The ties which connected the two courts were subsequently drawn closer by marriage; partly from policy and partly from a whim, Amasis espoused a Cyrenian woman named Ladikê, the daughter, according to some, of Arkesilas or of Battos, according to others, of a wealthy private individual named Kritobulos.* The Greeks of Europe and Asia Minor fared no less to their own satisfaction at his hand than their compatriots in Africa; following the example of his ally Croesus, he entered into relations with their oracles on several occasions, and sent them magnificent presents. The temple of Delphi having been burnt down in 548, the Athenian family of the Alcmæonides undertook to rebuild it from the ground for the sum of three hundred talents, of which one-fourth was to be furnished by the Delphians. When these, being too poor to pay the sum out of their own resources, made an appeal to the generosity of other friendly powers, Amasis graciously offered them a thousand talents of Egyptian alum, then esteemed the most precious of all others. Alum was employed in dyeing, and was an expensive commodity in the markets of Europe; the citizens of Delphi were all the more sensible of Pharaoh’s generosity, since the united Greeks of the Nile valley contributed only twenty minæ of the same mineral as their quota. Amasis erected at Cyrene a statue of his wife Ladikê, and another of the goddess Neît, gilded from head to foot, and to these he added his own portrait, probably painted on a wooden panel.**
* The very fact of the marriage is considered by Wiedemann
as a pure legend, but there is nothing against its
authenticity; the curious story of the relations of the
woman with Amasis told by the Cyrenian commentators is the
only part which need be rejected.
** The text of Herodotus can only mean a painted panel
similar to those which have been found on the mummies of the
Græco-Roman era in the Fayum.
He gave to Athene of Lindos two stone statues and a corselet of linen of marvellous fineness;* and Hera of Samos received two wooden statues, which a century later Herodotus found still intact. The Greeks flocked to Egypt from all quarters of the world in such considerable numbers that the laws relating to them had to be remodelled in order to avoid conflicts with the natives.
* It seems that one of these statues is that which, after
being taken to Constantinople, was destroyed in a fire in
476 A.D. Fragments of the corselet still existed in the
first century of our era, but inquisitive persons used to
tear off pieces to see for themselves whether, as Herodotus
assures us, each thread was composed of three hundred and
sixty-five strands, every one visible with the naked eye.
The townships founded a century earlier along the Pelusiac arm of the Nile had increased still further since the time of Necho, and to their activity was attributable the remarkable prosperity of the surrounding region. But the position which they occupied on the most exposed side of Egypt was regarded as permanently endangering the security of the country: her liberty would be imperilled should they revolt during a war with the neighbouring empire, and hand over the line of defence which was garrisoned by them to the invader. Amasis therefore dispossessed their inhabitants, and transferred them to Memphis and its environs. The change benefited him in two ways, for, while securing himself from possible treason, he gained a faithful guard for himself in the event of risings taking place in his turbulent capital. While he thus distributed these colonists of ancient standing to his best interests, he placed those of quite recent date in the part of the Delta furthest removed from Asia, where surveillance was most easy, in the triangle, namely, lying to the west of Sais, between the Canopic branch of the Nile, the mountains, and the sea-coast. The Milesians had established here some time previously, on a canal connected with the main arm of the river, the factory of Naucratis, which long remained in obscurity, but suddenly developed at the beginning of the XXVIth dynasty, when Sais became the favourite residence of the Pharaohs. This town Amasis made over to the Greeks so that they might make it the commercial and religious centre of their communities in Egypt.
Reduced by Faucher-Gudin from the plan published by Petrie.
The site of the Hellenion is marked A, the modern Arab
village B, the temenos of Hera and Apollo E, that of the
Dioskuri F, and that of Aphrodite G.
Temples already existed there, those of Apollo and Aphrodite, together with all the political and religious institutions indispensable to the constitution of an Hellenic city; but the influx of immigrants was so large and rapid, that, after the lapse of a few years, the entire internal organism and external aspect of the city were metamorphosed. New buildings rose from the ground with incredible speed—the little temple of the Dioskuri, the protectors of the sailor, the temple of the Samian Hera, that of Zeus of Ægina, and that of Athene;* ere long the great temenos, the Hellenion, was erected at the public expense by nine Æolian, Ionian, and Dorian towns of Asia Minor, to serve as a place of assembly for their countrymen, as a storehouse, as a sanctuary, and, if need be, even as a refuge and fortress, so great was its area and so thick its walls.**
* The temple of Athene, the Nît of the Saite nome, is as yet
known only by an inscription in Pctrie.
** The site has been rediscovered by Petrie at the southern
extremity of and almost outside the town; the walls were
about 48 feet thick and 39 feet high, and the rectangular
area enclosed by them could easily contain fifty thousand
men.