Description of Greece

​For one who has gone forward from Thornax, there is the city, which was called Sparta from the beginning, but in course of time came to be called also Lacedaemon, which is the same; whereas previously this name was given to the land. But as for the correction that was made by me in my Attic history, namely, that I have not spoken of everything in order, but have selected from them what is most worthy of mention, I will make this clear indeed before my account of the Spartans; for from the beginning my narrative wished to separate the most noteworthy things from the many stories, unworthy of relation, which each people tell among themselves. That I have therefore well deliberated, I will in no place transgress.

​For those of the Lacedaemonians who hold Sparta, there is a marketplace worthy of inspection, and on the marketplace are the council house of the Senate, and the offices of the Ephors, of the Law-wardens, and of those called Bidiaei. The Senate indeed is the council of greatest authority in the constitution for the Lacedaemonians, while the others are magistrates; and for the Ephors and the Bidiaei, who are each five in number, it is established for the latter to hold the contests at the place called Platanistas and other contests of the youths, while the Ephors administer indeed the other matters that are of the greatest importance and provide the eponymous magistrate, just as indeed among the Athenians one of those called the nine is the eponymous archon.

​The most famous feature of the marketplace is what they call the Persian Colonnade, built from the spoils of the Persian wars; and in course of time they have changed it to its present size and its present adornment. On the pillars are Persians of white stone, including Mardonius, the son of Gobryas. There is also represented Artemisia, who was a daughter of Lygdamis and reigned over Halicarnassus; they say that she voluntarily joined Xerxes in his campaign against Greece and displayed great deeds in the naval battle around Salamis.

​And there are temples on the marketplace of Caesar, who was the first among the Romans to desire monarchy and the first to acquire the established rule, and another was built for Augustus, his son, who established the sovereignty more firmly and advanced further in prestige and power than his father; and his name was Augustus, which in the tongue of the Greeks signifies “Reverend”.

​Near the altar of Augustus they show a bronze statue of Agias. They say that this Agias by prophecy predicted to Lysander that he would capture the Athenian fleet at Aegospotami, except for ten triremes; these indeed escaped to Cyprus, but the others the Lacedaemonians captured, both the ships themselves and the men. This Agias was a son of Agelochus, the son of Tisamenus;