Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 2.djvu/28

 20 STRABO. CASAUB. 346. height, since they called heights Sami ; perhaps also this was the acropolis of Arene, which the poet mentions in the Catalogue of the Ships ; " who inhabited Pylus, and the pleasant Arene ;" 1 for as the position of Arene has not been clearly discovered anywhere, it is conjectured, that it was most probably situ- ated where the adjoining river Anigrus, formerly called Minyeius, empties itself. As no inconsiderable proof of this, Homer says, " There is a river Minyeius, which empties itself into the sea, near Arene." 8 Now near the cave of the nymphs Anigriades is a fountain, by which the subjacent country is rendered marshy, and filled with pools of water. The Anigrus however receives the great- er part of the water, being deep, but with so little current that it stagnates. The place is full of mud, emits an offensive smell perceptible at a distance of 26 stadia, and renders the fish unfit for food. Some writers give this fabulous account of these waters, and attribute the latter effect to the venom of .the Hydra, which some of the Centaurs 3 washed from their wounds ; others say, that Melampus used these cleansing waters for the purification of the Proetades. 4 They are a cure for alphi, or leprous eruptions, and the white tetter, and the leichen. They say also that the Alpheus had its name from its property of curing the disease alphi. 5 Since then the sluggishness of the Anigrus, and the recoil of the waters of the sea, produce a state of rest rather than a current, they say, that its former name was Minyeius, but that some persons perverted the name and altered it to Mintems. The etymology of the name may be derived from other sources ; either from those who accompanied Chloris, the mother of Nestor, from the Minyeian Orchomenus ; or, 1 I!, ii. 591. 2 Il.it. 721. 3 Hercules, after killing the Hydra, dipped the arrows which he after- wards made use of against the Centaurs, in gall of this monster. Pau- sanias, however, speaks of one Centaur only, Chiron, or, according to others, Polenor, who washed his wounds in the Anigrus. 4 The daughters of Proetus. According to Apollodorus, Melampus cured them of madness, probably the effect of a disease of the skin. 5 Alphi, Lcpra alphoides. Leuce, white tetter or common leprosy. Letchun, a cutaneous disease tending to leprosy.