Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/146

 130 LASAEA. 585), and is said to have been destroyed by the Dioscuri, who hence derived the surname of Lapersae. (Strab. viii. p. 364 ; Steph. B. s. v. Aa.) There was also a mountain in Laconia called Lapersa. (Steph. B. s. V. Aanepira.) In the later period it was a place of no importance. Livy speaks of it as " vicus maritimus " (ssxviii. 30), and Pausanias mentions the ruins of the city on Mt. Asia. Before the walls he saw a statue of Hercules, and a trophy erected over the Macedonians who were a part of Philip's army when he invaded Laconia ; and among the ruins he noticed a statue of Athena Asia. The modern town was near a fountain called Galaco (TaAaKci), from the milky colour of its water, and near it Was a gymnasium, in which stood an ancient statue of Hermes. Besides the ruins of the old town on Mt. Asia, there were also buildings on the two other mountains mentioned above : on Mt. Ilium stood a temple of Dionysus, and on the summit a temple of Asclepius; and on Mt. Cnacadium a temple of Apollo Carneius. Las is spoken of by Polybius (v. 19) and Strabo (viii. p. 363) under the name of Asine ; and hence it has been supposed that some of the fugitives from Asine in Argolis m.ay have settled at Las, and given their name to the town. But, notwithstanding the statement of Polybius, from whom Strabo probably copied, we have given reasons elsewhere for believing that there was no Laeonian town called Asine ; and tliat the mistake probably arose from confounding "Asine"' with "Asia," on which Las originally stood. [Asine, No. 3.] Las stood upon the hill of PassM>d, which is now crowned by the ruins of a fortress of the middle ages, among which, however, Leake noticed, at the southern end of the eastern wall, a piece of Hellenic wall, about 50 paces in length, and tvvo-thirds of the height of the modern wall. It is formed of polygonal blocks of stone, some four feet long and three broad. The fountain Galaco is the stream Tm-kovrysa, which rises between the hill of Fas- savd and the village of Kdrvela, the latter being one mile and a half west of Passavd. (Leake, Morea, vol. i. p. 254, seq., p. 276, seq. ; Peloponnesiaca, p. 150 ; Boblaye, Eecherches, cf-c. p. 87 ; Curtius, Peluponnesos, vol. ii. p. 273, seq.) LASAEA (Aocraia), a city in Crete, near the roadstead of tiie '' Fair Havens." (Acts, xxvii. 8.) This place is not mentioned by any other writer, but is probably the same as the Lisia of the Peutinfjer Tables, 16 M. P. to the E. of Gortyna. (Comp, Hock, Kreta, vol. i. pp. 412, 439.) Some MSS. have Lasea; others, Alassa. The Viilgate reads Thalassa, which Beza contended was the true name. (Comp. Coney- beare and Howson, Life and Epist. of St. Paul, vol. ii. p. 330.) [E. B. J.] LA'SION (Aatricoi/ or Aaauav^, the chief town of the mountainous district of Acroreia in Elis proper, was situated upon the frontiers of Arcadia near Pso- phis. Curtius places it with great prob.ability in the upper valley of the Ladon, at the Paleokastro of Kiimani, on the road from the Eleian Pylos and Ephyra to Psophis. Lasion was a frequent object of dispute between the Arcadians and Eleians, both of whom laid claim to it. In the war which the Spar- tans carried on against Elis at the close of the Pelo- ponnesian War, Pausanias, king of Sparta, took La- sion (Died. xiv. 17). The invasion of Pausanias is not mentioned by Xenophon in his account of this war; but the latter author relates that, by the treaty of peace concluded between Elis and Sparta in B.C. LATHON. 400, the Eleians were obliged to give up Lasion, in consequence of its being claimed by the Arcadians. (Xen. Hell. iii. 2. § 300 I" ^- C- 366 the Eleians attempted to recover Lasion from the Arcadians ; they took the town by surprise, but were shortly afterwards driven out of it again by the Arcadians. (Xen. Hell. vii. 4. § 13, seq.; Died. xv. 77.) In B.C. 219 Lasion was again a fortress of Elis, but upon the capture of Psophis by Philip, the Eleian garrison at Lasion straightway deserted the place. (Polyb. iv. 72, 73.) Polybius mentions (v. 102) along with Lasion a fortress called Pyrgos, which he places in a district named Perippia. (Leake, Morea, vol. ii. p. 200, seq.; Boblaye, Recherclies,(fc. p. 125; Curtius, Peloponnesos, vol. i. p. 41.) LA'SSORA, a town of Galatia, mentioned in the Pent. Tab. as 25 miles distant from Eccobriga, whence we may infer that it is the same place as the Aaa-Kopia of Ptolemy (v. 4. § 9). The Anto- nine Itinerary (p. 203) mentions a town Adapera in about the same site. [L. S.J LASTI'GI, a town of Hispania Baetica, belonging to the conventus of Hispalis (Plin. iii. 1. s. 3), and one of the cities of which we have coins, all of them belonging to the period of its independence : their type is a head of Mars, with two ears of corn lying parallel to each other. The site is supposed to be at Zahai-a, lying on a height of the Sierra de Ronda, above the river Guadalete. (Carter's Travels, p. 171 ; Florez, JSsp. S. vol. ix. pp. 18, 60, Med. vol. ii. p. 475, vol. iii. p. 85 ; Mionnet, vol. i. p. 50, Suppl. vol. i. p. 113; Sestini, Med. Isp. p. 61; Num. Goth.; Eckhel, vol. i. p. 25; Ukert, vol. ii. pt. 1. pp. 358, 382.) [P. S.] LASLfS, a town of Crete, enumerated by Pliny (iv. 12) among his list of inland cities. A coin with the epigraph AATIHN, the Doric form for haaiaiv, is claimed by Eckhel (vol. ii. p. 316, comp. Sestini, p. 53) for this place. [E. B. J.] LATARA. [Ledus.] LATHON {Ade^v, Strab. xvii. p. 836, where the vtilgar reading is Aa5u)v ; comp. xiv. p. 647, where he calls it A-qOaLOS ; Ptol. iv. 4. § 4 ; ArjOcev, Ptol. Euerg. ap Ath. ii. p. 71 ; Fluvius Lkthon, Plin. V. 5 ; Solin. 27 ; Lethes Amnis, Lucan, ix. 355), a river of the Hesperidae or Hesperitae, in Cyre- naica. It rose in the Herculis Arenae, and fell into the sea a little N. of the city of Hesperides or Be- renice : Strabo connects it with the harbour of the city (iiJ.T)v 'EaTrepiSaJi/ : that there is not the slightest reason for altering the reading, as Groskurd and others do, into t/xvrj, will presently appear) ; and Scylax (p. 110, Gronov.) mentions the river, which he calls Ecceius ('E/cKeioj), as in close proximity with the city and habour of Hesperides. Pliny ex- pressly states that the river was not far from the city, and places on or near it a sacred grove, which was supposed to represent the " Gardens of the Hes- perides" (Plin. v. 5: nee procul ante oppidum flu- vius Lethon, Incus sacer, iibi Hesperidum horti me- morantm-). Athenaeus quotes from a work of Ptolemy Euergetes praises of its fine pike an<l eels, somewhat inconsistent, especially in the mouth of a luxurious king of Egypt, with the mythical sound of the name. That name is, in fact, plain Doric Greek, descriptive of the character of the river, like our English Mole. So well does it deserve the name, that it "escaped the notice" of commentators and geographers, till it was discovered by Beechey, as it still flows " concealed" from such scholars as depend on vague guesses in place of an accurate knowledge