Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/587

 PELODES. scribed by Pausanias (vii. 27). Of these, the most important were a temple of Athena, with a statue of the goddess, said to have been one of the earher works of Pbeidias ; a temple of Dionysus Lampter, in whose honour a festival, Lampteria, was cele- brated ; a temple of Apollo Theoxenius, to whom a festival, Theoxenia, was celebrated ; a gymnasium, &c. Sixty stadia from the city was the Mysaeum (Mvcraiov), a temple of the ]Iysian Demeter ; and near it a temple of Asclepius, called Cyrus (Kvpos) : at both of these places there were copious springs. The ruins of Pellene are situated at Zugra, and are now called Tzerkovi. The two temples of Mysaeum and Cyrus are placed by Leake at 7'rikkala, SE. of tlie ancient city. (Leake, Morea, vol. iii. p. 215, Pehpnnnesiaca, p. 391.) Between Aegium and Pellene, there was a village also called Pellene, celebrated for the manufacture of a particular kind of cloaks, which were given as prizes in the agonistic contests in the city. (Strab. viii. p. 386; Pind. 01. ix. 146, with Schol.; Aristoph. Av. 1421, with Schol.; Hesych. and Phot. s. v. UeWrjviKal xAatcai.) K. 0. Miiller (Dor. vol. ii. p. 430), however, questions this second Pellene : he supposes that Strabo is describing Pellene as both citadel and village, and he corrects the test, /ceiTai 5e /xera^v Alyiou Kal KvW-fivrjs, instead of DeA- XitvTjs ; but the context renders this conjecture im- probable. The harbour of Pellene was called Aristonautae (^ApiTTovadrat), and was distant 60 stadia from Pellene, and 120 from Aegeira. It is said to have been so called from the Argonauts having landed there in the course of their voyage. (Paus. vii. 26. § 14, ii. 12. § 2.) It was probably on the site of the modern Kamdri. (Leake, Morea, vol. iii. p. 384.) A little to the E., near the coast, was the fortress Oluru s ("OAoupos), dependent upon Pellene; Leake places it at Xylo-castro. It would thus have stood at the entrance of the gorge leading from the mari- time plain into the territory of Pellene, and would have been a position of great importance to the safety of that district. (Xen. Hell. vii. 14. §§ 17, 18 ; Plin. iv. 6 ; Mel. iii. 3 ; Steph. B. s. v. ; Leake, vol. iii. p. 224.) Near Aristonautae was GoNiissA or GoNOESSA (rovoecraa), to which Homer gives the epithet of lofty (cdneivif). According to Pau- sanias its proper name was Doxuss.i (AofoCffcra), which was changed by Peisistratus into Gonoessa, when he collected the poems of Homer. Pausanias says that it was a fortress belonging to the Sicy- onians, and lay between Aegeira and Pellene ; but from its position we may infer that it was at one time dependent upon Pellene. Leake places it at Koriifi, the lofty mountain, at the foot of which is Kamdri, the ancient Aristonautae. (Horn. II. ii. 573 ; Paus. vii. 26. § 13 ; Leake, vol. iii. p. 385.) 2. A town in Laconia. [Peli^na.] PELORUS. 571 COIN OF PELLENE. PELO'DES PORTUS. [Butiikotum.] PE'LOPIS I'NSULAE, nine small islands lying off Methana, on the Argolic coast. (Paus. ii. 34. §3.) They must be the islands lying between Epidaurus and Aegina, of which Pityonnesus (An- ghistri) is the largest. (Plin. iv. 12. s. 20; Leake, Morea, vol. ii. p. 455.) PELOPONNE'SUS. [Graecia.] PELOTvUS,PELO'RIS,orPELO'RIAS(n6Aa-pos &Kpa, Ptol.; IleAcopis, Thuc, Dion. Per ; rteAoipicir, Pol., Strab. : Capo diFaro), a celebrated promontory of Sicily, forming the NE. extremity of the whole island, and one of the three promontories which were considered to give to it the tiiangular form from which it derived the name of Trinacria. (Pol. i. 42; Strab. vi. pp. 265,266; Diod. v. 2 ; Plin. iii. 8. s. 14; Dion. Per. 467 — 472; Ovid. Met. xiii. 727.) It was at the same time the point which projected furthest towards the opposite coast of Italy; so that the narrowest part of the Sicilian straits was that which lay between Cape Pelorus and the coast ad- joining the headland of Caenys (Ptmta del Pezzo) on the coast of Bruttium. [Caenys.] A strange story is told by some Roman writers that it derived its name from the pilot of Hannibal, who was put to death by that general from a suspicion of treachery; thus overlooking the fact that it was known by that name to the Greeks for centuries before the time of Hannibal. (Mel. ii. 7. § 17; Val. Max, ix. 8. § 1 ; Sallust, ap. Serv. ad ^e?;. iii. 411.) The actual headland of Pelorus, now called the Capo del Faro, is a low, sandy point ; but about 2 miles from its ex- tremity there begins a ridge of hills which quickly rises into a range of mountains, of no great elevation, but steep and strongly marked. These continue in an unbroken range at the back of Messina, near which they attain a height of about 3000 feet, and flank the east coast of the island as far as the neigh- bourhood of Taormina, where they turn abruptly to the W. and stretch across in that direction without any real interruption, till they join the more lofty group of the Monte Madonia. It is to this range of mountains that the name of MoNs Neptunius is applied by Solinus (5. § 12), and which that author describes as separating the Tyrrhenian and Adriatic (i. e. Sicilian) seas. But there is no real geographical line of separation between these moun- tains and those further W., which were known to the ancients as the Mons Nebrodes. The lieadland of Pelorus may thus be looked upon as the extremity of a great mountain promontory, formed by the range of the Mons Neptunius, and extending from the neighbourhood of Messina to that of Milazso (Mylae), or, in a still wider sense, from Tauromenium on the E. coast to Tyndaris on the N. Diodorus calls it 100 stadia from the pro- montory to Messana, and the distance is still com- monly reckoned 12 miles, though it docs not really exceed 8. (Diod. xiv. 56.) From its proximity to Messana and its position commanding the passage of the straits, Pelorus was an important naval station, and as such its name is frequently mentioned in history. Thus, in n.c. 425, when the Athenian fleet under Lache.s was established at Rhegium, the Syracusans and their allies took post with their fleet at Peloms, where they were sup- ported also by a land force. (Thuc. iv. 25.) In B.C. 396 the Carthaginian general llimilco took post at Pelorus with his fleet and army, and, when the Mes-sanians sallied out to attack him, by taking ad- vantage of a north wind, sent his fleet down suddi-nly to Messana, which was surprised and taken before the troops could return to its defence. (Diod. xiv. 56, 57.) Again, during the siege of Messana by the Carthaginians at the commencement of the First Punic War, it was at Pelorus that their fleet was