One of the most famous of its early kings was Sisyphus, whose name is supposed to have been a reduplication of the Greek word sophos. His wisdom, however, seems to have been of a mean and sinister kind, better described as cunning, if we may judge from some of the illustrations of it which have come down to us. According to a well-known tradition he was condemned by Zeus to the hopeless and never-ending task, in Hades, of pushing a stone up the side of a mountain, from which it always rolled back before he could place it securely on the summit—an appropriate enough punishment for a man who had been guilty of murdering travellers as they crossed the isthmus by rolling down great stones upon them from the mountains.
His beautiful grandson, Bellerophon, was a man of a different type. His incorruptible virtue, when tempted by the queen of Argos, and the divine protection granted to him in all the perils to which, like Joseph in Egypt, he was exposed—culminating in his marriage to the King of Lycia’s daughter with half the kingdom for a dowry—formed a pleasing theme for ancient poets and moralists. According to one tradition, it was the hoof of his winged horse Pegasus that struck the first water from the fountain Peirene, on the top of Acro-Corinthus. According to another account the spring was a gift to Sisyphus from the river Asopus, for having given information against Zeus in a matter affecting his family welfare.
Another famous name was that of Creon, King of Corinth, whose daughter Glauké came to such a tragic end. According to the common version of the story, Jason had come to Corinth with his wife Medea, by whose aid he had succeeded in bringing back the Golden Fleece from Colchis. Forgetful of his vows, he fell in love with Glauké and was about to marry her, when the enraged Medea, who was skilled in the magical arts of the East, sent the bride a beautiful undergarment, which, as soon as it was put on, set fire to the wearer. Pausanias mentions a fountain into which Glauké threw herself in her agony, and within the last few years the enclosed well referred to has been brought to light.
After a long line of kings the Bacchiadæ are said to have come into power, ruling jointly, with one of their number as president, until the government was usurped by Cypselus, one of those “tyrants” who figure so prominently in Greek history during the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. Among the finest votive offerings at Olympia was an elaborately-carved chest dedicated by his descendants, the Cypselids, to commemorate the preservation of his life while he was an infant. His birth had been heralded by oracles which portended destruction to the ruling clan, from which his mother was sprung, and messengers were sent to Petra, where his parents lived, to take the child’s life. They had arranged that the first of them who should receive the child in his arms should dash it to the ground. But when the unsuspecting mother put it into the hands of one of them, he was so touched by a smile on the face of the infant that he passed it on to the second, and so on, till they had all failed to carry out their cruel design. On leaving the house they began to reproach one another for their weakness of purpose, and agreed to go in again and all take a share in the deed. But the mother had overheard the conversation, and succeeded in saving the child’s life by concealing it in a chest, for which reason it was called Cypselus.
Cypselus was succeeded by his son Periander, who ruled with a rod of iron, but brought the country to a still higher degree of prosperity than it had ever attained before. According to Herodotus, his cruel policy of destroying men of light and leading among his subjects had been learned from Thrasybulus of Miletus, to whom he sent a deputy for advice as to the best means of securing his position. Thrasybulus said nothing, but took his visitor into a corn-field, and as they passed along cut down all the high and heavy stalks which attracted his attention. According to Aristotle, however, Periander was the teacher of this lesson, not the learner. He was succeeded by a son, who was soon driven from the throne. A democratic government was then established, which continued, with the occasional rise of an oligarchy, for several centuries. So deep was the impression made on the Corinthians by the cruelty of their despots, that when a conference was held at Sparta some time afterwards for the purpose of considering a proposal to restore the Peisistratid dynasty to Athens, the Corinthian deputy made a strong and eloquent protest against it, and the design had to be abandoned.
