CHAPTER V

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And Smyrna, which was one of the 12 cities of the Æolians, on the site of what they now call the old city, was taken from the Æolians by the Ionians who came from Colophon, but some time afterwards the Ionians admitted its inhabitants to the Pan-Ionic league. But Alexander the son of Philip built the modern Smyrna in consequence of a dream he had. For on his return from hunting on Mount Pagus he went they say to the temple of Nemesis, and there found a well, and a plane-tree in front of the temple growing in the water. And they say he slept under this plane-tree and the goddesses of Nemesis appeared to him and bade him build a town on that site, and remove the people of Smyrna there from the old Smyrna. And the people of Smyrna sent envoys to Claros to consult the oracle in the present conjuncture, and the god gave the following oracular response,

“Thrice happy yea four times happy shall those men be, who shall dwell near Mount Pagus across the sacred Meles.”

So they willingly removed, and they worship two Nemeses instead of one, and they say their mother was Night, but the Athenians who worship Nemesis at Rhamnus say that she was the daughter of Oceanus.

The Ionians have a most magnificent country for the fruits of the earth, and temples such as there are nowhere else, the finest that of Ephesian Artemis for size and opulence, and next two to Apollo not quite finished, one at Branchidæ in Milesia, the other at Claros in Colophonia. Two temples in Ionia were burnt down by the Persians, one of Hera in Samos, and one of Athene in Phocæa. They are still wonderful though the fire has passed upon them. And you would be delighted with the temple of Hercules at Erythræ, and with the temple of Athene at Priene, the latter for the statue of the goddess, the former for its great antiquity. And at Erythræ is a work of art unlike the most ancient of Æginetan or Attic workmanship: its design is perfect Egyptian. It is the wooden raft on which the god sailed from Tyre in Phœnicia, why the people of Erythræ do not say. But to prove that it came into the Ionian sea they say it was moored at the promontory called Mid, which is on the mainland about half-way from the harbour of Erythræ to the island of Chios. And when this raft was at the promontory, the people of Erythræ and the Chians too had no small trouble in trying to get it on shore. At last a native of Erythræ, who got his living from the sea by catching fish, but had lost his eyesight through some disease, Phormio by name, dreamed that the women of Erythræ were to cut off their hair, and that the men making a rope out of this hair were to drag the raft ashore. The women who were citizens wouldn’t hear of it: but all the women who were slaves of Thracian race, or who being free had yet to earn their own living, allowed their hair to be cut off, and so at last the people of Erythræ got the raft to shore. So Thracian women alone are allowed to enter the temple of Hercules, and the rope made of hair is still kept by the people of Erythræ. They also say that the fisherman recovered his sight, and saw for the rest of his life. At Erythræ there is also a temple of Athene Polias, and a huge wooden statue of the goddess seated on a throne, in one hand a distaff in the other a globe. We conjecture it to be by Endœus from several circumstances, especially looking at the workmanship of the statue inside, and the Graces and Seasons in white marble, which used to stand in the open air. The people of Smyrna also had in my time a temple of Æsculapius between the mountain Coryphe and the sea which is unmixed with any other water.

Ionia besides the temples and the salubrity of the air has several other things worthy of record. Near Ephesus is the river Cenchrius, and the fertile Mount Pion, and the well Halitæa. And in Milesia is the well Biblis: of the love passages of Biblis they still sing. And in Colophonia is the grove of Apollo, consisting of ash trees, and not far from the grove the river Ales, the coldest river in Ionia. And the people of Lebedus have baths which are both wonderful and useful to men. The people of Teos also have baths at the promontory Macria, some natural consisting of sea-water that bursts in at a crevice of the rock, others built at wonderful cost. The people of Clazomenæ also have baths. Agamemnon is honoured there. And there is a grotto called the grotto of Pyrrhus’ mother, and they have a tradition about Pyrrhus as a shepherd. The people of Erythræ have also a place called Chalcis, from which the third of their tribes takes its name, where there is a promontory extending to the sea, and some sea baths, which of all the baths in Ionia are most beneficial to men. And the people of Smyrna have the most beautiful river Meles and a cave near its springs, where they say Homer wrote his Poems. The Chians also have a notable sight in the tomb of Œnopion, about whose deeds they have several legends. The Samians too on the way to the temple of Hera have the tomb of Rhadine and Leontichus, which those are accustomed to visit who are melancholy through love. The wonderful things indeed in Ionia are not far short of those in Greece altogether.

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