Taygetus in the context of "Evrotas Valley"

Messenia (Ancient Greek: Μεσσηνία) was an ancient district of the southwestern Peloponnese, more or less overlapping the modern Messenia region of Greece. It occupied the peninsular region usually called by the same name along with some of the mainland. To the north it had a border with Elis along the Neda river. From there the border with Arcadia ran along the tops of Mount Elaeum and Mount Nomia and then through foothills of Taygetus. The eastern border with Laconia went along the Taygetus ridge up to the Koskaraka river, and then along that river to the sea, near the city of Abia. The Ionian Sea forms the peninsula's western border, and the peninsula and mainland sections enclose the Messenian Gulf to the south.

Ancient Messenia existed continuously without change of name and with little change of territory to the modern Regional Unit of Greece of the same name.

Mystras or Mistras (Greek: Μυστρᾶς/Μιστρᾶς), also known in the Chronicle of the Morea as Myzethras or Myzithras (Μυζηθρᾶς), is a fortified town and a former municipality in Laconia, Peloponnese, Greece. Situated in the Taygetus range, above ancient Sparta, and below a "Frankish" castle, it served as the capital of the Byzantine Despotate of the Morea in the 14th and 15th centuries, experiencing a period of prosperity and cultural flowering during the Palaeologan Renaissance, including the teachings of Gemistos Plethon. The city also attracted artists and architects of the highest quality.

Mystras remained inhabited throughout the Ottoman period, when Western travellers mistook it for ancient Sparta. In the 1830s, it was abandoned and the new town of Sparta was built, approximately eight kilometres to the east. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the Sparta municipality. As an exceptionally well-preserved example of a Byzantine city and because of its testimony to the development of Late Byzantine and Post-byzantine art, Mystras was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1989.

The Alpheios (Greek: Αλφειός, Ancient Greek: Ἀλφειός, Latin Alpheus), sometimes spelled Alfeiós, is the main stream of the Alpheios Valley drainage system, a dendritic type, originating on the north slopes of Mount Taygetus, located in the center of the Peloponnesus of Greece, and flowing to the northwest to the vicinity of Olympia, where it turns to the west and, after being impounded by the Flokas Dam, a hydroelectric facility, empties into the Gulf of Kyparissia of the Ionian Sea south of Pyrgos. The entrance into the gulf through agricultural land and across an unpopulated, sandy beach partially blocked by a spit is hydrologically unspectacular, with the water too shallow to be navigable by any but the smallest craft.

The concept of a single source has little meaning for most of the rivers of Greece, which begin as a confluence of multiple springs in the mountain valleys. There is almost never just one, although most may be unreported or neglected. Thus it is appropriate to speak "a source" or "the sources" but never "the source."

Amykles (Greek: Αμύκλες) is a village in Laconia, southern Greece. It lies in the plain by the Eurotas river, 6 km south of Sparta, east of the Taygetus mountains, along the Greek National Road 39 from Sparta to Gytheio. It was named after the ancient town Amyclae, the ruins of which are situated 2 km northeast of the village.

The history of Sparta describes the history of the ancient Doric Greek city-state known as Sparta from its beginning in the legendary period to its incorporation into the Achaean League under the late Roman Republic, as Allied State, in 146 BC, a period of roughly 1000 years. Since the Dorians were not the first to settle the valley of the Eurotas River in the Peloponnesus of Greece, the preceding Mycenaean and Stone Age periods are described as well. Sparta went on to become a district of modern Greece. Brief mention is made of events in the post-classical periods.

Dorian Sparta rose to dominance in the 6th century BC. At the time of the Persian Wars, it was the recognized leader by assent of the Greek city-states. It subsequently lost that assent through suspicion that the Athenians were plotting to break up the Spartan state after an earthquake destroyed Sparta in 464 BC. When Sparta defeated Athens in the Peloponnesian War, it secured an unrivaled hegemony over southern Greece. Sparta's supremacy was broken following the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC. It was never able to regain its military superiority and was finally absorbed by the Achaean League in the 2nd century BC.

The Mani Peninsula is a geographical and cultural region of the Peloponnese in southern Greece. It is often referred to as Mani (Greek: Μάνη) or "the Mani". The inhabitants of Mani are known as Maniots (Mανιάτες, Maniátes). A Maniot tradition claims they descend from the ancient Spartans. Mani and the Maniots played a key role in the Greek War of Independence that began in 1821.

The Mani is the central of the three peninsulas extending southwards from the Peloponnese into the Mediterranean Sea. To Mani's east lie the Laconian Gulf and the peninsula of Cape Maleas, and to its west, the Messenian Gulf and the peninsula of Messenia. The Mani Peninsula is the southern extension of the Taygetus mountain range. It is about 45 km (28 mi) long, with a rocky, rugged, interior bordered by scenic coastlines. Mani terminates at Cape Matapan, the southernmost point of continental Greece.

Mount Ithome (Greek: Ἰθώμη) or Ithomi, previously Vourkano(s) (Greek: Βουρκάνο(ς)) or Voulcano(s) (Greek: Βουλκάνο(ς)), is the northernmost of twin peaks in Messenia, Greece. Mount Ithome rises to about 800 metres (2,600 feet), about 760 metres (2,490 feet) over Valyra, the seat of Ithomi, the former municipality. The other peak is Mount Eva (Greek: Εύα), 700 metres (2,300 feet), connected to Mount Ithomi by a thin ridge 0.80 kilometres (0.50 miles) long.

Mount Ithome is 25 kilometres (16 miles) north of Kalamata on the Gulf of Messenia, 60 kilometres (37 miles) east of Pylos, seat of Bronze Age Messenia, and 20 kilometres (12 miles) north of Messini, modern namesake of ancient Messene, nestled under the cliffs of Mount Ithome. From the top the whole valley of the Pamisos river can be viewed eastward to Mount Taygetus and southward to the Gulf of Messenia. The site is highly defensible and yet off the main road; in this case, the Kalamata-Pylos road.