Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume I.Pausanias, active approximately 150-175
History
Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume I.
Pausanias, active approximately 150-175
Greece -- Antiquities; Greece -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
Now Celeæ is about five stades from Phlius, and they sacrifice to
Demeter there every fourth year and not annually. Nor is the presiding
priest appointed for life, but a different one is chosen on each
occasion, who may marry if he chooses. In this respect they differ from
the Eleusinian mysteries, though generally speaking, as the Phliasians
themselves admit, their mysteries are an imitation of those. They
say that Dysaules the brother of Celeus came to their country and
established these rites, when he was driven from Eleusis by Ion the son
of Xuthus, who had been chosen commander in chief by the Athenians in
the war against the people of Eleusis. This statement of the Phliasians
I cannot assent to, that an Eleusinian should have been conquered in
battle and gone into exile, when before the war was fought out the
matter was submitted to arbitration, and Eumolpus remained at Eleusis.
But it is quite possible that Dysaules may have gone to Celeæ for some
other reason, and not that which the Phliasians allege. Nor indeed
had he, as it seems to me, any other relation with the Eleusinian
chiefs than as brother of Celeus, for else Homer would not have passed
him over in his Hymn to Demeter: where in his list of those who were
taught the mysteries by the goddess he ignores Dysaules. These are
his lines. “She shewed Triptolemus, and Diocles tamer of horses, and
powerful Eumolpus, and Celeus leader of the people, the due performance
of her rights and mysteries.”[19] However, according to the Phliasian
tradition, this Dysaules established the mysteries here, and also gave
the name Celeæ to the place. There is also here as I have said the
tomb of Dysaules, but subsequent to the date of the tomb of Aras: for
according to the Phliasian account Dysaules came after the days when
Aras was king. For they say Aras was a contemporary of Prometheus the
son of Iapetus, and lived three generations earlier than Pelasgus the
son of Arcas, and those who were called the Autochthons at Athens. And
they say the chariot of Pelops is attached to the roof of the temple
called the Anactorum. Such are the most important traditions of the
Phliasians.
CHAPTER XV.
On the road from Corinth to Argos you come to the small town of Cleonæ.
Some say Cleone was the daughter of Pelops, others that she was one of
the daughters of Asopus, the river that flows by Sicyon: however the
town got its name from her. There is a temple of Athene there, and a
statue of the goddess by Scyllis and Dipœnus, pupils of Dædalus. But
some say that Dædalus took a wife from Gortyns, and that Dipœnus and
Scyllis were his sons by her. At Cleonæ beside this temple is the tomb
of Eurytus and Cteatus, who had gone from Elis to be spectators of the
Isthmian games, and whom Hercules shot with arrows there, charging them
with having fought against him in the battle with Augeas.
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