                                      75 AD
                                    THESEUS
                                   Legendary
                                  by Plutarch
                           translated by John Dryden
THESEUS

  As geographers, Sosius, crowd into the edges of their maps parts
of the world which they do not know about, adding notes in the
margin to the effect, that beyond this lies nothing but the sandy
deserts full of wild beasts, unapproachable bogs, Scythian ice, or a
frozen sea, so in this work of mine, in which I have compared the
lives of the greatest men with one another, after passing through
those periods which probable reasoning can reach to and real history
find a footing in, I might very well say of those that are farther
off: "Beyond this there is nothing but prodigies and fictions, the
only inhabitants are the poets and inventors of fables; there is no
credit, or certainty any farther." Yet, after publishing an account of
Lycurgus the lawgiver and Numa the king, I thought I might, not
without reason, ascend as high as to Romulus, being brought by my
history so near to his time. Considering therefore with myself-

        "Whom shall I set so great a man to face?
        Or whom oppose? Who's equal to the place?"

(as Aeschylus expresses it), I found none so fit as him that peopled
the beautiful and far-famed city of Athens, to be set in opposition
with the father of the invincible and renowned city of Rome. Let us
hope that Fable may, in what shall follow, so submit to the
purifying processes of Reason as to take the character of exact
history. In any case, however, where it shall be found
contumaciously slighting credibility and refusing to be reduced to
anything like probable fact, we shall beg that we may meet with candid
readers, and such as will receive with indulgence the stories of
antiquity.
  Theseus seemed to me to resemble Romulus in many particulars. Both
of them, born out of wedlock and of uncertain parentage, had the
repute of being sprung from the gods.

        "Both warriors; that by all the world's allowed."

Both of them united with strength of body an equal vigour of mind; and
of the two most famous cities of the world, the one built Rome, and
the other made Athens be inhabited. Both stand charged with the rape
of women; neither of them could avoid domestic misfortunes nor
jealousy at home; but towards the close of their lives are both of
them said to have incurred great odium with their countrymen, if, that
is, we may take the stories least like poetry as our guide to the
truth.
  The lineage of Theseus, by his father's side, ascends as high as
to Erectheus and the first inhabitants of Attica. By his mother's side
he was descended of Pelops. For Pelops was the most powerful of all
the kings of Peloponnesus, not so much by the greatness of his
riches as the multitude of his children, having married many daughters
to chief men, and put many sons in places of command in the towns
round about him. One of whom named Pittheus, grandfather to Theseus,
was governor of the small city of the Troezenians and had the repute
of a man of the greatest knowledge and wisdom of his time; which then,
it seems, consisted chiefly in grave maxims, such as the poet Hesiod
got his great fame by, in his book of Works and Days. And, indeed,
among these is one that they ascribe to Pittheus,-

        "Unto a friend suffice
        A stipulated price;"

which, also, Aristotle mentions. And Euripides, by calling
Hippolytus "scholar of the holy Pittheus," shows the opinion that
the world had of him. Aegeus, being desirous of children, and
consulting the oracle of Delphi, received the celebrated answer
which forbade him the company of any woman before his return to
Athens. But the oracle being so obscure as not to satisfy him that
he was clearly forbid this, he went to Troezen, and communicated to
Pittheus the voice of the god, which was in this manner,-

        "Loose not the wine-skin foot, thou chief of men,
        Until to Athens thou art come again."

  Pittheus, therefore, taking advantage from the obscurity of the
oracle, prevailed upon him, it is uncertain whether by persuasion or
deceit, to lie with his daughter Aethra. Aegeus afterwards, knowing
her whom he had lain with to be Pittheus's daughter, and suspecting
her to be with child by him, left a sword and a pair of shoes,
hiding them under a great stone that had a hollow in it exactly
fitting them; and went away making her only privy to it, and
commanding her, if she brought forth a son who, when he came to
man's estate, should be able to lift up the stone and take away what
he had left there, she should send him way to him with those things
with all secrecy, and with injunctions to him as much as possible to
conceal his journey from every one; for he greatly feared the
Pallantidae, who were continually mutinying against him, and
despised him for his want of children, they themselves being fifty
brothers, all sons of Pallas.
  When Aethra was delivered of a son, some say that he was immediately
named Theseus, from the tokens which his father had put under the
stone; others that he had received his name afterwards at Athens, when
Aegeus acknowledged him for his son. He was brought up under his
grandfather Pittheus, and had a tutor and attendant set over him named
Connidas, to whom the Athenians even to this time, the day before
the feast that is dedicated to Theseus, sacrifice a ram, giving this
honour to his memory upon much juster grounds than to Silanio and
Parrhasius for making, pictures and statues of Theseus. There being
then a custom for the Grecian youth, upon their first coming to
man's estate, to go to Delphi and offer first-fruits of their hair
to the god, Theseus also went thither, and a place there to this day
is yet named Thesea, as it is said, from him. He clipped only the fore
part of his head, as Homer says the Abantes did. And this sort of
tonsure was from him named Theseus. The Abantes first used it, not
in imitation of the Arabians, as some imagine, nor of the Mysians, but
because they were a warlike people, and used to close fighting, and
above all other nations accustomed to engage hand to hand; as
Archilochus testifies in these verses:-

        "Slings shall not whirl, nor many arrows fly,
          When on the plain the battle joins; but swords,
        Man against man, the deadly conflict try
          As is the practice of Euboea's lords
        Skilled with the spear.-"

  Therefore that they might not give their enemies a hold by their
hair, they cut it in this manner. They write also that this was the
reason why Alexander gave command to his captains that all the
beards of the Macedonians should be shaved, as being the readiest hold
for an enemy.
  Aethra for some time concealed the true parentage of Theseus, and
a report was given out by Pittheus that he was begotten by Neptune;
for the Troezenians pay Neptune the highest veneration. He is their
tutelar god; to him they offer all their first-fruits, and in his
honour stamp their money with a trident.
  Theseus displaying not only great strength of body, but equal
bravery, and a quickness alike and force of understanding, his
mother Aethra conducting him to the stone, and informing him who was
his true father, commanded him to take from thence the tokens that
Aegeus had left, and sail to Athens. He without any difficulty set
himself to the stone and lifted it up; but refused to take his journey
by sea, though it was much the safer way, and though his mother and
grandfather begged him to do so. For it was at that time very
dangerous to go by land on the road to Athens, no part of it being
free from robbers and murderers. That age produced a sort of men, in
force of hand, and swiftness of foot, and strength of body,
excelling the ordinary rate and wholly incapable of fatigue; making
use, however, of these gifts of nature to no good or profitable
purpose for mankind, but rejoicing and priding themselves in
insolence, and taking the benefit of their superior strength in the
exercise of inhumanity and cruelty, and in seizing, forcing, and
committing all manner of outrages upon everything that fell into their
hands; all respect for others, all justice, they thought, all equity
and humanity, though naturally lauded by common people, either out
of want of courage to commit injuries or fear to receive them, yet
no way concerned those who were strong enough to win for themselves.
Some of these, Hercules destroyed and cut off in his passage through
these countries; but some escaping his notice while he was passing by,
fled and hid themselves, or else were spared by him in contempt of
their abject submission: and after that Hercules fell into misfortune,
and, having slain Iphitus, retired to Lydia, and for a long time was
there slave to Omphale, a punishment which he had imposed upon himself
for the murder: then, indeed, Lydia enjoyed high peace and security,
but in Greece and the countries about it the like villainies again
revived and broke out, there being none to repress or chastise them.
It was therefore a very hazardous journey to travel by land from
Athens to Peloponnesus; and Pittheus giving him an exact account of
each of the robbers and villains, their strength, and the cruelty they
used to all strangers, tried to persuade Theseus to go by sea. But he,
it seems, had long since been secretly fired by the glory of Hercules,
held him in the highest estimation, and was never more satisfied
than in listening to any that gave an account of him; especially those
that had seen him or had been present at any action or saying of
his. So that he was altogether in the same state of feeling as, in
after ages, Themistocles was, when he said that he could not sleep for
the trophy of Miltiades; entertaining such admiration for the virtue
of Hercules, that in the night his dreams were all of that hero's
actions, and in the day a continual emulation stirred him up to
perform the like. Besides, they were related, being born of
cousins-german. For Aethra was daughter of Pittheus, and Alcmena of
Lysidice; and Lysidice and Pittheus were brother and sister,
children of Hippodamia and Pelops. He thought it therefore a
dishonourable thing, and not to be endured, that Hercules should go
out everywhere, and purge both land and sea from wicked men, and he
himself should fly from the like adventures that actually came in
his way; disgracing his reputed father by a mean flight by sea, and
not showing his true one as good evidence of the greatness of his
birth by noble and worthy actions, as by the token that he brought
with him the shoes and the sword.
  With this mind and these thoughts, he set forward with a design to
do injury to nobody, but to repel and revenge himself of all those
that should offer any. And first of all, in a set combat, he slew
Periphetes, in the neighbourhood of Epidaurus, who used a club for his
arms, and from thence had the name of Corynetes, or the club-bearer;
who seized upon him, and forbade him to go forward in his journey.
Being pleased with the club, he took it, and made it his weapon,
continuing to use it as Hercules did the lion's skin, on whose
shoulders that served to prove how huge a beast he had killed; and
to the same end Theseus carried about him this club; overcome indeed
by him, but now in his hands, invincible.
  Passing on further towards the Isthmus of Peloponnesus, he slew
Sinnis, often surnamed the Bender of Pines, after the same manner in
which he himself had destroyed many others before. And this he did
without having either practised or ever learnt the art of bending
these trees, to show that natural strength is above all art. This
Sinnis had a daughter of remarkable beauty and stature, called
Perigune, who, when her father was killed, fled, and was sought
after everywhere by Theseus; and coming into a place overgrown with
brushwood, shrubs, and asparagus-thorn, there, in a childlike innocent
manner, prayed and begged them, as if they understood her, to give her
shelter, with vows that if she escaped she would never cut them down
nor burn them. But Theseus calling upon her, and giving her his
promise that he would use her with respect, and offer her no injury,
she came forth, and in due time bore him a son, named Melanippus;
but afterwards was married to Deioneus, the son of Eurytus, the
Oechalian, Theseus himself giving her to him. Ioxus, the son of this
Melanippus, who was born to Theseus, accompanied Ornytus in the colony
that he carried with him into Caria, whence it is a family usage
amongst the people called Ioxids, both male and female, never to
burn either shrubs or asparagus-thorn, but to respect and honour them.
  The Crommyonian sow, which they called Phaea, was a savage and
formidable wild beast, by no means an enemy to be despised. Theseus
killed her, going out of his way on purpose to meet and engage her, so
that he might not seem to perform all his great exploits out of mere
necessity; being also of opinion that it was the part of a brave man
to chastise villainous and wicked men when attacked by them, but to
seek out and overcome the more noble wild beasts. Others relate that
Phaea was a woman, a robber full of cruelty and lust, that lived in
Crommyon, and had the name of Sow given her from the foulness of her
life and manners, and afterwards was killed by Theseus. He slew also
Sciron, upon the borders of Megara, casting him down from the rocks,
being, as most report, a notorious robber of all passengers, and, as
others add, accustomed, out of insolence and wantonness, to stretch
forth his feet to strangers commanding them to wash them, and then
while they did it, with a kick to send them down the rock into the
sea. The writers of Megara, however, in contradiction to the
received report, and, as Simonides expresses it, "fighting with all
antiquity," contend that Sciron was neither a robber nor doer of
violence, but a punisher of all such, and the relative and friend of
good and just men; for Aeacus, they say, was ever esteemed a man of
the greatest sanctity of all the Greeks; and Cychreus, the Salaminian,
was honoured at Athens with divine worship; and the virtues of
Peleus and Telamon were not unknown to any one. Now Sciron was
son-in-law to Cychreus, father-in-law to Aeacus, and grandfather to
Peleus and Telamon, who were both of them sons of Endeis, the daughter
of Sciron and Chariclo; it was not probable, therefore, that the
best of men should make these alliances with one who was worst, giving
and receiving mutually what was of greatest value and most dear to
them. Theseus, by their account, did not slay Sciron in his first
journey to Athens, but afterwards, when he took Eleusis, a city of the
Megarians, having circumvented Diocles, the governor. Such are the
contradictions in this story. In Eleusis he killed Cercyon, the
Arcadian, in a wrestling match. And going on a little farther, in
Erineus, he slew Damastes, otherwise called Procrustes, forcing his
body to the size of his own bed, as he himself was used to do with all
strangers; this he did in imitation of Hercules, who always returned
upon his assailants the same sort of violence that they offered to
him; sacrificed Busiris, killed Antaeus in wrestling, and Cycnus in
single combat, and Termerus by breaking his skull in pieces (whence,
they say, comes the proverb of "a Termerian mischief"), for it seems
Termerus killed passengers that he met by running with his head
against them. And so also Theseus proceeded in the punishment of
evil men, who underwent the same violence from him which they had
inflicted upon others, justly suffering after the manner of their
own injustice.
  As he went forward on his journey, and was come as far as the
river Cephisus, some of the race of the Phytalidae met him and saluted
him, and upon his desire to use the purifications, then in custom,
they performed them with all the usual ceremonies, and, having offered
propitiatory sacrifices to the gods, invited him and entertained him
at their house, a kindness which, in all his journey hitherto, he
had not met.
  On the eighth day of Cronius, now called Hecatombaeon, he arrived at
Athens, where he found the public affairs full of all confusion, and
divided into parties and factions, Aegeus also, and his whole
private family, labouring under the same distemper; for Medea,
having fled from Corinth, and promised Aegeus to make him, by her art,
capable of having children, was living with him. She first was aware
of Theseus, whom as yet Aegeus did not know, and he being in years,
full of jealousies and suspicions, and fearing everything by reason of
the faction that was then in the city, she easily persuaded him to
kill him by poison at a banquet, to which he was to be invited as a
stranger. He, coming to the entertainment, thought it not fit to
discover himself at once, but willing to give his father the
occasion of first finding him out, the meat being on the table, he
drew his sword as if he designed to cut with it; Aegeus, at once
recognising the token, threw down the cup of poison, and,
questioning his son, embraced him, and having gathered together all
his citizens, owned him publicly before them, who, on their part,
received him gladly for the fame of his greatness and bravery; and
it is said, that when the cup fell, the poison was spilt there where
now is the enclosed space in the Delphinium; for in that place stood
Aegeus's house, and the figure of Mercury on the east side of the
temple is called the Mercury of Aegeus's gate.
  The sons of Pallas, who before were quiet upon expectation of
recovering the kingdom after Aegeus's death, who was without issue, as
soon as Theseus appeared and was acknowledged the successor, highly
resenting that Aegeus first, an adopted son only of Pandion, and not
at all related to the family of Erechtheus, should be holding the
kingdom, and that after him, Theseus, a visitor and stranger, should
be destined to succeed to it, broke out into open war. And dividing
themselves into two companies, one part of them marched openly from
Sphettus, with their father, against the city, the other, hiding
themselves in the village of Gargettus, lay in ambush, with a design
to set upon the enemy on both sides. They had with them a crier of the
township of Agnus, named Leos, who discovered to Theseus all the
designs of the Pallantidae. He immediately fell upon those that lay in
ambuscade, and cut them all off; upon tidings of which Pallas and
his company fled and were dispersed.
  From hence they say is derived the custom among the people of the
township of Pallene to have no marriages or any alliance with the
people of Agnus, nor to suffer the criers to pronounce in their
proclamations the words used in all other parts of the country,
Acouete Leoi (Hear ye people), hating the very sound of Leo, because
of the treason of Leos.
  Theseus, longing to be in action, and desirous also to make
himself popular, left Athens to fight with the bull of Marathon, which
did no small mischief to the inhabitants of Tetrapolis. And having
overcome it, he brought it alive in triumph through the city, and
afterwards sacrificed it to the Delphinian Apollo. The story of
Hecale, also, of her receiving and entertaining Theseus in this
expedition, seems to be not altogether void of truth; for the
townships round about, meeting upon a certain day, used to offer a
sacrifice which they called Hecalesia, to Jupiter Hecaleius, and to
pay honour to Hecale, whom, by a diminutive name, they called
Hecalene, because she, while entertaining Theseus, who was quite a
youth, addressed him, as old people do, with similar endearing
diminutives; and having made a vow to Jupiter for him as he was
going to the fight, that, if he returned in safety, she would offer
sacrifices in thanks of it, and dying before he came back, she had
these honours given her by way of return for her hospitality, by the
command of Theseus, as Philochorus tells us.
  Not long after arrived the third time from Crete the collectors of
the tribute which the Athenians paid them upon the following occasion.
Androgeus having been treacherously murdered in the confines of
Attica, not only Minos, his father, put the Athenians to extreme
distress by a perpetual war, but the gods also laid waste their
country; both famine and pestilence lay heavy upon them, and even
their rivers were dried up. Being told by the oracle that, if they
appeased and reconciled Minos, the anger of the gods would cease and
they should enjoy rest from the miseries they laboured under, they
sent heralds, and with much supplication were at last reconciled,
entering into an agreement to send to Crete every nine years a tribute
of seven young men and as many virgins, as most writers agree in
stating; and the most poetical story adds, that the Minotaur destroyed
them, or that, wandering in the labyrinth, and finding no possible
means of getting out, they miserably ended their lives there; and that
this Minotaur was (as Euripides hath it)-

        "A mingled form where two strange shapes combined,
        And different natures, bull and man, were joined."

But Philochorus says that the Cretans will by no means allow the truth
of this, but say that the labyrinth was only an ordinary prison,
having no other bad quality but that it secured the prisoners from
escaping, and that Minos, having instituted games in honour of
Androgeus, gave, as a reward to the victors, these youths, who in
the meantime were kept in the labyrinth; and that the first that
overcame in those games was one of the greatest power and command
among them, named Taurus, a man of no merciful or gentle
disposition, who treated the Athenians that were made his prize in a
proud and cruel manner. Also Aristotle himself, in the account that he
gives of the form of government of the Bottiaeans, is manifestly of
opinion that the youths were not slain by Minos, but spent the
remainder of their days in slavery in Crete; that the Cretans, in
former times, to acquit themselves of an ancient vow which they had
made, were used to send an offering of the first-fruits of their men
to Delphi, and that some descendants of these Athenian slaves were
mingled with them and sent amongst them, and, unable to get their
living there, removed from thence, first into Italy, and settled about
Japygia; from thence again, that they removed to Thrace, and were
named Bottiaeans; and that this is the reason why, in a certain
sacrifice, the Bottiaean girls sing a hymn beginning Let us go to
Athens. This may show us how dangerous it is to incur the hostility of
a city that is mistress of eloquence and song. For Minos was always
ill spoken of, and represented ever as a very wicked man, in the
Athenian theatres; neither did Hesiod avail him by calling him "the
most royal Minos," nor Homer, who styles him "Jupiter's familiar
friend;" the tragedians got the better, and from the vantage ground of
the stage showered down obloquy upon him, as a man of cruelty and
violence; whereas, in fact, he appears to have been a king and a
law-giver, and Rhadamanthus, a judge under him, administering the
statutes that he ordained.
  Now, when the time of the third tribute was come, and the fathers
who had any young men for their sons were to proceed by lot to the
choice of those that were to be sent, there arose fresh discontents
and accusations against Aegeus among the people, who were full of
grief and indignation that he who was the cause of all their
miseries was the only person exempt from the punishment; adopting
and settling his kingdom upon a bastard and foreign son, he took no
thought, they said, of their destitution and loss, not of bastards,
but lawful children. These things sensibly affected Theseus, who,
thinking it but just not to disregard, but rather partake of, the
sufferings of his fellow-citizens, offered himself for one without any
lot. All else were struck with admiration for the nobleness and with
love for the goodness of the act; and Aegeus, after prayers and
entreaties, finding him inflexible and not to be persuaded,
proceeded to the choosing of the rest by lot. Hellanicus, however,
tells us that the Athenians did not send the young men and virgins
by lot, but that Minos himself used to come and make his own choice,
and pitched upon Theseus before all others; according to the
conditions agreed upon between them, namely, that the Athenians should
furnish them with a ship and that the young men that were to sail with
him should carry no weapons of war; but that if the Minotaur was
destroyed, the tribute should cease.
  On the two former occasions of the payment of the tribute,
entertaining no hopes of safety or return, they sent out the ship with
a black sail, as to unavoidable destruction; but now, Theseus
encouraging his father, and speaking greatly of himself, as
confident that he should kill the Minotaur, he gave the pilot
another sail, which was white, commanding him, as he returned, if
Theseus were safe, to make use of that; but if not, to sail with the
black one, and to hang out that sign of his misfortune. Simonides says
that the sail which Aegeus delivered to the pilot was not white, but-

        "Scarlet, in the juicy bloom
        Of the living oak-tree steeped,"

and that this was to be the sign of their escape. Phereclus, son of
Amarsyas, according to Simonides, was pilot of the ship. But
Philochorus says Theseus had sent him by Scirus, from Salamis,
Nausithous to be his steersman, and Phaeax his look-out-man in the
prow, the Athenians having as yet not applied themselves to
navigation; and that Scirus did this because one of the young men,
Menesthes, was his daughter's son; and this the chapels of
Nausithous and Phaeax, built by Theseus near the temple of Scirus,
confirm. He adds, also, that the feast named Cybernesia was in
honour of them. The lot being cast, and Theseus having received out of
the Prytaneum those upon whom it fell, he went to the Delphinium,
and made an offering for them to Apollo of his suppliant's badge,
which was a bough of a consecrated olive tree, with white wool tied
about it.
  Having thus performed his devotion, he went to sea, the sixth day of
Munychion, on which day even to this time the Athenians send their
virgins to the same temple to make supplication to the gods. It is
farther reported that he was commanded by the oracle of Delphi to make
Venus his guide, and to invoke her as the companion and conductress of
his voyage and that, as he was sacrificing a she goat to her by the
sea-side, it was suddenly changed into a he, and for this cause that
goddess had the name of Epitragia.
  When he arrived at Crete, as most of the ancient historians as
well as poets tell us, having a clue of thread given him by Ariadne,
who had fallen in love with him, and being instructed by her how to
use it so as to conduct him through the windings of the labyrinth,
he escaped out of it and slew the Minotaur, and sailed back, taking
along with him Ariadne and the young Athenian captives. Phercydes adds
that he bored holes in the bottom of the Cretan ships to hinder
their pursuit. Demon writes that Taurus, the chief captain of Minos,
was slain by Theseus at the mouth of the port, in a naval combat as he
was sailing out for Athens. But Philochorus gives us the story thus:
That at the setting forth of the yearly games by King Minos, Taurus
was expected to carry away the prize, as he had done before; and was
much grudged the honour. His character and manners made his power
hateful, and he was accused moreover of too near familiarity with
Pasiphae, for which reason, when Theseus desired the combat, Minos
readily complied. And as it was a custom in Crete that the women
also should be admitted to the sight of these games, Ariadne, being
present, was struck with admiration of the manly beauty of Theseus,
and the vigour and address which he showed in the combat, overcoming
all that encountered with him. Minos, too, being extremely pleased
with him, especially because he had overthrown and disgraced Taurus,
voluntarily gave up the young captives to Theseus, and remitted the
tribute to the Athenians. Clidemus gives an account peculiar to
himself, very ambitiously, and beginning a great way back: That it was
a decree consented to by all Greece, that no vessel from any place,
containing above five persons, should be permitted to sail, Jason only
excepted, who was made captain of the great ship Argo, to sail about
and scour the sea of pirates. But Daedalus having escaped from
Crete, and flying by sea to Athens, Minos, contrary to this decree,
pursued him with his ships of war, was forced by a storm upon
Sicily, and there ended his life. After his decease, Deucalion, his
son, desiring a quarrel with the Athenians, sent to them, demanding
that they should deliver up Daedalus to him, threatening upon their
refusal, to put to death all the young Athenians whom his father had
received as hostages from the city. To this angry message Theseus
returned a very gentle answer excusing himself that he could not
deliver up Daedalus, who was nearly related to him, being his
cousin-german, his mother being Merope, the daughter of Erechtheus. In
the meanwhile he secretly prepared a navy, part of it at home near the
village of the Thymoetadae, a place of no resort, and far from any
common roads, the other part by his grandfather Pittheus's means at
Troezen, that so his design might be carried on with the greatest
secrecy. As soon as ever his fleet was in readiness, he set sail,
having with him Daedalus and other exiles from Crete for his guides;
and none of the Cretans having any knowledge of his coming, but
imagining when they saw his fleet that they were friends and vessels
of their own, he soon made himself master of the port, and immediately
making a descent, reached Gnossus before any notice of his coming,
and, in a battle before the gates of the labyrinth, put Deucalion
and all his guards to the sword. The government by this means
falling to Ariadne, he made a league with her, and received the
captives of her, and ratified a perpetual friendship between the
Athenians and the Cretans, whom he engaged under an oath never again
to commence any war with Athens.
  There are yet many other traditions about these things, and as
many concerning Ariadne, all inconsistent with each other. Some relate
that she hung herself, being deserted by Theseus. Others that she
was carried away by his sailors to the isle of Naxos, and married to
Oenarus, priest of Bacchus; and that Theseus left her because he
fell in love with another-

        "For Aegle's love was burning in his breast;

a verse which Hereas, the Megarian, says was formerly in the poet
Hesiod's works, but put out by Pisistratus, in like manner as he added
in Homer's Raising of the Dead, to gratify the Athenians, the line-

        "Theseus, Pirithous, mighty son of gods."

Others say Ariadne had sons also by Theseus, Oenopion and Staphylus;
and among these is the poet Ion of Chios, who writes of his own native
city-

        "Which once Oenopion, son of Theseus built."

But the more famous of the legendary stories everybody (as I may
say) has in his mouth. In Paeon, however, the Amathusian, there is a
story given, differing from the rest. For he writes that Theseus,
being driven by a storm upon the isle of Cyprus, and having aboard
with him Ariadne, big with child, and extremely discomposed with the
rolling of the sea, set her on shore, and left her there alone, to
return himself and help the ship, when, on a sudden, a violent wind
carried him again out to sea. That the women of the island received
Ariadne very kindly, and did all they could to console and alleviate
her distress at being left behind. That they counterfeited kind
letters, and delivered them to her, as sent from Theseus, and, when
she fell in labour, were diligent in performing to her every needful
service; but that she died before she could be delivered, and was
honourably interred. That soon after Theseus returned, and was greatly
afflicted for her loss, and at his departure left a sum of money among
the people of the island, ordering them to do sacrifice to Ariadne;
and caused two little images to be made and dedicated to her, one of
silver and the other of brass. Moreover, that on the second day of
Gorpiaeus, which is sacred to Ariadne, they have this ceremony among
their sacrifices, to have a youth lie down and with his voice and
gesture represent the pains of a woman in travail; and that the
Amathusians call the grove in which they show her tomb, the grove of
Venus Ariadne.
  Differing yet from this account, some of the Naxians write that
there were two Minoses and two Ariadnes, one of whom, they say, was
married to Bacchus, in the isle of Naxos, and bore the children
Staphylus and his brother; but that the other, of a later age, was
carried off by Theseus, and, being afterwards deserted by him, retired
to Naxos, with her nurse Corcyna, whose grave they yet show. That this
Ariadne also died there, and was worshipped by the island, but in a
different manner from the former; for her day is celebrated with
general joy and revelling, but all the sacrifices performed to the
latter are attended with mourning and gloom.
  Now Theseus, in his return from Crete, put in at Delos, and having
sacrificed to the god of the island, dedicated to the temple the image
of Venus which Ariadne had given him, and danced with the young
Athenians a dance that, in memory of him, they say is still
preserved among the inhabitants of Delos, consisting in certain
measured turnings and returnings, imitative of the windings and
twistings of the labyrinth. And this dance, as Dicaearchus writes,
is called among the Delians the Crane. This he danced around the
Ceratonian Altar, so called from its consisting of horns taken from
the left side of the head. They say also that he instituted games in
Delos, where he was the first that began the custom of giving a palm
to the victors.
  When they were come near the coast of Attica, so great was the joy
for the happy success of their voyage, that neither Theseus himself
nor the pilot remembered to hang out the sail which should have been
the token of their safety to Aegeus, who, in despair at the sight,
threw himself headlong from a rock, and perished in the sea. But
Theseus being arrived at the port of Phalerum, paid there the
sacrifices which he had vowed to the gods at his setting out to sea,
and sent a herald to the city to carry the news of his safe return. At
his entrance, the herald found the people for the most part full of
grief for the loss of their king; others, as may well be believed,
as full of joy for the tidings that he brought, and eager to welcome
him and crown him with garlands for his good news, which he indeed
accepted of, but hung them upon his herald's staff; and thus returning
to the seaside before Theseus had finished his libation to the gods,
he stayed apart for fear of disturbing the holy rites; but, as soon as
the libation was ended, went up and related the king's death, upon the
hearing of which, with great lamentations and a confused tumult of
grief, they ran with all haste to the city. And from hence, they
say, it comes that at this day, in the feast of Oschophoria, the
herald is not crowned, but his staff, and all who are present at the
libation cry out eleleu, iou, iou, the first of which confused
sounds is commonly used by men in haste, or at a triumph, the other is
proper to people in consternation or disorder of mind.
  Theseus, after the funeral of his father, paid his vows to Apollo
the seventh day of Pyanepsion; for on that day the youth that returned
with him safe from Crete made their entry into the city. They say,
also, that the custom of boiling pulse at this feast is derived from
hence; because the young men that escaped put all that was left of
their provision together, and, boiling it in one common pot, feasted
themselves with it, and ate it all up together. Hence, also, they
carry in procession an olive branch bound about with wool (such as
they then made use of in their supplications), which they call
Eiresione, crowned with all sorts of fruits, to signify that
scarcity and barrenness was ceased, singing in their procession this
song:-

        "Eiresione bring figs, and Eiresione bring loaves;
        Bring us boney in pints, and oil to rub on our bodies,
        And a strong flagon of wine, for all to go mellow to bed on."

Although some hold opinion that this ceremony is retained in memory of
the Heraclidae, who were thus entertained and brought up by the
Athenians. But most are of the opinion which we have given above.
  The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned had thirty
oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of
Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they
decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their place, insomuch
that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for
the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the
ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the
same.
  The feast called Oschophoria, or the feast of boughs, which to
this day the Athenians celebrate, was then first instituted by
Theseus. For he took not with him the full number of virgins which
by lot were to be carried away, but selected two youths of his
acquaintance, of fair and womanish faces, but of a manly and forward
spirit, and having, by frequent baths, and avoiding the heat and
scorching of the sun, with a constant use of all the ointments and
washes and dresses that serve to the adorning of the head or smoothing
the skin or improving the complexion, in a manner changed them from
what they were before, and having taught them farther to counterfeit
the very voice and carriage and gait of virgins so that there could
not be the least difference perceived, he, undiscovered by any, put
them into the number of the Athenian maids designed for Crete. At
his return, he and these two youths led up a solemn procession, in the
same habit that is now worn by those who carry the vine-branches.
Those branches they carry in honour of Bacchus and Ariadne, for the
sake of their story before related; or rather because they happened to
return in autumn, the time of gathering the grapes. The women, whom
they call Deipnopherae, or supper-carriers, are taken into these
ceremonies, and assist at the sacrifice, in remembrance and
imitation of the mothers of the young men and virgins upon whom the
lot fell, for thus they ran about bringing bread and meat to their
children; and because the women then told their sons and daughters
many tales and stories, to comfort and encourage them under the danger
they were going upon, it has still continued a custom that at this
feast old fables and tales should be told. For these particularities
we are indebted to the history of Demon. There was then a place chosen
out, and a temple erected in it to Theseus, and those families out
of whom the tribute of the youth was gathered were appointed to pay
tax to the temple for sacrifices to him. And the house of the
Phytalidae had the overseeing of these sacrifices, Theseus doing
them that honour in recompense of their former hospitality.
  Now, after the death of his father Aegeus, forming in his mind a
great and wonderful design, he gathered together all the inhabitants
of Attica into one town, and made them one people of one city, whereas
before they lived dispersed, and were not easy to assemble upon any
affair for the common interest. Nay, differences and even wars often
occurred between them, which he by his persuasions appeased, going
from township to township, and from tribe to tribe. And those of a
more private and mean condition readily embracing such good advice, to
those of greater power he promised a commonwealth without monarchy,
a democracy, or people's government, in which he should only be
continued as their commander in war and the protector of their laws,
all things else being equally distributed among them;- and by this
means brought a part of them over to his proposal. The rest, fearing
his power, which was already grown very formidable, and knowing his
courage and resolution, chose rather to be persuaded than forced
into a compliance. He then dissolved all the distinct statehouses,
council halls, and magistracies, and built one common state-house
and council hall on the site of the present upper town, and gave the
name of Athens to the whole state, ordaining a common feast and
sacrifice, which he called Panathenaea, or the sacrifice of all the
united Athenians. He instituted also another sacrifice called
Metoecia, or Feast of Migration, which is yet celebrated on the
sixteenth day of        Hecatombaeon. Then, as he had promised, he
laid down his regal power and proceeded to order a commonwealth,
entering upon this great work not without advice from the gods. For
having sent to consult the oracle of Delphi concerning the fortune
of his new government and city, he received this answer:-

        "Son of the Pitthean maid,
        To your town the terms and fates,
        My father gives of many states.
        Be not anxious nor afraid;
        The bladder will not fail to swim
        On the waves that compass him."

Which oracle, they say, one of the sibyls long after did in a manner
repeat to the Athenians, in this verse:-

        "The bladder may be dipt, but not be drowned."

Farther yet designing to enlarge his city, he invited all strangers to
come and enjoy equal privileges with the natives, and it is said
that the common form, Come hither, all ye people, was the words that
Theseus proclaimed when he thus set up a commonwealth, in a manner,
for all nations. Yet he did not suffer his state, by the promiscuous
multitude that flowed in, to be turned into confusion and he left
without any order or degree, but was the first that divided the
Commonwealth into three distinct ranks, the noblemen, the
husbandmen, and artificers. To the nobility he committed the care of
religion, the choice of magistrates, the teaching and dispensing of
the laws, and interpretation and direction in all sacred matters;
the whole city being, as it were, reduced to an exact equality, the
nobles excelling the rest in honour, the husbandmen in profit, and the
artificers in number. And that Theseus was the first, who, as
Aristotle says, out of an inclination to popular government, parted
with the regal power, Homer also seems to testify, in his catalogue of
the ships, where he gives the name of People to the Athenians only.
  He also coined money, and stamped it with the image of an ox, either
in memory of the Marathonian bull, or of Taurus, whom he vanquished,
or else to put his people in mind to follow husbandry; and from this
coin came the expression so frequent among the Greeks, of a thing
being worth ten or a hundred oxen. After this he joined Megara to
Attica, and erected that famous pillar on the Isthmus, which bears
an inscription of two lines, showing the bounds of the two countries
that meet there. On the east side the inscription is,-

        "Peloponnesus there, Ionia here"

and on the west side,-

        "Peloponnesus here, Ionia there."

He also instituted the games, in emulation of Hercules, being
ambitious that as the Greeks, by that hero's appointment, celebrated
the Olympian games to the honour of Jupiter, so by his institution,
they should celebrate the Isthmian to the honour of Neptune. For those
that were there before observed, dedicated to Melicerta, were
performed privately in the night, and had the form rather of a
religious rite than of an open spectacle or public feast. There are
some who say that the Isthmian games were first instituted in memory
of Sciron, Theseus thus making expiation for his death, upon account
of the nearness of kindred between them, Sciron being the son of
Canethus and Heniocha, the daughter of Pittheus; though others write
that Sinnis, not Sciron, was their son, and that to his honour, and
not to the other's, these games were ordained by Theseus. At the
same time he made an agreement with the Corinthians, that they
should allow those that came from Athens to the celebration of the
Isthmian games as much space of honour before the rest to behold the
spectacle in, as the sail of the ship that brought them thither
stretched to its full extent, could cover; so Hellanicus and Andro
of Halicarnassus have established.
  Concerning his voyage into the Euxine Sea, Philochorus and some
others write that he made it with Hercules, offering him his service
in the war against the Amazons, and had Antiope given him for the
reward of his valour; but the greater number, of whom are
Pherecydes, Hellanicus, and Herodorus, write that he made this
voyage many years after Hercules, with a navy under his own command,
and took the Amazon prisoner- the more probable story, for we do not
read that any other, of all those that accompanied him in this action,
took any Amazon prisoner. Bion adds, that, to take her, he had to
use deceit and fly away; for the Amazons, he says, being naturally
lovers of men, were so far from avoiding Theseus when he touched
upon their coasts, that they sent him presents to his ship; but he,
having invited Antiope, who brought them, to come aboard,
immediately set sail and carried her away. An author named Menecrates,
that wrote the History of Nicae in Bithynia, adds, that Theseus,
having Antiope aboard his vessel, cruised for some time about those
coasts, and that there were in the same ship three young men of
Athens, that accompanied him in this voyage, all brothers, whose names
were Euneos, Thoas, and soloon. The last of these fell desperately
in love with Antiope, and, escaping the notice of the rest, revealed
the secret only to one of his most intimate acquaintances, and
employed him to disclose his passion to Antiope; she rejected his
pretences with a very positive denial, yet treated the matter with
much gentleness and discretion, and made no complaint to Theseus of
anything that had happened; but Soloon, the thing being desperate,
leaped into a river near the seaside and drowned himself. As soon as
Theseus was acquainted with his death, and his unhappy love that was
the cause of it, he was extremely distressed, and, in the height of
his grief, an oracle which he had formerly received at Delphi came
into his mind; for he had been commanded by the priestess of Apollo
Pythius, that wherever in a strange land he was most sorrowful and
under the greatest affliction, he should build a city there, and leave
some of his followers to be governors of the place. For this cause
he there founded a city, which he called, from the name of Apollo,
Pythopolis, and, in honour of the unfortunate youth, he named the
river that runs by it Soloon, and left the two surviving brothers
intrusted with the care of the government and laws, joining with
them Hermus, one of the nobility of Athens, from whom a place in the
city is called the House of Hermus; though by an error in the accent
it has been taken for the House of Hermes, or Mercury, and the
honour that was designed to the hero, transferred to the god.
  This was the origin and cause of the Amazonian invasion of Attica,
which would seem to have been no slight or womanish enterprise. For it
is impossible that they should have placed their camp in the very
city, and joined battle close by the Pnyx and the hill called
Museum, unless, having first conquered the country around about,
they had thus with impunity advanced to the city. That they made so
long a journey by land, and passed the Cimmerian Bosphorus, when
frozen, as Hellanicus writes, is difficult to be believed. That they
encamped all but in the city is certain, and may be sufficiently
confirmed by the names that the places hereabout yet retain, and the
graves and monuments of those that fell in the battle. Both armies
being in sight, there was a long pause and doubt on each side which
should give the first onset; at last Theseus, having sacrificed to
Fear, in obedience to the command of an oracle he had received, gave
them battle; and this happened in the month of Boedromion, in which to
this very day the Athenians celebrate the Feast Boedromia. Clidemus,
desirous to be very circumstantial, writes that the left wing of the
Amazons moved towards the place which is yet called Amazonium and
the right towards the Pnyx, near Chrysa, that with this wing the
Athenians, issuing from behind the Museum, engaged, and that the
graves of those that were slain are to be seen in the street that
leads to the gate called the Piraic, by the chapel of the hero
Chalcodon; and that here the Athenians were routed, and gave way
before the women, as far as to the temple of the Furies, but, fresh
supplies coming in from the Palladium, Ardettus, and the Lyceum,
they charged their right wing, and beat them back into their tents, in
which action a great number of the Amazons were slain. At length,
after four months, a peace was concluded between them by the mediation
of Hippolyta (for so this historian calls the Amazon whom Theseus
married, and not Antiope), though others write that she was slain with
a dart by Molpadia, while fighting by Theseus's side, and that the
pillar which stands by the temple of Olympian Earth was erected to her
honour. Nor is it to be wondered at, that in events of such antiquity,
history should be in disorder. For indeed we are also told that
those of the Amazons that were wounded were privately sent away by
Antiope to Chalcis, where many by her care recovered, but some that
died were buried there in the place that is to this time called
Amazonium. That this war, however, was ended by a treaty is evident,
both from the name of the place adjoining to the temple of Theseus,
called, from the solemn oath there taken, Horcomosium; and also from
the ancient sacrifice which used to be celebrated to the Amazons the
day before the Feast of Theseus. The Megarians also show a spot in
their city where some Amazons were buried, on the way from the
market to a place called Rhus, where the building in the shape of a
lozenge stands. It is said, likewise, that others of them were slain
near Chaeronea, and buried near the little rivulet formerly called
Thermodon, but now Haemon, of which an account is given in the life of
Demosthenes. It appears further that the passage of the Amazons
through Thessaly was not without opposition, for there are yet shown
many tombs of them near Scotussa and Cynoscephalae.
  This is as much as is worth telling concerning the Amazons. For
the account which the author of the poem called the Theseid gives of
this rising of the Amazons, how Antiope, to revenge herself upon
Theseus for refusing her and marrying Phaedra, came down upon the city
with her train of Amazons, whom Hercules slew, is manifestly nothing
else but fable and invention. It is true, indeed, that Theseus married
Phaedra, but that was after the death of Antiope, by whom he had a son
called Hippolytus, or, as Pindar writes, Demophon. The calamities
which befell Phaedra and this son, since none of the historians have
contradicted the tragic poets that have written of them, we must
suppose happened as represented uniformly by them.
  There are also other traditions of the marriages of Theseus, neither
honourable in their occasions nor fortunate in their events, which yet
were never represented in the Greek plays. For he is said to have
carried off Anaxo, a Troezenian, and having slain Sinnis and
Cercyon, to have ravished their daughters; to have married Periboea,
the mother of Ajax, and then Phereboea, and then Iope, the daughter of
Iphicles. And further, he is accused of deserting Ariadne (as is
before related), being in love with Aegle, the daughter of Panopeus,
neither justly nor honourably; and lastly, of the rape of Helen, which
filled all Attica with war and blood, and was in the end the
occasion of his banishment and death, as will presently be related.
  Herodorus is of opinion, that though there were many famous
expeditions undertaken by the bravest men of his time, yet Theseus
never joined in any of them, once only excepted, with the Lapithae, in
their war against the Centaurs; but others say that he accompanied
Jason to Colchis and Meleager to the slaying of the Calydonian boar,
and that hence it came to be a proverb, Not without Theseus; that he
himself, however, without aid of any one, performed many glorious
exploits, and that from him began the saying, He is a second Hercules.
He also joined Adrastus in recovering the bodies of those that were
slain before Thebes, but not as Euripides in his tragedy says, by
force of arms, but by persuasion and mutual agreement and composition,
for so the greater part of the historians write; Philochorus adds
further that this was the first treaty that ever was made for the
recovering the bodies of the dead, but in the history of Hercules,
it is shown that it was he who first gave leave to his enemies to
carry off their slain. The burying-places of the most part are yet
to be seen in the villa called Eleutherae; those of the commanders, at
Eleusis, where Theseus allotted them a place, to oblige Adrastus.
The story of Euripides in his suppliants is disproved by Aeschylus
in his Eleusinians, where Theseus himself relates the facts as here
told.
  The celebrated friendship between Theseus and Pirithous is said to
have been thus began; the fame of the strength and valour of Theseus
being spread through Greece, Pirithous was desirous to make a trial
and proof of it himself, and to this end seized a herd of oxen which
belonged to Theseus, and was driving them away from Marathon, and,
when the news was brought that Theseus pursued him in arms, he did not
fly, but turned back and went to meet him. But as soon as they had
viewed one another, each so admired the gracefulness and beauty, and
was seized with such respect for the courage of the other, that they
forgot all thoughts of fighting; and Pirithous, first stretching out
his hand to Theseus, bade him be judge in this case himself, and
promised to submit willingly to any penalty he should impose. But
Theseus not only forgave him all, but entreated him to be his friend
and brother in arms; and they ratified their friendship by oaths.
After this Pirithous married Deidamia, and invited Theseus to the
wedding, entreating him to come and see his country, and make
acquaintance with the Lapithae; he had at the same time invited the
Centaurs to the feast, who growing hot with wine and beginning to be
insolent and wild, and offering violence to the women, the Lapithae
took immediate revenge upon them, slaying many of them upon the place,
and afterwards, having overcome them in battle, drove the whole race
of them out of their country, Theseus all along taking their part
and fighting on their side. But Herodorus gives a different relation
of these things; that Theseus came not to the assistance of the
Lapithae till the war was already begun; and that it was in this
journey that he had his first sight of Hercules, having made it his
business to find him out at Trachis, where he had chosen to rest
himself after all his wanderings and his labours; and that this
interview was honourably performed on each part, with extreme respect,
and good-will, and admiration of each other. Yet it is more
credible, as others write, that there were, before, frequent
interviews between them, and that it was by the means of Theseus
that Hercules was initiated at Eleusis, and purified before
initiation, upon account of several rash actions of his former life.
  Theseus was now fifty years old, as Hellanicus states, when he
carried off Helen, who was yet too young to be married. Some
writers, to take away this accusation of one of the greatest crimes
laid to his charge, say, that he did not steal away Helen himself, but
that Idas and Lynceus were the ravishers, who brought her to him,
and committed her to his charge, and that, therefore, he refused to
restore her at the demand of Castor and Pollux; or, indeed, they say
her own father, Tyndarus, had sent her to be kept by him, for fear
of Enarophorus, the son of Hippocoon, who would have carried her
away by force when she was yet a child. But the most probable account,
and that which has most witnesses on its side, is this: Theseus and
Pirithous went both together to Sparta, and, having seized the young
lady as she was dancing in the temple Diana Orthia, fled away with
her. There were presently men sent in arms to pursue, but they
followed no further than to Tegea; and Theseus and Pirithous, being
now out of danger, having passed through Peloponnesus, made an
agreement between themselves, that he to whom the lot should fall
should have Helen to his wife, but should be obliged to assist in
procuring another for his friend. The lot fell upon Theseus, who
conveyed her to Aphidnae, not being yet marriageable, and delivered
her to one of his allies, called Aphidnus, and, having sent his
mother, Aethra, after to take care of her, desired him to keep them so
secretly, that none might know where they were; which done, to
return the same service to his friend Pirithous, he accompanied him in
his journey to Epirus, in order to steal away the king of the
Molossians' daughter. The king, his own name being Aidoneus, or Pluto,
called his wife Proserpina, and his daughter Cora, and a great dog,
which he kept, Cerberus, with whom he ordered all that came as suitors
to his daughter to fight, and promised her to him that should overcome
the beast. But having been informed that the design of Pirithous and
his companion was not to court his daughter, but to force her away, he
caused them both to be seized, and threw Pirithous to be torn in
pieces by his dog, and put Theseus into prison, and kept him.
  About this time, Menestheus, the son of Peteus, grandson of
Orneus, and great-grandson of Erechtheus, the first man that is
recorded to have affected popularity and ingratiated himself with
the multitude, stirred up and exasperated the most eminent men of
the city, who had long borne a secret grudge to Theseus, conceiving
that he had robbed them of their several little kingdoms and
lordships, and having pent them all up in one city, was using them
as his subjects and slaves. He put also the meaner people into
commotion, telling them, that, deluded with a mere dream of liberty,
though indeed they were deprived of both that and of their proper
homes and religious usages, instead of many good and gracious kings of
their own, they had given themselves up to be lorded over by a
new-comer and a stranger. Whilst he was thus busied in infecting the
minds of the citizens, the war that Castor and Pollux brought
against Athens came very opportunely to further the sedition he had
been promoting, and some say that by his persuasions was wholly the
cause of their invading the city. At their first approach, they
committed no acts of hostility, but peaceably demanded their sister
Helen; but the Athenians returning answer that they neither had her
there nor knew where she was disposed of, they prepared to assault the
city, when Academus, having, by whatever means, found it out,
disclosed to them that she was secretly kept at Aphidnae. For which
reason he was both highly honoured during his life by Castor and
Pollux, and the Lacedaemonians, when often in aftertimes they made
incursions into Attica, and destroyed all the country round about,
spared the Academy for the sake of Academus. But Dicaearchus writes
that there were two Arcadians in the army of Castor and Pollux, the
one called Echedemus, and the other Marathus; from the first that
which is now called Academia was then named Echedemia, and the village
Marathon had its name from the other, who, to fulfil some oracle,
voluntarily offered himself to be made a sacrifice before battle. As
soon as they were arrived at Aphidnae, they overcame their enemies
in a set battle, and then assaulted and took the town. And here,
they say, Alycus, the son of Sciron, was slain, of the party of the
Dioscuri (Castor and Pollux), from whom a place in Megara, where he
was buried, is called Alycus to this day. And Hereas writes that it
was Theseus himself that killed him, in witness of which he cites
these verses concerning Alycus-

        "And Alycus upon Aphidnae's plain,
        By Theseus in the cause of Helen slain."

Though it is not at all probable that Theseus himself was there when
both the city and his mother were taken.
  Aphidnae being won by Castor and Pollux, and the city of Athens
being in consternation, Menestheus persuaded the people to open
their gates, and receive them with all manner of friendship, for
they were, he told them, at enmity with none but Theseus, who had
first injured them, and were benefactors and saviours to all mankind
beside. And their behviour gave credit to those promises; for,
having made themselves absolute masters of the place, they demanded no
more than to be initiated, since they were as nearly related to the
city as Hercules was, who had received the same honour. This their
desire they easily obtained, and were adopted by Aphidnus, as Hercules
had been by Pylius. They were honoured also like gods, and were called
by a new name, Anaces, either from the cessation of the war, or from
the care they took that none should suffer any injury, though there
was so great an army within the walls; for the phrase anakos ekhein is
used of those who look to or care for anything; kings for this reason,
perhaps, are called anactes. Others say, that from the appearance of
their star in the heavens, they were thus called, for in the Attic
dialect this name comes very near the words that signify above.
  Some say that Aethra, Theseus's mother, was here taken prisoner, and
carried to Lacedaemon, and from thence went away with Helen to Troy,
alleging this verse of Homer to prove that she waited upon Helen-

        "Aethra of Pittheus born, and large eyed Clymene."

Others reject this verse as none of Homer's, as they do likewise the
whole fable of Munychus, who, the story says, was the son of
Demophon and Laodice, born secretly, and brought up by Aethra at Troy.
But Ister, in the thirteenth book of his Attic History, gives us an
account of Aethra, different yet from all the rest: that Achilles
and Patroclus overcame Paris in Thessaly, near the river Sperchius,
but that Hector took and plundered the city of the Troezenians. and
made Aethra prisoner there. But this seems a groundless tale.
  Now Hercules, passing by the Molossians, was entertained in his
way to Aidoneus the king, who, in conversation, accidentally spoke
of the journey of Theseus and Pirithous into his country, of what they
had designed to do, and what they were forced to suffer. Hercules
was much grieved for the inglorious death of the one and the miserable
condition of the other. As for Pirithous, he thought it useless to
complain; but begged to have Theseus released for his sake, and
obtained that favour from the king. Theseus, being thus set at
liberty, returned to Athens, where his friends were not yet wholly
suppressed, and dedicated to Hercules all the sacred places which
the city had set apart for himself, changing their names from Thesea
to Heraclea, four only excepted, as Philochorus writes. And wishing
immediately to resume the first place in the commonwealth, and
manage the state as before, he soon found himself involved in factions
and troubles; those who long had hated him had now added to their
hatred contempt; and the minds of the people were so generally
corrupted, that, instead of obeying commands with silence, they
expected to be flattered into their duty. He had some thoughts to have
reduced them by force, but was overpowered by demagogues and factions.
And at last, despairing of any good success of his affairs in
Athens, he sent away his children privately to Euboea, commending them
to the care of Elephenor, the son of Chalcodon; and he himself
having solemnly cursed the people of Athens in the village of
Gargettus, in which there yet remains the place called Araterion, or
the place of cursing, sailed to Scyros, where he had lands left him by
his father, and friendship, as he thought, with those of the island.
Lycomedes was then king of Scyros. Theseus, therefore, addressed
himself to him and desired to have his lands put into his
possession, as designing to settle and to dwell there, though others
say that he came to beg his assistance against the Athenians. But
Lycomedes, either jealous of the glory of so great a man, or to
gratify Menestheus, having led him up to the highest cliff of the
island, on pretence of showing him from thence the lands that be
desired, threw him headlong down from the rock, and killed him. Others
say he fell down of himself by a slip of his foot, as he was walking
there, according to his custom, after supper. At that time there was
no notice taken, nor were any concerned for his death, but
Menestheus quietly possessed the kingdom of Athens. His sons were
brought up in a private condition, and accompanied Elephenor to the
Trojan war, but, after the decease of Menestheus in that expedition,
returned to Athens, and recovered the government. But in succeeding
ages, besides several other circumstances that moved the Athenians
to honour Theseus as a demigod, in the battle which was fought at
Marathon against the Medes, many of the soldiers believed they saw
an apparition of Theseus in arms, rushing on at the head of them
against the barbarians. And after the Median war, Phaedo being
archon of Athens, the Athenians, consulting the oracle at Delphi, were
commanded to gather together the bones of Theseus, and, laying them in
some honourable place, keep them as sacred in the city. But it was
very difficult to recover those relics, or so much as to find out
the place where they lay, on account of the inhospitable and savage
temper of the barbarous people that inhabited the island.
Nevertheless, afterwards, when Cimon took the island (as is related in
his life), and had a great ambition to find out the place where
Theseus was buried, he, by chance, spied an eagle upon a rising ground
pecking with her beak and tearing up the earth with her talons, when
on the sudden it came into his mind, as it were by some divine
inspiration, to dig there, and search for the bones of Theseus.
There were found in that place a coffin of a man of more than ordinary
size, and a brazen spear-head, and a sword lying by it, all which he
took aboard his galley and brought with him to Athens. Upon which
the Athenians, greatly delighted, went out to meet and receive the
relics with splendid processions and sacrifices, as if it were Theseus
himself returning alive to the city. He lies interred in the middle of
the city, near the present gymnasium. His tomb is a sanctuary and
refuge for slaves, and all those of mean condition that fly from the
persecution of men in power, in memory that Theseus while he lived was
an assister and protector of the distressed, and never refused the
petitions of the afflicted that fled to him. The chief and most solemn
sacrifice which they celebrate to him is kept on the eighth day of
Pyanepsion, on which he returned with the Athenian young men from
Crete. Besides which they sacrifice to him on the eighth day of
every month, either because he returned from Troezen the eighth day of
Hecatombaeon, as Diodorus the geographer writes, or else thinking that
number to be proper to him, because he was reputed to be born of
Neptune, because they sacrifice to Neptune on the eighth day of
every month. The number eight being the first cube of an even
number, and the double of the first square, seemed to be an emblem
of the steadfast and immovable power of this god, who from thence
has the names of Asphalius and Gaeiochus, that is, the establisher and
stayer of the earth.

                                THE END
