BOOK IV. IV. lo-v. 13 



isthmus on troUeys, and consequently successive 

 attempts were made by King Demetrius, Caesar the 

 dictator and the emperors Caligula and Nero, to dig 

 a ship-canal through the narrow part — an undertaking canal. 

 which the cnd that befell them all proves to have 

 been an act of sacrilege." In the middleof this neck 

 of land which we have called the Isthmus is the 

 colony of Corinth, the former name of which was 

 Ephyra ; its habitations chng to the side of a hill, 

 7| miles from the coast on either side, and the top of 

 its citadel, called the Corinthian Heights, on which is 

 the spring of Pirene, commands views of the two seas 

 in opposite directions. The distance across the 

 Isthmus from Leucas to Patras on the Gulf of Corinth 

 is 88 miles. The colony of Patras is situated on the 

 longest projection of the Peloponnese opposite to 

 Aetolia and the river Evenus, separated from them 

 at the actual mouth of the gulf by a gap of less than 

 a mile, as has been said ; but in length the Gulf of §6. 

 Corinth extends 85 miles from Patras to the Isthmus. 



V. At the Isthmus begins the province named Morca. 

 Achaia.* It waspreviouslycalled Aegialos*^ on account 

 of the cities situated in a row on its coast. The first 

 place there is Lecheae the port of Corinth, already 

 mentioned, and then come Olyrus the fortress of the 

 people of Trikala, and the towns of Hehce** and Bura, 

 and those in which their inhabitants took refuge 

 when the former towns were swallowed up by 

 the sea,' namely Basihca, Palaeokastro, Vostitza 

 and Artotina. Inland are Klenes and Hysiae. Then 

 come the port of Tekieh and Rhium already described, 

 the distance between which promontory and Patras 

 which we have mentioned above isfive miles ; and then 

 the place called Pherae. Of the nine mountains in 



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