particularly on the eastern end of the Pangaion massif and the much
more plentiful evidence on the southern slopes of Mount Lekane,
between ancient Neapolis and the western bank of the River Nestos,
where Chaido Koukouli-Chrysanthaki would locate Skapte Hyle.^42 These
preliminary explorations have not yet been followed up on a broader
scale and by more systematic analyses of the surviving evidence. There is
still a great deal more to learn about Pangaion’s early history.^43 Herod-
otus refers not just to the Pieres, Odomantoi, and Satrai, but also to the
Doberes and Paioplai (5.16), who are associated with a lowland area at
the foot of the mountain, an area once called Phyllis. According to
Thucydides, the Pieres originally lived farther west, in Macedonia
proper, but were compelled to move to the Pangaion area by the kings
of Macedon (2.99.3). Various authors connect Phoenician traders with
the mining region.^44 Euripides associated Pangaion with Orpheus and
with the horseman-hero, Rhesus (Rhesus 921 – 922; 972); while Apollo-
dorus makes this the seat of another mythical Thracian ruler, Lucurgus
(3.5.1). Latin and Greek authors were equally inspired by the mountain’s
evocative landscape, its distinctive wildlife, which included lions, pan-
thers, bears, and lynxes,^45 and its snowy peaks.^46
A key topographic problem is the identification of Mount Dysoron,
the origin of the mine that generated such an exceptional income of a
silver talent a day for King Alexander I of Macedon (Hdt. 5.17). Herod-
otus emphasizes the proximity of this location to Macedonia proper,
which has traditionally been interpreted as somewhere in the mountain
chain that separates Amphaxitis, the tributaries of the River Axios,
Mygdonia, and the Chalkidic peninsula from the River Strymon and its
tributaries. This physical proximity of Macedonia and the mountains
above Bisaltia, west of Lake Kerkinitis, has helped to explain the typo-
logical similarity of Alexander’s silver coinage to that of the Bisaltians,
which evidently served as a model.^47 The restoration of the name
‘Dysoron’on the decree of Alexander III concerning the territory of
(^42) Gale et al., 1980; Photos et al. 1989; Koukouli-Chrysanthaki 1990, 500–14 andfig. 2.
(^43) PindarPyth. 4.180; Aesch.Persae494; Hdt. 6.46, 7.112 ([Arist.]De Mirabilibus
Auscultationibus, 45). Theophrastus refers to its metal-bearing springs, whose mineral
concentration raises the temperature of the water (Theophr. F159 = Athen. 2.42b);
Pikoulas 2001.
(^44) Pl.NH7.197; Clem. Alex.Strom. 1. p. 307B; [Ar.]Mir. Ausc.45.
(^45) Pl.NH21.17; Xen.Cyneg.11.1; Ael.Hist. An.3.21.
(^46) Verg.Georg.4.462; Lucan, 1.679f.; 7.482; Sil. Ital. 2.73f.; 4.776f.; 9.465; Val. Flacc.
1.575, 598; 4.631.
(^47) Hammond,HMI, 92, 181–2;HMII, 74–91, 101; Borza 1990, 46–7; Hammond 1997;
on the Bisaltian models of Macedonian coins, Kagan 1987, 22–3; Archibald 1998, 86, 88,
116; Picard 2000, 242–7; Picard 2006, 270–2.
266 The lure of the northern Aegean