which is the designation of Thessaly. Argos, even in the opinion of many ancients, was only the name of a country. I am convinced, therefore, that, in the early times, it was nothing but the name of the country, and that, as the name of the city, it is of later origin. Just as Corinth was in reality newly built by the Dorians, and ought not, therefore, to be mentioned here, so Argos also was founded by Dorian settlers at a time when Mycenae and Tiryns had already fallen from their former eminence. Throughout all mythology, Tiryns alone is the capital of Diomedes and Sthenelus, and Mycenae that of the Atreids; these two cities alone are mentioned, no third ever occurs, and Argos is not spoken of until the Doric migration and conquest. In this manner it is clear that the tragedians, who, however, generally were not learned men, do not deserve the reproach which the Alexandrian grammarians made against them; as, for example, that Sophocles confounded Argos and Mycenae. Mycenae, before the existence of Argos, was a true Argos[11], the capital of the whole country, though by no means identical with the later Argos.[12] In this manner the outlines of those kingdoms acquire a more suitable shape: the Acte, or the eastern part of Argolis, was distinct from Argos Proper even at that time, just as it was afterwards; the capitals, Tiryns and Mycenae, were still near enough to each other. When, accordingly, the grammarians found such contradictions as in Sophocles, they endeavoured to mediate by means of more recent myths, or even by inventing new ones, and that often in the most singular manner. The whole story, for example, how Diomedes was forced to go to Italy, and how Sthenelus gave up his kingdom, arose only from the circumstance, that in later and seemingly better historical authorities, the statement was found that the capital of Tiryns was united with the kingdom of Agamemnon; and the difficulty of accounting for the manner in which that kingdom had disappeared, was removed by a fiction.