Part II. The Return to Greece
I. King Æetes
THEY had come into a country that was the strangest of all countries, and amongst a people that were the strangest of all peoples. They were in the land, this people said, before the moon had come into the sky. And it is true that when the great king of Egypt had come so far, finding in all other places men living on the high hills and eating the acorns that grew on the oaks there, he found in Colchis the city of Aea with a wall around it and with pillars on which writings were graven. That was when Egypt was called the Morning Land.
And many of the magicians of Egypt who had come with King Sesostris stayed in that city of Aea, and they taught people spells that could stay the moon in her going and coming, in her rising and setting. Priests of the Moon ruled the city of Aea until King Æetes came.
Æetes had no need of their magic, for Helios, the bright Sun, was his father, as he thought. Also, Hephæstus, the artisan of the gods, was his friend, and Hephæstus made for him [pg 110] many wonderful things to be his protection. Medea, too, his wise daughter, knew the secrets taught by those who could sway the moon.