CHAPTER XXI.
And as you descend from thence and turn to the market-place you see the tomb of Cerdo, the wife of Phoroneus, and the temple of Æsculapius. And the temple of Artemis, under the name Persuasion, was erected also by Hypermnestra, when she was victorious over her father in the trial about Lynceus. There is also a brazen statue of Æneas, and a place called Delta, but why it is called Delta I purposely pass over, for I didn’t like the explanation. And in front of it is a temple of Zeus Promoter of Flight, and near it is the sepulchre of Hypermnestra the mother of Amphiaraus, and the sepulchre of Hypermnestra the daughter of Danaus, who lies in the same grave with Lynceus. And opposite them is the tomb of Talaus the son of Bias, about whom and his descendants I have spoken already. And there is a temple of Athene under the name of Trumpet, which they say Hegeleus built. This Hegeleus they say was the son of Tyrsenus, who was the son of Hercules and a Lydian woman, and Tyrsenus was the first who invented the trumpet, and Hegeleus his son taught the Dorians who followed Temenus the use of it, and that was why he called Athene Trumpet. And before the temple of Athene is they say the tomb of Epimenides: for the Lacedæmonians when they fought against the Gnossians took Epimenides alive, but killed him afterwards because he did not prophesy auspiciously for them, and they say they brought his remains, and buried them, here. And the building of white stone, nearly in the middle of the market-place, is not a trophy over Pyrrhus the king of Epirus, as the Argives say, but a memorial that his body was burnt here, inasmuch as elephants and all other things which he used in battle are represented here. This was the building for his funeral pyre: but his bones lie in the temple of Demeter, where in my account of Attica I have shown that he died. And at the entrance of this temple of Demeter you may see his brazen shield hanging over the door.
And not far from the building in the market-place of the Argives is a mound of earth. They say the head of the Gorgon Medusa lies under it. To omit fable, it has been recorded of her that she was the daughter of Phorcus, and that after the death of her father she ruled over the people that live near the Tritonian marsh, and used to go out hunting and led the Libyans in battle, and moreover resisted with her army the power of Perseus, though picked men followed him from the Peloponnese, but she was treacherously slain by night, and Perseus, marvelling at her beauty even after death, cut her head off and brought it home to display to the Greeks. But Procles the Carthaginian, the son of Eucrates, has another account more plausible than this one. The desert of Libya produces monsters scarce credible to those that hear of them, and there both wild men and wild women are born: and Procles said he had seen one of those wild men that had been taken to Rome. He conjectured therefore that Medusa was a woman who had wandered from them, and gone to the Tritonian marsh, and illtreated the inhabitants till Perseus slew her: and Athene he thought assisted Perseus in the work, because the men in the neighbourhood of the Tritonian marsh were sacred to her. And in Argos close to this monument of the Gorgon is the tomb of the Gorgon-slayer Perseus. Why she was called Gorgon is plain to the hearer at once.[23] They say she was the first woman who ever married a second husband, for she married one Œbalus, when her husband Perieres the son of Æolus was dead, with whom she had lived from her virginity. Previously it was customary for women to remain widows if their husband died. And before this tomb is a trophy erected in stone to the Argive Laphaes, whom, according to the Argive tradition, the people rose up against and expelled when he was king, and when he fled to Sparta the Lacedæmonians endeavoured to restore him, but the Argives being victorious in the battle slew Laphaes and most of the Lacedæmonians. And not far from this trophy is the temple of Leto, and a statue of her by Praxiteles. And the figure near the goddess is the maiden they call Chloris, who they say was the daughter of Niobe, and was originally called Melibœa. And when the children of Amphion and Niobe were slain by Apollo and Artemis, she alone and Amyclas were saved alive, as they supplicated Leto. But fear turned Melibœa so pale that she remained so all the rest of her life, insomuch that her name was changed from Melibœa into Chloris (pale). This Chloris and Amyclas the Argives say built the original temple of Leto. But I myself am of opinion, (for I lean more than most people to the authority of Homer,) that none of the children of Niobe survived. The following line bears me out.
“Two arrows only slew the whole family.”[24]
Homer therefore describes the whole family of Amphion as cut off.
CHAPTER XXII.
Now the temple of Flowery Hera is on the right hand of the temple of Leto, and in front of it is the tomb of the women who fell in the fight between the Argives and Perseus, and had marched with Dionysus from the islands in the Ægean, and who were called Marines from that circumstance. And right opposite the sepulchre of those women is the temple of Demeter, surnamed Pelasgian because Pelasgus the son of Triopas built it, and at no great distance from the temple is Pelasgus’ tomb. And beyond the tomb is a brazen shrine not very large, which contains old statues of Artemis and Zeus and Athene. Lyceas in his verses has represented it as a votive offering to Zeus the Contriver, and said that the Argives who went on the expedition to Ilium swore here that they would not give over fighting, till they should either capture Ilium or be killed fighting there. But others have said that the remains of Tantalus are in that brazen shrine. I will not dispute that the Tantalus who was the son of Thyestes or Broteus, (for both traditions are current), who married Clytæmnestra before Agamemnon, was buried here. But the Tantalus who was said to be son of Zeus or Pluto was buried at Sipylus in a very handsome tomb which I have myself seen. And moreover there was no necessity for him to flee from Sipylus, as happened afterwards to Pelops when Ilus the Phrygian came against him with an army. But let the enquiry proceed no further. As for the rites which take place at the neighbouring trench, they say they were instituted by Nicostratus, a man of those parts. To this day they place in the trench lighted torches to Proserpine the daughter of Demeter. There too is a temple of Poseidon under the name of the Flood-god—for Poseidon flooded most of the region, because Inachus and the other arbitrators decided that the land was Hera’s and not his. But Hera afterwards got Poseidon to draw the water off: and the Argives, at the place where the stream retired, built a temple to Poseidon the Flood-god. And as you go a little further is the tomb of Argos, who was reputed to be the son of Zeus and Niobe the daughter of Phoroneus: and next is the temple of the Dioscuri. And there are statues of them and their sons, Anaxis and Mnasinous, and with them their mothers Hilaira and Phœbe, in black ebony wood, by Dipœnus and Scyllis. Even the horses are mostly made of ebony, though partly of ivory. And near this temple of the Dioscuri is a temple of Ilithyia, the offering of Helen, when Theseus went with Pirithous to Thesprotia, and Aphidna was captured by the Dioscuri, and Helen was taken to Lacedæmon. For they say she was pregnant by Theseus, and bare a child in Argos and built this temple to Ilithyia, and gave the child to Clytæmnestra, who was now the wife of Agamemnon, and the child afterwards became the wife of Menelaus. Euphorion the Chalcidian and Alexander the Pleuronian have mentioned it in their poems, and still earlier Stesichorus of Himera, and they say like the Argives that Iphigenia was the daughter of Theseus by Helen. And beyond the temple of Ilithyia is the temple of Hecate, and the statue is the work of Scopas. It is of stone and right opposite are two brazen statues of Hecate, one by Polycletus, and the other by his brother Naucydes the son of Mothon. And as you go straight for the gymnasium, which is called Cylarabis after Cylarabus, the son of Sthenelus, you come to the tomb of Licymnius the son of Electryon. Homer says he was slain by Tleptolemus the son of Hercules, who had to fly from Argos in consequence of this murder. And, as you turn off a little towards Cylarabis and the gate in this direction, is the sepulchre of Sacadas, who was the first who played the Hymn to Apollo at Delphi on the flute: and it seems the anger of Apollo against flute-players (which he had in consequence of the contest with Marsyas the Silenus) was appeased by this Sacadas. In this gymnasium of Cylarabus is a bust of Athene Capanea, and they show the tomb of Sthenelus, and of Cylarabus himself. And not far from this gymnasium is a monument to the Argives who sailed with the Athenians to reduce Syracuse and Sicily.
CHAPTER XXIII.
As you go thence on the road called the Hollow Way, there is on the right hand a temple of Dionysus: the statue of the god they say came from Eubœa. For when the Greeks returning from Ilium were shipwrecked at Caphareus, those of the Argives who contrived to escape to shore were in evil plight from cold and hunger. But when they prayed that one of the gods would save them in their present emergency, immediately as they went forward they saw a cave of Dionysus, and a statue of the god in the cave, and some wild goats that had taken refuge from the cold were huddled together in it. These the Argives killed, and eat their flesh, and used their skins for clothing. And when the winter was over, they repaired their vessels and sailed homewards, and took with them the wooden statue from the cave, and worship it to this day. And very near the temple of Dionysus you will see the house of Adrastus, and at some distance from it the temple of Amphiaraus, and beyond that the tomb of Eriphyle. And next these is the shrine of Æsculapius, and close to it the temple of Bato, who was of the family of Amphiaraus and one of the Melampodidæ, and was Amphiaraus’ charioteer when he went out to battle: and when the rout from Thebes came about, the earth opened and swallowed up Amphiaraus and the chariot and Bato all together. And as you return from the Hollow Way you come to the reputed tomb of Hyrnetho. If it is a cenotaph and merely in memory of her, their account is probable enough, but if they say that the body of Hyrnetho lies there I cannot believe them, but let him believe them who knows nothing about Epidaurus. The most famous of the temples of Æsculapius at Argos has a statue still to be seen, Æsculapius seated, in white stone, and next to him a statue of Hygiea. There are also seated near them those who designed these statues, Xenophilus and Strato. That temple was originally built by Sphyrus, the son of Machaon, and the brother of the Alexanor who has honours among the Sicyonians at Titane. And the statue of Pheræan Artemis, (for the Argives worship Pheræan Artemis as well as the Athenians and Sicyonians,) was they say brought from Pheræ in Thessaly. But I cannot agree with the Argives who say that they have at Argos the tombs of Deianira the daughter of Œneus, and of Helenus the son of Priam, and that they have the statue of Athene that was carried away from Ilium, and whose loss caused its fall. The Palladium, for that is its name, was certainly carried by Æneas to Italy. As to Deianira, we know she died at Trachis and not at Argos, and her tomb is near that of Hercules on Mount Œta. And as to Helenus the son of Priam, I have already shown that he went with Pyrrhus the son of Achilles to Epirus, and married Andromache, and was Regent for the sons of Pyrrhus, and that Cestrine in Epirus took its name from his son Cestrinus. Not that the Argive antiquarians are ignorant that all their traditions are not true, still they utter them: for it is not easy to get the mass of mankind to change their preconceived opinions. There are other things at Argos worth seeing, as the underground building, (in which is the brazen chamber which Acrisius formerly got constructed for the safe custody of his daughter, Perilaus deposed and succeeded him,) and the tomb of Crotopus, and the temple of Cretan Dionysus. For they say that Dionysus, after he had warred with Perseus and got friendly again with him, was highly honoured by the Argives in various respects, and was given as a special honour this enclosure. And afterwards it was called the temple of Cretan Dionysus, because they buried Ariadne here. And Lyceas says that when the temple was restored an earthenware cinerary urn was found that contained the ashes of Ariadne: which he said several Argives had seen. And near this temple of Dionysus is the temple of Celestial Aphrodite.