Bisaltia () or Bisaltica was an ancient country which was bordered by

Sintice Sintice or Sintike (Greek: Σιντική) was an ancient region and later district of the kingdom of Macedon. It was located north of Bisaltia and Odomantike up to Messapio mount and west of Crestonia and South Paeonia to Strymon river and ...

on the north,

Crestonia Crestonia (or Crestonice) () was an ancient region immediately north of Mygdonia. The Echeidorus river, which flowed through Mygdonia into the Thermaic Gulf, had its source in Crestonia. It was partly occupied by a remnant of the Pelasgi, who spo ...

on the west,

Mygdonia Mygdonia (; ) was an ancient territory, part of ancient Thrace, later conquered by Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon, which comprised the plains around Therma (Thessalonica) together with the valleys of Klisali and Besikia, including the ar ...

on the south and was separated by Odomantis on the north-east and Edonis on the south-east by river Strymon.The eponymous inhabitants, known as the Bisaltae, were a

Thracian The Thracians (; ; ) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Southeast Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied the area that today is shared between north-eastern Greece, ...

people. Later, the region was annexed by the

kingdom of Macedon Kingdom commonly refers to: * A monarchic state or realm ruled by a king or queen. ** A monarchic chiefdom, represented or governed by a king or queen. * Kingdom (biology), a category in biological taxonomy Kingdom may also refer to: Arts and me ...

and became one of its districts. The most important town in Bisaltia was the

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

city of Argilos. There was also a river named Bisaltes in the region, which has not been certainly identified.

History

Bisaltia, along with Crestonia, was ruled by a Thracian prince at the time of the

invasion An invasion is a Offensive (military), military offensive of combatants of one geopolitics, geopolitical Legal entity, entity, usually in large numbers, entering territory (country subdivision), territory controlled by another similar entity, ...

Xerxes I of Persia Xerxes I ( – August 465 BC), commonly known as Xerxes the Great, was a Persian ruler who served as the fourth King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 486 BC until his assassination in 465 BC. He was the son of Darius the Great ...

, but by the onset of the

Peloponnesian War The Second Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), often called simply the Peloponnesian War (), was an Ancient Greece, ancient Greek war fought between Classical Athens, Athens and Sparta and their respective allies for the hegemony of the Ancien ...

it was annexed by

Macedon 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 ...

. In Roman times, Bisaltia crossed a branch of the via Egnatia, in which the Roman sources (Itineraria) mention four horses change stations : ''Trinlo'' (=Tragilos), ''Graero'', ''Arason'' (=Arolos) and ''Euporia''. In various sites of Bisaltia have been found so far several interesting inscriptions of imperial times.D. C. Samsaris, La vallée du Bas-Strymon á l’ époque impériale (Contribution épigraphique á la topographie, l’ onomastique, l’ histoire et aux cultes de la province romaine de Macédoine), Dodona 18 (1989), fasc. 1, p. 215-225, n. 1-23 =
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 1, # PH150638)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150639?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 2, # PH150639
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 3, # PH150640)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150641?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 4, # PH150641
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 5, # PH150642)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150643?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 6, # PH150643
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 7, # PH150644)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150645?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 8, # PH150645
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 9, # PH150646)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150647?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 10, # PH150647
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 11, # PH150648)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150649?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 12, # PH150649
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 13, # PH150650)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150651?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 14, # PH150651
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 15, # PH150652)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150653?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 16, # PH150653
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 17, # PH150654)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150655?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 18, # PH150655
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 19, # PH150656)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150657?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 20, # PH150657
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 21 # PH150658)
http://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/150659?bookid=126&location=4 The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 22 # PH150659
The Packard Humanities Institute (Samsaris, Bas-Strymon 23 # PH150660)
/ref> Important towns of Bisaltia were Argilos, Berge and Brea. Bisaltia is contained within the Serres regional unit and part of the Thessaloniki regional unit in

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

References

External links

* {{coord, 40.9583, N, 23.3861, E, source:wikidata, display=title Geography of ancient Thrace Geography of ancient Macedonia Historical regions in Greece Lower Macedonia