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
11. Some say, that Salamis is unconnected with Attica, because the
priestess of Minerva Polias, who may not eat the new cheese of Attica,
but the produce only of a foreign land, yet uses the Salaminian cheese.
But this is a mistake, for she uses that which is brought from other
islands, that are confessedly near Attica, for the authors of this
custom considered all produce as foreign which was brought over sea.
It seems as if anciently the present Salamis was a separate state, and
that Megara was a part of Attica.
On the sea-coast, opposite to Salamis, the boundaries of Megara and
Attica are two mountains called Cerata, or Horns.[296]
12. Next is the city Eleusis,[297] in which is the temple of the
Eleusinian Ceres, and the Mystic Enclosure (Secos),[298] which Ictinus
built,[299] capable of containing the crowd of a theatre. It was this
person that built[300] the Parthenon in the Acropolis, in honour of
Minerva, when Pericles was the superintendent of the public works. The
city is enumerated among the demi, or burghs.
13. Then follows the Thriasian plain, and the coast, a demus of the same
name,[301] then the promontory Amphiale,[302] above which is a stone
quarry; and then the passage across the sea to Salamis, of about 2
stadia, which Xerxes endeavoured to fill up with heaps of earth, but the
sea-fight and the flight of the Persians occurred before he had
accomplished it.
There also are the Pharmacussæ,[303] two small islands, in the larger
of which is shown the tomb of Circe.
14. Above this coast is a mountain called Corydallus, and the demus
Corydalleis: then the harbour of Phoron, (Robbers,) and Psyttalia, a
small rocky desert island, which, according to some writers, is the
eye-sore of the Piræus.
Near it is Atalanta, of the same name as that between Eubœa and the
Locri; and another small island similar to Psyttalia; then the Piræus,
which is also reckoned among the demi, and the Munychia.
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