[425] Ἀσκληπιός γέ τοι καὶ Διόνυσος, εἴτ᾽ ἄνθρωποι πρότερον ἤστην εἴτε καὶ ἀρχῆθεν θεοί (Galen, Protreptic. 9. t. 1. p. 22, Kühn.). Pausanias considers him as θεὸς ἐξ ἀρχῆς (ii. 26, 7). In the important temple at Smyrna he was worshipped as Ζεὺς Ἀσκληπιός (Aristidês, Or. 6. p. 64; Or. 23. p. 456, Dind.).

[426] Apollodôr. ap. Clem. Alex. Strom. i. p. 381; see Heyne, Fragment. Apollodôr. p. 410. According to Apollodôrus, the apotheosis of Hêraklês and of Æsculapius took place at the same time, thirty-eight years after Hêraklês began to reign at Argos.

[427] About Hekatæus, Herodot. ii. 143; about Solôn, Diogen. Laërt. Vit. Platon. init.

A curious fragment, preserved from the lost works of Dikæarchus, tells us of the descendants of the Centaur Cheirôn at the town of Pêlion, or perhaps at the neighboring town of Dêmêtrias,—it is not quite certain which, perhaps at both (see Dikæarch. Fragment. ed. Fuhr, p. 408). Ταύτην δὲ τὴν δύναμιν ἓν τῶν πολιτῶν οἶδε γένος, ὁ δὴ λέγεται Χείρωνος ἀπόγονον εἶναι· παραδίδωσι δὲ καὶ δείκνυσι πατὴρ υἱῷ, καὶ οὕτως ἡ δύναμις φυλάσσεται, ὡς οὐδεὶς ἄλλος οἶδε τῶν πολιτῶν· οὐχ ὅσιον δὲ τοὺς ἐπισταμένους τὰ φάρμακα μισθοῦ τοῖς καμνοῦσι βοηθεῖν, ἀλλὰ προῖκα.

Plato, de Republ. iii. 4 (p. 391). Ἀχιλλεὺς ὑπὸ τῷ σοφωτάτῳ Χείρωνι τεθραμμένος. Compare Xenophôn, De Venat. c. 1.

[428] See the genealogy at length in Le Clerc, Historie de la Médecine, lib. ii. c. 2. p. 78, also p. 287; also Littré, Introduction aux Œuvres Complètes d’Hippocrate, t. i. p. 35. Hippocratês was the seventeenth from Æsculapius.

Theopompus the historian went at considerable length into the pedigree of the Asklêpiads of Kôs and Knidus, tracing them up to Podaleirius and his first settlement at Syrnus in Karia (see Theopomp. Fragm. 111, Didot): Polyanthus of Kyrênê composed a special treatise περὶ τῆς τῶν Ἀσκληπιαδῶν γενέσεως (Sextus Empiric. adv. Grammat. i. 12. p. 271); see Stephan. Byz. v. Κῶς, and especially Aristidês, Orat. vii. Asclêpiadæ. The Asklêpiads were even reckoned among the Ἀρχηγέται of Rhodes, jointly with the Hêrakleids (Aristidês, Or. 44, ad Rhod. p. 839, Dind.).

In the extensive sacred enclosure at Epidaurus stood the statues of Asklêpius and his wife Epionê (Pausan. ii. 29, 1): two daughters are coupled with him by Aristophanês, and he was considered especially εὔπαις (Plutus, 654); Jaso, Panakeia and Hygieia are named by Aristidês.

[429] Plato, Protagor. c. 6 (p. 311). Ἱπποκράτη τὸν Κῶον, τὸν τῶν Ἀσκληπιαδῶν; also Phædr. c. 121. (p. 270). About Ktêsias, Galen, Opp. t. v. p. 652, Basil.; and Bahrt, Fragm. Ktêsiæ, p. 20. Aristotle (see Stahr. Aristotelia, i. p. 32) and Xenophôn, the physician of the emperor Claudius, were both Asklêpiads (Tacit. Annal. xii. 61). Plato, de Republ. iii. 405, calls them τοὺς κομψοὺς Ἀσκληπιάδας.

Pausanias, a distinguished physician at Gela in Sicily, and contemporary of the philosopher Empedoklês, was also an Asklêpiad: see the verses of Empedoklês upon him, Diogen. Laërt. viii. 61.

[430] Strabo, viii. p. 374; Aristophan. Vesp. 122; Plutus, 635-750; where the visit to the temple of Æsculapius is described in great detail, though with a broad farcical coloring.

During the last illness of Alexander the Great, several of his principal officers slept in the temple of Serapis, in the hope that remedies would be suggested to them in their dreams (Arrian, vii. 26).

Pausanias, in describing the various temples of Asklêpius which he saw, announces as a fact quite notorious and well-understood, “Here cures are wrought by the god” (ii. 36, 1; iii. 26, 7; vii. 27, 4): see Suidas, v. Ἀρίσταρχος. The Orations of Aristidês, especially the 6th and 7th, Asklêpius and the Asklêpiadæ, are the most striking manifestations of faith and thanksgiving towards Æsculapius, as well as attestations of his extensive working throughout the Grecian world; also Orat. 23 and 25, Ἱερῶν Λόγος, 1 and 3; and Or. 45 (De Rhetoricâ, p. 22. Dind.), αἵ τ᾽ ἐν Ἀσκληπιοῦ τῶν ἀεὶ διατριβόντων ἀγελαὶ, etc.

[431] Pausan. ii. 27, 3; 36, 1. Ταύταις ἐγγεγραμμένα ἐστὶ καὶ ἀνδρῶν καὶ γυναικῶν ὀνόματα ἀκεσθέντων ὑπὸ τοῦ Ἀσκληπιοῦ, πρόσετι δὲ καὶ νόσημα, ὅ,τι ἕκαστος ἐνόσησε, καὶ ὅπως ἰάθη,—the cures are wrought by the god himself.

[432] “Apollodôrus ætatem Herculis pro cardine chronologiæ habuit” (Heyne, ad Apollodôr. Fragm. p. 410).

[433] Herodot. v. 81.

[434] Nem. iv. 22. Isthm. vii. 16.

[435] This tale, respecting the transformation of the ants into men, is as old as the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women. See Düntzer, Fragm. Epicc. 21. p. 34; evidently an etymological tale from the name Myrmidones. Pausanias throws aside both the etymology and the details of the miracle: he says that Zeus raised men from the earth, at the prayer of Æakus (ii. 29, 2): other authors retained the etymology of Myrmidons from μύρμηκες, but gave a different explanation (Kallimachus, Fragm. 114, Düntzer). Μυρμιδόνων ἐσσῆνα (Strabo, viii. p. 375). Ἐσσὴν, ὁ οἰκιστής (Hygin. fab. 52).

According to the Thessalian legend, Myrmidôn was the son of Zeus by Eurymedusa, daughter of Kletor; Zeus having assumed the disguise of an ant (Clemens Alex. Admon. ad Gent. p. 25. Sylb.).

[436] Apollod. iii. 12, 6. Isokrat. Evagor. Encom. vol. ii. p. 278, Auger. Pausan. i. 45, 13; ii. 29, 6. Schol. Aristoph. Equit. 1253.

So in the 106th Psalm, respecting the Israelites and Phinees, v. 29, “They provoked the Lord to anger by their inventions, and the plague was great among them;” “Then stood up Phinees and prayed, and so the plague ceased;” “And that was counted unto him for righteousness, among all posterities for evermore.”

[437] Pindar, Olymp. viii. 41, with the Scholia. Didymus did not find this story in any other poet older than Pindar.

[438] Apollod. iii. 12, 6, who relates the tale somewhat differently; but the old epic poem Alkmæônis gave the details (ap. Schol. Eurip. Andromach. 685)—

[439] Pindar, Nem. v. 15, with Scholia, and Kallimach. Frag. 136. Apollônius Rhodius represents the fratricide as inadvertent and unintentional (i. 92); one instance amongst many of the tendency to soften down and moralize the ancient tales.

Pindar, however, seems to forget this incident when he speaks in other places of the general character of Pêleus (Olymp. ii. 75-86. Isthm. vii. 40).

[440] Apollod. iii. 12, 7. Euphoriôn, Fragm. 5, Düntzer, p. 43, Epicc. Græc. There may have been a tutelary serpent in the temple at Eleusis, as there was in that of Athênê Polias at Athens (Herodot viii. 41. Photius, v. Οἰκοῦρον ὄφιν. Aristophan. Lysistr. 759, with the Schol.).

[441] Apollod. iii. 12, 7. Hesiod. ap. Strab. ix. p. 393.

The libation and prayer of Hêraklês, prior to the birth of Ajax, and his fixing the name of the yet unborn child, from an eagle (αἰετὸς) which appeared in response to his words, was detailed in the Hesiodic Eoia, and is celebrated by Pindar (Isthm. v. 30-54). See also the Scholia.

[442] Apollodôr. iii. 13, 5. Homer, Iliad, xviii. 434; xxiv. 62. Pindar, Nem. iv. 50-68; Isthm. vii. 27-50. Herodot. vii. 192. Catullus, Carm. 64. Epithal. Pel. et Thetidos, with the prefatory remarks of Dœring.

The nuptials of Pêleus and Thetis were much celebrated in the Hesiodic Catalogue, or perhaps in the Eoiai (Düntzer, Epic. Græc. Frag. 36. p. 39), and Ægimius—see Schol. ad Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 869—where there is a curious attempt of Staphylus to rationalize the marriage of Pêleus and Thetis.

There was a town, seemingly near Pharsalus in Thessaly, called Thetideium. Thetis is said to have been carried by Pêleus to both these places: probably it grew up round a temple and sanctuary of this goddess (Pherekyd. Frag. 16, Didot; Hellank. ap. Steph. Byz. Θεστιδεῖον).

[443] See the arguments of the lost poems, the Cypria and the Æthiopis, as given by Proclus, in Düntzer, Fragm. Epic. Gr. p. 11-16; also Schol. ad Iliad. xvi. 140; and the extract from the lost Ψυχοστασία of Æschylus, ap. Plato. de Republic. ii. c. 21 (p. 382, St.).

[444] Eurip. Androm. 1242-1260; Pindar, Olymp. ii. 86.

[445] Herodot. vii. 198.

[446] Plutarch, Pyrrh. 1; Justin, xi. 3; Eurip. Androm. 1253; Arrian, Exp. Alexand. i. 11.

[447] Pherekydês and Hellanikus ap. Marcellin. Vit. Thucydid. init.; Pausan. ii. 29, 4; Plutarch, Solôn, 10. According to Apollodôrus, however, Pherekydês said that Telamôn was only the friend of Pêleus, not his brother,—not the son of Æakus (iii. 12, 7): this seems an inconsistency. There was however a warm dispute between the Athenians and the Megarians respecting the title to the hero Ajax, who was claimed by both (see Pausan. i. 42, 4; Plutarch, l. c.): the Megarians accused Peisistratus of having interpolated a line into the Catalogue in the Iliad (Strabo, ix. p. 394).

[448] Herodot. vii. 90; Isokrat. Enc. Evag. ut sup.; Sophokl. Ajax, 984-995; Vellei. Patercul. i. 1; Æschyl. Pers. 891, and Schol. The return from Troy of Teukrus, his banishment by Telamôn, and his settlement in Cyprus, formed the subject of the Τεῦκρος of Sophoklês, and of a tragedy under a similar title by Pacuvius (Cicero de Orat. i. 58; ii. 46); Sophokl. Ajax, 892; Pacuvii Fragm. Teucr. 15.—

The legend of Teukros was connected in Attic archæology with the peculiar functions and formalities of the judicature, ἐν Φρεαττοῖ (Pausan. i. 28, 12; ii. 29, 7).

[449] Hesiod, Fragm. Düntz. Eoiai, 55, y. 43.—

Polyb. v. 2.—

[450] See his Æginetica, p. 14, his earliest work.

[451] Pindar, Olymp. ix. 74. The hero Ajax, son of Oïleus, was especially worshipped at Opus; solemn festivals and games were celebrated in his honor.

[452] Iliad, ii. 546. Odyss. vii. 81.—

[453] See the Life of Lykurgus, in Plutarch’s (I call it by that name, as it is always printed with his works) Lives of the Ten Orators, tom. iv. p. 382-384, Wytt. Κατῆγον δὲ τὸ γένος ἀπὸ τούτων καὶ Ἐρεχθέως τοῦ Γῆς καὶ Ἡφαίστου ... καὶ ἐστὶν αὐτὴ ἡ καταγωγὴ τοῦ γένους τῶν ἱερασαμένων του Ποσειδῶνος, etc. Ὃς τὴν ἱερωσύνην Ποσειδῶνος Ἐρεχθέως εἶχε (pp. 382, 383). Erechtheus Πάρεδρος of Athênê—Aristidês, Panathenaic. p. 184, with the Scholia of Frommel.

Butês, the eponymus of the Butadæ, is the first priest of Poseidôn Erichthonius: Apollod. iii. 15, 1. So Kallias (Xenoph. Sympos. viii. 40), ἱερεὺς θεῶν τῶν ἀπ᾽ Ἐρεχθέως.

[454] Herodot. viii. 55.

[455] Harpokration, v. Αὐτοχθών. Ὁ δὲ Πίνδαρος καὶ ὁ τὴν Δαναΐδα πεποιηκὼς φασιν, Ἐριχθόνιον ἐξ Ἡφαίστου καὶ Γῆς φανῆναι. Euripidês, Ion. 21. Apollod. iii. 14, 6; 15, 1. Compare Plato, Timæus, c. 6.

[456] Schol. ad Iliad, ii. 546, where he cites also Kallimachus for the story of Erichthonius. Etymologicon Magn. Ἐρεχθεύς. Plato (Kritias, c. 4) employs vague and general language to describe the agency of Hêphæstos and Athênê, which the old fable in Apollodôrus (iii. 14, 6) details in coarser terms. See Ovid, Metam. ii. 757.

[457] Æthra, mother of Theseus, is also mentioned (Homer, Iliad, iii. 144).

[458] Hellanikus, Fragm. 62; Philochor. Fragm. 8, ap. Euseb. Præp. Evang. x. 10. p. 489. Larcher (Chronologie d’Hérodote, ch. ix. s. 1. p. 278) treats both the historical personality and the date of Ogygês as perfectly well authenticated.

It is not probable that Philochorus should have given any calculation of time having reference to Olympiads; and hardly conceivable that Hellanikus should have done so. Justin Martyr quotes Hellanikus and Philochorus as having mentioned Moses,—ὡς σφόδρα ἀρχαίου καὶ παλαιοῦ τῶν Ἰουδαίων ἄρχοντος Μωϋσέως μέμνηνται—which is still more incredible even than the assertion of Eusebius about their having fixed the date of Ogygês by Olympiads (see Philochor. Fragm. 9).

[459] Apollod. iii. 14, 1; Herodot. viii. 55; Ovid. Metam. vi. 72. The story current among the Athenians represented Kekrops as the judge of this controversy (Xenoph. Memor. iii. 5, 10).

The impressions of the trident of Poseidôn were still shown upon the rock in the time of Pausanias (Pausan. i. 26, 4). For the sanctity of the ancient olive-tree, see the narrative of Herodotus (l. c.), relating what happened to it when Xerxes occupied the acropolis. As this tale seems to have attached itself specially to the local peculiarities of the Erechtheion, the part which Poseidôn plays in it is somewhat mean: that god appears to greater advantage in the neighborhood of the Ἱπποτὴς Κολωνὸς, as described in the beautiful Chorus of Sophoklês (Œdip. Colon. 690-712).

A curious rationalization of the monstrous form ascribed to Kekrops διφυὴς in Plutarch (Sera Num. Vindict. p. 551).

[460] Philochor. ap. Strabo. ix. p. 397.

[461] The Parian chronological marble designates Aktæus as an autochthonous person. Marmor Parium, Epoch. 3. Pausan. i. 2, 5. Philochorus treated Aktæus as a fictitious name (Fragm. 8, ut sup.).

[462] Pausan. viii. 2. 2. The three daughters of Kekrops were not unnoticed in the mythes (Ovid, Metam. ii. 739): the tale of Kephalus, son of Hersê by Hermês, who was stolen away by the goddess Eôs or Hêmera in consequence of his surpassing beauty, was told in more than one of the Hesiodic poems (Pausan. i. 3, 1; Hesiod. Theog. 986). See also Eurip. Ion. 269.

[463] Jul. Africanus also (ap. Euseb. x. 9. p. 486-488) calls Kekrops γηγενὴς and αὐτοχθών.

[464] Herod. viii. 44. Κρανααὶ Ἀθῆναι, Pindar.

[465] Apollod. iii. 14. Pausan. i. 26, 7.

[466] Virgil, Georgic iii. 114.

[467] The mythe of the visit of Dêmêtêr to Eleusis, on which occasion she vouchsafed to teach her holy rites to the leading Eleusinians, is more fully touched upon in a previous chapter (see ante, p. 50).

[468] Apollod. iii. 14, 8; Æsch. Supplic. 61; Soph. Elektr. 107; Ovid, Metamorph. vi. 425-670. Hyginus gives the fable with some additional circumstances, fab. 45. Antoninus Liberalis (Narr. 11), or Bœus, from whom he copies, has composed a new narrative by combining together the names of Pandareos and Aêdôn, as given in the Odyssey, xix. 523, and the adventures of the old Attic fable. The hoopoe still continued the habit of chasing the nightingale; it was to the Athenians a present fact. See Schol. Aristoph. Aves, 212.

[469] Thucyd. ii. 29. He makes express mention of the nightingale in connection with the story, though not of the metamorphosis. See below, chap. xvi. p. 544, note 2. So also does Pausanias mention and reason upon it as a real incident: he founds upon it several moral reflections (i. 5, 4; x. 4, 5): the author of the Λόγος Ἐπιτάφιος, ascribed to Demosthenês, treats it in the same manner, as a fact ennobling the tribe Pandionis, of which Pandiôn was the eponymus. The same author, in touching upon Kekrops, the eponymus of the Kekropis tribe, cannot believe literally the story of his being half man and half serpent: he rationalizes it by saying that Kekrops was so called because in wisdom he was like a man, in strength like a serpent (Demosth. p. 1397, 1398, Reiske). Hesiod glances at the fable (Opp. Di. 566), ὀρθογόη Πανδιονὶς ὦρτο χελιδών; see also Ælian., V. H. xii. 20. The subject was handled by Sophoklês in his lost Têreus.

[470] Poseidôn is sometimes spoken of under the name of Erechtheus simply (Lycophrôn, 158). See Hesychius, v. Ἐρεχθεύς.

[471] Pherekydês, Fragm. 77, Didot; ap. Schol. ad Odyss. xi. 320; Hellanikus Fr. 82; ap. Schol. Eurip. Orest. 1648. Apollodôrus (iii. 15, 1) gives the story differently.

[472] Upon this story of Iôn is founded the tragedy of Euripidês which bears that name. I conceive many of the points of that tragedy to be of the invention of Euripidês himself: but to represent Iôn as son of Apollo, not of Xuthus, seems a genuine Attic legend. Respecting this drama, see O. Müller, Hist. of Dorians, ii. 2. 13-15. I doubt however the distinction which he draws between the Ionians and the other population of Attica.

[473] Apollodôr. iii. 15, 2; Plato, Phædr. c. 3; Sophok. Antig. 984; also the copious Scholion on Apollôn. Rhod. i. 212.

The tale of Phineus is told very differently in the Argonautic expedition as given by Apollônius Rhodius, ii. 180. From Sophoklês we learn that this was the Attic version.

The two winged sons of Boreas and their chase of the Harpies were noticed in the Hesiodic Catalogue (see Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. ii. 296). But whether the Attic legend of Oreithyia was recognized in the Hesiodic poems seems not certain.

Both Æschylus and Sophoklês composed dramas on the subject of Oreithyia (Longin. de Sublimit. c. 3). “Orithyia Atheniensis, filia Terrigenæ, et a Borea in Thraciam rapta.” (Servius ad Virg. Æneid. xii. 83). Terrigenæ is the γηγενὴς Ἐρεχθεύς. Philochorus (Fragm. 30) rationalized the story, and said that it alluded to the effects of a violent wind.

[474] Herodot. vii. 189. Οἱ δ᾽ ὦν Ἀθηναῖοί σφι λέγουσι βοηθήσαντα τὸν Βορῆν πρότερον, καὶ τότε ἐκεῖνα κατεργάσασθαι· καὶ ἱρὸν ἀπελθόντες Βορέω ἱδρύσαντο παρὰ ποταμὸν Ἴλισσον.

[475] Herodot. l. c. Ἀθηναῖοι τὸν Βορῆν ἐκ θεοπροπίου ἐπεκαλέσαντο, ἐλθόντος σφι ἄλλου χρηστηρίου, τὸν γαμβρὸν ἐπίκουρον καλέσασθαι. Βορῆς δὲ, κατὰ τὸν Ἑλλήνων λόγον ἔχει γυναῖκα Ἀττικὴν, Ὠρειθυίην τὴν Ἐρεχθῆος. Κατὰ δὴ τὸ κῆδος τοῦτο, οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι, συμβαλλεόμενοί σφι τὸν Βορῆν γαμβρὸν εἶναι, etc.

[476] Suidas and Photius, v. Πάρθενοι: Protogeneia and Pandôra are given as the names of two of them. The sacrifice of Pandôra, in the Iambi of Hippônax (Hippônact. Fragm. xxi. Welck. ap. Athen. ix. p. 370), seems to allude to this daughter of Erechtheus.

[477] Apollodôr. iii. 15, 3; Thucyd. ii. 15; Isokratês (Panegyr. t. i. p. 206; Panathenaic. t. ii. p. 560, Auger), Lykurgus, cont. Leocrat. p. 201, Reiske, Pausan. i. 38, 3; Euripid. Erechth. Fragm. The Schol. ad. Soph. Œd. Col. 1048 gives valuable citations from Ister, Akestodôrus and Androtiôn: we see that the inquirers of antiquity found it difficult to explain how the Eumolpids could have acquired their ascendant privileges in the management of the Eleusinia, seeing that Eumolpus himself was a foreigner.—Ζητεῖται, τί δήποτε οἱ Εὐμολπίδαι τῶν τελετῶν ἐξάρχουσι, ξένοι ὄντες. Thucydidês does not call Eumolpus a Thracian: Strabo’s language is very large and vague (vii. p. 321): Isokratês says that he assailed Athens in order to vindicate the rights of his father Poseidôn to the sovereign patronage of the city. Hyginus copies this (fab. 46).

[478] Pausan. i. 38. 3. Ἐλευσίνιοί τε ἀρχαῖοι, ἅτε οὐ προσόντων σφισι γενεαλόγων, ἄλλα τε πλάσασθαι δεδώκασι καὶ μάλιστα ἐς τὰ γένη τῶν ἡρώων. See Heyne ad Apollodôr. iii. 15, 4. “Eumolpi nomen modo communicatum pluribus, modo plurium hominum res et facta cumulata in unum. Is ad quem Hercules venisse dicitur, serior ætate fuit: antiquior est is de quo hoc loco agitur ... antecessisse tamen hunc debet alius, qui cum Triptolemo vixit,” etc. See the learned and valuable comments of Lobeck in his Aglaophamus, tom. i. p. 206-213: in regard to the discrepancies of this narrative he observes, I think, with great justice (p. 211), “quo uno exemplo ex innumerabilibus delecto, arguitur eorum temeritas, qui ex variis discordibusque poetarum et mythographorum narratiunculis, antiquæ famæ formam et quasi lineamenta recognosci posse sperant.”

[479] Homer, Hymn, ad Cerer. 153-475.—

Also v. 105.

The hero Eleusis is mentioned in Pausanias, i. 38, 7: some said that he was the son of Hermês, others that he was the son of Ogygus. Compare Hygin. f. 147.

[480] Keleos and Metaneira were worshipped by the Athenians with divine honors (Athenagoras, Legat. p. 53, ed. Oxon.): perhaps he confounds divine and heroic honors, as the Christian controversialists against Paganism were disposed to do. Triptolemus had a temple at Eleusis (Pausan. i. 38, 6).

[481] Apollodôr. iii. 15, 4. Some said that Immaradus, son of Eumolpus, had been killed by Erechtheus (Pausan. i. 5, 2); others, that both Eumolpus and his son had experienced this fate (Schol. ad Eurip. Phœniss. 854). But we learn from Pausanias himself what the story in the interior of the Erechtheion was,—that Erechtheus killed Eumolpus (i. 27, 3).

[482] Cicero, Nat. Deor. iii. 19; Philochor. ap. Schol. Œdip. Col. 100. Three daughters of Erechtheus perished, and three daughters were worshipped (Apollodôr. iii. 15, 4; Hesychius, Ζεῦγος τριπάρθενον; Eurip. Erechtheus, Fragm. 3, Dindorf); but both Euripidês and Apollodôrus said that Erechtheus was only required to sacrifice, and only did sacrifice, one,—the other two slew themselves voluntarily, from affection for their sister. I cannot but think (in spite of the opinion of Welcker to the contrary, Griechisch. Tragöd. ii. p. 722) that the genuine legend represented Erechtheus as having sacrificed all three, as appears in the Iôn of Euripidês (276):—

Compare with this passage, Demosthen. Λόγος Ἐπιταφ. p. 1397, Reisk. Just before, the death of the three daughters of Kekrops, for infringing the commands of Athênê, had been mentioned. Euripidês modified this in his Erechtheus, for he there introduced the mother Praxithea consenting to the immolation of one daughter, for the rescue of the country from a foreign invader: to propose to a mother the immolation of three daughters at once, would have been too revolting. In most instances we find the strongly marked features, the distinct and glaring incidents as well as the dark contrasts, belong to the Hesiodic or old Post-Homeric legend; the changes made afterwards go to soften, dilute, and to complicate, in proportion as the feelings of the public become milder and more humane; sometimes however the later poets add new horrors.

[483] See the striking evidence contained in the oration of Lykurgus against Leocratês (p. 201-204. Reiske; Demosthen. Λόγ. Ἐπιταφ. l. c.; and Xenophon, Memor. iii. 5, 9): from the two latter passages we see that the Athenian story represented the invasion under Eumolpus as a combined assault from the western continent.

[484] Apollodôr. iii. 15, 5; Eurip. Iôn, 282; Erechth. Fragm. 20, Dindorf.

[485] Eurip. Iôn. 1570-1595. The Kreüsa of Sophoklês, a lost tragedy, seems to have related to the same subject.

Pausanias (vii. 1, 2) tells us that Xuthus was chosen to arbitrate between the contending claims of the sons of Erechtheus.

[486] Philochor. ap. Harpocrat. v. Βοηδρόμια; Strabo, viii. p. 383.

[487] Philochor. ap. Harpocrat. v. Βοηδρόμια.

[488] Sophokl. ap. Strab. ix. p. 392; Herodot. i. 173; Strabo, xii. p. 573.

[489] Plutarch, Thêseus, c. 13. Αἰγεὺς θετὸς γενόμενος Πανδίονι, καὶ μηδὲν τοῖς Ἐρεχθείδαις προσήκων. Apollodôr. iii. 15, 6.

[490] Ægeus had by Mêdea (who took refuge at Athens after her flight from Corinth) a son named Mêdus, who passed into Asia, and was considered as the eponymus and progenitor of the Median people. Datis, the general who commanded the invading Persian army at the battle of Marathôn, sent a formal communication to the Athenians announcing himself as the descendant of Mêdus, and requiring to be admitted as king of Attica: such is the statement of Diodôrus (Exc. Vatic. vii.-x. 48: see also Schol. Aristophan. Pac. 289).

[491] Ovid, Metamorph. vii. 433.—

Respecting the amours of Thêseus, Ister especially seems to have entered into great details; but some of them were noticed both in the Hesiodic poems and by Kekrops, not to mention Pherekydês (Athen. xiii. p. 557). Peirithous, the intimate friend and companion of Thêseus, is the eponymous hero of the Attic dême or gens Perithoidæ (Ephorus ap. Photium, v. Περιθοῖδαι).

[492] Thuc. ii. 15. Ἐπειδὴ δὲ Θησεὺς ἐβασίλευσε, γενόμενος μετὰ τοῦ ξυνετοῦ καὶ δυνατὸς, τά τε ἄλλα διεκόσμησε τὴν χώραν, καὶ κατάλυσας τῶν ἄλλων πόλεων τά τε βουλευτήρια καὶ τὰς ἀρχὰς, ἐς τὴν νῦν πόλιν ... ξυνῴκισε πάντας.

[493] Iliad, i. 265; Odyss. xi. 321. I do not notice the suspected line, Odyss. xi. 630.

[494] Diodôrus also, from his disposition to assimilate Thêseus to Hêraklês, has given us his chivalrous as well as his political attributes (iv. 61).

[495] Plutarch, Thêseus, i. Εἴη μὲν οὖν ἡμῖν, ἐκκαθαιρόμενον λόγῳ τὸ μυθῶδες ὑπακοῦσαι καὶ λαβεῖν ἱστορίας ὄψιν· ὅπου δ᾽ ἂν αὐθαδῶς τοῦ πιθανοῦ περιφρονῇ, καὶ μὴ δέχηται τὴν πρὸς τὸ εἰκὸς μίξιν, εὐγνωμόνων ἀκροατῶν δεησόμεθα, καὶ πρᾴως τὴν ἀρχαιολογίαν προσδεχομένων.

[496] See Isokratês, Panathenaic. (t. ii. p. 510-512, Auger); Xenoph. Memor. iii. 5, 10. In the Helenæ Encomium, Isokratês enlarges more upon the personal exploits of Thêseus in conjunction with his great political merits (t. ii. p. 342-350, Auger).

[497] Plutarch, Thêseus, 20.

[498] See the epigram of Krinagoras, Antholog. Pal. vol. ii. p. 144; ep. xv. ed. Brunck. and Kallimach. Frag. 40.

Some beautiful lines are preserved by Suidas, v. Ἐπαύλια, περὶ Ἑκάλης θανούσης (probably spoken by Thêseus himself, see Plutarch, Theseus, c. 14).

[499] Virgil, Æneid, vi. 617. “Sedet æternumque sedebit Infelix Thêseus.”

[500] Pherekyd. Fragm. 25, Didot.

[501] Iliad, iii. 186; vi. 152.

[502] See Proclus’s Argument of the lost Æthiopis (Fragm. Epicor. Græcor. ed. Düntzer, p. 16). We are reduced to the first book of Quintus Smyrnæus for some idea of the valor of Penthesileia; it is supposed to be copied more or less closely from the Æthiopis. See Tychsen’s Dissertation prefixed to his edition of Quintus, sections 5 and 12. Compare Dio. Chrysostom. Or. xi. p. 350, Reiske. Philostratus (Heroica, c. 19, p. 751) gives a strange transformation of this old epical narrative into a descent of Amazons upon the island sacred to Achilles.

[503] Apollôn. Rhod. ii. 966, 1004; Apollod. ii. 5-9; Diodôr. ii. 46; iv. 16. The Amazons were supposed to speak the Thracian language (Schol. Apoll Rhod. ii. 953), though some authors asserted them to be natives of Libyia, others of Æthiopia (ib. 965).

Hellanikus (Frag. 33, ap. Schol. Pindar. Nem. iii. 65) said that all the Argonauts had assisted Hêraklês in this expedition: the fragment of the old epic poem (perhaps the Ἀμαζόνια) there quoted mentions Telamôn specially.