Histories

In the last tower there is a great shrine; and in it stands a great and well-covered couch, and a golden table nearby. But no image has been set up in the shrine, nor does any human creature lie there for the night, except one native woman, chosen from all women by the god, as the Chaldaeans say, who are priests of this god.

These same Chaldaeans say (though I do not believe them) that the god himself is accustomed to visit the shrine and rest on the couch, as in Thebes [32.666,25.683] (deserted settlement), Qina, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaThebes of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt, as the Egyptians say

(for there too a woman sleeps in the temple of Theban Zeus,[*](Amon-Api (Greek *)ame/nwfis); cp. Hdt. 2.42.) and neither the Egyptian nor the Babylonian woman, it is said, has intercourse with men), and as does the prophetess of the god[*](Apollo.) at Patara [29.35,36.2167] (Perseus) Patara in Lycia (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Lycia, whenever she is appointed; for there is not always a place of divination there; but when she is appointed she is shut up in the temple during the night.

In the Babylonian temple there is another shrine below, where there is a great golden image of Zeus, sitting at a great golden table, and the footstool and the chair are also gold; the gold of the whole was said by the Chaldeans to be eight hundred talents' weight.