Book 1
3.17
Apropos of that passage of Homer:— And now they reach’d the running rivulets clear, Where from Scamander’s dizzy flood arise Two fountains, tepid one, from which a smoke Issues voluminous as from a fire, The other, even in summer heats, like hail For cold, or snow, or crystal stream frost-bound:And reached the two fair-flowing springs, where the two springs of the eddying Scamander rise. The one, indeed, flows with tepid water, and a steam arises from it around, as of burning fire; whilst the other flows forth in the summer time, like unto hail, or cold snow, or ice from water Iliad xxii. 147.Iliad xxii. 147. this writer tells us we must not be surprised, that although the cold spring still remains, the hot cannot be discovered; and says we must reckon the failing of the hot spring as the cause. He goes on to relate certain catastrophes recorded by Democles, how formerly in the reign of TantalusTantalus lived about 1387, B. C. there were great earthquakes in Lydia and Ionia as far as the Troad,Lydia and Ionia form the modern provinces of Aidin and Sarukan in Anadoli. A part of the Troad still preserves the name of Troiaki. which swallowed up whole villages and overturned Mount Sipylus;A mountain in Maeonia, close to the city of Magnesia. marshes then became lakes, and the city of Troy was covered by the waters.Ilus, who ascended the throne about 1400 years before the Christian era, founded the city, to which he gave the name of Ilium. The old city of Troy stood on a hill, and was safe from the inundation. Pharos, near Egypt, which anciently was an island, may now be called a peninsula, and the same may be said of Tyre and Clazomenae.These two cities were built on little islets adjoining the continent. Alexander connected them with the mainland by means of jetties. Clazomenae was situated on the Gulf of Smyrna, near to a place now called Vurla or Burla. The present appellation of Tyre, on the coast of Phoemicia, is Sur.
