Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 2.djvu/30

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22 STRABO. CASAUB. 348. and to the adjoining island Sphagia, is a distance of about 400 stadia, and from the Alpheius a distance of 750, and from the promontory Chelonatas 1030 stadia. In the inter- vening distance are the temple of the Macistian Hercules, and the river Acidon, which flows beside the tomb of Jardanus, and Chaa, a city which was once near Lepreum, where also is the TEpasian plain. It was for this Chaa, it is said, that the Arcadians and Pylians went to war with each other, which war Homer has mentioned, and it is thought that the verse ought to be written, " Oh that I were young as when multitudes of Pylii, and of Arcades, handling the spear, fought together at the swift-flowing Acidon near the walls of Chaa," ' not Celadon, nor Pheia, for this place is nearer the tomb of Jardanus and the Arcades than the other. 22. On the Triphylian Sea are situated Cyparissia, and Pyrgi, and the rivers Acidon and Neda. At present the boundary of Triphylia towards Messenia is the impetuous stream of the Neda descending from the Lycaeus, a mountain of Arcadia, and rising from a source which, according to the fable, burst forth to furnish water in which Rhea was to w r ash herself after the birth of Jupiter. It flows near Phigalia, and empties itself into the sea where the Pyrgita3, the extreme tribe of the Triphylii, approach the Cyparissenses, the first of the Messenian nation. But, anciently, the country had other boundaries, so that the dominions of Nestor included some places on the other side of the Neda, as the Cyparisseis, and some others beyond that tract, in the same manner as the poet extends the Pylian sea as far as the seven cities, which Aga- memnon promised to Achilles, " All near the sea bordering upon the sandy Pylus," 2 which is equivalent to, near the Pylian sea. 23. Next in order to the Cyparisseis in traversing the coast towards the Messenian Pylus and the Coryphasium, we meet with Erana, (Eranna,) which some writers incorrectly suppose was formerly called Arene, by the same name as the Pylian city, and the promontory Platamodes, from which to the Coryphasium, and to the place at present called Pylus, are at New Navarino. Barbie de Bocage at Old Navarino. See also Ernst Curt ins, Peloponnesus. 1 II. vii. 133. 2 II. ix. 153.