up black-glazed sherds.
N. I. Giannopoulos, Τὰ Φθιωτικά
50ff; id., ArchEph
(bronze 8th c. B.C.
statuette of Zeus Laphystios?); F. Stiihlin, AM
; id., RE
(1912) s.v. Halos; id., Das Hellenische
48 (1924) 483; W.
14 (1907-8) 225; A.J.B. Wace & M. S.
Thompson, “Excavations at Halos,” BSA
; G. Bendinelli, RFC
33 (1955) 294-300 (gold
medallion supposed to have come from the site); H.
Biesantz, Die Thessalischen Grabreliefs
(1965) 135, 138I
(4th c. B.C. Artemis torso, bronze Zeus).
T. S. MAC KAY