Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/40

 J4 HISTORY OF GREECE. enterprise and evacuated the country.* In retiring, however, they retained possession of Megara, where they established per- manent settlers, and which became from this moment Dorian, seemingly at first a dependency of Corinth, though it afterwards acquired its freedom and became an autonomous community. 2 This memorable act of devoted patriotism, analogous to that of the daughters of Erechtheus at Athens, and of Menoskeus at Thebes, entitled Kodrus to be ranked among the most splendid characters in Grecian legend. Kodrus is numbered as the last king of Athens : his descend- ants were styled Archons, but they held that dignity for life, a practice which prevailed during a long course of years after- wards. Medon and Neileus, his two sons, having quarrelled about the succession, the Delphian oracle decided in favor of the former; upon which the latter, affronted at the preference, re- solved upon seeking a new home. 3 There were at this moment many dispossessed sections of Greeks, and an adventitious popu- lation accumulated in Attica, who were anxious for settlements beyond sea. The expeditions which now set forth to cross the JEgean, chiefly under the conduct of members of the Kodrid family, composed collectively the memorable Ionic Emigration, of which the lonians, recently expelled from Peloponnesus, form- ed a part, but, as it would seem, only a small part ; for we hear of many quite distinct races, some renowned in legertd, who with- draw from Greece amidst this assemblage of colonists. Tho Kadmeians, the Minyae of Orchomenus, the Abantes of Euboea, the Dryopes ; the Molossi, the Phokians, the Boeotians, the Arca- dian Pelasgians, and even the Dorians of Epidaurus, are re- presented as furnishing each a proportion of the crews of these emigrant vessels. 4 Nor were the results unworthy of so mighty 1 Pherekydes, Fragm. 110, ed. Didot; Veil. Patcrc. i. 2; Conon, Narr. 26; Polysen. i. c. 1 8. Hellanikus traced the genealogy of Kodrus, through ten generations, up to Deukalion (Fragment 10, ed. Didot.) 2 Strabo, xiv. p. 653. 3 Pausan. vii. 2, 1. 4 Herodot. i. 146; Pausan. vii. 2, 3, 4. IsokratOs extols his Athenian ancestors for having provided, by means of this emigration, settlements foi BO large a number of distressed and poor Greeks at the expense of Barba- rians (Or. xii. Panathcnaic. p. 241)