Description of Greece (Books VII–VIII: Achaia, Arcadia) — Pausanias
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ΠΑΥΣΑΝΙΟΥ ΕΛΛΑΔΟΣ ΠΕΡΙΗΓΗΣΙΣ
Translation/edition: A. R. Shilleto (1886)
Language: English
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## Description of Greece


## Book VII — Achaia

[7.1] Now the country between Elis and Sicyonia which borders on the Corinthian Gulf is called in our day Achaia from its inhabitants, but in ancient times was called Ægialus and its inhabitants Ægialians, according to the tradition of the Sicyonians from Ægialeus, who was king of what is now Sicyonia, others say from the position of the country which is mostly on the sea-shore.¹ After the death of Hellen his sons chased their brother Xuthus out of Thessaly, accusing him of having privately helped himself to their father’s money. And he fled to Athens, and was thought worthy to marry the daughter of Erechtheus, and he had by her two sons Achæus and Ion. After the death of Erechtheus he was chosen to decide which of his sons should be king, and, because he decided in favour of Cecrops the eldest, the other sons of Erechtheus drove him out of the country: and he went to Ægialus and there lived and died. And of his sons Achæus took an army from Ægialus and Athens and returned to Thessaly, and took possession of the throne of his ancestors, and Ion, while gathering together an army against the Ægialians and their king Selinus, received messengers from Selinus offering him his only child Helice in marriage, and adopting him as his son and heir. And Ion was very well contented with this, and after the death of Selinus reigned over the Ægialians, and built Helice which he called after the name of his wife, and called the inhabitants of Ægialus Ionians after him. This was not a change of name but an addition, for they were called the Ionian Ægialians. And the old name Ægialus long prevailed as the name of the country. And so Homer in his catalogue of the forces of Agamemnon was pleased to call the country by its old name,
“Throughout Ægialus and spacious Helice.”²
[7.1] And at that period of the reign of Ion when the Eleusinians were at war with the Athenians, and the Athenians invited Ion to be Commander in Chief, death seized him in Attica, and he was buried at Potamos, a village in Attica. And his descendants reigned after him till they and their people were dispossessed by the Achæans, who in their turn were driven out by the Dorians from Lacedæmon and Argos. The mutual feuds between the Ionians and Achæans I shall relate when I have first given the reason why, before the return of the Dorians, the inhabitants of Lacedæmon and Argos only of all the Peloponnese were called Achæans. Archander and Architeles, the sons of Achæus, came to Argos from Phthiotis and became the sons in law of Danaus, Architeles marrying Automate, and Archander Scæa. And that they were sojourners in Argos is shewn very clearly by the name Metanastes (stranger) which Archander gave his son. And it was when the sons of Achæus got powerful in Argos and Lacedæmon that the name Achæan got attached to the whole population. Their general name was Achæans, though the Argives were privately called Danai. And now when they were expelled from Argos and Lacedæmon by the Dorians, they and their king Tisamenus the son of Orestes made the Ionians proposals to become their colonists without war. But the Ionian Court was afraid that, if they and the Achæans were one people, Tisamenus would be chosen as king over both nations for his bravery and the lustre of his race. So the Ionians did not accept the proposals of the Achæans but went to blows over it, and Tisamenus fell in the battle, and the Achæans beat the Ionians, and besieged them in Helice to which they had fled, but afterwards let them go upon conditions. And the Achæans buried the body of Tisamenus at Helice, but some time afterwards the Lacedæmonians, in accordance with an oracle from Delphi, removed the remains to Sparta, and the tomb of Tisamenus is now where the Lacedæmonians have their banquetings, at the place called Phiditia. And when the Ionians migrated to Attica the Athenians and their king, Melanthus the son of Andropompus, welcomed them as settlers, in gratitude to Ion and his services to the Athenians as Commander in Chief. But there is a tradition that the Athenians suspected the Dorians, and feared that they would not keep their hands off them, and received the Ionians therefore as settlers rather from their formidable strength than from goodwill to them.
[7.2] And not many years afterwards Medon and Nileus, the eldest sons of Codrus, quarrelled as to who should be king over the Athenians, and Nileus said he would not submit to the rule of Medon, because Medon was lame in one of his feet. But as they decided to submit the matter to the oracle at Delphi, the Pythian Priestess assigned the kingdom to Medon. So Nileus and the other sons of Codrus were sent on a colony, and took with them whatever Athenians wished, and the Ionians formed the largest part of the contingent. This was the third expedition that had started from Greece under different kings and with different peoples. The oldest expedition was that of Iolaus the Theban, the nephew of Hercules, who led the Athenians and people of Thespiæ to Sardinia. And, one generation before the Ionians sailed from Athens, the Lacedæmonians and Minyæ who had been expelled by the Pelasgi from Lemnos were led by Theras the Theban, the son of Autesion, to the island henceforward called Theras after him, but formerly called Calliste. And now thirdly the sons of Codrus were put at the head of the Ionians, though they had no connection with them by race, being as they were Messenians from Pylos as far as Codrus and Melanthus were concerned, and Athenians only on their mother’s side. And the following Greeks took part in this expedition of the Ionians, the Thebans under Philotas, who was a descendant of Peneleus, and the Minyæ from Orchomenus, who were kinsmen of the sons of Codrus. All the Phocians also took part in it (except the people of Delphi), and the Abantes from Eubœa. And to the Phocians the Athenians Philogenes and Damon, the sons of Euctemon, gave ships to sail in, and themselves led them to the colony. And when they had crossed over to Asia Minor, different detachments went to different maritime towns, but Nileus and his contingent to Miletus. The Milesians give the following account of their early history. They say their country was for two generations called Anactoria, during the reigns of Anax the Autochthon and Asterius his son, and that, when Miletus put in there with an expedition of Cretans, then the town and country changed its name to Miletus from him. And Miletus and the force with him came from Crete fleeing from Minos the son of Europa. And the Carians, who had settled earlier in the neighbourhood of Miletus, admitted the Cretans to a joint share with them. But now when the Ionians conquered the old inhabitants of Miletus, they slew all the males except those that ran away from the captured city, and married their wives and daughters. And the tomb of Nileus is as you approach Didymi, not far from the gates on the left of the road. And the temple and oracle of Apollo at Didymi are of earlier date than the migration of the Ionians: as also is the worship of the Ephesian Artemis. Not that Pindar in my opinion understood all about the goddess, for he says that the Amazons who fought against Theseus and Athens built the temple to her. Those women from Thermodon did indeed sacrifice to the Ephesian Artemis, as having known her temple of old, when they fled from Hercules and earlier still from Dionysus, and sought refuge there: it was not however built by them, but by Coresus, an Autochthon, and by Ephesus (who was they think the son of the river Cayster, and gave his name to the city of Ephesus). And the Leleges (who form part of Caria) and most of the Lydians inhabited the district. And several people lived near the temple for the purpose of supplication, and some women of the Amazonian race. And Androclus the son of Codrus, who was appointed king of the Ionians that sailed to Ephesus, drove the Leleges and Lydians who dwelt in the upper part of the city out of the district; but of those who lived near the temple no apprehensions were entertained, but they mutually gave and received pledges with the Ionians without any hostilities. Androclus also took Samos from the Samians, and for some time the Ephesians were masters of Samos and the adjacent islands. And after the Samians returned to their own possessions, Androclus assisted the people of Priene against the Carians and, though the Greeks were victorious, fell in the battle. And the Ephesians took up his corpse, and buried it in their own country where the tomb is shewn to this day, on the way from the temple by the Olympiæum to the Magnesian gates. The device on the tomb is a man in full armour.
[7.2] And the Ionians, when they inhabited Myus and Priene, drove the Carians out from those cities. Cyaretus the son of Codrus colonized Myus, and Priene was colonized by Thebans and Ionians mixed under Philotas, the descendant of Peneleus, and Æpytus the son of Nileus. So Priene, which had been ravaged by Tabalus the Persian, and afterwards by Hiero one of its own citizens, at last became an Ionian city. But the dwellers in Myus left their town in consequence of the following circumstance. In the neighbourhood of Myus is a small bay: this was converted into a marsh by the Mæander filling up the mouth of the bay with mud. And as the water became foul and no longer sea, mosquitoes in endless quantities bred in the marsh, till they compelled the poor people of Myus to leave the place. And they went to Miletus and carried off with them everything they could take and the statues of the gods: and in my time there was at Myus only a temple of Dionysus in white marble. A similar disaster fell upon the Atarnitæ near Pergamum.
[7.3] The Colophonians also regard the temple and oracle of Apollo at Claros as most ancient, for, while the Carians were still in possession of the country, they say that the first Greeks who came there were Cretans, a large force powerful both by land and sea under Rhacius, and the Carians remained still in possession of most of the country. But when the Argives and Thersander the son of Polynices took Thebes, several captives, and among others Manto were taken to Apollo at Delphi, but Tiresias died on the road not far from Haliartus.³ And when the god sent them to form a colony they crossed over into Asia Minor, and when they got to Claros the Cretans attacked them and took them before Rhacius. And he, understanding from Manto who they were and their errand, married Manto and made her companions fellow-settlers with him. And Mopsus, the son of Rhacius and Manto, drove out all the Carians altogether. And the Ionians on mutual conditions became fellow-citizens upon equal terms with the Colophonian Greeks. And the kingdom over the Ionians was usurped by their leaders Damasichthon and Promethus the sons of Codrus. And Promethus afterwards slew his brother Damasichthon and fled to Naxos, and died there, and his body was taken home and buried by the sons of Damasichthon: his tomb is at a place called Polytichides. And how Colophon came to be dispeopled I have previously described in my account about Lysimachus: its inhabitants were the only colonists at Ephesus that fought against Lysimachus and the Macedonians. And the tombs of those from Colophon and Smyrna that fell in the battle are on the left of the road to Claros.
[7.3] Lebedus also was dispeopled by Lysimachus simply to add to the population of Ephesus. It was a place in many respects favoured, and especially for its very numerous and agreeable warm baths near the sea. Originally it was inhabited by the Carians, till Andræmon, the son of Codrus, and the Ionians drove them out. Andræmon’s tomb is on the left of the road from Colophon, after you have crossed the river Calaon.
[7.3] And Teos was colonized by the Minyæ from Orchomenus, who came with Athamas; he is said to have been a descendant of Athamas the son of Æolus. Here too the Carians were mixed up with the Greeks. And the Ionians were conducted to Teos by Apœcus, the great-great-grandson of Melanthus, who did no harm to either the Orchomenians or Teians. And not many years afterwards came men from Attica and Bœotia, the former under Damasus and Naoclus the sons of Codrus, the latter under the Bœotian Geres, and both these new-comers were hospitably received by Apœcus and the people of Teos.
[7.3] The Erythræi also say that they came originally from Crete with Erythrus (the son of Rhadamanthys) who was the founder of their city, and when the Lycians Carians and Pamphylians occupied the city as well as the Cretans, (the Lycians being kinsfolk of the Cretans, having originally come from Crete when they fled from Sarpedon, and the Carians having an ancient friendship with Minos, and the Pamphylians also having Greek blood in their veins, for after the capture of Ilium they wandered about with Calchas), when all those that I have mentioned occupied Erythræ, Cleopus the son of Codrus gathered together from all the towns in Ionia various people, whom he formed into a colony at Erythræ.
[7.3] And the people of Clazomenæ and Phocæa had no cities before the Ionians came to Asia Minor: but when the Ionians arrived a detachment of them, not knowing their way about the country, sent for one Parphorus a Colophonian as their guide, and having built a city under Mount Ida left it not long after, and returned to Ionia and built Scyppius in Colophonia. And migrating of their own accord from Colophonia, they occupied the territory which they now hold, and built on the mainland the town of Clazomenæ. But afterwards from fear of the Persians they crossed over into the island opposite. But in process of time Alexander the son of Philip was destined to convert Clazomenæ into a peninsula, by connecting the island with the mainland by an embankment. Most of the inhabitants of Clazomenæ were not Ionians, but were from Cleonæ and Phlius, and had left those cities when the Dorians returned to the Peloponnese. And the people of Phocæa were originally from the country under Mount Parnassus which is still to our day called Phocis, and crossed over into Asia Minor with the Athenians Philogenes and Damon. And they took territory not by war but on an understanding with the people of Cyme. And as the Ionians would not receive them into the Pan-Ionic confederacy unless they received kings from the descendants of Codrus, they accepted from Erythræ and Teos Deœtes and Periclus and Abartus.
[7.4] And the cities of the Ionians in the islands were Samos near Mycale, and Chios opposite Mimas. The Samian Asius, the son of Amphiptolemus, has written in his poems that Phœnix had by Perimede (the daughter of Œneus) Astypalæa and Europe, and that Poseidon had by Astypalæa a son Ancæus, who was king over the Leleges, and married the daughter of the river-god Mæander, her name was Samia, and their children were Perilaus and Enudus and Samos and Alitherses and one daughter Parthenope, who bare Lycomedes to Apollo. Such is the account of Asius in his poems. Those who inhabited Samos at this time received the Ionian colonists rather of necessity than goodwill. The Ionian leader was Procles the son of Pityreus, an Epidaurian as also was a large number of his men, they had been banished from Epidauria by Deiphontes and the Argives, and Procles himself was a descendant of Ion the son of Xuthus. And Androclus and the Ephesians marched against Leogorus the son of Procles, who succeeded his father as king of Samos, and having defeated him in battle drove the Samians out of the island, on the pretext that they had joined the Carians in a plot against the Ionians. Of the Samians that were thus driven out of Samos some took a colony to the island near Thrace, which had been previously known as Dardania, but was henceforth called Samothrace; others under Leogorus built a fort on the mainland opposite at Anæa, and ten years afterwards crossed into Samos, drove out the Ephesians and recovered the island.
[7.4] The temple of Hera in Samos was according to the tradition of some built by the Argonauts, who brought the statue of the goddess from Argos. But the Samians themselves think that the goddess was born in their island on the banks of the river Imbrasus, and under the willow-tree that still grows in the temple of Hera. That this temple could not have been very ancient one naturally infers from the statue, which is by the Æginetan Smilis, the son of Euclides, who was a contemporary of Dædalus, but has not acquired equal renown. For Dædalus, an Athenian of the royal stock called Metionidæ, was most remarkable of all men for his art and misfortunes. For having killed his sister’s son, and knowing the vengeance that awaited him in his country, he became a voluntary exile and fled to Minos and Crete, and made works of art for Minos and his daughters, as Homer has described in the Iliad. But being condemned for treason against Minos, and thrown into prison with his son, he escaped from Crete and went to Inycus, a city of Sicily, to the court of Cocalus, and caused a war between the Sicilians and Cretans, because Cocalus would not give him up at the request of Minos. And so much beloved was he by the daughters of Cocalus for his art, that these ladies entered into a plot against the life of Minos out of favour to Dædalus. And it is plain that his fame extended over all Sicily, and most of Italy. While Smilis, except among the Samians and at Elea, had no fame whatever out of his own country; but he went to Samos, and there he made the statue of Hera.
[7.4] About Chios Ion the Tragedian has recorded that Poseidon went to that island when it was unoccupied, and had an intrigue there with a Nymph, and when she was in labour some snow fell, and so Poseidon called the boy Chios.⁴ By another Nymph he had Agelus and Melas. And in process of time Œnopion sailed to Chios from Crete with his sons Talus and Euanthes and Melas and Salagus and Athamas. And during the reign of Œnopion some Carians came to the island, and the Abantes from Eubœa. And Œnopion and his sons were succeeded by Amphiclus, who came to Chios from Histiæa in Eubœa in accordance with the oracle at Delphi. And Hector the fourth in descent from Amphiclus, (for he too was king of Chios), fought against the Abantes and Carians that were still in the island, and slew some in various battles, and compelled others to leave the island upon conditions of war. And after the Chians had finished the war, then Hector bethought him that he and the Ionians ought to jointly sacrifice to the welfare of the Pan-Ionic league. And Ion says he received the present of a tripod from the community of the Ionians for his prowess. But Ion has not told us how it was the Chians got ranked as Ionians.
[7.5] And Smyrna, which was one of the 12 cities of the Æolians, on the site of what they now call the old city, was taken from the Æolians by the Ionians who came from Colophon, but some time afterwards the Ionians admitted its inhabitants to the Pan-Ionic league. But Alexander the son of Philip built the modern Smyrna in consequence of a dream he had. For on his return from hunting on Mount Pagus he went they say to the temple of Nemesis, and there found a well, and a plane-tree in front of the temple growing in the water. And they say he slept under this plane-tree and the goddesses of Nemesis appeared to him and bade him build a town on that site, and remove the people of Smyrna there from the old Smyrna. And the people of Smyrna sent envoys to Claros to consult the oracle in the present conjuncture, and the god gave the following oracular response,
“Thrice happy yea four times happy shall those men be, who shall dwell near Mount Pagus across the sacred Meles.”
[7.5] So they willingly removed, and they worship two Nemeses instead of one, and they say their mother was Night, but the Athenians who worship Nemesis at Rhamnus say that she was the daughter of Oceanus.
[7.5] The Ionians have a most magnificent country for the fruits of the earth, and temples such as there are nowhere else, the finest that of Ephesian Artemis for size and opulence, and next two to Apollo not quite finished, one at Branchidæ in Milesia, the other at Claros in Colophonia. Two temples in Ionia were burnt down by the Persians, one of Hera in Samos, and one of Athene in Phocæa. They are still wonderful though the fire has passed upon them. And you would be delighted with the temple of Hercules at Erythræ, and with the temple of Athene at Priene, the latter for the statue of the goddess, the former for its great antiquity. And at Erythræ is a work of art unlike the most ancient of Æginetan or Attic workmanship: its design is perfect Egyptian. It is the wooden raft on which the god sailed from Tyre in Phœnicia, why the people of Erythræ do not say. But to prove that it came into the Ionian sea they say it was moored at the promontory called Mid, which is on the mainland about half-way from the harbour of Erythræ to the island of Chios. And when this raft was at the promontory, the people of Erythræ and the Chians too had no small trouble in trying to get it on shore. At last a native of Erythræ, who got his living from the sea by catching fish, but had lost his eyesight through some disease, Phormio by name, dreamed that the women of Erythræ were to cut off their hair, and that the men making a rope out of this hair were to drag the raft ashore. The women who were citizens wouldn’t hear of it: but all the women who were slaves of Thracian race, or who being free had yet to earn their own living, allowed their hair to be cut off, and so at last the people of Erythræ got the raft to shore. So Thracian women alone are allowed to enter the temple of Hercules, and the rope made of hair is still kept by the people of Erythræ. They also say that the fisherman recovered his sight, and saw for the rest of his life. At Erythræ there is also a temple of Athene Polias, and a huge wooden statue of the goddess seated on a throne, in one hand a distaff in the other a globe. We conjecture it to be by Endœus from several circumstances, especially looking at the workmanship of the statue inside, and the Graces and Seasons in white marble, which used to stand in the open air. The people of Smyrna also had in my time a temple of Æsculapius between the mountain Coryphe and the sea which is unmixed with any other water.
[7.5] Ionia besides the temples and the salubrity of the air has several other things worthy of record. Near Ephesus is the river Cenchrius, and the fertile Mount Pion, and the well Halitæa. And in Milesia is the well Biblis: of the love passages of Biblis they still sing. And in Colophonia is the grove of Apollo, consisting of ash trees, and not far from the grove the river Ales, the coldest river in Ionia. And the people of Lebedus have baths which are both wonderful and useful to men. The people of Teos also have baths at the promontory Macria, some natural consisting of sea-water that bursts in at a crevice of the rock, others built at wonderful cost. The people of Clazomenæ also have baths. Agamemnon is honoured there. And there is a grotto called the grotto of Pyrrhus’ mother, and they have a tradition about Pyrrhus as a shepherd. The people of Erythræ have also a place called Chalcis, from which the third of their tribes takes its name, where there is a promontory extending to the sea, and some sea baths, which of all the baths in Ionia are most beneficial to men. And the people of Smyrna have the most beautiful river Meles and a cave near its springs, where they say Homer wrote his Poems. The Chians also have a notable sight in the tomb of Œnopion, about whose deeds they have several legends. The Samians too on the way to the temple of Hera have the tomb of Rhadine and Leontichus, which those are accustomed to visit who are melancholy through love. The wonderful things indeed in Ionia are not far short of those in Greece altogether.
[7.6] After the departure of the Ionians the Achæans divided their land and lived in their towns, which were 12 in number, and well known throughout Greece. Dyme first near Elis, and then Olenus, and Pharæ, and Tritea, and Rhypes, and Ægium, and Cerynea, and Bura, and Helice, and Ægæ and Ægira, and last Pellene near Sicyonia. In these towns, which had formerly been inhabited by the Ionians, the Achæans and their kings dwelt. And those who had the greatest power among the Achæans were the sons of Tisamenus, Däimenes and Sparton and Tellis and Leontomenes. Cometes, the eldest of Tisamenus’ sons, had previously crossed over into Asia Minor. These ruled over the Achæans as also Damasias (the son of Penthilus, the son of Orestes), the brother of Tisamenus. Equal authority to them had Preugenes and his son Patreus from Lacedæmon; who were allowed by the Achæans to build a city in their territory, which was called Patræ after Patreus.
[7.6] The following were the wars of the Achæans. In the expedition of Agamemnon against Ilium, as they inhabited both Lacedæmon and Argos, they were the largest contingent from Greece. But when Xerxes and the Medes invaded Greece, the Achæans as far as we know did not join Leonidas at the pass of Thermopylæ, nor did they fight under Themistocles and the Athenians in the sea-fights off Eubœa and Salamis, nor were they in either the Lacedæmonian or Athenian list of allies. They were also behind at Platæa: for otherwise they would certainly have been mentioned among the other Greeks on the basement of the statue of Zeus at Olympia.⁵ I cannot but think they stayed behind on each of these occasions to save their country, and also after the Trojan War they did not think it befitting that the Lacedæmonians (who were Dorians) should lead them. As they showed long afterwards. For when the Lacedæmonians were at war with the Athenians, the Achæans readily entered into an alliance with the people of Patræ, and were equally friendly with the Athenians. And they took part in the wars that were fought afterwards by Greece, as at Chæronea against Philip and the Macedonians. But they admit that they did not go into Thessaly or take part in the battle of Lamia, because they had not yet recovered from their reverse in Bœotia. And the Custos Rotulorum at Patræ says that the wrestler Chilon was the only Achæan present at the action at Lamia. I know also myself that the Lydian Adrastus fought privately (and not in any concert with the Lydians) for the Greeks. This Adrastus had a brazen effigy erected to him by the Lydians in front of the temple of Persian Artemis, and the inscription they wrote upon it was that he died fighting for the Greeks against Leonnatus. And the pass at Thermopylæ that admitted the Galati was overlooked by all the Peloponnesians as well as by the Achæans: for as the barbarians had no ships, they thought they had nothing to fear from them, if they strongly fortified the Isthmus of Corinth, from Lechæum on the one sea to Cenchreæ on the other.
[7.6] This was the view at that time of all the Peloponnesians. And when the Galati crossed over into Asia Minor in ships got somewhere or other, then the Greeks were so situated that none of them were any longer clearly the leading state. For as to the Lacedæmonians, their reverse at Leuctra, and the gathering of the Arcadians at Megalopolis, and the vicinity of the Messenians on their borders, prevented their recovering their former prosperity. And the city of the Thebans had been so laid waste by Alexander, that not many years afterwards when they were reduced by Cassander, they were unable to protect themselves at all. And the Athenians had indeed the good will of all Greece for their famous actions, but that was no security to them in their war with the Macedonians.
[7.7] The Achæans were most powerful in the days when the Greeks were not banded together, but each looked after their own personal interests. For none of their towns except Pellene had any experience of tyrants at any time. And misfortunes from wars and the plague did not so much touch the Achæans as all the other Greeks. Accordingly what is called the Achæan League was by common consent the design and act of the Achæans. And this League was formed at Ægium because, next to Helice which had been swept away by a flood, it had been the foremost town in Achaia in former times, and was at this time the most powerful. And of the other Greeks the Sicyonians first joined this Achæan League. And next to the Sicyonians some of the other Peloponnesians joined it, some immediately, some rather later: and outside the Isthmus what brought people in was seeing that the Achæan League was becoming more and more powerful. And the Lacedæmonians were the only Greeks that were unfriendly to the Achæans and openly took up arms against them. For Pellene an Achæan town was taken by Agis, the son of Eudamidas, King of Sparta, though he was soon driven out again by Aratus and the Sicyonians. And Cleomenes, the son of Leonidas and grandson of Cleonymus, a king of the other family, when Aratus and the Achæans were gathered together at Dyme against him routed them badly in battle, though he afterwards concluded peace with the Achæans and Antigonus. Antigonus was at this time ruler of the Macedonians, being Regent for Philip, the son of Demetrius, who was quite a boy; he was Philip’s uncle and also stepfather. With him and the Achæans Cleomenes made peace, but soon violated his engagements, and reduced to slavery Megalopolis in Arcadia. And the reverse which the Lacedæmonians met with at Sellasia at the hands of the Achæans and Antigonus was in consequence of Cleomenes’ violation of his word. But Cleomenes we shall mention again when we come to Arcadia. And Philip the son of Demetrius, when he came to age, received the rule over the Macedonians from his stepfather Antigonus, who was glad to surrender it, and inspired great fear in all the Greeks by closely imitating Philip the son of Amyntas, (who was no ancestor of his, but a true despot), as in bribing people to betray their country. And at banquets he would offer the cup of fellowship and kindness filled not with wine but deadly poison, a thing which Philip the son of Amyntas in my opinion never thought of, but to Philip the son of Demetrius poisoning appeared a very trifling crime. And three towns he turned into garrison-towns as points d’appui against Greece, and in his insolence and haughty disregard of the Greeks he called these towns the keys of Greece. One was Corinth in the Peloponnese, the citadel of which he strongly fortified, and for Eubœa and Bœotia and Phocis he had Chalcis near the Euripus, and for Thessaly and Ætolia he garrisoned Magnesia under Mount Pelion. And by perpetual raids and plundering incursions he harassed the Athenians and Ætolians especially. I have mentioned before in my account of Attica the Greeks or barbarians who assisted the Athenians against Philip, and how in consequence of the weakness of their allies the Athenians were obliged to rely on an alliance with Rome. The Romans had sent some soldiers not long before nominally to assist the Ætolians against Philip, but really to spy out what the Macedonians were aiming at. But now they sent an army under the command of Otilius, that was his best known name, for the Romans are not called like the Greeks merely after their father’s name, but have 3 names at least and sometimes more. This Otilius had orders from the Romans to protect the Athenians and Ætolians against Philip. Otilius in all other respects obeyed his orders, but did one thing that the Romans were not pleased at. For he captured and rased to the ground Hestiæa (a town in Eubœa) and Anticyra in Phocis, places which had submitted to Philip simply from necessity. This was I think the reason why the Senate when they heard of it superseded him by Flaminius.
[7.8] Flaminius on his arrival immediately defeated the Macedonian garrison at Eretria and plundered the town, and next marched to Corinth which was occupied by Philip’s garrison, and sat down to a regular siege, and sent to the Achæans urging them to come to Corinth with an army, so as to be reckoned the allies of the Romans, and in friendship to the Greeks generally. But the Achæans took it ill that Flaminius and still earlier Otilius had handled so savagely old Greek cities, that had committed no offence against Rome, and were under the Macedonians against their wish. They foresaw also that instead of Philip and the Macedonians they would merely have the Romans as dictators in Greece. But after many speeches from different points of view had been delivered in the council, at last the party friendly to the Romans prevailed, and the Achæans joined Flaminius in the siege of Corinth. And the Corinthians, being thus freed from the Macedonian yoke, at once joined the Achæan League, which indeed they had formerly joined, when Aratus and the Sicyonians drove out the garrison from the citadel of Corinth and slew Persæus, who had been put in command of the garrison by Antigonus. And from that time forward the Achæans were called the allies of the Romans, and were devoted to them at all times, and followed them into Macedonia against Philip, and joined them in an expedition against the Ætolians, and fought on their side against Antiochus and the Syrians.
[7.8] In fighting against the Macedonians and Syrians the Achæans were animated only by friendship to the Romans: but in fighting against the Ætolians they were satisfying a long-standing grudge. And when the power at Sparta of Nabis, a man of the most unrelenting cruelty, had been overthrown, the Lacedæmonians became their own masters again, and as time went on the Achæans got them into their League, and were very severe with them, and rased to the ground the fortifications of Sparta, which had been formerly run up hastily at the time of the invasion of Demetrius and afterwards of Pyrrhus and the Epirotes, but during the power of Nabis had been very strongly fortified. And not only did the Achæans rase the walls of Sparta, but they prevented their youths from training as Lycurgus had ordained, and made them train in the Achæan way. I shall enter into all this in more detail in my account about Arcadia. And the Lacedæmonians, being sorely vexed with these harassing decrees of the Achæans, threw themselves into the arms of Metellus and his colleagues, who had come on an embassy from Rome, not to try and stir up war against Philip and the Macedonians, for a peace had been previously solemnly concluded between Philip and the Romans, but to try the charges made against Philip either by the Thessalians or the Epirotes. Philip himself indeed and the Macedonian supremacy had actually received a fatal blow from the Romans. For fighting against Flaminius and the Romans on the range of hills called Cynoscephalæ Philip got the worst of it, and having put forth all his strength in the battle got so badly beaten that he lost the greater part of his army, and was obliged by the Roman terms to remove his garrisons from all the Greek towns which he had seized and reduced during the war. The peace indeed with the Romans which he obtained sounded specious, but was only procured by various entreaties and at great expenditure of money. The Sibyl had indeed foretold not without the god the power which the Macedonians would attain to in the days of Philip the son of Amyntas, and how all this would crumble away in the days of another Philip. These are the very words of her oracle—
“Ye Macedonians, that boast in the Argeadæ as your kings, to you Philip as ruler shall be both a blessing and a curse. The first Philip shall make you ruler over cities and people, the last shall lose you all your honour, conquered by men both from the West and East.”
[7.8] The Romans that overthrew the Macedonian Empire lived in the West of Europe, and Attalus and the Mysian force that cooperated with them may be said to have been Eastern Nations.
[7.9] But now Metellus and his colleagues resolved not to neglect the quarrels of the Lacedæmonians and Achæans, so they convened before their council-board the most prominent Achæans, that they might publicly advise them to treat the Lacedæmonians in a kindlier spirit. And the Achæans returned answer that they would give no hearing to them or anyone else, who should approach them on any subject whatever, except they were armed with a decree from the Roman Senate. And Metellus and his colleagues, thinking they were treated by the Achæans with rather too much hauteur, on their return to Rome told the Senate many things against the Achæans which were not all true. And further charges still were brought against the Achæans by Areus and Alcibiades, who were held in great repute at Sparta, but who did not act well to the Achæans: for when they were exiled by Nabis the Achæans had kindly received them, and after the death of Nabis had restored them to Sparta contrary to the wish of the Lacedæmonian people. But now being admitted before the Roman Senate they inveighed against the Achæans with the greatest zeal. And the Achæans on their return from Rome sentenced them to death in their Council. And the Roman Senate sent Appius and some others to put the differences between the Achæans and Lacedæmonians on a just footing. But this embassy was not likely to please the Achæans, inasmuch as in Appius’ suite were Areus and Alcibiades, whom the Achæans detested at this time. And when they came into the council chamber they endeavoured by their words to stir up rather the animosity of the Achæans than to win them over by persuasion. Lycortas of Megalopolis, a man in merit behind none of the Arcadians, and who had friendly relations with Philopœmen upon whom he relied, put forward in his speech the just claims of the Achæans, and at the same time covertly blamed the Romans. But Appius and his suite jeered at Lycortas’ speech, and passed a vote that Areus and Alcibiades had committed no crime against the Achæans, and allowed the Lacedæmonians to send envoys to Rome, thus contravening the previous convention between the Romans and Achæans. For it had been publicly agreed that envoys of the Achæans might go to the Roman Senate, but those states which were in the Achæan League were forbidden to send envoys privately. And when the Achæans sent a counter-embassy to that of the Lacedæmonians, and the speeches on both sides were heard in the Senate, then the Romans despatched Appius and all his former suite as plenipotentiaries between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans. And they restored to Sparta those that had been exiled by the Achæans, and they remitted the fines of those who had absconded before judgment, and had been condemned in their absence. And they did not remove the Lacedæmonians from the Achæan League, but they ordered that foreign⁶ courts were to try capital cases, but all other cases they could themselves try, or submit them to the Achæan League. And the Spartans again built walls all round their city from the foundation. And those Lacedæmonians who were restored from exile meditated all sorts of contrivances against the Achæans, hoping to injure them most in the following way. The Messenians who were concerned in the death of Philopœmen, and who were banished it was thought on that account by the Achæans, these and other exiles of the Achæans they persuaded to go and take their case to Rome. And they went with them and intrigued for their return from exile. And as Appius greatly favoured the Lacedæmonians, and on all occasions went against the Achæans, whatever the Messenian or Achæan exiles wished was sure to come off without any difficulty, and letters were sent by the Senate to Athens and Ætolia, ordering them to restore the Messenians and Achæans to their rights. This seemed the unkindest cut of all to the Achæans, who upon various occasions were treated with great injustice by the Romans, and who saw that all their past services went for nothing, for after having fought against Philip and the Ætolians and Antiochus simply to oblige the Romans, they were neglected for exiles whose lives were far from pure. Still they thought they had better submit.
[7.10] Such was the state of affairs up to this point. But the most impious of all crimes, the betrayal of one’s country and fellow citizens for gain, was destined to bring about the destruction of the Achæans, a crime that has ever troubled Greece. For in the days of Darius (the son of Hystaspes) king of the Persians the Ionian affairs were ruined by all the Samian captains but eleven treacherously surrendering their ships. And after the subjugation of the Ionians the Medes enslaved Eretria; when those held in highest repute in Eretria played the traitor, as Philagras, the son of Cyneus, and Euphorbus, the son of Alcimachus. And when Xerxes went on his expedition to Greece, Thessaly was betrayed by the Aleuadæ, and Thebes was betrayed by Attaginus and Timegenidas, its foremost men. And during the Peloponnesian war Xenias, a native of Elis, endeavoured to betray Elis to the Lacedæmonians and Agis. And those who were called Lysander’s friends never ceased the attempt to betray their countries to Lysander. And in the reign of Philip, the son of Amyntas, one will find that Lacedæmon was not the only one of the Greek cities that were betrayed: the cities of Greece were more ruined through treason than they had been formerly by the plague. But Alexander the son of Philip had very little success indeed by treason. And after the reverse to the Greeks at Lamia Antipater, wishing to cross over with all despatch to the war in Asia Minor, was content to patch up a peace speedily, as it mattered nothing to him whether he left Athens or indeed all Greece free. But Demades and other traitors at Athens persuaded Antipater not to act friendly to the Greeks, and, by frightening the commonalty of the Athenians, they were the means of the introduction into Athens and most other towns of the Macedonian garrisons. What confirms my account is that the Athenians after the reverse in Bœotia did not become subject to Philip, though 1,000 were killed in the action, and 2,000 taken prisoners after: but at Lamia, although only 200 fell, they became slaves of the Macedonians. Thus at no time were wanting to Greece people afflicted with this itch for treason. And the Achæans at this time were made subject to the Romans entirely through the Achæan Callicrates. But the beginning of their troubles was the overthrow of Perseus and the Macedonian Empire by the Romans.
[7.10] Perseus the son of Philip was originally at peace with the Romans according to the terms of agreement between them and his father Philip, but he violated these conditions when he led an army against Abrupolis, the king of the Sapæans, (who are mentioned by Archilochus in one of his Iambic verses) and dispossessed them, though they were allies of the Romans. And Perseus and the Macedonians having been beaten in war on account of this outrage upon the Sapæans, ten Roman Senators were sent to settle affairs in Macedonia according to the interests of the Romans. And when they came to Greece Callicrates insinuated himself among them, letting slip no occasion of flattering them either in word or deed. And one of them, who was by no means remarkable for justice, was so won over by Callicrates that he was persuaded by him to enter the Achæan League. And he went to one of their general meetings, and said that when Perseus was at war with the Romans the most influential Achæans had furnished him with money, and assisted him in other respects. He bade the Achæans therefore pass a sentence of death against these men: and he said if they would do so, then he would give them their names. This seemed an altogether unfair way of putting it, and those present at the general meeting said that, if any of the Achæans had acted with Perseus, their names must be mentioned first, for it was not fair to condemn them before. And when the Roman was thus confuted, he was so confident as to affirm that all the Achæan Generals were implicated in the charge, for all were friendly to Perseus and the Macedonians. This he said at the instigation of Callicrates. And Xeno rose up next, a man of no small renown among the Achæans, and spoke as follows. “As to this charge, I am a General of the Achæans, and have neither acted against the Romans, nor shewn any good will to Perseus. And I am ready to be tried on this charge before either the Achæan League or the Romans.” This he said in the boldness of a good conscience. But the Roman Senator at once seized the opportunity his words suggested, and sent all whom Callicrates accused of being friendly to Perseus to stand their trial at Rome. Nothing of the kind had ever previously happened to the Greeks. For the Macedonians in the zenith of their power, as under Philip, the son of Amyntas, and Alexander, had never forced any Greeks who opposed them to be sent into Macedonia, but had allowed them to be tried by the Amphictyonic Council. But now every Achæan, however innocent, who was accused by Callicrates, had to go to Rome, so it was decreed, and more than 1,000 so went. And the Romans, treating them as if they had been already condemned by the Achæans, imprisoned them in various towns in Etruria, and, although the Achæans sent various embassies and supplications about them, returned no answer. But 17 years afterwards they released some 300 or even fewer, (who were all that remained in Italy of the 1,000 and more Achæans), thinking they had been punished sufficiently. And all those who escaped either on the journey to Rome in the first instance, or afterwards from the towns to which they had been sent by the Romans, were, if captured, capitally punished at once and no excuse received.
[7.11] And the Romans sent another Senator to Greece, Gallus by name, who was sent to arbitrate on the disputes between the Lacedæmonians and the Argives. This Gallus both spoke and acted with much hauteur to the Greeks, and treated the Lacedæmonians and Argives with the greatest contempt possible. For he disdained himself to arbitrate for cities which had attained such great renown, and had fought for their fatherland bravely and lavishly, and had previously submitted their claims to no less an arbitrator than Philip the son of Amyntas, and submitted the decision to Callicrates, the plague of all Greece. And when the Ætolians who inhabit Pleuron came to Gallus, desiring release from the Achæan League, they were allowed by him to send a private embassy to Rome, and the Romans gave their consent to what they asked. The Roman Senate also despatched to Gallus a decree, that he was at liberty to release from the Achæan League as many towns as he liked.
[7.11] And he carried out his orders, and meantime the Athenian people from necessity rather than choice plundered Oropus which was a town subject to them, for the Athenians had been reduced to a greater state of poverty than any of the Greeks by the war with the Macedonians. The Oropians appealed to the Senate at Rome, and they, thinking they had not been treated well, ordered the Sicyonians to levy upon the Athenians a fine proportionate to the harm they had done to the Oropians. The Sicyonians, as the Athenians did not come into court at the time of trial, fined them in their absence 500 talents, but the Roman Senate at the request of the Athenians remitted all the fine but 100 talents. And the Athenians did not pay even this, but by promises and gifts prevailed upon the Oropians to agree, that an Athenian garrison should occupy Oropus, and that the Athenians should have hostages from the Oropians, and if the Oropians should bring any further charges against the Athenians, then the Athenians were to withdraw their garrison, and return their hostages. And no long time elapsed when some of the garrison insulted some of the townsmen of Oropus. They sent therefore envoys to Athens to demand back their hostages, and at the same time to ask the Athenians to take away their garrison according to their agreement. But the Athenians flatly refused, on the plea that the outrage was committed by the garrison and not the Athenian people, they promised however that those in fault should be punished. And the Oropians appealed to the Achæans to help them, but the Achæans refused out of friendship and respect to the Athenians. Then the Oropians promised ten talents to Menalcidas, a Lacedæmonian by birth but serving at this time as General of the Achæans, if he would make the Achæans help them. And he promised half the money to Callicrates, who because of his friendship with the Romans had the greatest influence over the Achæans. And Callicrates responding to the wishes of Menalcidas, it was determined to help the Oropians against the Athenians. And some one announced news of this to the Athenians, and they with all speed went to Oropus, and after plundering whatever they had spared in former raids, withdrew their garrison. And Menalcidas and Callicrates tried to persuade the Achæans who came up too late for help, to make an inroad into Attica: but as they were against it, especially those who had come from Lacedæmon, the army went back again.
[7.12] And the Oropians, though no help had come from the Achæans, yet had to pay the money promised to Menalcidas. And he, when he had received his bribe, thought it a misfortune that he would have to share any part of it with Callicrates. So at first he practised putting off the payment of the gift and other wiles, but soon afterwards he was so bold as to deprive him of it altogether. My statement is confirmed by the proverb, “One fire burns fiercer than another fire, and one wolf is fiercer than other wolves, and one hawk flies swifter than another hawk, since the most unscrupulous of all men, Callicrates, is outdone in treachery by Menalcidas.” And Callicrates, who was never superior to any bribe, and had got nothing out of his hatred to Athens, was so vexed with Menalcidas that he deprived him of his office, and prosecuted him on a capital charge before the Achæans, viz. that he had tried to undermine the Achæans on his embassy to Rome, and that he had endeavoured to withdraw Sparta from the Achæan league. Menalcidas in this crisis gave 3 of the talents from Oropus to Diæus of Megalopolis, who had been his successor as General of the Achæans, and now, being zealous in his interest on account of his bribe, was bent on saving Menalcidas in spite of the Achæans. But the Achæans both privately and publicly were vexed with Diæus for the acquittal of Menalcidas. But Diæus turned away their charges against him to the hope of greater gain, by using the following wile as a pretext. The Lacedæmonians had gone to the Senate at Rome about some debateable land, and the Senate had told them to try all but capital cases before the Achæan League. Such was their answer. But Diæus told the Achæans what was not the truth, and deluded them by saying that the Roman Senate allowed them to pass sentence of death upon a Spartan. They therefore thought the Lacedæmonians could also pass sentence of life and death on themselves: but the Lacedæmonians did not believe that Diæus was speaking the truth, and wished to refer the matter to the Senate at Rome. But the Achæans objected to this, that the cities in the Achæan League had no right without common consent to send an embassy privately to Rome. In consequence of these disputes war broke out between the Achæans and the Lacedæmonians, and the Lacedæmonians, knowing they were not able to fight the Achæans, sent embassies to their cities and spoke privately to Diæus. All the cities returned the same answer, that if their general ordered them to take the field they could not disobey. For Diæus was in command, and he said that he intended to fight not against Sparta but against all that troubled her. And when the Spartan Senate asked who he thought were the criminals, he gave them a list of 24 men who were prominent in Sparta. Thereupon the opinion of Agasisthenes prevailed, a man previously held in good repute, and who for the following advice got still more highly thought of. He persuaded all those men whose names were mentioned to exile themselves from Lacedæmon, and not by remaining there to bring on a war on Sparta, and if they fled to Rome he said they would be soon restored by the Romans. So they departed and were nominally tried in their absence in the Spartan law-courts and condemned to death: but Callicrates and Diæus were sent by the Achæans to Rome to plead against these Spartan exiles before the Senate. And Callicrates died on the road of some illness, nor do I know whether if he had gone on to Rome he would have done the Achæans any good, or been to them the source of greater evils. But Diæus carried on a bitter controversy with Menalcidas before the Senate, not in the most decorous manner. And the Senate returned answer that they would send Ambassadors, who should arbitrate upon the differences between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans. And the journey of these ambassadors from Rome was somehow taken so leisurely, that Diæus had full time to deceive the Achæans, and Menalcidas the Lacedæmonians. The Achæans were persuaded by Diæus that the Lacedæmonians were directed by the Roman Senate to obey them in all things. While Menalcidas deceived the Lacedæmonians altogether, saying that they had been put by the Romans out of the jurisdiction of the Achæan League altogether.
[7.13] In consequence of these differences with the Lacedæmonians the Achæans made preparations again to go to war with them, and an army was collected against Sparta by Damocritus, who was chosen General of the Achæans at that time. And about the same time an army of Romans under Metellus went into Macedonia, to fight against Andriscus, the son of Perseus and grandson of Philip, who had revolted from the Romans. And the war in Macedonia was finished by the Romans with the greatest despatch. And Metellus gave his orders to the envoys, who had been sent by the Roman Senate to see after affairs in Asia Minor, to have a conference with the leaders of the Achæans before they passed over into Asia Minor, and to forbid them to war against Sparta, and to tell them they were to wait for the arrival from Rome of the envoys who were despatched to arbitrate between them and the Lacedæmonians. They gave these orders to Damocritus and the Achæans, who were beforehand with them and had already marched to Lacedæmon, but when they saw that the Achæans were not likely to pay any attention to their orders, they crossed over into Asia Minor. And the Lacedæmonians, out of spirit rather than from strength, took up arms and went out to meet the enemy in defence of their country, but were in a short time repulsed with the loss in the battle of about 1,000 who were in their prime both in respect to age and bravery, and the rest of the army fled pell mell into the town. And had Damocritus exhibited energy, the Achæans might have pursued those who fled from the battle up to the walls of Sparta: but he called them back from the pursuit at once, and rather went in for raids and plundering than sat down to a regular siege. He was therefore fined 50 talents by the Achæans as a traitor for not following up his victory, and as he could not pay he fled from the Peloponnese. And Diæus, who was chosen to succeed him as General, agreed when Metellus sent a second message not to carry on the war against the Lacedæmonians, but to wait for the arrival of the arbitrators from Rome. After this he contrived another stratagem against the Lacedæmonians: he won over all the towns round Sparta to friendship with the Achæans, and introduced garrisons into them, so as to make them points d’appui against Sparta. And Menalcidas was chosen by the Lacedæmonians as General against Diæus, and, as they were badly off for all supplies of war and not least for money, and as their soil had lain uncultivated, he persuaded them to violate the truce, and took by storm and sacked the town Iasus, which was on the borders of Laconia, but was at this time subject to the Achæans. And having thus stirred up strife again between the Lacedæmonians and the Achæans he was accused by the citizens, and, as he saw no hope of safety from the danger that seemed imminent for the Lacedæmonians, he voluntarily committed suicide by poison. Such was the end of Menalcidas, the most imprudent General of the Lacedæmonians at this crisis, and earlier still the most iniquitous person to the Achæans.
[7.14] At last the envoys, who had been sent from Rome to arbitrate between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans, arrived in Greece, among others Orestes, who summoned before him Diæus and the principal people in each city of the Achæans. And when they came to his head-quarters,⁷ he disclosed to them all his views, viz. that the Roman Senate thought it just that neither the Lacedæmonians nor Corinth should be forced into the Achæan League, nor Argos, nor Heraclea under Mount Œta, nor the Arcadians of Orchomenus, for they had no connection with the Achæans by ancestry, but had been incorporated subsequently into the Achæan League. As Orestes said this, the principal men of the Achæans would not stay to listen to the end of his speech, but ran outside the building and called the Achæans to the meeting. And they, when they heard the decision of the Romans, immediately turned their fury on all the Spartans who at that time resided at Corinth. And they plundered everyone who they were sure was a Lacedæmonian, or whom they suspected of being so by the way he wore his hair, or by his boots or dress or name, and some who got the start of them, and fled for refuge to Orestes’ head-quarters, they dragged thence by force. And Orestes and his suite tried to check the Achæans from this outrage, and bade them remember that they were acting outrageously against Romans. And not many days afterwards the Achæans threw all the Lacedæmonians whom they had arrested into prison, but dismissed all strangers whom they had arrested on suspicion. And they sent Thearidas and several other prominent Achæans as ambassadors to Rome, who after their departure on meeting on the road some other envoys to settle the Lacedæmonian and Achæan differences, who had been despatched later than Orestes, turned back again. And after Diæus had served his time as General, Critolaus was chosen as his successor by the Achæans; this Critolaus was possessed with a grim unreasoning passion to fight against the Romans, and, as the envoys from Rome to settle the disputes between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans had just arrived, he went to Tegea in Arcadia ostensibly to confer with them, but really because he did not want the Achæans summoned to a general meeting, and, while in the hearing of the Romans he sent messengers bidding the commissioners call a general meeting of the Achæans, he privately urged the commissioners not to attend the general meeting. And when the commissioners did not come, then he displayed great guile to the Romans, for he told them to wait for another general meeting of the Achæans that would be held six months later, for he himself said that he could discuss no question privately without the common consent of the Achæans. And the Roman envoys, when they discovered they were being deceived, returned to Rome. And Critolaus collected an army of Achæans at Corinth, and persuaded them to war against Sparta, and also to wage war at once against the Romans. When king and nation undertake war and are unsuccessful, it seems rather the malignity of some divine power than the fault of the originators of the war. But audacity and weakness combined should rather be called madness than want of luck. And this was the ruin of Critolaus and the Achæans. The Achæans were also further incited against the Romans by Pytheas, who was at that time Bœotarch at Thebes, and the Thebans undertook to take an eager part in prosecuting the war. For the Thebans had been heavily punished by the decision of Metellus, first they had to pay a fine to the Phocians for invading Phocis, and secondly to the Eubœans for ravaging Eubœa, and thirdly to the people of Amphissa for destroying their corn in harvest time.
[7.15] And the Romans being informed of all this by the envoys whom they had sent to Greece, and by the letters which Metellus wrote, passed a vote against the Achæans that they were guilty of treason, and, as Mummius had just been chosen consul, they ordered him to lead against them both a naval and land force. And Metellus, directly he heard that Mummius and the army with him had set out against the Achæans, made all haste that he might win his laurels in the campaign first, before Mummius could get up. He sent therefore messengers to the Achæans, bidding the Lacedæmonians and all other cities mentioned by the Romans to leave the Achæan League, and for the future he promised that there should be no anger on the part of the Romans for any earlier disobedience. At the same time that he made this Proclamation he brought his army from Macedonia, marching through Thessaly and by the Lamiac Gulf. And Critolaus and the Achæans, so far from accepting this proclamation which tended to peace, sat down and blockaded Heraclea, because it would not join the Achæan League. But when Critolaus heard from his spies that Metellus and the Romans had crossed the Spercheus, then he fled to Scarphea in Locris, not being bold enough to place the Achæans in position between Heraclea and Thermopylæ, and there await the attack of Metellus: for such a panic had seized him that he could extract no hope from a spot where the Lacedæmonians had so nobly fought for Greece against the Medes, and where at a later date the Athenians displayed equal bravery against the Galati. And Metellus’ army came up with Critolaus and the Achæans as they were in retreat a little before Scarphea, and many they killed and about 1,000 they took alive. But Critolaus was not seen alive after the battle, nor was he found among the dead, but if he tried to swim across the muddy sea near Mount Œta, he would have been very likely drowned without being observed. As to his end therefore one may make various guesses. But the thousand picked men from Arcadia, who had fought on Critolaus’ side in the action, marched as far as Elatea in Phocis, and were received in that town from old kinsmanship; but when the people of Phocis got news of the reverse of Critolaus and the Achæans, they requested these Arcadians to leave Elatea. And as they marched back to the Peloponnese Metellus and the Romans met them at Chæronea. Then came the Nemesis of the Greek gods upon the Arcadians, who were cut to pieces by the Romans, in the very place where they had formerly left in the lurch the Greeks who fought against Philip and the Macedonians.
[7.15] And Diæus was again made Commander-in-Chief of the Achæan army, and he imitated the action of Miltiades and the Athenians before Marathon by manumitting the slaves, and made a levy of Achæans and Arcadians in the prime of life from the various towns. And so his army altogether, including the slaves, amounted to 600 cavalry, and 14,000 infantry. Then he displayed the greatest want of strategy, for, though he knew that Critolaus and all the Achæan host had crumbled away before Metellus, yet he selected only 4,000 men, and put Alcamenes at their head. They were despatched to Megara to garrison that town and, should Metellus and the Romans come up, to stop their further progress. And Metellus, after his rout of the Arcadian picked men at Chæronea, had pushed on with his army to Thebes; for the Thebans had joined the Achæans in besieging Heraclea, and had also taken part in the fight near Scarphea. Then the inhabitants, men and women of all ages, abandoned Thebes, and wandered about all over Bœotia, and fled to the tops of the mountains. But Metellus would not allow his men either to set on fire the temples of the gods or to pull down any buildings, or to kill or take alive any of the fugitives except Pytheas, but him, if they should capture him, they were to bring before him. And Pytheas was forthwith found, and brought before Metellus, and executed. And when the Roman army marched on Megara, then Alcamenes and his men were seized with panic, and fled without striking a blow to Corinth, to the camp of the Achæans. And the Megarians delivered up their town to the Romans without a blow struck, and, when Metellus got to the Isthmus, he issued a Proclamation, inviting the Achæans even now to peace and harmony: for he had a strong desire that both Macedonia and Achaia should be settled by him. But this intention of his was frustrated by the folly of Diæus.
[7.16] Meantime Mummius, and with him Orestes, who was first sent from Rome to settle the disputes between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans, reached the Roman army one morning, took over the command, and sent Metellus and his forces back to Macedonia, and himself waited at the Isthmus till he had concentrated all his forces. His cavalry amounted to 3,500, his infantry to 22,000. There were also some Cretan bowmen, and Philopœmen had brought some soldiers from Attalus, from Pergamus across the Caicus. Mummius placed some of the Italian troops and allies, so as to be an advanced post for all his army, 12 stades in the van. And the Achæans, as this vanguard was left without defence through the confidence of the Romans, attacked them, and slew some, but drove still more back to the camp, and captured about 500 shields. By this success the Achæans were so elated that they attacked the Roman army without waiting for them to begin the battle. But when Mummius led out his army to battle in turn, then the Achæan cavalry, which was opposite the Roman cavalry, ran immediately, not venturing to make one stand against the attack of the enemy’s cavalry. And the infantry, though dejected at the rout of the cavalry, stood their ground against the wedge-like attack of the Roman infantry, and though outnumbered and fainting under their wounds, yet resisted bravely, till 1,000 picked men of the Romans took them in flank, and so turned the battle into a complete rout of the Achæans. And had Diæus been bold enough to hurry into Corinth after the battle, and receive within its walls the runaways from the fight and shut himself up there, the Achæans might have obtained better terms from Mummius, if the war had been lengthened out by a siege. But as it was, directly the Achæans gave way before the Romans, Diæus fled for Megalopolis, exhibiting to the Achæans none of that spirit which Callistratus, the son of Empedus, had displayed to the Athenians. For he being in command of the cavalry in Sicily, when the Athenians and their allies were badly defeated at the river Asinarus, boldly cut his way through the enemy at the head of the cavalry, and, after getting safe through with most of them to Catana, turned back again on the road to Syracuse, and finding the enemy still plundering the camp of the Athenians killed five with his own hand and then expired, himself and his horse having received fatal wounds. He won fair fame both for the Athenians and himself, and voluntarily met death, having preserved the cavalry whom he led. But Diæus after ruining the Achæans announced to the people of Megalopolis their impending ruin, and after slaying his wife with his own hand that she might not become a captive took poison and so died, resembling Menalcidas as in his greed for money so also in the cowardice of his death.
[7.16] And those of the Achæans who got safe to Corinth after the battle fled during the night, as also did most of the Corinthians. But Mummius did not enter Corinth at first, though the gates were open, as he thought some ambush lay in wait for him within the walls, not till the third day did he take Corinth in full force and set it on fire. And most of those that were left in the city were slain by the Romans, and the women and children were sold by Mummius, as also were the slaves who had been manumitted and had fought on the side of the Achæans, and had not been killed in action. And the most wonderful of the votive offerings and other ornaments he carried off to Rome, and those of less value he gave to Philopœmen, the general of Attalus’ troops, and these spoils from Corinth were in my time at Pergamus. And Mummius rased the walls of all the cities which had fought against the Romans, and took away their arms, before any advisers what to do were sent from Rome. And when they arrived, then he put down all democracies, and appointed chief-magistrates according to property qualifications.⁸ And taxes were laid upon Greece, and those that had money were forbidden to have land over the borders, and all the general meetings were put down altogether, as those in Achaia, or Phocis, or Bœotia, or any other part of Greece. But not many years afterwards the Romans took mercy upon Greece, and allowed them their old national meetings and to have land over the borders. They remitted also the fines which Mummius had imposed, for he had ordered the Bœotians to pay the people of Heraclea and Eubœa 100 talents, and the Achæans to pay the Lacedæmonians 200 talents. The Greeks got remission of these fines from the Romans, and a prætor was sent out from Rome, and is still, who is not called by the Romans prætor of all Greece but prætor of Achaia, because they reduced Greece through Achaia, which was then the foremost Greek power. Thus ended the war when Antitheus was Archon at Athens, in the 160th Olympiad, when Diodorus of Sicyon was victor in the course.
[7.17] At this time Greece was reduced to extreme weakness, being partially ruined, and altogether reduced to great straits, by the deity. For Argos, which had been a town of the greatest importance in the days of the so-called heroes, lost its good fortune with the overthrow of the Dorians. And the Athenians, who had survived the Peloponnesian War and the plague, and had even lift up their heads again, were not many years later destined to be subdued by the Macedonian power at its height. From Macedonia also came down on Thebes in Bœotia the wrath of Alexander. And the Lacedæmonians were first reduced by Epaminondas the Theban, and afterwards by the war with the Achæans. And when Achaia with great difficulty, like a tree that had received some early injury, grew to great eminence in Greece, then the folly of its rulers stopped its growth. And some time after the Empire of Rome came to Nero, and he made Greece entirely free, and gave to the Roman people instead of Greece the most fertile island of Sardinia. When I consider this action of Nero I cannot but think the words of Plato the son of Aristo most true, that crimes remarkable for their greatness and audacity are not committed by everyday kind of people, but emanate from a noble soul corrupted by a bad bringing up.⁹ Not that this gift long benefited Greece. For in the reign of Vespasian, who succeeded Nero, it suffered from intestine discord, and Vespasian made the Greeks a second time subject to taxes and bade them obey the prætor, saying that Greece had unlearnt how to use liberty. Such are the particulars which I ascertained.
[7.17] The boundaries between Achaia and Elis are the river Larisus (near which river there is a temple of Larissæan Athene), and Dyme, a town of the Achæans, about 30 stades from the Larisus. Dyme was the only town in Achaia that Philip the son of Demetrius reduced in war. And for this reason Sulpicius, the Roman Prætor, allowed his army to plunder Dyme. And Augustus afterwards assigned it to Patræ. In ancient days it was called Palea, but when the Ionians were in possession of it they changed its name to Dyme, I am not quite certain whether from some woman of the district called Dyme, or from Dymas the son of Ægimius. One is reduced to a little uncertainty about the name of the place also by the Elegiac couplet at Olympia on the statue of Œbotas, a native of Dyme, who in the 6th Olympiad was victor in the course, and in the 80th Olympiad was declared by the oracle at Delphi worthy of a statue at Olympia. The couplet runs as follows:
“Œbotas here the son of Œnias was victor in the course, and so immortalized his native place Palea in Achaia.”
[7.17] But there is no need for any real confusion from the town being called in the inscription Palea and not Dyme, for the older names of places are apt to be introduced by the Greeks into poetry, as they call Amphiaraus and Adrastus the sons of Phoroneus, and Theseus the son of Erechtheus.
[7.17] And a little before you come to the town of Dyme there is on the right of the way the tomb of Sostratus, who was a youth in the neighbourhood, and they say Hercules was very fond of him, and as he died while Hercules was still among men, Hercules erected his sepulchre and offered to him the first fruits of his hair. There is also still a device and pillar on the tomb and an effigy of Hercules on it. And I was told that the natives still offer sacrifices to Sostratus.
[7.17] There is also at Dyme a temple of Athene and a very ancient statue, there is also a temple built to the Dindymene Mother and Attes. Who Attes was I could not ascertain it being a mystery. But according to the Elegiac lines of Hermesianax he was the son of Calaus the Phrygian, and was born incapable of procreation. And when he grew up he removed to Lydia, and celebrated there the rites of the Dindymene Mother, and was so honoured that Zeus in jealousy sent a boar among the crops of the Lydians. Thereupon several of the Lydians and Attes himself were slain by this boar: and in consequence of this the Galati who inhabit Pessinus will not touch pork. However this is not the universal tradition about Attes, but there is a local tradition that Zeus in his sleep dropt seed into the ground, and that in process of time there sprang up a Hermaphrodite whom they called Agdistis; and the gods bound this Agdistis and cut off his male privities. And an almond-tree sprang from them and bare fruit, and they say the daughter of the river-god Sangarius took of the fruit. And as she put some in her bosom the fruit immediately vanished, and she became pregnant, and bare a boy, Attes, who was exposed and brought up by a goat. And as the lad’s beauty was more than human, Agdistis grew violently in love with him. And when he was grown up his relations sent him to Pessinus to marry the king’s daughter. And the wedding song was being sung when Agdistis appeared, and Attes in his rage cut off his private parts, and his father in law cut off his. Then Agdistis repented of his action towards Attes: and some contrivance was found out by Zeus so that the body of Attes should not decay nor rot. Such is the most notable legend about Attes.
[7.17] At Dyme is also the tomb of the runner Œbotas. He was the first Achæan who had won the victory at Olympia, and yet had received no especial reward from his own people. So he uttered a solemn imprecation that no Achæan might henceforth win the victory. And, as one of the gods made it his business to see that the imprecation of Œbotas should be valid, the Achæans learnt why they failed to secure victory at Olympia by consulting the oracle at Delphi. Then they not only conferred other honours upon Œbotas, but put up his statue at Olympia, after which Sostratus of Pellene won the race for boys in the course. And even now the custom prevails amongst the Achæans who intend to compete at Olympia to offer sacrifices to Œbotas, and, if they are victorious, to crown his statue at Olympia.
[7.18] About 40 stades from Dyme the river Pirus discharges itself into the sea, near which river the Achæans formerly had a town called Olenus. Those who have written about Hercules and his doings have not dwelt least upon Dexamenus the king of Olenus, and the hospitality Hercules received at his court. And that Olenus was originally a small town is confirmed by the Elegy written by Hermesianax on the Centaur Eurytion. But in process of time they say the people of Olenus left it in consequence of its weakness, and betook themselves to Piræ and Euryteæ.
[7.18] About 80 stades from the river Pirus is the town of Patræ, not far from which the river Glaucus discharges itself into the sea. The antiquarians at Patræ say that Eumelus, an Autochthon, was the first settler, and was king over a few subjects. And when Triptolemus came from Attica Eumelus received from him corn to sow, and under his instructions built a town called Aroe, which he so called from tilling the soil. And when Triptolemus had gone to sleep they say Antheas, the son of Eumelus, yoked the dragons to the chariot of Triptolemus, and tried himself to sow corn: but he died by falling out of the chariot. And Triptolemus and Eumelus built in common the town Anthea, which they called after him. And a third city called Mesatis was built between Anthea and Aroe. And the traditions of the people of Patræ about Dionysus, that he was reared at Mesatis, and was plotted against by the Titans there and was in great danger, and the explanation of the name Mesatis, all this I leave to the people of Patræ to explain, as I don’t contradict them. And when the Achæans drove the Ionians out later, Patreus the son of Preugenes and grandson of Agenor forbade the Achæans to settle at Anthea and Mesatis, but made the circuit of the walls near Aroe wider so as to include all that town, and called it Patræ after his own name. And Agenor the father of Preugenes was the son of Areus the son of Ampyx, and Ampyx was the son of Pelias, the son of Æginetus, the son of Deritus, the son of Harpalus, the son of Amyclas the son of Lacedæmon. Such was the genealogy of Patreus. And in process of time the people of Patræ were the only Achæans that went into Ætolia from friendship to the Ætolians, to join them in their war against the Galati. But meeting most serious reverses in battle, and most of them suffering also from great poverty, they left Patræ all but a few. And those who remained got scattered about the country and followed the pursuit of agriculture, and inhabited the various towns outside Patræ, as Mesatis and Anthea and Boline and Argyra and Arba. And Augustus, either because he thought Patræ a convenient place on the coast or for some other reason, introduced into it people from various towns. He incorporated also with it the Achæans from Rhypæ, after first rasing Rhypæ to the ground. And to the people of Patræ alone of all the Achæans he granted their freedom, and gave them other privileges as well, such as the Romans are wont to grant their colonists.
[7.18] And in the citadel of Patræ is the temple of Laphrian Artemis: the goddess has a foreign title, and the statue also is foreign. For when Calydon and the rest of Ætolia was dispeopled by the Emperor Augustus, that he might people with Ætolians his city of Nicopolis near Actium, then the people of Patræ got this statue of Laphrian Artemis. And as he had taken many statues from Ætolia and Acarnania for his city Nicopolis, so he gave to the people of Patræ various spoils from Calydon, and this statue of Laphrian Artemis, which even now is honoured in the citadel of Patræ. And they say the goddess was called Laphrian from a Phocian called Laphrius, the son of Castalius and grandson of Delphus, who they say made the old statue of Artemis. Others say that the wrath of Artemis against Œneus fell lighter upon the people of Calydon when this title was given to the goddess. The figure in the statue is a huntress, and the statue is of ivory and gold, and the workmanship is by Menæchmus and Soidas. It is conjectured that they were not much later than the period of Canachus the Sicyonian or the Æginetan Callon. And every year the people of Patræ hold the festival called Laphria to Artemis, in which they observe their national mode of sacrifice. Round the altar they put wood yet green in a circle, and pile it up about 16 cubits high. And the driest wood lies within this circle on the altar. And they contrive at the time of the festival a smooth ascent to the altar, piling up earth so as to form a kind of steps. First they have a most splendid procession to Artemis, in which the virgin priestess rides last in a chariot drawn by stags, and on the following day they perform the sacrificial rites, which both publicly and privately are celebrated with much zeal. For they place alive on the altar birds good to eat and all other kinds of victims, as wild boars and stags and does, and moreover the young of wolves and bears, and some wild animals fully grown, and they place also upon the altar the fruit of any trees that they plant. And then they set fire to the wood. And I have seen a bear or some other animal at the first smell of the fire trying to force a way outside, some even actually doing so by sheer strength. But they thrust them back again into the blazing pile. Nor do they record any that were ever injured by the animals on these occasions.
[7.19] And between the temple of Laphria and the altar is the sepulchre of Eurypylus. Who he was and why he came into this country I shall relate, when I have first described the condition of things when he came into these parts. Those of the Ionians who dwelt at Aroe and Anthea and Mesatis had in common a grove and temple of Artemis Triclaria, and the Ionians kept her festival annually all night long. And the priestess of the goddess was a maiden, who was dismissed when she married. They have a tradition that once the priestess of the goddess was one Comætho, a most beautiful maiden, and that Melanippus was deeply in love with her, who in all other respects and in handsomeness of appearance outdid all of his own age. And as Melanippus won the maiden’s love as well, he asked her in marriage of her father. It is somehow common to old age to be in most respects the very antipodes to youth, and especially in sympathy with love, so that Melanippus, who loved and was beloved, got no encouragement either from his own parents or from the parents of Comætho. And it is evident from various other cases as well as this that love is wont to confound human laws, and even to upset the honour due to the gods, as in this case, for Melanippus and Comætho satisfied their ardent love in the very temple of Artemis, and afterwards made the temple habitually their bridal-chamber. And forthwith the wrath of Artemis came on the people of the country, their land yielded no fruit, and unusual sicknesses came upon the people, and the mortality was much greater than usual. And when they had recourse to the oracle at Delphi, the Pythian Priestess laid the blame on Melanippus and Comætho, and the oracle ordered them to sacrifice to Artemis annually the most handsome maiden and lad. It was on account of this sacrifice that the river near the temple of Triclaria was called Amilichus (Relentless): it had long had no name. Now all these lads and maidens had done nothing against the goddess but had to die for Melanippus and Comætho, and they and their relations suffered most piteously. I do not put the whole responsibility for this upon Comætho and Melanippus, for to human beings alone is love felt worth life. These human sacrifices are said to have been stopped for the following reason. The oracle at Delphi had foretold that a foreign king would come to their country, and that he would bring with him a foreign god, and that he would stop this sacrifice to Artemis Triclaria. And after the capture of Ilium, when the Greeks shared the spoil, Eurypylus the son of Euæmon got a chest, in which there was a statue of Dionysus, the work some say of Hephæstus, and a gift of Zeus to Dardanus. But there are two other traditions about this chest, one that Æneas left it behind him when he fled from Ilium, the other that it was thrown away by Cassandra as a misfortune to any Greek who found it. However this may be, Eurypylus opened the chest and saw the statue, and was driven out of his mind by the sight. And most of his time he remained mad, though he came to himself a little at times. And being in that condition he did not sail to Thessaly, but to Cirrha and the Cirrhæan Gulf; and he went to Delphi and consulted the oracle about his disorder. And they say the oracle told him, where he should find people offering a strange sacrifice, to dedicate his chest and there dwell. And the wind drove Eurypylus’ ships to the sea near Aroe, and when he went ashore he saw a lad and maiden being led to the altar of Artemis Triclaria. And he saw at once that the oracle referred to this sacrifice, the people of the place also remembered the oracle, seeing a king whom they had never before seen, and as to the chest they suspected that there was some god in it. And so Eurypylus got cured of his disorder, and this human sacrifice was stopped, and the river was now called Milichus (Mild). Some indeed have written that it was not the Thessalian Eurypylus to whom what I have just recorded happened, but they want people to think that Eurypylus (the son of Dexamenus who was king at Olenus), who accompanied Hercules to Ilium, received the chest from Hercules. The rest of their tradition is the same as mine. But I cannot believe that Hercules was ignorant of the contents of this chest, or that if he knew of them he would have given the chest as a present to a comrade. Nor do the people of Patras record any other Eurypylus than the son of Euæmon, and to him they offer sacrifices every year, when they keep the festival to Dionysus.
[7.20] The name of the god inside the chest is Æsymnetes. Nine men, who are chosen by the people for their worth, look after his worship, and the same number of women. And one night during the festival the priest takes the chest outside the temple. That night has special rites. All the lads in the district go down to the Milichus with crowns on their heads made of ears of corn: for so used they in old time to dress up those whom they were leading to sacrifice to Artemis. But in our day they lay these crowns of ears of corn near the statue of the goddess, and after bathing in the river, and again putting on crowns this time of ivy, they go to the temple of Æsymnetes. Such are their rites on this night. And inside the grove of Laphrian Artemis is the temple of Athene called Pan-Achæis, the statue of the goddess is of ivory and gold.
[7.20] And as you go to the lower part of the city you come to the temple of the Dindymene Mother, where Attes is honoured. They do not show his statue, but there is one of the Mother wrought in stone. And in the market-place there is a temple of Olympian Zeus, he is on his throne and Athene is standing by it. And next Olympian Zeus is a statue of Hera, and a temple of Apollo, and a naked Apollo in brass, and sandals are on his feet, and one foot is on the skull of an ox. Alcæus has shown that Apollo rejoices especially in oxen in the Hymn that he wrote about Hermes, how Hermes filched the oxen of Apollo, and Homer still earlier than Alcæus has described how Apollo tended the oxen of Laomedon for hire. He has put the following lines in the Iliad into Poseidon’s mouth.
“I was drawing a spacious and handsome wall round the city of the Trojans, that it might be impregnable, while you, Phœbus, were tending the slow-paced cows with the crumpled horns.”¹⁰
[7.20] That is therefore one would infer the reason why the god is represented with his foot on the skull of an ox. And in the market-place in the open air is a statue of Athene, and in front of it is the tomb of Patreus.
[7.20] And next to the market-place is the Odeum, and there is a statue of Apollo there well worth seeing, it was made from the spoil that the people of Patræ got, when they alone of the Achæans helped the Ætolians against the Galati. And this Odeum is beautified in other respects more than any in Greece except the one at Athens: that excels this both in size and in all its fittings, it was built by the Athenian Herodes in memory of his dead wife. In my account of Attica I passed that Odeum over, because that part of my work was written before Herodes began building it. And at Patræ, as you go from the market-place where the temple of Apollo is, there is a gate, and the device on the gate consists of golden effigies of Patreus and Preugenes and Atherion, all three companions and contemporaries. And right opposite the market-place at this outlet is the grove and temple of Artemis Limnatis. While the Dorians were already in possession of Lacedæmon and Argos, they say that Preugenes in obedience to a dream took the statue of Artemis Limnatis from Sparta, and that the trustiest of his slaves shared with him in the enterprize. And that statue from Lacedæmon they keep generally at Mesoa, because originally it was taken by Preugenes there, but when they celebrate the festival of Artemis Limnatis, one of the servants of the goddess takes the old statue from Mesoa to the sacred precincts at Patræ: in which are several temples, not built in the open air, but approached by porticoes. The statue of Æsculapius except the dress is entirely of stone, that of Athene is in ivory and gold. And in front of the temple of Athene is the tomb of Preugenes, to whom they offer funereal rites as to Patreus annually, at the time of the celebration of the feast to Artemis Limnatis. And not far from the theatre are temples of Nemesis and Aphrodite: their statues are large and of white marble.
[7.21] In this part of the city there is also a temple to Dionysus under the title of Calydonian: because the statue of the god was brought from Calydon. And when Calydon was still inhabited, among other Calydonians who were priests to the god was one Coresus, who of all men suffered most grievously from love. He was enamoured of the maiden Callirhoe, but in proportion to the greatness of his love was the dislike of the maiden to him. And as by all his wooing and promises and gifts the maiden’s mind was not in the least changed, he went as a suppliant to the statue of Dionysus. And the god heard the prayer of his priest, and the Calydonians forthwith became insane as with drink, and died beside themselves. They went therefore in their consternation to consult the oracle at Dodona: for those who dwell on this mainland, as the Ætolians and their neighbours the Acarnanians and Epirotes, believe in the oracular responses they get from doves and the oak there. And they were oracularly informed at Dodona that it was the wrath of Dionysus that had caused this trouble, which would not end till Coresus either sacrificed to Dionysus Callirhoe or somebody who should volunteer to die instead of her. And as the maiden found no means of escape, she fled to those who had brought her up, but obtaining no aid from them, she had nothing now left but to die. But when all the preliminary sacrificial rites that had been ordered at Dodona had taken place, and she was led to the altar as victim, then Coresus took his place as sacrificial priest, and yielding to love and not to anger slew himself instead of her. And when she saw Coresus lying dead the poor girl repented, and, moved by pity and shame at his fate, cut her own throat at the well in Calydon not far from the harbour, which has ever since been called Callirhoe after her.
[7.21] And near the theatre is the sacred enclosure of some woman who was a native of Patræ. And there are here some statues of Dionysus of the same number and name as the ancient towns of the Achæans, for the god is called Mesateus and Antheus and Aroeus. These statues during the festival of Dionysus are carried to the temple of Æsymnetes, which is near the sea on the right as you go from the market-place. And as you go lower down from the temple of Æsymnetes there is a temple and stone statue to Recovery, originally they say erected by Eurypylus when he recovered from his madness. And near the harbour is a temple of Poseidon, and his statue erect in white stone. Poseidon, besides the names given to him by poets to deck out their poetry, has several local names privately given to him, but his universal titles are Pelagæus and Asphalius and Hippius. One might urge several reasons why he was called Hippius, but I conjecture he got the name because he was the inventor of riding. Homer at any rate in that part of his Iliad about the horse-races has introduced Menelaus invoking this god in an oath.
“Touch the horses, and swear by the Earth-Shaker Poseidon that you did not purposely with guile retard my chariot.”¹¹
[7.21] And Pamphus, the most ancient Hymn-writer among the Athenians, says that Poseidon was “the giver of horses and ships with sails.” So he got the name Hippius probably from riding and for no other reason.
[7.21] Also at Patræ not very far from that of Poseidon are temples of Aphrodite. One of the statues a generation before my time was fished up by some fishermen in their net. There are also some statues very near the harbour, as Ares in bronze, and Apollo, and Aphrodite. She has a sacred enclosure near the harbour, and her statue is of wood except the fingers and toes and head which are of stone. At Patræ there is also a grove near the sea, which is a most convenient race-course, and a most salubrious place of resort in summer time. In this grove there are temples of Apollo and Aphrodite, their statues also in stone. There is also a temple of Demeter, she and Proserpine are standing, but Earth is seated. And in front of the temple of Demeter is a well, which has a stone wall on the side near the temple, but there is a descent to it outside. And there is here an unerring oracle, not indeed for every matter, but in the case of diseases. They fasten a mirror to a light cord and let it down into this well, poising it so as not to be covered by the water, but that the rim of the mirror only should touch the water. And then they look into the mirror after prayer to the goddess and burning of incense. And it shews them whether the sick person will die or recover. Such truth is there in this water. Similarly very near Cyaneæ in Lycia is the oracle of Apollo Thyrxis, and the water there shows anyone looking into the well whatever he wants to see. And near the grove at Patræ are two temples of Serapis, and in one of them the statue of the Egyptian Belus. The people of Patræ say that he fled to Aroe from grief at the death of his sons, and that he shuddered at the name of Argos, and was still more afraid of Danaus. There is also a temple of Æsculapius at Patræ above the citadel and near the gates which lead to Mesatis.
[7.21] And the women at Patræ are twice as numerous as the men, and devoted to Aphrodite if any women are. And most of them get their living by the flax that grows in Elis, which they make into nets for the hair and other parts of dress.
[7.22] And Pharæ, a town in Achaia, is reckoned with Patræ since the days of Augustus, and the road to Pharæ from Patræ is about 150 stades, and from the sea to the mainland about 70 stades. And the river Pierus flows near Pharæ, the same river I think which flows by the ruins of Olenus, and is called Pirus by the men who live near the sea. Near the river is a grove of plane-trees, most of them hollow from old age, and of such a size that whoever chooses can eat and sleep inside them.¹² The circuit of the market-place is large at Pharæ according to ancient custom, and in the middle of the market-place is a stone statue of bearded Hermes; it is on the ground, no great size, and of square shape. And the inscription on it says that it was an offering of the Messenian Simylus. It is called Hermes of the Market-place, and near it is an oracle. And before the statue is a hearth made of stone, and some brazen lamps are fastened with lead to the hearth. He that wants to consult the oracle of the god comes at eventide and burns some frankincense on the hearth, and when he has filled the lamps with oil and lit them, he lays on the altar on the right of the statue the ordinary piece of money, a brass coin, and whispers his question whatever it is in the ear of the statue of the god. Then he departs from the market-place and stops up his ears. And when he has gone a little distance off he takes his hands from his ears, and whatever he next hears is he thinks the oracular response. The Egyptians have a similar kind of oracle in the temple of Apis. And at Pharæ the water is sacred, Hermes’ well is the name they give to it, and the fish in it they do not catch, because they think them sacred to the god. And very near the statue are 30 square stones, which the people of Pharæ venerate highly, calling each by the name of one of the gods. And in early times all the Greeks paid to unhewn stones, and not statues, the honours due unto the gods. And about 15 stades from Pharæ is a grove of Castor and Pollux. Bay trees chiefly grow in it, and there is neither temple in it nor any statues. The people of the place say the statues were removed to Rome. And in the grove at Pharæ is an altar of unhewn stones. But I could not learn whether Phares, the son of Phylodamia, the daughter of Danaus, or some one of the same name was the founder of the town.
[7.22] And Tritea, also a town of Achaia, is built in the interior of the country, and reckoned with Patræ by Imperial order. The distance from Pharæ to Tritea is about 120 stades. And before you get to it there is a tomb in white stone, well worth seeing in other respects and not least for the paintings on it, which are by Nicias. There is a throne of ivory and a young and good-looking woman seated on it, and a maid is standing by with a sun-shade. And a young man without a beard is standing up clad in a tunic, with a scarlet cloak over the tunic. And near him is a servant with some javelins, driving some hunting dogs. I could not ascertain their names; but everybody infers that they are husband and wife buried together. The founder of Tritea was some say Celbidas, who came from Cumæ in the Opic land, others say that Ares had an intrigue with Tritea the daughter of Triton, who was a priestess of Athene, and Melanippus their son when he was grown up built the town, and called it after the name of his mother. At Tritea there is a temple to what are called the Greatest Gods, their statues are made of clay: a festival is held to them annually, like the festival the Greeks hold to Dionysus. There is also a temple of Athene, and a stone statue still to be seen: the old statue was taken to Rome according to the tradition of the people of Tritea. The people of the place are accustomed to sacrifice both to Ares and Tritea.
[7.22] These towns are at some distance from the sea and well inland: but as you sail from Patræ to Ægium you come to the promontory of Rhium, about 50 stades from Patræ, and 15 stades further you come to the harbour of Panormus. And about as many stades from Panormus is what is called the wall of Athene, from which to the harbour of Erineus is 90 stades’ sail along the coast, and 60 to Ægium from Erineus, but by land it is about 40 stades less. And not far from Patræ is the river Milichus, and the temple of Triclaria (with no statue) on the right. And as you go on from Milichus there is another river called Charadrus, and in summer time the herds that drink of it mostly breed male cattle, for that reason the herdsmen keep all cattle but cows away from it. These they leave by the river, because both for sacrifices and work bulls are more convenient than cows, but in all other kinds of cattle the female is thought most valuable.
[7.23] And next to the river Charadrus are some ruins not very easy to trace of the town of Argyra, and the well Argyra on the right of the high road, and the river Selemnus that flows into the sea. The local account is that Selemnus was a handsome youth who fed his flocks here, and they say the sea-nymph Argyra was enamoured of him, and used to come up from the sea and sleep with him. But in a short time Selemnus lost all his good looks, and the Nymph no longer came to visit him, and Aphrodite turned the poor lad Selemnus, who was deprived of Argyra and dying for love, into a river. I tell the tale as the people of Patræ told it me. And when he became a river he was still enamoured of Argyra, (as the story goes about Alpheus that he still loved Arethusa,) but Aphrodite at last granted him forgetfulness of Argyra. I have also heard another tradition, viz. that the water of the Selemnus is a good love-cure both for men and women, for if they bathe in this water they forget their love. If there is any truth in this tradition, the water of Selemnus would be more valuable to mankind than much wealth.
[7.23] And at a little distance from Argyra is the river called Bolinæus, and a town once stood there called Bolina. Apollo they say was enamoured of a maiden called Bolina, and she fled from him and threw herself into the sea, and became immortal through his favour. And there is a promontory here jutting out into the sea, about which there is a tradition that it was here that Cronos threw the sickle into the sea, with which he had mutilated his father Uranus, so they call the promontory Drepanum (sickle). And a little above the high road are the ruins of Rhypæ, which is about 30 stades from Ægium. And the district round Ægium is watered by the river Phœnix and another river Miganitas, both of which flow into the sea. And a portico near the town was built for the athlete Strato, (who conquered at Olympia on the same day in the pancratium and in the wrestling), to practise in. And at Ægium they have an ancient temple of Ilithyia, her statue is veiled from her head to her toes with a finely-woven veil, and is of wood except the face and fingers and toes, which are of Pentelican marble. One of the hands is stretched out straight, and in the other she holds a torch. One may symbolize Ilithyia’s torches thus, that the throes of travail are to women as it were a fire. Or the torches may be supposed to symbolize that Ilithyia brings children to the light. The statue is by the Messenian Damophon.
[7.23] And at no great distance from the temple of Ilithyia is the sacred enclosure of Æsculapius, and statues in it of Hygiea and Æsculapius. The iambic line on the basement says that they were by the Messenian Damophon. In this temple of Æsculapius I had a controversy with a Sidonian, who said that the Phœnicians had more accurate knowledge generally about divine things than the Greeks, and their tradition was that Apollo was the father of Æsculapius, but that he had no mortal woman for his mother, and that Æsculapius was nothing but the air which is beneficial for the health of mankind and all beasts, and that Apollo was the Sun, and was most properly called the father of Æsculapius, because the Sun in its course regulates the Seasons and gives health to the air. All this I assented to, but was obliged to point out that this view was as much Greek as Phœnician, since at Titane in Sicyonia the statue of Æsculapius was called Health, and that it was plain even to a child that the course of the sun on the earth produces health among mankind.
[7.23] At Ægium there is also a temple to Athene and another to Hera, and Athene has two statues in white stone, but the statue of Hera may be looked upon by none but women, and those only the priestesses. And near the theatre is a temple and statue of beardless Dionysus. There are also in the market-place sacred precincts of Zeus Soter, and two statues on the left as you enter both of brass, the one without a beard seemed to me the older of the two. And in a building right opposite the road are brazen statues of Poseidon, Hercules, Zeus, and Athene, and they call them the Argive gods, because the Argive tradition says they were made at Argos, but the people of Ægium say it was because the statues were deposited with them by the Argives. And they say further that they were ordered to sacrifice to these statues every day: and they found out a trick by which they could sacrifice as required, but without any expense by feasting on the victims: and eventually these statues were asked back by the Argives, and the people of Ægium asked for the money they had spent on the sacrifices first, so the Argives (as they could not pay this) left the statues with them.
[7.24] At Ægium there is also near the market-place a temple in common to Apollo and Artemis, and in the market-place is a temple to Artemis alone dressed like a huntress, and the tomb of Talthybius the herald. Talthybius has also a monument erected to him at Sparta, and both cities perform funeral rites in his honour. And near the sea at Ægium Aphrodite has a temple, and next Poseidon, and next Proserpine the daughter of Demeter, and fourthly Zeus Homagyrius (the Gatherer). There are statues too of Zeus and Aphrodite and Athene. And Zeus was surnamed Homagyrius, because Agamemnon gathered together at this place the most famous men in Greece, to deliberate together in common how to attack the realm of Priam. Agamemnon has much renown generally, but especially because with the army that accompanied him first, without any reinforcements, he sacked Ilium and all the surrounding cities. And next to Zeus Homagyrius is the temple of Pan-Achæan Demeter. And the sea-shore at Ægium, where these temples just described are, furnishes abundantly water good to drink from a well. There is also a temple to Safety, the statue of the goddess may be seen by none but the priests, but the rites are as follows. They take from the altar of the goddess cakes made after the fashion of the country and throw them into the sea, and say that they send them to Arethusa in Syracuse. The people at Ægium have also several brazen statues as Zeus as a boy, and Hercules without a beard, by Ageladas the Argive. Priests are chosen annually for these gods, and each of the statues remains in the house of the priest. And in older times the most beautiful boy was chosen as priest to Zeus, and when their beards grew then the priest’s office passed to some other beautiful boy. And Ægium is the place where the general meeting of the Achæans is still held, just as the Amphictyonic Council is held at Thermopylæ and Delphi.
[7.24] As you go on you come to the river Selinus, and about 40 stades from Ægium is a place called Helice near the sea. It was once an important city, and the Ionians had there the most holy temple of Poseidon of Helice. The worship of Poseidon of Helice still remained with them, both when they were driven by the Achæans to Athens, and when they afterwards went from Athens to the maritime parts of Asia Minor. And the Milesians as you go to the well Biblis have an altar of Poseidon of Helice before their city, and similarly at Teos the same god has precincts and an altar. Even Homer has written of Helice, and of Poseidon of Helice.¹³ And later on the Achæans here, who drove some suppliants from the temple and slew them, met with quick vengeance from Poseidon, for an earthquake coming over the place rapidly overthrew all the buildings, and made the very site of the city difficult for posterity to find. Previously in earthquakes, remarkable for their violence or extent, the god has generally given previous intimation by signs. For either continuous rain or drought are mostly wont to precede their approach: and in winter the air is hotter, and in summer the disk of the sun is misty and has a different colour to its usual colour, being either redder or slightly inclining to black. And the springs are generally deficient in water, and gusts of wind sweeping over the district uproot the trees, and in the sky are meteors with flames of fire, and the appearance of the stars is unusual and excites consternation in the beholders, and moreover vapours and exhalations rise up out of the ground. And many other indications does the god give in the case of violent earthquakes. And earthquakes are not all similar, but those who have paid attention to such things from the first or been instructed by others have been able to recognize the following phenomena. The mildest of them, if indeed the word mildness is applicable to any of them, is when simultaneously with the first motion of the earth and with the rocking of buildings to their foundation a counter motion restores them to their former position. And in such an earthquake you may see pillars nearly rooted up falling into their places again, and walls that gaped asunder joining again: and beams that slipped out of their fittings slipping back again: so too in the pipes of conduits, if any pipe bursts from the pressure of water, the broken parts weld together again better than any workmen could adjust them. Another kind of earthquake destroys everything within its range, and, on whatever it spends its force, forthwith batters it down, like the military engines employed in sieges. But the most deadly kind of earthquake may be recognized by the following concomitants. The breath of a man in a long-continued fever comes thicker and with much effort, and this is marked in other parts of the body, but especially by feeling the pulse. Similarly this kind of earthquake they say undermines the foundations of buildings, and makes them rock to and fro, like the effect produced by the burrowing of moles in the earth. And this is the only kind of earthquake that leaves no trace in the earth of previous habitation. This was the kind of earthquake that rased Helice to the ground. And they say another misfortune happened to the place in the winter at the same time. The sea encroached over much of the district and quite flooded Helice with water: and the grove of Poseidon was so submerged that the tops of the trees alone were visible. And so the god suddenly sending the earthquake, and the sea encroaching simultaneously, the inundation swept away Helice and its population. A similar catastrophe happened to the town of Sipylus which was swallowed up by a landslip. And when this landslip occurred in the rock water came forth, and became a lake called Saloe, and the ruins of Sipylus were visible in the lake, till the water pouring down hid them from view. Visible too are the ruins of Helice, but not quite as clearly as formerly, because they have been effaced by the action of the sea.
[7.25] One may learn not only from this ruin of Helice but also from other cases that the vengeance of heaven for outrages upon suppliants is sure. Thus the god at Dodona plainly exhorted men to respect suppliants. For to the Athenians in the days of Aphidas came the following message from Zeus at Dodona.
“Think of the Areopagus and the smoking altars of the Eumenides, for you must treat as suppliants the Lacedæmonians conquered in battle. Slay them not with the sword, harm not suppliants. Suppliants are inviolable.”
[7.25] This the Greeks remembered when the Peloponnesians came to Athens, in the reign of Codrus the son of Melanthus. All the rest of the Peloponnesian army retired from Attica, when they heard of the death of Codrus and the circumstances attending it. For they did not any longer expect victory, as Codrus had devoted himself in accordance with the oracle at Delphi. But some of the Lacedæmonians got stealthily into the city by night, and at daybreak perceived that their friends had retired, and, as the Athenians began to muster against them, fled for safety to the Areopagus and to the altars of the goddesses called the August.¹⁴ And the Athenians allowed the suppliants to depart scot-free on this occasion, but some years later the authorities destroyed the suppliants of Athene, those of Cylo’s party who had occupied the Acropolis, and both the murderers and their children were considered accursed by the goddess. Upon the Lacedæmonians too who had killed some suppliants in the temple of Poseidon at Tænarum came an earthquake so long-continued and violent, that no house in Lacedæmon could stand against it. And the destruction of Helice happened when Asteus was Archon at Athens, in the 4th year of the 101st Olympiad, in which Damon of Thuria was victor. And as there were none left remaining at Helice the people of Ægium occupied their territory.
[7.25] And next to Helice, as you turn from the sea to the right, you will come to the town of Cerynea, built on a hill above the high-road. It got its name either from some local ruler or from the river Cerynites, which rises in Arcadia in the Mountain Cerynea, and flows through the district of those Achæans, who came from Argolis and dwelt there through the following mischance. The fort of Mycenæ could not be captured by the Argives owing to its strength, (for it had been built by the Cyclopes as the wall at Tiryns also), but the people of Mycenæ were obliged to evacuate their city because their supplies failed, and some of them went to Cleonæ, but more than half took refuge with Alexander in Macedonia, who had sent Mardonius the son of Gobryas on a mission to the Athenians, and the rest went to Cerynea, and Cerynea became more powerful through this influx of population, and more notable in after times through this coming into the town of the people of Mycenæ. And at Cerynea is a temple of the Eumenides, built they say by Orestes. Whatever wretch, stained with blood or any other defilement, comes into this temple to look round, he is forthwith driven frantic by his fears. And for this reason people are not admitted into this temple indiscriminately. The statues of the goddesses in the temple are of wood and not very large: but the statues of some women in the vestibule are of stone and artistically carved: the natives say that they are some priestesses of the Eumenides.
[7.25] And as you return from Cerynea to the high road, and proceed along it no great distance, the second turn to the right from the sea takes you by a winding road to Bura, which lies on a hill. The town got its name they say from Bura the daughter of Ion, the Son of Xuthus by Helice. And when Helice was totally destroyed by the god, Bura also was afflicted by a mighty earthquake, so that none of the old statues were left in the temples. And those that happened to be at that time away on military service or some other errand were the only people of Bura preserved. There are temples here to Demeter, and Aphrodite, and Dionysus, and Ilithyia. Their statues are of Pentelican marble by the Athenian Euclides. Demeter is robed. There is also a temple to Isis.
[7.25] And as you descend from Bura to the sea is the river called Buraicus, and a not very big Hercules in a cave, surnamed Buraicus, whose oracular responses are ascertained by dice on a board. He that consults the god prays before his statue, and after prayer takes dice, plenty of which are near Hercules, and throws four on the board. And on every dice is a certain figure inscribed, which has its interpretation in a corresponding figure on the board. It is about 30 stades from this temple of Hercules to Helice by the direct road. And as you go on your way from the temple of Hercules you come to a perennial river, that has its outlet into the sea, and rises in an Arcadian mountain, its name is Crathis as also the name of the mountain, and from this Crathis the river near Croton in Italy got its name. And near the Crathis in Achaia was formerly the town Ægæ, which they say was eventually deserted from its weakness. Homer has mentioned this Ægæ in a speech of Hera,
“They bring you gifts to Helice and Ægæ,”¹⁵
plainly therefore Poseidon had gifts equally at Helice and Ægæ. And at no great distance from Crathis is a tomb on the right of the road, and on it you will find a rather indistinct painting of a man standing by a horse. And the road from this tomb to what is called Gaius is 30 stades: Gaius is a temple of Earth called the Broad-breasted. The statue is very ancient. And the woman who becomes priestess remains henceforth in a state of chastity, and before she must only have been married once. And they are tested by drinking bull’s blood, whoever of them is not telling the truth is detected at once and punished. And if there are several competitors, the woman who obtains most lots is appointed priestess.
[7.26] And the seaport at Ægira (both town and seaport have the same name) is 72 stades from the temple of Hercules Buraicus. Near the sea there is nothing notable at Ægira, from the port to the upper part of the town is 12 stades. In Homer¹⁶ the town is called Hyperesia, the present name was given to it by the Ionian settlers for the following reason. A hostile band of Sicyonians was going to invade their land. And they, not thinking themselves a match for the Sicyonians, collected together all the goats in the country, and fastened torches to their horns, and directly night came on lit these torches. And the Sicyonians, who thought that the allies of the Hyperesians were coming up, and that this light was the campfires of the allied force, went home again: and the Hyperesians changed the name of their city because of these goats, and at the place where the goat that was most handsome and the leader of the rest had crouched down there they built a temple to Artemis the Huntress, thinking that this stratagem against the Sicyonians would not have occurred to them but for Artemis. Not that the name Ægira prevailed at once over Hyperesia. Even in my time there are still some who call Oreus in Eubœa by its old name of Hestiæa. At Ægira there is a handsome temple of Zeus, and his statue in a sitting posture in Pentelican marble by the Athenian Euclides. The head and fingers and toes are of ivory, and the rest is wood gilt and richly variegated. There is also a temple of Artemis, and a statue of the goddess which is of modern art. A maiden is priestess, till she grows to a marriageable age. And the old statue that stands there is, according to the tradition of the people at Ægira, Iphigenia the daughter of Agamemnon: and if they state what is correct, the temple must originally have been built to Iphigenia. There is also a very ancient temple of Apollo, ancient is the temple, ancient are the gables, ancient is the statue of the god, which is naked and of great size. Who made it none of the natives could tell: but whoever has seen the Hercules at Sicyon, would conjecture that the Apollo at Ægira was by the same hand as that, namely by Laphaes of Phlius. And there are some statues of Æsculapius in the temple in a standing position, and of Serapis and Isis apart in Pentelican marble. And they worship most of all Celestial Aphrodite: but men must not enter her temple. But into the temple of the Syrian goddess they may enter on stated days, but only after the accustomed rites and fasting. I have also seen another building in Ægira, in which there is a statue of Fortune with the horn of Amalthea, and next it a Cupid with wings: to symbolize to men that success in love is due to chance rather than beauty. I am much of the opinion of Pindar in his Ode that Fortune is one of the Fates, and more powerful than her sisters. And in this building at Ægira is a statue of a man rather old and evidently in grief, and 3 women are taking off their bracelets, and there are 3 young men standing by, and one has a breastplate on. The tradition about him is that he died after fighting most bravely of all the people of Ægira against the Achæans, and his brothers brought home the news of his death, and his sisters are stripping off their bracelets out of grief at his loss, and the people of the place call the old man his father Sympathetic, because he is clearly grieving in the statue.
[7.26] And there is a direct road from Ægira starting from the temple of Zeus over the mountains. It is a hilly road, and about 40 stades bring you to Phelloe, not a very important place, nor inhabited at all when the Ionians still occupied the land. The neighbourhood of Phelloe is very good for vine-growing, and in the rocky parts are trees and wild animals, as wild deer and wild boars. And if any places in Greece are well situated in respect of abundance of water, Phelloe is one of them. And there are temples to Dionysus and Artemis, the goddess is in bronze in the act of taking a dart out of her quiver, and Dionysus’ statue is decorated with vermilion. As you go down towards the seaport from Ægira and forward a little there is, on the right of the road, a temple of Artemis the Huntress, where they say the goat crouched down.
[7.26] And next to Ægira is Pellene: the people of Pellene are the last of the Achæans near Sicyon and Argolis. Their town was called according to their own tradition from Pallas who they say was one of the Titans, but according to the tradition of the Argives from the Argive Pellen, who was they say the son of Phorbas and grandson of Triopas. And between Ægira and Pellene there is a town subject to Sicyon called Donussa, which was destroyed by the Sicyonians, and which they say is mentioned by Homer in his Catalogue of Agamemnon’s forces in the line,
“And those who inhabited Hyperesia and steep Donoessa.”
Il. ii. 573.
But when Pisistratus collected the verses of Homer, that had been scattered about and had to be got together from various quarters, either he or some of his companions in the task changed the name inadvertently.¹⁷ The people of Pellene call their seaport Aristonautæ. To it from Ægira on the sea is a distance of 120 stades, and it is half this distance to Pellene from the seaport. The name Aristonautæ was given they say to their seaport because the Argonauts put in at the harbour.
[7.27] And the town of Pellene is on a hill which is very steep in its topmost peak, (indeed precipitous and therefore uninhabited), and is built upon its more level parts not continuously, but is cut as it were into two parts by the peak which lies between. And as you approach Pellene you see a statue of Hermes on the road called Dolios (wily), he is very ready to accomplish the prayers of people: it is a square statue, the god is bearded and has a hat on his head. On the way to the town there is also a temple of Athene made of the stone of the country, her statue is of ivory and gold by they say Phidias, who earlier still made statues of Athene at Athens and Platæa. And the people of Pellene say that there is a shrine of Athene deep underground under the base of her statue, and that the air from it is damp and therefore good for the ivory. And above the temple of Athene is a grove with a wall built round it to Artemis called the Saviour, their greatest oath is by her. No one may enter this grove but the priests, who are chiefly chosen out of the best local families. And opposite this grove is the temple of Dionysus called the Lighter, for when they celebrate his festival they carry torches into his temple by night, and place bowls of wine all over the city. At Pellene there is also a temple of Apollo Theoxenius, the statue is of bronze, and they hold games to Apollo called Theoxenia, and give silver as a prize for victory, and the men of the district contend. And near the temple of Apollo is one of Artemis, she is dressed as an archer. And there is a conduit built in the market-place, their baths have to be of rain-water for there are not many wells with water to drink below the city, except at a place called Glyceæ. And there is an old gymnasium chiefly given up to the youths to practise in, nor can any be enrolled as citizens till they have arrived at man’s estate. Here is the statue of Promachus of Pellene, the son of Dryon, who won victories in the pancratium, one at Olympia, three at the Isthmus, and two at Nemea, and the people of Pellene erected two statues to him, one at Olympia, and one in the gymnasium, the latter in stone and not in brass. And it is said that in the war between Corinth and Pellene Promachus slew most of the enemy opposed to him. It is said also that he beat at Olympia Polydamas of Scotussa, who contended a second time at Olympia, after coming home safe from the King of the Persians. But the Thessalians do not admit that Polydamas was beaten, and they bring forward to maintain their view the line about Polydamas,
“O Scotoessa, nurse of the invincible Polydamas.”
However the people of Pellene hold Promachus in the highest honour. But Chæron, though he won two victories in wrestling, and 4 at Olympia, they do not even care to mention, I think because he destroyed the constitution of Pellene, receiving a very large bribe from Alexander the son of Philip to become the tyrant of his country. At Pellene there is also a temple of Ilithyia, built in the smaller half of the town. What is called Poseidon’s chapel was originally a parish room, but is not used in our day, but it still continues to be held sacred to Poseidon, and is under the gymnasium.
[7.27] And about 60 stades from Pellene is Mysæum, the temple of Mysian Demeter. It was built they say by Mysius an Argive, who also received Demeter into his house according to the tradition of the Argives. There is a grove at Mysæum of all kinds of trees, and plenty of water springs up from some fountains. And they keep the feast here to Demeter 7 days, and on the third day of the feast the men withdraw from the temple, and the women perform there alone during the night their wonted rites, and not only are the men banished but even male dogs. And on the following day, when the men return to the temple, the women and men mutually jest and banter one another. And at no great distance from Mysæum is the temple of Æsculapius called Cyros, where men are healed by the god. Water too flows freely there, and by the largest of the fountains is a statue of Æsculapius. And some rivers have their rise in the hills above Pellene: one of them, called Crius from the Titan Crius, flows in the direction of Ægira.... There is another river Crius which rises at the mountain Sipylus and is a tributary of the Hermus. And on the borders between Pellene and Sicyonia is the river Sythas, the last river in Achaia, which has its outlet in the Sicyonian sea.

## Book VIII — Arcadia

[8.1] The parts of Arcadia near Argolis are inhabited by the people of Tegea and Mantinea. They and the other Arcadians are the inland division of the Peloponnese. For the Corinthians come first at the Isthmus: and next them by the sea are the Epidaurians: and by Epidaurus and Trœzen and Hermion is the Gulf of Argolis, and the maritime parts of Argolis: and next are the states of the Lacedæmonians, and next comes Messenia, which touches the sea at Mothone and Pylos and near Cyparissiæ. At Lechæum the Sicyonians border upon the Corinthians, being next to Argolis on that side: and next to Sicyon are the Achæans on the sea-shore, and the other part of the Peloponnese opposite the Echinades is occupied by Elis. And the borders between Elis and Messenia are by Olympia and the mouth of the Alpheus, and between Elis and Achaia the neighbourhood of Dyme. These states that I have mentioned border on the sea, but the Arcadians live in the interior and are shut off from the sea entirely: from which circumstance Homer describes them as having come to Troy not in their own ships but in transports provided by Agamemnon.¹⁸
[8.1] The Arcadians say that Pelasgus was the first settler in their land. It is probable that others also came with Pelasgus and that he did not come alone. For in that case what subjects would he have had? I think moreover that Pelasgus was eminent for strength and beauty and judgment beyond others, and that was why he was appointed king over them. This is the description of him by Asius.
“Divine Pelasgus on the tree-clad hills
Black Earth brought forth, to be of mortal race.”
And Pelasgus when he became king contrived huts that men should be free from cold and rain, and not be exposed to the fierce sun, and also garments made of the hides of pigs, such as the poor now use in Eubœa and Phocis. He was the inventor of these comforts. He too taught people to abstain from green leaves and grass and roots that were not good to eat, some even deadly to those who eat them. He discovered also that the fruit of some trees was good, especially acorns. And several since Pelasgus’ time have adopted this diet, so much so that the Pythian Priestess, when she forbade the Lacedæmonians to touch Arcadia, did so in the following words, “Many acorn-eating warriors are there in Arcadia, who will keep you off. I tell you the truth, I bear you no grudge.”
[8.1] And it was they say during the reign of Pelasgus that Arcadia was called Pelasgia.
[8.2] And Lycaon the son of Pelasgus devised even wiser things than his father. For he founded the town Lycosura on the Mountain Lycæus, and called Zeus Lycæus, and established a festival to him called the Lycæa. I do not think the Pan-Athenæa was established by the Athenians earlier, for their games were called Athenæa till the time of Theseus, when they were called Pan-Athenæa, because when they were then celebrated all the Athenians were gathered together into one city. As to the Olympian games—which they trace back to a period earlier than man, and in which they represent Cronos and Zeus wrestling, and the Curetes as the first competitors in running—for these reasons they may be passed over in the present account. And I think that Cecrops, king of Athens, and Lycaon were contemporaries, but did not display equal wisdom to the deity. For Cecrops was the first to call Zeus supreme, and did not think it right to sacrifice anything that had life, but offered on the altar the national cakes, which the Athenians still call by a special name, (pelani). But Lycaon brought a baby to the altar of Lycæan Zeus, and sacrificed it upon it, and sprinkled its blood on the altar. And they say directly after this sacrifice he became a wolf instead of a man. This tale I can easily credit, as it is a very old tradition among the Arcadians, and probable enough in itself. For the men who lived in those days were guests at the tables of the gods in consequence of their righteousness and piety, and those who were good clearly met with honour from the gods, and similarly those who were wicked with wrath, for the gods in those days were sometimes mortals who are still worshipped, as Aristæus, and Britomartis of Crete, and Hercules the son of Alcmena, and Amphiaraus the son of Œcles, and besides them Castor and Pollux. So one might well believe that Lycaon became a wolf, and Niobe the daughter of Tantalus a stone. But in our day, now wickedness has grown and spread all over the earth in all towns and countries, no mortal any longer becomes a god except in the language of excessive flattery,¹⁹ and the wicked receive wrath from the gods very late and only after their departure from this life. And in every age many curious things have happened, and some of them have been made to appear incredible to many, though they really happened, by those who have grafted falsehood on to truth. For they say that after Lycaon a person became a wolf from a man at the Festival of Lycæan Zeus, but not for all his life: for whenever he was a wolf if he abstained from meat ten months he became a man again, but if he tasted meat he remained a beast. Similarly they say that Niobe on Mount Sipylus weeps in summer time. And I have heard of other wonderful things, as people marked like vultures and leopards, and of the Tritons speaking with a human voice, who sing some say through a perforated shell. Now all that listen with pleasure to such fables are themselves by nature apt to exaggerate the wonderful, and so mixing fiction with truth they get discredited.
[8.3] The third generation after Pelasgus Arcadia advanced in population and cities. Nyctimus was the eldest son of Lycaon and succeeded to all his power, and his brothers built cities where each fancied. Pallas and Orestheus and Phigalus built Pallantium, and Orestheus built Oresthasium, and Phigalus built Phigalia. Stesichorus of Himera has mentioned a Pallantium in Geryoneis, and Phigalia and Oresthasium in process of time changed their names, the latter got called Oresteum from Orestes the son of Agamemnon, and the former Phialia from Phialus the son of Bucolion. And Trapezeus and Daseatas and Macareus and Helisson and Thocnus built Thocnia, and Acacus built Acacesium. From this Acacus, according to the tradition of the Arcadians, Homer invented a surname for Hermes. And from Helisson the city and river Helisson got their names. Similarly also Macaria and Dasea and Trapezus got their names from sons of Lycaon. And Orchomenus was founder of Methydrium and Orchomenus, which is called rich in cattle by Homer in his Iliad.²⁰ And Hypsus built Melæneæ and Hypsus and Thyræum and Hæmoniæ: and according to the Arcadians Thyrea in Argolis and the Thyreatic Gulf got their name from Thyreates. And Mænalus built Mænalus, in ancient times the most famous town in Arcadia, and Tegeates built Tegea, and Mantineus built Mantinea. And Cromi got its name from Cromus, and Charisia from Charisius its founder, and Tricoloni from Tricolonus, and Peræthes from Peræthus, and Asea from Aseatas, and Lycoa from Lyceus, and Sumatia from Sumateus. And both Alipherus and Heræus gave their names to towns. And Œnotrus, the youngest of the sons of Lycaon, having got money and men from his brother Nyctimus, sailed to Italy, and became king of the country called after him Œnotria. This was the first colony that started from Greece, for if one accurately investigates one will find that no foreign voyages for the purpose of colonization were ever made before Œnotrus.
[8.3] With so many sons Lycaon had only one daughter Callisto. According to the tradition of the Greeks Zeus had an intrigue with her. And when Hera detected it she turned Callisto into a she-bear, whom Artemis shot to please Hera. And Zeus sent Hermes with orders to save the child that Callisto was pregnant with. And her he turned into the Constellation known as the Great Bear, which Homer mentions in the voyage of Odysseus from Calypso,
“Looking on the Pleiades and late-setting Bootes, and the Bear, which they also call Charles’ wain.”²¹
[8.3] But perhaps the Constellation merely got its name out of honour to Callisto, for the Arcadians shew her grave.
[8.4] And after the death of Nyctimus Arcas the son of Callisto succeeded him in the kingdom. And he introduced sowing corn being taught by Triptolemus, and showed his people how to make bread, and to weave garments and other things, having learnt spinning from Adristas. And in his reign the country was called Arcadia instead of Pelasgia, and the inhabitants were called Arcadians instead of Pelasgi. And they say he mated with no mortal woman but with a Dryad Nymph. For the Nymphs used to be called Dryades, and Epimeliades, and sometimes Naiades, Homer in his poems mainly mentions them as Naiades.²² The name of this Nymph was Erato, and they say Arcas had by her Azan and Aphidas and Elatus: he had had a bastard son Autolaus still earlier. And when they grew up Arcas divided the country among his 3 legitimate sons, Azania took its name from Azan, and they are said to be colonists from Azania who dwell near the cave in Phrygia called Steunos and by the river Pencala. And Aphidas got Tegea and the neighbouring country, and so the poets call Tegea the lot of Aphidas. And Elatus had Mount Cyllene, which had no name then, and afterwards he migrated into what is now called Phocis, and aided the Phocians who were pressed hard in war by the Phlegyes, and built the city Elatea. And Azan had a son Clitor, and Aphidas had a son called Aleus, and Elatus had five sons, Æpytus and Pereus and Cyllen and Ischys and Stymphelus. And when Azan died funeral games were first established, I don’t know whether any other but certainly horseraces. And Clitor the son of Azan lived at Lycosura, and was the most powerful of the kings, and built the city which he called Clitor after his own name. And Aleus inherited his father’s share. And Mount Cyllene got its name from Cyllen, and from Stymphelus the well and city by the well were both called Stymphelus. The circumstances attending the death of Ischys, the son of Elatus, I have already given in my account of Argolis. And Pereus had no male offspring but only a daughter Neæra, who married Autolycus, who dwelt on Mount Parnassus, and was reputed to be the son of Hermes, but was really the son of Dædalion.
[8.4] And Clitor the son of Azan had no children, so the kingdom of Arcadia devolved upon Æpytus the son of Elatus. And as he was out hunting he was killed not by any wild animal but by a serpent, little expecting such an end. I have myself seen the particular kind of serpent. It is a very small ash-coloured worm, marked with irregular stripes, its head is broad and its neck narrow, it has a large belly and small tail, and, like the serpent they call the horned serpent, walks sideways like the crab. And Æpytus was succeeded in the kingdom by Aleus, for Agamedes and Gortys, the sons of Stymphelus, were great-grandsons of Arcas, but Aleus was his grandson, being the son of Aphidas. And Aleus built the old temple to Athene Alea at Tegea, which he made the seat of his kingdom. And Gortys, the son of Stymphelus, built the town Gortys by the river called Gortynius. And Aleus had three sons, Lycurgus and Amphidamas and Cepheus, and one daughter Auge. According to Hecatæus Hercules, when he came to Tegea, had an intrigue with this Auge, and at last she was discovered to be with child by him, and Aleus put her and the child in a chest and let it drift to sea. And she got safely to Teuthras, a man of substance in the plain of Caicus, and he fell in love with her and married her. And her tomb is at Pergamus beyond the Caicus, a mound of earth with a stone wall round it, and on the tomb a device in bronze, a naked woman. And after the death of Aleus Lycurgus his son succeeded to the kingdom by virtue of being the eldest. He did nothing very notable except that he slew by guile and not fairly Areithous a warrior. And of his sons Epochus died of some illness, but Ancæus sailed to Colchi with Jason, and afterwards, hunting with Meleager the wild boar in Calydon, was killed by it. Lycurgus lived to an advanced old age, having survived both his sons.
[8.5] And after the death of Lycurgus Echemus, the son of Aeropus the son of Cepheus the son of Aleus, became king of the Arcadians. In his reign the Dorians, who were returning to the Peloponnese under the leadership of Hyllus the son of Hercules, were beaten in battle by the Achæans near the Isthmus of Corinth, and Echemus slew Hyllus in single combat being challenged by him. For this seems more probable to me now than my former account, in which I wrote that Orestes was at this time king of the Achæans, and that it was during his reign that Hyllus ventured his descent upon the Peloponnese. And according to the later tradition it would seem that Timandra, the daughter of Tyndareus, married Echemus after he had killed Hyllus. And Agapenor, the son of Ancæus and grandson of Lycurgus, succeeded Echemus and led the Arcadians to Troy. And after the capture of Ilium the storm which fell on the Greeks as they were sailing home carried Agapenor and the Arcadian fleet to Cyprus, and he became the founder of Paphos, and erected the temple of Aphrodite in that town, the goddess having been previously honoured by the people of Cyprus in the place called Golgi. And afterwards Laodice, the daughter of Agapenor, sent to Tegea a robe for Athene Alea, and the inscription on it gives the nationality of Laodice.
“This is the robe which Laodice gave to her own Athene, sending it from sacred Cyprus to her spacious fatherland.”
[8.5] And as Agapenor did not get home from Ilium, the kingdom devolved upon Hippothous, the son of Cercyon, the son of Agamedes, the son of Stymphelus. Of him they record nothing notable, but that he transferred the seat of the kingdom from Tegea to Trapezus. And Æpytus the son of Hippothous succeeded his father, and Orestes the son of Agamemnon, in obedience to the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, migrated to Arcadia from Mycenæ. And Æpytus the son of Hippothous presuming to go into the temple of Poseidon at Mantinea, (though men were not allowed to enter it either then or now,) was struck blind on his entrance, and died not long afterwards.
[8.5] And during the reign of Cypselus, his son and successor, the Dorians returned to the Peloponnese in ships, landing near the Promontory of Rhium, not as three generations earlier attempting to return by way of the Isthmus of Corinth, and Cypselus, hearing of their return, gave his daughter in marriage to Cresphontes, the only unmarried son of Aristomachus, and thus won him over to his interests, and he and the Arcadians had now nothing to fear. And the son and successor of Cypselus was Olæas, who, in junction with the Heraclidæ from Lacedæmon and Argos, restored his sister’s son Æpytus to Messene. The next king was Bucolion, the next Phialus, who deprived Phigalus, (the founder of Phigalia, and the son of Lycaon), of the honour of giving his name to that town, by changing its name to Phialia after his own name, though the new name did not universally prevail. And during the reign of Simus, the son of Phialus, the old statue of Black Demeter that belonged to the people of Phigalia was destroyed by fire. This was a portent that not long afterwards Simus himself would end his life. And during the reign of Pompus his successor the Æginetans sailed to Cyllene for purposes of commerce. There they put their goods on beasts of burden and took them into the interior of Arcadia. For this good service Pompus highly honoured the Æginetans, and out of friendship to them gave the name of Æginetes to his son and successor: who was succeeded by his son Polymestor during whose reign Charillus and the Lacedæmonians first invaded the district round Tegea, and were beaten in battle by the men of Tegea, and also by the women who put on armour, and Charillus and his army were taken prisoners. We shall give a further account of them when we come to Tegea. And as Polymestor had no children Æchmis succeeded, the son of Briacas, and nephew of Polymestor. Briacas was the son of Æginetes but younger than Polymestor. And it was during the reign of Æchmis that the war broke out between the Lacedæmonians and Messenians. The Arcadians had always had a kindly feeling towards the Messenians, and now they openly fought against the Lacedæmonians in conjunction with Aristodemus king of Messenia. And Aristocrates, the son of Æchmis, acted insolently to his fellow-countrymen in various ways, but his great impiety to the gods I cannot pass over. There is a temple of Artemis Hymnia on the borders between Orchomenus and Mantinea. She was worshipped of old by all the Arcadians. And her priestess at this time was a maiden. And Aristocrates, as she resisted all his attempts to seduce her, and fled at last for refuge to the altar near the statue of Artemis, defiled her there. And when his wickedness was reported to the Arcadians they stoned him to death, and their custom was thenceforward changed. For instead of a maiden as priestess of Artemis they had a woman who was tired of the company of men. His son was Hicetas, who had a son Aristocrates, of the same name as his grandfather, and who met with the same fate, for he too was stoned to death by the Arcadians, who detected him receiving bribes from Lacedæmon, and betraying the Messenians at the great reverse they met with at the Great Trench. This crime was the reason why all the descendants of Cypselus were deposed from the sovereignty of Arcadia.
[8.6] In all these particulars about their kings, as I was curious, the Arcadians gave me full information. And as to the nation generally, their most ancient historical event is the war against Ilium, and next their fighting against the Lacedæmonians in conjunction with the Messenians; they also took part in the action against the Medes at Platæa. And rather from compulsion than choice they fought under the Lacedæmonians against the Athenians, and crossed into Asia Minor with Agesilaus, and were present at the battle of Leuctra in Bœotia. But on other occasions they exhibited their suspicion of the Lacedæmonians, and after the reverse of the Lacedæmonians at Leuctra they at once left them and joined the Thebans. They did not join the Greeks in fighting against Philip and the Macedonians at Chæronea, or in Thessaly against Antipater, nor did they fight against them, but they remained neutral. And they did not (they say) share in fighting against the Galati at Thermopylæ, only because they were afraid that, in the absence from home of the flower of their young men, the Lacedæmonians would ravage their land. And the Arcadians were of all the Greeks the most zealous members of the Achæan League. And all that happened to them that I could ascertain, not publicly but privately in their several cities, I shall describe as I come to each part of the subject.
[8.6] The passes into Arcadia from Argolis are by Hysiæ and across the mountain Parthenium into the district of Tegea, and two by Mantinea through what are called Holm-Oak and Ladder. Ladder is the broadest, and has steps cut in it. And when you have crossed that pass you come to Melangea, which supplies the people of Mantinea with water to drink. And as you advance from Melangea, about seven stades further, you come to a well called the well of the Meliastæ. These Meliastæ have orgies to Dionysus, and they have a hall of Dionysus near the well, and a temple to Aphrodite Melænis (Black). There seems no other reason for this title of the goddess, than that men generally devote themselves to love in the darkness of night, not like the animals in broad daylight. The other pass over Artemisium is far narrower than Ladder-pass. I mentioned before that Artemisium has a temple and statue of Artemis, and that in it are the sources of the river Inachus, which as long as it flows along the mountain road is the boundary between the Argives and Mantineans, but when it leaves this road flows thenceforward through Argolis, and hence Æschylus and others call it the Argive river.
[8.7] As you cross over Artemisium into the district of Mantinea the plain Argum (unfruitful) will receive you, rightly so called. For the rain that comes down from the mountains makes the plain unfruitful, and would have prevented it being anything but a swamp, had not the water disappeared in a cavity in the ground. It reappears at a place called Dine. This Dine is at a place in Argolis called Genethlium, and the water is sweet though it comes up from the sea. At Dine the Argives used formerly to offer to Poseidon horses ready bridled. Sweet water comes up from the sea plainly here in Argolis, and also in Thesprotia at a place called Chimerium. More wonderful still is the hot water of Mæander, partly flowing from a rock which the river surrounds, partly coming up from the mud of the river. And near Dicæarchia (Puteoli) in Tyrrhenia the sea water is hot, and an island has been constructed, so as for the water to afford warm baths.
[8.7] There is a mountain on the left of the plain Argum, where there are ruins of the camp of Philip, the son of Amyntas, and of the village Nestane. For it was at this village they say that Philip encamped, and the well there they still call Philip’s well. He went into Arcadia to win over the Arcadians to his side, and at the same time to separate them from the other Greeks. Philip one can well believe displayed the greatest valour of all the Macedonian kings before or after him, but no rightminded person could call him a good man, seeing that he trod under foot the oaths he had made to the gods, and on all occasions violated truces, and dishonoured good faith among men. And the vengeance of the deity came upon him not late, but early. For Philip had only lived 46 years when the oracle at Delphi was made good by his death, given to him they say when he inquired about the Persian war,
“The bull is crowned, the end is come, the sacrificer’s near.”
[8.7] This as the god very soon showed did not refer to the Mede, but to Philip himself. And after the death of Philip his baby boy by Cleopatra the niece of Attalus was put by Olympias with his mother into a brazen vessel over a fire, and so killed. Olympias also subsequently killed Aridæus. The deity also intended as it seems to mow down all the family of Cassander by untimely ends. For Cassander married Thessalonica the daughter of Philip, and Thessalonica and Aridæus had Thessalian mothers. As to Alexander all know of his early death. But if Philip had considered the eulogium passed upon Glaucus the Spartan, and had remembered that line in each of his actions,
“The posterity of a conscientious man shall be fortunate,”²³
I do not think that there would have been any reason for any of the gods to have ended at the same time the life of Alexander and the Macedonian supremacy.
[8.8] But this has been a digression. And next to the ruins of Nestane is a temple sacred to Demeter, to whom the Mantineans hold a festival annually. And under Nestane is much of the plain Argum, and the place called Mæras, which is 10 stades from the plain. And when you have gone on no great distance you will come to another plain, in which near the high road is a fountain called Arne. The following is the tradition of the Arcadians about it. When Rhea gave birth to Poseidon, the little boy was deposited with the flocks and fed with the lambs, and so the fountain was called Arne, (lamb fountain). And Rhea told Cronos that she had given birth to a foal, and gave him a foal to eat up instead of the little boy, just as afterwards instead of Zeus she gave him a stone wrapt up in swaddling-clothes. As to these fables of the Greeks I considered them childish when I began this work, but when I got as far as this book I formed this view, that those who were reckoned wise among the Greeks spoke of old in riddles and not directly, so I imagine the fables about Cronos to be Greek wisdom. Of the traditions therefore about the gods I shall state such as I meet with.
[8.8] Mantinea is about 12 stades from this fountain. Mantineus, the son of Lycaon, seems to have built the town of Mantinea, (which name the Arcadians still use), on another site, from which it was transferred to its present site by Antinoe, the daughter of Cepheus the son of Aleus, who according to an oracle made a serpent (what kind of serpent they do not record) her guide. And that is why the river which flows by the town got its name Ophis (serpent). And if we may form a judgment from the Iliad of Homer this serpent was probably a dragon. For when in the Catalogue of the Ships Homer describes the Greeks leaving Philoctetes behind in Lemnos suffering from his ulcer,²⁴ he did not give the title serpent to the watersnake, but he did give that title to the dragon whom the eagle dropped among the Trojans.²⁵ So it seems probable that Antinoe was led by a dragon.
[8.8] The Mantineans did not fight against the Lacedæmonians at Dipæa with the other Arcadians, but in the Peloponnesian war they joined the people of Elis against the Lacedæmonians, and fought against them, with some reinforcements from the Athenians, and also took part in the expedition to Sicily out of friendship to the Athenians. And some time afterwards a Lacedæmonian force under King Agesipolis, the son of Pausanias, invaded the territory of Mantinea. And Agesipolis was victorious in the battle, and shut the Mantineans up in their fortress, and captured Mantinea in no long time, not by storm, but by turning the river Ophis into the city through the walls which were built of unbaked brick. As to battering rams brick walls hold out better even than those made of stone, for the stones get broken and come out of position, so that brick walls suffer less, but unbaked brick is melted by water just as wax by the sun. This stratagem which Agesipolis employed against the walls of Mantinea was formerly employed by Cimon, the son of Miltiades, when he was besieging Boges the Mede and the Persians at Eion on the Strymon. So Agesipolis merely imitated what he had heard sung of by the Greeks. And when he took Mantinea, he left part of it habitable, but most of it he rased to the ground, and distributed the inhabitants in the various villages. The Thebans after the battle of Leuctra intended to restore the Mantineans from these villages to Mantinea. But though thus restored they were not at all faithful to the Thebans. For when they were besieged by the Lacedæmonians they made private overtures to them for peace, without acting in concert with the other Arcadians, and from fear of the Thebans openly entered into an offensive and defensive alliance with the Lacedæmonians, and in the battle fought on Mantinean territory between the Thebans under Epaminondas and the Lacedæmonians they ranged themselves with the Lacedæmonians. But after this the Mantineans and Lacedæmonians were at variance, and the former joined the Achæan League. And when Agis, the son of Eudamidas, was king of Sparta they defeated him in self defence by the help of an Achæan force under Aratus. They also joined the Achæans in the action against Cleomenes, and helped them in breaking down the power of the Lacedæmonians. And when Antigonus in Macedonia was Regent for Philip, the father of Perseus, who was still a boy, and was on most friendly terms with the Achæans, the Mantineans did several other things in his honour, and changed the name of their city to Antigonea. And long afterwards, when Augustus was about to fight the sea fight off the promontory of Apollo at Actium, the Mantineans fought on his side, though the rest of the Arcadians took part with Antony, for no other reason I think than that the Lacedæmonians were on the side of Augustus. And ten generations afterwards when Adrian was Emperor, he took away from the Mantineans the imported name of Antigonea and restored the old name of Mantinea.
[8.9] And the Mantinæans have a double temple divided in the middle by a wall of partition, on one side is the statue of Æsculapius by Alcamenes, on the other is the temple of Leto and her children. Praxiteles made statues the third generation after Alcamenes. In the basement are the Muse and Marsyas with his pipe. There also on a pillar is Polybius the son of Lycortas, whom we shall mention hereafter. The Mantineans have also several other temples, as one to Zeus Soter, and another to Zeus surnamed Bountiful because he gives all good things to mankind, also one to Castor and Pollux, and in another part of the city one to Demeter and Proserpine. And they keep a fire continually burning here, taking great care that it does not go out through inadvertence. I also saw a temple of Hera near the theatre: the statues are by Praxiteles, Hera is seated on a throne, and standing by her are Athene and Hebe the daughter of Hera. And near the altar of Hera is the tomb of Arcas, the son of Callisto: his remains were brought from Mænalus in accordance with the oracle at Delphi.
“Cold is Mænalia, where Arcas lies
Who gave his name to all Arcadians.
Go there I bid you, and with kindly mind
Remove his body to the pleasant city,
Where three and four and even five roads meet,
There build a shrine and sacrifice to Arcas.”
And the place where the tomb of Arcas is they call the altars of the Sun. And not far from the theatre are some famous tombs, Vesta called Common a round figure, and they say Antinoe the daughter of Cepheus lies here. And there is a pillar above another tomb, and a man on horseback carved on the pillar, Gryllus the son of Xenophon. And behind the theatre are ruins of a temple of Aphrodite Symmachia and her statue, and the inscription on the basement of it states that Nicippe the daughter of Paseas offered it. And this temple was erected by the Mantineans as a record to posterity of the seafight off Actium fought by them in conjunction with the Romans. And they worship Athene Alea, and have a temple and statue of her. They also regard Antinous as a god, his temple is the latest in Mantinea, he was excessively beloved by the emperor Adrian. I never saw him alive but have seen statues and paintings of him. He has also honours elsewhere, and there is a city near the Nile in Egypt called after him, and the following is the reason why he was honoured at Mantinea. He belonged by birth to the town Bithynium in Bithynia beyond the river Sangarius, and the Bithynians were originally Arcadians from Mantinea. That is why the Emperor assigned him divine honours at Mantinea, and his rites are annual, and games are held to him every fifth year. And the Mantineans have a room in the Gymnasium which has statues of Antinous, and is in other respects well worth a visit for the precious stones with which it is adorned and the paintings, most of which are of Antinous and make him resemble young Dionysus. And moreover there is an imitation here of the painting at Ceramicus of the action of the Athenians at Mantinea. And in the market-place the Mantineans have the brazen image of a woman, who they say is Diomenea the daughter of Arcas, and they have also the hero-chapel of Podares, who they say fell in the battle against Epaminondas and the Thebans. But three generations before my time they changed the inscription on the tomb to suit a descendant and namesake of Podares, who lived at the period when one could become a Roman Citizen. But it was the old Podares that the Mantineans in my time honoured, saying that the bravest (whether of their own men or their allies) in the battle was Gryllus the son of Xenophon, and next Cephisodorus of Marathon, who was at that time the Commander of the Athenian Cavalry, and next Podares.
[8.10] There are roads leading from Mantinea to the other parts of Arcadia, I will describe the most notable things to see on each of them. As you go to Tegea on the left of the highroad near the walls of Mantinea is a place for horseracing, and at no great distance is the course where the games to Antinous take place. And above this course is the Mountain Alesium, so called they say from the wanderings of Rhea, and on the mountain is a grove of Demeter. And at the extreme end of the mountain is the temple of Poseidon Hippius, not far from the course in Mantinea. As to this temple I write what I have heard and what others have recorded about it. It was built in our day by the Emperor Adrian, who appointed overseers over the workmen, that no one might spy into the old temple nor move any portion of its ruins, and he ordered them to build the new temple round the old one, which was they say originally built to Poseidon by Agamedes and Trophonius, who made beams of oak and adjusted them together. And when they kept people from entering into this temple they put up no barrier in front of the entrance, but only stretched across a woollen thread, whether they thought this would inspire fear as people then held divine things in honour, or that there was some efficacy in this thread. And Æpytus the son of Hippothous neither leapt over this thread nor crept under it but broke through it and so entered the temple, and having acted with impiety was struck blind, (sea water bursting into his eyes from the outraged god), and soon after died. There is an old tradition that sea water springs up in this temple. The Athenians have a similar tradition about their Acropolis, and so have the Carians who dwell at Mylasa about the temple of their god, whom they call in their native dialect Osogo. The Athenians are only about 20 stades distant from the sea at Phalerum, and the seaport for Mylasa is 80 stades from that town, but the Mantineans are at such a very long distance from the sea that this is plainly supernatural there.
[8.10] When you have passed the temple of Poseidon you come to a trophy in stone erected for a victory over the Lacedæmonians and Agis. This was the disposition of the battle. On the right wing were the Mantineans themselves, with an army of all ages under the command of Podares, the great grandson of that Podares who had fought against the Thebans. They had also with them the seer from Elis, Thrasybulus the son of Æneas of the family of the Iamidæ, who prophesied victory for the Mantineans, and himself took part in the action. The rest of the Arcadians were posted on the left wing, each town had its own commander, and Megalopolis had two, Lydiades and Leocydes. And Aratus with the Sicyonians and Achæans occupied the centre. And Agis and the Lacedæmonians extended their line of battle that they might not be outflanked by the enemy, and Agis and his staff occupied the centre. And Aratus according to preconcerted arrangement with the Arcadians fell back (he and his army) when the Lacedæmonians pressed them hard, and as they fell back they formed the shape of a crescent. And Agis and the Lacedæmonians were keen for victory, and en masse pressed fiercely on Aratus and his division. And they were followed by the Lacedæmonians on the wings, who thought it would be a great stepping stone to victory to rout Aratus and his division. But the Arcadians meanwhile stole upon their flanks, and the Lacedæmonians being surrounded lost most of their men, and their king Agis the son of Eudamidas fell. And the Mantineans said that Poseidon appeared helping them, and that is why they erected their trophy as a votive offering to Poseidon. That the gods have been present at war and slaughter has been represented by those who have described the doings and sufferings of the heroes at Ilium, the Athenian poets have sung also that the gods took part in the battles at Marathon and Salamis. And manifestly the army of the Galati perished at Delphi through Apollo and the evident assistance of divine beings. So the victory here of the Mantineans may have been largely due to Poseidon. And they say that Leocydes, who with Lydiades was the general of the division from Megalopolis, was the ninth descendant from Arcesilaus who lived at Lycosura, of whom the Arcadians relate the legend that he saw a stag (which was sacred to the goddess Proserpine) of extreme old age, on whose neck was a collar with the following inscription,
“I was a fawn and captured, when Agapenor went to Ilium.”
[8.10] This tradition shews that the stag is much longer-lived than the elephant.
[8.11] Next to the temple of Poseidon you will come to a place full of oak trees called Pelagos; there is a road from Mantinea to Tegea through these oak trees. And the boundary between the districts of Mantinea and Tegea is the round altar on the highroad. And if you should turn to the left from the temple of Poseidon, in about five stades you will come to the tombs of the daughters of Pelias. The people of Mantinea say they dwelt here to avoid the vituperations which came upon them for the death of their father. For as soon as Medea came to Iolcos she forthwith plotted against Pelias, really working for Jason’s interest, while ostensibly hostile to him. She told the daughters of Pelias that, if they liked, she could make their father a young man instead of an old man. So she slew a ram and boiled his flesh with herbs in a caldron, and she brought the old ram out of the caldron in the shape of a young man alive. After this she took Pelias to boil and cut him up, but his daughters got hardly enough of him to take to burial. This compelled them to go and live in Arcadia, and when they died their sepulchres were raised here. No poet has given their names so far as I know, but Mico the painter has written under their portraits the names Asteropea and Antinoe.
[8.11] And the place called Phœzon is about 20 stades from these tombs, where is a tomb with a stone base, rising up somewhat from the ground. The road is very narrow at this place, and they say it is the tomb of Areithous, who was called Corynetes from the club which he used in battle. As you go about 30 stades along the road from Mantinea to Pallantium, the oak plantation called Pelagos extends along the highroad, and here the cavalry of the Mantineans and Athenians fought against the Bœotian cavalry. And the Mantineans say that Epaminondas was killed here by Machærion a Mantinean, but the Lacedæmonians say that the Machærion who killed Epaminondas was a Spartan. But the Athenian account, corroborated by the Thebans, is that Epaminondas was mortally wounded by Gryllus: and this corresponds with the painting of the action at Mantinea. The Mantineans also seem to have given Gryllus a public funeral, and erected to him his statue on a pillar where he fell as the bravest man in the allied army: whereas Machærion, though the Lacedæmonians mention him, had no special honours paid to him as a brave man, either at Sparta or at Mantinea. And when Epaminondas was wounded they removed him yet alive out of the line of battle. And for a time he kept his hand on his wound, and gasped for breath, and looked earnestly at the fight, and the place where he kept so looking they called ever after Scope, (Watch), but when the battle was over then he took his hand from the wound and expired, and they buried him on the field of battle. And there is a pillar on his tomb, and a shield above it with a dragon as its device. The dragon is intended to intimate that Epaminondas was one of those who are called the Sparti, the seed of the dragon’s teeth. And there are two pillars on his tomb, one ancient with a Bœotian inscription, and the other erected by the Emperor Adrian with an inscription by him upon it. As to Epaminondas one might praise him as one of the most famous Greek generals for talent in war, indeed second to none. For the Lacedæmonian and Athenian generals were aided by the ancient renown of their states and the spirit of their soldiers: but the Thebans were dejected and used to obey other Greek states when Epaminondas in a short time put them into a foremost position.
[8.11] Epaminondas had been warned by the oracle at Delphi before this to beware of Pelagos. Taking this word in its usual meaning of the sea he was careful not to set foot on a trireme or transport: but Apollo evidently meant this oak plantation Pelagos and not the sea. Places bearing the same name deceived Hannibal the Carthaginian later on, and the Athenians still earlier. For Hannibal had an oracle from Ammon that he would die and be buried in Libyssa. Accordingly he hoped that he would destroy the power of Rome, and return home to Libya and die there in old age. But when Flaminius the Roman made all diligence to take him alive, he went to the court of Prusias as a suppliant, and being rejected by him mounted his horse, and in drawing his sword wounded his finger. And he had not gone on many stades when a fever from the wound came on him, and he died the third day after, and the place where he died was called Libyssa by the people of Nicomedia. The oracle at Dodona also told the Athenians to colonize Sicily. Now not far from Athens is a small hill called Sicily. And they, not understanding that it was this Sicily that the oracle referred to, were induced to go on expeditions beyond their borders and to engage in the fatal war against Syracuse. And one might find other similar cases to these.
[8.12] And about a stade from the tomb of Epaminondas is a temple of Zeus surnamed Charmo. In the Arcadian oak-plantations there are different kinds of oaks, some they call broadleaved, and others they call fegi. A third kind have a thin bark so light, that they make of it floats for anchors and nets. The bark of this kind of oak is called cork by some of the Ionians and by Hermesianax the Elegiac Poet.
[8.12] From Mantinea a road leads to the village Methydrium, formerly a town, now included in Megalopolis. When you have gone 30 stades further you come to the plain called Alcimedon, and above it is the mountain Ostracina, where the cave is where Alcimedon, one of the men called Heroes, used to dwell. Hercules according to the tradition of the Phigalians had an intrigue with Phialo, the daughter of this Alcimedon. When Alcimedon found out she was a mother he exposed her and her boy immediately after his birth on the mountain. Æchmagoras was the name given to the boy according to the Arcadians. And the boy crying out when he was exposed, the bird called the jay heard his wailing and imitated it. And Hercules happening to pass by heard the jay, and thinking it was the cry of his boy and not the bird, turned at the sound, and when he perceived Phialo he loosed her from her bonds and saved the boy’s life. From that time the well has been called Jay from the bird. And about 40 stades from this well is the place called Petrosaca, the boundary between Megalopolis and Mantinea.
[8.12] Besides the roads I have mentioned there are two that lead to Orchomenus, and in one of them is what is called Ladas’ course, where he used to practise for running, and near it is a temple of Artemis, and on the right of the road a lofty mound which they say is the tomb of Penelope, differing from what is said about her in the Thesprotian Poem. For in it she is represented as having borne a son Ptoliporthes to Odysseus after his return from Troy. But the tradition of the Mantineans about her is that she was detected by Odysseus in having encouraged the suitors to the house, and therefore sent away by him, and that she forthwith departed to Lacedæmon, and afterwards migrated to Mantinea, and there died. And near this tomb is a small plain, and a hill on it with some ruins still remaining of old Mantinea, and the place is called The Town to this day. And as you go on in a Northerly direction, you soon come to the well of Alalcomenea. And about 30 stades from The Town are the ruins of a place called Mæra, if indeed Mæra was buried here and not at Tegea: for the most probable tradition is that Mæra, the daughter of Atlas, was buried at Tegea and not at Mantinea. But perhaps it was another Mæra, a descendant of the Mæra that was the daughter of Atlas, that came to Mantinea.
[8.12] There still remains the road which leads to Orchomenus, on which is the mountain Anchisia, and the tomb of Anchises at the foot of the mountain. For when Æneas was crossing to Sicily he landed in Laconia, and founded the towns Aphrodisias and Etis, and his father Anchises for some reason or other coming to this place and dying there was also buried at the foot of the mountain called Anchisia after him. And this tradition is confirmed by the fact that the Æolians who now inhabit Ilium nowhere shew in their country the tomb of Anchises. And near the tomb of Anchises are ruins of a temple of Aphrodite, and Anchisia is the boundary between the districts of Mantinea and Orchomenus.
[8.13] In the part belonging to Orchomenus, on the left of the road from Anchisia, on the slope of the mountain is a temple to Hymnian Artemis, in whose worship the Mantineans also share. The goddess has both a priestess and priest, who not only have no intercourse with one another by marriage, but all their life long keep separate in other respects. They have neither baths nor meals together as most people do, nor do they ever go into a stranger’s house. I know that similar habits are found among the priests of Ephesian Artemis, called by themselves Histiatores but by the citizens Essenes, but they are only kept up for one year and no longer. To Hymnian Artemis they also hold an annual festival.
[8.13] The old town of Orchomenus was on the top of a hill, and there are still ruins of the walls and market-place. But the town in our day is under the circuit of the old walls. And among the notable sights are a well, from which they get their water, and temples of Poseidon and Aphrodite, and their statues in stone. And near the town is a wooden statue of Artemis in a large cedar-tree, whence the goddess is called Artemis of the Cedar-tree. And below the town are some heaps of stones apart from one another, which were erected to some men who fell in war, but who they fought against, whether Arcadians or any other Peloponnesians, neither do the inscriptions on the tombs nor any traditions of the people of Orchomenus record.
[8.13] And opposite the town is the mountain called Trachys. And rainwater flows through a hollow ravine between Orchomenus and Mount Trachys, and descends into another plain belonging to Orchomenus. This plain is not very large, and most of it is marsh. And as you go on about three stades from Orchomenus, a straight road takes you to the town of Caphya by the ravine, and after that on the left hand by the marsh. And another road, after you have crossed the water that flows through the ravine, takes you under the mountain Trachys. And on this road the first thing you come to is the tomb of Aristocrates, who violated the priestess of Artemis Hymnia. And next to the tomb of Aristocrates are the wells called Teneæ, and about 7 stades further is a place called Amilus, which they say was formerly a town. At this place the road branches off into two directions, one towards Stymphelus, and the other towards Pheneus. And as you go to Pheneus a mountain will lie before you, which is the joint boundary for Orchomenus and Pheneus and Caphya. And a lofty precipice called the Caphyatic rock projects from the mountain. Next to the boundary I have mentioned is a ravine, and a road leads through it to Pheneus. And in the middle of this ravine some water comes out from a fountain, and at the end of the ravine is the town of Caryæ.
[8.14] And the plain of Pheneus lies below Caryæ, and they say the old Pheneus was destroyed by a deluge: even in our day there are marks on the hills where the water rose to. And about 5 stades from Caryæ are the mountains Oryxis and Sciathis, at the bottom of each of which mountains is a pit which receives the water from the plain. And these pits the people of Pheneus say are wrought by hand, for they were made by Hercules when he lived at Pheneus with Laonome, the mother of Amphitryon, for Amphitryon was the son of Alcæus by Laonome, the daughter of Gyneus a woman of Pheneus, and not by Lysidice the daughter of Pelops. And if Hercules really dwelt at Pheneus, one may easily suppose that, when he was expelled from Tiryns by Eurystheus, he did not go immediately to Thebes but first to Pheneus. Hercules also dug through the middle of the plain of Pheneus a channel for the river Olbius, which river some of the Arcadians call Aroanius and not Olbius. The length of this canal is about 50 stades, and the depth where the banks have not fallen in about 30 feet. The river however does not now follow this channel, but has returned to its old channel, having deserted Hercules’ canal.
[8.14] And from the pits dug at the bottom of the mountains I have mentioned to Pheneus is about 50 stades. The people of Pheneus say that Pheneus an Autochthon was their founder. Their citadel is precipitous on all sides, most of it is left undefended, but part of it is carefully fortified. On the citadel is a temple of Athene Tritonia, but only in ruins. And there is a brazen statue of Poseidon Hippius, an offering they say of Odysseus. For he lost his horses and went all over Greece in quest of them, and finding them on this spot in Pheneus he erected a temple there to Artemis under the title of Heurippe, and offered the statue of Poseidon Hippius. They say also that when Odysseus found his horses here he thought he would keep them at Pheneus, as he kept his oxen on the mainland opposite Ithaca. And the people of Pheneus shew some letters written on the base of the statue, which are the orders of Odysseus to those who looked after his horses. In all other respects there seems probability in the tradition of the people of Pheneus, but I cannot think that the brazen statue of Poseidon is an offering of Odysseus, for they did not in those days know how to make statues throughout in brass as you weave a garment. Their mode of making statues in brass I have already shewn in my account of Sparta in reference to the statue of Zeus Supreme. For the first who fused and made statues of cast brass were Rhœcus the son of Philæus and Theodorus the son of Telecles both of Samos. The most famous work of Theodorus was the seal carved out of an Emerald, which Polycrates the tyrant of Samos very frequently wore and was very proud of.
[8.14] And as you descend about a stade from the citadel you come to the tomb of Iphicles, the brother of Hercules and the father of Iolaus, on an eminence. Iolaus according to the tradition of the Greeks assisted Hercules in most of his Labours. And Iphicles the father of Iolaus, when Hercules fought his first battle against Augeas and the people of Elis, was wounded by the sons of Actor who were called Molinidæ from their mother Moline, and his relations conveyed him to Pheneus in a very bad condition, and there Buphagus (a native of Pheneus) and his wife Promne took care of him, and buried him as he died of his wound. And to this day they pay him the honours they pay to heroes. And of the gods the people of Pheneus pay most regard to Hermes, and they call their games Hermæa. And they have a temple of Hermes, and a stone statue of the god made by the Athenian Euchir the son of Eubulides. And behind the temple is the tomb of Myrtilus. This Myrtilus was, the Greeks say, the son of Hermes, and charioteer to Œnomaus, and when any one came to court the daughter of Œnomaus, Myrtilus ingeniously spurred the horses of Œnomaus, and, whenever he caught up any suitor in the race, he hurled a dart at him and so killed him. And Myrtilus himself was enamoured of Hippodamia, but did not venture to compete for her hand, but continued Œnomaus’ charioteer. But eventually they say he betrayed Œnomaus, seduced by the oaths that Pelops made to him, that if he won he would let Myrtilus enjoy Hippodamia one night. But when he reminded Pelops of his oath he threw him out of a ship into the sea. And the dead body of Myrtilus was washed ashore, and taken up and buried by the people of Pheneus, so they say, and annually by night they pay him honours. Clearly Pelops cannot have had much sea to sail on, except from the mouth of the Alpheus to the seaport of Elis. The Myrtoan Sea cannot therefore have been named after this Myrtilus, for it begins at Eubœa and joins the Ægean by the desert island of Helene, but those who seem to me to interpret best the antiquities of Eubœa say that the Myrtoan Sea got its name from a woman called Myrto.
[8.15] At Pheneus they have also a temple of Eleusinian Demeter, and they celebrate the rites of the goddess just the same as at Eleusis, according to their statement. For they say that Naus, who was the great grandson of Eumolpus, came to them in obedience to the oracle at Delphi, and brought these mysteries. And near the temple of Eleusinian Demeter is what is called Petroma, two large stones fitting into one another. And they celebrate here annually what they call their great rites, they detach these stones, and take from them some writings relative to these rites, and when they have read them in the ears of the initiated they replace them again the same night. And I know that most of the inhabitants of Pheneus regard “By Petroma” their most solemn oath. And there is a round covering on Petroma with a likeness of Cidarian Demeter inside, the priest puts this likeness on his robes at what they call the great rites, when according to the tradition he strikes the earth with rods and summons the gods of the lower world. The people of Pheneus also have a tradition that before Naus Demeter came here in the course of her wanderings, and to all the people of Pheneus that received her hospitably the goddess gave other kinds of pulse but no beans. Why they do not consider beans a pure kind of pulse, is a sacred tradition. Those who according to the tradition of the people of Pheneus received the goddess were Trisaules and Damithales, and they built a temple to Demeter Thesmia under Mount Cyllene, where they established her rites as they are now celebrated. And this temple is about 15 stades from Pheneus.
[8.15] As you go on about 15 stades from Pheneus in the direction of Pellene and Ægira in Achaia, you come to a temple of Pythian Apollo, of which there are only ruins, and a large altar in white stone. The people of Pheneus still sacrifice here to Apollo and Artemis, and say that Hercules built the temple after the capture of Elis. There are also here the tombs of the heroes who joined Hercules in the expedition against Elis and were killed in the battle. And Telamon is buried very near the river Aroanius, at a little distance from the temple of Apollo, and Chalcodon not far from the well called Œnoe’s well. As one was the father of that Elephenor who led the Eubœans to Ilium, and the other the father of Ajax and Teucer, no one will credit that they fell in this battle. For how could Chalcodon have assisted Hercules in this affair, since Amphitryon is declared to have slain him earlier according to Theban information that we can rely on? And how would Teucer have founded Salamis in Cyprus, if nobody had banished him from home on his return from Troy? And who but Telamon could have banished him? Manifestly therefore Chalcodon from Eubœa and Telamon from Ægina could not have taken part with Hercules in this expedition against Elis: they must have been obscure men of the same name as those famous men, a casual coincidence such as has happened in all ages.
[8.15] The people of Pheneus have more than one boundary between them and Achaia. One is the river called Porinas in the direction of Pellene, the other is a temple sacred to Artemis in the direction of Ægira. And in the territory of Pheneus after the temple of Pythian Apollo you will soon come to the road that leads to the mountain Crathis, in which the river Crathis has its rise, which flows into the sea near Ægæ, a place deserted in our day but in older days a town in Achaia. And from this Crathis the river in Italy in the district of Bruttii gets its name. And on Mount Crathis there is a temple to Pyronian Artemis: from whose shrine the Argives in olden times introduced fire into the district about Lerne.
[8.16] And as you go eastwards from Pheneus you come to the promontory of Geronteum, and by it is a road. And Geronteum is the boundary between the districts of Pheneus and Stymphelus. And as you leave Geronteum on the left and go through the district of Pheneus you come to the mountains called Tricrena, where there are three wells. In these they say the mountain nymphs washed Hermes when he was born, and so they consider these wells sacred to Hermes. And not far from Tricrena is another hill called Sepia, and here they say Æpytus the son of Elatus died of the bite of a serpent, and here they buried him, for they could not carry his dead body further. These serpents are still (the Arcadians say) to be found on the hill but in no great quantity, for every year much of it is covered with snow, and those serpents that the snow catches outside of their holes are killed by it, and if they first get back to their holes, yet the snow kills part of them even there, as the bitter cold sometimes penetrates to their holes. I was curious to see the tomb of Æpytus, because Homer mentions it in his lines about the Arcadians.²⁶ It is a pile of earth not very high, surrounded by a coping of stone. It was likely to inspire wonder in Homer as he had seen no more notable tomb. For when he compared the dancing-ground wrought by Hephæstus on Achilles’ shield to the dancing-ground made by Dædalus for Ariadne,²⁷ it was because he had seen nothing more clever. And though I know many wonderful tombs I will only mention two, one in Halicarnassus and one in the land of the Hebrews. The one in Halicarnassus was built for Mausolus king of Halicarnassus, and is so large and wonderful in all its adornation, that the Romans in their admiration of it call all notable tombs Mausoleums. And the Hebrews have in the city of Jerusalem, which has been rased to the ground by the Roman Emperor, a tomb of Helen a woman of that country, which is so contrived that the door, which is of stone like all the rest of the tomb, cannot be opened except on one particular day and month of the year. And then it opens by the machinery alone, and keeps open for some little time and then shuts again. But at any other time of the year anyone trying to open it could not do so, you would have to smash it before you could open it.
[8.17] Not far from the tomb of Æpytus is Cyllene the highest of the mountains in Arcadia, and the ruins of a temple of Cyllenian Hermes on the top of the mountain. It is clear that both the mountain and god got their title from Cyllen the son of Elatus. And men of old, as far as we can ascertain, had various kinds of wood out of which they made statues, as ebony, cypress, cedar, oak, yew, lotus. But the statue of Cyllenian Hermes is made of none of these but of the wood of the juniper tree. It is about 8 feet high I should say. Cyllene has the following phenomenon. Blackbirds all-white lodge in it. Those that are called by the Bœotians by the same name are a different kind of bird, and are not vocal. The white eagles that resemble swans very much and are called swan-eagles I have seen on Sipylus near the marsh of Tantalus, and individuals have got from Thrace before now white boars and white bears. And white hares are bred in Libya, and white deer I have myself seen and admired in Rome, but where they came from, whether from the mainland or islands, it did not occur to me to inquire. Let this much suffice relative to the blackbirds of Mount Cyllene, that no one may discredit what I have said about their colour.
[8.17] And next to Cyllene is another mountain called Chelydorea, where Hermes found the tortoise, which he is said to have skinned and made a lyre of. Chelydorea is the boundary between the districts of Pheneus and Pellene, and the Achæans graze their flocks on most of it.
[8.17] And as you go westwards from Pheneus the road to the left leads to the city Clitor, that to the right to Nonacris and the water of the Styx. In old times Nonacris, which took its name from the wife of Lycaon, was a small town in Arcadia, but in our day it is in ruins, nor are many portions even of the ruins easy to trace. And not far from the ruins is a cliff, I do not remember to have seen another so high. And water drops from it which the Greeks call the Styx.
[8.18] Hesiod has represented Styx in his Theogony, (for there are some who assign the Theogony to Hesiod), as the daughter of Oceanus and the wife of Pallas. Linus too they say has represented the same. But the verses of Linus (all of which I have read) seem to me spurious. Epimenides the Cretan also has represented Styx as the daughter of Oceanus, but not as the wife of Pallas, but of Piras, whoever he was, to whom she bare Echidna. And Homer has frequently introduced the Styx into his poetry. For example in the oath of Hera,
“Witness me now Earth and high Heaven above
And water of the Styx, that trickles down.”²⁸
Here he represents the water of the Styx dripping down as you may see it. But in the catalogue of those who went with Guneus he makes the water of the Styx flow into the river Titaresius.²⁹ He has also represented the Styx as a river of Hades, and Athene says that Zeus does not remember that she saved Hercules in it in one of the Labours imposed by Eurystheus.
“For could I have foreseen what since has chanced,
When he was sent to Hades jailor dread
To bring from Erebus dread Hades’ Cerberus,
He would not have escaped the streams of Styx.”
(Il. viii. 366-369.)
Now the water that drips from the cliff near Nonacris falls first upon a lofty rock, and oozes through it into the river Crathis, and its water is deadly both to man and beast. It is said also that it was deadly to goats who first drank of the water. But in time this was well known, as well as other mysterious properties of the water. Glass and crystal and porcelain, and various articles made of stone, and pottery ware, are broken by the water of the Styx. And things made of horn, bone, iron, brass, lead, tin, silver, and amber, melt when put into this water. Gold also suffers from it as all other metals, although one can purify gold from rust, as the Lesbian poetess Sappho testifies, and as anyone can test by experiment. The deity has as it seems granted to things which are least esteemed the property of being masters of things held in the highest value. For pearls are melted by vinegar, and the adamant, which is the hardest of stones, is melted by goat’s blood. A horse’s hoof alone is proof against the water of the Styx, for if poured into a hoof the hoof is not broken. Whether Alexander the son of Philip really died of this poisonous water of the Styx I do not know, but there is a tradition to that effect.
[8.18] Beyond Nonacris there are some mountains called Aroania and a cave in them, into which they say the daughters of Prœtus fled when they went mad, till Melampus brought them back to a place called Lusi, and cured them by secret sacrifices and purifications. The people of Pheneus graze their flocks on most of the mountains Aroania, but Lusi is on the borders of Clitor. It was they say formerly a town, and Agesilaus a native of it was proclaimed victor with a race-horse, when the Amphictyones celebrated the eleventh Pythiad, but in our days there are not even any ruins of it in existence. So the daughters of Prœtus were brought back by Melampus to Lusi, and healed of their madness in the temple of Artemis, and ever since the people of Clitor call Artemis Hemerasia.
[8.19] And there are some of Arcadian race who live at Cynætha, who erected at Olympia a statue of Zeus with a thunderbolt in each hand. Cynætha is about 40 stades from the temple of Artemis, and in the market-place are some altars of the gods, and a statue of the Emperor Adrian. But the most memorable thing there is a temple of Dionysus. They keep the festival of the god in wintertime, when men smeared all over with oil pick a bull from the herd, which the god puts it into their mind to take and convey to the temple, where they offer it in sacrifice. And there is a well there of cold water, about two stades from the town, and a plane-tree growing by it. Whoever is bitten by a mad dog, or has received any other hurt, if he drinks of this water gets cured, and for this reason they call the well Alyssus. Thus the water called Styx near Pheneus in Arcadia is for man’s hurt, whereas the water at Cynætha is exactly the reverse for man’s cure. Of the roads in a westward direction from Pheneus there remains that on the left which leads to Clitor, and is by the canal which Hercules dug for the river Aroanius. The road along this canal goes to Lycuria, which is the boundary between the districts of Pheneus and Clitor.
[8.20] And after having advanced from Lycuria about 50 stades you will come to the springs of the river Ladon. I have heard that the water of the marsh at Pheneus, after falling into the pits under the mountains, reappears here, and forms the springs of Ladon. I am not prepared to say whether this is so or not. But the river Ladon excels all the rivers in Greece for the beauty of its stream, and is also famous in connection with what poets have sung about Daphne. The tradition current about Daphne among those who live on the banks of the Orontes I pass over, but the following is the tradition both in Arcadia and Elis. Œnomaus the ruler at Pisa had a son Leucippus who was enamoured of Daphne, and hotly wooed her for his wife, but discovered that she had a dislike to all males. So he contrived the following stratagem. He let his hair grow to the Alpheus,³⁰ and put on woman’s dress and went to Daphne with his hair arranged like a girl’s, and said he was the daughter of Œnomaus, and would like to go a hunting with Daphne. And being reckoned a girl, and excelling all the other girls in the lustre of his family and skill in hunting, and paying the greatest possible attention to Daphne, he soon won her strong friendship. But they who sing of Apollo’s love for Daphne add that Apollo was jealous of Leucippus’ happiness in love. So when Daphne and the other maidens desired to bathe in the Ladon and swim about, they stripped Leucippus against his will, and discovering his sex they stabbed him and killed him with javelins and daggers.
[8.21] So the story goes. From the springs of Ladon it is 60 stades to the town of Clitor, the road is a narrow path by the river Aroanius. And near the town you cross a river called Clitor, which flows into the Aroanius about 7 stades from the town. There are various kinds of fish in the river Aroanius, especially some variegated ones which have they say a voice like the thrush. I have seen them caught but never heard their voice, though I have waited by the riverside till sunset, when they are said to be most vocal.
[8.21] The town of Clitor got its name from the son of Azan, and is situated in a plain with hills not very high all round it. The most notable temples are those to Demeter, and Æsculapius, and to Ilithyia. Homer says there are several Ilithyias, but does not specify their number. But the Lycian Olen, who was earlier than Homer, and wrote Hymns to Ilithyia and for the Delians, says that she was the same as Fate, and older than Cronos. And he calls her Eulinus. The people of Clitor have also a temple, about 4 stades from the town, to Castor and Pollux under the name of the Great Gods, their statues are of brass. And on the crest of a hill about 30 stades from Clitor is a temple and statue of Athene Coria.
[8.22] I return to Stymphelus and to Geronteum, the boundary between the districts of Pheneus and Stymphelus. The people of Stymphelus are no longer ranked as Arcadians, but are in the Argolic League from their own choice. But that they are of Arcadian race is testified by Homer, and Stymphelus, the founder of the town, was great grandson of Arcas, the son of Callisto. He is said originally to have built the town on another site than that it now occupies. In old Stymphelus lived they say Temenus the son of Pelasgus, who brought up Hera, and built three temples to the goddess and called her by three titles, when she was still a maiden the Child-goddess, and after she was married to Zeus he called her the Full-grown, and after she broke with Zeus for some reason or other and returned to Stymphelus he called her the Widow. This is the tradition about the goddess at Stymphelus. But the town in our day has none of these temples, though it has the following remarkable things. There is a spring from which the Emperor Adrian conveyed water to the town of Corinth. In winter this spring converts a small marsh into the river Stymphelus, but in summer the marsh is dry, and the river is only fed by the spring. This river soaks into the ground, and comes up again in Argolis, where its name is changed to Erasinus. About this river Stymphelus there is a tradition that some man-eating birds lived on its banks, whom Hercules is said to have killed with his arrows. But Pisander of Camirus says that Hercules did not kill them but only frightened them away with the noise of rattles. The desert of Arabia has among other monsters some birds called Stymphelides, who are as savage to men as lions and leopards. They attack those who come to capture them, and wound them with their beaks and kill them. They pierce through coats of mail that men wear, and if they put on thick robes of mat, the beaks of these birds penetrate them too, as the wings of little birds stick in bird-lime. Their size is about that of the crane, and they are like storks, but their beaks are stronger and not crooked like those of storks. Whether these birds now in Arabia, that have the same name as those formerly in Arcadia, are similar in appearance I do not know, but if there have been in all time these Stymphelides like hawks and eagles, then they are probably of Arabian origin, and some of them may formerly have flown from Arabia to Stymphelus in Arcadia. They may also have been originally called some other name than Stymphelides by the Arabians: and the fame of Hercules, and the superiority of the Greeks to the barbarians, may have made the name Stymphelides prevail to our day over their former name in the desert of Arabia. At Stymphelus there is also an ancient temple of Stymphelian Artemis, the statue is wooden but most of it gilt over. And on the roof of the temple is a representation of these birds called Stymphelides. It is difficult to decide whether it is in wood or plaster, but I conjecture more likely in wood than plaster. There are also represented some maidens in white stone with legs like birds, standing behind the temple. And in our days a wonderful thing is said to have happened. They were celebrating at Stymphelus the festival of Stymphelian Artemis rather negligently, and violating most of the established routine, when a tree fell at the opening of the cavity where the river Stymphelus goes underground, and blocked up the passage, so that the plain became a marsh for 400 stades. And they say that a hunter was pursuing a fleeing deer, and it jumped into the swamp, and the hunter in the heat of the chase jumped in after it: and it swallowed up both deer and man. And they say the water of the river followed them, so that in a day the whole water in the plain was dried up, they having opened a way for it. And since that time they have celebrated the festival of Artemis with greater ardour.
[8.23] And next to Stymphelus comes Alea a town in the Argolic league, founded they say by Aleus the son of Aphidas. There are temples here of Ephesian Artemis and Alean Athene, and a temple and statue of Dionysus. They celebrate annually the festival of Dionysus called Scieria, in which according to an oracle from Delphi the women are flogged, as the Spartan boys are flogged at the temple of Orthia.
[8.23] I have shewn in my account of Orchomenus that the straight road is by the ravine, and that there is another on the left of the lake. And in the plain of Caphyæ there is a reservoir, by which the water from the territory of Orchomenus is kept in, so as not to harm the fertile district. And within this reservoir some other water, in volume nearly as large as a river, is absorbed in the ground and comes up again at what is called Nasi, near a village called Rheunos, and it forms there the perennial river called Tragus. The town gets its name clearly from Cepheus the son of Aleus, but the name Caphyæ has prevailed through the Arcadian dialect. And the inhabitants trace their origin to Attica, they say they were expelled by Ægeus from Athens and fled to Arcadia, and supplicated Cepheus to allow them to dwell there. The town is at the end of the plain at the foot of some not very high hills, and has temples of Poseidon and of Cnacalesian Artemis, so called from the mountain Cnacalus where the goddess has annual rites. A little above the town is a well and by it a large and beautiful plane-tree, which they call Menelaus’, for they say that when he was mustering his army against Troy he came here and planted it by the well, and in our day they call the well as well as the plane-tree Menelaus’. And if we may credit the traditions of the Greeks about old trees still alive and flourishing, the oldest is the willow in the temple of Hera at Samos, and next it the oak at Dodona, and the olive in the Acropolis and at Delos, and the Syrians would assign the third place for its antiquity to their laurel, and of all others this plane-tree is the most ancient.
[8.23] About a stade from Caphyæ is the place Condylea, where was a grove and temple in olden times to Artemis of Condylea. But the goddess changed her title they say for the following reason. Some children playing about the temple, how many is not recorded, came across a rope, and bound it round the neck of the statue, and said that they would strangle Artemis. And the people of Caphyæ when they found out what had been done by the children stoned them, and in consequence of this a strange disorder came upon the women, who prematurely gave birth to dead children, till the Pythian Priestess told them to bury the children who had been stoned, and annually to bestow on them funeral rites, for they had not been slain justly. The people of Caphyæ obeyed the oracle and still do, and ever since call the goddess, (this they also refer to the oracle), Apanchomene (strangled). When you have ascended from Caphyæ seven stades you descend to Nasi, and fifty stades further is the river Ladon. And when you have crossed it you will come to the oak-coppice Soron, between Argeathæ and Lycuntes and Scotane. Soron is on the road to Psophis, and it and all the Arcadian oak-coppices shelter various wild animals, as boars and bears, and immense tortoises, from which you could make lyres as large as those made from the Indian tortoise. And at the end of Soron are the ruins of a village called Paus, and at no great distance is what is called Siræ, the boundary between the districts of Clitor and Psophis.
[8.24] The founder of Psophis was they say Psophis the son of Arrho, (the son of Erymanthus, the son of Aristas, the son of Parthaon, the son of Periphetes, the son of Nyctimus): others say Psophis the daughter of Xanthus, the son of Erymanthus, the son of Arcas. This is the Arcadian account. But the truest tradition is that Psophis was the daughter of Eryx, the ruler in Sicania, who would not receive her into his house as she was pregnant, but intrusted her to Lycortas, a friend of his who dwelt at Phegia, which was called Erymanthus before the reign of Phegeus: and Echephron and Promachus (her sons by Hercules) who were brought up there changed the name of Phegia into Psophis after their mother’s name. The citadel at Zacynthus is also named Psophis, for the first settler who sailed over to that island was from Psophis, Zacynthus the son of Dardanus. From Siræ Psophis is about 30 stades, and the river Aroanius, and at a little distance the Erymanthus, flow by the town. The Erymanthus has its sources in the mountain Lampea, which is they say sacred to Pan, and may be a part of Mount Erymanthus. Homer has represented Erymanthus as a hunter on Taygetus and Erymanthus, and a lover of Lampea, and as passing through Arcadia, (leaving the mountain Pholoe on the right and Thelpusa on the left), and becoming a tributary of the Alpheus. And it is said that Hercules at the orders of Eurystheus hunted the boar (which exceeded all others in size and strength), on the banks of the Erymanthus. And the people of Cumæ in the Opic territory say that some boar’s teeth which they have stored up in the temple of Apollo are the teeth of this Erymanthian boar, but their tradition has little probability in it. And the people of Psophis have a temple of Aphrodite surnamed Erycina, which is now only in ruins, and was built (so the story goes) by the sons of Psophis, which is not improbable. For there is in Sicily in the country near Mount Eryx a temple of Aphrodite Erycina, most holy from its hoary antiquity and as wealthy as the temple at Paphos. And there are still traces of hero-chapels of Promachus and Echephron the sons of Psophis. And at Psophis Alcmæon the son of Amphiaraus is buried, whose tomb is neither very large nor beautified, except by some cypress trees which grow to such a height, that the hill near is shaded by them. These trees are considered sacred to Alcmæon so that the people will not cut them down, and the people of the place call them Maidens. Alcmæon came to Psophis, when he fled from Argos after slaying his mother, and there married Alphesibœa the daughter of Phegeus, (from whom Psophis was still called Phegia), and gave her gifts as was usual and among others the famous necklace. And as while he dwelt in Arcadia his madness became no better, he consulted the oracle at Delphi, and the Pythian Priestess informed him that the Avenger of his mother Eriphyle would follow him to every place except to a spot which was most recent, and made by the action of the sea since he had stained himself with his mother’s blood. And he found a place which the Achelous had made by silting and dwelt there, and married Callirhoe the daughter of Achelous according to the tradition of the Acarnanians, and had by her two sons Acarnan and Amphoterus, from the former of whom the Acarnanians on the mainland got their present name, for they were before called Curetes. And many men and still more women come to grief through foolish desires. Callirhoe desired that the necklace of Eriphyle should be hers, and so she sent Alcmæon against his will into Phegia, where his death was treacherously compassed by Temenus and Axion, the sons of Phegeus, who are said to have offered the necklace to Apollo at Delphi. And it was during their reign in the town then called Phegia that the Greeks went on the expedition against Troy, in which the people of Psophis say they took no part, because the leaders of the Argives had an hostility with their kings, as most of them were relations of Alcmæon and had shared in his expedition against Thebes. And the reason why the islands called the Echinades formed by the Achelous got separated from the mainland, was because when the Ætolians were driven out the land became deserted, and, as Ætolia was uncultivated, the Achelous did not deposit as much mud as usual. What confirms my account is that the Mæander, that flowed for so many years through the arable parts of Phrygia and Caria, in a short time converted the sea between Priene and Miletus into mainland. The people of Psophis also have a temple and statue on the banks of the Erymanthus to the River-God Erymanthus. Except the Nile in Egypt all River-Gods have statues in white stone, but the Nile, as it flows through Ethiopia to the sea, has its statues generally made of black stone.
[8.24] The tradition that I have heard at Psophis about Aglaus, a native of the town who was a contemporary of the Lydian Crœsus, that he was happy all his life, I cannot credit. No doubt one man will have less trouble than another, as one ship will suffer less from tempests than another ship: but that a man should always stand aloof from misfortune, or that a ship should never encounter a storm, is a thing which does not answer to human experience. Even Homer has represented one jar placed by Zeus full of blessings, and another full of woes,³¹ instructed by the oracle at Delphi, which had informed him that he would be both unfortunate and fortunate, as born for both fortunes.
[8.25] On the road from Psophis to Thelpusa the first place you come to is on the left of the river Ladon and called Tropæa, and close to it is the oak-coppice called Aphrodisium, and thirdly you come to some ancient writing on a pillar which forms the boundary between the territory of Psophis and Thelpusa. In the district of Thelpusa is a river called Arsen, after crossing which you will come about 25 stades further to the ruins of a village called Caus, and a temple of Causian Æsculapius built by the wayside. Thelpusa is about 40 stades from this temple, and was called they say after the River-Nymph Thelpusa, the daughter of Ladon. The river Ladon has its source, as I have already stated, in the neighbourhood of Clitor, and flows first by Lucasium and Mesoboa and Nasi to Oryx and what is called Halus, and thence to Thaliades and the temple of Eleusinian Demeter close to Thelpusa, which has statues in it no less than 7 feet high of Demeter, Proserpine, and Dionysus, all in stone. And next to this temple of Eleusinian Demeter the river Ladon flows on leaving Thelpusa on the left, which lies on a lofty ridge, and has now few inhabitants, indeed the market-place which is now at the end of the town was originally they say in the very centre. There is also at Thelpusa a temple of Æsculapius, and a temple of the twelve gods mostly in ruins. And after passing Thelpusa the Ladon flows on to the temple of Demeter at Onceum: and the people of Thelpusa call the goddess Erinys, as Antimachus also in his description of the expedition of the Argives to Thebes, in the line,
“Where they say was the seat of Demeter Erinys.”
[8.25] Oncius was the son of Apollo according to tradition, and reigned in Thelpusa at the place called Onceum. And the goddess Demeter got the name Erinys in this way: when she was wandering about in quest of her daughter Proserpine, Poseidon they say followed her with amatory intentions, and she changed herself into a mare and grazed with the other horses at Onceum, and Poseidon found out her metamorphosis and changed himself into a horse and so got his ends, and Demeter was furious at this outrage, but afterwards they say ceased from her anger and bathed in the river Ladon. So the goddess got two surnames, Erinys (Fury) from her furious anger, for the Arcadians call being angry being a Fury, and Lusia from her bathing in the Ladon. The statues in the temple are of wood, but the heads and fingers and toes are of Parian marble. The statue of Erinys has in her left hand a cist and in her right a torch, and is one conjectures about nine feet in height, while the statue of Lusia seems six feet high. Let those who think the statue is Themis, and not Demeter Lusia, know that their idea is foolish. And they say that Demeter bare a daughter to Poseidon, (whose name they will not reveal to the uninitiated), and the foal Arion, and that was why Poseidon was called Hippius there first in Arcadia. And they introduce some lines from the Iliad and Thebaid in confirmation of this: in the Iliad the lines about Arion.
[8.25] “Not if one were to drive from behind the godlike Arion, swift courser of Adrastus, who was of the race of the Immortals.”³² And in the Thebaid when Adrastus fled from Thebes, “Dressed in sad-coloured clothes with Arion dark-maned courser.”
[8.25] They want to make the lines indicate in an ambiguous way that Poseidon was the father of Arion. But Antimachus says he was the son of earth:
“Adrastus, the son of Talaus and grandson of Cretheus, was the first of the Danai who drove a pair of much praised horses, the swift Cærus and Thelpusian Arion, whom near the grove of Oncean Apollo the earth itself gave birth to, a wonder for mortals to look upon.”
[8.25] And though this horse sprung out of the ground it may have been of divine origin, and its mane and colour may have been dark. For there is a tradition that Hercules when he was warring with the people of Elis asked Oncus for a horse, and captured Elis riding into the battle upon Arion, and that afterwards he gave the horse to Adrastus. Antimachus also has written about Arion, “He was broken in thirdly by king Adrastus.”
[8.25] The river Ladon next leaves in its course on its left the temple of Erinys as also the temple of Oncean Apollo, and on its right the temple of the Boy Æsculapius, which also contains the tomb of Trygon, who they say was the nurse of Æsculapius. For Æsculapius as a boy was exposed at Thelpusa, and found by Autolaus the bastard son of Arcas and brought up by him, and that is I think the reason why a temple was erected to the Boy Æsculapius, as I have set forth in my account of Epidaurus. And there is a river called Tuthoa, which flows into the Ladon near the boundary between the districts of Thelpusa and Heræa called by the Arcadians Plain. And where the Ladon flows into the Alpheus is what is called the Island of Crows. Some think that Enispe and Stratie and Rhipe mentioned by Homer were islands formed by the Ladon and formerly inhabited, but let them know the idea is a foolish one, for the Ladon could never form islands such as a boat could pass. For though in beauty it is second to no Greek or barbarian river, it is not wide enough to make islands as the Ister or Eridanus.
[8.26] The founder of Heræa was Heræus the son of Lycaon, and the town lies on the right of the Alpheus, most of it on a gentle eminence, but part of it extending to the river. Near the river are race-courses separated from each other by myrtle trees and other planted trees, and there are baths, and two temples of Dionysus, one called Polites, and the other Auxites. And they have a building where they celebrate the orgies of Dionysus. There is also at Heræa a temple of Pan, who was a native of Arcadia. And there are some ruins of a temple of Hera, of which the pillars still remain. And of all the Arcadian athletes Damaretus of Heræa was the foremost, and the first who conquered at Olympia in the race in heavy armour. And as you go from Heræa to Elis, you will cross the Ladon about 15 stades from Heræa, and from thence to Erymanthus is about 20 stades. And the boundary between Heræa and Elis is according to the Arcadian account the Erymanthus, but the people of Elis say that the boundary is the tomb of Corœbus, who was victor when Iphitus restored the Olympian games that had been for a long time discontinued, and offered prizes only for racing. And there is an inscription on his tomb that he was the first victor at Olympia, and that his tomb was erected on the borders of Elis.
[8.26] There is a small town also called Aliphera, which was abandoned by many of its inhabitants at the time the Arcadian colony was formed at Megalopolis. To get to Aliphera from Heræa you cross the Alpheus, and when you have gone along the plain about 10 stades you arrive at a mountain, and about 30 stades further you will get to Aliphera over the mountain. The town got its name from Alipherus the son of Lycaon, and has temples of Æsculapius and Athene. The latter they worship most, and say that she was born and reared among them; they have also built an altar here to Zeus Lecheates, so called because he gave birth to Athene here. And they call their fountain Tritonis, adopting as their own the tradition about the river Triton. And there is a statue of Athene in bronze, the work of Hypatodorus, notable both for its size and artistic merit. They have also a public festival to one of the gods, who I think must be Athene. In this public festival they sacrifice first of all to Muiagrus (Flycatcher), and offer to him vows and call upon him, and when they have done this they think they will no longer be troubled by flies. And on the road from Heræa to Megalopolis is Melæneæ, which was founded by Melæneus the son of Lycaon, but is deserted in our day, being swamped with water. And 40 stades higher is Buphagium, where the river Buphagus rises, which falls into the Alpheus. And the sources of the Buphagus are the boundary between the districts of Megalopolis and Heræa.
[8.27] Megalopolis is the most recent city not only in Arcadia but in all Greece, except those which have been filled by settlers from Rome in the changes made by the Roman Empire. And the Arcadians crowded into it to swell its strength, remembering that the Argives in older days had run almost daily risk of being reduced in war by the Lacedæmonians, but when they had made Argos strong by an influx of population then they were able to reduce Tiryns, and Hysiæ, and Orneæ, and Mycenæ, and Midea, and other small towns of no great importance in Argolis, and had not only less fear of the Lacedæmonians but were stronger as regards their neighbours generally. Such was the idea which made the Arcadians crowd into Megalopolis. The founder of the city might justly be called Epaminondas the Theban: for he it was that stirred up the Arcadians to this colonization, and sent 1,000 picked Thebans, with Parmenes as their leader, to defend the Arcadians should the Lacedæmonians attempt to prevent the colonization. And the Arcadians chose as founders of the colony Lycomedes and Opoleas from Mantinea, and Timon and Proxenus from Tegea, and Cleolaus and Acriphius from Clitor, and Eucampidas and Hieronymus from Mænalus, and Possicrates and Theoxenus from Parrhasium. And the towns which were persuaded by the Arcadians (out of liking for them and hatred to the Lacedæmonians) to leave their own native places were Alea, Pallantium, Eutæa, Sumateum, Iasæa, Peræthes, Helisson, Oresthasium, Dipæa, Lycæa, all these from Mænalus. And of the Entresii Tricoloni, and Zœtium, and Charisia, and Ptolederma, and Cnausus, and Parorea. And of the Ægytæ Scirtonium, and Malæa, and Cromi, and Blenina, and Leuctrum. And of the Parrhasii Lycosura, and Thocnia, and Trapezus, and Proses, and Acacesium, and Acontium, and Macaria, and Dasea. And of the Cynuræans in Arcadia Gortys, and Thisoa near Mount Lycæus, and Lycæatæ, and Aliphera. And of those which were ranked with Orchomenus Thisoa, and Methydrium, and Teuthis, and moreover the town called Tripolis, and Dipœna, and Nonacris. And the rest of Arcadia fell in with the general plan, and zealously gathered into Megalopolis. The people of Lycæatæ and Tricolonus and Lycosura and Trapezus were the only Arcadians that changed their minds, and, as they did not agree to leave their old cities, some of them were forced into Megalopolis against their will, and the people of Trapezus evacuated the Peloponnese altogether, all that is that were not killed by the Arcadians in their fierce anger, and those that got away safe sailed to Pontus, and were received as colonists by those who dwelt at Trapezus on the Euxine, seeing that they came from the mother-city and bare the same name. But the people of Lycosura though they had refused compliance yet, as they had fled for refuge to their temple, were spared from awe of Demeter and Proserpine. And of the other towns which I have mentioned some are altogether without inhabitants in our day, and others are villages under Megalopolis, as Gortys, Dipœna, Thisoa near Orchomenus, Methydrium, Teuthis, Calliæ, and Helisson. And Pallantium was the only town in that day that seemed to find the deity mild. But Aliphera has continued a town from of old up to this day.
[8.27] Megalopolis was colonized a year and a few months after the reverse of the Lacedæmonians at Leuctra, when Phrasiclides was Archon at Athens, in the second year of the 102nd Olympiad, when Damon of Thuria was victor in the course. And the people of Megalopolis, after being enrolled in alliance with Thebes, had nothing to fear from the Lacedæmonians. So they thought. But when the Thebans commenced what is called the Sacred War and the people of Phocis attacked them, who were on the borders of Bœotia, and had plenty of money as they had seized on the temple stores at Delphi, then the Lacedæmonians in their zeal tried to drive out the people of Megalopolis and the other Arcadians, but as they stoutly defended themselves, and were openly assisted by their neighbours, nothing very remarkable happened on either side. But the hostility between the Arcadians and the Lacedæmonians tended to increase greatly the power of the Macedonians and Philip the son of Amyntas, as neither at Chæronea nor again in Thessaly did the Arcadians fight on the side of the Greeks. And no long time after Aristodemus seized the chief power in Megalopolis. He was a Phigalian by race and the son of Artylas, but had been adopted by Tritæus, one of the leading men in Megalopolis. This Aristodemus, in spite of his seizing the chief power, was yet called Good man and True. For when he was in power the Lacedæmonians marched with an army into the district of Megalopolis under Acrotatus, the eldest of the sons of their king Cleomenes—I have already given his genealogy and that of all the kings of Sparta—and in a fierce battle that ensued, in which many were slain on both sides, the men of Megalopolis were victorious, and among the Spartans who fell was Acrotatus, who thus lost his chance of succession. And two generations after the death of Aristodemus Lydiades seized the chief power: he was of no obscure family, and by nature very ambitious, (as he showed himself afterwards), and yet a patriot. For he was very young when he had the chief power, and when he came to years of discretion he voluntarily abdicated his power, though it was quite firmly established. And, when the people of Megalopolis joined the Achæan League, Lydiades was held in such high honour, both by his own city and by all the Achæans, that his fame was equal to that of Aratus. And again the Lacedæmonians in full force under the king of the other family, Agis the son of Eudamidas, marched against Megalopolis, with a larger and better-equipped army than that which Acrotatus had gathered together, and defeated the people of Megalopolis who came out to meet them, and bringing a mighty battering-ram against the walls gave the tower a strong shake, and the next day hoped to batter it down all together. But the North Wind was it seems destined to be a benefactor to all the Greeks, for it shattered most of the Persian ships at the rocks called Sepiades,³³ and the same Wind prevented the capture of Megalopolis, for it broke in pieces Agis’ battering-ram by a strong continuous and irresistible blast. This Agis, whom the North Wind thus prevented taking Megalopolis, is the same who was driven out of Pellene in Achaia by the Sicyonians under Aratus³⁴ and who afterwards died at Mantinea. And no long time afterwards Cleomenes the son of Leonidas took Megalopolis in time of peace. And some of the inhabitants bravely defending their city in the night were driven out, and Lydiades fell in the action fighting in a manner worthy of his renown: and Philopœmen the son of Craugis saved about two-thirds of the lads and grown men, and fled with the women to Messenia. And Cleomenes slew all he captured, and rased the city to the ground, and burnt it with fire. How the people of Megalopolis recovered their city, and what they did after their restoration to it, I shall narrate when I come to Philopœmen. And the Lacedæmonian nation had no share in the sufferings of the people of Megalopolis, for Cleomenes had changed the constitution from a kingdom to an autocracy.
[8.27] As I have before said, the boundary between the districts of Megalopolis and Heræa is the source of the river Buphagus, named they say after the hero Buphagus, the son of Iapetus and Thornax. There is also a Thornax in Laconia. And they have a tradition that Artemis slew Buphagus with an arrow at the mountain Pholoe because he attempted her chastity.
[8.28] And as you go from the sources of the Buphagus you will first come to a place called Maratha, and next to Gortys, a village in our day but formerly a town. There is there a temple of Æsculapius in Pentelican marble, his statue has no beard, there is also a statue of Hygiea, both statues are by Scopas. And the people of the place say that Alexander the son of Philip offered his breastplate and spear to Æsculapius, in my day the breastplate was still to be seen and the tip of the spear.
[8.28] Gortys has a river called Lusius flowing by it, so called in the neighbourhood from the tradition of Zeus being washed there after his birth. But those who live at some distance call the river Gortynius from the name of the village Gortys. This Gortynius is one of the coldest of streams. The Ister, the Rhine, the Hypanis, the Borysthenes, and other rivers that are congealed in winter, one might rightly call in my opinion winter rivers: for they flow through country mostly lying in snow, and the air in their neighbourhood is generally frosty. But those rivers which flow in a temperate climate, and refresh men in summer both in drinking and bathing, and in winter are not unpleasant, these are the rivers which I should say furnish cold water. Cold is the water of Cydnus that flows through the district of Tarsus, cold is the water of Melas by Side in Pamphylia: while the coldness of the river Ales near Colophon has been celebrated by elegiac poets. But Gortynius is colder still especially in summer. It has its sources at Thisoa on the borders of Methydrium, the place where it joins the Alpheus they call Rhæteæ.
[8.28] Near the district of Thisoa is a village called Teuthis, formerly a town. In the war against Ilium it furnished a leader whose name was Teuthis, or according to others Ornytus. But when the winds were unfavourable to the Greeks at Aulis, and a contrary wind detained them there some time, Teuthis had some quarrel with Agamemnon, and was going to march back with his detachment of Arcadians. Then they say Athene in the semblance of Melas the son of Ops tried to divert Teuthis from his homeward march. But he in his boiling rage ran his spear into the goddess’ thigh, and marched his army back from Aulis. And when he got back home he thought the goddess shewed him her wounded thigh. And from that time a wasting disease seized on Teuthis, and that was the only part of Arcadia where the land produced no fruit. And some time after several oracular responses were given from Dodona, shewing them how to propitiate the goddess, and they made a statue of Athene with a wound in her thigh. I have seen this statue with the thigh bound with a purple bandage. In Teuthis there are also temples of Aphrodite and Artemis. So much for Teuthis.
[8.28] On the road from Gortys to Megalopolis is erected a monument to those who fell in the battle against Cleomenes. This monument the people of Megalopolis call the Treaty Violation, because Cleomenes violated the treaty. Near this monument is a plain 60 stades in extent, and on the right are the ruins of the town of Brenthe, and the river Brentheates flows from thence, and joins the Alpheus about 5 stades further.
[8.29] After crossing the Alpheus you come to the district of Trapezus, and the ruins of the town of Trapezus, and again as you turn to the Alpheus on the left from Trapezus is a place not far from the river called Bathos, where every third year they have rites to the Great Goddesses. And there is a spring there called Olympias, which flows only every other year, and near it fire comes out of the ground. And the Arcadians say that the fabled battle between the giants and the gods took place here, and not at Pallene in Thrace, and they sacrifice here to thunder and lightning and storms. In the Iliad Homer has not mentioned the Giants, but in the Odyssey³⁵ he has stated that the Læstrygones who attacked the ships of Odysseus were like giants and not men, he has also represented the king of the Phæacians saying that the Phæacians are near the gods as the Cyclopes and the race of giants.³⁶ But in the following lines he shews very clearly that the giants are mortal and not a divine race:
“Who ruled once o’er the overweening Giants:
But that proud race destroyed, and died himself.”³⁷
The word used for race (λαὸς) here in Homer means a good many. The fable that the giants had dragons instead of feet is shewn both here and elsewhere to be merely a fable. Orontes a river in Syria, (which does not flow to the sea throughout through a level plain, but pours down along precipitous rocks), the Roman Emperor wanted to make navigable for ships from the sea as far as Antioch. So with great labour and expenditure of money he dug a canal fit for this purpose, and diverted the river into it. And when the old channel was dry, an earthenware coffin was discovered in it more than 11 cubits in length, and that was the size of the corpse in it which was a perfect man. This corpse the god in Clarus, when some Syrians consulted the oracle, said was Orontes of Indian race. And if the earth which was originally moist and damp first produced mortals by the warmth of the sun, what part of the world is likely to have produced mortals either earlier or bigger than India, which even up to our day produces beasts excelling ours both in strange appearance and in size?
[8.29] And about 10 stades from the place called Bathos is Basilis, whose founder was Cypselus, who married his daughter to Cresphontes the son of Aristomachus. Basilis is now in ruins, and there are remains of a temple to Eleusinian Demeter. As you go on from thence and cross the Alpheus again you will come to Thocnia, which gets its name from Thocnus the son of Lycaon, and is quite deserted in our day. Thocnus is said to have built his town on the hill. And the river Aminius flows past this hill and falls into the Helisson, and at no great distance the Helisson flows into the Alpheus.
[8.30] The river Helisson rises in a village of the same name, and flows through the districts of Dipæa and Lycæatæ and Megalopolis, and falls into the Alpheus about 30 stades from Megalopolis. And near the city is a temple of Watching Poseidon, the head of the statue is all that now remains.
[8.30] The river Helisson divides Megalopolis into two parts, as Cnidos and Mitylene are divided by their channels, and the market-place is built in a northerly direction, on the right of the river’s course. There are precincts and a stone temple to Lycæan Zeus. But there is no approach to it, for the inside is visible, there are altars to the god and two tables and as many eagles. And there is a stone statue of Pan, surnamed Œnois from the Nymph Œnoe, who used to be with the other Nymphs, and was privately Pan’s nurse. And in front of the sacred precincts is a brazen statue of Apollo, very fine, about 12 feet high, it was a contribution from Phigalia towards the beautifying of Megalopolis. And the place where the statue was originally put by the people of Phigalia was called Bassæ. Epicurius, the title of the god, accompanied the statue from Phigalia, the origin of that title I shall explain when I come to Phigalia. And on the right of the statue of Apollo is a small statue of the Mother of the Gods, but no remains of the temple except the pillars. In front of the temple is no statue of the Mother, but the bases on which statues are put are visible. And an elegiac couplet on one of the bases says that the effigy there was Diophanes the son of Diæus, who first ranged all the Peloponnese into what is called the Achæan League. And the portico in the market-place called Philip’s was not erected by Philip the son of Amyntas, but the people of Megalopolis to gratify him named it after him. And a temple was built close to it to Hermes Acacesius, of which nothing now remains but a stone tortoise. And near Philip’s portico is another not so large, which contains six public offices for the magistrates of Megalopolis: in one of them is a statue of Ephesian Artemis, and in another a brazen Pan a cubit high surnamed Scolitas. Pan got this title from the hill Scolitas, which is inside the walls, and from which water flows into the Helisson from a spring. And behind these public offices is a temple of Fortune, and a stone statue five feet high. And the portico which they call Myropolis is in the market-place, it was built out of the spoils taken from the Lacedæmonians under Acrotatus the son of Cleomenes, who were defeated fighting against Aristodemus, who at that time had the chief power in Megalopolis. And in the market-place behind the precincts sacred to Lycæan Zeus is the statue on a pillar of Polybius the son of Lycortas. Some elegiac verses are inscribed stating that he travelled over every land and sea, and was an ally of the Romans and appeased their wrath against Greece. This was the Polybius that wrote the history of Rome, and the origin and history of the Carthaginian war, and how at last not without a mighty struggle Scipio, whom they called Africanus, put an end to the war and rased Carthage to the ground. And when the Roman General followed the advice that Polybius gave, things went well, when he did not he met they say with misfortune. And all the Greek cities that joined the Achæan League got the Romans to allow Polybius to fix their constitution and frame their laws. And the council chamber is on the left of Polybius’ statue.
[8.30] And the portico in the market-place called Aristandreum was they say built by Aristander, one of the citizens. Very near this portico towards the east is the temple of Zeus Soter, adorned with pillars all round. Zeus is represented seated on his throne, and by him stands Megalopolis, and on the left is a statue of Artemis Preserver. All these are in Pentelican marble, and were carved by the Athenians Cephisodotus and Xenophon.
[8.31] And the west end of the portico has precincts sacred to the Great Goddesses. They are Demeter and Proserpine, as I have already set forth in my account of Messenia, and Proserpine is called by the Arcadians Preserver. And on figures in relief at the entrance are Artemis, Æsculapius, and Hygiea. And of the Great Goddesses Demeter is in stone throughout, Proserpine has the parts under her dress of wood, the height of both statues is about 15 feet. The statues in front of 2 moderate-sized maidens, in tunics that come down to their ankles, are they say the daughters of Damophon, each of them has a basket on her head full of flowers. But those who think they are divinities take them to be Athene and Artemis gathering flowers with Proserpine. There is also a Hercules by Demeter about a cubit high, Onomacritus in his verses says that this Hercules was one of the Idæan Dactyli. There is a table in front of him, and on it are carved two Seasons, and Pan with his reed-pipe, and Apollo with his lyre. There is also an inscription stating that they were among the earliest gods. On the table are also carved the following Nymphs, Neda carrying Zeus while still a baby, and Anthracia one of the Arcadian Nymphs with a torch, and Hagno with a water-pot in one hand and in the other a bowl, Archirhoe and Myrtoessa also are carrying water-pots and water is trickling from them. And inside the precincts is the temple of Friendly Zeus, the statue is like Dionysus and is by the Argive Polycletus. The god has buskins on, and a cup in one hand, and in the other a thyrsus, and an eagle perched on the thyrsus. This last is the only thing which does not harmonize with the legendary Dionysus. And behind this temple is a small grove of trees surrounded by a wall, into which men may not enter. And before it are statues of Demeter and Proserpine about 3 feet high. And inside the precincts is a temple of the Great Goddesses and of Aphrodite. Before the entrance are some old wooden statues of Hera and Apollo and the Muses, brought they say from Trapezus. The statues in the temple were made by Damophon, Hermes’ in wood, and Aphrodite’s in wood, except her hands and head and toes, which are of stone. And they surname the Goddess Inventive, most properly in my opinion, for most inventions come from Aphrodite whether in word or deed. There are also in a room some statues of Callignotus and Mentas and Sosigenes and Polus, who are said to have first instituted at Megalopolis the worship of the Great Goddesses, which is an imitation of the Eleusinian Mysteries. And within the precincts are square figures of several gods, as Hermes surnamed Agetor, and Apollo, and Athene, and Poseidon, and the Sun surnamed Soter, and Hercules. A large temple has been built to them, in which are celebrated the rites of the Great Goddesses.
[8.31] And on the right of the temple of the Great Goddesses is the temple of Proserpine; her statue is of stone about 8 feet high, and there are fillets on the base throughout. Into this temple women have at all times right of entrance, but men only once a year. And there is a gymnasium in the market-place built facing west. And behind the portico which they call after Macedonian Philip are two hills not very high; and on one are ruins of a temple of Athene Polias, and on the other ruins of a temple of full-grown Hera. Under this hill the spring called Bathyllus swells the stream of the river Helisson.
[8.32] Such are the things worthy of mention here. The part of the city on the other side of the river faces south, and has one of the most remarkable theatres in Greece, and in it is a perennial spring. And not far from the theatre are the foundations of a council-chamber, which was built for 10,000 Arcadians, and called from its builder Thersilium. And next is a house which in my time belonged to a private man, but was originally built for Alexander the son of Philip. And there is a statue of Ammon near it, like the square Hermæ, with ram’s horns on its head. And there is a temple built in common for the Muses and Apollo and Hermes, of which a few foundations only remain. There are also statues of one of the Muses, and of Apollo, like the square Hermæ. There are also ruins of a temple of Aphrodite, of which nothing remains but the vestibule and three statues of the goddess, one called the Celestial, the second the Common, the third has no title. And at no great distance is an altar of Ares, who had also it is said a temple there originally. There is also a racecourse beyond the temple of Aphrodite, in one direction extending towards the theatre, (and there is a spring of water there which they hold sacred to Dionysus,) and in another part of it there was said to be a temple of Dionysus, struck with lightning by the god two generations before my time, and there are still a few vestiges of it. But a joint-temple to Hercules and Hermes is no longer in existence, except the Altar. And in this direction there is a hill towards the east, and on it a temple of the Huntress Artemis, the votive offering of Aristodemus, and on the right are precincts sacred to the Huntress Artemis. Here too are a temple and statues of Æsculapius and Hygiea, and as you descend a little there are gods in a square shape called Workers, as Athene Ergane and Apollo Agyieus. And Hermes, Hercules, and Ilithyia, have special fame from Homer, for Hermes is the messenger of Zeus and conveys the souls of the departed to Hades, and Hercules is famous for the accomplishment of his many Labours, and Ilithyia is represented in the Iliad as presiding over childbirth. There is also another temple under this hill, of Æsculapius as a Boy, the statue of the god is erect and about a cubit in height, and there is also an Apollo seated on a throne about six feet high. There are here also stored up some bones too large to belong to a man, they are said to have belonged to one of the giants, whom Hopladamus called in to aid Rhea, the circumstances I shall narrate later on. And near this temple is a well, which contributes its water to the Helisson.
[8.33] That Megalopolis, peopled with such zeal on the part of all the Arcadians and with the best wishes from all Greece, has lost all its ancient prestige and felicity and is in our day mostly ruins, I nothing marvel at, knowing that the deity ever likes to introduce changes, and that fortune in like manner changes things strong and weak, present and past, reducing with a high hand everything in subjection to her. Witness Mycenæ, which in the days of the war against Ilium was the leading power in Greece, and Nineveh the seat of the Assyrian empire, and Thebes in Bœotia, which was once reckoned worthy to be at the head of Greece: the two former are in ruins and without inhabitants, while the name of Thebes has come down to a citadel only and a few inhabitants. And of the cities which were excessively wealthy of old, as Thebes in Egypt, and Orchomenus belonging to the Minyæ, and Delos the emporium of all Greece, the two former are hardly as wealthy as a man moderately well off, while Delos is actually without a population at all, if you do not reckon the Athenians who come to guard the temple. And of Babylon nothing remains but the temple of Bel and the walls, though it was the greatest city once that the sun shone upon, as nothing but its walls remain to Tiryns in Argolis. All these the deity has reduced to nothing. Whereas Alexandria in Egypt and Seleucia on the Orontes, that were built only yesterday, have attained to such a size and felicity, that fortune seems to lavish her favours upon them. Fortune also exhibits her power more mightily and wonderfully than in the good or bad fortune of cities in the following cases. No long sail from Lemnos is the island Chryse, in which they say Philoctetes met with his bite from the watersnake. This island was entirely submerged by the waves, so that it went to the bottom of the sea. And another island called Hiera, which did not then exist, has been formed by the action of the sea. So fleeting and unstable are human affairs!
[8.34] As you go from Megalopolis to Messene, you will come in about 7 stades to a temple of some goddesses on the left of the high road. They call both goddesses and place Maniæ, which is I fancy a title of the Eumenides, for they say Orestes was driven mad here after the murder of his mother. And not far from the temple is a small mound, with a stone finger upon it, the mound is called Finger’s tomb, because here they say Orestes in his madness gnawed off one of his fingers. And there is another place contiguous called Ace, because there Orestes was healed of his madness: there too is a temple to the Eumenides. These goddesses, they say, when they wanted to drive Orestes mad, appeared black to him, and when he had gnawed off his finger then they appeared white, and this sight made him sane, and he turned away their wrath by offering to them expiations, and he sacrificed to these white goddesses; they usually sacrifice to them and the Graces together. And near the place Ace is a temple called Shearing-place, because Orestes cut off his hair inside it. And the Antiquarians of the Peloponnese say that this pursuit of Orestes by the Furies of his mother Clytæmnestra happened prior to the trial before the Areopagus, when his accuser was not Tyndareus, for he was no longer alive, but Perilaus the cousin of Clytæmnestra, who asked for vengeance for the murder of his kinswoman. Perilaus was the son of Icarius, who afterwards had daughters born to him.
[8.34] From Maniæ to the Alpheus is about 15 stades, to the place where the river Gatheatas flows into the Alpheus, as earlier still the river Carnion falls into the Gatheatas. The sources of the Carnion are at Ægytis below the temple of Apollo Cereates; and the Gatheatas has its rise at Gatheæ in the Cromitic district, which is about 40 stades from the Alpheus, and in it the ruins can still be traced of the town of Cromi. From Cromi it is about 20 stades to Nymphas, which is well watered and full of trees. And from Nymphas it is about 20 stades to Hermæum, the boundary between the districts of Messenia and Megalopolis, where there is a Hermes on a pillar.
[8.35] This road leads to Messene, but another leads from Megalopolis to Carnasium in Messenia, where the Alpheus has its rise, at the place where the Malus and the Scyrus mingle their waters with it in one stream. If you keep the Malus on the right for about thirty stades and then cross it, you will mount on higher ground till you come to the place called Phædria, which is about 15 stades from the village called Hermæum, near the temple of Despœna. Hermæum is the boundary between the districts of Messenia and Megalopolis, and there are statues not very large of Despœna and Demeter, Hermes and Hercules: and I think the wooden statue of Hercules made by Dædalus on the borders of Messenia and Arcadia once stood here.
[8.35] The road to Lacedæmon from Megalopolis is 30 stades to the Alpheus, and then along the riverside till you come to one of its tributaries the Thius, which you leave on the left and arrive at Phalæsiæ, about 40 stades from the Alpheus. Phalæsiæ is about 20 stades from the temple of Hermes at Belemina. The Arcadians say that Belemina originally belonged to them, and that the Lacedæmonians robbed them of it. But their account is not probable on other grounds, nor is at all likely that the Thebans would have allowed the Arcadians to be stripped of their territory in this quarter, could they with justice have righted them.
[8.35] From Megalopolis are also roads to the interior of Arcadia, as to Methydrium 170 stades from Megalopolis, and 13 stades further to the place called Scias, where are ruins of a temple to Sciadian Artemis, erected tradition says by Aristodemus the tyrant. And 10 stades further there are the ruins of a place called Charisiæ, and another 10 stades further is Tricoloni, which was formerly a town; and there is still on the hill a temple and square statue of Poseidon, and a grove of trees round the temple. Tricoloni was founded by the sons of Lycaon, and Zœtia about 15 stades from Tricoloni, (not in a direct line but a little to the left); was founded they say by Zœteus the son of Tricolonus. And Paroreus, the younger son of Tricolonus, founded Paroria, which is about 10 stades from Zœtia. Both are without inhabitants now, but at Zœtia there are temples of Demeter and Artemis. And there are other towns in ruins, as Thyræum 15 stades from Paroria, and Hypsus on a hill of the same name above the plain. Between Thyræum and Hypsus all the country is hilly and abounds with wild beasts. I have previously shewn that Thyræus and Hypsus were sons of Lycaon.
[8.35] On the right of Tricoloni is a steep road to a spring called Wells, as you descend about 30 stades you come to the tomb of Callisto, a high mound of earth, with many trees growing wild, and some planted. And on the top of this mound is a temple of Artemis called The Most Beautiful, and I think when Pamphus in his verses called Artemis The Most Beautiful he first learnt this epithet from the Arcadians. And twenty-five stades further, 100 from Tricolonus in the direction of the Helisson, on the high road to Methydrium, (which is the only town left to Tricoloni), is a place called Anemosa and the mountain Phalanthum, on which are ruins of a town of the same name, founded they say by Phalanthus, the son of Agelaus, and grandson of Stymphelus. Above it is a plain called Polus, and next to it is Schœnus, so called from the Bœotian Schœneus. And if Schœneus was a stranger in Arcadia, Atalanta’s Course near Schœnus may have taken its name from his daughter. And next is a place called I think * * *, and all agree that this is Arcadian soil.
[8.36] Nothing now remains to be mentioned but Methydrium, which is 137 stades from Tricoloni. It was called Methydrium, because the high hill on which Orchomenus built the town was between the rivers Malœtas and Mylaon, and, before it was included in Megalopolis, inhabitants of Methydrium were victors at Olympia. There is at Methydrium a temple of Poseidon Hippius near the river Mylaon. And the mountain called Thaumasium lies above the river Malœtas, and the people of Methydrium wish it to be believed that Rhea when she was pregnant with Zeus came to this mountain, and got the protection of Hoplodamus and the other Giants with him, in case Cronos should attack her. They admit that Rhea bore Zeus on part of Mt Lycæus, but they say that the cheating of Cronos and the offering him a stone instead of the child, (a legend universal amongst the Greeks), took place here. And on the top of the mountain is Rhea’s Cave, and into it only women sacred to the goddess may enter, nobody else.
[8.36] About 30 stades from Methydrium is the well Nymphasia, and about 30 stades from Nymphasia is the joint boundary for the districts of Megalopolis Orchomenus and Caphya.
[8.36] From Megalopolis, through what are called the gates to the marsh, is a way to Mænalus by the river Helisson. And on the left of the road is a temple of the Good God. And if the gods are the givers of good things to mortals, and Zeus is the chief of the gods, one would follow the tradition and conjecture that this is a title of Zeus. A little further is a mound of earth, the tomb of Aristodemus, who though a tyrant was not robbed of the title of Good, and a temple of Athene called Inventive, because she is a goddess who invents various contrivances. And on the right of the road is an enclosure sacred to the North Wind, to whom the people of Megalopolis sacrifice annually, and they hold no god in higher honour than Boreas, as he was their preserver from Agis and the Lacedæmonians.³⁸ And next is the tomb of Œcles the father of Amphiaraus, if indeed death seized him in Arcadia, and not when he was associated with Hercules in the expedition against Laomedon. Next to it is a temple and grove of Demeter called Demeter of the Marsh, five stades from the city, into which none but women may enter. And thirty stades further is the place called Paliscius. About 20 stades from Paliscius, leaving on the left the river Elaphus which is only a winter torrent, are the ruins of Peræthes and a temple of Pan. And if you cross the winter-torrent, about 15 stades from the river is a plain called Mænalium, and after having traversed this you come to a mountain of the same name. At the bottom of this mountain are traces of the town of Lycoa, and a temple and brazen statue of Artemis of Lycoa. And in the southern part of the mountain is the town of Sumetia. In this mountain are also the so-called Three Roads, whence the Mantineans, according to the bidding of the oracle at Delphi, removed the remains of Arcas the son of Callisto. There are also ruins of Mænalus, and traces of a temple of Athene, and a course for athletical contests, and another for horseraces. And the mountain Mænalium they consider sacred to Pan, insomuch that those who live near it say that they hear Pan making music with his pipes. Between the temple of Despœna and Megalopolis it is 40 stades, half of the road by the Alpheus, and when you have crossed it about 2 stades further are the ruins of Macaria, and seven stades further are the ruins of Dasea, and it is as many more from Dasea to the hill of Acacesius. Underneath this hill is the town of Acacesium, and there is a statue of Hermes (made of the stone of the hill) on the hill to this day, and they say Hermes was brought up there as a boy, and there is a tradition among the Arcadians that Acacus the son of Lycaon was his nurse. The Thebans have a different legend, and the people of Tanagra again have a different one to the Theban one.
[8.37] From Acacesium it is four stades to the temple of Despœna. There was first there a temple of Artemis the Leader, and a brazen statue of the goddess with torches, about 6 feet high I conjecture. From thence there is an entrance to the sacred enclosure of Despœna. As you approach the temple there is a portico on the right, and on the wall figures in white stone, the Fates and Zeus as Master of the Fates, and Hercules robbing Apollo of his tripod. All that I could discover about them I will relate, when in my account of Phocis I come to Delphi. And in the portico near the temple of Despœna, between the figures I have mentioned, is a tablet painted with representations of the mysteries. On a third figure are some Nymphs and Pans, and on a fourth Polybius the son of Lycortas. And the inscription on him is that Greece would not have been ruined at all had it taken his advice in all things, and when it made mistakes he alone could have retrieved them. And in front of the temple is an altar to Demeter and another to Despœna, and next one to the Great Mother. And the statues of the Goddesses Despœna and Demeter, and the throne on which they sit, and the footstool under their feet, are all of one piece of stone: and neither about the dress nor on the throne is any portion of another stone dove-tailed in, but everything is one block of stone. This stone was not fetched from a distance, they say, but, in consequence of a vision in a dream, found and dug up in the temple precincts. And the size of each of the statues is about the size of the statue at Athens of the Mother. They are by Damophon. Demeter has a torch in her right hand, and has laid her left hand upon Despœna: and Despœna has her sceptre, and on her knees what is called a cist, which she has her right hand upon. And on one side of the throne stands Artemis by Demeter, clad in the skin of a deer and with her quiver on her shoulders, in one hand she holds a lamp, and in the other two dragons. And at her feet lies a dog, such as are used for hunting. And on the other side of the throne near Despœna stands Anytus in armour: they say Despœna was brought up near the temple by him. He was one of the Titans. Homer first introduced the Titans into poetry, as gods in what is called Tartarus, in the lines about the oath of Hera.³⁹ And Onomacritus borrowed the name of the Titans from Homer when he wrote his poem about the orgies of Dionysus, and represented the Titans as contributing to the sufferings of Dionysus. Such is the Arcadian tradition about Anytus. It was Æschylus the son of Euphorion that taught the Greeks the Egyptian legend, that Artemis was the daughter of Demeter and not of Leto. As to the Curetes, for they too are carved under the statues, and the Corybantes, a different race from the Curetes who are carved on the base, though I know all about them I purposely pass it by. And the Arcadians bring into the temple all wood except that of the pomegranate. On the right hand as you go out of the temple is a mirror fixed to the wall: if any one looks into this mirror, he will see himself very obscurely or not at all, but the statues of the goddesses and the throne he will see quite clearly. And by the temple of Despœna as you ascend a little to the right is the Hall, where the Arcadians perform her Mystic rites, and sacrifice to her victims in abundance. Each sacrifices what animal he has got: nor do they cut the throats of the victims as in other sacrifices, but each cuts off whatever limb of the victim he lights on. The Arcadians worship Despœna more than any of the gods, and say that she was the daughter of Poseidon and Demeter. Her general appellation is Despœna, a name they also give to the Daughter of Zeus and Demeter, but her private name is Persephone, as Homer⁴⁰ and still earlier Pamphus have given it, but that name of Despœna I feared to write down for the uninitiated. And beyond the Hall is a grove sacred to Despœna surrounded by a stone wall: in the grove are several kinds of trees, as olives and oak from one root, which is something above the gardener’s art. And beyond the grove are altars of Poseidon Hippius as the father of Despœna, and of several other of the gods. And the inscription on the last altar is that it is common to all the gods.
[8.37] From thence you ascend by a staircase to the temple of Pan, which has a portico and a not very large statue. To Pan as to all the most powerful gods belongs the property of answering prayer and of punishing the wicked. In his temple a never ceasing fire burns. It is said that in ancient times Pan gave oracular responses, and that his interpreter was the Nymph Erato, who married Arcas the son of Callisto. They also quote some of Erato’s lines, which I have myself perused. There too is an altar to Ares, and two statues of Aphrodite in a temple, one of white marble, the more ancient one of wood. There are also wooden statues of Apollo and Athene, Athene has also a temple.
[8.38] And a little higher up is the circuit of the walls of Lycosura, which contains a few inhabitants. It is the oldest of the towns of the earth either on the mainland or in islands, and the first the sun saw, and all mankind made it their model for building towns.
[8.38] And on the left of the temple of Despœna is Mount Lycæus, which some of the Arcadians call Olympus and others the Sacred Hill. They say Zeus was reared on this mountain: and there is a spot on it called Cretea on the left of the grove of Parrhasian Apollo, and the Arcadians maintain that this was the Crete where Zeus was reared, and not the island of Crete as the Cretans hold. And the names of the Nymphs, by whom they say Zeus was brought up, were (they say) Thisoa and Neda and Hagno. Thisoa gave her name to a town in Parrhasia, and in my time there is a village called Thisoa in the district of Megalopolis, and Neda gave her name to the river Neda, and Hagno gave her name to the spring on Mount Lycæus, which like the river Ister has generally as much water in summer as in winter. But should a drought prevail for any length of time, so as to be injurious to the fruits of the earth and to trees, then the priest of Lycæan Zeus prays to the water and performs the wonted sacrifice, and lowers a branch of oak into the spring just on the surface, and when the water is stirred up a steam rises like a mist, and after a little interval the mist becomes a cloud, and collecting other clouds soon causes rain to fall upon Arcadia. There is also on Mount Lycæus a temple of Pan and round it a grove of trees, and a Hippodrome in front of it, where in old times they celebrated the Lycæan games. There are also here the bases of some statues, though the statues are no longer there: and an elegiac couplet on one of the bases says it is the statue of Astyanax who was an Arcadian.
[8.38] Mount Lycæus among other remarkable things has the following. There is an enclosure sacred to Lycæan Zeus into which men may not enter, and if any one violates this law he will not live more than a year. It is also still stated that inside this enclosure men and beasts alike have no shadow, and therefore when any beast flees into this enclosure the hunter cannot follow it up, but remaining outside and looking at the beast sees no shadow falling from it. As long indeed as the Sun is in Cancer there is no shadow from trees or living things at Syene in Ethiopia, but this sacred enclosure on Mount Lycæus is the same in reference to shadows during every period of the year.
[8.38] There is on the highest ridge of the mountain a mound of earth, the altar of Lycæan Zeus, from which most of the Peloponnese is visible: and in front of this altar there are two pillars facing east, and some golden eagles upon them of very ancient date. On this altar they sacrifice to Lycæan Zeus secretly: it would not be agreeable to me to pry too curiously into the rites, let them be as they are and always have been.
[8.38] On the eastern part of the mountain is a temple of Parrhasian Apollo, also called Pythian Apollo. During the annual festival of the god they sacrifice in the market-place a boar to Apollo the Helper, and after the sacrifice they convey the victim to the temple of Parrhasian Apollo with fluteplaying and solemn procession, and cut off the thighs and burn them, and consume the flesh of the victim on the spot. Such is their annual custom.
[8.38] And on the north side of Mount Lycæus is the district of Thisoa: the men who live here hold the Nymph Thisoa in highest honour. Through this district several streams flow that fall into the Alpheus, as Mylaon and Nus and Achelous and Celadus and Naliphus. There are two other rivers of the same name but far greater fame than this Achelous in Arcadia, one that flows through Acarnania and Ætolia till it reaches the islands of the Echinades, which Homer has called in the Iliad the king of all rivers,⁴¹ the other the Achelous flowing from Mount Sipylus, which river and mountain he has associated with the legend of Niobe.⁴² The third Achelous is this one on Mount Lycæus.
[8.38] To the right of Lycosura are the hills called Nomia, on which is a temple of Pan Nomius on a spot called Melpea, so called they say from the piping of Pan there. The simplest explanation why the hills were called Nomia is that Pan had his pastures there, but the Arcadians say they were called after a Nymph of that name.
[8.39] Past Lycosura in a westerly direction flows the river Plataniston, which everyone must cross who is going to Phigalia, after which an ascent of 30 stades or a little more takes you to that town. How Phigalus was the son of Lycaon, and how he was the original founder of the town, and how in process of time the name of the town got changed into Phialia from Phialus the son of Bucolion, and afterwards got back its old name, all this I have entered into already. There are other traditions not worthy of credit, as that Phigalus was an Autochthon and not the son of Lycaon, and some say that Phigalia was one of the Nymphs called Dryads. When the Lacedæmonians attacked Arcadia and invaded Phigalia, they defeated the inhabitants in a battle and laid siege to the town, and as the town was nearly taken by storm the Phigalians evacuated it, or the Lacedæmonians allowed them to leave it upon conditions of war. And the capture of Phigalia and the flight of the Phigalians from it took place when Miltiades was chief magistrate at Athens, in the 2nd year of the 30th Olympiad, in which Chionis the Laconian was victor for the third time. And it seemed good to those Phigalians who had escaped to go to Delphi, and inquire of the god as to their return. And the Pythian Priestess told them that if they tried by themselves to return to Phigalia she foresaw no hope of their return, but if they took a hundred picked men from Oresthasium, and they were slain in battle, the Phigalians would get their return through them. And when the people of Oresthasium heard of the oracular message given to the Phigalians, they vied with one another in zeal who should be one of the 100 picked men, and participate in the expedition to Phigalia. And they engaged with the Lacedæmonian garrison and fulfilled the oracle completely: for they all died fighting bravely, and drove out the Spartans, and put it in the power of the Phigalians to recover their native town. Phigalia lies on a hill which is mostly precipitous, and its walls are built on the rocks, but as you go up to the town there is a gentle and easy ascent. And there is a temple of Artemis the Preserver, and her statue in stone in an erect position. From this temple they usually conduct the processions. And in the gymnasium there is a statue of Hermes with a cloak on, which does not cease at his feet but covers the whole square figure. There is also a temple of Dionysus called Acratophorus by the people of the place, the lower parts of the statue are not visible being covered by leaves of laurel and ivy. And all the statue that can be seen is coloured with vermilion so as to look very gay. The Iberes find this vermilion with their gold.
[8.40] The people of Phigalia have also in their market-place the statue of Arrhachion the pancratiast, an antique one in all other respects and not least so in its shape. The feet are not very wide apart, and the hands are by the side near the buttocks. The statue is of stone, and they say there was an inscription on it, which time has obliterated. This Arrhachion had two victories at Olympia in the two Olympiads before the 54th, through the equity of the umpires and his own merit. For when he contended for the prize of wild olive with the only one of his antagonists that remained, his opponent got hold of him first and with his feet hugged him, and at the same time grappled his neck tightly with his arms. And Arrhachion broke the finger of his antagonist, and gave up the ghost being throttled, and his antagonist also, though he had throttled Arrhachion, fainted away from the pain his finger gave him. And the people of Elis crowned the dead body of Arrhachion and proclaimed him victor. I know the Argives did the same in the case of Creugas the boxer of Epidamnus, for though he was dead they gave him the crown at Nemea, because his opponent Damoxenus the Syracusan violated their mutual agreements. For as they were boxing evening came on, and they agreed in the hearing of all the audience that they should strike one another once in turn. Boxers did not at this time wear the cestus loaded with iron, but they wore leather thongs, (which they fastened under the hollow of the hand that the fingers might be left uncovered), made of ox hides and thin and deftly woven together after an old fashion. Then Creugas delivered the first blow on Damoxenus’ head, and Damoxenus bade Creugas hold back his hand, and as he did so struck him under the ribs with his fingers straight out, and such was the hardness of his nails and the violence of the blow that his hand pierced his side, seized his bowels and dragged and tore them out. Creugas immediately expired. And the Argives drove Damoxenus off the course because he had violated the conditions, and instead of one blow had given several to his antagonist. To Creugas though dead they assigned the victory, and erected to him a statue in Argos, which is now in the temple of Lycian Apollo.
[8.41] The Phigalians have also in their market-place a mortuary chapel to the 100 picked men from Oresthasium, and annually offer funeral sacrifices to them as to heroes. And the river called Lymax which falls into the Neda flows by Phigalia. It got its name Lymax they say from the purifications of Rhea. For when after giving birth to Zeus the Nymphs purified her after travail, they threw into this river the afterbirth, which the ancients called Lymata. Homer bears me out when he says that the Greeks purifying themselves to get rid of the pestilence threw the purifications into the sea.⁴³ The Neda rises on the mountain Cerausius, which is a part of Mount Lycæus. And where the Neda is nearest to Phigalia, there the lads of the town shear off their hair to the river. And near the sea it is navigable for small craft. Of all the rivers that we know of the Mæander is most winding having most curves and sinuosities. And next for winding would come the Neda. About 12 stades from Phigalia are hot baths, and the Lymax flows into the Neda not far from that place. And where they join their streams is a temple of Eurynome, holy from remote antiquity, and difficult of access from the roughness of the ground. Round it grow many cypresses close to one another. Eurynome the Phigalian people believe to be a title of Artemis, but their Antiquarians say that Eurynome was the daughter of Oceanus, and is mentioned by Homer in the Iliad as having joined Thetis in receiving Hephæstus.⁴⁴ And on the same day annually they open the temple of Eurynome: for at all other times they keep it shut. And on that day they have both public and private sacrifices to her. I was not in time for the festival, nor did I see the statue of Eurynome. But I heard from the Phigalians that the statue has gold chains round it, and that it is a woman down to the waist and a fish below. To the daughter of Oceanus who dwelt with Thetis in the depths of the sea these fish extremities would be suitable: but I do not see any logical connection between Artemis and a figure of this kind.
[8.41] Phigalia is surrounded by mountains, on the left by Cotilius, on the right by the projecting mountain Elaion. Cotilius is about 40 stades from Phigalia, and on it is a place called Bassæ, and a temple of Apollo the Helper, the roof of which is of stone. This temple would stand first of all the temples in the Peloponnese, except that at Tegea, for the beauty of the stone and neatness of the structure. And Apollo got his title of Helper in reference to a pestilence, as among the Athenians he got the title of Averter of Ill because he turned away from them some pestilence. He helped the Phigalians about the time of the Peloponnesian war, as both titles of Apollo shew plainly, and Ictinus the builder of the temple at Phigalia was a contemporary of Pericles, and the architect of what is called the Parthenon at Athens. I have already mentioned the statue of Apollo in the market-place at Megalopolis.
[8.41] And there is a spring of water on Mount Cotilius, from which somebody has written that the river Lymax takes its rise, but he can neither have seen the spring himself, nor had his account from any one who had seen it. I have done both: and the water of the spring on Mount Cotilius does not travel very far, but in a short time gets lost in the ground altogether. Not that it occurred to me to inquire in what part of Arcadia the river Lymax rises. Above the temple of Apollo the Helper is a place called Cotilum, where there is a temple of Aphrodite lacking a roof, as also a statue of the goddess.
[8.42] The other mountain, Elaion, is about 30 stades from Phigalia, and there is a cave there sacred to Black Demeter. All the traditions that the people of Thelpusa tell about the amour of Poseidon with Demeter are also believed by the people of Phigalia. But the latter differ in one point: they say Demeter gave birth not to a foal but to her that the Arcadians call Despœna. And after this they say, partly from indignation with Poseidon, partly from sorrow at the rape of Proserpine, she dressed in black, and went to this cave and nobody knew of her whereabouts for a long time. But when all the fruits of the earth were blighted, and mankind was perishing from famine, and none of the gods knew where Demeter had hidden herself but Pan, who traversed all Arcadia, hunting in various parts of the mountains, and had seen Demeter dressed as I have described on Mount Elaion, then Zeus learning all about this from Pan sent the Fates to Demeter, and she was persuaded by them to lay aside her anger, and to wean herself from her grief. And in consequence of her abode there, the Phigalians say that they considered this cave as sacred to Demeter, and put in it a wooden statue of the goddess, fashioned as follows. The goddess is seated on a rock, like a woman in all respects but her head, which is that of a mare with a mare’s mane, and figures of dragons and other monsters about her head, and she has on a tunic which reaches to the bottom of her feet. In one hand she has a dolphin, in the other a dove. Why they delineated the goddess thus is clear to everybody not without understanding who remembers the legend. And they call her Black Demeter because her dress is black. They do not record who this statue was by or how it caught fire. But when the old one was burnt the Phigalians did not offer another to the goddess, but neglected her festivals and sacrifices, till a dearth came over the land, and when they went to consult the oracle the Pythian Priestess gave them the following response:
“Arcadians, acorn-eating Azanes who inhabit Phigalia, go to the secret cave of the horse-bearing Demeter, and inquire for alleviation from this bitter famine, you that were twice Nomads living alone, living alone feeding upon roots. Demeter taught you something else besides pasture, she introduced among you the cultivation of corn, though you have deprived her of her ancient honours and prerogatives. But you shall eat one another and dine off your children speedily, if you do not propitiate her wrath by public libations, and pay divine honours to the recess in the cave.”
[8.42] When the Phigalians heard this oracular response, they honoured Demeter more than before, and got Onatas of Ægina, the son of Mico, for a great sum of money to make them a statue of the goddess. This Onatas made a brazen statue of Apollo for the people of Pergamus, most wonderful both for its size and artistic merit. And he having discovered a painting or copy of the ancient statue, but perhaps chiefly, so the story goes, from a dream he had, made a brazen statue of Demeter for the people of Phigalia, a generation after the Persian invasion of Greece. Here is the proof of the correctness of my date. When Xerxes crossed into Europe Gelon the son of Dinomenes was ruler of Syracuse and the rest of Sicily, and after his death the kingdom devolved upon his brother Hiero, and as Hiero died before he could give to Olympian Zeus the offerings he had vowed for the victories of his horses, Dinomenes his son gave them instead. Now Onatas made these, as the inscriptions at Olympia over the votive offering show.
“Hiero having been formerly victor in your august contests, Olympian Zeus, once in the fourhorse chariot, and twice with a single horse, bestows on you these gifts: his son Dinomenes offers them in memory of his Syracusan father.”
[8.42] And the other inscription is as follows,
“Onatas the son of Mico made me, a native of Ægina.” Onatas was therefore a contemporary of the Athenian Hegias and the Argive Ageladas.
[8.42] I went to Phigalia chiefly to see this Demeter, and I sacrificed to the goddess in the way the people of the country do, no victim but the fruit of the vine and other trees, and honeycombs, and wool in an unworked state with all its grease still on it, and these they lay on the altar built in front of the cave, and pour oil over all. This sacrifice is held every year at Phigalia both publicly and privately. A priestess conducts the ritual, and with her the youngest of the three citizens who are called Sacrificing Priests. Round the cave is a grove of oak trees, and warm water bubbles up from a spring. The statue made by Onatas was not there in my time, nor did most people at Phigalia know that it had ever existed, but the oldest of those I met with informed me that 3 generations before his time some stones from the roof fell on to it, and that it was crushed by them and altogether smashed up, and we can see plainly even now traces in the roof where the stones fell in.
[8.43] Pallantium next demands my attention, both to describe what is worthy of record in it, and to show why the elder Antonine made it a town instead of a village, and also free and exempt from taxation. They say that Evander was the best of the Arcadians both in council and war, and that he was the son of Hermes by a Nymph the daughter of Lado, and that he was sent with a force of Arcadians from Pallantium to form a colony, which he founded near the river Tiber. And part of what is now Rome was inhabited by Evander and the Arcadians who accompanied him, and was called Pallantium in remembrance of the town in Arcadia. And in process of time it changed its name into Palatium. It was for these reasons that Pallantium received its privileges from the Roman Emperor. This Antonine, who bestowed such favours on Pallantium, imposed no war on the Romans willingly, but when the Mauri, (the most important tribe of independent Libyans, who were Nomads and much more formidable than the Scythians, as they did not travel in waggons but they and their wives rode on horseback,) commenced a war with Rome, he drove them out of all their territory into the most remote parts, and compelled them to retire from Libya to Mount Atlas and to the neighbourhood of Mount Atlas. He also took away from the Brigantes in Britain most of their territory, because they had attacked the Genunii who were Roman subjects. And when Cos and Rhodes cities of the Lycians and Carians were destroyed by a violent earthquake, the Emperor Antonine restored them by large expenditure of money and by his zeal in re-peopling them. As to the grants of money which he made to the Greeks and barbarians who stood in need of them, and his magnificent works in Greece and Ionia and Carthage and Syria, all this has been minutely described by others. This Emperor left another token of his liberality. Those subject nations who had the privilege of being Roman citizens, but whose sons were reckoned as Greeks, had the option by law of leaving their money to those who were no relations, or letting it swell the wealth of the Emperor. But Antonine allowed them to leave their property to their sons, preferring to exhibit philanthropy rather than to maintain a law which brought in money to the revenue. This Emperor the Romans called Pius from the honour he paid to the gods. I think he might also justly have borne the title of the elder Cyrus, Father of mankind. He was succeeded by his son Antonine, who fought against the Germans, the most numerous and warlike barbarians in Europe, and subdued the Sauromatæ who had commenced an iniquitous war.
[8.44] To return to our account of Arcadia, there is a road from Megalopolis to Pallantium and Tegea, leading to what is called the Mound. On this road is a suburb of Megalopolis, called Ladocea from Ladocus the son of Echemus. And next comes Hæmoniæ, which in ancient times was a town founded by Hæmon the son of Lycaon, and is still called Hæmoniæ. And next it on the right are the ruins of Oresthasium, and the pillars of a temple to Artemis surnamed the Priestess. And on the direct road from Hæmoniæ is the place called Aphrodisium, and next to it Athenæum, on the left of which is a temple of Athene and stone statue of the goddess. About 20 stades from Athenæum are the ruins of Asea, and the hill which was formerly the citadel has still remains of walls. And about 5 stades from Asea is the Alpheus a little away from the road, and near the road is the source of the Eurotas. And near the source of the Alpheus is a temple of the Mother of the Gods without a roof, and two lions in stone. And the Eurotas joins the Alpheus, and for about 20 stades they flow together in a united stream, till they are lost in a cavity and come up again, the Eurotas in Laconia, the Alpheus at Pegæ in Megalopolis. There is also a road from Asea leading up to Mount Boreum, on the top of which are traces of a temple. The tradition is that Odysseus on his return from Ilium built it to Poseidon and Preserver Athene.
[8.44] What is called the Mound is the boundary for the districts of Megalopolis Tegea and Pallantium, and as you turn off from it to the left is the plain of Pallantium. In Pallantium there is a temple, and a stone statue of Pallas and another of Evander, and a temple to Proserpine the daughter of Demeter, and at no great distance a statue of Polybius. The hill above the town was used of old as the citadel, and on the top of it are remains even to our day of a temple of the gods called Pure, oaths by whom are still accounted most weighty. They do not know the particular names of these gods, or if they know they will not tell them. But one might conjecture that they were called Pure, because Pallas did not sacrifice to them in the same way as his father did to Lycæan Zeus.
[8.44] And on the right of what is called the Mound is the Manthuric plain on the borders of Tegea, being indeed only 50 stades from Tegea. There is a small hill on the right of the road called Cresium, on which is the temple of Aphneus. For according to the legend of the people of Tegea Ares had an intrigue with Aerope, the daughter of Cepheus the son of Aleus, and she died in childbirth, and the baby still clung to his mother though she was dead, and sucked from her breasts a plentiful supply of milk, and as Ares had caused this they called the god Aphneus, and the boy was called they say Aeropus. And on the road to Tegea is the well called Leuconius, so called from Leucone, (who they say was a daughter of Aphidas), whose tomb is not far from Tegea.
[8.45] The people of Tegea say that their district got its name in the days of Tegeates the son of Lycaon, and that the inhabitants were distributed into 8 parishes, Gareatæ, Phylaces, Caryatæ, Corythes, Potachidæ, Œatæ, Manthyres, and Echeuethes, and that in the reign of Aphidas a ninth parish was formed, called after him Aphidas. The founder of the town in our day was Aleus. The people of Tegea besides the public events which they had a share in in common with all the Arcadians, as the war against Ilium, and the war with the Persians, and the battle with the Lacedæmonians at Dipæa, had special renown of their own from the following circumstances. Ancæus the son of Lycurgus, though wounded, sustained the attack of the Calydonian boar, and Atalanta shot at it and was the first to hit it, and for this prowess its head and hide were given her as trophies. And when the Heraclidæ returned to the Peloponnese, Echemus of Tegea, the son of Aeropus, had a combat with Hyllus and beat him. And the people of Tegea were the first Arcadians who beat the Lacedæmonians who fought against them, and took most of them captive.
[8.45] The ancient temple at Tegea of Athene Alea was built by Aleus, but in after times the people at Tegea built the goddess a great and magnificent temple. For the former one was entirely consumed by fire which spread all over it, when Diophantus was Archon at Athens, in the second year of the 96th Olympiad, in which Eupolemus of Elis won the prize in the course. The present one far excels all the temples in the Peloponnese for beauty and size. The architecture of the first row of pillars is Doric, that of the second row is Corinthian, and that of the pillars outside the temple is Ionic. The architect I found on inquiry was Scopas the Parian, who made statues in various parts of old Greece, and also in Ionia and Caria. On the gables is represented the hunting of the boar of Calydon, on one side of the boar, nearly in the centre of the piece, stand Atalanta and Meleager and Theseus and Telamon and Peleus and Pollux and Iolaus, the companion of Hercules in most of his Labours, and the sons of Thestius, Prothous and Cometes, the brothers of Althæa: and on the other side of the boar Ancæus already wounded and Epochus supporting him as he drops his weapon, and near him Castor, and Amphiaraus the son of Œcles, and besides them Hippothous the son of Cercyon, the son of Agamedes, the son of Stymphelus, and lastly Pirithous. On the gables behind is a representation of the single combat between Telephus and Achilles on the plain of Caicus.
[8.46] And the ancient statue of Athene Alea, and together with it the tusks of the Calydonian boar, were carried away by the Emperor Augustus, after his victory over Antony and his allies, among whom were all the Arcadians but the Mantineans. Augustus does not seem to have commenced the practice of carrying off votive offerings and statues of the gods from conquered nations, but to have merely followed a long-established custom. For after the capture of Ilium, when the Greeks divided the spoil, the statue of Household Zeus was given to Sthenelus the son of Capaneus: and many years afterwards, when the Dorians had migrated to Sicily, Antiphemus, the founder of Gela, sacked Omphace a town of the Sicani, and carried from thence to Gela a statue made by Dædalus. And we know that Xerxes the son of Darius, the king of the Persians, besides what he carried off from Athens, took from Brauron a statue of Brauronian Artemis, and moreover charged the Milesians with cowardice in the sea-fight against the Athenians at Salamis, and took from them the brazen Apollo at Branchidæ, which a long time afterwards Seleucus sent back to the Milesians. And the statues taken from the Argives at Tiryns are now, one in the temple of Hera, the other in the temple of Apollo at Elis. And the people of Cyzicus having forced the people of Proconnesus to settle with them took from them a statue of the Dindymene Mother. The statue generally was of gold, but the head instead of ivory was made with the teeth of Hippopotamuses. So the Emperor Augustus merely followed a long established custom usual both among Greeks and barbarians. And you may see the statue of Athene Alea in the Forum at Rome built by Augustus. It is throughout of ivory and the workmanship of Endœus. Those who busy themselves about such curiosities say that one of the tusks of the boar was broken off, and the remaining one was suspended as a votive offering in Cæsar’s gardens in the temple of Dionysus. It is about 2½ feet long.
[8.47] And the statue now at Tegea of Athene, called Hippia by the Manthurii, because (according to their tradition) in the fight between the gods and the giants the goddess drove the chariot of Enceladus, though among the other Greeks and Peloponnesians the title Alea has prevailed, was taken from the Manthurii. On one side of the statue of Athene stands Æsculapius, on the other Hygiea in Pentelican marble, both by the Parian Scopas. And the most notable votive offerings in the temple are the hide of the Calydonian boar, which is rotten with lapse of time and nearly devoid of hair, and some fetters hung up partly destroyed by rust, which the captives of the Lacedæmonians wore when they dug in the district of Tegea. And there is the bed of Athene, and an effigy of Auge to imitate a painting, and the armour of Marpessa, called the Widow, a woman of Tegea, of whom I shall speak hereafter. She was a priestess of Athene when a girl, how long I do not know but not after she grew to womanhood. And the altar they say was made for the goddess by Melampus the son of Amythaon: and on the altar are representations of Rhea and the Nymph Œnoe with Zeus still a babe, and on each side 4 Nymphs, on the one side Glauce and Neda and Thisoa and Anthracia, and on the other Ida and Hagno and Alcinoe and Phrixa. There are also statues of the Muses and Mnemosyne.
[8.47] And not far from the temple is a mound of earth, constituting a race-course, where they hold games which they call Aleæa from Athene Alea, and Halotia because they took most of the Lacedæmonians alive in the battle. And there is a spring towards the north of the temple, near which they say Auge was violated by Hercules, though their legend differs from that of Hecatæus about her. And about 3 stades from this spring is the temple of Hermes called Æpytus.
[8.47] At Tegea there is also a temple to Athene Poliatis, which once every year the priest enters. They call it the temple of Protection, and say that it was a boon of Athene to Cepheus, the son of Aleus, that Tegea should never be captured, and they say that the goddess cut off one of the locks of Medusa, and gave it him as a protection for the city. They have also the following legend about Artemis Hegemone. Aristomelidas the ruler at Orchomenus in Arcadia, being enamoured of a maiden of Tegea, got her somehow or other into his power, and committed the charge of her to one Chronius. And she before being conducted to the tyrant slew herself in modesty and fear. And Artemis stirred up Chronius in a dream against Aristomelidas, and he slew him and fled to Tegea and built there a temple to Artemis.
[8.48] In the market-place, which is in shape very like a brick, is a temple of Aphrodite called the Brick Aphrodite, and a stone statue of the goddess. And there are two pillars, on one of which are effigies of Antiphanes and Crisus and Tyronidas and Pyrrhias, who are held in honour to this day as legislators for Tegea, and on the other pillar Iasius, with his left hand on a horse and in his right hand a branch of palm. He won they say the horserace at Olympia, when Hercules the Theban established the Olympian games. Why a crown of wild olive was given to the victor at Olympia I have shown in my account of Elis, and why of laurel at Delphi I shall show hereafter. And at the Isthmian games pine, at the Nemean games parsley, were wont to be the prize, as we know from the cases of Palæmon and Archemorus. But most games have a crown of palm as the prize, and everywhere the palm is put into the right hand of the victor. The beginning of this custom was as follows. When Theseus was returning from Crete he instituted games they say to Apollo at Delos, and himself crowned the victors with palm. This was they say the origin of the custom, and Homer has mentioned the palm in Delos in that part of the Odyssey where Odysseus makes his supplication to the daughter of Alcinous.⁴⁵
[8.48] There is also a statue of Ares called Gynæcothœnas in the market-place at Tegea, graven on a pillar. For in the Laconian war, at the first invasion of Charillus the king of the Lacedæmonians, the women took up arms, and lay in ambush under the hill called in our day Phylactris. And when the armies engaged, and the men on both sides exhibited splendid bravery, then they say the women appeared on the scene, and caused the rout of the Lacedæmonians, and Marpessa, called the Widow, excelled all the other women in daring, and among other Spartans Charillus was taken prisoner, and was released without ransom, upon swearing to the people of Tegea that he would never again lead a Lacedæmonian army to Tegea, which oath he afterwards violated. And the women privately sacrificed to Ares independently of the men for the victory, and gave no share of the flesh of the victim to the men. That is why Ares was called Gynæcothœnas (i.e. Women’s Feast). There is also an altar and square statue of Adult Zeus. Square statues the Arcadians seem greatly to delight in. There are also here the tombs of Tegeates the son of Lycaon, and Mæra the wife of Tegeates, who they say was the daughter of Atlas, and is mentioned by Homer⁴⁶ in Odysseus’ account to Alcinous of his journey to Hades and the souls he saw there. And in the market-place at Tegea there is a temple of Ilithyia, and a statue called Auge on her knees, and the tradition is that Aleus ordered Nauplius to take his daughter Auge and drown her in the sea, and as she was being led there she fell on her knees, and gave birth to a son on the spot where is now the temple of Ilithyia. This tradition differs from another one, which states that Auge gave birth to Telephus unbeknown to her father, and that he was exposed on Mount Parthenium and suckled by a doe, though this last part of the tradition is also recorded by the people of Tegea. And near the temple of Ilithyia is an altar to Earth, and close to the altar is a pillar in white stone, on which is a statue of Polybius the son of Lycortas, and on another pillar is Elatus one of the sons of Arcas.
[8.49] And not far from the market-place is a theatre, and near it are the bases of some brazen statues, the statues themselves are no longer there. And an elegiac couplet on one of the bases says that that was the statue of Philopœmen. This Philopœmen the Greeks hold in the highest honour, both for his sagacity and exploits. As to the lustre of his race his father Craugis was second to none of the Arcadians of Megalopolis, but he dying when Philopœmen was quite a boy his guardian was Cleander an exile from Mantinea, who had come to live at Megalopolis after the troubles in his native place, and had been on a footing of old friendship with the family of Craugis. And Philopœmen had they say among other tutors Megalophanes and Ecdelus: the sons of Arcesilaus were pupils they say of Pitanæus. In size and strength he was inferior to none of the Peloponnesians, but he was far from good-looking. He didn’t care about contending in the games, but he cultivated his own piece of ground, and was fond of hunting wild beasts. He read also they say frequently the works of the most famous Greek sophists, and books on the art of war, especially such as touched on strategy. He wished in all things to make Epaminondas his model in his frame of mind and exploits, but was not able in all points to come up to this. For Epaminondas was especially mild and had his temper completely under control, whereas Philopœmen was hot-tempered. But when Cleomenes captured Megalopolis, Philopœmen was not dismayed at this unexpected misfortune, but conveyed off safely two-thirds of the adults and all the women and children to Messene, as the Messenians were at that time their allies and well-disposed to them. And when Cleomenes sent a message to these exiles that he was sorry for what he had done, and that the people of Megalopolis might return if they signed a treaty, Philopœmen persuaded all the citizens to return only with arms in their hands, and not upon any conditions or treaty. And in the battle which took place at Sellasia against Cleomenes and the Lacedæmonians, in which the Achæans and Arcadians from all the cities took part, and also Antigonus with an army from Macedonia, Philopœmen took his place with the cavalry at first, but when he saw that the issue of the battle turned on the behaviour of the infantry he willingly became a footsoldier, and, as he was displaying valour worthy of record, one of the enemy pierced through both his thighs, and being so impeded he dropt on his knees and was constrained to fall forwards, so that by the motion of his feet the spear snapped off. And when Cleomenes and the Lacedæmonians were defeated, and Philopœmen returned to the camp, then the doctors cut out of his thighs the spearpoint and the spear itself. And Antigonus, hearing and seeing his courage, was anxious to invite him over to Macedonia. But he paid little heed to Antigonus, and crossed over by ship to Crete, where a civil war was raging, and became a captain of mercenaries. And on his return to Megalopolis he was at once chosen by the Achæans commander of their cavalry, and he made them the best cavalry in Greece. And when the Achæans and all their allies fought at the river Larisus against the men of Elis and the Ætolian force that aided the people of Elis from kinsmanship, Philopœmen first slew with his own hands Demophantus the commander of the enemy’s cavalry, and then put to flight all the cavalry of the Ætolians and men of Elis.
[8.50] And as the Achæans left everything to him and made him everybody, he changed the arms of the infantry, for, whereas before they bore short spears and oblong shields like those in use among the Celts and Persians (called thyrei and gerrha), he persuaded them to wear breastplates and greaves, and also to use the shields in use in Argolis and long spears. And when Machanidas rose to power in Lacedæmon, and war again broke out between the Achæans and the Lacedæmonians under him, Philopœmen was commander in chief of the Achæan force, and in the battle of Mantinea the light-armed Lacedæmonians beat the light-armed troops of the Achæans, and Machanidas pressed upon them in their flight, but Philopœmen forming his infantry into a square routed the Lacedæmonian hoplites, and fell in with Machanidas as he was returning from the pursuit and slew him. Thus the Lacedæmonians, though they lost the battle, were more fortunate from their reverse than one would have anticipated, for they were freed from their tyrant. And not long after, when the Argives were celebrating the Nemean games, Philopœmen happened to be present at the contest of the harpers: and Pylades a native of Megalopolis (one of the most noted harpers of the day who had carried off the victory at the Pythian games), at that moment striking up the tune of the Milesian Timotheus called Persæ, and commencing at the words
“Winning for Hellas the noble grace of freedom,”
all the Greeks gazed earnestly on Philopœmen, and signified by clapping that they referred to him the words of the Ode. A similar tribute of respect was I understand paid to Themistocles at Olympia, where the whole theatre rose up on his entrance. Philip indeed, the son of Demetrius, the king of the Macedonians, who also poisoned Aratus of Sicyon, sent men to Megalopolis with orders to kill Philopœmen, and though unsuccessful in this he was execrated by all Greece. And the Thebans who had beaten the Megarians in battle, and had already got inside the walls at Megara, through treachery on the part of the Megarians, were so alarmed at the arrival of Philopœmen to the rescue, that they went home again without effecting their object. And again there rose up at Lacedæmon a tyrant called Nabis, who attacked the Messenians first of the Peloponnesians, and as he made his attack by night, when they had no expectation of it, he took all Messene but the citadel, but upon Philopœmen’s coming up the next day with an army he departed from it on conditions of war.
[8.50] And Philopœmen, when the time of his command expired, and other Achæans were chosen as commanders, went a second time to Crete and helped the Gortynians who were pressed hard in war. But as the Arcadians were vexed with him for going abroad he returned from Crete, and found the Romans at war with Nabis. And as the Romans had equipped a fleet against Nabis, Philopœmen in his zeal wished to take part in the contest, but being altogether without experience of the sea, he unwittingly embarked on an unseaworthy trireme, so that the Romans and their allies remembered the lines of Homer, in his Catalogue of the ships, about the ignorance of the Arcadians in maritime affairs.⁴⁷ And not many days after this naval engagement Philopœmen and his regiment, taking advantage of a dark night, set the camp of the Lacedæmonians at Gythium on fire. Thereupon Nabis intercepted Philopœmen and all the Arcadians with him on difficult ground, they were very brave but there were very few of them. But Philopœmen changed the position of his troops, so that the advantage of the ground rested with him and not with the enemy, and, defeating Nabis and slaying many of the Lacedæmonians in this night attack, raised his fame still higher among the Greeks. And after this Nabis obtained from the Romans a truce for a certain definite period, but before the time expired he was assassinated by a man from Calydon, who had come ostensibly to negotiate an alliance, but was really hostile, and had been suborned by the Ætolians for this very purpose.
[8.51] And Philopœmen about this time made an incursion into Sparta, and compelled the Lacedæmonians to join the Achæan League. And not very long after Titus Flaminius, the commander in chief of the Romans in Greece, and Diophanes the son of Diæus of Megalopolis, who had been chosen at this time general of the Achæans, marched against Lacedæmon, alleging that the Lacedæmonians were plotting against the Romans: but Philopœmen, although at present he was only a private individual, shut the gates as they were coming in. And the Lacedæmonians, in return for this service and for his success against both their tyrants, offered him the house of Nabis, which was worth more than 100 talents; but he had a soul above money, and bade the Lacedæmonians conciliate by their gifts instead of him those who had persuasive powers with the people in the Achæan League. In these words he referred they say to Timolaus. And he was chosen a second time general of the Achæans. And as the Lacedæmonians at that time were on the eve of a civil war, he exiled from the Peloponnese about 300 of the ringleaders, and sold for slaves about 3000 of the Helots, and demolished the walls of Sparta, and ordered the lads no longer to train according to the regulations of Lycurgus but in the Achæan fashion. But the Romans afterwards restored to them their national training. And when Antiochus (the descendant of Seleucus Nicator) and the army of Syrians with him were defeated by Manius and the Romans at Thermopylæ, and Aristænus of Megalopolis urged the Achæans to do all that was pleasing to the Romans and not to resist them at all, Philopœmen looked angrily at him, and told him that he was hastening the fate of Greece. And when Manius was willing to receive the Lacedæmonian fugitives, he resisted this proposal before the Council. But on Manius’ departure, he permitted the fugitives to return to Sparta.
[8.51] But vengeance was about to fall on Philopœmen for his haughtiness. For when he was appointed general of the Achæans for the 8th time, he twitted a man not without some renown for having allowed the enemy to capture him alive: and not long after, as there was a dispute between the Messenians and Achæans, he sent Lycortas with an army to ravage Messenia: and himself the third day afterwards, though he was suffering from a fever and was more than 70, hurried on to share in the action of Lycortas, at the head of about 60 cavalry and targeteers. And Lycortas and his army returned home without having done or received any great harm. But Philopœmen, who had been wounded in the head in the action and had fallen off his horse, was taken alive to Messene. And in a meeting which the Messenians immediately held there were many different opinions as to what they should do with him. Dinocrates and the wealthy Messenians were urgent to put him to death: but the popular party were most anxious to save him alive, calling him even the father of all Greece. But Dinocrates in spite of the popular party took Philopœmen off by poison. And Lycortas not long after collected a force from Arcadia and from Achaia and marched against Messene, and the popular party in Messene at once fraternized with them, and all except Dinocrates who were privy to the murder of Philopœmen were put to death. And he committed suicide. And the Arcadians brought the remains of Philopœmen to Megalopolis.
[8.52] And now Greece ceased to produce a stock of distinguished men. Miltiades the son of Cimon, who defeated the barbarians that landed at Marathon, and checked the Persian host, was the first public benefactor of Greece, and Philopœmen the son of Craugis the last. For those who before Miltiades had displayed conspicuous valour, (as Codrus the son of Melanthus, and the Spartan Polydorus, and the Messenian Aristomenes), had all clearly fought for their own nation and not for all Greece. And after Miltiades Leonidas (the son of Anaxandrides) and Themistocles (the son of Neocles) expelled Xerxes from Greece, the latter by his two sea-fights, the former by the action at Thermopylæ. And Aristides the son of Lysimachus, and Pausanias the son of Cleombrotus, who commanded at Platæa, were prevented from being called benefactors of Greece, the latter by his subsequent crimes, the former by his laying tribute on the Greek islanders, for before Aristides all the Greek dominions were exempt from taxation. And Xanthippus the son of Ariphron, in conjunction with Leotychides king of Sparta, destroyed the Persian fleet off Mycale, and Cimon did many deeds to excite the emulation of the Greeks. As for those who won the greatest renown in the Peloponnesian war, one might say that they with their own hands almost ruined Greece. And when Greece was already in pitiful plight, Conon the son of Timotheus and Epaminondas the son of Polymnis recovered it somewhat, the former in the islands and maritime parts, the latter by ejecting the Lacedæmonian garrisons and governors inland, and by putting down the decemvirates. Epaminondas also made Greece more considerable by the addition of the well-known towns of Messene and the Arcadian Megalopolis. I consider also Leosthenes and Aratus the benefactors of all Greece, for Leosthenes against the wishes of Alexander brought back safe to Greece in ships 50,000 Greeks who had served under the pay of Persia: as for Aratus I have already touched upon him in my account of Sicyon.
[8.52] And the following is the inscription on Philopœmen at Tegea. “Spread all over Greece is the fame and glory of the Arcadian warrior Philopœmen, as wise in the council-chamber as brave in the field, who attained such eminence in war as cavalry leader. Two trophies won he over two Spartan tyrants, and when slavery was growing he abolished it. And therefore Tegea has erected this statue to the high souled son of Craugis, the blameless winner of his country’s freedom.” That is the inscription at Tegea.
[8.53] And the statues erected to Apollo Aguieus by the people of Tegea were dedicated they say for the following reason. Apollo and Artemis punished they say in every place all persons who, when Leto was pregnant and wandering about Arcadia, neglected and took no account of her. And when Apollo and Artemis came into the district of Tegea, then they say Scephrus, the son of Tegeates, went up to Apollo and had a private conversation with him. And Limon his brother, thinking Scephrus was making some charge against him, ran at his brother and slew him. But swift vengeance came upon Limon, for Artemis at once transfixed him with an arrow. And Tegeates and Mera forthwith sacrificed to Apollo and Artemis, and afterwards when a mighty famine came upon the land the oracle at Delphi told them to mourn for Scephrus. Accordingly they pay honours to him at the festival of Apollo Aguieus, and the priestess of Artemis pursues some one, pretending that she is Artemis pursuing Limon. And the remaining sons of Tegeates, Cydon and Archedius and Gortys, migrated they say of their own accord to Crete, and gave their names to the towns Cydonia and Gortys and Catreus. But the Cretans do not accept the tradition of the people of Tegea, they say that Cydon was the son of Acacallis the daughter of Minos and Hermes, and that Catreus was the son of Minos, and Gortys the son of Rhadamanthus. About Rhadamanthus Homer says, in the conversation between Proteus and Menelaus, that Menelaus went to the Elysian fields, and before him Rhadamanthus: and Cinæthon in his verses represents Rhadamanthus as the son of Hephæstus, and Hephæstus as the son of Talos, and Talos as the son of Cres. The traditions of the Greeks are mostly different and especially in genealogies. And the people of Tegea have 4 statues of Apollo Aguieus, one erected by each tribe. And the names of the tribes are Clareotis, Hippothœtis, Apolloniatis, and Atheneatis, the two former so called from the lots which Arcas made his sons cast for the land, and from Hippothous the son of Cercyon.
[8.53] There is also at Tegea a temple to Demeter and Proserpine, the goddesses whom they call Fruit-giving, and one near to Paphian Aphrodite, which was erected by Laodice, who was, as I have stated before, a daughter of that Agapenor who led the Arcadians to Troy, and dwelt at Paphos. And not far from it are two temples to Dionysus, and an altar to Proserpine, and a temple and gilt statue of Apollo, the statue by Chirisophus, a Cretan by race, whose age and master we do not know. But the stay of Dædalus at Minos’ court in Crete, and the statues which he made, has brought much greater fame to Crete. And near Apollo is a stone statue of Chirisophus himself.
[8.53] And the people of Tegea have an altar which they call common to all Arcadians, where there is a statue of Hercules. He is represented as wounded in the thigh with the wound he received in the first fight which he had with the sons of Hippocoon. And the lofty place dedicated to Zeus Clarius, where most of the altars at Tegea are, is no doubt so called from the lots which the sons of Arcas cast. And the people of Tegea have an annual festival there, and they say the Lacedæmonians once invaded their territory at the time of the festival, and the god sent snow, and they were cold, and weary from the weight of their armour, and the people of Tegea unbeknown to the enemy lit a fire, (and so they were not incommoded with the cold), and put on their armour, and went out against them, and overcame them in the action. I have also seen at Tegea the following sights, the house of Aleus, and the tomb of Echemus, and a representation on a pillar of the fight between Echemus and Hyllus.
[8.53] As you go from Tegea towards Laconia, there is an altar of Pan on the left of the road, and another of Lycæan Zeus, and there are ruins of temples. Their altars are about 2 stades from the walls, and about seven stades further is a temple of Artemis called Limnatis, and a statue of the goddess in ebony. The workmanship is called Æginetan by the Greeks. And about 10 stades further are ruins of the temple of Artemis Cnaceatis.
[8.54] The boundary between the districts of the Lacedæmonians and Tegea is the river Alpheus, which rises at Phylace, and not far from its source another river flows into it formed from several unimportant streams, and that is why the place is called the Meeting of the Waters. And the Alpheus seems in the following particular to be contrary in its nature to all other rivers, it is frequently lost in the ground and comes up again. For starting from Phylace and the Meeting of the Waters it is lost in the plain of Tegea, and reappears again at Asea, and after mixing its stream with the Eurotas is a second time lost in the ground: and emerging again at what the Arcadians call the Wells, and flowing by the districts of Pisa and Olympia, it falls into the sea beyond Cyllene, the arsenal of the people of Elis. Nor can the Adriatic, though a big and stormy sea, bar its onward passage, for it reappears at Ortygia in Syracuse, and mixes its waters with the Arethusa.
[8.54] The straight road, leading to Thyrea and the villages in the Thyreatic district, is memorable for containing the tomb of Orestes the son of Agamemnon, the people of Tegea say that a Spartan removed his remains from thence, but in our day there is no tomb within the walls. The river Garates also flows by the road, when you have crossed it and gone on ten stades you come to a temple of Pan, and near it an oak also sacred to Pan.
[8.54] The road from Tegea to Argos is very well adapted for carriages and is in fact quite a high road. The first thing you come to on it is a temple and statue of Æsculapius, and after turning to the left for about a stade you come to a temple of Pythian Apollo quite fallen to decay and in ruins. And on the high road are many oaks and a temple of Demeter, called Demeter of Corythes, in a grove of oaks, and near it is a temple to Mystic Dionysus. And next comes Mount Parthenium, on which is shown an enclosure sacred to Telephus, where they say he was exposed as a boy and brought up by a doe. And at a little distance is the temple of Pan, where both the Athenians and people of Tegea say that Pan appeared to Philippides and had an interview with him. Mount Parthenium also has tortoises admirably adapted for making lyres of, which the men who live on the mountain fear to take and will not allow strangers to take, for they consider them sacred to Pan. When you have crossed over the mountain top you come in what is now arable land to the boundary between the districts of Tegea and Argos, viz. Hysiæ in Argolis.
[8.54] These are the divisions of the Peloponnese, and the towns in the divisions, and the most notable things in each town.

## Notes

[1] Ægialus (αἰγιαλός) is Greek for sea-shore. In this last view compare the names Pomerania, Glamorganshire.
[2] Iliad, ii. 575.
[3] See Book ix. ch. 33.
[4] The Greek for snow is chion. Hence the paronomasia.
[5] See Book v. ch. 23.
[6] Meaning Roman I take it.
[7] Which were at Corinth, as we see in this chapter a little later.
[8] That is, wherever Mummius found a democratical form of government, there he established an oligarchy. Cf. Plat. Rep. 550. C. Id. Legg. 698. B.
[9] See Plato Rep. vi. 491. E.
[10] Iliad, xxi. 446-448.
[11] Iliad, xxiii. 584, 5.
[12] See the wonderful account of Pliny. Nat. Hist. xii. 1.
[13] Hom. Iliad, ii. 575; viii. 203; xx. 404.
[14] A euphemism for the Eumenides.
[15] Iliad, viii. 203.
[16] Iliad, ii. 573.
[17] To Gonoessa, the reading to be found in modern texts of Homer.
[18] Iliad, ii. 612.
[19] e.g., as used to the Roman Emperors, divus.
[20] Iliad, ii. 605.
[21] Odyssey, v. 272, 273.
[22] e.g. Odyssey, xiii. 104.
[23] See Herod. vi. 86. Hesiod, 285.
[24] Iliad, ii. 721-723.
[25] Iliad, xii. 200-208.
[26] Iliad, ii. 604.
[27] Iliad, xviii. 590-592.
[28] Iliad, xv. 36, 37.
[29] Iliad, ii. 748-751.
[30] Probably on the pretext that he meant to shear his hair to the Alpheus. See i. 37; viii. 41.
[31] Iliad, xxiv. 527-533.
[32] Iliad, xxiii. 346, 7.
[33] See Herodotus vii. 188, 189.
[34] See Book vii. ch. 7.
[35] Odyssey, x. 119, 120.
[36] Odyssey, vii. 205, 206.
[37] Id. vii. 59, 60.
[38] See ch. 27.
[39] Iliad, xiv. 277-279.
[40] e.g. Odyssey, x. 491, 494, 509.
[41] Iliad, xxi. 194-197.
[42] Iliad, xxiv. 615-617.
[43] Iliad, i. 314.
[44] Iliad, xviii. 398, 399, 405.
[45] Odyssey, vi. 162 sq.
[46] Odyssey, xi. 326.
[47] Iliad, ii. 614.