Lamia Castle stands at the highest part of the town, on the summit of a rocky hill. It dominates the surrounding area and controls the valley of the river of Spercheis as far as the Malian gulf, and the pass that leads through mount Orthrys to Thessaly. It is a highly important monument and bears direct witness to the history of the town. The earliest part of the fortification has polygonal masonry and dates from the 5th B.C., when Lamia became capital of Malis. The area was occupied during the Ottoman period, and a mosque was erected in the south-west corner. During the Lamian War (323/2 B.C), the Athenian general Leosthenes was killed outside the walls of the city while besieging the Macedonians who were dending Lamia. In 191 B.C, the Roman consul Marius Aquilius Glabrio captured the city and savagely plundered it. At the time of Justinian the acropolis was probably included in the programme of repairs to the forts between Thessaly and Thermopylae. In the 13 and 14th century B.C. it passed successively into the hands of the foreign conquerors of the Middle Ages, particularly the Franks and Catalans, and was called Kastro. In 1466, it was finally captured by the Ottoman Turks, who retained possession of it until Lamia was liberated in 1833. At the time of king Otto, an army barracks was erected in the central square to be used by the troops guarding the border, which was then just north of Lamia. The Castle continued to be used for military purposes until the beginning of the Second World War. Since 1994, the Lamia Archaeological Museum has been housed on the first floor of the barracks, which was repaired for the purpose.