There are roads leading from Mantinea to the other parts of Arcadia, I
will describe the most notable things to see on each of them. As you
go to Tegea on the left of the highroad near the walls of Mantinea
is a place for horseracing, and at no great distance is the course
where the games to Antinous take place. And above this course is the
Mountain Alesium, so called they say from the wanderings of Rhea, and
on the mountain is a grove of Demeter. And at the extreme end of the
mountain is the temple of Poseidon Hippius, not far from the course
in Mantinea. As to this temple I write what I have heard and what
others have recorded about it. It was built in our day by the Emperor
Adrian, who appointed overseers over the workmen, that no one might
spy into the old temple nor move any portion of its ruins, and he
ordered them to build the new temple round the old one, which was they
say originally built to Poseidon by Agamedes and Trophonius, who made
beams of oak and adjusted them together. And when they kept people
from entering into this temple they put up no barrier in front of the
entrance, but only stretched across a woollen thread, whether they
thought this would inspire fear as people then held divine things in
honour, or that there was some efficacy in this thread. And Æpytus the
son of Hippothous neither leapt over this thread nor crept under it
but broke through it and so entered the temple, and having acted with
impiety was struck blind, (sea water bursting into his eyes from the
outraged god), and soon after died. There is an old tradition that sea
water springs up in this temple. The Athenians have a similar tradition
about their Acropolis, and so have the Carians who dwell at Mylasa
about the temple of their god, whom they call in their native dialect
Osogo. The Athenians are only about 20 stades distant from the sea at
Phalerum, and the seaport for Mylasa is 80 stades from that town, but
the Mantineans are at such a very long distance from the sea that this
is plainly supernatural there.
When you have passed the temple of Poseidon you come to a trophy
in stone erected for a victory over the Lacedæmonians and Agis.
This was the disposition of the battle. On the right wing were the
Mantineans themselves, with an army of all ages under the command of
Podares, the great grandson of that Podares who had fought against
the Thebans. They had also with them the seer from Elis, Thrasybulus
the son of Æneas of the family of the Iamidæ, who prophesied victory
for the Mantineans, and himself took part in the action. The rest
of the Arcadians were posted on the left wing, each town had its
own commander, and Megalopolis had two, Lydiades and Leocydes. And
Aratus with the Sicyonians and Achæans occupied the centre. And Agis
and the Lacedæmonians extended their line of battle that they might
not be outflanked by the enemy, and Agis and his staff occupied the
centre. And Aratus according to preconcerted arrangement with the
Arcadians fell back (he and his army) when the Lacedæmonians pressed
them hard, and as they fell back they formed the shape of a crescent.
And Agis and the Lacedæmonians were keen for victory, and _en masse_
pressed fiercely on Aratus and his division. And they were followed
by the Lacedæmonians on the wings, who thought it would be a great
stepping stone to victory to rout Aratus and his division. But the
Arcadians meanwhile stole upon their flanks, and the Lacedæmonians
being surrounded lost most of their men, and their king Agis the son of
Eudamidas fell. And the Mantineans said that Poseidon appeared helping
them, and that is why they erected their trophy as a votive offering
to Poseidon. That the gods have been present at war and slaughter has
been represented by those who have described the doings and sufferings
of the heroes at Ilium, the Athenian poets have sung also that the gods
took part in the battles at Marathon and Salamis. And manifestly the
army of the Galati perished at Delphi through Apollo and the evident
assistance of divine beings. So the victory here of the Mantineans may
have been largely due to Poseidon. And they say that Leocydes, who with
Lydiades was the general of the division from Megalopolis, was the
ninth descendant from Arcesilaus who lived at Lycosura, of whom the
Arcadians relate the legend that he saw a stag (which was sacred to the
goddess Proserpine) of extreme old age, on whose neck was a collar
with the following inscription,
“I was a fawn and captured, when Agapenor went to Ilium.”
This tradition shews that the stag is much longer-lived than the
elephant.