640 The battle ἐπὶ τῇ Μεγάλῃ Τάφρῳ, περὶ Τάφρον (Polyb. IV. 33. Pausan. IV. 6. 1. 17. 2.), in which Aristocrates is supposed to have betrayed the Messenians, was also mentioned by Tyrtæus; but the account which he gave of it quite differs from that in Pausanias, viz. that the Spartans were intentionally posted in front of a trench, that they might not be able to run away. Eustratius ad Aristot. Eth. Nic. III. 8. 5. fol. 46. καὶ οἱ πρὸ τῶν τάφρων καὶ τῶν τοιούτων παρατάττοντες. τοῦτο περὶ Λακεδαιμονίων λέγοι ἄν; τοιαύτην γάρ τινα μάχην, ὄτε πρὸς Μεσηνίους ἐμαχέσαντο, ἐπολέμουν, ἧς καὶ Τυρταῖος μνημονεύει. 641 According to Pausanias. 642 Pausan. IV 15. 4. What he says in IV. 24. 1. does not, however, agree well with this. 643 Herod. III. 41. That the Lacedæmonians, at the beginning of the second war, dedicated a statue of Jupiter, twelve feet in height, at Olympia, with the inscription in Pausan. V. 24. 1. is merely a conjecture of the ἐξηγηταί. 644 The passage of Strabo VIII. p. 362. should be arranged thus: “Tyrtæus says that the second conquest of Messenia took place,” ἡνίκα φησὶν αὐτὸς στρατηγῆσαι τὸν πόλεμον τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις, καὶ γὰρ εἶναί φησιν ἐκεῖθεν ἐν τῇ ἐλεγείᾳ ἥν ἐπιγράφουσιν Εὐνομίαν; Αὐτὸς γὰρ Κρονίων—νῆσον ἀφικόμεθα. Ὤστε ἤ ταῦτα ἈΚΥΡΩΤΕΟΝ τὰ ἐλεγεῖα (for ἠκύρωται τὰ ἐλ. some MSS. have ΗΚΥΡΩΤΑΙΟΝΤΑ), ἢ Φιλοχόρῳ ἀπιστητέον καὶ Καλλισθένει καὶ ἄλλοις πλείοσιν εἰποῦσιν ἐξ Ἀθηνῶν καὶ Ἀφιδνῶν ἀφίκεσθαι. Comp. p. 52. n. d., and Porson’s Adversaria, p. 39. But there is nothing surprising in Tyrtæus, who lived among the Dorians, speaking of the whole nation in the first person plural, without mentioning his own different origin. In the same manner Tyrtæus says of the Spartan nation as of a whole, Μεσσήνην εἵλομεν εὐρύχορον, Pausan. IV. 6. 2. Compare the verses of Mimnermus in Strab. XIV. p. 634. The Laconian town of Aphidnæ, from which the Leucippidæ are supposed to have come, has probably arisen from some misunderstanding. (Steph. Byz. in v.) Archimbrotus also, the father of Tyrtæus (Suidas in v.), looks like an etymological invention; Ἀρχίμβροτος, “the ruler of men.” 645 Concerning a defeat of the Spartans by the Argives, see below, § 13. 646 Callisthenes ap. Polyb. IV. 33. 2. Aristomenes, according to Pausan. IV. 24. married his sister and daughters to persons at Phigalea, Lepreum, and Heræa. This is alluded to in a verse from the fifth book of Rhianus in Steph. Byz. in v. Φιγάλεια, τὴν μὲν ἀνήγετ᾽ ἄκοιτιν ἐπὶ κραναὴν Φιγάλειαν, viz. Tharyx. 647 This circumstance was narrated by Rhianus in the sixth (probably the last) book, in which Atabyrum, a town in Rhodes, was mentioned, Steph. Byz. in v. Ἀτάβυρον.