The Geography of Strabo, Volume 2 (of 3): Literally Translated, with NotesStrabo
History
The Geography of Strabo, Volume 2 (of 3): Literally Translated, with Notes
Strabo
Geography -- Early works to 1800
4. Something peculiar took place among the Larisæans in the plain of
Caÿster, in the Phriconis, and in Thessaly. All of them occupied a
country, the soil of which has been accumulated by rivers, by the
Caÿster,[1522] the Hermus,[1523] and the Peneus.[1524]
At Larisa Phriconis Piasus is said to receive great honours. He was
chief of the Pelasgi, and enamoured, it is said, of his daughter Larisa,
whom he violated, and was punished for the outrage. She discovered him
leaning over a cask of wine, seized him by his legs, lifted him up, and
dropped him down into the vessel. These are ancient accounts.
5. To the present Æolian cities we must add Ægæ and Temnus, the
birth-place of Hermagoras, who wrote a book on the Art of Rhetoric.
These cities are on the mountainous country which is above the district
of Cyme, and that of the Phocæans and Smyrnæans, beside which flows the
Hermus.
Not far from these cities is Magnesia under Sipylus, made a free city by
a decree of the Romans. The late earthquakes have injured this place. To
the opposite parts, which incline towards the Caïcus to Cyme from
Larisa, in passing to which the river Hermus is crossed, are 70 stadia;
thence to Myrina 40 stadia; thence to Grynium 40 stadia, and thence to
Elæa. But, according to Artemidorus, next to Cyme is Adæ; then, at the
distance of 40 stadia, a promontory, which they call Hydra, that forms
the Elaïtic Gulf with the opposite promontory Harmatus. The breadth of
the entrance is about 80 stadia, including the winding of the bays.
Myrina, situated at 60 stadia, is an Æolian city with a harbour, then
the harbour of Achæans, where are altars of the twelve gods; next is
Grynium, a small city [of the Myrinæans], a temple of Apollo, an ancient
oracle, and a costly fane of white marble. To Myrina are 40 stadia; then
70 stadia to Elæa, which has a harbour and a station for vessels of the
Attalic kings, founded [CAS. 622] by Menestheus and the Athenians who
accompanied him in the expedition against Ilium.
The places about Pitane, and Atarneus, and others in this quarter, which
follow Elæa, have been already described.
6. Cyme is the largest and best of the Æolian cities. This and Lesbos
may be considered the capitals of the other cities, about 30 in number,
of which not a few exist no longer. The inhabitants of Cyme are
ridiculed for their stupidity, for, according to some writers, it is
said of them that they only began to let the tolls of the harbour three
hundred years after the foundation of their city, and that before this
time the town had never received any revenue of the kind; hence the
report that it was late before they perceived that they inhabited a city
lying on the sea.
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