=Acesta=, a town of Sicily, called after king Acestes, and known also by the name of Segesta. It was built by Æneas, who left there part of his crew, as he was going to Italy. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 5, li. 746, &c. =Acestes=, son of Crinisus and Egesta, was king of the country near Drepanum in Sicily. He assisted Priam in the Trojan war, and kindly entertained Æneas during his voyage, and helped him to bury his father on mount Eryx. In commemoration of this, Æneas built a city there called Acesta, from Acestes. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 5, li. 746. =Acestium=, a woman who saw all her relations invested with the sacred office of torch-bearer in the festivals of Ceres. _Pausanias_, bk. 1, ch. 37. =Acestodōrus=, a Greek historian, who mentions the review which Xerxes made of his forces before the battle of Salamis. _Plutarch_, _Themistocles_. =Acestorĭdes=, an Athenian archon.――――A Corinthian, governor of Syracuse. _Diodorus_, bk. 19. =Acetes=, one of Evander’s attendants. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 11, li. 30. =Achabȳtos=, a lofty mountain in Rhodes, where Jupiter had a temple. =Achæa=, a surname of Pallas, whose temple in Daunia was defended by dogs which fawned upon the Greeks, but fiercely attacked all other persons. _Aristotle_, _de Mirabilibus_.――――Ceres was called Achæa, from her _lamentations_ (ἀχεα) at the loss of Proserpine. _Plutarch_, _De Iside et Osiride_. =Achæi=, the descendants of Achæus, at first inhabited the country near Argos, but being driven by the Heraclidæ, 80 years after the Trojan war, they retired among the Ionians, whose 12 cities they seized and kept. The names of these cities are Pellene, Ægira, Æges, Bura, Tritæa, Ægion, Rhypæ, Olenos, Helice, Patræ, Dyme, and Pharæ. The inhabitants of these three last began a famous confederacy, 284 years B.C., which continued formidable upwards of 130 years, under the name of the _Achæan league_, and was most illustrious whilst supported by the splendid virtues and abilities of Aratus and Philopœmen. Their arms were directed against the Ætolians for three years, with the assistance of Philip of Macedon, and they grew powerful by the accession of neighbouring states, and freed their country from foreign slavery, till at last they were attacked by the Romans, and, after one year’s hostilities, the Achæan league was totally destroyed, B.C. 147. The Achæans extended the borders of their country by conquest and even planted colonies in Magna Græcia.――――The name of _Achæi_ is generally applied to all the Greeks, indiscriminately, by the poets. _See:_ Achaia. _Herodotus_, bk. 1, ch. 145; bk. 8, ch. 36.――_Statius_, _Thebaid_, bk. 2, li. 164. ――_Polybius._――_Livy_, bks. 27, 32, &c.――_Plutarch_, _Philopœmen_. ――_Pliny_, bk. 4, ch. 5.――_Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 4, li. 605. ――_Pausanias_, bk. 7, ch. 1, &c.――――Also a people of Asia on the borders of the Euxine. _Ovid_, _Ex Ponto_, bk. 4, poem 10, li. 27.