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[5]

As for the remaining cities, it is not worthwhile to mention any of them except those which are mentioned by Homer. Calliarus is no longer inhabited, but is now a beautifully-tilled plain, and they so call it from what is the fact in the case.1 Bessa, too, does not exist; it is a wooded place. Neither does Augeiae, whose territory is held by the Scarphians. Now this Bessa should be written with a double s (for it is named from its being a wooded place, being spelled the same way—like Nape2 in the plain of Methymne, which Hellanicus ignorantly names Lape), whereas the deme in Attica, whose inhabitants are accordingly called Besaeeis, should be written with one s.

1 i.e., from καλός (beautiful) and ἀρόω (till). Eustathius (Eustatius ad Iliad 2.531) says: "Calliarus, they say, was named after Calliarus, son Hodoedocus and Laonome: others say that it was named Calliara, in the nueter gender, because the land there was beautifully tilled."

2 Both "bessa" and nape mean "wooded glen."

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load focus English (H.C. Hamilton, Esq., W. Falconer, M.A., 1903)
load focus Greek (1877)
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