9. Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library, 1.45, 3.42, 13.82, 17.108 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 1.45. 1. After the gods the first king of Egypt, according to the priests, was Menas, who taught the people to worship gods and offer sacrifices, and also to supply themselves with tables and couches and to use costly bedding, and, in a word, introduced luxury and an extravagant manner of life.,2. For this reason when, many generations later, Tnephachthus, the father of Bocchoris the wise, was king and, while on a campaign in Arabia, ran short of supplies because the country was desert and rough, we are told that he was obliged to go without food for one day and then to live on quite simple fare at the home of some ordinary folk in private station, and that he, enjoying the experience exceedingly, denounced luxury and pronounced a curse on the king who had first taught the people their extravagant way of living; and so deeply did he take to heart the change which had taken place in the people's habits of eating, drinking, and sleeping, that he inscribed his curse in hieroglyphs on the temple of Zeus in Thebes; and this, in fact, appears to be the chief reason why the fame of Menas and his honours did not persist into later ages.,3. And it is said that the descendants of this king, fifty-two in number all told, ruled in unbroken succession more than a thousand and forty years, but that in their reigns nothing occurred that was worthy of record.,4. Subsequently, when Busiris became king and his descendants in turn, eight in name, the last of the line, who bore the same name as the first, founded, they say, the city which the Egyptians call Diospolis the Great, though the Greeks call it Thebes. Now the circuit of it he made one hundred and forty stades, and he adorned it in marvellous fashion with great buildings and remarkable temples and dedicatory monuments of every other kind;,5. in the same way he caused the houses of private citizens to be constructed in some cases four stories high, in others five, and in general made it the most prosperous city, not only of Egypt, but of the whole world.,6. And since, by reason of the city's pre-eminent wealth and power, its fame has been spread abroad to every region, even the poet, we are told, has mentioned it when he says: Nay, not for all the wealth of Thebes in Egypt, where in ev'ry hall There lieth treasure vast; a hundred are Her gates, and warriors by each issue forth Two hundred, each of them with car and steeds.,7. Some, however, tell us that it was not one hundred "gates" (pulai) which the city had, but rather many great propylaea in front of its temples, and that it was from these that the title "hundred-gated" was given it, that is, "having many gateways." Yet twenty thousand chariots did in truth, we are told, pass out from it to war; for there were once scattered along the river from Memphis to the Thebes which is over against Libya one hundred post-stations, each one having accommodation for two hundred horses, whose foundations are pointed out even to this day. 3.42. 1. But we shall now take up the other side, namely, the opposite shore which forms the coast of Arabia, and shall describe it, beginning with the innermost recess. This bears the name Poseideion, since an altar was erected here to Poseidon Pelagius by that Ariston who was dispatched by Ptolemy to investigate the coast of Arabia as far as the ocean.,2. Directly after the innermost recess is a region along the sea which is especially honoured by the natives because of the advantage which accrues from it to them. It is called the Palm-grove and contains a multitude of trees of this kind which are exceedingly fruitful and contribute in an unusual degree to enjoyment and luxury.,3. But all the country round about is lacking in springs of water and is fiery hot because it slopes to the south; accordingly, it was a natural thing that the barbarians made sacred the place which was full of trees and, lying as it did in the midst of a region utterly desolate, supplied their food. And indeed not a few springs and streams of water gush forth there, which do not yield to snow in coldness; and these make the land on both sides of them green and altogether pleasing.,4. Moreover, an altar is there built of hard stone and very old in years, bearing an inscription in ancient letters of an unknown tongue. The oversight of the sacred precinct is in the care of a man and a woman who hold the sacred office for life. The inhabitants of the place are long-lived and have their beds in the trees because of their fear of the wild beasts.,5. After sailing past the Palm-grove one comes to an island off a promontory of the mainland which bears the name Island of Phocae from the animals which make their home there; for so great a multitude of these beasts spend their time in these regions as to astonish those who behold them. And the promontory which stretches out in front of the island lies over against Petra, as it is called, and Palestine; for to this country, as it is reported, both the Gerrhaeans and Minaeans convey from Upper Arabia, as it is called, both the frankincense and the other aromatic wares. 13.82. 1. Now the sacred buildings which they constructed, and especially the temple of Zeus, bear witness to the grand manner of the men of that day. of the other sacred buildings some have been burned and others completely destroyed because of the many times the city has been taken in war, but the completion of the temple of Zeus, which was ready to receive its roof, was prevented by the war; and after the war, since the city had been completely destroyed, never in the subsequent years did the Acragantini find themselves able to finish their buildings.,2. The temple has a length of three hundred and forty feet, a width of sixty, and a height of one hundred and twenty not including the foundation. And being as it is the largest temple in Sicily, it may not unreasonably be compared, so far as magnitude of its substructure is concerned, with the temples outside of Sicily; for even though, as it turned out, the design could not be carried out, the scale of the undertaking at any rate is clear.,3. And though all other men build their temples either with walls forming the sides or with rows of columns, thrown enclosing their sanctuaries, this temple combines both these plans; for the columns were built in with the walls, the part extending outside the temple being rounded and that within square; and the circumference of the outer part of the column which extends from the wall is twenty feet and the body of a man may be contained in the fluting, while that of the inner part is twelve feet.,4. The porticoes were of enormous size and height, and in the east pediment they portrayed The Battle between the Gods and the Giants which excelled in size and beauty, and in the west The Capture of Troy, in which each one of the heroes may be seen portrayed in a manner appropriate to his rôle.,5. There was at that time also an artificial pool outside the city, seven stades in circumference and twenty cubits deep; into this they brought water and ingeniously contrived to produce a multitude of fish of every variety for their public feastings, and with the fish swans spent their time and a vast multitude of every other kind of bird, so that the pool was an object of great delight to gaze upon.,6. And witness to the luxury of the inhabitants is also the extravagant cost of the monuments which they erected, some adorned with sculptured race-horses and others with the pet birds kept by girls and boys in their homes, monuments which Timaeus says he had seen extant even in his own lifetime.,7. And in the Olympiad previous to the one we are discussing, namely, the Ninety-second, when Exaenetus of Acragas won the "stadion," he was conducted into the city in a chariot and in the procession there were, not to speak of the other things, three hundred chariots belonging to citizens of Acragas.,8. Speaking generally, they led from youth onward a manner of life which was luxurious, wearing as they did exceedingly delicate clothing and gold ornaments and, besides, using strigils and oil-flasks made of silver and even of gold. 17.108. 1. Now there came to Susa at this time a body of thirty thousand Persians, all very young and selected for their bodily grace and strength.,2. They had been enrolled in compliance with the king's orders and had been under supervisors and teachers in the arts of war for as long as necessary. They were splendidly equipped with the full Macedonian armament and encamped before the city, where they were warmly commended by the king after demonstrating their skill and discipline in the use of their weapons.,3. The Macedonians had not only mutinied when ordered to cross the Ganges River but were frequently unruly when called into an assembly and ridiculed Alexander's pretence that Ammon was his father. For these reasons Alexander had formed this unit from a single age-group of the Persians which was capable of serving as a counter-balance to the Macedonian phalanx. These were the concerns of Alexander.,4. Harpalus had been given the custody of the treasury in Babylon and of the revenues which accrued to it, but as soon as the king had carried his campaign into India, he assumed that Alexander would never come back, and gave himself up to comfortable living. Although he had been charged as satrap with the administration of a great country, he first occupied himself with the abuse of women and illegitimate amours with the natives and squandered much of the treasure under his control on incontinent pleasure. He fetched all the long way from the Red Sea a great quantity of fish and introduced an extravagant way of life, so that he came under general criticism.,5. Later, moreover, he sent and brought from Athens the most dazzling courtesan of the day, whose name was Pythonicê. As long as she lived he gave her gifts worthy of a queen, and when she died, he gave her a magnificent funeral and erected over her grave a costly monument of the Attic type.,6. After that, he brought out a second Attic courtesan named Glycera and kept her in exceeding luxury, providing her with a way of life which was fantastically expensive. At the same time, with an eye on the uncertainties of fortune, he established himself a place of refuge by benefactions to the Athenians. When Alexander did come back from India and put to death many of the satraps who had been charged with neglect of duty, Harpalus became alarmed at the punishment which might befall him. He packed up five thousand talents of silver, enrolled six thousand mercenaries, departed from Asia and sailed across to Attica.,7. When no one there accepted him, he shipped his troops off to Taenarum in Laconia, and keeping some of the money with him threw himself on the mercy of the Athenians. Antipater and Olympias demanded his surrender, and although he had distributed large sums of money to those persons who spoke in his favour, he was compelled to slip away and repaired to Taenarum and his mercenaries.,8. Subsequently he sailed over to Crete, where he was murdered by Thibron, one of his Friends. At Athens, an accounting was undertaken of the funds of Harpalus, and Demosthenes and certain other statesmen were convicted of having accepted money from this source. |
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