Bolbe
ἡ Βόλβη λίμνη
Bolbe
1.
(ἡ Βόλβη λίμνη), a lake in Mygdonia in Macedonia, at no great distance from the sea. (Aeseh. Pers. 486; Scylax, p. 27; Thuc. 1.58, 4.103; Cantacuz. 2.25.) The lake empties itself into the Strymonic gulf,; by means of a river flowing through the pass called Aulon or Arethusa. (Thuc. 4.103.) The name of this river is not mentioned by Thucydides, but it is evidently the same as the Rechius (Ῥήχιος) of Procopius (de Aedif. 4.4). Among the smaller streams flowing into the lake we find mention of the Ammites (Ἀμμίτης) and Olynthiacus (Ὀλυνθιακός). (Athen. 8.334e.) The perch (λάβραχ) of the lake was particularly admired by the gastronomic poet Archestratus. (Athen. 7.311a.) The lake is now called Besíkia. It is about 12 miles in length, and 6 or 8 in breadth. (Clarke, Travels, vol. 2.3. p. 376; Leake, Northern Greece, vol. iii. pp. 170, 231, 462; Tafel, Thessalonica, p. 14, seq.)
2.
A town of the same name, situated upon the lake (Steph. B. sub voce Βόλβαι), to which Procopius (de Aedif. 4.4) gives the name of Bolbus (Βολβός). Leake places it on the northern side of the lake, on the site of the modern town of Besíkia. (Leake, Northern Greece, vol. iii. p. 231.)
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.