S. Jerome under the date Olymp. VII 4 (= 749 B.C.) says “the Milesians held the sea for eighteen years and built in Egypt the city of Naukratis[538].” This statement agrees with Stephanus Byzantinus[539] who calls Naukratis “a city of Egypt from the Milesians who were at that time supreme at sea.” Jerome and Stephanus are in harmony with Polycharmus[540] who mentions a certain Herostratos as living at Naukratis and trading there and making long voyages in the XXIIIrd Olymp. (688 B.C.). But there are other writers who put the foundation later. Strabo, in the passage already referred to[541], after describing the foundation of the Milesians’ Fort in the days of Psammetichus, continues: “and eventually they sailed up to the Saite nome and after defeating Inaros in a naval engagement they founded the city of Naukratis.” Lastly we have Herodotus[542] stating that King Amasis (570–526 B.C.) “gave the city of Naukratis for Greeks who came to Egypt to dwell in,” an assertion that taken by itself might mean that Naukratis was founded in or after 570 B.C.[543]. One further witness remains to be cited. Sappho wrote a poem reproaching her brother Charaxos for his devotion to a Naukratite hetaera named Doriche, with whom he had fallen in love when bringing Lesbian wine to Naukratis by way of trade[544]. Among the papyri discovered by Grenfell and Hunt at Oxyrhynchus is a fragment containing sixteen mutilated Sapphic lines that almost certainly form part of this very poem[545]. This means that Naukratis had already grown to be a pleasure city in the days of Sappho. Unfortunately her dates are not absolutely certain. A recent heresy brought her down to the reign of Amasis, but her floruit is generally given as the end of the seventh century, and there seem to be no sufficient reasons for not accepting that date.