[438] Cf. Meister, Sächs. Ges. d. Wiss. Abhandl. 1906, Nr. 3, summarised p. 96 ff., where it is pointed out that the characteristics commonly described as Dorian belong in reality also to Achaean and that in general they are rather to be ascribed to the latter. At the same time it is to be noted that some of the characteristics here claimed as specifically Dorian are shared also by Cypriot, a fact which rather suggests that they may be indigenous to the south-east of the Peloponnesos. If the Dorians came from the same quarter as the Achaeans—and not very many generations later—it is intelligible enough that the two groups of dialects should be difficult to distinguish, even apart from the fact that an Achaean stratum—however insignificant numerically—underlies the Dorian practically everywhere.
[439] Cf. especially Meyer, Geschichte des Alterthums, II p. 55 f., Forsch. zur alten Geschichte, I p. 112 ff.; Ridgeway, Early Age of Greece, p. 659 ff., etc.; Kretschmer, Glotta, I 17 ff. Prof. Meyer has subsequently abandoned this view (Gesch. d. Alt.2, I p. 687).
[440] Cf. Meyer, Forsch. I (passim). The genealogical explanation seems to me to be pressed too far here. The case of the Arcadians is the one in which it is most probable, since apart from genealogies there is no real evidence that this people was connected with the Pelasgoi in any way. Yet even here the cause assigned (ib., p. 53 ff.) is scarcely adequate. One might rather suspect a confusion or identification of the names Λυκάων and Λυκαῖος; but I have no inclination to propound a theory on the subject.
[441] Quoted from Jowett's translation.
[442] Cf. Meyer, Forsch., I p. 115; yet in another passage (ib., p. 111 note) considerations are pointed out which can hardly have been unfamiliar to Herodotus.
[443] It is to be remembered that the name ἡ μεγάλη Ἑλλάς appears to have come from the Achaean colonies in Italy.
[444] It is worth noting that stems in -ān-, as names of peoples, seem to have been specially characteristic of north-western Greek; e.g. Αἰνιᾶνες, Ἀθαμᾶνες, Εὐρυτᾶνες, Κεφαλλᾶνες, Ἀκαρνᾶνες.
[445] It is scarcely necessary to notice the subsidiary arguments which have been adduced in favour of the hypothesis—e.g. that Achilles had been instructed by the Centaur Cheiron and that his spear had come from Pelion. They are sufficiently accounted for by the fact that the poems are of Aeolic origin. The suggestion that Peleus himself is the eponymus of Pelion belongs to a class which has been sufficiently discussed above (p. [267] ff.).
[446] The exceptional case is that of Aias the son of Telamon. But we have no information relating to Salamis before its conquest by the Athenians in the sixth century. It may have been under Achaean rule in early times.
[447] In the case of the Peloponnesian Achaia it is conceivable that a genuine tradition of a conquest of earlier (Ionic) inhabitants may be preserved in Herod. I 145. But the story that this conquest was connected with the Dorian invasion can hardly be due to anything but 'combination'; and traces of such a process can be distinguished plainly enough in Herodotus' account. The important fact is that the author of the Catalogue of Ships evidently knew nothing of the story.