[21\7: ~to\ Lê/thês pedi/on~, l. 186. This is the earliest reference to Lethe of which we can be quite sure; but it is made so casually that it is obvious that Aristoph. is merely alluding to a story well known to his audience. Plato makes use of the ~Lê/thês pedi/on~ together with the ~Ame/lês potamo/s~ (hence 621 C: ~Lê/thês potamo/s~) in the myth at the close of the _Republic_, x, 621 A, which is intended to illustrate and support the theory of _palingenesia_. Of course, this ingenious fancy was eminently suitable for use by adherents of the doctrine of metempsychosis; but there is nothing to show that it had been actually _invented_ for the special benefit of this doctrine, i.e. by Orphics or Pythagoreans--as many have supposed. It is probable that it was nothing more originally but an attempt to explain symbolically the unconscious condition of the ~amenêna\ ka/rêna~. Does Theognis already (704, 705) refer to it?--~Persepho/nên . . . hê/te bro/tois pare/chei _lê/thên_, bla/ptousa no/oio~. Other references to the ~Lê/thês pu/lai, La/thas do/moi, Lê/thês hu/dôr~ are all later; the ~Lê/thês thro/nos~ in the account of Theseus' journey to Hades in [Apollod.] _Epit._ i, 24, is perhaps taken from older legendary material. (Bergk's assertion, _Opusc._ ii, 716: "The conception of Lethe's fountain and stream is _certainly_ ancient and popular: the well of Lethe is nothing but the fountain of the gods: whoever drinks of it forgets all sorrows, etc.," {250} is entirely devoid of foundation in fact.) The river of Lethe was in later times localized on earth like Acheron and Styx; in the R. Limia of Gallaecia--far away on the western sea--men rediscovered the _Oblivionis flumen_ (account of the year 137 B.C.: Liv., _Epit._ 55; Flor. 1, 33, 12; App., _Hisp._ 72: Plu., _QR._ 34, p. 272 D; cf. Mela, 3, § 10; Plin., _NH._ 4, § 115. Absurd aetiology in Strabo, p. 153).] [22\7: This is presumably the meaning of the words which Pausanias (10, 28, 5) uses: his absurd mannerism makes him talk round the incident instead of simply describing it. (Much too artificial explanation of the circumstance in Dümmler, _Delphika_, p. 15 [1894].)] [23\7: Paus. 10, 28, 4.] [24\7: See Appendix iii.]