598 



THESEUS THESSALY. 



tribute engaged him to undertake this expedition. 

 He was successful, by means of Ariadne, the 

 daughter of Minos, who was enamoured of him ; and, 

 after he had escaped from the labyrinth with a clew 

 of threud, und killed the Minotaur (see Minotau- 

 ms), he sailed from Crete with the six boys and 

 seven maidens whom his victory had redeemed from 

 death. In the island of Naxos, whither he was 

 driven by the winds, he had the meanness to aban- 

 don Ariadne, to whom he was indebted for his 

 safety. The rejoicings which his return might 

 have occasioned at Athens, were interrupted by the 

 death of jEgeus, who threw himself into the sea ; 

 when he saw his son's ship return with black sails, 

 which was the signal of ill success. He succeeded 

 his father. The Athenians were governed with 

 mildness, and Theseus made new regulations, and 

 enacted new laws. The number of the inhabitants 

 of Athens was increased ; a court was instituted, 

 which had the care of all civil affairs; and Theseus 

 made the governmentdemocratical, while he reserved 

 for himself only the command of the armies. (See 

 Attica.) The fame which he had gained by bis 

 victories and policy made his alliance courted ; but 

 Pirithous, king of the Lapithae, alone wished to 

 gain his friendship, by meeting him in the field of 

 battle. He invaded the territories of Attica ; and, 

 when Theseus marched out to meet him, the two 

 enemies, struck at the sight of each other, cordially 

 embraced ; and from that time began the most sin- 

 cere friendship, which has become proverbial. 

 Theseus was present at the nuptials of bis friend ; 

 and be was the most courageous of the Lapithae, in 

 the defence of Hippodamia, and her female attend- 

 ants, against the attempts of the Centaurs. When 

 Pirithoiis (q. v.) had lost Hippodamia, he agreed 

 with Theseus, whose wife was also dead, to carry 

 away some of the daughters of the gods. Their 

 first attempt was upon Helen. After they had 

 obtained the prize, they cast lots, and she became 

 the property of Theseus; but the resentment of 

 Castor and Pollux soon obliged him to restore her 

 into their hands. Theseus assisted his friend in 

 procuring a wife, and they descended into the in- 

 fernal regions to carry away Proserpine. Pluto, 

 apprized of their intentions, stopped them ; and 

 Pirithoiis was placed on his father's wheel, and 

 Theseus was tied to a huge stone, on which he had 

 sat to rest himself. Virgil represents him in this 

 state of punishment; but others declare, that he 

 was not long detained in hell. When Hercules 

 came to steal the dog Cerberus, he tore him away 

 from the stone, but with such violence, that his 

 skin was left behind. During the captivity of 

 Theseus in the kingdom of Pluto (see Phaedra), 

 Mnestheus, one of the descendants of Erechtheus, 

 ingratiated himself into the favour of the people of 

 Athens, and obtained the crown. Theseus at- 

 tempted to eject the usurper, but to no purpose. 

 The Athenians had forgotten his services ; and he 

 retired to the court of Lycomedes, king of Scyros, 

 who, either jealous of his fame, or bribed by Mnes- 

 theus, threw him down a deep precipice. Some 

 suppose that Theseus inadvertently fell down this 

 precipice, and that he was crushed to death. The 

 children of Theseus, after the death of Mnestheus, 

 recovered the Athenian throne, brought his remains 

 from Scyros, and gave them a magnificent burial. 

 They also raised statues and a temple ; and festivals 

 and games were publicly instituted to commemorate 

 his actions. These festivals were still celebrated 

 in the age of Pausanias and Plutarch, about 1200 



years after the death of Theseus. The historian? 

 disagree with the poets in their accounts of this 

 hero; and they all suppose, that, instead of attempt- 

 ing to carry away the wife of Pluto, the two friends 

 wished to seduce a daughter of Aidoneus, king of 

 the Molossi. This daughter, as they say, bore the 

 name of Proserpine ; and the dog which kept the 

 gates of the palace was called Cerberus ; and hence 

 arises the fiction of the poets. Pirithoiis was torn 

 to pieces by the dog ; but Theseus was confined in 

 prison, from whence he made his escape some time 

 after, by the assistance of Hercules. Some authors 

 place Theseus and his friend in the number of the 

 Argonauts ; but they were both detained, either in 

 the infernal regions, or in the country of the Mo- 

 lossi, at the time of Jason's expedition to Colchis. 



THESIS (Sim;, position, formed from nttfa, I 

 put or lay down); in the schools, a general propo- 

 sition which a person advances and offers to main- 

 tain. In logic, every proposition may be divided 

 into thesis and hypothesis. Thesis contains the 

 thing affirmed or denied, and hypothesis the condi- 

 tions of the affirmation or negation. Thus, "if a 

 triangle and parallelogram have equal basis and alti- 

 tudes (hypothesis), the first is half of the second* 

 (thesis). For arsis and thesis, see Rhythm. 



THESMOPHORUS. See Ceres. 



THESPIS, a native of a village near Athens, 

 lived in the time of Solon, in the first half of the 

 sixth century B. C., and is considered the inventor 

 of tragedy, as he added to the dithyrambic choruses 

 of the feats of Bacchus a character, which, when 

 the chorus was silent, generally recited a mythical 

 story. He received for his trouble a he goat (<r^n- 

 <yof~) ; and this gave occasion to the name tragedy. 

 Tbespis used a wagon for his stage. See Drama. 



THESSALONICA. See Salonica. 



THESSALY, THESSALIA; the northern part 

 of ancient Greece Proper, bounded on the east by 

 the Thermaic gulf, separated from Brcotia on the 

 south by mount (Eta, from Epirus on the west by 

 mount Pindus, and from Macedonia on the north 

 by mount Olympus. It is a fruitful and picturesque 

 country, in which beautiful and rich plains in- 

 terchange with elevated districts, and watered by 

 numerous streams, among which the Peneus was 

 the most celebrated, for its vale of Tempe. Its 

 cornfields and vineyards were not less productive 

 than its meadows, and it was famous for its breed 

 of horses. The Thessalians were considered the 

 best horsemen among the Greeks, and the in- 

 vention of equitation has been attributed to them. 

 The Haemones (from whom the country was also 

 called Haemonia) were considered the original in- 

 habitants. The Pelasgians and Hellenes, the latter 

 under Deucalion, in the sixteenth century B. C., 

 afterwards settled in this region, in which dwelt 

 also the Centaurs and Lapithae, mountaineers re- 

 siding on Olympus and Ossa. The eastern pro- 

 montory, which stretched far out into the JEge&n 

 sea, was formed by mount Pelion, which the giants 

 piled upon Ossa in their attempt to storm heaven. 

 Upon the summit of Pelion (now Petra} is a 

 celebrated cavern, in which the Centaur Chiron, 

 the tutor of Achilles, was said to have lived. In 

 Thessaly, Achaeus, JEolus, and Dorus, the founders 

 of the tribes which bore their name, are first dis- 

 covered, and several small states successively rose 

 here. Among them was lolchos, the dominion 

 1 of JEson, father of Jason, the leader of the Argo- 

 ! nauts; Phthia, where Peleus, father of Achilles, 

 ruled over the Myrmidons; and Pheran, which at a 



