Pella became the capital of the kingdom of Macedonia around 400 BC. The city was sacked and plundered by the Romans in 168 BC and finished off by an earthquake a few decades later. It is said to be the birthplace of Alexander the Great and his father Philip II. It used to be a port, but the sea has receded.

Part of the ancient city has been excavated. What you can see at the site, about 40 minutes from Thessaloniki by bus, is mostly the floor plans of two large upper-class houses and the debris of the former Agora (marketplace/municipal offices). There is also a small museum that displays several of the floor mosaics from the excavation as well as household objects and grave goods.

The city was laid out in a grid, and apparently this area near the Agora was the classy section of town.

Views around the site

Apparently, archaeologists are impressed with the technology used in the city water and sewer system.

A piece of a clay water pipe (now perched on a wall fragment)

This is hard to see (should've tried the flash), but it's basically a 4th-century-BC manhole. At crossroads around the city, the water pipes emptied into clay jars that fed back into more pipes. The jars were there to let people look in and check on the state of the water system. (I presume this would've had a cover on top originally.) The mouth of this jar was about 8 inches in diameter.

A small drainage channel in the road, near the House of Dionysos

A larger drainage channel, covered by tiles

I wonder if this shelter is protecting ongoing excavations? There were a lot of chunks of stone and things under there.

A nearby village