Such in general then is the nature and extent of the Peloponnesus, and of the country on the other side of the strait up to the farther recess of the gulf. Such also is the nature of the gulf between both. We shall next describe each country in particular, beginning with Elis. CHAPTER III. 1. At present the whole sea-coast lying between the Achæi and Messenii is called Eleia, it stretches into the inland parts towards Arcadia at Pholoe, and the Azanes, and Parrhasii. Anciently it was divided into several states; afterwards into two, Elis of the Epeii, and Elis under Nestor, the son of Neleus. As Homer says, who mentions Elis of the Epeii by name, “Sacred Elis, where the Epeii rule.”[32] The other he calls Pylus subject to Nestor, through which, he says, the Alpheius flows: “Alpheius, that flows in a straight line through the land of the Pylians.”[33] The poet was also acquainted with a city Pylus; “They arrived at Pylus, the well-built city of Neleus.”[34] The Alpheius however does not flow through nor beside the city, but another river flows beside it, which some call Pamisus, others Amathus, from which Pylus seems to be termed Emathöeis, but the Alpheius flows through the Eleian territory. 2. Elis, the present city, was not yet founded in the time of Homer, but the inhabitants of the country lived in villages. It was called Cœle [or Hollow] Elis, from the accident of its locality, for the largest and best part of it is situated in a hollow. It was at a late period, and after the Persian war, that the people collected together out of many demi, or [CAS. 337] burghs, into one city. And, with the exception of a few, the other places in the Peloponnesus which the poet enumerates are not to be called cities, but districts. Each contained several assemblages of demi or burghs, out of which the famous cities were afterwards formed, as Mantineia in Arcadia, which was furnished with inhabitants from five burghs by Argives; Tegea from nine; Heræa from as many during the reign of Cleombrotus, or Cleonymus; Ægium out of seven, or eight; Patræ out of seven; Dyme out of eight; thus Elis also was formed out of the surrounding burghs. The demus of the Agriades was one of those added to it. The Peneius[35] flows through the city by the Gymnasium, which the Eleii constructed long after the countries which were subject to Nestor had passed into their possession.