5.
In former times the Ionians occupied this country, and were also in possession of Attica, before the time of the building of Megara, wherefore the poet does not mention these places by any appropriate name, but when he calls all those dwelling in Attica, Athenians, he comprehends these also in the common appellation, regarding them as Athenians; so when, in the Catalogue of the Ships, he says,
“And they who occupied Athens, a well-built city,”284
we must understand the present Megarenses also, as having taken a part in the expedition. The proof of this is, that Attica was, in former times, called Ionia, and Ias, and when the poet says,
“There the Bœoti, Iaones,”285
he means the Athenians. But of this Ionia Megaris was a part.
6.
Besides, the Peloponnesians and Ionians having had frequent disputes respecting their boundaries, on which Crommyonia also was situated, assembled and agreed upon a spot of the Isthmus itself, on which they erected a pillar having an inscription on the part towards Peloponnesus,
“this is Peloponnesus, not Ionia;”
and on the side towards Megara,
“this is not Peloponnesus, but Ionia.”
Although those, who wrote on the history of Attica,286 differ in many respects, yet those of any note agree in this, that when there were four Pandionidæ, Ægeus, Lycus, Pallas, and Nisus; and when Attica was divided into four portions, Nisus obtained, by lot, Megaris, and founded Nisæa. Philochorus says, that his government extended from the Isthmus to Pythium,287 but according to Andron, as far as Eleusis and the Thriasian plain.
Since, then, different writers give different accounts of the division of the country into four parts, it is enough to adduce these lines from Sophocles where Ægeus says,
“My father determined that I should go away to Acte, having assigned to me, as the elder, the best part of the land; to Lycus, the opposite garden of Eubœa; for Nisus he selects the irregular tract of the shore of Sciron; and the rugged Pallas, breeder of giants, obtained by lot the part to the south.”288
Such are the proofs which are adduced to show that Megaris was a part of Attica.
