Page:History of Greece Vol X.djvu/248

 226 HISTORY OF GREECE. metrius of Pharus as the two horns of Peloponnesus : whoever held these two horns, was master of the bull. 1 Ithome was near two thousand five hundred feet above the level of the s<ia, having upon its summit an abundant spring of water, called Klep- sydra. Upon this summit the citadel or acropolis of the new town of Messene was built; while the town itself was situated lower down on the slope, though connected by a continuous wall with its acropolis. First, solemn sacrifices were offered, by Epami- nondas, who was recognized as GEkist or Founder, 2 to Dionysius and Apollo Ismenius, by the Argeians, to the Argeian Here and Zeus Nemeius, by the Messenians, to Zeus Ithomates and the Dioskuri. Next, prayer was made to the ancient Heroes and Heroines of the Hessenian nation, especially to the invincible war- rior Aristomenes, that they would now come back and again take up their residence as inmates in enfranchised Messene. After this, the ground was marked out and the building was begun, under the sound of Argeian and Boeotian flutes, playing the strains of Pro- nonius and Sakadas. The best masons andvarchitects were invited from all Greece, to lay out the streets with regularity, as well as to ensure a proper distribution and construction of the sacred edi- fices. 3 In respect of the fortifications, too, Epaminondas was stu- diously provident. Such was their excellence and solidity, that they exhibited matter for admiration even in the after-days of the trav- eller Pausanias. 4 From their newly-established city on the hill of Ithome, the Messenians enjoyed a territory extending fifteen miles southward down to the Messenian Gulf, across a plain, then as well as now, the richest and most fertile in Peloponnesus ; while to the east- ward, their territory was conterminous with that of Arcadia and the contemporary establishment of Megalopolis. All the newly- appropriated space was land cut off from the Spartan dominion. How much was cut off in the direction south-east of Ithome (along the north-eastern coast ofrthe Messenian Gulf), we cannot exactly say. But it would appear that the Perioeki of Thuria, situated in that neighborhood, were converted into an independent community 1 Strabo, viii, p. 361 ; Polybius, vii, 11. das (ix, 15, 4). Pausan. iv, 27, 3. * Pausan. h 31, 5.
 * Pausan. ix. 14, 2 compare the inscription on the statue of Epaminon