ancient Macedonia
Macedonia ( ; , ), also called Macedon ( ), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, which later became the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by the royal ...
, on the
Haliacmon
The Haliacmon (, ''Aliákmonas''; formerly: , ''Aliákmon'' or ''Haliákmōn'') is the longest river flowing entirely in Greece, with a total length of . In Greece there are three rivers longer than Haliacmon: Maritsa (), Struma (Strymónas), bot ...
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...
and Pliny, the inhabitants of which were removed to
Pythium
''Pythium'' is a genus of parasitic oomycetes. They were formerly classified as fungi. Most species are plant parasites, but '' Pythium insidiosum'' is an important pathogen of animals, causing pythiosis. The feet of the fungus gnat are fre ...
. As Pythium was in
Perrhaebia Perrhaebia () was the northernmost district of ancient Thessaly, where the tribe of the Perrhaebi lived. Major cities were: Pythion, Doliche, Azorus, Oloosson and Phalanna the capital. Perrhaebia was part of Macedon
Macedonia ( ; , ), ...
, at the southwestern foot of the Pierian mountains, 19th century archaeologist
William Martin Leake
William Martin Leake FRS (14 January 17776 January 1860) was an English soldier, spy, topographer, diplomat, antiquarian, writer, and Fellow of the Royal Society. He served in the British Army, spending much of his career in the Mediterrane ...
placed Balla in the mountainous part of Pieria, and supposed that
Velventos
Velventos () or Velvento (Βελβεντό) is a town and municipality in Kozani regional unit, Western Macedonia, Greece. The 2021 census recorded 2,949 people in the community of Velventos and 3,057 in the municipality. The municipality has an a ...
may have derived its name from it. In that case it would be a different place from the "Bala" of the
Peutinger Table
' (Latin for 'The Peutinger Map'), also known as Peutinger's Tabula, Peutinger tables James Strong and John McClintock (1880)"Eleutheropolis" In: ''The Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature''. NY: Haper and Brothers ...
Berrhoea
Veria (; ), officially transliterated Veroia, historically also spelled Beroea or Berea, is a city in Central Macedonia, in the geographic region of Macedonia, northern Greece, capital of the regional unit of Imathia. It is located north-north ...
.
Léon Heuzey misidentified the city of Aegae as Balla in the 1860s, a view that prevailed until 1976. Modern scholars treat its site as unlocated. One suggested location for the city is at the village of .