=Acharnæ=, a village of Attica. _Thucydides_, bk. 2, ch. 19. =Achātes=, a friend of Æneas, whose fidelity was so exemplary that _Fidus Achates_ became a proverb. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 1, li. 316.――――A river of Sicily. =Achĕlōĭdes=, a patronymic given to the Sirens as daughters of Achelous. _Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 5, fable 15. =Achelorium=, a river of Thessaly. _Polyænus_, bk. 8. =Achelōus=, the son of Oceanus or Sol by Terra or Tethys, god of the river of the same name in Epirus. As one of the numerous suitors of Dejanira daughter of Œneus he entered the lists against Hercules and being inferior, changed himself into a serpent, and afterwards into an ox. Hercules broke off one of his horns, and Achelous being defeated, retired in disgrace into his bed of waters. The broken horn was taken up by the nymphs, and filled with fruits and flowers, and after it had for some time adorned the hand of the conqueror, it was presented to the goddess of plenty. Some say that he was changed into a river after the victory of Hercules. This river is in Epirus, and rises in mount Pindus, and after dividing Acarnania from Ætolia, falls into the Ionian sea. The sand and mud which it carries down, have formed some islands at its mouth. This river is said by some to have sprung from the earth after the deluge. _Herodotus_, bk. 2, ch. 10.――_Strabo_, bk. 10.――_Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 8, fable 5; bk. 9, fable 1; _Amores_, bk. 3, poem 6, li. 35.――_Apollodorus_, bk. 1, chs. 3 & 7; bk. 2, ch. 7.――_Hyginus_, preface to fables.――――A river of Arcadia falling into the Alpheus.――――Another flowing from mount Sipylus. _Pausanias_, bk. 8, ch. 38. =Acherdus=, a tribe of Attica; hence _Acherdusius_, _Demosthenes_. =Acherĭmi=, a people of Sicily. _Cicero_, bk. 3, _Against Verres_. =Achĕron=, a river of Thesprotia, in Epirus, falling into the bay of Ambracia. Homer called it, from the dead appearance of its waters, one of the rivers of hell, and the fable has been adopted by all succeeding poets, who make the god of the stream to be the son of Ceres without a father, and say that he concealed himself in hell for fear of the Titans, and was changed into a bitter stream, over which the souls of the dead are at first conveyed. It receives, say they, the souls of the dead, because a deadly languor seizes them at the hour of dissolution. Some make him son of Titan, and suppose that he was plunged into hell by Jupiter, for supplying the Titans with water. The word Acheron is often taken for hell itself. _Horace_, bk. 1, ode 3, li. 36.――_Virgil_, _Georgics_, bk. 2, li. 292; _Æneid_, bk. 2, li. 295, &c.――_Strabo_, bk. 7.――_Lucan_, bk. 3, li. 16.――_Silius Italicus_, bk. 2.――_Sylvæ_, poem 6, li. 80.――_Livy_, bk. 8, ch. 24.――――A river of Elis in Peloponnesus.――――Another on the Riphæan mountains. _Orpheus._――――Also a river in the country of the Brutii in Italy. _Justin_, bk. 12, ch. 2.