Rich in Agricultural Land - Difficult Access to Sea

In contrast, communities with plentiful agricultural lands but only difficult access to the sea were able to support relatively large populations and were typically ruled by a landowning aristocracy.

A prime example is Thessaly (cf. Stahlin 1924; Philippson vol. 1 1950), where the ‘plains are the middle parts, a country most blest, except so much of it as is subject to inundations by rivers’ (Strabon 9.5.2). The plain was indeed watered throughout the year by the Peneios and its tributary, the river Epineus, and surrounded by high mountain ranges, the Olympos in the north, the Pindos in the west, and the Othrys, Ossa and Pelion in the south; the coastline towards the Aegean in the east provided some small and unimportant harbours only in the Pagasitic Gulf. While other parts of Greece were threatened by drought, parts of Thessaly were so well watered that they were swampy for at least part of the year. Most of the land, however, was used for producing grain (the climate with its searing-hot summers is unsuitable for the olive tree); animal husbandry included not only the usual goats and sheep, but cattle and especially horses, the pride of the landowning Thessalian aristocracy. Unlike other parts of Greece, Thessaly remained a rather loosely connected federation of communities, which through internal strife slowly disintegrated: in the fifth century, some aristocratic groups favoured a pro-Athenian policy, while others supported Sparta. The federation continued to be weak, and foreign powers attempted to put themselves at its centre. The most successful of them was Philip II of Macedon in 352, who eight years later reorganized the federation, and in 338 incorporated Thessaly as a distinct unit in the Korinthian League and thus his realm.

Further to the south, Boiotia (cf. Buck 1979) consisted mainly of fertile plains surrounded by mountainous territory, while the sea was difficult to reach from the interior. Like Thessaly, it had a good water supply - so abundant, in fact, that Lake Kopais rendered large areas marshy for most of the year and separated western Boiotia (around Chaironeia, Orchomenos and Lebadeia) from the larger eastern part (around Thebes), whose plains and rolling hills allowed not only for production of grain, olives and wine, fruit and vegetables, but also, like Thessaly, for raising cattle and horses (which, again, were sought after by the ruling aristocracy); beyond this part of Boiotia, there were the smaller but exceptionally fertile plains of Thespiai and Plataiai. Given the desirability of the land and its position as the only land-bridge between Attika and central Greece - Epameinondas is said to have called it ‘a stage (orchestra) of war’ (Plutarch Moralia 193e) - Boiotia formed a rather loose federation under Theban leadership, which had sided with the Persians in the Persian wars, but it lost its influence (or was even dissolved) for a generation after the battle of Plataiai in 479. Athens’ conflict with Sparta lead to the latter’s support of Thebes (in 421 Boiotia, though geographically well outside the Peloponnese, was a member of what we call the Peloponnesian League: Thuc. 5.17.2). In the course of the fourth century it rose to become an independent new power, j oining the Second Athenian League, defeating Sparta at Leuktra in 371 and thus becoming a leading power for nearly a decade; eventually it was conquered by the Macedonians in 338, and Alexander the Great destroyed the city of Thebes three years later.

A similar combination of large and fertile lands and difficult access to the sea can be found in Elis in the north-western Peloponnese. Enclosed by high mountain ranges towards the north-east and east and elsewhere looking towards the sea, with hardly a useful natural harbour, Elis grew grain, vines and olives, flax and hemp, and raised cattle and horses, but the lack of easy lines of communication to the outside world forced Elis to be self-sufficient. Unlike the equally self-sufficient regions of Thessaly and Boiotia, however, it had little strategic importance and thus remained untouched by the Persian Wars and later events. Formally belonging to the Peloponnesian League, it sided first with Sparta, later with Athens; after the latter’s defeat it was forced back into Sparta’s league, becoming independent after Sparta’s defeat at Leuktra in 371 - but, in sum, it remained a self-contained and self-sufficient marginal region throughout the Classical Age (cf. Rizakis 1991).

For further examples one could also look to Messenia, ‘good for ploughing’ (Tyrtaios F 5 West), in the south-western Peloponnese, whose fertile lands - cf. Euripides F 1083 Nauck2 on a country full of‘beautiful fruit and good irrigation’ - had been completely conquered by Sparta by the late seventh century to serve as an agricultural resource for the Spartans; central Euboia with Chalkis, and Eretria with the Lelantine plain; and Kolophon in western Asia Minor. It is not surprising that communities with difficult access to the sea and plentiful agricultural lands remained self-sufficient, and, unless they were of strategic relevance, remained very much marginal in the world as far as it is illuminated by our sources for the Classical Age.