This study of prehistoric artefacts and ruins discovered in north-east Greece by the team of archaeologists led by A. J. B. Wace and M. S. Thompson was first published in 1912, thirty years after that area first revealed prehistoric remains. The one hundred and twenty sites in the Thessaly area have yielded domestic artefacts and ruins ranging from spit supports to tombs. These are depicted through detailed sketches, photographs and descriptions. The evolving architecture uncovered at different strata at the excavation sites, and the changing forms of the artefacts discovered alongside them, are explored in relation to other Greek excavation sites to determine any possible historic significance. Modern technological advances have taken some aspects of archaeology in a very different direction, but the practices of meticulous data collection and comparative analysis between sites and strata demonstrated here provide a valuable lesson in establishing a chronology of cultural and domestic development.

On the north-west side of the great central cone of Mount Ossa a wide fissure runs right across the mountain from Mega Keserlì to Tságezi. On the south side of this fissure and at the base of the central cone lies the village of Spiliá, which is to be distinguished from another village of the same name near Laspochori at the eastern entrance to Tempe. To the north of the fissure rises a peak known as Pláka, which is the part of Ossa that directly overhangs Tempe. A little below the bare rocky summit of this peak, which rises to a height of at least 3,500 feet, and on its south side about an hour's walk from Spiliá, is a cave, which, though long known to the inhabitants of the district, has never before been visited by archaeologists.

A little to the south of Sparta and opposite the hamlet of Psychiko, at the point where the Magoula river runs into the Eurotas, the hills on the left or eastern bank of the latter approach quite close to the river. These hills, which stand high above the plain, have long been identified with those on which, according to Polybius, the Menelaion stood, and as the site of Therapnai. In fact the statements of this author and of Livy make it practically certain that these are the hills in question. They were first explored by Ross in 1833, and he claimed as the shrine of Helen and Menelaos the building that he began to excavate on the principal peak close to the modern chapel of Hagios Elias, and directly above the Eurotas. No other Greek building has yet been found on these heights, so that we may for the present assume with considerable probability that this one, discovered by Ross, is the shrine of Helen and Menelaos mentioned by Herodotus and Pausanias.

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