CHAPTER XVIII.
And there is the brazen chariot of Cratisthenes of Cyrene, and Victory and Cratisthenes on the chariot. Plainly then he won his victory in the chariot race. There is a tradition also that he was the son of Mnaseas the runner, who was surnamed by the Greeks Libyan. And these votive offerings to him at Olympia are by Pythagoras of Rhegium.
Here too I found the statue of Anaximenes, who wrote a History of all Antiquities in Greece, and of the exploits of Philip the son of Amyntas, and afterwards of Alexander. This honour in Olympia he owed to the people of Lampsacus: for the following is recorded about him. He got round Alexander, who was by no means a mild king but excessively passionate, by the following contrivance. The people of Lampsacus having espoused the cause of the king of the Persians, or being thought to have done so by Alexander, he boiled over in anger against them and threatened them with the most condign chastisement. And they in all haste sent Anaximenes to supplicate for their wives and children and country, as he had been well known to Alexander and earlier still to Philip. And Anaximenes went to Alexander, who had learnt the motive of his errand, and had sworn they say by all the gods that he would do exactly contrary to what he entreated. Then Anaximenes said, “O King oblige me with this favour, enslave the women and children at Lampsacus, and raze the whole town to its foundations, and burn the temples of the gods.” This is what he said, and Alexander having no contrivance to meet his cunning, and being compelled by his oath, very unwillingly pardoned the people of Lampsacus. Anaximenes seems also to have known how to punish an enemy very cleverly and exemplarily. He was naturally a sophist and a very good imitator of the arguments of the sophists. And having a quarrel with Theopompus, the son of Damasistratus, he wrote a book full of abuse against the Athenians and Lacedæmonians and Thebans. And as he had imitated his style very accurately, and put the name of Theopompus on the title page, and distributed the book about in various towns, though he himself was really the writer, general odium was stirred up throughout Greece against Theopompus. Nor did any one earlier than Anaximenes practise extempore oratory. But I cannot think that he was author of the verses about Alexander that run in his name.
And Sotades, (who was proclaimed a Cretan, as indeed he was), won the prize in the long course in the 99th Olympiad, but in the next Olympiad, being bribed by the Ephesian people, he registered himself as an Ephesian, and the Cretans exiled him for it.
And the first athletes who had effigies at Olympia were Praxidamas the Æginetan, who won the prize for boxing in the 59th Olympiad, and the Opuntian Rhexibius, who won the prize in the pancratium in the 61st Olympiad. And their effigies are made of wood, Rhexibius’ of figwood, and the Æginetan’s of cypress. This last has suffered less than the other.