For the modern Greek prefecture, see Imathia

Emathia (Greek: ) is an earliest and poetic name of Macedonia (region)

Macedonia (region)

Macedonia is a geographical and historical region of the Balkan peninsula in southeastern Europe. Its boundaries have changed considerably over time, but nowadays the region is considered to include parts of five Balkan countries: Greece, the Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, as...

, but foremost it roughly corresponds to the district of Bottiaea

Bottiaea

Bottiaea was a geographical region of ancient Macedonia and an administrative district of the Macedonian Kingdom. It was previously inhabited by the Bottiaeans, a people of uncertain origin, later expelled by the Macedonians into Bottike...

 around Pella

Pella

Pella , an ancient Greek city located in Pella Prefecture of Macedonia in Greece, was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia.-Etymology:...

.

Classical sources

Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

, who makes no mention of Macedonia or Chalcidice, places Emathia as a region next to Pieria.
The Homeric name was renewed mainly in Roman times ; and Ptolemy

Ptolemy

Claudius Ptolemy , was a Roman citizen of Egypt who wrote in Greek. He was a mathematician, astronomer, geographer, astrologer, and poet of a single epigram in the Greek Anthology. He lived in Egypt under Roman rule, and is believed to have been born in the town of Ptolemais Hermiou in the...

 even mentions cities of Emathia instead of Bottiaea

Bottiaea

Bottiaea was a geographical region of ancient Macedonia and an administrative district of the Macedonian Kingdom. It was previously inhabited by the Bottiaeans, a people of uncertain origin, later expelled by the Macedonians into Bottike...

.
In Nonnus

Nonnus

Nonnus of Panopolis , was a Greek epic poet. He was a native of Panopolis in the Egyptian Thebaid, and probably lived at the end of the 4th or early 5th century....

, Dionysiaca 48.6 Typhoeus

Typhon

Typhon , also Typhoeus , Typhaon or Typhos was the last son of Gaia, fathered by Tartarus, and the most deadly monster of Greek mythology. He was known as the "Father of all monsters"; his wife Echidna was likewise the "Mother of All Monsters."Typhon was described in pseudo-Apollodorus,...

 having stript the mountains of Emathia, he cast the rocky missiles at Dionysus

Dionysus

Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

. In Ovidius, Metamorphoses 5.313 the daughters of Pierus

Pierus

Pierus , in Greek mythology, is a name attributed to two individuals.*Pierus, the eponym of Pieria, son of Makednos and father by Antiope or Euippe of the of Pierides, nine maidens who wanted to outshine the Muses...

 say: we grant Emathia's plains, to where uprise Paeonia's peaks of snow. The Emathian or Emathius dux is a frequently used name by Latin poets for Alexander the Great, as in Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

, the Emathian conqueror . Strabo relates that what is now called Macedonia was in earlier times called Emathia but since Homer, the earliest source considers Emathia only a region next to Pieria, Strabo's reference should be interpreted in the Roman era context of Emathia's name reviving. The same stands for Latin writers who name Thessaly

Thessaly

Thessaly is a traditional geographical region and an administrative region of Greece, comprising most of the ancient region of the same name. Before the Greek Dark Ages, Thessaly was known as Aeolia, and appears thus in Homer's Odyssey....

 as Emathia ; Macedonia (Roman province)

Macedonia (Roman province)

The Roman province of Macedonia was officially established in 146 BC, after the Roman general Quintus Caecilius Metellus defeated Andriscus of Macedon, the last Ancient King of Macedon in 148 BC, and after the four client republics established by Rome in the region were dissolved...

 included Thessaly. In 12.462 of Metamorphoses, an Emathian Halesus is killed by the centaur

Centaur

In Greek mythology, a centaur or hippocentaur is a member of a composite race of creatures, part human and part horse...

 Latreus and in Catullus

Catullus

Gaius Valerius Catullus was a Latin poet of the Republican period. His surviving works are still read widely, and continue to influence poetry and other forms of art.-Biography:...

 64. 324, Peleus

Peleus

In Greek mythology, Pēleus was a hero whose myth was already known to the hearers of Homer in the late 8th century BCE. Peleus was the son of Aeacus, king of the island of Aegina, and Endeïs, the oread of Mount Pelion in Thessaly; he was the father of Achilles...

 is Emathiae tutamen (protector).

Polybius

Polybius

Polybius , Greek ) was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic Period noted for his work, The Histories, which covered the period of 220–146 BC in detail. The work describes in part the rise of the Roman Republic and its gradual domination over Greece...

 (23.10.4) mentions that Emathia was earliest called Paeonia

Paeonia

Paeonia or Paionia may refer to:*the generic name of the peony*the ancient tribe and kingdom of Paeonia , in today's northern Greece and the Republic of Macedonia*Paionia , a municipality in northern Greece...

 and Strabo (frg 7.38) that Paeonia was extended to Pieria and Pelagonia

Pelagonia

This is about the geographical plain between Greece and the Republic of Macedonia. For the political unit in Macedonia, go to Pelagonia Statistical Region....

. According to Hammond

N. G. L. Hammond

Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond CBE, DSO was a British scholar of ancient Greece of great accomplishment and an operative for the British Special Operations Executive in occupied Greece during World War II....

 the references are related to Bronze Age period before the Trojan War

Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology and was narrated in many works of Greek literature, including the Iliad...

.

Etymology

According to Solinus and Justin

Justin

Justin is a given name. It may refer to:People* Justin , a common given name* Justin , 3rd century Roman historian* Justin I , or Flavius Iustinius Augustus, an Eastern Roman Emperor who ruled from 518 to 527...

, Emathia was named after the Samothracian

Samothrace

Samothrace is a Greek island in the northern Aegean Sea. It is a self-governing municipality within the Evros peripheral unit of Thrace. The island is long and is in size and has a population of 2,723 . Its main industries are fishing and tourism. Resources on the island includes granite and...

 king Emathion

Emathion

- Ethiopian king :Emathion was king of Aethiopia, the son of Tithonus and Eos, and brother of Memnon. Heracles killed him.- Samothracian :Emathion was king of Samothrace, was the son of Zeus and Electra , brother to Dardanus, Iasion, Eetion, and Harmonia...

 and not after the local Emathus

Emathus

Emathus , Emathius or Amathus , was son of Makednos, from whom Emathia was believed to have derived its name. The daughters of Pierus, the Pierides, are sometimes called Emathides. The Emathian or Emathius in Latin is a frequently used name by Latin poets for Alexander the Great...

. The etymology of the name has been related to Homeric Greek

Homeric Greek

Homeric Greek is the form of the Greek language that was used by Homer in the Iliad and Odyssey. It is an archaic version of Ionic Greek, with admixtures from certain other dialects, such as Aeolic Greek. It later served as the basis of Epic Greek, the language of epic poetry, typically in...

: amathos êmathoessa, sandy land , PIE *samadh ; the coastal, swampy land around Axius river, in contrast to mountainous Macedonia . Probably also meadow land (PIE

Pie

A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that covers or completely contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients....

: mē-2, m-e-t- to mow, reap).