Greek Texts & Translations

If Mycenae experienced this fate, it is not surprising that some of the cities mentioned in the Catalogue of the Ships, and said to be subject to Argos, have disappeared. These are the words of the Catalogue: They who occupied Argos, and Tiryns, with strong walls, and Hermione, and Asine situated on a deep bay, and Eïones, and Epidaurus with its vines, and the valiant Achaean youths who occupied Aegina, and Mases. ^note Among these we have already spoken of Argos; we must now speak of the rest. 11

Proetus seems to have used Tiryns as a stronghold, and to have fortified it by means of the Cyclopes. There were seven of them, and were called Gasterocheires, ^note because they subsisted by their art. They were sent for and came from Lycia. Perhaps the caverns about Nauplia, and the works there, have their name from these people. The citadel Licymna has its name from Licymnius. It is distant from Nauplia about 12 stadia. This place is deserted, as well as the neighbouring Midéa, which is different from the Boeotian Mídea, for that is accentuated Mídea, like πὸνια, but this is accentuated Midéa, like Tegéa.

Prosylmna borders upon Midéa; it has also a temple of Juno. The Argives have depopulated most of these for their refusal to submit to their authority. Of the inhabitants some went from Tiryns to Epidaurus; others from Hermione to the Ialieis (the Fishermen), as they are called; others were transferred by the Lacedaemonians to Messenia from Asine, (which is itself a village in the Argive territory near Nauplia,) and they built a small city of the same name as the Argolic Asine. For the Lacedaemonians, according to Theopompus, got possession of a large tract of country belonging to other nations, and settled there whatever fugitives they had received, who had taken refuge among them; and it was to this country the Nauplians had retreated. 12

Hermione is one of the cities, not undistinguished. The coast is occupied by Halieis, as they are called, a tribe who subsist by being employed on the sea in fishing. There is a general opinion among the Hermionenses that there is a short descent from their country to Hades, and hence they do not place in the mouths of the dead the fare for crossing the Styx.