Achæa, a surname of Pallas, whose temple in Daunia was defended by dogs which fawned upon the Greeks, but fiercely attacked all other persons. Aristotle, de Mirabilibus.——Ceres was called Achæa, from her lamentations (ἀχεα) at the loss of Proserpine. Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride.
Achæi, the descendants of Achæus, at first inhabited the country near Argos, but being driven by the Heraclidæ, 80 years after the Trojan war, they retired among the Ionians, whose 12 cities they seized and kept. The names of these cities are Pellene, Ægira, Æges, Bura, Tritæa, Ægion, Rhypæ, Olenos, Helice, Patræ, Dyme, and Pharæ. The inhabitants of these three last began a famous confederacy, 284 years B.C., which continued formidable upwards of 130 years, under the name of the Achæan league, and was most illustrious whilst supported by the splendid virtues and abilities of Aratus and Philopœmen. Their arms were directed against the Ætolians for three years, with the assistance of Philip of Macedon, and they grew powerful by the accession of neighbouring states, and freed their country from foreign slavery, till at last they were attacked by the Romans, and, after one year’s hostilities, the Achæan league was totally destroyed, B.C. 147. The Achæans extended the borders of their country by conquest and even planted colonies in Magna Græcia.——The name of Achæi is generally applied to all the Greeks, indiscriminately, by the poets. See: [Achaia]. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 145; bk. 8, ch. 36.—Statius, Thebaid, bk. 2, li. 164.—Polybius.—Livy, bks. 27, 32, &c.—Plutarch, Philopœmen.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 5.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, li. 605.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 1, &c.——Also a people of Asia on the borders of the Euxine. Ovid, Ex Ponto, bk. 4, poem 10, li. 27.
Achæium, a place of Troas, opposite Tenedos. Strabo, bk. 8.
Achæmĕnes, a king of Persia, among the progenitors of Cyrus the Great; whose descendants were called Achæmenides, and formed a separate tribe in Persia, of which the kings were members. Cambyses, son of Cyrus, on his death-bed, charged his nobles, and particularly the Achæmenides, not to suffer the Medes to recover their former power, and abolish the empire of Persia. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 125; bk. 3, ch. 65; bk. 7, ch. 1.—Horace, bk. 2, ode 12, li. 21.——A Persian, made governor of Egypt by Xerxes, B.C. 484.
Achæmenia, part of Persia, called after Achæmenes. Hence Achæmenius. Horace, Epodes, poem 13, li. 12.
Achæmenĭdes, a native of Ithaca, son of Adramastus, and one of the companions of Ulysses, abandoned on the coast of Sicily, where Æneas, on his voyage to Italy, found him. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 624.—Ovid, Ibis, li. 417.
Achæorum littus, a harbour in Cyprus. Strabo.——In Troas,——in Æolia,——in Peloponnesus,——on the Euxine. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 34.
Achæorum statio, a place on the coast of the Thracian Chersonesus, where Polyxena was sacrificed to the shades of Achilles, and where Hecuba killed Polymnestor, who had murdered her son Polydorus.
Achæus, a king of Lydia, hung by his subjects for his extortion. Ovid, Ibis.——A son of Xuthus of Thessaly. He fled, after the accidental murder of a man, to Peloponnesus; where the inhabitants were called from him, Achæi. He afterwards returned to Thessaly. Strabo, bk. 8.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 1.——A tragic poet of Eretria, who wrote 43 tragedies, of which some of the titles are preserved, such as Adrastus, Linus, Cycnus, Eumenides, Philoctetes, Pirithous, Theseus, Œdipus, &c.; of these only one obtained the prize. He lived some time after Sophocles.——Another of Syracuse, author of 10 tragedies.——A river which falls into the Euxine. Arrian, Periplus of the Euxine Sea.——A relation of Antiochus the Great, appointed governor of all the king’s provinces beyond Taurus. He aspired to sovereign power, which he disputed for eight years with Antiochus, and was at last betrayed by a Cretan. His limbs were cut off, and his body, sewed in the skin of an ass, was exposed on a gibbet. Polybius, bk. 8.
Achaia, called also Hellas, a country of Peloponnesus at the north of Elis on the bay of Corinth, which is now part of Livadia. It was originally called Ægialus (shore) from its situation. The Ionians called it Ionia, when they settled there; and it received the name of Achaia, from the Achæi, who dispossessed the Ionians. See: [Achæi].——A small part of Phthiotis was also called Achaia, of which Alos was the capital.