“Onatas the son of Micon made me, a dweller at Ægina.”
This Æginetan Onatas we should regard in the statuary art as second to none since Dædalus and the Attic school.
CHAPTER XXVI.
The Dorian Messenians also, who received Naupactus from the Athenians, erected at Olympia a Victory on a pillar, the design of the Mendæan Pæonius, and made from spoils taken from the enemy, I imagine, when they fought with the Acarnanians and Œniadæ. But the Messenians themselves say that this Victory was erected for their share with the Athenians in the action at Sphacteria, and that they did not insert the name of the enemy from fear of the Lacedæmonians, and they could have had no fear of the Œniadæ and Acarnanians.
I found also many votive offerings of Micythus scattered about, and three of them together, next to the statue of Iphitus of Elis and Truce crowning him, viz. Amphitrite and Poseidon and Vesta, by the Argive Glaucus. And near the left side of the great temple he placed Proserpine the daughter of Demeter, and Aphrodite, and Ganymede, and Artemis, and of the poets Homer and Hesiod, and of the gods again Æsculapius and Hygiea. And among the votive offerings of Micythus is Agon with the dumb bells. These dumb bells are fashioned as follows. They are semicircular in shape though not a perfect semi-circle, and are so constructed that the fingers can pass through, as they do through the handles of a shield. And next the statue of Agon is Dionysus, and the Thracian Orpheus, and the statue of Zeus which I mentioned a little above. These are works of art of the Argive Dionysius. Others besides they say were given by Micythus, but were removed by Nero. And the Argives Dionysius and Glaucus had no master in their craft that we know of, but the period when they flourished is shewn by the fact that Micythus placed their works of art at Olympia. For Herodotus informs us in his history that this Micythus was the slave of Anaxilas the king at Rhegium, and was afterwards his treasurer, and after his death went to Tegea. And the inscriptions on these votive offerings make Micythus the son of Chœrus, and the Greek colony of Rhegium, or Messene near the Strait, his native place. But they do not mention his ever living at Tegea, and these votive offerings at Olympia were the fulfilment of a vow for the recovery of his son, who was wasting away in a consumption.
And near the larger votive offerings of Micythus, the work of the Argive Glaucus, is a statue of Athene with a helmet on her head and her Ægis. This was made by Nicodamus the Mænalian, and is a votive offering of the people of Elis. And next to Athene is a statue of Victory, an offering of the Mantineans, for what war is not specified in the inscription. And it is said to be an imitation by Calamis of the wooden statue at Athens of Wingless Victory. And near the smaller votive offerings of Micythus made by Dionysius are the Labours of Hercules with the Nemean lion, and the hydra, and Cerberus, and the Erymanthian boar. They were brought to Olympia by the men of Heraclea, who overran the territory of the neighbouring barbarians the Mariandyni. Heraclea is a town near the Euxine, and was colonized by the Megarians. The Bœotians of Tanagra also had a share in the colony.
CHAPTER XXVII.
And opposite those I have mentioned are other votive offerings in a row, facing the South, and very near the enclosure sacred to Pelops. Among them are the votive offerings of Mænalian Phormis, who crossed over from Mænalus to Sicily to Gelon the son of Dinomenes, and in the army of Gelon, and afterwards in the army of Gelon’s brother Hiero, displayed great valour, and advanced to such a pitch of fortune that he offered these votive offerings at Olympia, and also some others to Apollo at Delphi. His offerings at Olympia are two horses and two charioteers, a charioteer by each horse. The first horse and groom is by Dionysius the Argive, the second by the Æginetan Simo. And the first has the following inscription on the side, the first line not in metre,
“Phormis the Arcadian from Mænalus, now a Syracusan, offered me.”
This is the horse about which the people of Elis have a tradition on the power of lust in horses. It is evident that several remarkable properties of this horse come from the cunning of a magician. In size and beauty it is inferior to many to be seen in Altis: it has also the tail knocked off, which makes it more unsightly still. Nevertheless stallions not only in spring but all the year round are madly in lust after it. For they rush into Altis, breaking their reins or escaping from their drivers, and endeavour to mount this horse, with far greater impetuosity than they exhibit to the handsomest mare alive whom they had been accustomed to mount. And though their hoofs slip on the polished basement they do not cease to neigh fiercely, and try to mount this horse with frantic energy, till by whips or sheer strength they get pulled off. There is no other way of getting them away from this brazen horse.[75] I have seen in Lydia a different kind of marvel to this horse of Phormis, but equally the cunning work of a magician. Among the Lydians called Persici there are temples at Hierocæsarea and Hypæpa, and in each of these temples there is a chamber in which are ashes on an altar, not like other ashes in appearance. And a magician enters into this chamber, and, after placing dry wood upon the altar, first of all places a tiara on his head, and then calls on the gods in a foreign tongue not understood by the Greeks. And this he chants from a book, and the wood gets lighted evidently without fire and a bright blaze shines forth from it. Let this digression suffice.