Celetrum or Keletron ( grc, Κέλετρον) was a town of Orestis region in

Upper Macedonia Upper Macedonia (Greek: Ἄνω Μακεδονία, ''Ánō Makedonía'') is a geographical and tribal term to describe the upper/western of the two parts in which, together with Lower Macedonia, the ancient kingdom of Macedon was roughly divided. ...

(today: Western Macedonia, Greece), situated on a peninsula which is surrounded by the waters of a lake, and has only a single entrance over a narrow isthmus which connects it with the continent. Celetrum has been identified with the Celaenidium or Kelainidion (Κελαινίδιον) of Hierocles. The town also bore the name of Justinianopolis or Ioustinianoupolis (Ἰουστινιανούπολις). In the first campaign of the Romans in the Second Macedonian War, in 200 BCE, the consul

Sulpicius The gens Sulpicia was one of the most ancient patrician families at ancient Rome, and produced a succession of distinguished men, from the foundation of the Republic to the imperial period. The first member of the gens who obtained the consulshi ...

, after having invested this place, which submitted to him, returned to Dassaretia, and from thence regained Apollonia, the place from which he had departed on this expedition. The position is so remarkable that there is no difficulty in identifying it with the modern town of Kastoria. The lake, which bears the same name, is about six miles long and four broad (10 by 6 km). The peninsula is nearly four miles (6 km) in circumference, and the outer point is not far from the centre of the lake. The later fortification of Kastoria consists only of a wall across the western extremity of the isthmus, which was built in the time of the Byzantine Empire, and has a wet ditch, making the peninsula an island. In the middle of the wall stands a square tower, through which was the only entrance to the town. The ruins of a parallel wall flanked with round towers, which in Byzantine times crossed the peninsula from shore to shore, excluding all the east part of it, in the

19th century The 19th (nineteenth) century began on 1 January 1801 ( MDCCCI), and ended on 31 December 1900 ( MCM). The 19th century was the ninth century of the 2nd millennium. The 19th century was characterized by vast social upheaval. Slavery was abolis ...

divided the Greek and

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quarters of the town. The site of Celetrum is in the modern city of Kastoria.

References

Populated places in ancient Macedonia Former populated places in Greece Orestis (region) Kastoria {{AncientMacedonia-geo-stub