CHAPTER I.
1. Since Eubœa[537] stretches along the whole of this coast from Sunium to Thessaly, except the extremity on each side,[538] it may be convenient to connect the description of this island with that of Thessaly. We shall then pass on to Ætolia and Acarnania, parts of Europe of which it remains to give an account.
2. The island is oblong, and extends nearly 1200 stadia from Cenæum[539] to Geræstus.[540] Its greatest breadth is about 150 stadia, but it is irregular.[541]
Cenæum is opposite to Thermopylæ, and in a small degree to the parts beyond Thermopylæ: Geræstus[542] and Petalia[543] are opposite to Sunium.
Eubœa then fronts[544] Attica, Bœotia, Locris, and the Malienses. From its narrowness, and its length, which we have mentioned, it was called by the ancients Macris.[545]
It approaches nearest to the continent at Chalcis. It projects with a convex bend towards the places in Bœotia near Aulis, and forms the Euripus,[546] of which we have before spoken at length. We have also mentioned nearly all the places on either side of the Euripus, opposite to each other across the strait, both on the continent and on the island. If anything is omitted we shall now give a further explanation.
And first, the parts lying between Aulis (Chalcis?) and the places about Geræstus are called the Hollows of Eubœa, for the sea-coast swells into bays, and, as it approaches Chalcis, juts out again towards the continent.
3. The island had the name not of Macris only, but of Abantis also. The poet in speaking of Eubœa never calls the inhabitants from the name of the island, Eubœans, but always Abantes;
“they who possessed Eubœa, the resolute Abantes;”[547]