Welcker’s Dissertation (Die Æschylische Trilogie, p. 248, seqq.) enlarges much upon the Lemnian and Samothracian worship.
[514] Herodot. v, 26, 27. The twenty-seventh chapter is extremely perplexing. As the text reads at present, we ought to make Lykarêtus the subject of certain predications which yet seem properly referable to Otanês. We must consider the words from Οἱ μὲν δὴ Λήμνιοι—down to τελευτᾷ—as parenthetical, which is awkward; but it seems the least difficulty in the case, and the commentators are driven to adopt it.
[515] Zenob. Proverb. iii, 85.
[516] Herodot. vi, 140. Charax ap. Stephan. Byz. v. Ἡφαιστíα.
[517] Xenophon, Hellen. v, 1, 31. Compare Plato, Menexenus, c. 17, p. 245, where the words ἡμετέραι ἀποίκιαι doubtless mean Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros.
[518] Thucyd. iv, 23, v, 8, vii, 57; Phylarchus ap. Athenæum, vi, p. 255; Dêmosthen. Philippic. 1, c. 12, p. 17, R.: compare the Inscription, No. 1686, in the collection of Boeckh, with his remarks, p. 297.
About the stratagems resorted to before the Athenian dikastery, to procure delay by pretended absence in Lemnos or Skyros, see Isæus, Or. vi, p. 58 (p. 80, Bek.); Pollux, viii, 7, 81; Hesych. v. Ἴμβριος; Suidas, v. Λημνία δίκη: compare also Carl Rhode, Res Lemnicæ, p. 50 (Wratislaw 1829).
It seems as if εἰς Λῆμνον πλεῖν had come to be a proverbial expression at Athens for getting out of the way,—evading the performance of duty: this seems to be the sense of Dêmosthenês, Philipp. i, c. 9, p. 14. ἀλλ᾽ εἰς μὲν Λῆμνον τὸν παρ᾽ ὑμῶν ἵππαρχον δεῖ πλεῖν, τῶν δ᾽ ὑπὲρ τῶν τῆς πόλεως κτημάτων ἀγωνιζομένων Μενέλαον ἱππαρχεῖν.
From the passage of Isæus above alluded to, which Rhode seems to me to construe incorrectly, it appears that there was a legal connubium between Athenian citizens and Lemnian women.
[519] Herodot. vi, 136.