dience, calling themselves generally by one name; and yet every several nation, after some one of the posterity of Hellen, who had reigned over it. And because this is the furthest antiquity of Greece, it will not be amiss to recount the pedigree of her first planters.

Iapetus, (as the poets fable,) was the son of heaven and earth; so accounted, either because the names of his parents had, in the Greek tongue, such signification, or perhaps for his knowledge in astronomy and philosophy.

Iapetus begat Prometheus and Epimetheus: of whom all men have read that have read poets. Prometheus begat Deucalion; and Epimetheus, Pyrrha. Deucalion, and his wife Pyrrha, reigned in Thessaly, which was then called Pyrrha, (as Cretensis Rhianus affirmeth,) of Pyrrha the queen. In Deucalion's time was that great flood, of which we have spoken elsewhere. Deucalion begat Hellen, whose sons were Xuthus, Dorus, and Eolus: of Dorus and Æolus, the Dores and Eolians had name. The Eoles inhabited Boeotia. The Dores having first inhabited sundry parts of Thessaly, did afterwards seat themselves about Parnassus, and finally became lords of the countries about Lacedæmon: Xuthus, the eldest son of Hellen, being banished by his brethren, for having diverted from them, to his own use, some part of their father's goods, came to Athens, where marrying the daughter of king Erechtheus, he begat on her two sons, Achæus and Ion. Of these two Achæus, for a slaughter by him committed, fled into Peloponnesus; and seating himself in Laconia, gave name to that region; from whence, (as some write,) he afterwards departed, and levying an army, recovered the kingdom of his grandfather in Thessaly.

Ion being general for the Athenians, when Eumolpus the Thracian invaded Attica, did obtain a great victory, and thereby such love and honour of the people, that they committed the ordering of

their state into his hands. He divided the citizens into tribes, appointing every one to some occupation, or good course of life. When the people multiplied, he planted colonies in Sycionia, then called Egialos, or Ægialia; in which country Selinus then reigning, thought it safer to give his daughter Helice in marriage to Ion, and make him his heir, than to contend with him. So Ion married Helice, and built a town called by his wife's name in Ægialia, where he and his posterity reigned long, and, (though not obliterating the old name,) gave to that land denomination. But in after-times, the Dores assisting the nephews of Hercules, invaded Peloponnesus, and overcoming the Achæans possessed Laconia, and all those parts which the Achæi had formerly occupied. Hereupon the Achæi, driven to seek a new seat, came unto the Iones, desiring to inhabit Ægialia with them, and alleging in vain, that Ion and Achæus had been brethren. When this request could not be obtained, they sought by force to expel the Ionians, which they performed; but they lost their king Tisamenes, the son of Orestes, in that war.

Thus were the Iones driven out of Peloponnesus, and compelled to remove into Attica, from whence after a while they sailed into Asia, and peopled the western coast thereof, on which they built twelve cities, inhabited by them, even to this day, at the least without any universal or memorable transmigration. This expedition of the Iones into Asia, hath been mentioned by all which have written of that age, and is commonly placed a hundred and forty years after the war of Troy, and sixty years after the descent of the Heraclidæ into Peloponnesus. These Heraclidæ were they of whom the kings of Sparta issued; which race held that kingdom about seven hundred years. Of their father Hercules, many strange things are delivered unto us by the poets, of which some are like to have been true, others perhaps must be allegorically understood. But the

most approved writers think that there were many called Hercules, all whose exploits were by the Greeks ascribed to the son of Alcmena, who is said to have performed these twelve great labours.

First, he slew the Nemean lion: secondly, he slew the serpent Hydra, which had nine heads, whereof one being cut off, two grew in the place: the third was overtaking a very swift hart: the fourth was the taking of a wild boar alive, which haunted mount Erymanthus in Arcadia: the fifth was the the cleansing of Augeas's ox-stall in one day, which he performed, by turning the river Alpheus into it: the sixth was the chasing away of the birds from the lake Stymphalis: the seventh was the fetching a bull from Crete: the eighth was the taking of the mares, which Diomedes king of Thrace fed with human flesh the ninth was to fetch a girdle of the queen of the Amazons: the three last were, to fetch Geryon's beeves from Gades; the golden apples of the Hesperides; and Cerberus from hell. The mythological interpretation of these I purposely omit, as both over-long to be here set down, and no less perplexed than the labours themselves. For some by Hercules understand fortitude, prudence, and constancy, interpreting the monsters, vices. Others make Hercules the sun, and his travels to be the twelve signs of the zodiac. There are others who apply his works historically to their own conceits; as well assured, that the exposition cannot have more unlikelihood than the fables. That he took Elis, Pylus, Oechalia, and other towns, being assisted by such as either admired his virtues, or were be holden unto him; also that he slew many thieves and tyrants, I take to be truly written, without addition of poetical vanity. His travels through most parts of the world are, or may seem, borrowed from Hercules Libycus. But sure it is, that many cities of Greece were greatly bound to him; for that he, (bending all his endeavours to the common good,)

delivered the land from much oppression. But after his death, no city of Greece, (Athens excepted,) requited, the virtue and deserts of Hercules, with constant protection of his children, persecuted by the king Eurystheus. This Eurystheus was son of Sthenelus, and grandchild of Perseus; he reigned in Mycena, the mightiest city then in Greece. He it was that imposed those hard tasks upon Hercules, who was bound to obey him, (as poets report,) for the expiation of that murther which in his madness he had committed upon his own children; but as others say, because he was his subject and servant: wherefore there are who commend Eurystheus for employing the strength of Hercules to so good a purpose. But it is generally agreed by the best writers, that Hercules was also of the stock of Perseus, and holden in great jealousy by Eurystheus, because of his virtue, which appeared more and more in the dangerous services wherein he was employed; so that he grew great in reputation through all Greece, and had, by many wives and concubines, above sixty children. These children Eurystheus would fain have got in his power, when Hercules was dead but they fled unto Ceyx king of Thracinia, and from him, (for he durst not withstand Eurystheus,) to Athens. The Athenians not only gave them entertainment, but lent them aid, wherewith they encountered Eurystheus. Iolaus, the brother's son of Hercules, who had assisted him in many of his travels, was captain of the Heraclidæ. It is said of him, that being dead, he obtained leave of Pluto to live again till he might revenge the injuries done by Eurystheus; whom, when he had slain in battle, he died again. It seems to me, that whereas he had led colonies into Sicily, and abode there a long time forgotten, he came again into Greece to assist his cousins, and afterwards returned back. When the Peloponnesians understood that Eurystheus was slain, they took Atreus the son of Pelops to be their king;

;

for he was rich, mighty, and favoured of the people. Against him the Heraclidæ marched under Hyllus the son of Hercules. But to avoid effusion of blood, it was agreed, that Hyllus should fight with Echenus, king of the Tegeatæ, a people of Arcadia, who assisted Atreus, with condition that if Hyllus were victor, he should peaceably enjoy what he challenged as his right; otherwise the Heraclidæ should not enter Peloponnesus in a hundred years. In that combat Hyllus was slain, and the Heraclidæ compelled to forbear their country, till the third generation; at which time they returned under Aristodemus, (as the best authority shews, though some have said, that they came under the conduct of his children,) and brought with them the Dores, whom they planted in that country, as is before shewed, having expelled the Achæi, over whom the issue of Pelops had reigned after the death of Eurystheus four generations.

SECT. VII.

Of Homer and Hesiod; and many changes in the world, that happened about this age.

ABOUT this time that excellent learned poet Homer lived, as many of the best chronologers affirm. He was by the race of the Mæones, descended (as Functius imagineth') of Berosus's Anamæon, who gave name to that people. But this Functius imagineth Homer the poet to have been long after these times, rashly framing his æra according to Archilochus in the tract, or rather fragment de temporibus; and makes seven more of this name to have flourished in divers cities in Greece. Whence, perhaps, sprang the diversity of opinions, both of the

2

1 Fun. Chro. fol. 11. col. D. 2. This author set out with Berosus and others, first at Basil, and after with friar Annius's comment at Antwerp, is incertæ fidei. Naulcer. f. 147. placeth Homer in the thirty-second generation in the time of Samuel.