Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/31

 MIGRATION OF BCEOTIANS FROM THESSALY. 13 talus, grandson of Pheidippus, who was reported to have con- ducted the Thesprotians across the passes of Pindus into Thes- saly, to have conquered the fertile central plain of that country, and to have imposed upa i it his own name instead of its previous denomination ^Eolis. 1 Whatever we may think of this legend as it stands, the state of Thessaly during the historical ages renders it highly probable that the Thessalians, properly so called, Avere a body of immi- grant conquerors. They appear always as a rude, warlike, vio- lent, and uncivilized race, distinct from their neighbors the Ach- oeans, the Magnetos, and the Perrhsebians, and holding all the three in tributary dependence : these three tribes stand to them in a relation analogous to that of the Lacedaemonian Periceki towards Sparta, while the Penestae, who cultivated their lands, are almost an exact parallel of the Helots. Moreover, the low level of taste and intelligence among the Thessalians, as well as certain points of their costume, assimilates them more to Mace- donians or Epirots than to Hellens. 2 Their position in Thessaly is in many respects analogous to that of the Spartan Dorians in Peloponnesus, and there seems good reason for concluding that the former, as well as the latter, were originally victorious in- vaders, though we cannot pretend to determine the time at which the invasion took place. The great family of the Aleuads, 3 and probably other Thessalian families besides, were descendants of Herakles, like the kings of Sparta. There are no similar historical grounds, in the case of the alleged migration of the Boeotians from Thessaly to Boeotia, to justify a belief in the main fact of the legend, nor were the different legendary stories in harmony one with the other. While the Homeric Epic recognizes the Boeotians in Boeotia, but not in ap. Schol. Pindar. Pytli. x. 85), which creates the confusion with the Thes- protian Ephyre. 1 Hcrodot. vii. 176; Velleius Patercul. i. 2-3 ; Charax. ap. Stephan. Byz. v. &upiov; Polyccn. via. 44. There were several different statements, however, about the parentage of Thessalus, as well as about the name of the country (Strabo, ix. p. 443 Stephan. Byz. v. Alftovio.). s See K. 0. Miiller, Elstoiy of the Dorians, Introduction, sect. 4. 3 Pindar, Pyth. x, 2.