TEMPE, (anc. geog.), a most pleasant place or
valley of Thessaly. That there it was, appears from
the epithets Thessalica, (Livy); Thessala, (Ovid);
but in what particular district is the question. From
the Phthiotica of Catullus, it should seem to be of
Phthiotis: but the Peneus, which ran through Tempe,
was at too great a distance, being separated from it
by Mount Othrys and others. First, however, we shall
define Tempe, previous to the determining the particu-
lar district in which it lay. The Peneus, according to
Pliny, running down between Ossa to the south and
Olympus to the north, for 500 stadia, is for half that
space navigable: in the direction of this course lies
what is called Tempe, extending in length for five miles,
in breadth for almost an acre and an half, with gentle
convexities rising on the right and left, beyond ken of
human sight. Within glides the Peneus in its verdant
light, green in its pebbles, charming in the grass
on its banks, harmoniously vocal with the music of
birds. In this description Strabo and Ælian agree;
the last adding, that it has an agreeable variety of
places of retreat; and that it is not the work of man's
hand, but the spontaneous production of nature; and
Strabo, that formerly the Peneus formed a lake in this
spot, being checked in its course by the higher grounds
about the sea; but that an opening being made by an
earthquake, and Mount Ossa torn from Olympus, the
Peneus gained a free course between them. But Livy,
who calls Tempe a grove, remarks a degree of horror
rather than amenity, with which the Roman army was
struck in marching over the narrow pass; for, besides
the defile, difficult to go over, which runs on for five
miles, there are steep rocks on each hand, down which
the prospect is apt to cause a dizziness heightened by
the noise and depth of the interfluent Peneus. Hence
it appears that Tempe was in the Pelasgiotis, whose
extremity was formerly the Peneus, but afterwards,
as is probable, allotted to Magnesia; and thus Pliny
places the mouth of the Peneus not in Thessaly itself,
but in the Magnesia of Thessaly. The name is pro-
perly Temenos, a sacred grove; whence the Romans
formed Tempus, and the diminutive Tempulum, or
Templum. The name Tempe became at length an ap-
pellative to denote any pleasant spot.