[612] Herodotus notices the large importation of wine into Egypt in his day, from all Greece as well as from Phenicia, as well as the employment of the earthen vessels in which it was brought for the transport of water, in the journeys across the desert (iii, 6).
In later times, Alexandria was supplied with wine chiefly from Laodikeia, in Syria, near the mouth of the Orontes (Strabo, xvi, p. 751).
[613] Herodot. ii, 147-154. ἀπὸ Ψαμμητίχου,—πάντα καὶ τὰ ὕστερον ἐπιστάμεθα ἀτρεκέως.
[614] See these differences stated and considered in Boeckh, Manetho und die Hundssternperiode. pp. 326—336, of which some account is given in the Appendix to this chapter.
[615] Herodot. ii, 149-152. This narrative of Herodotus, however little satisfactory in an historical point of view, bears evident marks of being the genuine tale which he heard from the priests of Hephæstos. Diodorus gives an account more historically plausible, but he could not well have had any positive authorities for that period, and he gives us seemingly the ideas of Greek authors of the days of the Ptolemies. Psammetichus (he tells us), as one of the twelve kings, ruled at Saïs and in the neighboring part of the delta: he opened a trade, previously unknown in Egypt, with Greeks and Phenicians, so profitable that his eleven colleagues became jealous of his riches and combined to attack him. He raised an army of foreign mercenaries and defeated them (Diodor. i, 66-67). Polyænus gives a different story about Psammetichus and the Karian mercenaries (vii 3).
[616] Herodot. ii, 154.
[617] Strabo, xvii, p. 801. καὶ τὸ Μιλησίων τεῖχος· πλεύσαντες γὰρ ἐπὶ Ψαμμητίχου τριάκοντα ναυσὶν Μιλήσιοι κατὰ Κυαξάρη (οὗτος δὲ τῶν Μήδων) κάτεσχον εἰς τὸ στόμα τὸ Βολβίτινον· εἶτ᾽ ἐκβάντες ἐτείχισαν τὸ λεχθὲν κτίσμα· χρόνῳ δ᾽ ἀναπλεύσαντες εἰς τὸν Σαϊτικὸν νομὸν, καταναυμαχήσαντες Ἴναρον, πόλιν ἔκτισαν Ναύκρατιν οὐ πολὺ τῆς Σχεδίας ὕπερθεν.
What is meant by the allusion to Kyaxarês, or to Inarus, in this passage, I do not understand. We know nothing of any relations either between Kyaxarês and Psammetichus, or between Kyaxarês and the Milesians. moreover, if by κατὰ Κυαξάρη be meant in the time of Kyaxarês, as the translators render it, we have in immediate succession ἐπὶ Ψαμμητίχου—κατὰ Κυαξάρη, with the same meaning, which is, to say the least of it, a very awkward sentence. The words οὗτος δὲ τῶν Μήδων look not unlike a comment added by some early reader of Strabo, who could not understand why Kyaxarês should be here mentioned, and who noted his difficulty in words which have subsequently found their way into the text. Then again, Inarus belongs to the period between the Persian and Peloponnesian wars: at least we know no other person of that name than the chief of the Egyptian revolt against Persia (Thucyd. i, 114) who is spoken of as a “Libyan, the son of Psammetichus.” The mention of Kyaxarês, therefore, here appears unmeaning, while that of Inarus is an anachronism: possibly, the story that the Milesians founded Naukratis “after having worsted Inarus in a sea-flight,” may have grown out of the etymology of the name Naukratis, in the mind of one who found Inarus the son of Psammetichus mentioned two centuries afterwards, and identified the two Psammetichuses with each other.
The statement of Strabo has been copied by Steph. Byz. v. Ναύκρατις. Eusebius also announces (Chron. i, p. 168) the Milesians as the founders of Naukratis, but puts the event at 753 B. C., during what he calls the Milesian thalassokraty: see Mr. Fynes Clinton ad ann. 732 B. C. in the Fasti Hellenici.
[618] Herodot. ii, 166