Next to Sicyonia is Phliasia. Its chief town Phlius is 40 stades at most distant from Titane, and the road to it from Sicyon is straight. That the Phliasians have no connection with the Arcadians is plain from the catalogue of the Arcadians in Homer’s Iliad, for they are not included among them. And that they were Argives originally, and became Dorians after the return of the Heraclidæ to the Peloponnese, will appear in the course of my narrative. As I know there are many different traditions about among the Phliasians, I shall give those which are most generally accepted among them. The first person who lived in this land was they say Aras an Autochthon, and he built a city on that hill which is still in our time called the Arantine hill, (not very far from another hill, on which the Phliasians have their citadel and a temple of Hebe.) Here he built his city, and from him both land and city got called of old Arantia. It was in his reign that Asopus (said to be the son of Celusa and Poseidon) found the water of the river which they still call Asopus from the name of the person who found it.[17] And the sepulchre of Aras is in a place called Celeæ, where they say also Dysaules, an Eleusinian, is buried. And Aras had a son Aoris and a daughter Aræthyrea, who the Phliasians say were cunning hunters and brave in war. And, Aræthyrea dying first, Aoris changed the name of the city into Aræthyrea. Homer has made mention of it (when recording those who went with Agamemnon to Ilium) in the line
“They lived at Orneæ and lovely Aræthyrea.”[18]
And I think the tombs of the sons of Aras are on the Arantine hill. And at their tombs are some remarkable pillars, and before the rites which they celebrate to Ceres they look at these tombs, and call Aras and his sons to the libations. As to Phlias, the third who gave his name to the land, I cannot at all accept the Argive tradition that he was the son of Cisus the son of Temenus, for I know that he was called the son of Dionysus, and was said to have been one of those who sailed in the Argo. And the lines of the Rhodian poet bear me out, “Phlias also came with the men of Aræthyrea, where he dwelt, wealthy through his sire Dionysus, near the springs of Asopus.” And Aræthyrea was the mother of Phlias and not Chthonophyle, for Chthonophyle was his wife and he had Andromedas by her.
CHAPTER XIII.
By the return of the Heraclidæ all the Peloponnese was disturbed except Arcadia, for many of the cities had to take Dorian settlers, and frequent changes of inhabitants took place. The following were the changes at Phlius. Rhegnidas a Dorian (the son of Phalces the son of Temenus) marched against it from Argos and Sicyon. And some of the Phliasians were content with his demands, that they should remain in their own land, that he should be their king, and that the Dorians and he should have lands assigned to them. But Hippasus and his party stood out for a vigorous defence, and not for yielding up to the Dorians their numerous advantages without a fight. But as the people preferred the opposite view, Hippasus and those who agreed with him fled to Samos. And the great grandson of this Hippasus was Pythagoras, surnamed the Wise: who was the son of Mnesarchus, the son of Euphron, the son of Hippasus. This is the account the Phliasians give of their own history, and in most particulars the Sicyonians bear them out.
The most notable public sights are as follows. There is in the citadel at Phlius a cypress grove, and a temple hoary from old antiquity. The deity to whom the temple belongs is said by the most ancient of the Phliasians to have been Ganymeda, but by later ones Hebe: of whom Homer has made mention in the single combat between Menelaus and Paris, saying that she was the cupbearer of the gods, and again in the descent of Odysseus to Hades he has said that she was the wife of Hercules. But Olen in his Hymn to Hera says that she was reared by the Seasons, and was mother of Ares and Hebe. And among the Phliasians this goddess has various honours and especially in regard to slaves; for they give them entire immunity if they come as suppliants here, and when prisoners are loosed of their fetters they hang them up on the trees in the grove. And they keep a yearly feast which they call Ivy-cuttings. But they have no statue in any secret crypt, nor do they display one openly: and they have a sacred reason for acting so, for on the left as you go out there is a temple of Hera with a statue in Parian marble. And in the citadel there are some precincts sacred to Demeter, and in them a temple and statue of Demeter and Persephone, and also a brazen statue of Artemis, which seemed to me ancient. And as you go down from the citadel there is on the right a temple and beardless statue of Æsculapius. Under this temple is a theatre. And not far from it is a temple of Demeter, and some old statues of the goddess in a sitting posture.
And in the market-place there is a brazen she-goat, mostly gilt. It got honours among the Phliasians for the following reason. The constellation which they call the She-Goat does continuous harm to vines at its rise. And that no serious detriment might result from it, they paid various honours to this brazen goat, and decked its statue with gold. Here too is a monument of Aristias the son of Pratinas. The Satyrs carved by Aristias and Pratinas are reckoned the best carving next to that of Æschylus. In the back part of the market-place is a house called by the Phliasians the seer’s house. Into it Amphiaraus went (so they say) and lay all night in sleep before giving his oracular responses: and according to their account he for some time lived there privately and not as a seer. And since his time the building has been shut up entirely. And not far off is what is called Omphalus, the centre of all the Peloponnese, if indeed their account is correct. Next you come to an ancient temple of Dionysus, and another of Apollo, and another of Isis. The statue of Dionysus may be seen by anybody, as also that of Apollo: but that of Isis may only be seen by the priests. The following is also a tradition of the Phliasians, that Hercules, when he returned safe from Libya with the apples of the Hesperides, went to Phlius for some reason or other, and when he was living there was visited by Œneus, who was a connexion by marriage. On his arrival from Ætolia either he feasted Hercules, or Hercules feasted him. However this may be, Hercules struck the lad Cyathus, the cupbearer of Œneus, on the head with one of his fingers, not being pleased with the drink he offered him: and as this lad died immediately from the blow, the Phliasians erected a chapel to his memory. It was built near the temple of Apollo, and has a stone statue of Cyathus in the act of handing the cup to Hercules.
CHAPTER XIV.
Now Celeæ is about five stades from Phlius, and they sacrifice to Demeter there every fourth year and not annually. Nor is the presiding priest appointed for life, but a different one is chosen on each occasion, who may marry if he chooses. In this respect they differ from the Eleusinian mysteries, though generally speaking, as the Phliasians themselves admit, their mysteries are an imitation of those. They say that Dysaules the brother of Celeus came to their country and established these rites, when he was driven from Eleusis by Ion the son of Xuthus, who had been chosen commander in chief by the Athenians in the war against the people of Eleusis. This statement of the Phliasians I cannot assent to, that an Eleusinian should have been conquered in battle and gone into exile, when before the war was fought out the matter was submitted to arbitration, and Eumolpus remained at Eleusis. But it is quite possible that Dysaules may have gone to Celeæ for some other reason, and not that which the Phliasians allege. Nor indeed had he, as it seems to me, any other relation with the Eleusinian chiefs than as brother of Celeus, for else Homer would not have passed him over in his Hymn to Demeter: where in his list of those who were taught the mysteries by the goddess he ignores Dysaules. These are his lines. “She shewed Triptolemus, and Diocles tamer of horses, and powerful Eumolpus, and Celeus leader of the people, the due performance of her rights and mysteries.”[19] However, according to the Phliasian tradition, this Dysaules established the mysteries here, and also gave the name Celeæ to the place. There is also here as I have said the tomb of Dysaules, but subsequent to the date of the tomb of Aras: for according to the Phliasian account Dysaules came after the days when Aras was king. For they say Aras was a contemporary of Prometheus the son of Iapetus, and lived three generations earlier than Pelasgus the son of Arcas, and those who were called the Autochthons at Athens. And they say the chariot of Pelops is attached to the roof of the temple called the Anactorum. Such are the most important traditions of the Phliasians.