Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 2.djvu/103

 B. ix. c. ii. $ 6-8. BCEOTIA. 95 times their affairs have continued to decline, nor do they retain the appearance even of a considerable village. Other cities (of Boeotia) have experienced a similar fate, with the excep- tion of Tanagra and Thespiae, which in comparison with Thebes are in a tolerable condition. 6. We are next to make a circuit of the country, beginning at the sea-coast, opposite Euboaa, which is continuous with that of Attica. We begin this circuit from Oropus, and the Sacred Har- bour, 1 which is called Delphinium, opposite to which is the ancient Eretria in Eubo3a, having a passage across of 60 stadia. After Delphinium, at the distance of 20 stadia, is Oropus, and opposite to this is the present Eretria. 2 There is a passage over to it of 40 stadia. 7. Next is Delium, 3 a place sacred to Apollo, in imitation of that at Delos. It is a small town of the Tanagrasans, at the distance of 30 stadia from Aulis. To this place the Athenians, after their defeat in battle, fled in disorder. 4 In the flight, Socrates the philosopher (who having lost his horse, was serving on foot) observed Xenophon, the son of Gryllus, upon the ground, fallen from his horse ; he raised him upon his shoulders and carried him away in safety, a distance of many stadia, until the rout was at an end. 8. Then follows a great harbour, which is called Bathys (or deep harbour) : then Aulis, 5 a rocky spot, and a village of the Tanagrseans, with a harbour capable of containing 50 small vessels. So that probably the naval station of the mitted by Sylla in the war against Mithridates, which completed the final ruin of Thebes, must have been fresh in the memory of Strabo. 1 Hieros Limen. 2 New Eretria stood at Paleocastro, and old Eretria at Vathy. 3 Dramesi. 4 Athenaeus, v. 15. by Homer (II. ii. 303) it is called AvXlg irtTprjeaaa. About three miles south of Chalcis, on the Boeotian coast, are two bays, separated from each other by a rocky peninsula : the northern is small and winding, the south- ern spreads out at the end of a channel into a large circular basin. The latter harbour, as well as a village situated a mile to the southward of it, is called Vathy, a name evidently derived from fia9vq ifirjv. We may therefore conclude that Aulis was situated on the rocky peninsula be- tween these two bays. Leake and Smith.
 * Livy states (xlv. 27) that Aulis was distant three miles from Chalcis ;