Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/730

 712 CEOTON. i^ oanfines of the Locriaos, the intennddiate towns of Scylletium and Cauknia bdng its colonies and dependencies. The immediate neighboarhood of the city, though less fertile than thi^ of Sybaris and Thnrii, was well adapted for the growth of com, and the Inzoriant pastores of the valley of the Neaeihos are celebrated by Theocritus, and retain their richness to the present day. [Nbaethus.] The same poet, who has laid the scene of one of his Idylls in the neighboarhood of Grotona, speaks with praise of the banks of the Aesams, wbidi are now dreary and barren : as well as of the pastures and shady woods of two mountains called Physcus and Latymnum. These last must have been situated in the neighbourhood of Crotooa, but cannot be iden- tified with any certainty. (Theocr. iv. 17 — 19, 33 — 25 ; and SchoL od loc, Swinbome's TVooeb, vol i. p. 313.) Six miles distant from the city of Crotona was the celebrated temple of the Lacinian Juno, on the promontory of the same name. (Liv. xxiv. 3 ; Strab. vL pu 261 ; Scyl. p. 6. § 13 ; Dionys. Per. 371 ; and Eustath. ad 2oc.) Livy calls it " nobile templum, ipsa urbe nobilius:" indeed, there was no other temple of equal fame or sanctity in the whole of Magna Graecia. The period of its foundation is wholly unknown. Virgil alludes to it as already in existence at the time of the voyage of Aeneas, and Dionysius tells us that a bronze cup was still pre- served there, which had been dedicated by that hero. (Virg. Aen. iii. 552 ; Dionys. i. 52.) Some legends ascribed its foundation to Hercules, others to La- dnias or Ladnus, who was said to have been dwell- ing there when it was visited by Hercules, and from whom the promcmtory dwived its name : others, again, spoke of the headland and sacred grove as having been presented by Thetis to Hera herself. (Died, iv. 24; Tzetz. ad L^cophr. 857, 1006; Serv. ad Aen. iii. 552.) These legends may be considered as indicating that the temple did not owe its foun- dation to the Greek colonists of Crotona, but that there previously existed a sacred edifice, or at least a consecrated locality (r^/Acyof ), on the spot, probably of Pdasgic origin. The temple of Hera became the scene of a great annual assembly of all the Italian Greeks, at which a procession took place in honour of the goddess, to whom splendid ofierings were made ; and this festival became a fiivourite occasion for the Greeks of the neighbouring cities to display their magnificence. (Pseud. Arist. da Mirab. 96 ; Athen. xii. p. 541.) The interior of the tem|de was adorned with paintings, executed by order of the Crotoniats at the pubUc cost, among which the most celebrated was that of Helen by Zeuxis, for the execution of which that artist was allowed to select five of the most beautiful virgins of the city as his models. (Cic de Inv, il 1 ; Plin. xxxv. 9. s. M.) Besides abundance of occasional ofierings of the most costly description, the temple derived great wealth from its permanent revenues, especially its cattle, out of the produce of which a column of solid gold was formed, and set cq) in the sanctuary. (Liv. xxiv. 3.) Immediately a<yoining the temple itself was an extensive grove, or rather forest, of tall pine- trees, enclosing within it rich pastures, on which the cattle belonging to the temple were allowed to feed, unprotected and uninjured. (Ibid.) The immense mass of treasures that had thus accumulated in the temple is said to have excited the cupidity of Hannibal, during the time that he was established in its neighbourhood, but he was CBOTON. I warned by the goddess herself is a dream to lefauh I from touching them. (Cic de Biv, i. 24.) It was at the same period that he dedioated there a braue tablet, containing a detailed account of his wars in Spain and Italy^ the number of his fisnoes, &C., wbidi was consulted, and is frequently refened to, by the historian Polybius. (PoL iii. 33, 56.) But though this odebrated sanctuary had been spared botii by Pyrrhtts and Hannibal, it was j^ofiuied by the Bomaa censor Q. Fulvius Flaoens, who, in B.G. 173, atxipped it of half its roof, which was composed of marble slabs instead of tiles, £»r the pai^pose of adnniiag a temple of Fortnna Equestris, whidi he was erectiiig at Borne. The ootnge was, indeed, severely cen- sured by the senate, who caused the slabs to be carried back to Lacinium, but in the decayed ogo- dition of the province, it was found imposaUe is replace them. (Liv. xlii. 3 ; VaL Max. i. I. § SO.) The decay of the temple may probably be diUed as commencing firom this period, and must have resolied from the general decline of the neigfaboniTng dtiei and country. But Appian teUs us that it was etill wealthy, and replete with oflkringB, as late as b. a 36, when it was plundered by Sex. Pompeius. (AppL B. C. V. 1 33.) Hence Strabo speaks of it as baring in his time lost its wealth, though the temple itself was still in existence. Pliny meations the Ladmaa Promontory, but without noticing the temple. It appears, however, from extant remains, as well » frcHn an inscription, ^ Herae Ladniae,** fbond in the ruins, that it still continued to subdst as a sacred edifice down to a late period. (Dionys. i. 52 ; Stiah vi. p. 261 ; Mommsen, /. J2. N. 72.) The ruins of this celebrated temple are hut inooD- siderable ; one column alone is standing, of the Doric order, doeely resembling those of Meti^MOtom : it is based on a foundation of huge stones cut into £aoets : but some admixture of bri^work shows that the building must have been repaired in BomsA times. A second column was standing till near tbe middle of the hist centuiy; and conddenble remains of the pavement, and the wall which formed the peribolus of the temple, were carried off to be used in the construction of the mole and the bishop'k palace at CoUwte. Biedesd, who visited these ruins in 1767, and upon whose authority many modem writers have described the building as of enormoiii extent, appears to have been misled by some masses of masonry (of reticulated work, and therefore cer^ tainly of Boman construction), more than 100 yards distant from the column, and which could never have formed any part of the tem]de. These frag- ments are generally known by tite absurd appellitioa of the School of Pythagoras. The podtion of the temple on a bold projecting rode (as described by Lucan. ii. 434), must have been very strikiag, com- manding a noble view in aU directions, and fomuog a landmark to voyagers, who were in the habit of striking across the bay duect from the lapygtti Promontoiy to that of Ladninm (Virg. Aen. iii 552). The smgle column that fonns its solitary remnant, still serves the same puipose. (Swinburne^ TraveUf vol i. pp. 321-- 323; Craven, SnrfAeni Tour, p. 238.) The coins of Grotoma are very numeraos : the more ancient ones are of the class called mcuMy having the one dde convex, the other eoocave : a mode of coinage peculiar to the dties of Magna Graecia. The type of all these earlier coins is a tripod, as on the one annexed, in allusion to tbe, oracle of Ddphi, in puFsoanoe df whidi the dty