24. Orneæ has the same name as the river which flows beside it. At present it is deserted; formerly, it was well inhabited, and contained a temple of Priapus, held in veneration. It is from this place that Euphronius, (Euphorius?) the author of a poem, the Priapeia, applies the epithet Orneates to the god. It was situated above the plain of the Sicyonians, but the Argives were masters of the country. Aræthyrea[231] is now called Phliasia. It had a city of the same name as the country near the mountain Celossa. They afterwards removed thence and built a city at the distance of 30 stadia, which they called Phlius.[232] Part of the mountain Celossa is the Carneates, whence the Asopus takes its rise, which flows by Sicyon,[233] and forms the Asopian district, which is a part of Sicyonia. There is also an Asopus, which flows by Thebes, and Platæa, and Tanagra. There is another also in Heracleia Trachinia, which flows beside a village, called Parasopii, and a fourth at Paros. Phlius is situated in the middle of a circle formed by Sicyonia, Argeia, Cleonæ, and Stymphalus. At Phlius and at Sicyon the temple of Dia, a name given to Hebe, is held in veneration. 25. Sicyon was formerly called Mecone, and at a still earlier period, Ægiali. It was rebuilt high up in the country about 20, others say, about 12, stadia from the sea, upon an eminence naturally strong, which is sacred to Ceres. The buildings anciently consisted of a naval arsenal and a harbour. Sicyonia is separated by the river Nemea from the Corinthian territory. It was formerly governed for a very long period by tyrants, but they were always persons of mild and moderate disposition. Of these, the most illustrious was Aratus, who made the city free, and was the chief of the Achæans, who voluntarily conferred upon him that power; he extended the confederacy by annexing to it his own country, and the other neighbouring cities. Hyperesia, and the cities next in order in the Catalogue of the poet, and Ægialus,[234] [or the sea-coast,] as far as Dyme, and the borders of the Eleian territory, belong to the Achæans. CHAPTER VII. 1. The Ionians, who were descendants of the Athenians, were, anciently, masters of this country. It was formerly called Ægialeia, and the inhabitants Ægialeans, but in later times, Ionia, from the former people, as Attica had the name of Ionia, from Ion the son of Xuthus. It is said, that Hellen was the son of Deucalion, and that he governed the country about Phthia between the Peneius and Asopus, and transmitted to his eldest son these dominions, sending the others out of their native country to seek a settlement each of them for himself. Dorus, one of them, settled the Dorians about Parnassus, and when he left them, they bore his name. Xuthus, another, married the daughter of Erechtheus, and was the founder of the Tetrapolis of Attica, which consisted of Œnoe, Marathon, Probalinthus, and Tricorythus.