Pausanias: Description of Greece Book 10 - Phocis 32-38

[10.32.1] XXXII. Adjoining the sacred enclosure is a theater worth seeing, and on coming up from the enclosure…and here is an image of Dionysus, dedicated by the Cnidians. The Delphian race-course is on the highest part of their city. It was made of the stone that is most common about Parnassus, until Herodes the Athenian rebuilt it of Pentelic marble. Such in my day the objects remaining in Delphi that are worth recording.

[10.32.2] On the way from Delphi to the summit of Parnassus, about sixty stades distant from Delphi, there is a bronze image. The ascent to the Corycian cave is easier for an active walker than it is for mules or horses. I mentioned a little earlier in my narrative51 that this cave was named after a nymph called Corycia, and of all the caves I have ever seen this seemed to me the best worth seeing.

[10.32.3] It would be impossible to discover even the mere number of caves whose entrances face the beach or the deep sea, but the most famous ones in Greek or in foreign lands are the following. The Phrygians on the river Pencelas, and those who came to this land originally from the Azanians in Arcadia, show visitors a cave called Steunos, which is round, and handsome in its loftiness. It is sacred to the Mother, and there is an image of her.

[10.32.4] Themisonium above Laodiceia is also inhabited by Phrygians. When the army of the Gauls was laying waste Ionia and the borders of Ionia, the Themisonians say that they were helped by Heracles, Apollo and Hermes, who revealed to their magistrates in dreams a cave, and commanded that in it should be hidden the Themisonians with their wives and children.

[10.32.5] This is the reason why in front of the cave they have set up small images, called Gods of the Cave, of Heracles, Hermes and Apollo. The cave is some thirty stades distant from the city, and in it are springs of water. There is no entrance to it, the sunlight does not reach very far, and the greater part of the roof lies quite close to the floor.

[10.32.6] There is also near Magnesia on the river Lethaeus a place called Aulae (Halls), where there is a cave sacred to Apollo, not very remarkable for its size, but the image of Apollo is very old indeed, and bestows strength equal to any task. The men sacred to the god leap down from sheer precipices and high rocks, and uprooting trees of exceeding height walk with their burdens down the narrowest of paths.

[10.32.7] But the Corycian cave exceeds in size those I have mentioned, and it is possible to make one's way through the greater part of it even without lights. The roof stands at a sufficient height from the floor, and water, rising in part from springs but still more dripping from the roof, has made clearly visible the marks of drops on the floor throughout the cave. The dwellers around Parnassus believe it to be sacred to the Corycian nymphs, and especially to Pan. From the Corycian cave it is difficult even for an active walker to reach the heights of Parnassus. The heights are above the clouds, and the Thyiad women rave there in honor of Dionysus and Apollo.

[10.32.8] Tithorea is, I should guess, about one hundred and eighty stades distant from Delphi on the road across Parnassus. This road is not mountainous throughout, being fit even for vehicles, but was said to be several stades longer. I am aware that Herodotus52 in his account of the Persian invasion gives the town a different name from that given to it in the oracles of Bacis.

[10.32.9] For Bacis called the inhabitants Tithoreans, but the account of them in Herodotus states that during the advance of the barbarian the people dwelling here fled up to the summit, and that the city's name was Neon, Tithorea being the name of the peak of Parnassus. It appears, then, that at first Tithorea was the name applied to the whole district; but in course of time, when the people migrated from the villages, the city too came to be called Tithorea, and not Neon any longer. The natives say that Tithorea was so called after a nymph of the same name, one of those who in days of old, according to the story of the poets, grew out of trees and especially out of oaks.

[10.32.10] One generation before I was born heaven made the fortunes of Tithorea decay. There are the buildings of a theater, and the enclosure of a rather ancient market-place. The most noteworthy objects in the city are the grove, temple and image of Athena. There is also the tomb of Antiope and Phocus. I have already in my account of Thebes mentioned53 how Antiope went mad because of the wrath of Dionysus, and the reason why she brought on herself the anger of the god;

[10.32.11] I have also told how Phocus, the son of Ornytion, fell in love with her, how she married him and is buried with him, and what Bacis the soothsayer says about this grave in common with that of Zethus and Amphion at Thebes. I found nothing else remarkable in the town except what I have already mentioned. Running past the city of Tithorea is a river that gives the inhabitants drinking-water. They go down to the bank and draw the water up. The name of the river is Cachales.

[10.32.12] Seventy stades distant from Tithorea is a temple of Asclepius, called Archagetas (Founder). He receives divine honors from the Tithoreans, and no less from the other Phocians. Within the precincts are dwellings for both the suppliants of the god and his servants. In the middle is the temple of the god and an image made of stone, having a beard more than two feet long. A couch is set on the right of the image. It is usual to sacrifice to the god any animal except the goat.

[10.32.13] About forty stades distant from Asclepius is a precinct and shrine sacred to Isis, the holiest of all those made by the Greeks for the Egyptian goddess. For the Tithoreans think it wrong to dwell round about it, and no one may enter the shrine except those whom Isis herself has honored by inviting them in dreams. The same rule is observed in the cities above the Maeander by the gods of the lower world; for to all whom they wish to enter their shrines they send visions seen in dreams.

[10.32.14] In the country of the Tithoreans a festival in honor of Isis is held twice each year, one in spring and the other in autumn. On the third day before each of the feasts those who have permission to enter cleanse the shrine in a certain secret way, and also take and bury, always in the same spot, whatever remnants they may find of the victims thrown in at the previous festival. We estimated that the distance from the shrine to this place was two stades.

[10.32.15] So on this day they perform these acts about the sanctuary, and on the next day the small traders make themselves booths of reeds or other improvised material. On the last of the three days they hold a fair, selling slaves, cattle of all kinds, clothes, silver and gold.

[10.32.16] After mid-day they turn to sacrificing. The more wealthy sacrifice oxen and deer, the poorer people geese and guinea fowl. But it is not the custom to use for the sacrifice sheep, pigs or goats. Those whose business it is to burn the victims54 and send them into the shrine . . . having made a beginning must wrap the victims in bandages of coarse or fine linen; the mode of preparing is the Egyptian.

[10.32.17] All that they have devoted to sacrifice are led in procession; some send the victims into the shrine,while others burn the booths before the shrine and themselves go away in haste. They say that once a profane man, who was not one of those descending into the shrine, when the pyre began to burn, entered the shrine to satisfy his rash inquisitiveness. It is said that everywhere he saw ghosts, and on returning to Tithorea and telling what he had seen he departed this life.

[10.32.18] I have heard a similar story from a man of Phoenicia, that the Egyptians hold the feast for Isis at a time when they say she is mourning for Osiris. At this time the Nile begins to rise, and it is a saying among many of the natives that what makes the river rise and water their fields is the tears of Isis. At that time then, so said my Phoenician, the Roman governor of Egypt bribed a man to go down into the shrine of Isis in Coptus. The man despatched into the shrine returned indeed out of it, but after relating what he had seen, he too, so I was told, died immediately. So it appears that Homer's verse55 speaks the truth when it says that it bodes no good to man to see godhead face to face.

[10.32.19] The olive oil of Tithorea is less abundant than Attic or Sicyonian oil, but in color and pleasantness it surpasses Iberian oil and that from the island of Istria. They distil all manner of unguents from the oil, and also send it to the Emperor.

[10.33.1] XXXIII. Another road from Tithorea is the one that leads to Ledon. Once Ledon also was considered a city, but in my day the Ledontians owing to their weakness had abandoned the city, and the dwellers on the Cephisus were about seventy people. Still the name of Ledon is given to their dwellings, and the citizens, like the Panopeans, have the right to be represented at the general assembly of the Phocians. The ruins of the ancient Ledon are forty stades farther up from these dwellers on the Cephisus. They say that the city took its name from an aboriginal.

[10.33.2] Other cities have incurred incurable harm through the sin of their own citizens, hut Troy's ruin was complete when it fell through the outrage that Alexander committed against Menelaus, and Miletus through the lack of control shown by Histiaeus, and his passionate desire, now to possess the city in the land of the Edonians, now to be admitted to the councils of Dareius, and now to go back to Ionia. Again, Philomelus brought on the community of Ledon the punishment to be paid for the crime of his own impiety.

[10.33.3] Lilaea is a winter day's journey distant from Delphi; we estimated the length of the road, which goes across and down Parnassus, to be one hundred and eighty stades. Even after their city had been restored, its inhabitants were fated to suffer a second disaster at the hands of the Macedonians. Besieged by Philip, the son of Demetrius, they made terms and surrendered, and a garrison was brought into the city, until a native of the city, whose name was Patron, united against the garrison those of the citizens who were of military age, conquered the Macedonians in battle, and forced them to withdraw under a truce. In return for this good deed the Lilaeans dedicated his statue at Delphi.

[10.33.4] In Lilaea are also a theater, a market-place and baths. There is also a sanctuary of Apollo, and one of Artemis. the images are standing, of Attic workmanship, and of marble from the Pentelic quarries. They say that Lilaea was one of the Naids, as they are called, a daughter of the Cephisus, and that after this nymph the city was named. Here the river has its source.

[10.33.5] It is not always quiet when it rises from the ground, but it usually happens that at about mid-day it makes a noise as it wells up. You could compare the roar of the water to the bellowing of a bull. Lilaea has a temperate climate in autumn, in summer, and in spring; but Mount Parnassus prevents the winter from being correspondingly mild.

[10.33.6] Charadra is twenty stades distant, situated on the top of a lofty crag. The inhabitants are badly off for water; their drinking water is the river Charadrus, and they have to go down about three stades to reach it. This river is a tributary of the Cephisus, and it seems to me that the town was named after the Charadrus. In the market-place at Charadra are altars of Heroes, as they are called, said by some to be the Dioscuri, by others to be local heroes.

[10.33.7] The land beside the Cephisus is distinctly the best in Phocis for planting, sowing and pasture. This part of the district, too, is the one most under cultivation, so that there is a saying that the verse,

  And they who dwelt beside the divine river Cephisus, Hom. Il. 2.522

alludes, not to a city Parapotamii (Riverside), but to the farmers beside the Cephisus.

[10.33.8] The saying, however, is at variance with the history of Herodotus56 as well as with the records of victories at the Pythian games. For the Pythian games were first held by the Amphictyons, and at this first meeting a Parapotamian of the name of Aechmeas won the prize in the boxing match for boys. Similarly Herodotus, enumerating the cities that King Xerxes burnt in Phocis, includes among them the city of Parapotamii. However, Parapotamii was not restored by the Athenians and Boeotians, but the inhabitants, being poverty stricken and few in number, were distributed among the other cities. I found no ruins of Parapotamii left, nor is the site of the city remembered.

[10.33.9] The road from Lilaea to Amphicleia is sixty stades. The name of this Amphicleia has been corrupted by the native inhabitants. Herodotus, following the most ancient account, called it Amphicaea; but the Amphictyons, when they published their decree for the destruction of the cities in Phocis, gave it the name of Amphicleia. The natives tell about it the following story. A certain chief, suspecting that enemies were plotting against his baby son, put the child in a vessel, and hid him in that part of the land where he knew there would be most security. Now a wolf attacked the child, but a serpent coiled itself round the vessel, and kept up a strict watch.

[10.33.10] When the child's father came, supposing that the serpent had purposed to attack the child, he threw his javelin, which killed the serpent and his son as well. But being informed by the shepherds that he had killed the benefactor and protector of his child, he made one common pyre for both the serpent and his son. Now they say that even to-day the place resembles a burning pyre, maintaining that after this serpent the city was called Ophiteia.

[10.33.11] They celebrate orgies, well worth seeing, in honor of Dionysus, but there is no entrance to the shrine, nor have they any image that can be seen. The people of Amphicleia say that this god is their prophet and their helper in disease. The diseases of the Amphicleans themselves and of their neighbors are cured by means of dreams. The oracles of the god are given by the priest, who utters them when under the divine inspiration.

[10.33.12] Fifteen stades away from Amphicleia is Tithronium, lying on a plain. It contains nothing remarkable. From Tithronium it is twenty stades to Drymaea. At the place where this road joins at the Cephisus the straight road from Amphicleia to Drymaea,57 the Tithronians have a grove and altars of Apollo. There has also been made a temple, but no image.

Drymaea is eighty stades distant from Amphicleia, on the left . . . according to the account in Herodotus,58 but in earlier days Naubolenses. The inhabitants say that their founder was Naubolus, son of Phocus, son of Aeacus. At Drymaea is an ancient sanctuary of Demeter Lawgiver, with a standing image made of stone. Every year they hold a feast in her honor, the Thesmophoria.

[10.34.1] XXXIV. Elateia is, with the exception of Delphi, the largest city in Phocis. It lies over against Amphicleia, and the road to it from Amphicleia is one hundred and eighty stades long, level for the most part, but with an upward gradient for a short distance quite close to the town of Elateia. In the plain flows the Cephisus, and the most common bird to live along its banks is the bustard.

[10.34.2] The Elateans were successful in repelling the Macedonian army under Cassander, and they managed to escape from the war that Taxilus, general of Mithridates, brought against them. In return for this deed the Romans have given them the privilege of living in the country free and immune from taxation. They claim to be of foreign stock, saying that of old they came from Arcadia. For they say that when the Phlegyans marched against the sanctuary at Delphi, Elatus, the son of Arcas, came to the assistance of the god, and with his army stayed behind in Phocis, becoming the founder of Elateia.

[10.34.3] Elateia must be numbered among the cities of the Phocians burnt by the Persians. Some disasters were shared by Elateia with the other Phocians, but she had peculiar calamities of her own, inflicted by fate at the hands of the Macedonians. In the war waged by Cassander, it is Olympiodorus who must receive most credit for the Macedonians being forced to abandon a siege. Philip, the son of Demetrius, reduced the people of Elateia to the utmost terror, and at the same time seduced by bribery the more powerful of the citizens.

[10.34.4] Titus, the Roman governor, who had a commission from Rome to give all Greeks their freedom, promised to give back to Elateia its ancient constitution, and by messengers made overtures to its citizens to secede from Macedonia. But either they or their government were stupid enough to be faithful to Philip, and the Romans reduced them by siege. Later on the Elateans held out when besieged by the barbarians of Pontus under the command of Taxilus, the general of Mithridates. As a reward for this deed the Romans gave them their freedom.

[10.34.5] An army of bandits, called the Costoboes, who overran Greece in my day, visited among other cities Elateia. Whereupon a certain Mnesibulus gathered round him a company of men and put to the sword many of the barbarians, but he himself fell in the fighting. This Mnesibulus won several prizes for running, among which were prizes for the foot-race, and for the double race with shield, at the two hundred and thirty-fifth Olympic festival.59 In Runner Street at Elateia there stands a bronze statue of Mnesibulus.

[10.34.6] The market-place itself is worth seeing, and so is the figure of Elatus carved in relief upon a slab. I do not know for certain whether they made the slab to honor him as their founder or merely to serve as a gravestone to his tomb. A temple has been built to Asclepius, with a bearded image of the god. The names of the makers of the image are Timocles and Timarchides, artists of Attic birth. At the end of the city on the right is a theater, and an ancient bronze image of Athena. They say that this goddess helped them against the barbarians under Taxilus.

[10.34.7] About twenty stades away from Elateia is a sanctuary of Athena surnamed Cranaea. The road to it slopes upwards, but so gentle is the ascent that it causes no fatigue – in fact one scarcely notices it. At the end of the road is a hill which, though for the most part precipitous, is neither very large nor very high. On this hill the sanctuary has been built, with porticoes and dwellings through them, where live those whose duty it is to wait on the god, chief of whom is the priest.

[10.34.8] They choose the priest from boys who have not yet reached the age of puberty, taking care beforehand that his term of office shall run out before puberty arrives. The office lasts for five successive years, during which the priest boards with the goddess, and bathes in tubs after the ancient manner. This image too was made by the sons of Polycles. It is armed as for battle, and on the shield is wrought in relief a copy of what at Athens is wrought on the shield of her whom the Athenians call the Virgin. ABAE

[10.35.1] XXXV. To reach Abae and Hyampolis from Elateia you may go along a mountain road on the right of the city of Elateia, but the highway from Orchomenus to Opus also leads to those cities. If then you go along the road from Orchomenus to Opus, and turn off a little to the left, you reach the road to Abae. The people of Abae say that they came to Phocis from Argos, and that the city got its name from Abas, the founder, who was a son of Lynceus and of Hypermnestra, the daughter of Danails. Abae from of old has been considered sacred to Apollo, and here too there was an oracle of that god.

[10.35.2] The treatment that the god at Abae received at the hands of the Persians was very different from the honor paid him by the Romans. For while the Romans have given freedom of government to Abae because of their reverence for Apollo, the army of Xerxes burned down, as it did others, the sanctuary at Abae. The Greeks who opposed the barbarians resolved not to rebuild the sanctuaries burnt down by them, but to leave them for all time as memorials of their hatred. This too is the reason why the temples in the territory of Haliartus, as well as the Athenian temples of Hera on the road to Phalerum and of Demeter at Phalerum, still remain half-burnt even at the present day.

[10.35.3] Such, I suppose, was the appearance of the sanctuary at Abae also, after the Persian invasion, until in the Phocian war some Phocians, overcome in battle, took refuge in Abae. Whereupon the Thebans gave them to the flames, and with the refugees the sanctuary, which was thus burnt down a second time. However, it still stood even in my time, the frailest of buildings ever damaged by fire, seeing that the ruin begun by the Persian incendiaries was completed by the incendiaries of Boeotia.

[10.35.4] Beside the large temple there is another, but smaller in size, made for Apollo by the emperor Hadrian. The images are of earlier date, being dedicated by the Abaeans themselves; they are made of bronze, and all alike are standing, Apollo, Leto and Artemis. At Abae there is a theater, and also a market-place, both of ancient construction.

[10.35.5] Returning to the straight road to Opus, you come next to Hyampolis. Its mere name tells you who the inhabitants originally were, and the place from which they were expelled when they came to this land. For it was the Hyantes of Thebes who came here when they fled from Cadmus and his army. In earlier times the city was called by its neighbors the city of the Hyantes, but in course of time the name of Hyampolis prevailed over the other.

[10.35.6] Although Xerxes had burnt down the city, and afterwards Philip had razed it to the ground, nevertheless there were left the structure of an old market-place, a council-chamber (a building of no great size) and a theater not far from the gates. The emperor Hadrian built a portico which bears the name of the emperor who dedicated it. The citizens have one well only. This is their sole supply, both for drinking and for washing; from no other source can they get water, save only from the winter rains.

[10.35.7] Above all other divinities they worship Artemis, of whom they have a temple. The image of her I cannot describe, for their rule is to open the sanctuary twice, and not more often, every year. They say that whatever cattle they consecrate to Artemis grow up immune to disease and fatter than other cattle.

[10.35.8] The straight road to Delphi that leads through Panopeus and past Daulis and the Cleft Way, is not the only pass from Chaeroneia to Phocis. There is another road, rough and for the most part mountainous, that leads from Chaeroneia to the Phocian city of Stiris. The length of the road is one hundred and twenty stades. The inhabitants assert that by descent they are not Phocian, but Athenian, and that they came from Attica with Peteus, the son of Orneus, when he was pursued from Athens by Aegeus. They add that, because the greater part of those who accompanied Peteus came from the parish of Stiria, the city received the name of Stiris.

[10.35.9] The people of Stiris have their dwellings on a high and rocky site. For this reason they suffer from a shortage of water in summer; the wells are few, and the water is bad that they supply. These wells give washing-water to the people and drinking-water to the beasts of burden, but for their own drinking water the people go down about four stades and draw it from a spring. The spring is in a hole dug into the rocks, and they go down to it to fetch water.

[10.35.10] In Stiris is a sanctuary of Demeter surnamed Stiria. It is of unburnt brick; the image is of Pentelic marble, and the goddess is holding torches. Beside her, bound60 with ribbons, is an image of Demeter, as ancient as any of that goddess that exists.

[10.36.1] XXXVI. From Stiris to Ambrossus is about six stades. The road is flat, lying on the level with mountains on both sides of it. The greater part of the plain is covered with vines, and in the territory of Ambrossus grow shrubs, though not close together like the vines. This shrub the Ionians, as well as the rest of the Greeks, call kokkos, and the Gauls above Phrygia call it in their native speech hys. This kokkos grows to the size of what is called the rhamnos; the leaves are darker and softer than those of the mastich-tree, though in other respects the two are alike.

[10.36.2] Its fruit is like the fruit of the nightshade, and its size is about that of the bitter vetch. There breeds in the fruit of the kokkos a small creature. If this should reach the air when the fruit has ripened, it becomes in appearance like a gnat, and immediately flies away. But as it is they gather the fruit of the kokkos before the creature begins to move, and the blood of the creature serves as a dye for wool.

[10.36.3] Ambrossus lies at the foot of Mount Parnassus, on the side opposite to Delphi. They say that the city was named after Ambrossus, a hero. On going to war with Philip and his Macedonians the Thebans drew round Ambrossus a double wall. It is made of a local stone, black in color and very hard indeed. Each ring of wall is a little less than a fathom broad, and two and a half fathoms in height except where it has broken down.

[10.36.4] The interval between the first ring and the second is a fathom. The building of towers, of battlements, or of any ornament, has been entirely neglected, as the only object the citizens had in constructing the walls was immediate protection. There is a small market-place at Ambrossus, and of the stone statues set up in it most are broken.

[10.36.5] The road to Anticyra is at first up-hill. About two stades up the slope is a level place, and on the right of the road is a sanctuary of Artemis surnamed Dictynnaean, a goddess worshipped with great reverence by citizens. The image is of Aeginetan workmanship, and made of a black stone. From the sanctuary of the Dictynnaean goddess the road is downhill all the way to Anticyra. They say that in days of old the name of the city was Cyparissus, and that Homer in the list of Phocians61 was determined to call it by this name, although it was called Anticyra in Homer's day, because Anticyreus was a contemporary of Heracles.

[10.36.6] The city lies over against the ruins of Medeon. I have mentioned in the beginning of my account of Phocis that the people of Anticyra were guilty of sacrilege against the sanctuary at Delphi.62 They were driven from home by Philip, son of Amyntas, and yet once more by the Roman Otilius, because they were subjects of the Macedonian king Philip, son of Demetrius. Otilius had been despatched from Rome to help the Athenians against Philip.

[10.36.7] The mountains beyond Anticyra are very rocky, and on them grows hellebore in great profusion. Black hellebore sends those who take it to stool, and purges the bowels; the nature of the other, the white kind, is to purge by vomiting. It is the root of the hellebore which is used as a purging drug.

[10.36.8] In the market-place at Anticyra are bronze statues, and at the harbor is a small sanctuary of Poseidon, built of unhewn stones. The inside is covered with stucco. The image, which is made of bronze, is a standing figure, with one foot resting on a dolphin. On this side he has one hand upon his thigh; in his other hand is a trident.

[10.36.9] Opposite the gymnasium, in which the baths have been made, is another gymnasium, an old one, in which stands a bronze statue. The inscription on it says that Xenodamus of Anticyra, a pancratiast, won an Olympic victory in the match for men. If the inscription speaks the truth, it would seem that Xenodamus received the wild olive at the two hundred and eleventh Olympic festival.63 But this is the only festival omitted in the Elean records.

[10.36.10] Beyond the market-place there is in a well a spring of water. Over the well there is a roof to shelter it from the sun, with columns to support the roof. A little higher up than the well is a tomb built of any stones that came to hand. Here they say are buried the sons of Iphitus; one returned safe from Troy and died in his native land; the other, Schedius, died, they say, in the Troad, but his bones also were brought home.

[10.37.1] XXXVII. About two stades off the city there is, on the right, a high rock, which forms part of a mountain, with a sanctuary of Artemis built upon it. The image of Artemis is one of the works of Praxiteles; she carries a torch in her right hand and a quiver over her shoulders, while at her left side there is a dog. The image is taller than the tallest woman.

[10.37.2] Bordering on the Phocian territory is a land named after Bulon, the leader of the colony, which was founded by a union of emigrants from the cities in ancient Doris. The Bulians are said of Philomelus and the Phocians . . . the general assembly. To Bulis from Thisbe in Boeotia is a journey of eighty stades; but I do not know if in Phocis there be a road by land at all from Anticyra, so rough and difficult to cross are the mountains between Anticyra and Bulis. To the harbor from Anticyra is a sail of one hundred stades, and the road by land from the harbor to Bulis we conjectured to be about seven stades long.

[10.37.3] Here a torrent falls into the sea, called by the natives Heracleius. Bulis lies on high ground, and it is passed by travellers crossing by sea from Anticyra to Lechaeum in Corinthian territory. More than half its inhabitants are fishers of the shell-fish that gives the purple dye. The buildings in Bulis are not very wonderful; among them is a sanctuary of Artemis and one of Dionysus. The images are made of wood, but we were unable to judge who was the artist. The god worshipped most by the Bulians is named by them the Greatest, a surname, I should think, of Zeus. At Bulis there is a spring called Saunium.

[10.37.4] The length of the road from Delphi to Cirrha, the port of Delphi, is sixty stades. Descending to the plain you come to a race-course, where at the Pythian games the horses compete. I have told in my account of Elis64 the story of the Taraxippus at Olympia, and it is likely that the race-course of Apollo too may possibly harm here and there a driver, for heaven in every activity of man bestows either better fortune or worse. But the race-course itself is not of a nature to startle the horses, either by reason of a hero or on any other account.

[10.37.5] The plain from Cirrha is altogether bare, and the inhabitants will not plant trees, either because the land is under a curse, or because they know that the ground is useless for growing trees. It is said that to Cirrha . . . and they say that from Cirrha the place received its modern name. Homer, however, in the Iliad,65 and similarly in the hymn to Apollo,66 calls the city by its ancient name of Crisa. Afterwards the people of Cirrha behaved wickedly towards Apollo; especially in appropriating some of the god's land.

[10.37.6] So the Amphictyons determined to make war on the Cirrhaeans, put Cleisthenes, tyrant of Sicyon, at the head of their army, and brought over Solon from Athens to give them advice. They asked the oracle about victory, and the Pythian priestess replied:–

  You will not take and throw down the tower of this city,
  Until on my precinct shall dash the wave
  Of blue-eyed Amphitrite, roaring over the winedark sea.

So Solon induced them to consecrate to the god the territory of Cirrha, in order that the sea might become neighbor to the precinct of Apollo.

[10.37.7] Solon invented another trick to outwit the Cirrhaeans. The water of the river Pleistus ran along a channel to the city, and Solon diverted it in another direction. When the Cirrhaeans still held out against the besiegers, drinking well-water and rain-water, Solon threw into the Pleistus roots of hellebore, and when he perceived that water held enough of the drug he diverted it back again into its channel. The Cirrhaeans drank without stint of the water, and those on the wall, seized with obstinate diarrhoea, deserted their posts,

[10.37.8] and the Amphictyons captured the city. They exacted punishment from the Cirrhaeans on behalf of the god, and Cirrha is the port of Delphi. Its notable sights include a temple of Apollo, Artemis and Leto, with very large images of Attic workmanship. Adrasteia has been set up by the Cirrhaeans in the same place, but she is not so large as the other images.

[10.38.1] XXXVIII. The territory of the Locrians called Ozolian adjoins Phocis opposite Cirrha. I have heard various stories about the surname of these Locrians, all of which I will tell my readers. Orestheus, son of Deucalion, king of the land, had a bitch that gave birth to a stick instead of a puppy. Orestheus buried the stick, and in the spring, it is said, a vine grew from it, and from the branches (ozoi) of the stick the people got their name.

[10.38.2] Others believe that Nessus, ferrying on the Evenus, was wounded by Heracles, but not killed on the spot, making his escape to this country; when he died his body rotted unburied, imparting a foul stench to the atmosphere of the place. The third story says that the exhalations from a certain river, and its very water, have a peculiar smell; the fourth, that asphodel grows in great abundance and when in flower . . . because of the smell.

[10.38.3] Another story says that the first dwellers here were aboriginals, but as yet not knowing how to weave garments they used to make themselves a protection against the cold out of the untanned skins of beasts, turning outwards the shaggy side of the skins for the sake of a good appearance. So their own skins were sure to smell as badly as did the hides.

[10.38.4] One hundred and twenty stades away from Delphi is Amphissa, the largest and most renowned city of Locris. The people hold that they are Aetolians, being ashamed of the name of Ozolians. Support is given to this view by the fact that, when the Roman emperor67 drove the Aetolians from their homes in order to found the new city of Nicopolis, the greater part of the people went away to Amphissa. Originally, however, they came of Locrian race. It is said that the name of the city is derived from Amphissa, daughter of Macar, son of Aeolus, and that Apollo was her lover.

[10.38.5] The city is beautifully constructed, and its most notable objects are the tomb of Amphissa and the tomb of Andraemon. With him was buried, they say, his wife Gorge, daughter of Oeneus. On the citadel of Amphissa is a temple of Athena, with a standing image of bronze, brought, they say, from Troy by Thoas, being part of the spoils of that city. But I cannot accept the story.

[10.38.6] For I have stated in an earlier part of my work68 that two Samians, Rhoecus, son of Philaeus, and Theodorus, son of Telecles, discovered how to found bronze most perfectly, and were the first casters of that metal. I have found extant no work of Theodorus, at least no work of bronze. But in the sanctuary of Ephesian Artemis, as you enter the building containing the pictures, there is a stone wall above the altar of Artemis called Goddess of the First Seat. Among the images that stand upon the wall is a statue of a woman at the end, a work of Rhoecus, called by the Ephesians Night.

[10.38.7] A mere glance shows that this image is older, and of rougher workmanship, than the Athena in Amphissa. The Amphissians also celebrate mysteries in honor of the Boy Kings, as they are called. Their accounts as to who of the gods the Boy Kings are do not agree; some say they are the Dioscuri, others the Curetes, and others, who pretend to have fuller knowledge, hold them to be the Cabeiri.

[10.38.8] These Locrians also possess the following cities. Farther inland from Amphissa, and above it, is Myonia, thirty stades distant from it. Its people are those who dedicated the shield to Zeus at Olympia. The town lies upon a height, and it has a grove and an altar of the Gracious Gods. The sacrifices to the Gracious Gods are offered at night, and their rule is to consume the meat on the spot before sunrise. Beyond the city is a precinct of Poseidon, called Poseidonium, and a temple of Poseidon is in it. But the image had disappeared before my time.

[10.38.9] These, then, live above Amphissa. On the coast is Oeantheia, neighbor to which is Naupactus. The others, but not Amphissa, are under the government of the Achaeans of Patrae, the emperor Augustus having granted them this privilege. In Oeantheia is a sanctuary of Aphrodite, and a little beyond the city there is a grove of cypress-trees mixed with pines; in the grove is a temple of Artemis with an image. The paintings on the walls I found had lost their color with time, and nothing of them was still left worth seeing.

[10.38.10] I gather that the city got its name from a woman or a nymph, while as for Naupactus, I have heard it said that the Dorians under the sons of Aristomachus built here the vessels in which they crossed to the Peloponnesus, thus, it is said, giving to the place its name.69 My account of Naupactus, how the Athenians took it from the Locrians and gave it as a home to those who seceded to Ithome at the time of the earthquake at Lacedaemon, and how, after the Athenian disaster at Aegospotami, the Lacedaemonians expelled the Messenians from Naupactus, all this I have fully related in my history of Messenia.70 When the Messenians were forced to leave, the Locrians gathered again at Naupactus.

[10.38.11] The epic poem called the Naupactia by the Greeks is by most people assigned to a poet of Miletus, while Charon, the son of Pythes, says that it is a composition of Carcinus of Naupactus. I am one of those who agree with the Lampsacenian writer. For what reason could there be in giving the name of Naupactia to a poem about women composed by an author of Miletus?

[10.38.12] Here there is on the coast a temple of Poseidon with a standing image made of bronze; there is also a sanctuary of Artemis with an image of white marble. She is in the attitude of one hurling a javelin, and is surnamed Aetolian. In a cave Aphrodite is worshipped, to whom prayers are offered for various reasons, and especially by widows who ask the goddess to grant them marriage.

[10.38.13] The sanctuary of Asclepius I found in ruins, but it was originally built by a private person called Phalysius. For he had a complaint of the eyes, and when he was almost blind the god at Epidaurus sent to him the poetess Anyte, who brought with her a sealed tablet. The woman thought that the god's appearance was a dream, but it proved at once to be a waking vision. For she found in her own hands a sealed tablet; so sailing to Naupactus she bade Phalysius take away the seal and read what was written. He did not think it possible to read the writing with his eyes in such a condition, but hoping to get some benefit from Asclepius he took away the seal. When he had looked at the wax he recovered his sight, and gave to Anyte what was written on the tablet, two thousand staters of gold.

THE END.

51. See Paus. 10.6.3. 52. Hdt. 8.32 53. See Paus. 9.17.6. 54. This scarcely makes sense, and the emendation of Kayser is ingenious: “Those whom Isis has invited to send the victims.” 55. Hom. Il. 20.131 56. See Hdt. 8.33. 57. With the reading para: “joins the straight road from Amphicleia to Drymaea along the bank of the Cephisus.” 58. Hdt. 8.33 59. 162 A.D 60. Should we read kateilêmenon? Cf. Lucian Sym. 47: kateilêmenos tainiais tên kephalên.

61. See Hom. Il. 2.619 62. Paus. 10.3 63. 67 A.D 64. Paus. 6.20.15 65. Hom. Il. 2.520 66. See HH Apoll. 269, 282, 438. 67. See Paus. 5.23.3 and Paus. 7.18.8. 68. Paus. 8.14.8 69. Naupactus means “the city of ship-building.” 70. Paus. 4.23 foll.