Kyllini Attractions

Then as now it was a productive farming region, whose abundance of livestock is referred to by Homer ("Iliad", 11, 671 ff.; "Odyssey", 4, 635 ff.). In this region too were the Augean stables which Herakles had to cleanse. By conquering the territory of Pisatis, on the river Alpheios, and Triphylia, to the south of the river, Elis gained control of Olympia and the conduct of the Olympic Games. Its capital was the city of Elis, founded in 471 B.C. After the fourth Crusade (1203-04) the territory fell into the hands of the Villehardouins, who built the town of Andréville (now Andravída) as their capital. Communications with Europe were maintained through the port of Glareàntsa, 15km/9mi west on the north side of the Kyllíni peninsula, on which Geoffrey II de Villehardouin built in 1223 the mighty castle of Clairmont (now garbled into Khlemoutsí).