Untitled - 24grammata.com

GEOGRAPHICAL TIEW OF GREECE. 5of Triphylia be reckoned, amounted to forty-eight miles ;itsbreadth in the broadest part was not more than half as much.Several rivers, which had their rise in the Arcadian mountains, watered its fruitful plains. Among them the Alpheuswas the largest and the most famous ;for the Olympic gameswere celebrated on its banks. Its fountains were not fardistant from those of the Eurotas ;and as the latter, takinga southerly direction, flowed through the land of war, theformer, in a westerly one, passed through the land of peace.For here, in the country sacred to Jove, where the nation ofthe Hellenes, assembling in festive pomp, saluted each otheras one people, no bloody feuds were suffered to profanethesoil. Armies were indeed permittedto pass throughtheconsecrated land ;but they were first deprived of their arms,which they did not again receive tillthey left it, 1 This general rule was afterwards limited in its applicationto thetime of the Olympian games but even during the following;wars, the treasures of art in the sanctuaries of Elis remaineduninjured and under their protectionitlong enjoyed a;beneficent peace.The country of Elis embraced three divisions.The woodyTriphylia was in the south, and contained that Pylus, which,according to the judgment of Strabo, could laya better claimthan either of the other two towns of the same name, tohave been the country ruled by Nestor. 3The northern division was Elis, a plain enclosed by the rough mountainsPholoe and Scollis, both spurs from the Arcadian Erymanthus,and watered by the Selleis and the Elian Peneus, onwhose banks lay the city that gave aname to the whole region, over which it also exercised supreme authority ; forthe district of the Elians, embracing both Pisatis and Triphylia, extended to the borders of Messenia. 3 The middle1Strabo, viii. p. 247. Phidon of Argos was the first who violated thissanctity by an invasion, to appropriate to himself the holding of the Olympicgames (about 900 years before "Christ); yet this occupation must have beentransient, for when Elis was built, (about 447 years before Christ,) that city,even then relying on this sanctity, was surrounded by no walls. Strabo, Lc.other reliIt was not till after the Peloponnesian war, that this and so manygious ideas appear to have died away. .2 Strabo, vin. p. 242, The two other towns were situated, one in northernElis, the other in Messenia., , , . , , **3 Strabo, viii. p. 247, relates the manner m winch it came to be extendedthus far by the assistance of the Spartansin the Messenian war.