CHAPTER XXIV

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At Ægium there is also near the market-place a temple in common to Apollo and Artemis, and in the market-place is a temple to Artemis alone dressed like a huntress, and the tomb of Talthybius the herald. Talthybius has also a monument erected to him at Sparta, and both cities perform funeral rites in his honour. And near the sea at Ægium Aphrodite has a temple, and next Poseidon, and next Proserpine the daughter of Demeter, and fourthly Zeus Homagyrius (_the Gatherer_). There are statues too of Zeus and Aphrodite and Athene. And Zeus was surnamed Homagyrius, because Agamemnon gathered together at this place the most famous men in Greece, to deliberate together in common how to attack the realm of Priam. Agamemnon has much renown generally, but especially because with the army that accompanied him first, without any reinforcements, he sacked Ilium and all the surrounding cities. And next to Zeus Homagyrius is the temple of Pan-Achæan Demeter. And the sea-shore at Ægium, where these temples just described are, furnishes abundantly water good to drink from a well. There is also a temple to Safety, the statue of the goddess may be seen by none but the priests, but the rites are as follows. They take from the altar of the goddess cakes made after the fashion of the country and throw them into the sea, and say that they send them to Arethusa in Syracuse. The people at Ægium have also several brazen statues as Zeus as a boy, and Hercules without a beard, by Ageladas the Argive. Priests are chosen annually for these gods, and each of the statues remains in the house of the priest. And in older times the most beautiful boy was chosen as priest to Zeus, and when their beards grew then the priest’s office passed to some other beautiful boy. And Ægium is the place where the general meeting of the Achæans is still held, just as the Amphictyonic Council is held at Thermopylæ and Delphi.

As you go on you come to the river Selinus, and about 40 stades from Ægium is a place called Helice near the sea. It was once an important city, and the Ionians had there the most holy temple of Poseidon of Helice. The worship of Poseidon of Helice still remained with them, both when they were driven by the Achæans to Athens, and when they afterwards went from Athens to the maritime parts of Asia Minor. And the Milesians as you go to the well Biblis have an altar of Poseidon of Helice before their city, and similarly at Teos the same god has precincts and an altar. Even Homer has written of Helice, and of Poseidon of Helice.[13] And later on the Achæans here, who drove some suppliants from the temple and slew them, met with quick vengeance from Poseidon, for an earthquake coming over the place rapidly overthrew all the buildings, and made the very site of the city difficult for posterity to find. Previously in earthquakes, remarkable for their violence or extent, the god has generally given previous intimation by signs. For either continuous rain or drought are mostly wont to precede their approach: and in winter the air is hotter, and in summer the disk of the sun is misty and has a different colour to its usual colour, being either redder or slightly inclining to black. And the springs are generally deficient in water, and gusts of wind sweeping over the district uproot the trees, and in the sky are meteors with flames of fire, and the appearance of the stars is unusual and excites consternation in the beholders, and moreover vapours and exhalations rise up out of the ground. And many other indications does the god give in the case of violent earthquakes. And earthquakes are not all similar, but those who have paid attention to such things from the first or been instructed by others have been able to recognize the following phenomena. The mildest of them, if indeed the word mildness is applicable to any of them, is when simultaneously with the first motion of the earth and with the rocking of buildings to their foundation a counter motion restores them to their former position. And in such an earthquake you may see pillars nearly rooted up falling into their places again, and walls that gaped asunder joining again: and beams that slipped out of their fittings slipping back again: so too in the pipes of conduits, if any pipe bursts from the pressure of water, the broken parts weld together again better than any workmen could adjust them. Another kind of earthquake destroys everything within its range, and, on whatever it spends its force, forthwith batters it down, like the military engines employed in sieges. But the most deadly kind of earthquake may be recognized by the following concomitants. The breath of a man in a long-continued fever comes thicker and with much effort, and this is marked in other parts of the body, but especially by feeling the pulse. Similarly this kind of earthquake they say undermines the foundations of buildings, and makes them rock to and fro, like the effect produced by the burrowing of moles in the earth. And this is the only kind of earthquake that leaves no trace in the earth of previous habitation. This was the kind of earthquake that rased Helice to the ground. And they say another misfortune happened to the place in the winter at the same time. The sea encroached over much of the district and quite flooded Helice with water: and the grove of Poseidon was so submerged that the tops of the trees alone were visible. And so the god suddenly sending the earthquake, and the sea encroaching simultaneously, the inundation swept away Helice and its population. A similar catastrophe happened to the town of Sipylus which was swallowed up by a landslip. And when this landslip occurred in the rock water came forth, and became a lake called Saloe, and the ruins of Sipylus were visible in the lake, till the water pouring down hid them from view. Visible too are the ruins of Helice, but not quite as clearly as formerly, because they have been effaced by the action of the sea.

[13] Hom. Iliad, ii. 575; viii. 203; xx. 404.

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