Abae was the site of the oracular shrine of Apollon in Phokis (Phocis). The people of Abae claimed to have originally come from Argos and that their city was named after Abas, a son of Lynkeus (Lynceus) and Hypermnestra, the daughter of Danaus.
When King Xerxes of Persia invaded Greece in 480 BCE, he burned many of the Phokian cities including Abae. After the Persians were forced out of Greece, the inhabitants of Abae refused to rebuild the original temple of Apollon so they could remember their hatred of the Persians and the sacrilege the barbarians had committed. The temple of Apollon was burned a second time by the Thebans and very little of the original structure survived. A smaller temple of Apollon was built by the Roman Emperor Hadrian and decorated with old bronze statues of Apollon, Artemis and their mother, Leto.
| References: Pausanias, Description of Greece book 10.35.1 |