Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume II.Pausanias, active approximately 150-175
History
Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume II.
Pausanias, active approximately 150-175
Greece -- Antiquities; Greece -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
On the death of Eteocles the succession devolved upon the posterity of
Almus. Almus had two daughters Chrysogenia and Chryse: and the story
goes that Chryse had a son by Ares called Phlegyas, who succeeded
to the kingdom when Eteocles died without any male progeny. So they
changed the name of the whole country from Andreis to Phlegyantis, and
to the city Andreis, which was very early inhabited, the king gave his
own name Phlegyas, and gathered into it the most warlike of the Greeks.
And the people of Phlegyas in their folly and audacity stood aloof as
time went on from the other Orchomenians, and attracted to themselves
the neighbouring people: and eventually led an army against Delphi to
plunder the temple, and when Philammon with some picked Argives came
against them he and they were slain in the battle that ensued. That the
people of Phlegyas more than the other Greeks delighted in war is shewn
by the lines in the Iliad about Ares and Panic the son of Ares,
“They two armed themselves for battle with the Ephyri and the warriors
of Phlegyas.”[74]
By the Ephyri here Homer means I think those of Thesprotia in Epirus.
But the inhabitants of Phlegyas were entirely overthrown by frequent
lightning and violent earthquakes: and the residue were carried off by
an epidemic, all but a few who escaped to Phocis.
And as Phlegyas died childless, Chryses the son of Chrysogenia (the
daughter of Almus) by Poseidon succeeded him. And he had a son Minyas,
from whom his subjects the Minyæ took the name they still keep. So
great were his revenues that he excelled all his predecessors in
wealth, and he was the first we know of that built a Treasury for the
reception of his money. The Greeks are it seems more apt to admire
things out of their own country than things in it, since several of
their notable historians have described in great detail the Pyramids
of Egypt, but have not mentioned at all the Treasury of Minyas and the
walls at Tiryns, though they are no less remarkable. The son of Minyas
was Orchomenus, and in his reign the town was called Orchomenus and
its inhabitants Orchomenians: but none the less they also continued to
be called Minyæ to distinguish them from the Orchomenians in Arcadia.
It was during the reign of this Orchomenus that Hyettus came from
Argos, fleeing after his slaying Molurus (the son of Arisbas) whom he
had caught with his wife, and Orchomenus gave him all the land now
round the village of Hyettus and the neighbouring district. Hyettus is
mentioned by the author of the Poem which the Greeks call the Great EϾ.
“Hyettus having slain Molurus (the dear son of Arisbas) in the
chamber of his wedded wife, left his house and fled from Argos
fertile-in-horses, and went to the court of Orchomenus of Minyæ, and
the hero received him, and gave him part of his possessions in a noble
spirit.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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