BOOK I — Attica (Part 2)

And as you go to Eleusis from Athens, by the way which the Athenians call the Sacred Way, is the tomb of Anthemocritus, to whom the Megarians acted most unscrupulously, inasmuch as they killed him though he came as a herald, to announce to them that henceforth they were not to cultivate the sacred land. And for this act of theirs the wrath of the two goddesses still abides, since they are the only Greeks that the Emperor Adrian was not able to aggrandise. And next to the column of Anthemocritus is the tomb of Molottus, who was chosen as General of the Athenians when they crossed over into Eubœa to the aid of Plutarch. And near this is a village called Scirus for the following reason. When the people of Eleusis were at war with Erechtheus, a prophet came from Dodona Scirus by name, who also built at Phalerum the old temple of Sciradian Athene. And as he fell in battle the Eleusinians buried him near a mountain torrent, and both the village and torrent get their name from the hero. And near is the tomb of Cephisodorus, who was the leader of the people, and especially opposed Philip the son of Demetrius, the king of the Macedonians. And Cephisodorus got as allies for the Athenians the Mysian king Attalus, and the Egyptian king Ptolemy, and independent nations as the Ætolians, and islanders as the Rhodians and Cretans. And as the succours from Egypt and Mysia and Crete came for the most part too late, and as the Rhodians (fighting by sea only) could do little harm to heavy-armed soldiers like the Macedonians, Cephisodorus sailed for Italy with some of the Athenians, and begged the Romans to aid them. And they sent them a force and a general, who so reduced Philip and the Macedonians that eventually Perseus, the son of Philip, lost his kingdom, and was carried to Italy as a captive. This Philip was the son of Demetrius: who was the first of the family who was king of Macedonia, after slaying Alexander the son of Cassander, as I have before related.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

And next to the tomb of Cephisodorus are buried Heliodorus the Aliensian, (you may see a painting of him in the large temple of Athene): and Themistocles the son of Poliarchus, the great grandson of the Themistocles that fought the great sea-fight against Xerxes and the Medes. All his other descendants except Acestius I shall pass by. But she the daughter of Xenocles, the son of Sophocles, the son of Leo, had the good fortune to have all her ancestors torchbearers even up to her great grandfather Leo, and in her life she saw first her brother Sophocles a torchbearer, and after him her husband Themistocles, and after his death her son Theophrastus. Such was the good fortune she is said to have had.

And as you go a little further is the grove of the hero Lacius, who gives his name to a township. There too is the tomb of Nicocles of Tarentum, who won the greatest fame of all harpers. There is also an altar to Zephyrus, and a temple of Demeter and Proserpine: Athene and Poseidon have joint honours with them. Here they say Phytalus received Demeter into his house, and the goddess gave him in return a fig tree. My account is confirmed by the inscription on Phytalus’ tomb.

“Here Phytalus king-hero once received Holy Demeter, when she first vouchsafed The fruit that mortals call the fig: since when The race of Phytalus has deathless fame.”

And before crossing over the river Cephisus, is the tomb of Theodorus, one of the best tragic actors of his day. And there are two statues near the river, Mnesimaches, and his son cutting off his hair as a votive offering to the Cephisus. That it was an ancient custom for all the Greeks to cut off locks of their hair to rivers one would infer from the verses of Homer, who describes Peleus as vowing to cut off his hair to the river Spercheus if his son Achilles returned safe from Troy.

On the other side of the Cephisus is an ancient altar to Milichian (_i.e._ _mild_) Zeus, where Theseus got purified after slaying the progeny of Phytalus. He had slain other robbers, and Sinis, who was his relation by Pittheus his maternal grandfather. And there are the tombs here of Theodectes the son of Phaselites, and of Mnesitheus. This last they say was a noted doctor, and dedicated several statues, and among them one of Iacchus. And by the roadside is a small temple called the temple of Cyamites (_Bean-man_): but I have no certain information, whether he first sowed beans, or whether they gave the name to some hero, because it was not lawful to ascribe the invention of beans to Demeter. And whoever has seen the Eleusinian mysteries, or has read the Orphic poems, knows what I mean. And of the tombs that are finest for size and beauty are two especially, one of a Rhodian who had migrated to Athens, the other of Pythionice, made by Harpalus a Macedonian, who had fled from Alexander and sailed to Europe from Asia, and coming to Athens was arrested by the Athenians, but escaped by bribing the friends of Alexander and others, and before this had married Pythionice, whose extraction I don’t know, but she was a courtesan both at Athens and Corinth. He was so enamoured of her that, when she died, he raised this monument to her, the finest of all the ancient works of art in Greece.

And there is a temple in which are statues of Demeter and Proserpine and Athene and Apollo: but originally the temple was built to Apollo alone. For they say that Cephalus the son of Deioneus went with Amphitryon to the Teleboæ, and was the first dweller in the island which is now called from him Cephallenia: and that he fled from Athens, and lived for some time at Thebes, because he had murdered his wife Procris. And in the tenth generation afterwards Chalcinus and Dætus his descendants sailed to Delphi, and begged of the god permission to return to Athens: and he ordered them first to sacrifice to Apollo on the spot where they should see a trireme on land moving. And when they got to the mountain called Pœcilus a dragon appeared eagerly running into its hole: and here they sacrificed to Apollo, and afterwards on their arrival at Athens the Athenians made them citizens. Next to this is a temple of Aphrodite, and before it a handsome wall of white stone.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

Now the channels called Rheti are like rivers only in their flow, for their water is sea water. And one might suppose that they flow from the Euripus near Chalcis underground, falling into a sea with a lower level. These Rheti are said to be sacred to Proserpine and Demeter, and their priests only may catch the fish in them. And they were, as I hear, in old times the boundaries between the territory of the Eleusinians and Athenians. And the first inhabitant on the other side of the Rheti was Crocon, and that district is called to this day the kingdom of Crocon. This Crocon the Athenians say married Sæsara the daughter of Celeus. This at least is the tradition of the occupants of the township of Scambonidæ. Crocon’s tomb indeed I could not find, but Eumolpus’ tomb the Athenians and Eubœans both show. This Eumolpus they say came from Thrace, and was the son of Poseidon and Chione: and Chione was they say the daughter of Boreas and Orithyia. Homer has not indeed given us his pedigree, but he calls him in his poem a noble man. And in the battle between the people of Eleusis and the Athenians Erechtheus the king of Athens was slain, and also Immaradus the son of Eumolpus: and peace was concluded on these conditions, that the people of Eleusis should be in all other respects Athenians, but should have the private management of their Mysteries. And the rites of the two goddesses, Demeter and Proserpine, were performed by the daughters of Celeus. Pamphus and Homer alike call them by the names Diogenea, and Pammerope, and Sæsara. But on the death of Eumolpus Ceryx the youngest son was the only one left, who (the heralds say) was not the son of Eumolpus at all, but the son of Hermes by Aglaurus the daughter of Cecrops.

There is also a hero-chapel to Hippothoon, from whom a tribe gets its name, and near it one to Zarex, who is said to have learnt music of Apollo. But my own idea is that Zarex was a stranger, a Lacedæmonian who had come into Attica, and that the city Zarex in Laconia by the sea was called after him. But if the hero Zarex was a native of Attica, I know nothing about him. And the river Cephisus flows near the Eleusinian territory with greater speed than before: and here is a place called Erineus, where Pluto they say descended, when he carried off Proserpine. On the banks of this river Theseus slew the robber Polypemon, who was surnamed Procrustes. And the Eleusinians have a temple to Triptolemus, and to Propylæan Artemis, and to Father Poseidon, and a well called Callichorus, where the Eleusinian women first danced and sang songs to the goddess. And the Rharian plain was the first sown and the first that produced crops according to tradition, and this is the reason why it is the custom to use barley from it to make cakes for the sacrifices. Here is shown Triptolemus’ threshing-floor and altar. But what is inside the sacred wall I am forbidden by a dream to divulge, for those who are uninitiated, as they are forbidden sight of them, so also clearly may not hear of the mysteries. And the hero Eleusis, from whom the city gets its name, was according to some the son of Hermes and Daira the daughter of Oceanus, others make him the son of Ogygus. For the ancients, when they had no data for their pedigrees, invented fictitious ones, and especially in the pedigrees of heroes.

And as you turn from Eleusis to Bœotia the boundary of Attica is the Platæan district. That was the old boundary between the Athenians and the people of Eleutheræ. But when the people of Eleutheræ became Athenians then Mount Cithæron in Bœotia became the boundary. And the people of Eleutheræ became Athenians not by compulsion, but from hatred to the Thebans and a liking for the Athenian form of government. In this plain too is a temple of Dionysus, and a statue of the god was removed thence to Athens long ago: the one at Eleutheræ now is an imitation of it. And at some distance is a small grotto, and near it a spring of cold water. And it is said that Antiope gave birth to twins and left them in this grotto, and a shepherd finding them near the spring gave them their first bath in it, having stript them of their swaddling clothes. And there was still in my day remains of a wall and buildings at Eleutheræ. This makes it clear that it was a town built a little above the plain towards Mount Cithæron.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

And another road leads from Eleusis to Megara: as you go along this road is a well called the Well of Flowers. Pamphus records that it was at this well that Demeter sat in the guise of an old woman after the rape of Proserpine: and that she was taken thence as an old woman of the country by the daughters of Celeus to their mother, and that Metanira entrusted her with the education of her son. And not far from the well is the temple of Metanira, and next to it the tombs of those that fell at Thebes. For Creon, who was at that time the ruler at Thebes (being Regent for Laodamas the son of Eteocles), would not allow their relations to bury the dead: and Adrastus having supplicated Theseus, and a battle having been fought between the Athenians and Bœotians, when Theseus was the victor, he conveyed the dead bodies to Eleusis and there buried them. But the Thebans say that they surrendered the dead bodies of their own free will, and did not fight on this question. And next to the tombs of the Argives is the monument of Alope, who they say was the mother of Hippothoon by Poseidon, and was in consequence put to death by her father Cercyon. Now this Cercyon is said in other respects to have been harsh to strangers, and especially to those who would not contend with him in wrestling: and this place was called even in my day Cercyon’s wrestling ground, at a little distance from the tomb of Alope. And Cercyon is said to have killed all that wrestled with him but Theseus. But Theseus wrestled against him cunningly throw for throw and beat him: for he was the first who elevated wrestling into a science, and afterwards established training schools for wrestling: for before the time of Theseus only size and strength were made use of in wrestling.

Such in my opinion are the most noteworthy among Athenian traditions or sights. And in my account I have selected out of a mass of material that only which was important enough to be considered history.

Next to Eleusis is the district called Megaris: it too belonged originally to the Athenians, having been bequeathed to Pandion by (its) king Pylas. Proofs of what I assert are the tomb of Pandion in that district, and the fact that Nisus, though he conceded the kingdom of Attica to Ægeus the head of the family, yet himself was selected to be king of Megara and the whole district up to Corinth: and even now the Megarians have a dockyard called Nisæa after him. And afterwards, when Codrus was king, the Peloponnesians marched against Athens: and not having any brilliant success there they went home again, but took Megara from the Athenians, and gave it to the Corinthians and others of their allies that wished to dwell in it. Thus the Megarians changed their customs and dialect and became Dorians. And they say the city got its name in the days of Car, the son of Phoroneus, who was king in this district: in his day they say first temples were built to Demeter among them, and the inhabitants called them Halls. This is at any rate the tradition of the Megarians. But the Bœotians say that Megareus the son of Poseidon lived at Onchestus, and went with an army of Bœotians to aid Nisus in his war against Minos, and that he fell in the battle, and got buried there, and the city which had been formerly called Nisa, got its name Megara from him. And years afterwards, in the 12th generation from Car, the son of Phoroneus, the Megarians say Lelex came from Egypt and became king, and during his reign the Megarians were called Leleges. And he had a son Cleson, and a grandson Pylas, and a great-grandson Sciron, who married the daughter of Pandion, and afterwards, (Sciron having a controversy with Nisus the son of Pandion about the sovereignty), Æacus was arbitrator, and gave his decision that the kingdom was to belong to Nisus and his descendants, but the command of the army was to devolve upon Sciron. And Megareus the son of Poseidon, having married Iphinoe the daughter of Nisus, succeeded Nisus they say in the kingdom. But of the Cretan war, and the capture of the city in the days of King Nisus, they pretend to know nothing.

CHAPTER XL.

There is in the city a conduit erected by Theagenes, of whom I mentioned before that he married his daughter to Cylon an Athenian. This Theagenes when he was king erected this conduit, well worth seeing for its size and beauty and the number of its pillars. And the water that flows into is called after the Sithnidian Nymphs, who, according to the Megarian tradition, are natives, and one of them bare a son to Zeus, whose name was Megarus, and who escaped Deucalion’s flood by getting to the top of Mount Gerania (_Cranemountain_), which was not the original name of the mountain, but was so called because he followed in his swimming the flight of some cranes by their cry. And not far from this conduit is an ancient temple, and there are some statues in it of Roman Emperors, and an image of Artemis in brass by the name of Saviour. The story goes that some men in the army of Mardonius who had overrun Megaris wished to return to Thebes to join Mardonius, but by the contrivance of Artemis wandered about all night, and lost their way, and got into the mountainous part of the country, and, endeavouring to ascertain if the enemy’s army was about, shot some arrows, and the rock shot at returned a groan, and they shot again and again furiously. And at last their arrows were expended in shooting at their supposed foes. And when day dawned, and the Megarians really did attack them, (well armed against men badly armed and now _minus_ ammunition), they slew most of them. And this is why they put up an image to Artemis the Saviour. Here too are images of the so-called 12 gods, the production of Praxiteles. He also made an Artemis of the Strongylii. And next, as you enter the sacred enclosure of Zeus called the Olympieum, there is a temple well worth seeing: the statue of Zeus is not finished in consequence of the war between the Peloponnesians and the Athenians, in which the Athenians every year by land and by sea injured the Megarians both publicly and privately, ravaging their territory, and bringing them individually to the greatest poverty. And the head of this statue of Zeus is of ivory and gold, but the other parts are of clay and earthenware: and they say it was made by Theocosmus a native, assisted by Phidias. And above the head of Zeus are the Seasons and the Fates: it is plain to all that Fate is his servant, and that he orders the Seasons as is meet. In the back part of the temple there are some wooden figures only half finished: Theocosmus intended to finish them when he had adorned the statue of Zeus with ivory and gold. And in the temple there is the brazen ram of a trireme, which was they say taken at Salamis, in the sea fight against the Athenians. The Athenians do not deny that there was for some time a defection on the part of Salamis to the Megarians, but Solon they say by his elegiac verses stirred the Athenians up, and they fought for it, and eventually retook it. But the Megarians say that some of their exiles, called Doryclei, mixed themselves among the inhabitants and betrayed Salamis to the Athenians. And next to the enclosure of Zeus, as you ascend the Acropolis still called the Carian from Car the son of Phoroneus, is the temple of Nyctelian Dionysus, and the temple of Aphrodite the Procuress, and the Oracle of Night, and a roofless temple of dusty Zeus. And statues of Æsculapius and Hygiea, both the work of Bryaxis. Here too is the sacred Hall of Demeter: which they say was erected by Car when he was king.

CHAPTER XLI.

As you descend from the Acropolis in a Northerly direction, you come to the sepulchre of Alcmene near the Olympieum. She died they say at Megara on her journey from Argos to Thebes, and the sons of Hercules had a dispute, some wishing to take her dead body to Argos, others to Thebes: for the sons of Hercules by Megara were buried at Thebes, as also Amphitryon’s sons. But Apollo at Delphi gave the oracular response that it would be better for them to bury Alcmena at Megara. From this place the interpreter of national Antiquities took me to a place called Rhun (_Flow_), so called because some water flowed here from the hills above the city, but Theagenes when he was king diverted the water into another direction, and erected here an altar to Achelous. And at no great distance is the monument of Hyllus the son of Hercules, who fought in single combat with the Arcadian Echemus, the son of Aeropus. Who this Echemus was that slew Hyllus I shall shew in another place, but Hyllus is buried at Megara. The expedition to the Peloponnese, when Orestes was king, might rightly be called an expedition of the sons of Hercules. And not far from the monument of Hyllus is the temple of Isis, and near it the temple of Apollo and Artemis. This last they say was built by Alcathous, after he had slain the lion that was called the lion of Mount Cithæron. This lion had they say devoured several Megarians and among them the king’s son Euippus: whose elder brother Timalcus had been killed by Theseus still earlier, when he went with Castor and Pollux to the siege of Aphidna. Megareus therefore promised his daughter in marriage, and the succession to the kingdom, to whoever should kill the lion of Mount Cithæron. So Alcathous (the son of Pelops) attacked the beast and slew him, and, when he became king built this temple, dedicating it to Huntress Artemis and Hunter Apollo. This at any rate is the local tradition. But though I don’t want to contradict the Megarians, I cannot find myself in agreement with them entirely, for though I quite admit that the lion of Mount Cithæron was killed by Alcathous, yet who ever recorded that Timalcus the son of Megareus went to Aphidna with Castor and Pollux? And how (if he had gone there) could he have been thought to have been killed by Theseus, seeing that Alcman in his Ode to Castor and Pollux, recording how they took Athens, and carried away captive the mother of Theseus, yet says that Theseus was away? Pindar also gives a very similar account, and says that Theseus wished to be connected by marriage with Castor and Pollux, till he went away to help Pirithous in his ambitious attempt to wed Proserpine. But whoever drew up the genealogy plainly knew the simplicity of the Megarians, since Theseus was the descendant of Pelops. But indeed the Megarians purposely hide the real state of things, not wishing to own that their city was captured when Nisus was king, and that Megareus who succeeded to the kingdom was the son in law of Nisus, and that Alcathous was the son in law of Megareus. But it is certain that it was not till after the death of Nisus, and a revolution at Megara, that Alcathous came there from Elis. And this is my proof. He built up the wall anew, when the whole of the old wall had been demolished by the Cretans. Let this suffice for Alcathous and the lion, whether he slew the lion on Mount Cithæron or somewhere else, before he erected the temple to Huntress Artemis and Hunter Apollo.

As you descend from this temple is the hero-chapel of Pandion, who, as I have already shewn, was buried at what is called the rock of Athene the Diver. He has also divine honours paid to him at Megara. And near the hero-chapel of Pandion is the monument of Hippolyta. This is the Megarian tradition about her. When the Amazons, on account of Antiope, made an expedition against the Athenians, they were beaten by Theseus, and most of them (it so happened) fell in battle, but Hippolyta (the sister of Antiope), who was at that time leader of the Amazons, fled to Megara with the remnant of them, and there, having been unsuccessful with her army, and dejected at the present state of things, and still more despondent about getting safe home again to Themiscyra, died of grief and was buried. And the device on her tomb is an Amazon’s shield. And not far distant is the tomb of Tereus, who married Procne the daughter of Pandion. Tereus was king (according to the Megarian tradition) of Pagæ in Megaris, but in my opinion (and there are still extant proofs of what I state) he was king of Daulis N.W. of Chæronea: for most of what is now called Hellas was inhabited in old time by barbarians. And his subjects would no longer obey Tereus after his vile conduct to Philomela, and after the murder of Itys by Procne and Philomela. And he committed suicide at Megara, and they forthwith piled up a tomb for him, and offer sacrifices to him annually, using pebbles in the sacrifice instead of barley. And they say the hoopoe was first seen here. And Procne and Philomela went to Athens, and lamenting what they had suffered and done melted away in tears: and the tradition that they were changed into a nightingale and swallow is, I fancy, simply that these birds have a sorrowful and melancholy note.

CHAPTER XLII.

There is also another citadel at Megara that gets its name from Alcathous. As one goes up to it, there is on the right hand a monument of Megareus, who started from Onchestus to aid the Megarians in the Cretan War. There is also shown an altar of the gods called Prodromi: and they say that Alcathous first sacrificed to them when he was commencing to build his wall. And near this altar is a stone, on which they say Apollo put his harp down, while he assisted Alcathous in building the wall. And the following fact proves that the Megarians were numbered among the Athenians: Peribœa the daughter of Alcathous was certainly sent by him to Crete with Theseus in connection with the tribute. And Apollo, as the Megarians say, assisted him in building the wall, and laid his harp down on the stone: and if one chances to hit it with a pebble, it sounds like a harp being played. This inspired great wonder in me, but not so much as the Colossus in Egypt. At Thebes in Egypt, when you cross the Nile, at a place called the Pipes (_Syringes_), there is a seated statue that has a musical sound, most people call it Memnon: for he they say went from Ethiopia to Egypt and even to Susa. But the Thebans say it was a statue not of Memnon, but Phamenophes a Theban, and I have heard people say it was Sesostris. This statue Cambyses cut in two: and now the head to the middle of the body lies on the ground, but the lower part remains in a sitting posture, and every morning at sunrise resounds with melody, and the sound it most resembles is that of a harp or lyre with a chord broken.

And the Megarians have a council chamber, which was once as they say the tomb of Timalcus, who, as I said a little time back, was killed by Theseus. And on the hill where the citadel stands is a temple of Athene, and a brazen statue of the goddess, except the hands and the toes, which as well as the face are of ivory. And there is another temple here of Athene called Victory, and another of her as Aiantis. As regards the latter, all mention of it is passed over by the interpreters of curiosities at Megara, but I will write my own ideas. Telamon the son of Æacus married Peribœa the daughter of Alcathous. I imagine then that Aias, having succeeded to the kingdom of Alcathous, made this statue of Athene Aiantis.

The old temple of Apollo was made of brick: but afterwards the Emperor Adrian built it of white stone. The statues called Apollo Pythius and Apollo Decataphorus are very like Egyptian statues, but the one they call Archegetes is like Æginetan handiwork. And all alike are made of ebony. I heard a Cyprian, a cunning herbalist, say that the ebony has neither leaves nor fruit, and that it is never seen exposed to the sun, but its roots are underground, and the Ethiopians dig them up, and there are men among them who know how to find it. There is also a temple of Law-giving Demeter. And as you go down from thence is the tomb of Callipolis the son of Alcathous. Alcathous had also an elder son called Ischepolis, whom his father sent to assist Meleager in Ætolia against the Calydonian boar. And when he was killed Callipolis heard the news first in this place: and he ran to the citadel, where his father was sacrificing to Apollo, and threw down the wood from the altar. And Alcathous, not having yet heard the news about Ischepolis, was vexed with Callipolis for his irreverence, and in his wrath killed him instantaneously by striking him on the head with one of the pieces of wood he had thrown down from the altar.

On the road to the Prytaneum there is a hero-chapel of Ino, and a cornice of stone round it. Some olive-trees also grow there. The Megarians are the only Greeks that say that the dead body of Ino was cast on the shore of Megaris, and that Cleso and Tauropolis, the daughters of Cleso and granddaughters of Lelex, found it and buried it. And they say that Ino was called by them first Leucothea, and they sacrifice to her every year.

CHAPTER XLIII.

They also lay claim to the possession of a mortuary-chapel of Iphigenia, for she too they say died at Megara. But I have heard a different account of Iphigenia from the Arcadians, and I know that Hesiod in his Catalogue of Women describes Iphigenia as not dying, but being changed into Hecate by the will of Artemis. And Herodotus wrote not dissimilarly to this, that the Tauric people in Scythia after shipwreck sacrifice to a virgin, who is they say Iphigenia the daughter of Agamemnon. Adrastus also has divine honours among the Megarians: he too they say died among them (when he was leading the army back after the capture of Thebes), of old age and sorrow for the death of Ægialeus. And Agamemnon erected an altar to Artemis at Megara, when he went to Calchas, a native of the place, to persuade him to join the expedition to Ilium. And in the Prytaneum they say Euippus the son of Megareus was buried, and also Ischepolis the son of Alcathous. And there is a rock near the Prytaneum called _The Calling Rock_, because Demeter (if there is any truth in the tale), when she wandered about seeking her daughter, called out for her here. And the Megarian women still perform a kind of mimic representation of this. And the Megarians have tombs in the city: one they erected for those who fell fighting against the Medes, the other, called Æsymnian, is a monument to heroes. For when Hyperion, the last king of Megara, the son of Agamemnon, was killed by Sandion on account of his greed and haughtiness, they chose no longer to be under kingly government, but to have chief magistrates annually chosen, so as to be under one another’s authority by turn. Then it was that Æsymnus, second to none of the Megarians in fame and influence, went to Apollo at Delphi, and asked how they were to have prosperity. And the god among other things told them they would fare well if they deliberated on affairs with the majority. Thinking these words had reference to the dead, they built here a council chamber, that the tomb of the heroes might be inside their council chamber. As you go from thence to the hero-chapel of Alcathous, which the Megarians now use as a Record Office, there are two tombs, one they say of Pyrgo, the wife of Alcathous before he married Euæchma the daughter of Megareus, the other of Iphinoe the daughter of Alcathous, who they say died unmarried. At her tomb it is the custom of maidens before marriage to pour libations, and sacrifice some of their long hair, as the maidens of Delos used to do to Hecaerge and Opis. And near the entrance to the temple of Dionysus are the tombs of Astycratea and Manto, the daughters of Polyidus, (the son of Cœranus, the son of Abas, the son of Melampus,) who went to Megara, and purged Alcathous for the murder of his son Callipolis. And Polyidus also built the temple of Dionysus, and erected a statue of the god veiled in my day except the face: that is visible. And a Satyr is near Dionysus, the work of Praxiteles in Parian marble. And this they call Tutelary Dionysus, and another they call Dionysus Dasyllius (_the Vine-ripener_), and this statue they say was erected by Euchenor the son of Cœranus the son of Polyidus. And next to the temple of Dionysus is the shrine of Aphrodite, and a statue of the goddess in ivory, under the title Praxis (_Action_). This is the oldest statue in the shrine. And _Persuasion_ and another goddess whom they call _Consolation_ are by Praxiteles: and by Scopas _Love_ and _Desire_ and _Yearning_, each statue expressing the particular shade of meaning marked by the words. And near the shrine of Aphrodite is the temple of Chance: this too is by Praxiteles. And in the neighbouring temple Lysippus has made the Muses and a brazen Zeus.

The Megarians also have the tomb of Corœbus: the verses about him I shall relate here though they are also Argive intelligence. In the days when Crotopus was king in Argos, his daughter Psamathe they say had a child by Apollo, and being greatly afraid of her father knowing it exposed the child. And some sheep dogs of Crotopus lit upon the child and killed it, and Apollo sent upon the city _Punishment_, a monster who took children away from their mothers (they say), till Corœbus killed it to ingratiate himself with the Argives. And after killing it, as a second plague came on them and vexed them sore, Corœbus of his own accord went to Delphi, and offered to submit to the punishment of the god for killing _Punishment_. The Pythian priestess forbade Corœbus to return to Argos, but told him to carry a tripod from the temple, and wherever the tripod should fall, there he was to build a temple to Apollo and himself dwell. And the tripod slipt out of his hand and fell (without his contrivance) on the mountain Gerania, and there he built the village Tripodisci. And his tomb is in the market-place at Megara: and there are some elegiac verses on it that relate to Psamathe and Corœbus himself, and a representation on the tomb of Corœbus killing Punishment. These statues are the oldest Greek ones in stone that I have myself seen.

CHAPTER XLIV.

Next Corœbus is buried Orsippus, who, though the athletes according to olden custom had girdles round their loins, ran naked at Olympia in the race and won the prize. And they say that he afterwards as general cut off a slice of his neighbours’ territory. But I think at Olympia he dropped his girdle on purpose, knowing that it is easier for a man to run naked than with a girdle on. And as you descend from the market-place by the way called Straight, there is on the right hand a temple of Protecting Apollo: you can find it by turning a little out of the way. And there is in it a statue of Apollo well worth seeing, and an Artemis and Leto, and other statues, and Leto and her sons by Praxiteles. And there is in the ancient gymnasium, near the gates called Nymphades, a stone in shape like a small pyramid. This they call Apollo Carinus, and there is here a temple to Ilithyia also. Such are the notable things the city contains. And as you descend to the dockyard, which is still called Nisæa, is a temple of Demeter the Wool-bearer. Several explanations are given of this title, among them that those who first reared sheep in this country gave her that name. And one would conjecture that the roof had fallen from the temple by the lapse of time. There is here also a citadel called Nisæa. And as you descend from it there is near the sea a monument of Lelex the king, who is said to have come from Egypt, and to have been the son of Poseidon by Libye the daughter of Epaphus. There is an island too near Nisæa of no great size called Minoa. Here the navy of the Cretans was moored in the war with Nisus. And the mountainous part of Megaris is on the borders of Bœotia, and contains two towns, Pagæ and Ægosthena. As you go to Pagæ, if you turn a little off from the regular road, there is shewn the rock which has arrows fixed in it everywhere, into which the Medes once shot in the night. At Pagæ too well worth seeing is a brazen statue of Artemis under the title of _Saviour_, in size and shape like the statues of the goddess at Megara. There is also here a hero-chapel of Ægialeus the son of Adrastus. He, when the Argives marched against Thebes the second time, was killed in the first battle at Glisas, and his relations carried him to Pagæ in Megaris, and buried him there, and the hero-chapel is still called after his name. And at Ægosthena is a temple of Melampus the son of Amythaon, and a man of no great size is carved on a pillar. And they sacrifice to Melampus and have a festival to him every year. But they say that he has no prophetic powers either in dreams or in any other way. And I also heard at Erenea a village of Megaris, that Autonoe the daughter of Cadmus, excessively grieving at the death of Actæon, and the circumstances of it which tradition records, and the general misfortunes of her father’s house, migrated there from Thebes: and her tomb is in that village.

And as you go from Megara to Corinth there are several tombs, and among them that of the Samian flute-player Telephanes. And they say that this tomb was erected by Cleopatra, the daughter of Philip the son of Amyntas. And there is a monument of Car the son of Phoroneus, originally only a mound of earth, but afterwards in consequence of the oracle it was beautified with a shell-like stone. And the Megarians are the only Greeks who possess this peculiar kind of stone, and many things in their city are made of it. It is very white, and softer than other stone, and seashells are everywhere in it. Such is this kind of stone. And the road, called the Scironian road after Sciron, is so called because Sciron, when he was commander in chief of the Megarians, first made it a road for travellers according to tradition. And the Emperor Adrian made it so wide and convenient that two chariots could drive abreast.

Now there are traditions about the rocks which project in the narrow part of the road; with regard to the Molurian rock, that Ino threw herself into the sea from it with Melicerta, the younger of her sons: for Learchus the oldest was killed by his father. Athamas also is said to have acted in the same way when mad, and to have exhibited ungovernable rage to Ino and her children, thinking that the famine which befell the Orchomenians, which also apparently caused the death of Phrixus, was not the visitation of God, but a stepmother’s contrivance against them all. So she to escape him threw herself and her boy Melicerta into the sea from the Molurian rock. And the boy, being carried it is said by a dolphin to the Isthmus of Corinth, had various honours paid to him under the name of Palæmon, and the Isthmian games were celebrated in his honour. This Molurian rock they consider sacred to Leucothea and Palæmon, but the rocks next to it they consider accursed, because Sciron lived near them, who threw into the sea all strangers that chanced to come there. And a tortoise used to swim about near these rocks, so as to devour those that were thrown in: these sea tortoises are like land tortoises, except in size and the shape of their feet which are like those of seals. But the whirligig of time which brought on Sciron punishment for all this, for he himself was thrown by Theseus into the same sea. And on the top of the mountain is a temple to Zeus called the Remover. They say that Zeus was so called because when a great drought once happened to the Greeks, and Æacus in obedience to the oracle prayed to Pan-Hellenian Zeus at Ægina, he took it away and removed it. Here are also statues of Aphrodite and Apollo and Pan. And as you go on a little further is the tomb of Eurystheus. They say that he fled here from Attica after the battle with the Heraclidæ, and was killed by Iolaus. As you descend this road is a temple of Latoan Apollo, and near to it the boundaries between Megaris and Corinth, where they say Hyllus the son of Hercules had a single combat with the Arcadian Echemus.

FOOTNOTES:

A stade was about one-eighth of a Roman mile.

Odyssey, xi., 122, 123.

See Plutarch’s “Life of Theseus.”

Iliad, xxiii., 677-680.

See Herod., iii., 64.

Perhaps a reminiscence of Hom. Il. i. 423.

See Verg. Ecl. 3. 106. Theocr. x. 28. And especially Ovid, Metamorph. x. 210-219.

Demeter and Proserpine.

Iliad xxiii. 144-148.

The Greek is _Megara_. Hence the paronomasia.

Herod. iv. 99, and 103.