Description of Greece

​Very near Damiscus stands a man, whoever he may be, for they do not mention his name upon it; but it is a dedication of Ptolemy, the son of Lagus. Ptolemy called himself a Macedonian in the inscription, although he was king of Egypt. For Chaereas, a boy boxer from Sicyon, there is an inscription stating that he won when young in years and that his father was Chaeremon; and it is also written that the one who made the statue was Asterion, the son of Aeschylus.

​After Chaereas are dedicated Sophios, a Messenian boy, and Stomios, an Elean man; to the former it befell to outstrip the boys who ran with him, and to Stomios to win three victories in the pentathlon at Olympia and at the Nemean games. The inscription upon him also adds these things: that he, commanding the cavalry for the Eleans, set up trophies, and that a man commanding the enemy died at the hands of Stomios, having fought a duel with him by challenge.

​The Eleans say that this man was from Sicyon and ruled over the Sicyonians, and that they themselves, through friendship with the Thebans, marched against Sicyon together with the force from Boeotia. Thus the expedition of the Eleans and Thebans against Sicyon would appear to have taken place after the disaster of the Lacedaemonians at Leuctra.

​Next is dedicated a boxer from Lepreum in the territory of the Eleans, Labax, son of Euphron, and also dedicated from Elis itself is a wrestler, Aristodemus, son of Thrasis; he had also two victories at Pytho. The statue of Aristodemus is the work of Daedalus of Sicyon, the pupil and father of Patrocles.

​The statue of Hippos, an Elean who won the boys’ boxing, was made by Damocritus of Sicyon, who went back in the line of teachers to the fifth generation to Critias the Attic. For Ptolichus of Corcyra studied under Critias himself, and Amphion was a pupil of Ptolichus, while Piso, a man from Calauria, was taught by Amphion, and Damocritus by Piso.

​Cratinus from Aegeira in Achaea was in his time the most beautiful of his contemporaries, and wrestled with the greatest skill. When he wrestled down the boys, he was permitted by the Eleans to set up also a statue of his trainer beside him. His statue was made by Cantharus of Sicyon, who was the son of Alexis, and the pupil of Eutychides.

​The statue of Eupolemus, an Elean, was made by Daedalus of Sicyon. The inscription upon it declares that Eupolemus won the Olympic victory in the men’s stadion, and that he also had two Pythian crowns for the pentathlon, and another from the Nemean games. It is also said concerning Eupolemus that three Hellanodikai presided over the race, and two of them awarded the victory to Eupolemus, but the third to Leon, an Ambraciot, and that Leon secured a fine against each of the two Hellanodikai who had decided that Eupolemus won, before the Olympic council.

​The statue of Oebotas was dedicated by the Achaeans in accordance with an oracle of Apollo at Delphi in the eightieth Olympiad; but Oebotas’s victory in the stadion occurred in the sixth Olympiad. How then could Oebotas have fought along with the Greeks at the battle of Plataea? For the defeat of Mardonius and the Medes at Plataea took place in the seventy-fifth Olympiad. Now, it is necessary for me to report what is said by the Greeks, but it is no longer necessary to believe it all. What other things befell Oebotas will be added in my account of the Achaeans.