1.22.4
There is but one entry to the Acropolis. It affords no other, being precipitous throughout and having a strong wall. The gateway has a roof of white marble, and down to the present day it is unrivalled for the beauty and size of its stones. Now as to the statues of the horsemen, I cannot tell for certain whether they are the sons of Xenophon or whether they were made merely to beautify the place. On the right of the gateway is a temple of Wingless Victory. From this point the sea is visible, and here it was that, according to legend, Aegeus threw him self down to his death.
1.22.5
For the ship that carried the young people to Crete began her voyage with black sails; but Theseus, who was sailing on an adventure against the bull of Minos, as it is called, had told his father beforehand that he would use white sails if he should sail back victorious over the bull. But the loss of Ariadne made him forget the signal. Then Aegeus, when from this eminence he saw the vessel borne by black sails, thinking that his son was dead, threw himself down to destruction. There is at Athens a sanctuary dedicated to him, and called the hero-shrine of Aegeus.
1.22.6
On the left of the gateway is a building with pictures. Among those not effaced by time I found Diomedes taking the Athena from Troy, and Odysseus in Lemnos taking away the bow of Philoctetes. There in the pictures is Orestes killing Aegisthus, and Pylades killing the sons of Nauplius who had come to bring Aegisthus succor. And there is Polyxena about to be sacrificed near the grave of Achilles. Homer did well in passing by this barbarous act. I think too that he showed poetic insight in making Achilles capture Scyros, differing entirely from those who say that Achilles lived in Scyros with the maidens, as Polygnotus has re presented in his picture. He also painted Odysseus coming upon the women washing clothes with Nausicaa at the river, just like the description in Homer. There are other pictures, including a portrait of Alcibiades,
1.22.7
and in the picture are emblems of the victory his horses won at Nemea. There is also Perseus journeying to Seriphos, and carrying to Polydectes the head of Medusa, the legend about whom I am unwilling to relate in my description of Attica. Included among the paintings—I omit the boy carrying the water-jars and the wrestler of Timaenetus note—is Musaeus. I have read verse in which Musaeus receives from the North Wind the gift of flight, but, in my opinion, Onomacritus wrote them, and there are no certainly genuine works of Musaeus except a hymn to Demeter written for the Lycomidae.
1.22.8
Right at the very entrance to the Acropolis are a Hermes (called Hermes of the Gateway) and figures of Graces, which tradition says were sculptured by Socrates, the son of Sophroniscus, who the Pythia testified was the wisest of men, a title she refused to Anacharsis, although he desired it and came to Delphi to win it.
ch. 23
1.23.1
Among the sayings of the Greeks is one that there were seven wise men. Two of them were the despot of Lesbos and Periander the son of Cypselus. And yet Peisistratus and his son Hippias were more humane than Periander, wiser too in war fare and in statecraft, until, on account of the murder of Hipparchus, Hippias vented his passion against all and sundry, including a woman named Leaena (Lioness).
1.23.2
What I am about to say has never before been committed to writing, but is generally credited among the Athenians. When Hipparchus died, Hippias tortured Leaena to death, because he knew she was the mistress of Aristogeiton, and therefore could not possibly, he held, be in ignorance of the plot. As a recompense, when the tyranny of the Peisistratidae was at an end, the Athenians put up a bronze lioness in memory of the woman, which they say Callias dedicated and Calamis made.
1.23.3
Hard by is a bronze statue of Diitrephes shot through by arrows. note Among the acts reported of this Diitrephes by the Athenians is his leading back home the Thracian mercenaries who arrived too late to take part in the expedition of Demosthenes against Syracuse. He also put into the Chalcidic Euripus, where the Boeotians had an inland town Mycalessus, marched up to this town from the coast and took it. Of the inhabitants the Thracians put to the sword not only the combatants but also the women and children. I have evidence to bring. All the Boeotian towns which the Thebans sacked were inhabited in my time, as the people escaped just before the capture; so if the foreigners had not exterminated the Mycalessians the survivors would have afterwards reoccupied the town.
1.23.4
I was greatly surprised to see the statue of Diitrephes pierced with arrows, because the only Greeks whose custom it is to use that weapon are the Cretans. For the Opuntian Locrians, whom Homer represents as coming to Troy with bows and slings, we know were armed as heavy infantry by the time of the Persian wars. Neither indeed did the Malians continue the practice of the bow; in fact, I believe that they did not know it before the time of Philoctetes, and gave it up soon after. Near the statue of Diitrephes—I do not wish to write of the less distinguished portraits—are figures of gods; of Health, whom legend calls daughter of Asclepius, and of Athena, also surnamed Health.
