Greek Texts & Translations

When you have entered you see the god, a beardless figure of gold and ivory made by Calamis. ^note He holds a staff in one hand, and a cone of the cultivated pine in the other. The Sicyonians say that the god was carried to them from Epidaurus on a carriage drawn by two mules, that he was in the likeness of a serpent, and that he was brought by Nicagora of Sicyon, the mother of Agasicles and the wife of Echetimus. Here are small figures hanging from the roof. She who is on the serpent they say is Aristodama, the mother of Aratus, whom they hold to be a son of Asclepius.

Such are the noteworthy things that this enclosure presented to me, and opposite is another enclosure, sacred to Aphrodite. The first thing inside is a statue of Antiope. They say that her sons were Sicyonians, and because of them the Sicyonians will have it that Antiope herself is related to themselves. After this is the sanctuary of Aphrodite, into which enter only a female verger, who after her appointment may not have intercourse with a man, and a virgin, called the Bath-bearer, holding her sacred office for a year. All others are wont to behold the goddess from the entrance, and to pray from that place.

The image, which is seated, was made by the Sicyonian Canachus, who also fashioned the Apollo at Didyma of the Milesians, and the Ismenian Apollo for the Thebans. It is made of gold and ivory, having on its head a polos, ^note and carrying in one hand a poppy and in the other an apple. They offer the thighs of the victims, excepting pigs; the other parts they burn for the goddess with juniper wood, but as the thighs are burning they add to the offering a leaf of the paideros.

This is a plant in the open parts of the enclosure, and it grows nowhere else either in Sicyonia or in any other land. Its leaves are smaller than those of the esculent oak, but larger than those of the holm; the shape is similar to that of the oak-leaf. One side is of a dark color, the other is white. You might best compare the color to that of white-poplar leaves.

Ascending from here to the gymnasium you see in the right a sanctuary of Artemis Pheraea. It is said that the wooden image was brought from Pherae. This gymnasium was built for the Sicyonians by Cleinias, and they still train the youths here. White marble images are here, an Artemis wrought only to the waist, and a Heracles whose lower parts are similar to the square Hermae.

On the way down to the plain is a sanctuary of Demeter, said to have been founded by Plemnaeis as a thank-offering to the goddess for the rearing of his son. A little farther away from the sanctuary of Hera founded by Adrastus is a temple of the Carnean Apollo. Only the pillars are standing in it; you will no longer find there walls or roof, nor yet in that of Hera Pioneer. This temple was founded by Phalces, son of Temenus, who asserted that Hera guided him on the road to Sicyon.

On the direct road from Sicyon to Phlius, on the left of the road and just about ten stades from it, is a grove called Pyraea, and in it a sanctuary of Hera Protectress and the Maid. Here the men celebrate a festival by themselves, giving up to the women the temple called Nymphon for the purposes of their festival. In the Nymphon are images of Dionysus, Demeter, and the Maid, with only their faces exposed. The road to Titane is sixty stades long, and too narrow to be used by carriages drawn by a yoke.

At a distance along it, in my opinion, of twenty stades, to the left on the other side of the Asopus, is a grove of holm oaks and a temple of the goddesses named by the Athenians the August, and by the Sicyonians the Kindly Ones. On one day in each year they celebrate a festival to them and offer sheep big with young as a burnt offering, and they are accustomed to use a libation of honey and water, and flowers instead of garlands. They practise similar rites at the altar of the Fates; it is in an open space in the grove.

On turning back to the road, and having crossed the Asopus again and reached the summit of the hill, you come to the place where the natives say that Titan first dwelt. They add that he was the brother of Helius (Sun), and that after him the place got the name Titane. My own view is that he proved clever at observing the seasons of the year and the times when the sun increases and ripens seeds and fruits, and for this reason was held to be the brother of Helius. Afterwards Alexanor, the son of Machaon, the son of Asclepius, came to Sicyonia and built the sanctuary of Asclepius at Titane.