submitted without resistance, with the exception of Helos, the inhabitants of which were, as a punishment, reduced to slavery, thus giving rise to the class of slaves or serfs called Helots.

Messenia yielded to Cresphontes without a struggle. Melanthus, who ruled over the country as the representative of the race of the Pylian Nestor, withdrew to Attica with a portion of his subjects.

Corinth was not conquered by the Dorians till the next generation. One of the descendants of Hercules, named Hippotēs, had put to death the seer Carnus, when the Heracleida were on the point of embarking at Naupactus. He had in consequence been banished for ten years, and was not allowed to take part in the enterprise. His son, Alētēs, who derived his name from his long wanderings, subsequently attacked Corinth at the head of a body of Dorians. The mighty dynasty of the Sisyphids was expelled, and many of the Æolian inhabitants emigrated to foreign lands.

§ 6. Such are the main features of the legend of the Return of the Heracleida. In order to make the story more striking and impressive, it compresses into a single epoch events which probably occupied several generations. It is in itself improbable that the brave Achæans quietly submitted to the Dorian invaders after a momentary struggle. We have, moreover, many indications that such was not the fact, and that it was only gradually and after a long-protracted contest that the Dorians became undisputed masters of the greater part of Peloponnesus. The imagination loves to assign to one cause the results of numerous and different actions. Thus in our own history we used to read that the conquest of England by the Normans was completed by the battle of Hastings, in which Harold fell, whereas we now know that the Saxons long continued to offer a formidable resistance to the Norman invaders, and that the latter did not become undisputed masters of the country for two or three generations.

That portion of the tradition which makes the Dorians to have been conducted into Peloponnesus by princes of Achæan blood, may safely be rejected, notwithstanding the general belief of the fact in ancient times. The Dorians, as we have already seen, were poor in mythical renown; and it would appear that the royal family at Sparta, though of Dorian origin, claimed Hercules as their founder in order to connect themselves with the ancient glories of the Achæan race. They thus became the representatives of Agamemnon and Orestes; and in the Persian war the Spartans on one occasion laid claim to the supreme command of the Grecian forces in consequence of this connection. We cannot err in supposing the story to be a fabrication of later times, seeing that there are such obvious reasons for its forgery, and such inherent improbability in its truth.

§ 7. The foundation of the Greek colònies in Asia Minor is closely connected in the legends with the conquest of Peloponnesus by the Dorians. There is nothing improbable in the statement, that the original inhabitants,

who had been dislodged by the invaders, sought new homes on the coasts of Asia Minor; but in this case, as in the conquest of Peloponnesus, many separate occurrences are unquestionably grouped into one. The stream of migration probably continued to flow across the Ægean from Greece to Asia Minor for several generations. New adventurers constantly joined the colonists who were already settled in the country, and thus in course of time the various Greek cities were founded, which were spread over the western coast of Asia Minor, from the Propontis on the north to Lycia on the south. These cities were divided among the three great races of Eolians, Ionians, and Dorians, the Eolians occupying the northern portion of the coast, together with the islands of Lesbos and Tenedos, the Ionians the central part, with the islands of Chios, Samos, and the Cyclades, and the Dorians the southwestern corner, with the islands of Rhodes and Cos.

§ 8. The Æolic colonies are said to have been the earliest. Achæans, who had been driven out of Peloponnesus by the Dorians, were led by their native princes, the descendants of Orestes, to seek new homes in the East. In Boeotia they were joined by a part both of the original inhabitants of the country and of their Boeotian conquerors. From the latter, who were Æolians, the migration is called the Eolic, but sometimes also the Boeotian. The united body of emigrants, however, still continued under the command of the Achæan princes. They embarked at the port of Aulis, from which Agamemnon had sailed against Troy. They first occupied Lesbos, where they founded six cities; and a detachment of them settled on the opposite coast of Asia Minor, from the foot of Mount Ida to the mouth of the river Hermus. Smyrna was originally an Æolic city, but it afterwards passed into the hands of the Ionians. In the historical times there were eleven Æolic cities on the mainland, but of these Cymē was the only one which rose to importance.*

§ 9. The Ionic migration was more important than the preceding one, and gave rise to some of the most flourishing cities in the Hellenic world. It derived its name from the Ionians, who had been expelled by the Achæans from their homes on the Corinthian Gulf, and had taken refuge in Attica. The Ionians, however, appear to have formed only a small part of the emigrants. Inhabitants from many other parts of Greece, who had been driven out of their native countries, had also fled to Attica, which is said to have afforded protection and welcome to all these fugitives. The small territory of Attica could not permanently support this increase of population; and accordingly these strangers resolved to follow the example of the Æolians and seek new settlements in the East. They were led by princes of the family of Codrus, the last king of Attica. In their pas

The names of the eleven Æolic cities were Cyme, Temnos, Larissa, Neon-Tichos, Egæ, Myrina, Grynium, Cilla, Notium, Egiroëssa, Pitanē

sage across the Egean Sea they colonized most of the Cyclades; and in Asia Minor they took possession of the fertile country from the Hermus to the Mæander, which was henceforth called Ionia, and also of the neighboring islands of Chios and Samos. In this district we find twelve independent states in later times, all of which adopted the Ionic name, notwithstanding the diversity of their origin, and were united by the common worship of the god Poseidon (Neptune) at the great Pan-Ionic festival.* There can be no doubt that these cities were really founded at different periods and by different emigrants, although their origin is ascribed to the great legendary migration of which we have been speaking, and which is referred by chronologists to one special year, one hundred and forty years after the Trojan war.

*The names of the twelve Ionic cities, enumerated from south to north, were Milētus, Myūs, Priēnē, Samos, Ephesus, Colophon, Lebědus, Teos, Erythræ, Chios, Clazoměnæ, Phocæa. To these twelve Smyrna was afterwards added.

§ 10. The Doric colonies in the southwestern corner of Asia Minor and in the neighboring islands may be traced in like manner to the conquest of Peloponnesus by the Dorians. In the general change of population and consequent emigrations caused by this important event, some of the Doric chiefs were also induced to quit the country they had recently subdued, and to lead bodies of their own countrymen and of the conquered Achæans to Asia. The most celebrated of the Doric migrations was that conducted by the Argive Althæmenes, a descendant of Temenus, who, after leaving some of his followers at Crete, proceeded with the remainder to the island of Rhodes, where he founded the three cities of Lindus, Ialysus, and Camirus. About the same time Dorians settled in the neighboring island of Cos, and founded the cities of Halicarnassus and Cnidus on the mainland. These six colonies formed a confederation, usually called the Doric Hexapolis.

§ 11. Doric colonies were also founded in mythical times in the islands of Crete; Melos, and Thera. The colonization of Crete more particularly deserves our attention, on account of the similarity of the institutions of its Doric cities to those of Sparta. There were Dorians in Crete in the time of the Odyssey, but their chief migrations to this island took place in the third generation after their conquest of Peloponnesus. Of these two are expressly mentioned, one conducted under the auspices of Sparta, and the other by the Argive Althæmenes. Of the latter we have already spoken; the former consisted chiefly of Minyans, who had been settled at Amycla by the Achæan Philonomus, to whom the Spartans had granted this city on account of his treachery, as has been already related. These Minyans, having revolted against Sparta, were sent out of the country as emigrants, but accompanied by many Spartans. They sailed towards Crete, and in their passage settled some of their number in the island of Melos, which remained faithful to Lacedæmon, even in the time of the Peloponnesian war. In Crete they founded Gortys and Lyctus, which are mentioned as Spartan colonies. The Doric colonists in Crete were anxious to connect themselves with the mythical glories of Minos, and consequently ascribed their political and social institutions to this celebrated hero. Hence the tradition arose that the Spartan institutions were borrowed by Lycurgus from those of Crete; but it seems more probable that their similarity was owing to their common origin, and that the Dorians of Crete brought from the mother country usages which they sought to hallow by the revered name of Minos.

§ 12. The Return of the Heracleida and the foundation of the abovementioned colonies form the conclusion of the Mythical Age. From this time to the commencement of authentic history in the first Olympiad, there is a period of nearly three hundred years, according to the common chronology. Of this long period we have scarcely any record. But this ought not to excite our surprise. The subjects of mythical narrative are drawn,

not from recent events, but from an imaginary past, which is supposed to be separated from the present by an indefinite number of years. Originally no attempt was made to assign any particular date to the grand events of the Mythical Age. It was sufficient for the earlier Greeks to believe that their gods and heroes were removed from them by a vast number of generations; and it was not till a later time that the literary men of Greece endeavored to count backwards to the Mythical Age, and to affix dates to the chief events in legendary Greece.