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When Achilles was nine years old, Calchas declared that Troy could not be taken without him; so Thetis, foreseeing that it was fated he should perish if he went to the war, disguised him in female garb and entrusted him as a maiden to Lycomedes.[*](As to Achilles disguised as a girl at the court of Lycomedes in Scyros, see Bion ii.5ff.; Philostratus Junior, Im. 1; Scholiast on Hom. Il. ix.668; Hyginus, Fab. 96; Statius, Achill. i.207ff. The subject was painted by Polygnotus in a chamber at the entrance to the acropolis of Athens (Paus. 1.22.6). Euripides wrote a play called The Scyrians on the same theme. See TGF (Nauck 2nd ed.), pp. 574ff. Sophocles composed a tragedy under the same title, which has sometimes been thought to have dealt with the same subject, but more probably it was concerned with Neoptolemus in Scyros and the mission of Ulysses and Phoenix to carry him off to Troy. See The Fragments of Sophocles, ed. A. C. Pearson, vol. ii. pp. 191ff. The youthful Dionysus, like the youthful Achilles, is said to have been brought up as a maiden. See above, Apollod. 3.4.3, with the note. One of the questions which the emperor Tiberius used solemnly to propound to the antiquaries of his court was: What was the name of Achilles when he lived as a girl among girls? See Suetonius Tiberius, 70. The question was solemnly answered by learned men in various ways: some said that the stripling's female name was Cercysera, others that it was Issa, and others that it was Pyrrha. See Ptolemy Hephaest., Nov. Hist. i. in Westermann's Mythographi Graeci, p. 183.) Bred at

his court, Achilles had an intrigue with Deidamia, daughter of Lycomedes, and a son Pyrrhus was born to him, who was afterwards called Neoptolemus. But the secret of Achilles was betrayed, and Ulysses, seeking him at the court of Lycomedes, discovered him by the blast of a trumpet.[*](The usual story was that the crafty Ulysses spread out baskets and women's gear, mingled with arms, before the disguised Achilles and his girlish companions in Scyros; and that while the real girls pounced eagerly on the feminine gauds, Achilles betrayed his sex by snatching at the arms. See Philostratus Junior, Im. i; Scholiast on Hom. Il. xix.326; Ov. Met. 13.162ff. Apollodorus tells us that Achilles was detected by the sound of a trumpet. This is explained by Hyginus, Fab. 96, who says that while Achilles was surveying the mingled trumpery and weapons, Ulysses caused a bugle to sound and a clash of arms to be heard, whereupon Achilles, imagining that an enemy was at hand, tore off his maidenly attire and seized spear and shield. Statius gives a similar account of the detection (Statius, Achill. ii.167ff.).) And in that way Achilles went to Troy. He was accompanied by Phoenix, son of Amyntor. This Phoenix had been blinded by his father on the strength of a false accusation of seduction preferred against him by his father's concubine Phthia. But Peleus brought him to Chiron, who restored his sight, and thereupon Peleus made him king of the Dolopians.[*](See Hom. Il. 9.437-484, with the Scholiast on Hom. Il. 9.448. But Homer says nothing about the blinding of Phoenix by his angry father or his cure by Chiron; and according to Homer the accusation of having debauched his father's concubine was not false but true, Phoenix having been instigated to the deed by his mother, who was jealous of the concubine. But variations from the Homeric narrative were introduced into the story by the tragedians who handled the theme (Scholiast on Hom. Il. 9.437-484). Sophocles and Euripides both wrote tragedies on the subject under the same title of Phoenix; the tragedy of Euripides seems to have been famous. See TGF (Nauck 2nd ed.), pp. 286, 621ff.; The Fragments of Sophocles, ed. A. C. Pearson, vol. ii.320ff. The blinding of Phoenix by his father Amyntor is alluded to by a poet of the Greek anthology (Anth. Pal. iii.3). Both the poet and Apollodorus probably drew on Euripides, who from an allusion in Aristoph. Acharn. 421 is known to have represented Phoenix as blind. Both the blinding and the healing of Phoenix are related by Tzetzes (Scholiast on Lycophron 421), who may have followed Apollodorus. According to the Scholiast on Hom. Il. 9.437-484, the name of the concubine was Clytia; according to Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 421, it was Clytia or Phthia. Apollodorus calls her Phthia. The Scholiast on Plato (Laws, xi. p. 931 B), gives a version of the story which agrees entirely with that of Apollodorus, and may have been copied from it. The healing of Phoenix's eyes by Chiron is mentioned by Prop. ii.1.60.) Achilles was also accompanied by Patroclus, son of Menoetius[*](Compare Hom. Il. 11.785ff. Homer does not mention the name of Patroclus's mother.) and Sthenele, daughter of Acastus; or the mother of Patroclus was Periopis, daughter of Pheres, or, as Philocrates says, she was Polymele, daughter of Peleus. At Opus, in a quarrel over a game of dice, Patroclus killed the boy Clitonymus, son of Amphidamas, and flying with his father he dwelt at the house of Peleus[*](See Hom. Il. 23.84-90; compare Scholiast on Hom. Il. xii.1; Strab. 9.4.2; Ovid, Ex Ponto i.3.73ff. The name of the slain lad was variously given as Clisonymus (Scholiast, l.c.) or Aeanes (Strabo and Scholiast, ll.cc.)) and became a minion of Achilles.---

Cecrops, a son of the soil, with a body compounded of man and serpent, was the first king of Attica, and the country which was formerly called Acte he named Cecropia after himself.[*](According to the Parian Chronicle (Marmor Parium 2-4), with which Apollodorus is in general agreement, the first king of Attica was Cecrops, and the country was named Cecropia after him, whereas it had formerly been called Actice (sic) after an aboriginal named Actaeus. Pausanias (Paus. 1.2.6) represents this Actaeus as the first king of Attica, and says that Cecrops succeeded him on the throne by marrying his daughter. But Pausanias, like Apollod. 3.15.5, distinguishes this first Cecrops from a later Cecrops, son of Erechtheus (Apollod. 1.5.3). Apollodorus is at one with Pausanias in saying that the first Cecrops married the daughter of Actaeus, and he names her Agraulus (see below, Apollod. 3.14.2). Philochorus said, with great probability, that there never was any such person as Actaeus; according to him, Attica lay waste and depopulated from the deluge in the time of Ogyges down to the reign of Cecrops. See Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelii, x.10. Tzetzes (Chiliades v.637) and Hyginus, Fab. 48 agree in representing Cecrops as the first king of Attica; Hyginus calls him a son of the earth. As to his double form, the upper part of him being human and the lower part serpentine, see Aristoph. Wasps 438, with the Scholiast; Eur. Ion 1163ff.; Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 111; Tzetzes, Chiliades v.638ff.; Scholiast on Aristoph. Plutus 773; Diod. 1.28.7, who rationalizes the fable after his usual fashion.) In his time, they say, the gods resolved to take possession of

cities in which each of them should receive his own peculiar worship. So Poseidon was the first that came to Attica, and with a blow of his trident on the middle of the acropolis, he produced a sea which they now call Erechtheis.[*](As to the contest between Poseidon and Athena for possession of Attica, see Hdt. 8.55; Plut. Them. 19; Paus. 1.24.5; Paus. 1.26.5; Ov. Met. 6.70ff.; Hyginus, Fab. 164; Serv. Verg. G. 1.12; Lactantius Placidus on Statius, Theb. vii.185; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i. pp. 1, 115 (First Vatican Mythographer 2; Second Vatican Mythographer 119). A rationalistic explanation of the fable was propounded by the eminent Roman antiquary Varro. According to him, the olive-tree suddenly appeared in Attica, and at the same time there was an eruption of water in another part of the country. So king Cecrops sent to inquire of Apollo at Delphi what these portents might signify. The oracle answered that the olive and the water were the symbols of Athena and Poseidon respectively, and that the people of Attica were free to choose which of these deities they would worship. Accordingly the question was submitted to a general assembly of the citizens and citizenesses; for in these days women had the vote as well as men. All the men voted for the god, and all the women voted for the goddess; and as there was one more woman than there were men, the goddess appeared at the head of the poll. Chagrined at the loss of the election, the male candidate flooded the country with the water of the sea, and to appease his wrath it was decided to deprive women of the vote and to forbid children to bear their mother's names for the future. See Augustine, De civitate Dei xviii.9. The print of Poseidon's trident on the rock of the acropolis at Athens was shown down to late times. See Strab. 9.1.16; Paus. 1.26.5. The “sea,” which the god was supposed to have produced as evidence of his right to the country was also to be seen within the Erechtheum on the acropolis; Pausanias calls it a well of sea water, and says that, when the south wind blew, the well gave forth a sound of waves. See Hdt. 8.55; Paus. 1.26.5; Paus. 8.10.4. According to the late Latin mythographers (see the references above), Poseidon produced a horse from the rock in support of his claim, and this version of the story seems to have been accepted by Virgil (Geo. i.12ff.), but it is not countenanced by Greek writers. The Athenians said that the contest between Poseidon and Athena took place on the second of the month Boedromion, and hence they omitted that day from the calendar. See Plut. De fraterno amore 11; Plut. Quaest. Conviv. ix.6. The unlucky Poseidon also contested the possession of Argos with Hera, and when the judges gave a verdict against him and in favour of the goddess, he took his revenge, as in Attica, by flooding the country. See Paus. 2.22.4; compare Paus. 2.15.5; Polemo, Greek History, cited by the Scholiast on Aristides, vol. iii. p. 322, ed. Dindorf.) After him came Athena, and, having called on Cecrops to witness her act of taking possession, she planted an olive tree, which is still shown in the Pandrosium.[*](The olive-tree seems to have survived down to the second century of our era. See Hdt. 8.55; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, De Dinarcho Judicium 3; Paus. 1.27.3; Cicero, De legibus, i.1.2; Hyginus, Fab. 164; Pliny, Nat. Hist. xvi.240. Dionysius agrees with Apollodorus in representing the tree as growing in the Pandrosium, which is proved by inscriptions to have been an enclosure to the west of the Erechtheum. See Frazer, commentary on Pausanias, vol. ii. p. 337.) But when the two strove for possession of the country, Zeus parted them and appointed arbiters, not, as some have affirmed, Cecrops and Cranaus, nor yet Erysichthon, but the twelve gods.[*](Compare Ov. Met. 6.72ff. ) And in accordance with their verdict the country was adjudged to Athena, because Cecrops bore witness that she had been the first to plant the olive. Athena, therefore, called the city Athens after herself, and Poseidon in hot anger flooded the Thriasian plain and laid Attica under the sea.[*](As to this flood, see Varro, in Augustine, De civitate Dei xviii.9; Hyginus, Fab. 164. The Thriasian plain is the plain in which Eleusis stands. See Strab. 9.1.6 Strab. 9.1.13.)