Prosymna ( grc, Πρόσυμνα) was a town in ancient Argolis, in whose territory the celebrated Heraeum, or temple of

Hera In ancient Greek religion, Hera (; grc-gre, Ἥρα, Hḗrā; grc, Ἥρη, Hḗrē, label=none in Ionic and Homeric Greek) is the goddess of marriage, women and family, and the protector of women during childbirth. In Greek mythology, she ...

, stood. Statius gives it the epithet "celsa." Pausanias mentions only a district of this name. According to Greek mythology, its name derives from a daughter of Asterion called Prosymna who, together with her sisters Acrea and Euboea, were wet-nurses of Hera.

Archaeology

The place was inhabited since the Neolithic period. In 1878, the area of ancient Prosymna,

Panagiotis Stamatakis Panagiotis Stamatakis ( el, Παναγιώτης Σταµατάκης) (c.1840–1885) (sometimes anglicised as Panayotis or Stamatakes) was a Greek archaeologist. He is noted particularly for his role in supervising the excavations of Heinrich S ...

found a beehive tomb that was built in the Mycenaean epoch and that was also reused in later periods. Archaeological investigations continued under the auspices of the Swedish Institute at Athens in the 1930s and then during the 1980s and 1990s that found two settlement areas on two different sides of the Mastos hill slope, belonging to the Early and Late Helladic periods, respectively. They have found chamber tombs and large amounts of pottery that testify that the place was an important center of production of this material for many centuries. During the Hellenistic period and the early and late Roman the area also experienced a boom.Berbati en Argolis
on the website of the Swedish Institute of Athens.

References

Populated places in ancient Argolis Former populated places in Greece Ancient Greek archaeological sites in Greece {{AncientArgolis-geo-stub