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[5]

Near the strait situated between Asia and Lesbos there are about twenty small islands, or, according to Timosthenes, forty. They are called Hecatonnesoi,1 a compound name like Peloponnesus, the letter N being repeated by custom in such words as Myonnesus, Proconnesus, Halonnesus, so that Hecatonnesoi is of the same import as Apollonnesoi, since Apollo is called Hecatus;2 for along the whole of this coast, as far as Tenedos, Apollo is held in the highest veneration, and worshipped under the names of Smintheus, Cillæus, Gryneus, or other appellations.

Near these islands is Pordoselene, which contains a city of the same name, and in front of this city is another island3 larger than this, and a city of the same name, uninhabited, in which there is a temple of Apollo.

1 In which are comprehended the Arginusi mentioned above.

2 According to Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, Hecatonnesoi means the ‘hundred islands,’ the word being composed not of Hecatus but of Hecaton, ἑκατὸν, ‘a hundred,’ and νῆσοι, ‘islands.’

3 The name appears to be wanting.

The Geography of Strabo. Literally translated, with notes, in three volumes. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.

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