herodotus

in the midst between them there was a narrow channel, through whichflows the Peneios, and hearing also that by this way there was a goodroad leading to Thessaly, formed a desire to sail thither and look atthe outlet of the Peneios, because he was meaning to march by theupper road, through the land of the Macedonians who dwell inland,until he came to the Perraibians, passing by the city of Gonnos; forby this way he was informed that it was safest to go. And havingformed this desire, so also he proceeded to do; that is, he embarkedin a Sidonian ship, the same in which he used always to embark when hewished to do anything of this kind, and he displayed a signal for theothers to put out to sea also, leaving there the land-army. Then whenXerxes had looked at the outlet of the Peneios, he was possessed bygreat wonder, and summoning his guides he asked them whether it waspossible to turn the river aside and bring it out to the sea byanother way. 129. Now it is said that Thessaly was in old time a lake,being enclosed on all sides by very lofty mountains: for the parts ofit which lie towards the East are shut in by the ranges of Pelion andOssa, which join one another in their lower slopes, the parts towardsthe North Wind by Olympos, those towards the West by Pindos and thosetowards the mid-day and the South Wind by Othrys; and the region inthe midst, between these mountains which have been named, is Thessaly,forming as it were a hollow. Whereas then many rivers flow into it andamong them these five of most note, namely Peneios, Apidanos,Onochonos, Enipeus and Pamisos, these, which collect their waters fromthe mountains that enclose Thessaly round, and flow into this plain,with names separate each one, having their outflow into the sea by onechannel and that a narrow one, first mingling their waters alltogether in one and the same stream; and so soon as they are mingledtogether, from that point onwards the Peneios prevails with its nameover the rest and causes the others to lose their separate names. Andit is said that in ancient time, there not being yet this channel andoutflow between the mountains, these rivers, and besides these riversthe lake Boibeïs also, had no names as they have now, but by theirwaters they made Thessaly to be all sea. The Thessalians themselvessay that Poseidon made the channel through which the Peneios flows;and reasonably they report it thus, because whosoever believes that itis Poseidon who shakes the Earth and that the partings asunderproduced by earthquake are the work of this god, would say, if he sawthis, that it was made by Poseidon; for the parting asunder of themountains is the work of an earthquake, as is evident to me. 130. Sothe guides, when Xerxes asked whether there was any other possibleoutlet to the sea for the Peneios, said with exact knowledge of thetruth: "O king, for this river there is no other outgoing whichextends to the sea, but this alone; for all Thessaly is circled aboutwith mountains as with a crown." To this Xerxes is said to havereplied: "The Thessalians then are prudent men. This it appears was