Description of Greece

​My narrative returns me to Stymphalus and to the boundaries of the Pheneans and Stymphalians, the place called Geronteium. The Stymphalians are no longer classed with the Arcadians, but belong to the Argolic confederacy, having transferred themselves to it voluntarily; but that they are of Arcadian race is testified by the verses of Homer, and Stymphalus, their founder, was the third descendant of Arcas, the son of Callisto. It is said, however, that they originally settled in another part of the country, and not in the city of our day.

​In the ancient Stymphalus, they say that Temenus, the son of Pelasgus, dwelt, and that Hera was reared by this Temenus, and that he himself established three sanctuaries for the goddess and gave her three surnames: while she was still a maiden, he called her Child; when she was married to Zeus, he called her Fully-grown; but when she had quarreled for some reason with Zeus and returned to Stymphalus, Temenus named her Widow. These are the things said by the Stymphalians about the goddess, to my knowledge.

​But the city of our day has none of the things mentioned, but has others of such number. There is a spring in the land of the Stymphalians, and from this water the Emperor Hadrian brought to the Corinthians for their city. In Stymphalus, in the winter season, the spring makes a small lake and from it the river Stymphalus; but in summer, it no longer forms a lake beforehand, but is immediately a river from the spring. This river goes down into a chasm of the earth, and appearing again in Argolis, it changes its name, and they call it Erasinus instead of Stymphalus.

​Concerning the water in Stymphalus, a story holds that once man-eating birds were reared by it; Heracles is said to have shot these birds down. But Pisander of Camirus says that he did not kill the birds, but drove them away with the noise of rattles. The desert of the Arabians, however, produces other wild beasts, and also birds called Stymphalian, no more gentle to men than lions and leopards.

​These birds fly against those who come to hunt them, and wound them with their beaks and kill them. Whatever bronze or iron armor men wear, the birds pierce through; but if they weave thick clothing of bark, the beaks of the Stymphalian birds are caught by the bark clothing, just as the wings of small birds stick to bird-lime. These birds are in size like the crane, and they resemble ibises, but they carry more powerful beaks, and not crooked like those of ibises.

​Whether the Arabian birds of my time have the name of the birds once in Arcadia, while not having the same appearance as those, I do not know. But if throughout all time, just like hawks and eagles, there are also Stymphalian birds, these birds seem to me to be an Arabian creature, and a part of them flying might once have come to Arcadia to Stymphalus. By the Arabians they would indeed originally have been called by some other name and not Stymphalian; but the fame of Heracles, and the honor paid to Greek things before barbarian things, prevailed so that even those in the desert of the Arabians are called Stymphalian even in our day.

​In Stymphalus there is also an ancient sanctuary of Artemis of Stymphalus; and the image is a wooden statue, for the most part gilded. Near the roof of the temple there are also the Stymphalian birds represented; now, it was difficult to distinguish clearly whether they were made of wood or of plaster, but to us on estimating they appeared to be of wood rather than plaster. There are also maidens of white marble, and they have the legs of birds, and they stand behind the temple.

​It is also said that in our day a marvel of this kind occurred. In Stymphalus, they were celebrating the festival of Artemis of Stymphalus with no great zeal in other respects, and they neglected most of the established rules for it. Therefore, timber falling into the mouth of the chasm where the river goes down blocked the water from sinking, and they say the plain became a lake for them to the extent of about four hundred stades.

​And they say that a hunter pursued a fleeing deer, and she rushed into the marsh, while the hunter, following in his excitement, swam after the deer; and thus the chasm received both the deer and, after her, the man. They say the water of the river followed these, so that in a day all the flooded part of the plain was dried up for the Stymphalians; and from this time on, they celebrate the festival to Artemis with greater devotion.