40.

The Magnesians appear to be the descendants of Delphians who inhabited the Didymæan mountains in Thessaly, and of whom Hesiod says,

“or, as the chaste virgin, who inhabits the sacred Didymæan hills in the plain of Dotium, opposite Amyrus, abounding with vines, and bathes her feet in the lake Bœbias—”

At Magnesia also was the temple of Dindymene, the mother of the gods. Her priestess, according to some writers, was the daughter, according to others, the wife, of Themistocles. At present there is no temple, because the city has been transferred to another place. In the present city is the temple of Artemis Leucophryene, which in the size of the nave and in the number of sacred offerings is inferior to the temple at Ephesus; but, in the fine proportion and the skill exhibited in the structure of the enclosure, it greatly surpasses the Ephesian temple; in size it is superior to all the temples in Asia, except that at Ephesus and that at Didymi.

Anciently the Magnetes were utterly extirpated by Treres, a Cimmerian tribe, who for a long period made successful inroads. Subsequently Ephesians got possession of the place.101 Callinus speaks of the Magnetes as still in a flourishing state, and successful in the war against the Ephesians. But Archilochus seems to have been acquainted with the calamities which had befallen them:

“bewail the misfortunes of the Thasians, not of the Magnetes;”

whence we may conjecture that Archilochus was posterior to Callinus. Yet Callinus mentions some other earlier inroad of the Cimmerians, when he says—

“and now the army of the daring Cimmerians is advancing,”

where he is speaking of the capture of Sardis.