4.8.7) was an ancient town of Messenia,[1] situated upon a hill rising from the left bank of the river Nedon, and at a distance of a mile (1.5 km) from the Messenian Gulf.
[3] William Smith states that it is probable that the earth deposited at the mouth of the river Nedon has, in the course of centuries, encroached upon the sea.
[5] Pherae occupied the site of Kalamata, the modern capital of Messenia; and in antiquity also it seems to have been the chief town in the southern Messenian plain.
The home of Diocles is also where Telemachus and Peisistratus spent a night at his house on their way from Pylos to visit king Menelaus in Lacedaemon[9] and their return.
[10] Xenophon records that Pherae (Φεραί) was one of the Lacedaemonian cities razed by Persian satrap Pharnabazus II and Athenian General Conon during the Corinthian War (in 394 BCE).
Pausanias visited it and noted temples of Tyche, and of Nicomachus and Gorgasus, grandsons of Asclepius.