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XIII.4

This webpage reproduces a section of
The Geography

of
Strabo

published in Vol. V
of the Loeb Classical Library edition,
1928

The text is in the public domain.

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XIV.2

(Vol. VI) Strabo
Geography

 p197  Book XIV, Chapter 1

1 6321 It remains for me to speak of the Ionians and the Carians and the seaboard outside the Taurus, which last is occupied by Lycians, Pamphylians, and Cilicians; for in this way I can finish my entire description of the peninsula, the isthmus of which, as I was saying,​2 is the road which leads over from the Pontic Sea to the Issic Sea.

2 The coasting voyage round Ionia is about three thousand four hundred and thirty stadia, this distance being so great because of the gulfs and the fact that the country forms a peninsula of unusual extent; but the distance in a straight line across the isthmus is not great. For instance, merely the distance from Ephesus to Smyrna is a journey, in a straight line, of three hundred and twenty stadia, for the distance to Metropolis is one hundred and twenty stadia and the remainder to Smyrna, whereas the coasting voyage is but slightly short of two thousand two hundred. Be that as it may, the bounds of the Ionian coast extend from the Poseidium of the Milesians, and from the Carian frontiers, as far as Phocaea and the Hermus River, which latter is the limit of the Ionian seaboard.

3 Pherecydes says concerning this seaboard that Miletus and Myus and the parts round Mycalê and  p199 Ephesus were in earlier time occupied by Carians, and that the coast next thereafter, as far as Phocaea and Chios and Samos, which were ruled by Ancaeus, was occupied by Leleges, but that both were driven out by the Ionians and took refuge in the remaining parts of Caria. He says that Androclus, legitimate son of Codrus the king of Athens, 633 was the leader of the Ionian colonisation, which was later than the Aeolian, and that he became the founder of Ephesus; and for this reason, it is said, the royal seat of the Ionians was established there. And still now the descendants of his family are called kings; and they have certain honours, I mean the privilege of front seats at the games and of wearing purple robes as insignia of royal descent, and staff instead of sceptre, and of the superintendence of the sacrifices in honour of the Eleusinian Demeter. Miletus was founded by Neleus, a Pylian by birth. The Messenians and the Pylians pretend a kind of kinship with one another, according to which the more recent poets call Nestor a Messenian; and they say that many of the Pylians accompanied Melanthus, father of Codrus, and his followers to Athens, and that, accordingly, all this people sent forth the colonising expedition in common with the Ionians. There is an altar, erected by Neleus, to be seen on the Poseidium. Myus was founded by Cydrelus, bastard son of Codrus; Lebedus by Andropompus, who seized a place called Artis; Colophon by Andraemon a Pylian, according to Mimnermus in his Nanno;​3 Prienê by Aepytus the son of Neleus, and then later by Philotas, who brought a colony from Thebes; Teos, at first by Athamas, for which reason it is by Anacreon called Athamantis, and at  p201 the time of the Ionian colonisation by Nauclus, bastard son of Codrus, and after him by Apoecus and Damasus, who were Athenians, and Geres, a Boeotian; Erythrae by Cnopus, he too a bastard son of Codrus; Phocaea by the Athenians under Philogenes; Clazomenae by Paralus; Chios by Egertius, who brought with him a mixed crowd; Samos by Tembrion, and then later by Procles.

4 These are the twelve Ionian cities,​4 but at a later time Smyrna was added, being induced by the Ephesians to join the Ionian League; for the Ephesians were fellow-inhabitants of the Smyrnaeans in ancient times, when Ephesus was also called Smyrna. And Callinus somewhere so names it, when he calls the Ephesians Smyrnaeans in the prayer to Zeus, "and pity the Smyrnaeans"; and again, "remember, if ever the Smyrnaeans burnt up beautiful thighs of oxen in sacrifice to thee."​5 Smyrna was an Amazon who took possession of Ephesus; and hence the name both of the inhabitants and of the city, just as certain of the Ephesians were called Sisyrbitae after Sisyrbê. Also a certain place belonging to Ephesus was called Smyrna, as Hipponax plainly indicates: "He lived behind the city in Smyrna between Tracheia and Lepra Actê";​6 for the name Lepra Actê was given to Mt. Prion, which lies above the present city and has on it a part of the city's wall. At any rate, the possessions behind Prion  p203 are still now referred to as in the "opistholeprian" territory,​7 634 and the country alongside the mountain round Coressus was called "Tracheia."​8 The city was in ancient times round the Athenaeum, which is now outside the city near the Hypelaeus,​9 as it is called; so that Smyrna was near the present gymnasium, behind the present city, but between Tracheia and Lepra Actê. On departing from the Ephesians, the Smyrnaeans marched to the place where Smyrna now is, which was in the possession of the Leleges, and, having driven them out, they founded the ancient Smyrna, which is about twenty stadia distant from the present Smyrna. But later, being driven out by the Aeolians, they fled for refuge to Colophon, and then with the Colophonians returned to their own land and took it back, as Mimnermus tells us in his Nanno, after recalling that Smyrna was always an object of contention: "After we left Pylus, the steep city of Neleus, we came by ship to lovely Asia, and with our overweening might settled in beloved Colophon, taking the initiative in grievous insolence. And from there, setting out from the Astëeis River, by the will of the gods we took Aeolian Smyrna."​10 So much, then, on this subject. But I must again go over the several parts in detail,  p205 beginning with the principal places, those where the foundings first took place, I mean those round Miletus and Ephesus; for these are the best and most famous cities.

5 Next after the Poseidium of the Milesians, eighteen stadia inland, is the oracle of Apollo Didymeus among the Branchidae.​11 It was set on fire by Xerxes, as were also the other temples, except that at Ephesus. The Branchidae gave over the treasures of the god to the Persian king, and accompanied him in his flight in order to escape punishment for the robbing and the betrayal of the temple. But later the Milesians erected the largest temple in the world, though on account of its size it remained without a roof. At any rate, the circuit of the sacred enclosure holds a village settlement; and there is a magnificent sacred grove both inside and outside the enclosure; and other sacred enclosures contain the oracle and the shrines. Here is laid the scene of the myth of Branchus and the love of Apollo. The temple is adorned with costliest offerings consisting of early works of art. Thence to the city is no long journey, by land or by sea.

6 Ephorus says: Miletus was first founded and fortified above the sea by the Cretans, where the Miletus of olden times is now situated, being settled in Sarpedon, who brought colonists from the Cretan Miletus 635 and named the city after that Miletus, the place formerly being in the possession of the Leleges; but later Neleus and his followers fortified the present city. The present city has four harbours, one of which is large enough for a fleet. Many are  p207 the achievements of this city, but the greatest is the number of its colonisations; for the Euxine Pontus has been colonised everywhere by these people, as also the Propontis and several other regions. At any rate, Anaximenes of Lampsacus says that the Milesians colonised the islands Icaros and Leros; and, near the Hellespont, Limnae in the Chersonesus, as also Abydus and Arisba and Paesus in Asia; and Artacê and Cyzicus in the island of the Cyziceni; and Scepsis in the interior of the Troad. I, however, in my detailed description speak of the other cities, which have been omitted by him. Both Milesians and Delians invoke an Apollo "Ulius," that is, as god of "health and healing," for the verb "ulein" means "to be healthy"; whence the noun "ulê"​12 and the salutation, "Both health and great joy to thee"; for Apollo is the god of healing. And Artemis has her name from the fact that she makes people "Artemeas."​13 And both Helius​14 and Selenê​15 are closely associated with these, since they are the causes of the temperature of the air. And both pestilential diseases and sudden deaths are imputed to these gods.

7 Notable men were born at Miletus: Thales, one of the Seven Wise Men, the first to begin the science of natural philosophy​16 and mathematics among the Greeks, and his pupil Anaximander, and again the pupil of the latter, Anaximenes, and also Hecataeus, the author of the History, and, in my time, Aeschines the orator, who remained in exile  p209 to the end, since he spoke freely, beyond moderation, before Pompey the Great. But the city was unfortunate, since it shut its gates against Alexander and was taken by force, as was also the case with Halicarnassus; and also, before that time, it was taken by the Persians. And Callisthenes says that Phrynichus the tragic poet was fined a thousand drachmas by the Athenians because he wrote a play entitled The Capture of Miletus by Dareius. The island Ladê lies close in front of Miletus, as do also the isles in the neighbourhood of the Tragaeae, which afford anchorage for pirates.

8 Next comes the Latmian Gulf, on which is situated "Heracleia below Latmus," as it is called, a small town that has an anchoring-place. It was at first called Latmus, the same name as the mountain that lies above it, which Hecataeus indicates, in his opinion, to be the same as that which by the poet is called "the mountain of the Phtheires"​17 (for he says that the mountain of the Phtheires lies above Latmus), though some say that it is Mt. Grium, 636 which is approximately parallel to Latmus and extends inland from Milesia towards the east through Caria to Euromus and Chalcetores.​18 This mountain lies above Heracleia, and at a high elevation.​19 At a slight distance away from it, after one has crossed a little river near Latmus, there is to be seen the sepulchre of Endymion, in a cave. Then from Heracleia to Pyrrha, a small town, there is a voyage of about one hundred stadia.

9 But the voyage from Miletus to Heracleia, including the sinuosities of the gulfs, is a little more  p211 and one hundred stadia, though that from Miletus to Pyrrha, in a straight course, is only thirty — so much longer is the journey along the coast. But in the case of famous places my reader must needs endure the dry part of such geography as this.

10 The voyage from Pyrrha to the outlet of the Maeander River is fifty stadia, a place which consists of shallows and marshes; and, going inland in rowboats thirty stadia, one comes to the city Myus, one of the twelve Ionian cities, which, on account of its sparse population, has now been incorporated into Miletus. Xerxes is said to have given this city to Themistocles to supply him with fish, Magnesia to supply him with bread, and Lampsacus with wine.

11 Thence, within four stadia, one comes to a village, the Carian Thymbria, near which is Aornum, a sacred cave, which is called Charonium, since it emits deadly vapours. Above it lies Magnesia on the Maeander, a colony of the Magnesians of Thessaly and the Cretans, of which I shall soon speak.20

12 After the outlets of the Maeander comes the shore of Prienê, above which lies Prienê, and also the mountain Mycalê, which is well supplied with wild animals and with trees. This mountain lies above the Samian territory​21 and forms with it, on the far side of the promontory called Trogilian, a strait about seven stadia in width. Prienê is by some writers called Cadmê, since Philotas, who founded it, was a Boeotian. Bias, one of the Seven Wise Men, was a native of Prienê, of whom Hipponax says "stronger in the pleading of his cases than Bias of Prienê."22

 p213  13 Off the Trogilian promontory lies an isle of the same name. Thence the nearest passage across to Sunium is one thousand six hundred stadia; on the voyage one has at first Samos and Icaria and Corsia on the right, and the Melantian rocks on the left; and the remainder of the voyage is through the midst of the Cyclades islands. The Trogilian promontory itself is a kind of spur of Mt. Mycalê. Close to Mycalê lies another mountain, in the Ephesian territory, I mean Mt. Pactyes, in which the Mesogis terminates.

14 The distance from the Trogilian promontory to Samos​23 is forty stadia. Samos faces the south, both it and its harbour, which latter has a naval station. The greater part of it is on level ground, 637 being washed by the sea, but a part of it reaches up into the mountain that lies above it. Now on the right, as one sails towards the city, is the Poseidium, a promontory which with Mt. Mycalê forms the seven-stadia strait; and it has a temple of Poseidon; and in front of it lies an isle called Narthecis; and on the left is the suburb near the Heraeum, which consists of an ancient temple and a great shrine, which latter is now a repository of tablets.​24 Apart from the number of the tablets placed there, there are other repositories of votive tablets and some small chapels full of ancient works of art. And the temple, which is open to the sky, is likewise full of most excellent statues. Of these, three of colossal size, the work of Myron, stood upon one base; Antony  p215 took these statues away,​25 but Augustus Caesar restored two of them, those of Athena and Heracles, to the same base, although he transferred the Zeus to the Capitolium, having erected there a small chapel for that statue.

15 The voyage round the island of the Samians is six hundred stadia. In earlier times, when it was inhabited by Carians, it was called Parthenia, then Anthemus, then Melamphyllus, and then Samos, whether after some native hero or after someone who colonised it from Ithaca and Cephallenia.​26 Now in Samos there is a promontory approximately facing Drepanum in Icaria which is called Ampelus, but the entire mountain which makes the whole of the island mountainous is called by the same name. The island does not produce good wine,​a although good wine is produced by the islands all round, and although most of the whole of the adjacent mainland produces the best of wine, for example, Chios and Lesbos and Cos. And indeed the Ephesian and Metropolitan wines are good; and Mt. Mesogis and Mt. Tmolus and the Catacecaumene country and Cnidos and Smyrna and other less significant places produce exceptionally good wine, whether for enjoyment or medicinal purposes. Now Samos is not altogether fortunate in regard to wines, but in all other respects it is a blest country, as is clear from the fact that it became an object of contention in war, and also from the fact that those who praise it do not hesitate to apply to it the proverb, that "it  p217 produces even birds' milk," as Menander somewhere says. This was also the cause of the establishment of the tyrannies there, and of their enmity against the Athenians.

16 Now the tyrannies reached their greatest height in the time of Polycrates and his brother Syloson. Polycrates was such a brilliant man, both in his good fortune and in his natural ability, 638 that he gained supremacy over the sea; and it is set down,​27 as a sign of his good fortune, that he purposely flung into the sea his ring, a ring of very costly stone and engraving, and that a little later one of the fishermen brought him the very fish that swallowed it; and that when the fish was cut open the ring was found; and that on learning this the king of the Egyptians, it is said, declared in a kind of prophetic way that any man who had been exalted so highly in welfare would shortly come to no happy end of life; and indeed this is what happened, for he was captured by treachery by the satrap of the Persians and hanged. Anacreon the melic poet lived in companion­ship with Polycrates; and indeed the whole of his poetry is full of his praises. It was in his time, as we are told, that Pythagoras, seeing that the tyranny was growing in power, left the city and went off to Egypt and Babylon, to satisfy his fondness for learning; but when he came back and saw that the tyranny still endured, he set sail for Italy and lied there to the end of his life. So much for Polycrates.

17 Syloson was left a private citizen by his brother, but to gratify Dareius, the son of Hystaspes,  p219 he gave him a robe which Dareius desired when he saw him wearing it; and Dareius at that time was not yet king, but when Dareius became king, Syloson received as a return-gift the tyranny of Samos. But he ruled so harshly that the city became depopulated; and thence arose the proverb, "by the will of Syloson there is plenty of room."

18 The Athenians at first sent Pericles as general and with him Sophocles the poet, who by a siege put the disobedient Samians in bad plight; but later they sent two thousand allottees from their own people, among whom was Neocles, the father of Epicurus the philosopher, a schoolmaster as they call him. And indeed it is said that Epicurus grew up here and in Teos, and that he became an ephebus​28 at Athens, and that Menander the comic poet became an ephebus at the same time. Creophylus, also, was a Samian, who, it is said, once entertained Homer and received as a gift from him the inscription of the poem called The Capture of Oechalia. But Callimachus clearly indicates the contrary in an epigram of his, meaning that Creophylus composed the poem, but that it was ascribed to Homer because of the story of the hospitality shown him: "I am the toil of the Samian, who once entertained in his house the divine Homer. I bemoan Eurytus, for all that he suffered, and golden-haired Ioleia. I am called Homer's writing. For Creophylus, dear Zeus, this is a great achievement." 639 Some call Creophylus Homer's teacher, while others say that it was not Creophylus, but Aristeas the Proconnesian, who was his teacher.

 p221  19 Alongside Samos lies the island Icaria, whence was derived the name of the Icarian Sea. This island is named after Icarus the son of Daedalus, who, it is said, having joined his father in flight, both being furnished with wings, flew away from Crete and fell here, having lost control of their course; for, they add, on rising too close to the sun, his wings slipped off, since the wax​29 melted. The whole island is three hundred stadia in perimeter; it has no harbours, but only places of anchorage, the best of which is called Histi.​30 It has a promontory which extends towards the west. There is also on the island a temple of Artemis, called Tauropolium; and a small town Oenoê; and another small town Dracanum, bearing the same name as the promontory on which it is situated and having near by a place of anchorage. The promontory is eighty stadia distant from the promontory of the Samians called Cantharius, which is the shortest distance between the two. At the present time, however, it has but few inhabitants left, and is used by Samians mostly for the grazing of cattle.

20 After the Samian strait, near Mt. Mycalê, as one sails to Ephesus, one comes, on the right, to the seaboard of the Ephesians; and a part of this seaboard is held by the Samians. First on the seaboard is Panionium, lying three stadia about the sea where the Pan‑Ionia, a common festival of the Ionians, are held, and where sacrifices are performed in honour of the Heliconian Poseidon; and Prienians serve as priests at this sacrifice, but I have spoken of them in my account of the Peloponnesus.​31 Then comes Neapolis, which in earlier times belonged to  p223 the Ephesians, but now belongs to the Samians, who gave in exchange for it Marathesium, the more distant for the nearer place. Then comes Pygela, a small town, with a temple of Artemis Munychia, founded by Agamemnon and inhabited by a part of his troops; for it is said that some of his soldiers became afflicted with a disease of the buttocks​32 and were called diseased-buttocks," and that, being afflicted with this disease, they stayed there, and that the place thus received this appropriate name. Then comes the harbour called Panormus, with a temple of the Ephesian Artemis; and then the city Ephesus. On the same coast, slightly above the sea, is also Ortygia, which is a magnificent grove of all kinds of trees, of the cypress most of all. It is traversed by the Cenchrus River, where Leto is said to have bathed herself after her travail.​33 For here is the mythical scene of the birth, and of the nurse Ortygia, and of the holy place where the birth took place, and of the olive tree near by, where the goddess is said first to have taken a rest after she was relieved from her travail. 640 Above the grove lies Mt. Solmissus, where, it is said, the Curetes stationed themselves, and with the din of their arms frightened Hera out of her wits when she was jealously spying on Leto, and when they helped Leto to conceal from Hera the birth of her children. There are several temples in the place, some ancient and others built in later times; and in the ancient temples are many ancient wooden images, but in those of later times there are works of Scopas; for example, Leto holding a sceptre and Ortygia standing beside her with a  p225 child in each arm. A general festival is held there annually; and by a certain custom the youths vie for honour, particularly in the splendour of their banquets there. At that time, also, a special college of the Curetes holds symposiums and performs certain mystic sacrifices.

21 The city of Ephesus was inhabited both by Carians and by Leleges, but Androclus drove them out and settled the most of those who had come with him round the Athenaeum and the Hypelaeus, though he also included a part of the country situated on the slopes of Mt. Coressus. Now Ephesus was thus inhabited until the time of Croesus, but later the people came down from the mountainside and abode round the present temple until the time of Alexander. Lysimachus built a wall round the present city, but the people were not agreeably disposed to change their abodes to it; and therefore he waited for a downpour of rain and himself took advantage of it and blocked the sewers so as to inundate the city; and the inhabitants were then glad to make the change. He named the city after his wife Arsinoê; the old name, however, prevailed. There was a senate, which was conscripted; and with these were associated the Epicteti,​34 as they were called, who administered all the affairs of the city.

22 As for the temple of Artemis, its first architect was Chersiphron; and then another man made it larger. But when it was set on fire by a certain Herostratus, the citizens erected another and better one, having collected the ornaments of the women and their own individual belongings, and having sold also the pillars of the former temple. Testimony is borne to these facts by the decrees that were made  p227 at that time. Artemidorus says: Timaeus of Tauromenium, being ignorant of these decrees and being anyway an envious and slanderous fellow (for which reason he was also called Epitimaeus),​35 says that they exacted means for the restoration of the temple from the treasures deposited in their care by the Persians; but there were no treasures on deposit in their care at that time, and, even if there had been, they would have been burned along with the temple; and after the fire, when the roof was destroyed, who could have wished to keep deposits of treasure lying in a sacred enclosure that was open to the sky? 641 Now Alexander, Artemidorus adds, promised the Ephesians to pay all expenses, both past and future, on condition that he should have the credit therefor on the inscription, but they were unwilling, just as they would have been far more unwilling to acquire glory by sacrilege and a spoliation of the temple.​36 And Artemidorus praises the Ephesian who said to the king​37 that it was inappropriate for a god to dedicate offerings to gods.

23 After the completion of the temple, which, he says, was the work of Cheirocrates​38 (the same man who built Alexandreia and the same man who proposed to Alexander to fashion Mt. Athos into his likeness, representing him as pouring a libation from a kind of ewer into a broad bowl, and to make two cities, one on the right of the mountain and the other on the left, and a river flowing from one to  p229 the other) — after the completion of the temple, he says, the great number of dedications in general were secured by means of the high honour they paid their artists,​39 but the whole of the altar was filled, one might say, with the works of Praxiteles. They showed me also some of the works of Thrason, who made the chapel of Hecatê, the waxen image of Penelopê, and the old woman Eurycleia. They had eunuchs as priests, whom they called Megabyzi. And they were always in quest of persons from other places who were worthy of this preferment, and they held them in great honour. And it was obligatory for maidens to serve as colleagues with them in their priestly office. But though at the present time some of their usages are being preserved, yet others are not; but the temple remains a place of refuge, the same as in earlier times, although the limits of the refuge have often been changed; for example, when Alexander extended them for a stadium, and when Mithridates shot an arrow from the corner of the roof and thought it went a little farther than a stadium, and when Antony doubled this distance and included within the refuge a part of the city. But this extension of the refuge proved harmful, and put the city in the power of criminals; and it was therefore nullified by Augustus Caesar.

24 The city has both an arsenal and a harbour. The mouth of the harbour was made narrower by the engineers,​40 but they, along with the king who ordered it, were deceived as to the result, I mean Attalus Philadelphus; for he thought that the  p231 entrance would be deep enough for large merchant vessels — as also the harbour itself, which formerly had shallow places because of the silt deposited by the Caÿster River — if a mole were thrown up at the mouth, which was very wide, and therefore ordered that the mole should be built. But the result was the opposite, for the silt, thus hemmed in, made the whole of the harbour, as far as the mouth, more shallow. Before this time the ebb and flow of the tides would carry away the silt and draw it to the sea outside. Such, then, is the harbour; and the city, because of its advantageous situation in other respects, grows daily, and is the largest emporium in Asia 642 this side the Taurus.

25 Notable men have been born in this city: in ancient times, Heracleitus the Obscure, as he is called; and Hermodorus, concerning whom Heracleitus himself says: "It were right for the Ephesians from youth upwards to be hanged, who banished their most useful man, saying: 'Let no man of us be most useful; otherwise, let him be elsewhere and with other people.' " Hermodorus is reputed to have written certain laws for the Romans. And Hipponax the poet was from Ephesus; and so were Parrhasius the painter and Apelles, and more recently Alexander the orator, surnamed Lychnus,​41 who was a statesman, and wrote history, and left behind him poems in which he describes the position of the heavenly bodies and gives a geographic description of the continents, each forming the subject of a poem.

26 After the outlet of the Caÿster River comes  p233 a lake that runs inland from the sea, called Selinusia; and next comes another lake that is confluent with it, both affording great revenues. Of these revenues, though sacred, the kings deprived the goddess, but the Romans gave them back; and again the tax‑gatherers forcibly converted the tolls to their own use; but when Artemidorus was sent on an embassy, as he says, he got the lakes back for the goddess, and he also won the decision over Heracleotis, which was in revolt,​42 his case being decided at Rome; and in return for this the city erected in the temple a golden image of him. In the innermost recess of the lake there is a temple of a king, which is said to have been built by Agamemnon.

27 Then one comes to the mountain Gallesius, and to Colophon, an Ionian city, and to the sacred precinct of Apollo Clarius, where there was once an ancient oracle. The story is told that Calchas the prophet, with Amphilochus the son of Amphiaraüs, went there on foot on his return from Troy, and that having met near Clarus a prophet superior to himself, Mopsus, the son of Manto, the daughter of Teiresias, he died of grief. Now Hesiod​43 revises the myth as follows, making Calchas propound to Mopsus this question: "I am amazed in my heart at all these figs on this wild fig tree, small though it is; can you tell me the number?" And he makes Mopsus reply: "They are ten thousand in number, and their measure is a medimnus;​44 but there is one  p235 over, which you cannot put in the measure."​45 "Thus he spake," Hesiod adds, "and the number the measure could hold proved true. And then the eyes of Calchas were closed by the sleep of death." 643 But Pherecydes says that the question propounded by Calchas was in regard to a pregnant sow, how many pigs she carried, and that Mopsus said, "three, one of which is a female," and that when Mopsus proved to have spoken the truth, Calchas died of grief. Some say that Calchas propounded the question in regard to the sow, but that Mopsus propounded the question in regard to the wild fig tree, and that the latter spoke the truth but that the former did not, and died of grief, and in accordance with a certain oracle. Sophocles tells the oracle in his Reclaiming of Helen, that Calchas was destined to die when he met a prophet superior to himself, but he transfers the scene of the rivalry and of the death of Calchas to Cilicia. Such are the ancient stories.

28 The Colophonians once possessed notable naval and cavalry forces, in which latter they were so far superior to the others that wherever in wars that were hard to bring to an end, the cavalry of the Colophonians served as ally, the war came to an end; whence arose the proverb, "he put Colophon to it," which is quoted when a sure end is put to any affair.​b Native Colophonians, among those of whom we have record, were: Mimnermus, who was both a flute-player and elegiac poet; Xenophanes, the natural philosopher, who composed the "Silli"​46 in verse; and Pindar​47 speaks also of a certain  p237 Polymnastus as one of the famous musicians: "Thou knowest the voice, common to all, of Polymnastus the Colophonian." And some say that Homer was from there. On a straight voyage it is seventy stadia from Ephesus, but if one includes the sinuosities of the gulfs it is one hundred and twenty.

29 After Colophon one comes to the mountain Coracius and to an isle sacred to Artemis, whither deer, it has been believed, swim across and give birth to their young. Then comes Lebedus, which is one hundred and twenty stadia distant from Colophon. This is the meeting-place and settlement of all the Dionysiac artists in Ionia as far as the Hellespont; and this is the place where both games and a general festal assembly are held every year in honour of Dionysus. They formerly lived in Teos, the city of the Ionians that comes next after Colophon, but when the sedition broke out they fled for refuge to Ephesus. And when Attalus settled them in Myonnesus between Teos and Lebedus the Tëians sent an embassy to beg of the Romans not to permit Myonnesus to be fortified against them; and they migrated to Lebedus, whose inhabitants gladly received them because of the dearth of population by which they were then afflicted. Teos, also, is one hundred and twenty stadia distant from Lebedus; and in the intervening distance there is an island Aspis, by some called Arconnesus. And Myonnesus is settled on a height that forms a peninsula.

30 644 Teos also is situated on a peninsula; and it has a harbour. Anacreon the melic poet was from Teos; in whose time the Tëians abandoned their city and migrated to Abdera, a Thracian city, being unable to bear the insolence of the Persians; and  p239 hence the verse in reference to Abdera. "Abdera, beautiful colony of the Tëians." But some of them returned again in later times. As I have already said,​48 Apellicon also was a Tëian; and Hecataeus the historian was from the same city. And there is also another harbour to the north, thirty stadia distant from the city, called Gerrhaeïdae.

31 Then one comes to Chalcideis, and to the isthmus of the Chersonesus, belonging to the Tëians and Erythraeans. Now the latter people live this side the isthmus, but the Tëians and Clazomenians live on the isthmus itself; for the southern side of the isthmus, I mean the Chalcideis, is occupied by Tëians, but the northern by Clazomenians, where their territory joins the Erythraean. At the beginning of the isthmus lies the place called Hypocremnus, which lies between the Erythraean territory this side the isthmus and that of the Clazomenians on the other side. Above the Chalcideis is situated a sacred precinct consecrated to Alexander the son of Philip; and games, called the Alexandreia, are proclaimed by the general assembly of the Ionians and are celebrated there. The passage across the isthmus from the sacred precinct of Alexander and from the Chalcideis to Hypocremnus is fifty stadia, but the voyage round by sea is more than one thousand. Somewhere about the middle of the circuit is Erythrae, an Ionian city, which has a harbour, and also four isles lying off it, called Hippi.49

32 Before coming to Erythrae, one comes first to a small town Erae belonging to the Tëians; and then  p241 to Corycus, a high mountain, and to a harbour at the foot of it, Casystes, and to another harbour called Erythras, and to several others in order thereafter. The waters along the coast of Mt. Corycus, they say, were everywhere the haunt of pirates, the Corycaeans, as they are called, who had found a new way of attacking vessels; for, they say, the Corycaeans would scatter themselves among the harbours, follow up the merchants whose vessels lay at anchor in them, and overhear what cargoes they had aboard and whither they were bound, and then come together and attack the merchants after they had put to sea and plunder their vessels; and hence it is that we call every person who is a busybody and tries to overhear private and secret conversations a Corycaean; and that we say in a proverb: "Well then, the Corycaean was listening to this," when one thinks that he is doing or saying something in secret, but fails to keep it hidden because of persons who spy on him and are eager to learn what does not concern them.

33 After Mt. Corycus one comes to Halonnesos, a small island. Then to Argennum, 645 a promontory of the Erythraean territory; it is very close to the Poseidium of the Chians, which latter forms a strait about sixty stadia in width. Between Erythrae and Hypocremnus lies Mimas, a lofty mountain, which is well supplied with game and well wooded. Then one comes to a village Cybelia, and to a promontory Melaena, as it is called, which has a millstone quarry.

34 Erythrae was the native city of Sibylla, a woman who was divinely inspired and had the gift of prophecy, one of the ancients. And in the time of Alexander there was another woman who likewise  p243 had the gift of prophecy; she was called Athenaïs, and was a native of the same city. And, in my time, Heracleides the Herophileian physician, fellow-pupil of Apollonius Mys,​50 was born there.

35 As for Chios, the voyage round it along the coast is nine hundred stadia; and it has a city with a good port and with a naval station for eighty ships. On making the voyage round it from the city, with the island on the right, one comes first to the Poseidium. Then to Phanae, a deep harbour, and to a temple of Apollo and a grove of palm trees. Then to Notium, a shore suited to the anchoring of vessels. Then to Laïus, this too a shore suited to the anchoring of vessels: whence to the city there is an isthmus of sixty stadia, but the voyage round, which I have just now described, is three hundred and sixty stadia. Then to Melaena, a promontory, opposite to which lies Psyra, an island fifty stadia distant from the promontory, lofty, and having a city of the same name. The circuit of the island is forty stadia. Then one comes to Ariusia, a rugged and harbourless country, about thirty stadia in extent, which produces the best of the Grecian wines. Then to Pelinaeus, the highest mountain in the island. And the island also has a marble quarry. Famous natives of Chios are: Ion the tragic poet, and Theopompus the historian, and Theocritus the sophist. The two latter were political opponents of one another. The Chians also claim Homer, setting forth as strong testimony that the men called Homeridae were descendants of Homer's family; these are mentioned by Pindar:51  p245 "Whence also the Homeridae, singers of deftly woven lays, most often . . . ." The Chians at one time possessed also a fleet, and attained to liberty and to maritime empire. The distance from Chios to Lesbos, sailing southwards, is about four hundred stadia.

36 After Hypocremnus one comes to Chytrium, the site on which Clazomenae was situated in earlier times. Then to the present Clazomenae, with eight small islands lying off it that are under cultivation. Anaxagoras, the natural philosopher, an illustrious man and associate of Anaximenes the Milesian, was a Clazomenian. And Archelaüs the natural philosopher and Euripides the poet took his entire course. Then to a temple of Apollo and to hot springs, and to the gulf and the city of the Smyrnaeans.

37 646 Next one comes to another gulf, on which is the old Smyrna, twenty stadia distant from the present Smyrna. After Smyrna had been rased by the Lydians, its inhabitants continued for about four hundred years to live in villages. Then they were reassembled into a city by Antigonus, and afterwards by Lysimachus, and their city is now the most beautiful of all; a part of it is on a mountain and walled, but the greater part of it is in the plain near the harbour and near the Metroüm and near the gymnasium. The division into streets is exceptionally good, in straight lines as far as possible; and the streets are paved with stone; and there are large quadrangular porticoes, with both lower and upper stories. There is also a library; and the Homereium, a quadrangular portico containing a shrine and wooden statue​52 of Homer; for the  p247 Smyrnaeans also lay especial claim to the poet; and indeed a bronze coin of theirs is called Homereium. The River Meles flows near the walls; and, in addition to the rest of the city's equipment, there is also a harbour that can be closed. But there is one error, not a small one, in the work of the engineers, that when they paved the streets they did not give them under­ground drainage; instead, filth covers the surface, and particularly during rains, when the cast‑off filth is discharged upon the streets. It was here that Dolabella captured by siege, and slew, Trebonius, one of the men who treacherously murdered the deified Caesar; and he set free​53 many parts of the city.

38 After Smyrna one comes to Leucae, a small town, which after the death of Attalus Philometor​54 was caused to revolt by Aristonicus, who was reputed to belong to the royal family and intended to usurp the kingdom. Now he was banished from Smyrna, after being defeated in a naval battle near the Cymaean territory by the Ephesians, but he went up into the interior and quickly assembled a large number of resourceless people, and also of slaves, invited with a promise of freedom, whom he called Heliopolitae.​55 Now he first fell upon Thyateira unexpectedly, and then got possession of Apollonis, and then set his efforts against other fortresses. But he did not last long; the cities immediately sent a large number of troops against him, and they were assisted by Nicomedes the Bithynian and by the kings of the Cappadocians. Then came five Roman  p249 ambassadors, and after that an army under Publius Crassus the consul,​56 and after that Marcus Perpernas,º who brought the war to an end, having captured Aristonicus alive and sent him to Rome. Now Aristonicus ended his life in prison; Perpernas died of disease; and Crassus, attacked by certain people in the neighbourhood of Leucae, fell in battle. And Manius Aquillius came over as consul​57 with ten lieutenants and organised the province into the form of government that still now endures. 647 After Leucae one comes to Phocaea, on a gulf, concerning which I have already spoken in my account of Massalia.​c Then to the boundaries of the Ionians and the Aeolians; but I have already spoken of these. In the interior above the Ionian seaboard there remain to be described the places in the neighbourhood of the road that leads from Ephesus to Antiocheia and the Maeander River. These places are occupied by Lydians and Carians mixed with Greeks.

39 The first city one comes to after Ephesus is Magnesia, which is an Aeolian city and is called "Magnesia on the Maeander," for it is situated near that river. But it is much nearer the Lethaeus River, which empties into the Maeander and has its beginning in Mt. Pactyes, the mountain in the territory of the Ephesians. There is another Lethaeus in Gortyna, and another near Triccê, where Asclepius is said to have been born, and still another in the country of the Western Libyans. And the city lies in the plain near the mountain called Thorax, on which Daphitas the grammarian is said to have been crucified, because he reviled the kings in a distich:  p251 "Purpled with stripes, mere filings of the treasure of Lysimachus, ye rule the Lydians and Phrygia." It is said that an oracle was given out that Daphitas should be on his guard against Thorax.

40 The Magnetans are thought to be descendants of Delphians who settled in the Didyman hills, in Thessaly, concerning whom Hesiod says: "Or as the unwedded virgin who, dwelling on the holy Didyman hills, in the Dotian Plain, in front of Amyrus, bathed her foot in Lake Boebeïs."​58 Here was also the temple of Dindymenê, Mother of the gods. According to tradition, the wife of Themistocles, some say his daughter, served as a priestess here. But the temple is not now in existence, because the city has been transferred to another site. In the present city is the temple of Artemis Leucophryenê, which in the size of its shrine and in the number of its votive offerings is inferior to the temple at Ephesus, but in the harmony and skill shown in the structure of the sacred enclosure is far superior to it. And in size it surpasses all the sacred enclosures in Asia except two, that at Ephesus and that at Didymi. In ancient times, also, it came to pass that the Magnetans were utterly destroyed by the Treres, a Cimmerian tribe, although they had for a long time been a prosperous people, but the Milesians took possession of the place in the following year. Now Callinus mentions the Magnetans as still being a prosperous people and as being successful in their war against the Ephesians, but Archilochus is obviously already aware of the  p253 misfortune that befell them: "to bewail the woes of the Thasians, not those of the Magnetans";​59 648 whence one may judge that he was more recent than Callinus. And Callinus recalls another, and earlier, invasion of the Cimmerians when he says: "And now the army of the Cimmerians, mighty in deeds, advanceth,"​60 in which he plainly indicates the capture of Sardeis.

41 Well-known natives of Magnesia are: Hegesias the orator, who, more than any other, initiated the Asiatic style, as it is called, whereby he corrupted the established Attic custom; and Simus the melic poet, he too a man who corrupted the style handed down by the earlier melic poets and introduced the Simoedia,​61 just as that style was corrupted still more by the Lysioedi and the Magoedi, and by Cleomachus the pugilist, who, having fallen in love with a certain cinaedus​62 and with a young female slave who was kept as a prostitute by the cinaedus, imitated the style of dialects and mannerisms that was in vogue among the cinaedi. Sotades was the first man to write the talk of the cinaedi; and then Alexander the Aetolian. But though these two men imitated that talk in mere speech, Lysis accompanied it with song; and so did Simus, who was still earlier than he. As for Anaxenor, the citharoede,​63 the theatres exalted him, but Antony exalted him all he possibly could, since he even appointed him exactor of tribute from four cities, giving him a body-guard of soldiers.  p255 Further, his native land greatly increased his honours, having clad him in purple as consecrated to Zeus Sosipolis,​64 as is plainly indicated in his painted image in the market-place. And there is also a bronze statue of him in the theatre, with the inscription, "Surely this is a beautiful thing, to listen to a singer such as this man is, like unto the gods in voice."​65 But the engraver, missing his guess, left out the last letter of the second verse, the base of the statue not being wide enough for its inclusion; so that he laid the city open to the charge of ignorance, because of the ambiguity of the writing, as to whether the last word should be taken in the nominative case or in the dative;​66 for many write the dative case without the iota, and even reject the ordinary usage as being without natural cause.

42 After Magnesia comes the road to Tralleis, with Mt. Mesogis on the left, and, at the road itself and on the right, the plain of the Maeander River, which is occupied by Lydians and Carians, and by Ionians, both Milesians and Myesians, and also by the Aeolians of Magnesia. And the same kind of topographical account applies as far as Nysa and Antiocheia. The city of the Tralleians is situated upon a trapezium-shaped site, with a height fortified by nature; 649 and the places all round are well defended. And it is as well peopled as any other city in Asia by people of means; and always some of its men hold the chief places in the province, being called Asiarchs.  p257 Among these was Pythodorus, originally a native of Nysa, but he changed his abode to Tralleis because of its celebrity; and with only a few others he stood out conspicuously as a friend of Pompey. And he came into possession of the wealth of a king, worth more than two thousand talents, which, though sold by the deified Caesar, was redeemed by him through his friendship with Pompey and was left by him unimpaired to his children. He was the father of Pythodoris, the present queen in Pontus, of whom I have already spoken.​67 Pythodorus, then, flourished in my time, as also Menodorus, a man of learning, and otherwise august and grave, who held the priesthood of Zeus Larisaeus. But he was overthrown by a counter-party friendly to Dometiusº Ahenobarbus; and Dometius, relying on his informers, slew him, as guilty of causing the fleet to revolt. Here were born famous orators: Dionysocles and afterwards Damasus Scombrus. Tralleis is said to have been founded by Argives and by certain Tralleian Thracians, and hence the name. And the city was ruled for a short time by tyrants, the sons of Cratippus, at the time of the Mithridatic war.

43 Nysa is situated near Mt. Mesogis, for the most part lying upon its slopes; and it is a double city, so to speak, for it is divided by a torrential stream that forms a gorge, which at one place has a bridge over it, joining the two cities, and at another is adorned with an amphitheatre, with a hidden under­ground passage for the torrential waters. Near the theatre are two heights, below one of which is the gymnasium of youths; and below the other is the market-place and the gymnasium for  p259 older persons. The plain lies to the south of the city, as it does to the south of Tralleis.

44 On the road between the Tralleis and Nysa is a village of the Nysaeans, not far from the city, Acharaca, where is the Plutonium, with a costly sacred precinct and a shrine of Pluto and Corê, and also the Charonium, a cave that lies but also the sacred precinct, by nature wonderful; for they say that those who are diseased and give heed to the cures prescribed by the god resort thither and live in the village near the cave among experienced priests, who on their behalf sleep in the cave and through dreams prescribe the cures. These are also the men who invoke the healing power of the gods. And they often bring the sick into the cave and leave them there, to remain in quiet, like animals in their lurking-holes, without food for many days. 650 And sometimes the sick give heed also to their own dreams, but still they use those other men, as priests, to initiate them into the mysteries and to counsel them. To all others the place is forbidden and deadly. A festival is celebrated every year at Acharaca; and at that time in particular those who celebrate the festival can see and hear concerning all these things; and at the festival, too, about noon, the boys and young men of the gymnasium, nude and anointed with oil, take up a bull and with haste carry him up into the cave; and, when let loose, the bull goes forward a short distance, falls, and breathes out his life.

 p261  45 Thirty stadia from Nysa, after one crosses over Mt. Tmolus and the mountain called Mesogis, towards the region to the south of the Mesogis,​68 there is a place called Leimon,​69 whither the Nysaeans and all the people about go to celebrate their festivals. And not far from Leimon is an entrance into the earth sacred to the same gods, which is said to extend down as far as Acharaca. The poet is said to name this meadow when he says, "On the Asian meadow"; and they point out a hero-temple of Caÿster and a certain Asius, and the Caÿster River that streams forth near by.

46 The story is told that three brothers, Athymbrus and Athymbradus and Hydrelus, who came from Lacedaemon, founded the three cities which were named after them, but that the cities later became scantily populated, and that the city Nysa was founded by their inhabitants; but that Athymbrus is now regarded by Nysaeans as their original founder.

47 Near Nysa, on the far side of the Maeander River, are situated noteworthy settlements; I mean Coscinia and Orthosia; and this side the river, Briula, Mastaura, and Acharaca, and above the city, on the mountain, Aroma (in which the letter rho70 is short), whence comes the best Mesogitan wine, I mean the Aromian.

 p263  48 Famous men born at Nysa are: Apollonius the Stoic philosopher, best of the disciples of Panaetius; and Menecrates, pupil of Aristarchus; and Aristodemus, his son, whose entire course, in his extreme old age, I in my youth took at Nysa; and Sostratus, the brother of Aristodemus, and another Aristodemus, his cousin, who trained Pompey the Great, proved themselves notable grammarians. But my teacher also taught rhetoric and had two schools, both in Rhodes and in his native land, teaching rhetoric in the morning and grammar in the evening; at Rome, however, when he was in charge of the children of Pompey the Great, he was content with the teaching of grammar.


The Editor's Notes:

1 For map of Asia Minor, see Vol. V (at end).

2 12.1.3.

3 A fragment (Bergk 10) otherwise unknown.

4 8.7.1.

5 Frag. 2 (Bergk).

6 Frag. 44 (Bergk).

7 i.e. in the territory "behind Lepra."

8 i.e. "Rugged" country.

9 A fountain.

10 Frag. 9 (Bergk).

11 i.e. at Didyma. On this temple see Herod. 1.46, 5.36, 6.19.

12 i.e. a "healed wound"; also a "scar."

13 i.e. "safe and sound."

14 The Sun‑god.

15 The Moon-goddess.

16 Literally "physiology," which again shows the perversion of Greek scientific names in English (cf. Vol. I, p27, footnote 2).

17 Iliad 2.868.

18 See 14.2.22.

19 Or rather, perhaps, "and in sight of it" (see critical note).

The critical note to the Greek text, after ὑπέρκειται δὲ ταύτης ἐν ὕψει, reads:

For ὕψει Groskurd conj. ὄψει, and Meineke so reads.

20 §§ 39‑40 following.

21 The isle of Samos.

22 Frag. 79 (Bergk).

23 i.e. the city Samos.

24 Whether maps or paintings, or both, the translator does not know.

25 See 13.1.30.

26 See 10.2.17.

27 See Herodotus, 3.40‑43, and 120, 125.

28 i.e. at eighteen years of age underwent a "scrutiny" and was registered as an Athenian citizen.

29 i.e. the wax which joined the wings to his body.

30 i.e. Masts.

31 8.7.2.

32 In Greek, with "pygalgia."

33 Referring, of course, to the birth of Apollo and Artemis.

34 Men specially summoned, privy-councillors.

35 Calumniator.

36 Referring, of course, to the charge that they took the Persian treasures.

37 Alexander.

38 Apparently an error for "Deinocrates," a Macedonian architect (cf. Vitruvius 1.1.14).

Thayer's Note: No consensus; Plutarch, who adds several interesting details (Life of Alexander, LXXII.5‑8), calls him Stasicrates — or at least his MSS. do.

39 Artemidorus means, of course, that the local artists were actuated by piety and patriotism.

40 Literally, "architects."

41 i.e. Lamp.

42 i.e. from Ephesus.

43 Frag. 160 (Rzach).

44 About a bushel and a half.

45 i.e. the measure would hold only 999 of these figs.

46 Satires, or lampoons, attacking Homer and Hesiod.

47 Frag. 188 (Bergk).

48 13.1.54.

49 i.e. Horses.

50 Mus, i.e. Mouse.

51 Nemean Odes 2.1.

52 The primary meaning of the Greek word here used for "statue," xoanon, is "a prehistoric statue carved of wood."

53 Others translate the verbº "destroyed," or the like, but cf. its use in 8.6.14 and Herodotus 1.149.

54 See 13.4.2.

55 Citizens of the city of Helius (Sun‑god).

56 131 B.C.

57 129 B.C.

58 Also quoted in 9.5.22.

59 Frag. 20 (Bergk).

60 Frag. 3 (Bergk).

61 A loose song.

62 An obscene talker.

Thayer's Note: No.

The word, originally denoting a type of dancer, almost invariably means an effeminate male who engages in homosexual acts, especially as the passive partner in sodomy (Gell. III.5, VI.12; Suet. Aug. 68; Catullus, passim (esp. 16, 25, 29); Firmicus Maternus, (very frequently: Books VII, VIII, III, VI). By a natural association, the word also migrated to a species of fish: Mair's note on Oppian (Halieutica, Introduction, p. l) is instructive.

What this particular cinaedus was doing with a female prostitute is a bit of mystery — maybe she was a source of income, or a confidante in a marginal world — but there's no accounting for tastes. As for Cleomachus, there's plenty of kink to go around. His literary work recorded the gay cant of his time: a pity it's lost.

63 One who played the cithara and sang to its accompaniment (cf. 9.3.10 and note on "the citharoedes").

64 City-Saviour.

65 Odyssey 9.3.

66 i.e. as ΑΥΔΗ or ΑΥΔΗΙ.

Thayer's Note: the subscript iota — which in the capital letters of inscriptions is written out as a full letter — had long been silent.

67 12.3.293137.

68 The text, which seems to be corrupt, is recast and emended by Groskurd to read, "having crossed the Mesogis towards the region to the south of Tmolus." But the simple rectification of the text made by the present translator solves the difficulty quite as well (see critical note).

The critical note to the Greek text (ὑπερβᾶσι Τμῶλον καὶ τὸ ὄρος τὴν Μεσωγίδα ἐπὶ τὰ πρὸς τὸν νότον) reads:

καί, before τὸ ὄρος, Jones inserts. E reads τὸ ὄρος καὶ τὴν Μεσωγίδα.

69 i.e. meadow.

70 Apparently an error for "in which name the letter omega is shortened to omicron" (cp. the well-known Greek word Arōma, which may mean either "spice" or "arable land").


Thayer's Notes:

a The particle δ’ that articulates this clause to what precedes can often enough be left untranslated, but the word "Ampelus" in the preceding sentence means "grape-vine": it would have been better to translate "Yet the island does not produce good wine".

b Smacks of folk-etymology, but just the same, it's the origin of our word colophon, as in the printer's mark at the end of a book.

c Strabo's passage on Massalia (Massilia) is in 4.1.4‑5; Phocaea is mentioned there, but only incidentally in connection with the founding of her colony. Nowhere in the Geography does Strabo describe Phocaea.


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