Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 2.djvu/184

 176 STRABO. CASAUB. 463. lians, the poet came to reckon the Pleuronii among the JEto- lians. 2. Ephorus, after having asserted that the nation of the JEtolians were never in subjection to any other people, but, from all times of which any memorial remains, their country continued exempt from the ravages of war, both on account of its local obstacles and their own experience in warfare, says, that from the beginning Curetes were in possession of the whole country, but on the arrival of ^Etolus, the son of Endy- mion, from Elis, who defeated them in various battles, the Curetes retreated to the present Acarnania, and the -ZEtolians returned with a body of Epeii, and founded ten of the most ancient cities in JEtolia. ; and in the tenth generation after- wards Elis was founded, in conjunction with that people, by Oxylus, the son of Hsemon, who had passed over from jEtolia. They produce, as proofs of these facts, inscriptions, one sculptured on the base of the statue of ^Etolus at Therma in ^Etolia, where, according to the custom of the country, they assemble to elect their magistrates ; " this statue of ^Etolus, son of Endymion, brought up near the streams of the Alpheius, and in the neighbourhood of the stadia of Olympia, ^Etolians dedicated as a public monument of his merits." And the other inscription on the statue of Oxylus is in the market-place of Elis ; "JStolus, having formerly abandoned the original inhabitants of this country, won by the toils of war the land of the Curetes. But Oxylus, the son of Heemon, the tenth scion of that race, founded this ancient city." 3. He rightly alleges, as a proof of the affinity subsisting reciprocally between the Eleii and the ^Etolians, these in- scriptions, both of which recognise not the affinity alone, but also that their founders had established settlers in each other's country. Whence he clearly convicts those of falsehood who assert, that the Eleii were a colony of ^Etolians, and that the JEtolians were not a colony of Eleii. But he seems to ex- hibit the same inconsistency in his positions here, that we proved l with regard to the oracle at Delphi. For after as- serting that JEtolia had never been ravaged by war from all time of which there was any memorial, and saying, that from the first the Curetes were in possession of this country, he 1 B.ix. c. iii. 6 11.