The history of the Grecian states commences about 1800 years before Christ, when the Egyptians on the opposite side of the Mediterranean were in a high state of civilization; but the portion of history which precedes 884 B. C. is understood to be fabulous, and entitled to little credit. According to the Greek poets, the original inhabitants of the country, denominated Pelasgians, were a race of savages, who lived in caves, and clothed themselves with the skins of the wild beasts. Uranus, an Egyptian prince, landed in the country, and became the father of a family of giants, named Titans, who rebelled against, and dethroned him. His son Saturn, who reigned in his stead, in order to prevent the like misfortune from befalling himself, ordered all his own children to be put to death as soon as they were born. But one named Jupiter was concealed by the mother, and reared in the island of Crete, from which in time he returned, and deposed his father. The Titans, jealous of this new prince, rebelled against him, but were vanished and expelled for ever from the country. Jupiter divided his dominions with his brothers Neptune and Pluto. The countries which he reserved to himself he governed with great wisdom, holding his court on Mount Olympus, a hill in Thessaly, 9000 feet in height, and the loftiest in Greece. Any truth which there might be in the story of the Titans and their princes was completely disguised by the poets, and by the popular imagination. Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto, were looked back to, not as mortals, but as deities; and the top of Mount Olympus was supposed to be the heavenly residence of gods, by whom the affairs of mortals were governed. And for ages after the dawn of philosophy, these deified sons of Saturn, and numberless others connected with them, were the objects of the national worship, not only among the Greeks, but also among the Romans. At an uncertain but very early date an Asiatic people named the Hellenes immigrated into Greece, in some cases expelling the Pelasgi, and in others intermingling with them, so that in process of time all the inhabitants of Greece came to be called Hellenes. They were, however, divided into several tribes the principal of which were the Dorians, Æolians, and Ionians, each of whom spoke a dialect differing in some respect from those made use of by the others. These dialects were named the Doric, Æolic, and Ionic, in reference to the tribes which used them; and a fourth, which was afterwards formed from the Ionic, was named the Attic, from its being spoken by the inhabitants of Attica.