[498] In the other Greek towns, the smaller coins were of copper.
[499] Athamas, King of Thebes. An allusion to a tragedy by Sophocles, in which Athamas is dragged before the altar of Zeus with his head circled with a chaplet, to be there sacrificed; he is, however, saved by Heracles.
[500] No doubt Socrates sprinkled flour over the head of Strepsiades in the same manner as was done with the sacrificial victims.
[501] The mysteries of Eleusis celebrated in the Temple of Demeter.
[502] A mountain of Attica, north of Athens.
[503] Sybaris, a town of Magna Graecia (Lucania), destroyed by the Crotoniates in 709 B.C., was rebuilt by the Athenians under the name of Thurium in 444 B.C. Ten diviners had been sent with the Athenian settlers.
[504] A parody of the dithyrambic style.
[505] Hieronymus, a dithyrambic poet and reputed an infamous pederast.
[506] When guests at the nuptials of Pirithous, King of the Lapithae, and Hippodamia, they wanted to carry off and violate the bride. That, according to legend, was the origin of their war against the Lapithae. Hieronymus is likened to the Centaurs on account of his bestial passion.
[507] A general, incessantly scoffed at by Aristophanes because of his cowardice.