Pausanias, Phocis

CHAPTER VIII.

Some think that Amphictyon the son of Deucalion appointed the general Council of the Greeks, and that was why those who assembled at the Council were called Amphictyones : but Androtion in his history of Attica says that originally delegates came to Delphi from the neighbouring people who were called Amphictiones, and in process of time the name Amphictyones prevailed. They say too that the following Greek States attended this general Council, the lonians, the Dolopes, the Thessalians, the Aenianes, the Magnetes, the Malienses, the Phthiotes, the Dorians, the Phocians, the Locrians who dwelt under Mount Cnemis and bordered upon Phocis. But when the Phocians seized the temple, and ten years afterwards the Sacred War came to an end, the Amphictyonic Council was changed : for the Macedonians obtained admission to it, and the Phocians and (of the Dorians) the Lacedaemonians ceased to belong to it, the Phocians because of their sacrilegious outbreak on the temple, and the Lacedaemonians be cause they had assisted the Phocians. But when Brennus led the Galati against Delphi, the Phocians exhibited greater bravery than any of the Greeks in the war, and were in consequence restored to the Amphictyonic Council, and in other respects regained their former position. And the Emperor Augustus wished that the inhabitants of Nicopolis near Actium should belong to the Amphictyonic Council, so he joined the Magnetes and Malienses and Aenianes and Phthiotes to the Thessalians, and transferred their votes, and those of the Dolopes who had died out, to the people of Nicopolis. And in my time the Amphictyones were 30 members. Six came from Nicopolis, six from Macedonia, six from Thessaly, two from the Boeotians (who were originally in Thessaly and called Aeolians), two from Phocis, and two from Delphi, one from ancient Doris, one from the Locrians called Ozolae, one from the Locrians opposite Euboea, one from Euboea, one from Argos Sicyon Corinth and Megara, and one from Athens. Athens and Delphi and Nicopolis send delegates to every Amphictyonic Council : but the other cities I have mentioned only join the Amphictyonic Council at certain times.
As you enter Delphi there are four temples In a row, the first in ruins, the next without statues or effigies, the third has effigies of a few of the Roman Emperors, the fourth is called the temple of Athene Pronoia. And the statue in the ante-chapel is the votive offering of the Massaliotes, and is larger in size than the statue within the temple. The Massaliotes are colonists of the Phocaeans in Ionia, and were part of those who formerly fled from, Phocaea from Harpagus the Mede, but, after having beaten the Carthaginians in a naval engagement, obtained the land which they now occupy, and rose to great prosperity. This votive offering of the Massaliotes is of brass. The golden shield which was offered to Athene Pronoia by Croesus the Lydian was taken away (the Delphians said) by Philomelus. Near this temple is the sacred enclosure of the hero Phylacus, who, according to the tradition of the Delphians, protected them against the invasion of the Persians. In the part of the gymnasium which is in the open air was once they say a wild wood where Odysseus, when he went to Autolycus and hunted with the sons of Autolycus, was wounded on the knee by a boar. 1 As you turn to the left from the gymnasium, and descend I should say about 3 stades, is the river called Plistus, which falls into the sea at Cirrha the haven of the Delphians. And as you ascend from the gymnasium to the temple on the right of the road is the water Castalia which is good to drink. Some say it got its name from Castalia a local woman, others say from, a man called Castalius. But Panyasis, the son of Polyarchus, in the poem he wrote about Hercules says that Castalia was the daughter of Achelous. For he says about Hercules,

" Crossing with rapid feet snow-crown'd Parnassus he came to the immortal fountain of Castalia, the daughter of Achelous."

I have also heard that the water of Castalia is a gift of the river Cephisus. Alcaeus indeed so represents it in his Prelude to Apollo, and his statement is confirmed by the people of Lilaea, who believe that the local cakes and other things, which they throw into the Cephisus on certain stated days, reappear in the Castalia.


1 Odyssey, xix. 428-431.