[39] The first place after Ephesus is Magnesia, an Æolian city, and called Magnesia on the Mæander, for it is situated near it; but it is still nearer the Lethæus, which discharges itself into the Mæander. It has its source in Pactyes, a mountain in the Ephesian district. There is another Lethæus in Gortyne, a third near Tricca, where Asclepius is said to have been born, and the fourth among the Hesperitæ Libyans.1 Magnesia lies in a plain, near a mountain called Thorax,2 on which it is said Daphitas the grammarian was crucified, for reviling the kings in a distich— “‘O slaves, with backs purpled with stripes, filings of the gold of Lysimachus, you are the kings of Lydia and Phrygia.’” An oracle is said to have warned Daphitas to beware of the Thorax.3
1 Western Africa.
2 Gumusch-dagh.
3 According to Suidas, Daphnidas ridiculed oracles, and inquired of the oracle of Apollo, ‘Shall I find my horse?’ when he had none. The oracle answered that he would find it. He was afterwards, by the command of Attalus, king of Pergamum, taken and thrown from a precipice called the Horse.
The Geography of Strabo. Literally translated, with notes, in three volumes. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.