[651] Iliad, iv. 381-400, with the Schol. The first celebration of the Nemean games is connected with this march of the army of Adrastus against Thêbes; they were celebrated in honor of Archemorus, the infant son of Lykurgus, who had been killed by a serpent while his nurse Hypsipylê went to show the fountain to the thirsty Argeian chiefs (Apollod. iii. 6, 4; Schol. ad Pindar Nem. 1).
[652] The story recounted that the head of Melanippus was brought to Tydeus as he was about to expire of his wound, and that he gnawed it with his teeth, a story touched upon by Sophoklês (apud Herodian. in Rhetor. Græc. t. viii. p. 601, Walz.).
The lyric poet Bacchylidês (ap. Schol. Aristoph. Aves, 1535) seems to have handled the story even earlier than Sophoklês.
We find the same allegation embodied in charges against real historical men: the invective of Montanus against Aquilius Regulus, at the beginning of the reign of Vespasian, affirmed, “datam interfectori Pisonis pecuniam a Regulo, appetitumque morsu Pisonis caput” (Tacit. Hist. iv. 42).
[653] Apollodôr. iii. 6, 8. Pindar, Olymp. vi. 11; Nem. ix. 13-27. Pausan. ix. 8, 2; 18, 2-4.
Euripidês, in the Phœnissæ (1122 seqq.), describes the battle generally; see also Æsch. S. Th. 392. It appears by Pausanias that the Thêbans had poems or legends of their own, relative to this war: they dissented in various points from the Cyclic Thêbaïs (ix. 18, 4). The Thêbaïs said that Periklymenus had killed Parthenopæus; the Thêbans assigned this exploit to Asphodikus, a warrior not commemorated by any of the poets known to us.
The village of Harma, between Tanagra and Mykalêssus, was affirmed by some to have been the spot where Amphiaräus closed his life (Strabo, ix. p. 404): Sophoklês placed the scene at the Amphiaræium near Orôpus (ap Strabon. ix. p. 399).
[654] Pindar, Olymp. vi. 16. Ἕπτα δ᾽ ἔπειτα πυρᾶν νέκρων τελεσθέντων Ταλαϊονίδας Εἶπεν ἐν Θήβαισι τοιοῦτόν τι ἔπος· Ποθέω στρατιᾶς ὀφθαλμὸν ἐμᾶς Ἀμφότερον, μάντιν τ᾽ ἀγαθὸν καὶ δουρὶ μάχεσθαι.
The scholiast affirms that these last expressions are borrowed by Pindar from the Cyclic Thêbaïs.
The temple of Amphiaräus (Pausan. ii. 23, 2), his oracle, seems to have been inferior in estimation only to that of Delphi (Herodot. i. 52; Pausan. i. 34; Cicero, Divin. i. 40). Crœsus sent a rich present to Amphiaräus, πυθόμενος αὐτοῦ τήν τε ἀρετὴν καὶ τὴν πάθην (Herod. l. c); a striking proof how these interesting legends were recounted and believed as genuine historical facts. Other adventures of Amphiaräus in the expedition against Thêbes were commemorated in the carvings on the Thronus at Amyklæ (Pausan. iii. 18, 4).