After Eurystheus had perished, the Heraclids came to attack Peloponnese and they captured all the cities.[*](For the first attempted invasion of the Peloponnese by the Heraclids or sons of Herakles, see Diod. 4.58.1-4. The invasion is commonly spoken of as a return, because, though their father Herakles had been born at Thebes in Boeotia, he regarded Mycenae and Tiryns, the kingdom of his forefathers, as his true home. The word (κάθοδος) here employed by Apollodorus is regularly applied by Greek writers to the return of exiles from banishment, and in particular to the return of the Heraclids. See, for example, Strab. 8.3.30, Strab. 8.4.1, Strab. 8.5.5, Strab. 8.6.10, Strab. 8.7.1, Strab. 8.8.5, Strab. 9.1.7, Strab. 10.2.6, Strab. 13.1.3, Strab. 14.2.6; Paus. 4.3.3; Paus. 5.6.3. The corresponding verbs, κατέρχεσθαι, “to return from exile,” and κατάγειν, “to bring back from exile,” are both used by Apollodorus in these senses. See Apollod. 2.7.2-3; Apollod. 2.8.2 and Apollod. 2.8.5; Apollod. 3.10.5. The final return of the Heraclids, in conjunction with the Dorians, to the Peloponnese is dated by Thuc. 1.12.3 in the eightieth year after the capture of Troy; according to Paus. 4.3.3, it occurred two generations after that event, which tallies fairly with the estimate of Thucydides. Velleius Paterculus i.2.1 agrees with Thucydides as to the date, and adds for our further satisfaction that the return took place one hundred and twenty years after Herakles had been promoted to the rank of deity.) When a year had elapsed from their
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return, a plague visited the whole of Peloponnese; and an oracle declared that this happened on account of the Heraclids, because they had returned before the proper time. Hence they quitted Peloponnese and retired to Marathon and dwelt there.
[*](Diodorus Siculus says nothing of this return of the Heraclids to Attica after the plague, but he records (Diod. 4.58.3ff.) that, after their defeat and the death of Hyllus at the Isthmus, they retired to Tricorythus and stayed there for fifty years. We have seen (above, p. 278, note on Apollod. 2.8.1) that Tricorythus was situated at the northern end of the plain of Marathon.) Now before they came out of Peloponnese, Tlepolemus had killed Licymnius inadvertently; for while he was beating a servant with his stick Licymnius ran in between; so he fled with not a few, and came to Rhodes, and dwelt there.
[*](For the homicide and exile of Tlepolemus, see Hom. Il. 2.653-670, with the Scholiast on Hom. Il. 662; Pind. O. 7.27(50)ff.; Strab. 14.2.6; Diod. 4.58.7ff. According to Pindar, the homicide was apparently not accidental, but committed in a fit of anger with a staff of olive-wood.) But Hyllus married Iole according to his father's commands, and sought to effect the return of the Heraclids. So he went to Delphi and inquired how they should return; and the god said that they should await the third crop before returning. But Hyllus supposed that the third crop signified three years; and having waited that time he returned with his army
[*](He was met by a Peloponnesian army at the Isthmus of Corinth and there defeated and slain in single combat by Echemus, king of Tegea. Then, in virtue of a treaty which they had concluded with their adversaries, the Heraclids retreated to Attica and did not attempt the invasion of Peloponnese again for fifty years. See Diod. 4.58.1-5; Paus. 8.5.1. These events may have been recorded by Apollodorus in the lacuna which follows.) --- of Hercules to Peloponnese, when Tisamenus, son of
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Orestes, was reigning over the Peloponnesians.
[*](Pausanias at first dated the return of the Heraclids in the reign of this king (Paus. 2.18.7, Paus. 3.1.5; compare Apollod. 4.3.3), but he afterwards retracted this opinion (Apollod. 8.5.1).) And in another battle the Peloponnesians were victorious, and Aristomachus
[*](This Aristomachus was a son of Cleodaeus (Paus. 2.7.6), who was a son of Hyllus (Paus. 3.15.10), who was a son of Herakles (Paus. 1.35.8). Aristomachus was the father of Aristodemus, Temenus, and Cresphontes (Paus. 2.18.7, Paus. 8.5.6), of whom Temenus and Cresphontes led the Heraclids and Dorians in their final invasion and conquest of Peloponnese (Paus. 2.18.7, Paus. 5.3.5ff., Paus. 5.4.1, Paus. 8.5.6, Paus. 10.38.10). Compare Hdt. 6.52, who indicates the descent of Aristodemus from Herakles concisely by speaking of “Aristodemus, the son of Aristomachus, the son of Cleodaeus, the son of Hyllus.” Thus, according to the traditional genealogy, the conquerors of the Peloponnese were great-grandsons of Herakles. With regard to Aristomachus, the father of the conquerors, Pausanias says (Paus. 2.7.6) that he missed his chance of returning to Peloponnese through mistaking the meaning of the oracle. The reference seems to be to the oracle about “the narrows,” which is reported by Apollodorus (see below, note 2.8.2.h).) was slain. But when the sons of Cleodaeus
[*](As Heyne pointed out, the name Cleodaeus here is almost certainly wrong, whether we suppose the mistake to have been made by Apollodorus himself or by a copyist. For Cleodaeus was the father of Aristomachus, whose death in battle Apollodorus has just recorded; and, as the sequel clearly proves, the reference is here not to the brothers but to the sons of Aristomachus, namely, Temenus and Cresphontes, the conquerors of the Peloponnese. Compare the preceding note.) were grown to man's estate, they inquired of the oracle concerning their return. And the god having given the same answer as before, Temenus blamed him, saying that when they had obeyed the oracle they had been unfortunate. But the god retorted that they were themselves to blame for their misfortunes, for they did not understand the oracles, seeing that by “ the third crop” he meant, not a crop of the earth, but a crop of a generation, and that by the narrows he meant the broad-bellied sea on the right of the Isthmus.
[*](The oracle was recorded and derided by the cynical philosopher Oenomaus, who, having been deceived by what purported to be a revelation of the deity, made it his business to expose the whole oracular machinery to the ridicule and contempt of the public. This he did in a work entitled On Oracles, or the Exposure of Quacks, of which Eusebius has preserved some extracts. From one of these (Eusebius, v.20) we learn that when Aristomachus applied to the oracle, he was answered, “The gods declare victory to thee by the way of the narrows” (Νίκην σοι φαίνουσι θεοὶ διʼ ὁδοῖο στενύγρων). This the inquirer understood to mean “by the Isthmus of Corinth,” and on that understanding the Heraclids attempted to enter Peloponnese by the Isthmus, but were defeated. Being taxed with deception, the god explained that when he said “the narrows” he really meant “the broads,” that is, the sea at the mouth of the Gulf of Corinth. Compare K. O. Müller, Die Dorier(2), i.58ff., who would restore the “retort courteous” of the oracle in two iambic lines as follows:γενεᾶς γάρ, οὐ γῆς καρπὸν ἐξεῖπον τρίτονκαὶ τὴν στενυγρὰν αὖ τὸν εὐρυγάστορα—ἔχοντα κατὰ τὸν Ἰσθμὸν δεξιάν. ) On hearing that,
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Temenus made ready the army and built ships in Locris where the place is now named Naupactus from that.
[*](Naupactus means “ship-built.” Compare Strab. 9.4.7; Paus. 4.26.1; Paus. 10.38.10.) While the army was there, Aristodemus was killed by a thunderbolt,
[*](Aristodemus was a son of Aristomachus and brother of Temenus and Cresphontes, the conquerors of the Peloponnese (Paus. 2.18.7). Some said he was shot by Apollo at Delphi for not consulting the oracle, but others said he was murdered by the children of Pylades and Electra (Paus. 3.1.6). Apollodorus clearly adopts the former of these two accounts; the rationalistic Pausanias preferred the latter.) leaving twin sons, Eurysthenes and Procles, by Argia, daughter of Autesion.
[*](Compare Hdt. 6.52.) And it chanced that a calamity also befell the army at Naupactus. For there appeared to them a soothsayer reciting oracles in a fine frenzy, whom they took for a magician sent by the Peloponnesians to be the ruin of the army. So Hippotes, son of Phylas, son of Antiochus, son of Hercules, threw a javelin at him, and hit and killed him.[*](The soothsayer was Carnus, an Acarnanian; the Dorians continued to propitiate the soul of the murdered seer after his death. See Paus. 3.13.4; Conon 26; Scholiast on Theocritus v.83.) In consequence of that, the naval force perished with the destruction of the fleet, and the land force suffered from famine, and the army disbanded. When Temenus inquired of the oracle concerning this calamity, the god said that these things were done by the soothsayer[*](That is, by the angry spirit of the murdered man.) and he ordered him to banish the slayer for ten years and to take for his guide the Three-Eyed One. So they banished Hippotes, and sought for the Three-Eyed One.[*](With this and what follows compare Paus. 5.3.5ff.; Suidas, s.v. Τριόφθαλμος ; and as to Oxylus, compare Strab. 8.3.33. Pausanias calls Oxylus the son of Haemon.) And
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they chanced to light on Oxylus, son of Andraemon, a man sitting on a one-eyed horse ( its other eye having been knocked out with an arrow); for he had fled to Elis on account of a murder, and was now returning from there to Aetolia after the lapse of a year.
[*](The homicide is said to have been accidental; according to one account, the victim was the homicide's brother. See Paus. 5.3.7. As to the banishment of a murderer for a year, see note on Apollod. 2.5.11.) So guessing the purport of the oracle, they made him their guide. And having engaged the enemy they got the better of him both by land and sea, and slew Tisamenus, son of Orestes.
[*](Pausanias gives a different account of the death of Tisamenus. He says that, being expelled from Lacedaemon and Argos by the returning Heraclids, king Tisamenus led an army to Achaia and there fell in a battle with the Ionians, who then inhabited that district of Greece. See Paus. 2.18.8, Paus. 7.1.7ff. ) Their allies, Pamphylus and Dymas, the sons of Aegimius, also fell in the fight.
When they had made themselves masters of Peloponnese, they set up three altars of Paternal Zeus, and sacrificed upon them, and cast lots for the cities. So the first drawing was for Argos, the second for Lacedaemon, and the third for Messene. And they brought a pitcher of water, and resolved that each should cast in a lot. Now Temenus and the two sons of Aristodemus, Procles and Eurysthenes, threw stones; but Cresphontes, wishing to have Messene allotted to him, threw in a clod of earth. As the clod was dissolved in the water, it could not be but that the other two lots should turn up. The lot of Temenus having been drawn first, and that of the sons of Aristodemus second, Cresphontes got
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Messene.
[*](As to the drawing of the lots, and the stratagem by which Cresphontes secured Messenia for himself, see Polyaenus, Strateg. i.6; Paus. 4.3.4ff. Sophocles alludes to the stratagem (Soph. Aj. 1283ff., with the Scholiast on Soph. Aj. 1285).) And on the altars on which they sacrificed they found signs lying: for they who got Argos by the lot found a toad; those who got Lacedaemon found a serpent; and those who got Messene found a fox.[*](In the famous paintings by Polygnotus at Delphi, the painter depicted Menelaus, king of Sparta, with the device of a serpent on his shield. See Paus. 10.26.3. The great Messenian hero Aristomenes is said to have escaped by the help of a fox from the pit into which he had been thrown by the Lacedaemonians. See Paus. 4.18.6ff. I do not remember to have met with any evidence, other than that of Apollodorus, as to the association of the toad with Argos.) As to these signs the seers said that those who found the toad had better stay in the city ( seeing that the animal has no strength when it walks); that those who found the serpent would be terrible in attack, and that those who found the fox would be wily. Now Temenus, passing over his sons Agelaus, Eurypylus, and Callias, favoured his daughter Hyrnetho and her husband Deiphontes; hence his sons hired some fellows to murder their father.[*](Compare Paus. 2.19.1; Paus. 2.28.2ff., who agrees as to the names of Hyrnetho and her husband Deiphontes, but differs as to the sons of Temenus, whom he calls Cisus, Cerynes, Phalces, and Agraeus.) On the perpetration of the murder the army decided that the kingdom belonged to Hyrnetho[*](The grave of Hyrnetho was shown at Argos, but she is said to have been accidentally killed by her brother Phalces near Epidaurus, and long afterwards she was worshipped in a sacred grove of olives and other trees on the place of her death. See Paus. 2.23.3; Paus. 2.28.3-7.) and Deiphontes. Cresphontes had not long reigned over Messene when he was murdered with two of his sons;[*](Compare Paus. 4.3.7.) and Polyphontes, one of the true Heraclids, came to the
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throne and took to wife, against her will, Merope, the wife of the murdered man.
[*](Compare Hyginus, Fab. 137.) But he too was slain. For Merope had a third son, called Aepytus, whom she gave to her own father to bring up. When he was come to manhood he secretly returned, killed Polyphontes, and recovered the kingdom of his fathers.
[*](Compare Paus. 4.3.7ff. (who does not name Polyphontes); Hyginus, Fab. 184. According to Hyginus, the name of the son of Cresphontes who survived to avenge his father's murder was Telephon. This story of Merope, Aepytus, and Polyphontes is the theme of Matthew Arnold's tragedy Merope, an imitation of the antique.)