CHAPTER IV.

“they dwelt at Pleuron, and the lofty Calydon.”696

Thestius however, father-in-law of Œneus, and father of Althæa, chief of the Curetes, was master of Pleuronia. But when war broke out between the Thestiadæ, Œneus, and Meleager about a boar’s head and skin, according to the poet,697following the fable concerning the boar of Calydon, but, as is probable, the dispute related to a portion of the territory; the words are these,

“Curetes and Ætolians, firm in battle, fought against one another.”698

These then are the facts more immediately connected (with geography).

7. There699are others more remote from the subject of thiswork, which have been erroneously placed by historians under one head on account of the sameness of name: for instance, accounts relating to “Curetic affairs” and “concerning the Curetes” have been considered as identical with accounts “concerning the people (of the same name) who inhabited Ætolia and Acarnania.” But the former differ from the latter, and resemble rather the accounts which we have of Satyri and Silenes, Bacchæ and Tityri; for the Curetes are represented as certain dæmons, or ministers of the gods, by those who have handed down the traditions respecting Cretan and Phrygian affairs, and which involve certain religious rites, some mystical, others the contrary, relative to the nurture of Jupiter in Crete; the celebration of orgies in honour of the mother of the gods, in Phrygia, and in the neighbourhood of the Trojan Ida. There is however a very great variety700in these accounts. According to some, the Corybantes, Cabeiri, Idæan Dactyli, and Telchines are represented as the same persons as the Curetes; according to others, they are related to, yet distinguished from, each other by some slight differences; but to describe them in general terms and more at length, they are inspired with an enthusiastic and Bacchic frenzy, which is exhibited by them as ministers at the celebration of the sacred rites, by inspiring terror with armed dances, accompanied with the tumult and noise of cymbals, drums, and armour, and with the sound of pipes and shouting; so that these sacred ceremonies are nearly the same as those that are performed among the Samothracians in Lemnus, and in many other places; since the ministers of the god are said to be the same.701The whole of this kind ofdiscussion is of a theological nature, and is not alien to the contemplation of the philosopher.

8. But since even the historians, through the similarity of the name Curetes, have collected into one body a mass of dissimilar facts, I myself do not hesitate to speak of them at length by way of digression, adding the physical considerations which belong to the history.702Some writers however endeavour to reconcile one account with the other, and perhaps they have some degree of probability in their favour. They say, for instance, that the people about Ætolia have the name of Curetes from wearing long dresses like girls, (κόραι,) and that there was, among the Greeks, a fondness for some such fashion. The Ionians also were called “tunic-trailers,”703and the soldiers of Leonidas,704who went out to battle with their hair dressed, were despised by the Persians, but subjects of their admiration in the contest. In short, the application of art to the hair consists in attending to its growth, and the manner of cutting it,705and both these are the peculiar care of girls and youths;706whence in several ways it is easy to find a derivation of the name Curetes. It is also probable, that the practice of armed dances, first introduced by persons who paid so much attention to their hair and their dress, and who were called Curetes, afforded a pretence for men more warlike than others, and who passed their lives in arms, to be themselves called by the same name of Curetes, I mean those in Eubœa, Ætolia, and Acarnania. Homer also gives this name to the young soldiers;

“selecting Curetes, the bravest of the Achæans, to carry from the swift ship, presents, which, yesterday, we promised to Achilles.”707

And again;

“Curetes Achæi carried the presents.”708

So much then on the subject of the etymology of the name Curetes. [The dance in armour is a military dance; this is shown by the Pyrrhic dance and by Pyrrichus, who, it is said, invented this kind of exercise for youths, to prepare them for military service.]709

9. We are now to consider how the names of these people agree together, and the theology, which is contained in their history.

Now this is common both to the Greeks and the Barbarians, to perform their religious ceremonies with the observance of a festival, and a relaxation from labour; some are performed with enthusiasm, others without any emotion; some accompanied with music, others without music; some in mysterious privacy, others publicly; and these are the dictates of nature.710For relaxation from labour withdraws the thoughts from human occupations, and directs the reflecting mind to the divinity: enthusiasm seems to be attended with a certain divine inspiration, and to approach the prophetic character; the mystical concealment of the sacred rites excites veneration for the divinity, and imitates his nature, which shuns human senses and perception; music also, accompanied with the dance, rhythm, and song, for the same reason brings us near the deity by the pleasure which it excites, and by the charms of art. For it has been justly said, that men resemble the gods chiefly in doing good, but it may be said more properly, when they are happy; and this happiness consists in rejoicing, in festivals, in philosophy, and in music.711For let not the art be blamed, if it should sometimes be abused by the musician employing it to excite voluptuousness in convivialmeetings at banquets, on the stage, or under other circumstances, but let the nature of the institutions which are founded on it be examined.712

10. Hence Plato, and, before his time, the Pythagoreans, called music philosophy. They maintained that the world subsisted by harmony, and considered every kind of music to be the work of the gods. It is thus that the muses are regarded as deities, and Apollo has the name of President of the Muses, and all poetry divine, as being conversant about the praises of the gods. Thus also they ascribe to music the formation of manners, as everything which refines the mind approximates to the power of the gods.

The greater part of the Greeks attribute to Bacchus, Apollo, Hecate, the Muses, and Ceres, everything connected with orgies and Bacchanalian rites, dances, and the mysteries attended upon initiation. They call also Bacchus, Dionysus, and the chief Dæmon of the mysteries of Ceres.713The carrying about of branches of trees, dances, and initiations are common to the worship of these gods. But with respect to Apollo and the Muses, the latter preside over choirs of singers and dancers; the former presides both over these and divination. All persons instructed in science, and particularly those who have cultivated music, are ministers of the Muses; these and also all who are engaged in divination are ministers of Apollo. Those of Ceres, are the Mystæ, torch-bearers and Hierophants; of Dionysus, Seileni, Satyri, Tityri, Bacchæ, Lenæ, Thyiæ, Mimallones, Naïdes, and Nymphæ, as they are called.

11. But in Crete both these, and the sacred rites of Jupiter in particular, were celebrated with the performance of orgies, and by ministers, like the Satyri, who are employed in the worship of Dionysus. These were called Curetes, certain youths who executed military movements in armour, accompanied with dancing, exhibiting the fable of the birth of Jupiter, in which Saturn was introduced, whose custom it was to devour his children immediately after their birth; Rhea attempts to conceal the pains of childbirth, and to remove the new-born infant out of sight, using her utmost endeavours to preserve it.In this she has the assistance of the Curetes who surround the goddess, and by the noise of drums and other similar sounds, by dancing in armour and by tumult, endeavour to strike terror into Saturn, and escape notice whilst removing his child. The child is then delivered into their hands to be brought up with the same care by which he was rescued. The Curetes therefore obtained this appellation, either because they were boys (κόροι), or because they educated Jupiter in his youth (κουροτροφεῖν), for there are two explanations, inasmuch as they acted the same part with respect to Jupiter as the Satyri (with respect to Dionysus). Such then is the worship of the Greeks, as far as relates to the celebration of orgies.

12. But the Berecyntes, a tribe of Phrygians, the Phrygians in general, and the Trojans, who live about Mount Ida, themselves also worship Rhea, and perform orgies in her honour; they call her mother of gods, Agdistis, and Phrygia,714the Great Goddess; from the places also where she is worshipped, Idæa, and Dindymene,715Sipylene,716Pessinuntis,717and Cybele.718The Greeks call her ministers by the same name Curetes, not that they follow the same mythology, but they mean a different kind of persons, a sort of agents analogous to the Satyri. These same ministers are also called by them Corybantes.

13. We have the testimony of the poets in favour of these opinions. Pindar, in the Dithyrambus, which begins in this manner;

“formerly the dithyrambus used to creep upon the ground, long and trailing.”

After mentioning the hymns, both ancient and modern, in honour of Bacchus, he makes a digression, and says,

“for thee, O Mother, resound the large circles of the cymbals, and the ringing crotala; for thee, blaze the torches of the yellow pine;”

where he combines with one another the rites celebrated among the Greeks in honour of Dionysus with those performed among the Phrygians in honour of the mother of thegods. Euripides, in the Bacchæ, does the same thing, conjoining, from the proximity of the countries,719Lydian and Phrygian customs.

“Then forsaking Tmolus, the rampart of Lydia, my maidens, my pride, [whom I took from among barbarians and made the partners and companions of my way, raise on high the tambourine of Phrygia, the tambourine of the great mother Rhea,] my invention.

“Blest and happy he who, initiated into the sacred rites of the gods, leads a pure life; who celebrating the orgies of the Great Mother Cybele, who brandishing on high the thyrsus and with ivy crowned, becomes Dionysus’ worshipper. Haste, Bacchanalians, haste, and bring Bromius Dionysus down from the Phrygian mountains to the wide plains of Greece.”

And again, in what follows, he combines with these the Cretan rites.

“Hail, sacred haunt of the Curetes, and divine inhabitants of Crete, progenitors of Jove, where for me the triple-crested Corybantes in their caves invented this skin-stretched circle [of the tambourine], who mingled with Bacchic strains the sweet breath of harmony from Phrygian pipes, and placed in Rhea’s hands this instrument which re-echoes to the joyous shouts of Bacchanalians; from the Mother Rhea the frantic Satyri succeeded in obtaining it, and introduced it into the dances of the Trieterides, among whom Dionysus delights to dwell.”720

And the chorus in Palamedes says,

“Not revelling with Dionysus, who together with his mother was cheered with the resounding drums along the tops of Ida.”

14. Conjoining then Seilenus, Marsyas, and Olympus, and ascribing to them the invention of the flute, they thus again combine Dionysiac and Phrygian rites, frequently confounding Ida and Olympus,721and making them re-echo with their noise, as if they were the same mountain. There are four peaks of Ida called Olympi, opposite Antandros.722There is also a Mysian Olympus, bordering upon Ida, but not the same mountain. Sophocles represents Menelaus in the Polyxena as setting sail in haste from Troy, and Agamemnon as wishing to remain behind a short time, with a view to propitiate Minerva. He introduces Menelaus as saying,

“But do thou remain there on the Idæan land,Collect the flocks on Olympus, and offer sacrifice.”723

“But do thou remain there on the Idæan land,

Collect the flocks on Olympus, and offer sacrifice.”723

15. They invented terms appropriate to the sounds of the pipe, of the crotala, cymbals, and drums; to the noise also of shouts; to the cries of Evoe; and to the beating of the ground with the feet. They invented certain well-known names also to designate the ministers, dancers, and servants employed about the sacred rites, as Cabeiri, Corybantes, Pans, Satyri, Tityri, the god Bacchus; Rhea, Cybele, Cybebe, and Dindymene, from the places where she was worshipped. [The god] Sabazius belongs to the Phrygian rites, and may be considered the child as it were of the [Great] Mother. The traditional ceremonies observed in his worship are those of Bacchus.724

16. The rites called Cotytia, and Bendideia,725celebratedamong the Thracians, resemble these. The Orphic ceremonies had their origin among these people. Æschylus mentions the goddess Cotys, and the instruments used in her worship among the Edoni.726For after saying,

“O divine Cotys, goddess of the Edoni,With the instruments of the mountain worship;”

“O divine Cotys, goddess of the Edoni,

With the instruments of the mountain worship;”

immediately introduces the followers of Dionysus,

“one holding the bombyces, the admirable work of the turner, with the fingers makes the loud notes resound, exciting frenzy; another makes the brass-bound cotylæ to re-echo.”

And in another passage;

“The song of victory is poured forth; invisible mimes low and bellow from time to time like bulls, inspiring fear, and the echo of the drum rolls along like the noise of subterranean thunder;”727

for these are like the Phrygian ceremonies, nor is it at all improbable that, as the Phrygians themselves are a colony of Thracians, so they brought from Thrace their sacred ceremonies, and by joining together Dionysus and the Edonian Lycurgus they intimate a similarity in the mode of the worship of both.

17. From the song, the rhythm, and the instruments, all Thracian music is supposed to be Asiatic. This is evident also from the places where the Muses are held in honour. For Pieria, Olympus, Pimpla, and Leibethrum were anciently places, and mountains, belonging to the Thracians, but at present they are in the possession of the Macedonians. The Thracians, who were settled in Bœotia, dedicated Helicon to the Muses, and consecrated the cave of the Nymphs, Leibethriades. The cultivators of ancient music are said to have been Thracians, as Orpheus, Musæus, Thamyris; hence also Eumolpus had his name. Those who regard the whole of Asia as far as India as consecrated to Bacchus, refer to that country as the origin of a great portion of the present music. One author speaks of “striking forcibly the Asiatic cithara:” another calls the pipes Berecynthian and Phrygian.Some of the instruments also have barbarous names, as Nablas, Sambyce,728Barbitus,729Magadis,730and many others.

18. As in other things the Athenians always showed their admiration of foreign customs, so they displayed it in what respected the gods. They adopted many foreign sacred ceremonies, particularly those of Thrace and Phrygia; for which they were ridiculed in comedies. Plato mentions the Bendidean, and Demosthenes the Phrygian rites, where he is exposing Æschines and his mother to the scorn of the people; the former for having been present when his mother was sacrificing, and for frequently joining the band of Bacchanalians in celebrating their festivals, and shouting, Evoï, Saboï, Hyes Attes, and Attes Hyes, for these cries belong to the rites of Sabazius and the Great Mother.

19. But there may be discovered respecting these dæmons, and the variety of their names, that they were not called ministers only of the gods, but themselves were called gods. For Hesiod says that Hecaterus and the daughter of Phoroneus had five daughters,

“From whom sprung the goddesses, the mountain nymphs,And the worthless and idle race of satyrs,And the gods Curetes, lovers of sport and dance.”

“From whom sprung the goddesses, the mountain nymphs,

And the worthless and idle race of satyrs,

And the gods Curetes, lovers of sport and dance.”

The author of the Phoronis calls the Curetes, players upon the pipe, and Phrygians; others call them “earth-born, and wearing brazen shields.” Another author terms the Corybantes, and not the Curetes, Phrygians, and the Curetes, Cretans. Brazen shields were first worn in Eubœa, whence the people had the name of Chalcidenses.731Others say, that the Corybantes who came from Bactriana, or, according to some writers, from the Colchi, were given to Rhea, as a band of armed ministers, by Titan. But in the Cretan history the Curetes are called nurses and guardians of Jove, and are described as having been sent for from Phrygia to Crete by Rhea. According to other writers, there were nine Telchines in Rhodes, who accompanied Rhea to Crete, and from nursing732Jupiter had the name of Curetes;733that Corybus, one of their party, was the founder of Hierapytna, and furnished the

Prasians734in Rhodes with the pretext for saying that Corybantes were certain dæmons, children of Minerva and the sun. By others, the Corybantes are represented to be the children of Saturn; by others, of Jupiter and Calliope, or to be the same persons as the Cabeiri; that they went away735to Samothrace,736which was formerly called Melite; but their lives and actions are mysterious.

20. The Scepsian (Demetrius) who has collected fabulous stories of this kind, does not receive this account because no mysterious tradition about the Cabeiri is preserved in Samothrace, yet he gives the opinion of Stesimbrotus of Thasus, to the effect that the sacred rites in Samothrace were celebrated in honour of the Cabeiri.737Demetrius, however, says that they had their name from Cabeirus, the mountain in Berecynthia. According to others, the Curetes were the same as the Corybantes, and were ministers of Hecate.

The Scepsian says in another place, in contradiction to Euripides, that it is not the custom in Crete to pay divine honours to Rhea, and that these rites were not established there, but in Phrygia only, and in the Troad, and that they who affirm the contrary are mythologists rather than historians; and were probably misled by an identity of name, for Ida is a mountain both in the Troad and in Crete; and Dicte is a spot in the Scepsian territory, and a mountain in Crete.738Pytna is a peak of Ida, (and a mountain in Crete,) whence the city Hierapytna has its name. There is Hippocorona in the territory of Adramyttium, and Hippocoronium739in Crete. Samonium also is the eastern promontory of the island, and a plain in the Neandris,740and in the territory of the Alexandrians (Alexandria Troas).

21. But Acusilaus, the Argive, mentions a Camillus, theson of Cabeira and Vulcan; who had three sons, Cabeiri, (and three daughters,) the Nymphs Cabeirides.741

According to Pherecydes, there sprung from Apollo and Rhetia nine Corybantes, who lived in Samothrace; that from Cabeira, the daughter of Proteus and Vulcan, there were three Cabeiri, and three Nymphs, Cabeirides, and that each had their own sacred rites. But it was at Lemnos and Imbros that the Cabeiri were more especially the objects of divine worship, and in some of the cities of the Troad; their names are mystical.

Herodotus742mentions, that there were at Memphis temples of the Cabeiri as well as of Vulcan, which were destroyed by Cambyses. The places where these dæmons received divine honours are uninhabited, as Corybantium in the territory Hamaxitia belonging to the country of the Alexandrians, near Sminthium;743and Corybissa in the Scepsian territory about the river Eureïs, and a village of the same name, and the winter torrent Æthaloeïs.744

The Scepsian says, that it is probable that the Curetes and Corybantes are the same persons, who as youths and boys were employed to perform the armed dance in the worship of the mother of the gods. They were called Corybantes745from their dancing gait, and butting with their head (κορύπτοντας); by the poet they were called βητάρμονες,

“Come hither, you who are the best skilled Betarmones among the Phæacians.”746

Because the Corybantes are dancers, and are frantic, we call those persons by this name whose movements are furious.

22. Some writers say that the first inhabitants of the country at the foot of Mount Ida were called Idæan Dactyli,for the country below mountains is called the foot, and the summits of mountains their heads; so the separate extremities of Ida (and all are sacred to the mother of the gods) are called Idæan Dactyli.747

But Sophocles748supposes, that the first five were males, who discovered and forged iron,749and many other things which were useful for the purposes of life; that these persons had five sisters, and from their number had the name of Dactyli.750Different persons however relate these fables differently, connecting one uncertainty with another. They differ both with respect to the numbers and the names of these persons; some of whom they call Celmis, and Damnameneus, and Hercules, and Acmon, who, according to some writers, were natives of Ida, according to others, were settlers, but all agree that they were the first workers in iron, and upon Mount Ida. All writers suppose them to have been magicians, attendants upon the mother of the gods, and to have lived in Phrygia about Mount Ida. They call the Troad Phrygia, because, after the devastation of Troy, the neighbouring Phrygians became masters of the country. It is also supposed that the Curetes and the Corybantes were descendants of the Idæan Dactyli, and that they gave the name of Idæan Dactyli to the first hundred persons who were born in Crete; that from these descended nine Curetes, each of whom had ten children, who were called Idæan Dactyli.751

23. Although we are not fond of fabulous stories, yet we have expatiated upon these, because they belong to subjects of a theological nature.

All discussion respecting the gods requires an examination of ancient opinions, and of fables, since the ancients expressed enigmatically their physical notions concerning the nature of things, and always intermixed fable with their discoveries. It is not easy therefore to solve these enigmas exactly, but if we lay before the reader a multitude of fabulous tales, some consistent with each other, others which are contradictory, wemay thus with less difficulty form conjectures about the truth. For example, mythologists probably represented the ministers of the gods, and the gods themselves, as coursing over the mountains, and their enthusiastic behaviour, for the same reason that they considered the gods to be celestial beings, and to exercise a providential care over all things, and especially over signs and presages. Mining, hunting, and a search after things useful for the purposes of life, appeared to have a relation to this coursing over the mountains, but juggling and magic to be connected with enthusiastic behaviour, religious rites, and divination. Of such a nature, and connected in particular with the improvement of the arts of life, were the Dionysiac and Orphic arts. But enough of this subject.

1.Havingdescribed the islands about the Peloponnesus, and other islands also, some of which are upon, and others in front of, the Corinthian Gulf, we are next to speak of Crete,752(for it belongs to the Peloponnesus,) and the islands near Crete, among which are the Cyclades and the Sporades. Some of these are worthy of notice, others are inconsiderable.

2. At present we are to speak first of Crete.

According to Eudoxus, it is situated in the Ægæan sea, but he ought not to have described its situation in that manner, but have said, that it lies between Cyrenaica and the part of Greece comprehended between Sunium and Laconia,753extending in length in the direction from west to east, and parallel to these countries;754that it is washed on the north by the Ægæan and Cretan seas, and on the south by the African, which joins the Ægyptian sea.

The western extremity of the island is near Phalasarna;755its breadth is about 200 stadia, and divided into two promontories; of which the southern is called Criu-Metopon, (or Ram’s head,) and that on the north, Cimarus.756The eastern promontory is Samonium,757which does not stretch much further towards the east than Sunium.758

3. Sosicrates, who, according to Apollodorus, had an exact knowledge of this island, determines its length (not?)759to exceed 2300 stadia, and its breadth (about 300),760so that according to Sosicrates the circuit of the island is not more than 5000 stadia, but Artemidorus makes it 4100. Hieronymussays, that its length is 2000 stadia, and its breadth irregular, and that the circuit would exceed the number of stadia assigned by Artemidorus. Throughout one-third of its length, (beginning from the western parts, the island is of a tolerable width).761Then there is an isthmus of about 100 stadia, on the northern shore of which is a settlement, called Amphimalla;762on the southern shore is Phœnix,763belonging to the Lampeis.

The greatest breadth is in the middle of the island.

Here again the shores approach, and form an isthmus narrower than the former, of about 60 stadia in extent, reckoning from Minoa,764in the district of the Lyctii,765to Therapytna,766and the African sea. The city is on the bay. The shores then terminate in a pointed promontory, the Samonium, looking towards Ægypt and the islands of the Rhodians.767

4. The island is mountainous and woody, but has fertile valleys.

The mountains towards the west are called Leuca, or the White Mountains,768not inferior in height to the Taÿgetum,769and extending in length about 300 stadia. They form a ridge, which terminates at the narrow parts (the isthmus). In the middle of the island, in the widest part, is (Ida),770the highest of the mountains there. Its compass is about 600 stadia. It is surrounded by the principal cities. There are other mountains equal in height to the White Mountains, some of which terminate on the south, others towards the east.

5. From the Cyrenæan771territory to Criu-metopon772is avoyage of two days and nights. From Cimarus [to Malea] are 700 stadia.773In the midway is Cythera.774From the promontory Samonium775to Ægypt a ship sails in four days and nights, but, according to other writers, in three. Some say that it is a voyage of 5000 stadia; others, of still less than this. According to Eratosthenes, the distance from Cyrenaïca to Criu-Metopon is 2000 stadia, and thence to Peloponnesus less than [1000].776

6. One language is intermixed with another, says the poet; there are in Crete,

“Achæi, the brave Eteocretans, Cydones, Dorians divided into three bands,777and the divine Pelasgi.”778

Of these people, says Staphylus, the Dorians occupy the eastern parts of the island, Cydonians the western, Eteocretans the southern, to whom Prasus, a small town, belonged, where is the temple of the Dictæan Jupiter; the other nations, being more powerful, inhabited the plains. It is probable that the Eteocretans779and Cydonians were aboriginal inhabitants, and that the others were foreigners, who Andron says came from Thessaly, formerly called Doris, but now Hestiæotis, from which country he says the Dorians, who were settled about Parnassus, migrated, and founded Erineum, Bœum, and Cytinium, whence they are called by the poet Trichaïces, or tripartite. But the account of Andron is not generally admitted, who represents the Tetrapolis Doris as composed of three cities, and the metropolis of the Dorians as a colony of Thessalians. The epithet Trichaïces780is understood to be derived either from their wearing a triple crest,781or from having crests of hair.782

7. There are many cities in Crete, but the largest and most distinguished are Cnossus,783Gortyna,784Cydonia.785Both Homer and later writers celebrate Cnossus(11) above the rest,calling it vast, and the palace of Minos. It maintained its pre-eminence for a long period. It afterwards lost its ascendency, and was deprived of many of its customs and privileges. The superiority was transferred to Gortyna and Lyctus.786But it afterwards recovered its ancient rank of the capital city. Cnossus lies in a plain, with its ancient circumference of 30 stadia, between the Lyctian and Gortynian territory; [distant] 200 stadia from Gortyna, and from Lyttus 120, which the poet787calls Lyctus. Cnossus is at the distance of 25 stadia from the northern sea; Gortyna 90, and Lyctus 80, stadia from the African sea. Cnossus has a marine arsenal, Heracleium.788

8. Minos, it is said, used as an arsenal Amnisus,789where is a temple of Eileithyia. Cnossus formerly had the name of Cæratus, which is the name of the river790which runs beside it.

Minos791is regarded as an excellent legislator, and the first who possessed the sovereignty of the sea. He divided the island into three portions, in each of which he built a city; Cnossus * * * * * * *,792opposite to Peloponnesus, which lies toward the north.

According to Ephorus, Minos was an imitator of Rhadamanthus, an ancient personage, and a most just man. He had the same name as his brother, who appears to have been the first to civilize the island by laws and institutions, by founding cities, and by establishing forms of government. He pretended to receive from Jupiter the decrees which he promulgated. It was probably in imitation of Rhadamanthus that Minos went up to the cave of Jupiter, at intervals of nine years, and brought from thence a set of ordinances, which he said were the commands of Jove; for which reason the poet thus expresses himself;

“There reigned Minos, who every ninth year conversed with the great Jupiter.”793

Such is the statement of Ephorus; the ancients on the other hand give a different account, and say that he was tyrannical and violent, and an exactor of tribute, and speak in the strain of tragedy about the Minotaur, the Labyrinth, and the adventures of Theseus and Dædalus.

9. It is difficult to determine which is right. There is another story also not generally received; some persons affirming that Minos was a foreigner, others that he was a native of the island. Homer seems to support the latter opinion, when he says, that

“Minos, the guardian of Crete, was the first offspring of Jupiter.”794

It is generally admitted with regard to Crete that in ancient times it was governed by good laws, and induced the wisest of the Greeks to imitate its form of government, and particularly the Lacedæmonians, as Plato shows in his “Laws,” and Ephorus has described in his work “Europe.” Afterwards there was a change in the government, and for the most part for the worse. For the Tyrrheni, who chiefly infested our sea, were followed by the Cretans, who succeeded to the haunts and piratical practices of the former people, and these again afterwards were subject to the devastations of the Cilicians. But the Romans destroyed them all after the conquest of Crete,795and demolished the piratical strongholds of the Cilicians. At present Cnossus has even a colony of Romans.

10. So much then respecting Cnossus, a city to which I am no stranger; but owing to the condition of human affairs, their vicissitudes and accidents, the connexion and intercourse that subsisted between ourselves and the city is at an end. Which may be thus explained. Dorylaüs, a military tactician, a friend of Mithridates Euergetes, was appointed, on account of his experience in military affairs, to levy a body of foreigners, and was frequently in Greece and Thrace, and often in the company of persons who came from Crete, before the Romans were in possession of the island. A great multitude of mercenary soldiers was collected there, from whomeven the bands of pirates were recruited. During the stay of Dorylaüs in the island, a war happened to break out between the Cnossians and the Gortynians. He was appointed general by the Cnossians, and having finished the war speedily and successfully, he obtained the highest honours. A short time afterwards, being informed that Euergetes had been treacherously put to death by his courtiers at Sinope, and that he was succeeded in the government by his wife and children, he abandoned everything there, remained at Cnossus, and married a Macedonian woman of the name of Sterope, by whom he had two sons, Lagetas and Stratarchas, (the latter I myself saw when in extreme old age,) and one daughter. Of the two sons of Euergetes, he who was surnamed Eupator succeeded to the throne when he was eleven years of age; Dorylaüs, the son of Philetærus, was his foster-brother. Philetærus was the brother of Dorylaüs the Tactician. The king had been so much pleased with his intimacy with Dorylaüs when they lived together as children, that on attaining manhood he not only promoted Dorylaüs to the highest honours, but extended his regard to his relations and sent for them from Cnossus. At this time Lagetas and his brother had lost their father, and were themselves grown up to manhood. They quitted Cnossus, and came to Mithridates. My mother’s mother was the daughter of Lagetas. While he enjoyed prosperity, they also prospered; but upon his downfall (for he was detected in attempting to transfer the kingdom to the Romans with a view to his own appointment to the sovereignty) the affairs of Cnossus were involved in his ruin and disgrace; and all intercourse with the Cnossians, who themselves had experienced innumerable vicissitudes of fortune, was suspended.

So much then respecting Cnossus.

11. After Cnossus, the city Gortyna seems to have held the second place in rank and power. For when these cities acted in concert they held in subjection all the rest of the inhabitants, and when they were at variance there was discord throughout the island; and whichever party Cydonia espoused, to them she was a most important accession.

The city of the Gortynians lies in a plain, and was perhaps anciently protected by a wall, as Homer also intimates,

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