by Pausanias
Of gold strung with pieces of amber, like the sun. Hom. Od. 18.295
But Homer does not say that the necklace given to Eriphyle was of gold varied with stones. So probably the scepter is the only work of Hephaestus.
MT PETRACHUS
[9.41.6] There is beyond the city a crag called Petrachus. Here they hold that Cronus was deceived, and received from Rhea a stone instead of Zeus, and there is a small image of Zeus on the summit of the mountain.
[9.41.7] Here in Chaeroneia they distil unguents from flowers, namely, the lily, the rose, the narcissus and the iris. These prove to be cures for the pains of men. The unguent from the rose, if it be smeared on wooden images, prevents their decaying. The iris grows in marshes, is in size as large as a lily, but is not white in color, and smells less sweet.
BOOK X.
PHOCIS, MYTHICAL HISTORY
[10.1.1] I. It is plain that such part of Phocis as is around Tithorea and Delphi was so named in very ancient days after a Corinthian, Phocus, a son of Ornytion. Not many years afterwards, the name established itself as the received title of what is today called Phocis, when the Aeginetans had disembarked on the land with Phocus the son of Aeacus.
[10.1.2] Opposite the Peloponnesus, and in the direction of Boeotia, Phocis stretches to the sea, and touches it on one side at Cirrha, the port of Delphi, and on the other at the city of Anticyra. In the direction of the Lamian Gulf there are between Phocis and the sea only the Hypocnemidian Locrians. By these is Phocis bounded in this direction, by Scarpheia on the other side of Elateia, and by Opus and its port Cynus beyond Hyampolis and Abae.
[10.1.3] The most renowned exploits of the Phocian people were undertaken by the whole nation. They took part in the Trojan war, and fought against the Thessalians before the Persian invasion of Greece, when they accomplished some noteworthy deeds.
PHOCIS, HISTORY
Expecting that the Thessalians would invade their land at Hyampolis, they buried there earthen water-pots, covered these with earth, and so waited for the Thessalian cavalry. Ignorant of the Phocian stratagem, the Thessalians without knowing it drove their horses on to the water-pots, where stumbling into them the horses were lamed, and threw or killed their riders.
[10.1.4] The Thessalians, more enraged than ever against the Phocians, gathered levies from all their cities and marched out against them. Whereupon the Phocians, greatly terrified at the army of the Thessalians, especially at the number of their cavalry and the practised discipline of both mounts and riders, despatched a mission to Delphi, praying the god that they might escape the danger that threatened them. The oracle given them was this:–
I will match in fight mortal and immortal,
And to both will I give victory, but more to the mortal.
[10.1.5] On receiving this oracle, the Phocians sent three hundred picked men with Gelon in command to make an attack on the enemy. The night was just falling, and the orders given were to reconnoiter without being observed, to return to the main body by the least known route, and to remain strictly on the defensive. These picked men along with their leader Gelon, trampled on by horses and butchered by their enemies, perished to a man at the hands of the Thessalians.
[10.1.6] Their disaster created such panic among the Phocians in the camp that they actually gathered together in one spot their women, children, movable property, and also their clothes, gold, silver and images of the gods, and making a vast pyre they left in charge a force of thirty men.
[10.1.7] These were under orders that, should the Phocians chance to be worsted in the battle, they were first to put to death the women and the children, then to lay them like victims with the valuables on the pyre, and finally to set it alight and perish themselves, either by each other’s hands or by charging the cavalry of the Thessalians. Hence all forlorn hopes are called by the Greeks “Phocian despair.” On this occasion the Phocians forthwith proceeded to attack the Thessalians.
[10.1.8] The commander of their cavalry was Daiphantes of Hyampolis, of their infantry Rhoeus of Ambrossus. But the office of commander-in-chief was held by Tellias, a seer of Elis, upon whom rested all the Phocians’ hopes of salvation.
[10.1.9] When the battle joined, the Phocians had before their eyes what they had resolved to do to their women and children, and seeing that their own salvation trembled in the balance, they dared the most desperate deeds, and, with the favour of heaven, achieved the most famous victory of that time.
[10.1.10] Then did all Greece understand the oracle given to the Phocians by Apollo. For the watchword given in battle on every occasion by the Thessalian generals was Itonian Athena, and by the Phocian generals Phocus, from whom the Phocians were named. Because of this engagement the Phocians sent as offerings to Delphi statues of Apollo, of Tellias the seer, and of all their other generals in the battle, together with images of their local heroes. The figures were the work of the Argive Aristomedon.
[10.1.11] Afterwards the Phocians discovered a stratagem quite as clever as their former ones. For when the armies were lying opposite each other at the pass into Phocis, five hundred picked men of Phocis, waiting until the moon was full, attacked the Thessalians on that night, first smearing themselves with chalk and, in addition to the chalk, putting on white armour. It is said that there then occurred a wholesale slaughter of the Thessalians, who thought this apparition of the night to be too unearthly to be an attack of their enemies. It was Tellias of Elis who devised this stratagem also for the Phocians to use against the Thessalians.
[10.2.1] II. When the Persian army crossed into Europe, it is said that the Phocians were forced to join the Great King, but deserted the Persian cause and ranged themselves with the Greeks at the battle of Plataea. Subsequently it happened that a fine was inflicted on them by the Amphictyons. I cannot find out the truth of the story, whether the fine was inflicted because of the misdeeds of the Phocians, or whether the Thessalians exacted the fine from the Phocians because of their ancient hatred.
[10.2.2] As they were disheartened at the greatness of the fine, Philomelus, son of Theotimus, than whom no Phocian stood higher in rank, his country being Ledon, a city of Phocis, took charge and tried to persuade them to seize the sanctuary at Delphi, pointing out that the amount of the sum to be paid was beyond their resources. He stated, among other plausible arguments, that Athens and Sparta had always been favorable to them, and that if Thebes or any other state made war against them, they would have the better owing to their courage and resources.
[10.2.3] When Philomelus put all this before them, the Phocians were nothing loath, either because their judgment was blinded by heaven, or because their nature was to put gain before religion. The seizure of Delphi by the Phocians occurred when Heracleides was president at Delphi and Agathocles archon at Athens, in the fourth year of the hundred and fifth Olympiad, when Prorus of Cyrene was victorious in the foot-race.
[10.2.4] When they had seized the sanctuary, the best mercenaries in Greece at once mustered to join them, while the Thebans, at variance before, declared open war against them. The war lasted ten successive years, and during this long time victory often fell to the Phocians and their mercenaries, and often the Thebans proved the better. An engagement took place at the town of Neon, in which the Phocians were worsted, and in the rout Philomelus threw himself down a high precipice, and so lost his life. This was the very punishment fixed by the Amphictyons for spoilers of the sanctuary.
[10.2.5] After the death of Philomelus the Phocians gave the command to Onomarchus, while Philip, son of Amyntas, made an alliance with the Thebans. Philip had the better of the encounter, and Onomarchus fleeing to the coast was there shot down by his own troops, who considered their defeat due to his lack of enterprise and inexperience as a general.
[10.2.6] Such was the end which fate brought upon Onomarchus, and his brother Phaylus was chosen as commander-in-chief. It is said that no sooner had this Phaylus come to rule over the Phocians when he saw the following vision in a dream. Among the votive
offerings to Apollo was a representation in bronze of a man’s body in an advanced stage of decay, with the flesh already fallen off, and nothing left but the bones. The Delphians said that it was an offering of Hippocrates the physician. Now the thought came to Phaylus that he resembled this offering. Forthwith he was attacked by a wasting disease, which so fulfilled the omen of the dream.
[10.2.7] On the death of Phaylus the sovereignty of the Phocians devolved on Phalaecus his son. Phalaecus, accused of appropriating to his own use the sacred treasures, was deposed, and crossing with a fleet to Crete, accompanied by such Phocians as sided with him and by a part of his mercenaries, he sat down to besiege Cydonia, which refused to accede to his demand for money, and perished along with the greater part of his army.
[10.3.1] III. In the tenth year after the seizure of the sanctuary, Philip put an end to the war, which was called both the Phocian War and the Sacred War, in the year when Theophilus was archon at Athens, which was the first of the hundred and eighth Olympiad at which Polycles of Cyrene was victorious in the foot-race. The cities of Phocis were captured and razed to the ground. The tale of them was Lilaea, Hyampolis, Anticyra, Parapotamii, Panopeus and Daulis. These cities were distinguished in days of old, especially because of the poetry of Homer.
[10.3.2] The army of Xerxes, burning down certain of these, made them better known in Greece, namely Erochus, Charadra, Amphicleia, Neon, Tithronium and Drymaea. The rest of the Phocian cities, except Elateia, were not famous in former times, I mean Phocian Trachis, Phocian Medeon, Echedameia, Ambrossus, Ledon, Phlygonium and Stiris. On the occasion to which I have referred all the cities enumerated were razed to the ground and their people scattered in villages. The one exception to this treatment was Abae, whose citizens were free from impiety, and had had no share in the seizure of the sanctuary or in the war.
[10.3.3] The Phocians were deprived of their share in the Delphic sanctuary and in the Greek assembly, and their votes were given by the Amphictyons to the Macedonians. Subsequently, however, the Phocian cities were rebuilt, and their inhabitants restored from the villages to their native cities, save such as were prevented from being rebuilt by their original weakness and by their want of funds at the period of restoration. It was the Athenians and Thebans who brought back the inhabitants before the disaster of Chaeroneia befell the Greeks.
[10.3.4] The Phocians took part in the battle of Chaeroneia, and afterwards fought at Lamia and Crannon against the Macedonians under Antipater. No Greeks were keener defenders against the Gauls and the Celtic invaders than were the Phocians, who considered that they were helping the god of Delphi, and at the same time, I take it, that they were making amends for the old crimes they had committed.
PANOPEUS
[10.4.1] IV. Such were the memorable exploits of the Phocians. From Chaeroneia it is twenty stades to Panopeus, a city of the Phocians, if one can give the name of city to those who possess no government offices, no gymnasium, no theater, no market-place, no water descending to a fountain, but live in bare shelters just like mountain cabins, right on a ravine. Nevertheless, they have boundaries with their neighbors, and even send delegates to the Phocian assembly. The name of the city is derived, they say, from the father of Epeius, and they maintain that they are not Phocians, but were originally Phlegyans who fled to Phocis from the land of Orchomenus.
[10.4.2] A survey of the ancient circuit of Panopeus led me to guess it to be about seven stades. I was reminded of Homer’s verses about Tityos, where he mentions the city of Panopeus with its beautiful dancing-floors, and how in the fight over the body of Patroclus he says that Schedius, son of Iphitus and king of the Phocians, who was killed by Hector, lived in Panopeus. It seemed to me that the reason why the king lived here was fear of the Boeotians; at this point is the easiest pass from Boeotia into Phocis, so the king used Panopeus as a fortified post.
[10.4.3] The former passage, in which Homer speaks of the beautiful dancing-floors of Panopeus, I could not understand until I was taught by the women whom the Athenians call Thyiads. The Thyiads are Attic women, who with the Delphian women go to Parnassus every other year and celebrate orgies in honor of Dionysus. It is the custom for these Thyiads to hold dances at places, including Panopeus, along the road from Athens. The epithet Homer applies to Panopeus is thought to refer to the dance of the Thyiads.
[10.4.4] At Panopeus there is by the roadside a small building of unburnt brick, in which is an image of Pentelic marble, said by some to be Asclepius, by others Prometheus. The latter produce evidence of their contention. At the ravine there lie two stones, each of which is big enough to fill a cart. They have the color of clay, not earthy clay, but such as would be found in a ravine or sandy torrent, and they smell very like the skin of a man. They say that these are remains of the clay out of which the whole race of mankind was fashioned by Prometheus.
[10.4.5] Here at the ravine is the tomb of Tityos. The circumference of the mound is just about one-third of a stade, and they say that the verse in the Odyssey:–
Lying on the ground, and lie lay over nine roods, Hom. Od. 11.577
refers, not to the size of Tityos, but to the place where he lay, the name of which was Nine Roods.
[10.4.6] Cleon of Magnesia on the Hermus used to say that those men were incredulous of wonders who in the course of their own lives had not met yet greater marvels. He declared that Tityos and other monsters had been as tradition says they were. He happened, he said, to be at Cadiz, and he, with the rest of the crowd, sailed forth from the island in accordance with the command of Heracles; on their return to Cadiz they found cast ashore a man of the sea, who was about five roods in size, and burning away, because heaven had blasted him with a thunderbolt.
DAULIS
[10.4.7] So said Cleon. About twenty-seven stades distant from Panopeus is Daulis. The men there are few in number, but for size and strength no Phocians are more renowned even to this day. They say that the name of the city is derived from Daulis, a nymph, the daughter of the Cephisus. Others say that the place, on which the city was built, was wooded, and that such shaggy places (dasea) were called daula by the ancients. For this reason, they say, Aeschylus called the beard of Glaucus of Anthedon hypene daulos.
[10.4.8] Here in Daulis the women are said to have served up to Tereus his own son, which act was the first pollution of the dining-table among men. The hoopoe, into which the legend says Tereus was changed, is a bird a little larger than the quail, while the feathers on its head rise into the shape of a crest.
[10.4.9] It is noteworthy that in Phocis swallows neither hatch nor lay eggs; in fact no swallow would even make a nest in the roof of a house. The Phocians say that even when Philomela was a bird she had a terror of Tereus, and so kept away from his country. At Daulis is a sanctuary of Athena with an ancient image. The wooden image, of an even earlier date, the Daulians say was brought from Athens by Procne.
NEAR DAULIS
[10.4.10] In the territory of Daulis is a place called Tronis. Here has been built a shrine of the Founder hero. This founder is said by some to have been Xanthippus, a distinguished soldier; others say that he was Phocus, son of Ornytion, son of Sisyphus. At any rate, he is worshipped every day, and the Phocians bring victims and pour the blood into the grave through a hole, but the flesh they are wont to consume on the spot.
[10.5.1] V. There is also an ascent through Daulis to the summit of Parnassus, a longer one than that from Delphi, though not so difficult. Turning back from Daulis to the straight road to Delphi and going forwards, you see on the left of the road a building called the Phocian Building, where assemble the Phocian delegates from each city.
[10.5.2] The building is large, and within are pillars standing throughout its length. From the pillars rise steps to each wall, on which steps the Phocian delegates take their seats. At the end are neither pillars nor steps, but images of Zeus, Athena and Hera. That of Zeus is on a throne; on his right stands Hera, on his left Athena.
THE CLEFT ROAD
[10.5.4] The Cleft Road and the rash deed committed on it by Oedipus were the beginning of his troubles, and the tombs of Laius and the servant who followed him are still just as they were in the very middle of the place where the three roads meet, and over them have been piled unhewn stones. According to the story, it was Damasistratus, king of Plataea, who found the bodies lying and buried them.
DELPHI, MYTHICAL HISTORY
[10.5.5] From here the high road to Delphi becomes both steeper and more difficult for the walker. Many and different are the stories told about Delphi, and even more so about the oracle of Apollo. For they say that in the earliest times the oracular seat belonged to Earth, who appointed as prophetess at it Daphnis, one of the nymphs of the mountain.
[10.5.6] There is extant among the Greeks an hexameter poem, the name of which is Eumolpia, and it is assigned to Musaeus, son of Antiophemus. In it the poet states that the oracle belonged to Poseidon and Earth in common; that Earth gave her oracles herself, but Poseidon used Pyrcon as his mouthpiece in giving responses. The verses are these:–
Forthwith the voice of the Earth-goddess uttered a wise word,
And with her Pyrcon, servant of the renowned Earth-shaker. [Musaeus], Eumolpia
They say that afterwards Earth gave her share to Themis, who gave it to Apollo as a gift. It is said that he gave to Poseidon Calaureia, that lies off Troezen, in exchange for his oracle.