The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [108]
13. For no other region is as pleasant as Ionia, neither above it nor below it, nor east nor west of it.
14. For in other countries either the climate is too cold and damp, or else the heat and drought are sorely oppressive.
15. The Ionians do not all speak the same language, but have four different dialects.
16. Towards the south the main city is Miletus, next to which lie Myus and Priene; all these three are in Caria and have the same dialect.
17. Their cities in Lydia are Ephesus, Colophon, Lebedus, Teos, Clazomenae and Phocaea. The inhabitants of these towns have a dialect of their own.
18. There are three other Ionian towns, two in the isles, namely, Samos and Chios; and one on the mainland, namely Erythrae.
19. Of these Chios and Erythrae have the same dialect, while Samos has a language of its own.
20. Of the Ionians at this period, the Milesians were in no danger of attack, as Cyrus had received them into alliance.
21. The islanders also had as yet nothing to fear, since Phoenicia was still independent of Persia, and the Persians themselves were not a seafaring people.
22. The Milesians had separated from the common cause solely on account of the extreme weakness of the Ionians:
23. For, feeble as the power of the entire Hellenic race was at that time, of all its tribes the Ionic was by far the feeblest and least esteemed, not possessing a single state of any mark except Athens.
24. The Athenians and most of the other Ionic States went so far in disliking the name ‘Ionia’ as not to use it.
25. But the twelve cities in Asia always gloried in the name; thus they gave the civic hall which they built for themselves the name of the Panionium.
26. The Ionians founded twelve cities in Asia, and refused to enlarge the number,
27. On account of their having been divided into twelve States when they lived in the Peloponnese before being driven out by the Achaeans.
28. It is incorrect to maintain that these Ionians are more Ionian than the rest, since the truth is that no small portion of them were Abantians from Euboea, who are not even Ionians in name;
29. And, besides, there were mixed up with the emigration of Minyae from Orchomenus, Cadmeians, Dryopians, Phocians from the several cities of Phocis, Molossians, Arcadian Pelasgi, Dorians from Epidaurus, and many other distinct tribes.
30. Even those who came from the Prytaneum of Athens, and reckon themselves the purest Ionians of all, brought no wives with them to the new country,
31. But married Carian girls, whose fathers they had slain. Hence these women made a law, which they bound themselves to observe,
32. And which they handed down to their daughters after them, ‘That none should ever sit at table with her husband, or call him by his name’;
33. Because the invaders slew their fathers, their husbands and their sons, and then forced them to become their wives. It was at Miletus that these events took place.
34. The kings, too, whom they set over themselves, were either Lycians, of the blood of Glaucus, son of Hippolochus, or Pylian Caucons of the blood of Codrus, son of Melanthus; or else from both those families.
35. But since these Ionians valued their name more than any of the others did, let them pass for pure-bred Ionians; though truly all are Ionians who have their origin from Athens.
Chapter 15
1. Originally the Aeolians had twelve cities upon the mainland, like the Ionians, but the Ionians deprived them of Smyrna in the following way:
2. Certain men of Colophon had been engaged in a sedition there, and being the weaker party, were driven into banishment.
3. The Smyrnaeans received the fugitives, who, after a time, watching their opportunity, while the inhabitants were celebrating a feast outside the walls, shut the gates, and so captured the town.
4. The Aeolians of the other States came to their aid, and terms were agreed between the parties,
5. The Ionians consenting to give up all the moveables, and the Aeolians making a surrender of the