In the market-place, which is in shape very like a brick, is a temple
of Aphrodite called the Brick Aphrodite, and a stone statue of the
goddess. And there are two pillars, on one of which are effigies of
Antiphanes and Crisus and Tyronidas and Pyrrhias, who are held in
honour to this day as legislators for Tegea, and on the other pillar
Iasius, with his left hand on a horse and in his right hand a branch
of palm. He won they say the horserace at Olympia, when Hercules the
Theban established the Olympian games. Why a crown of wild olive was
given to the victor at Olympia I have shown in my account of Elis, and
why of laurel at Delphi I shall show hereafter. And at the Isthmian
games pine, at the Nemean games parsley, were wont to be the prize, as
we know from the cases of Palæmon and Archemorus. But most games have
a crown of palm as the prize, and everywhere the palm is put into the
right hand of the victor. The beginning of this custom was as follows.
When Theseus was returning from Crete he instituted games they say to
Apollo at Delos, and himself crowned the victors with palm. This was
they say the origin of the custom, and Homer has mentioned the palm in
Delos in that part of the Odyssey where Odysseus makes his supplication
to the daughter of Alcinous.[45]
There is also a statue of Ares called Gynæcothœnas in the market-place
at Tegea, graven on a pillar. For in the Laconian war, at the first
invasion of Charillus the king of the Lacedæmonians, the women took up
arms, and lay in ambush under the hill called in our day Phylactris.
And when the armies engaged, and the men on both sides exhibited
splendid bravery, then they say the women appeared on the scene, and
caused the rout of the Lacedæmonians, and Marpessa, called the Widow,
excelled all the other women in daring, and among other Spartans
Charillus was taken prisoner, and was released without ransom, upon
swearing to the people of Tegea that he would never again lead a
Lacedæmonian army to Tegea, which oath he afterwards violated. And the
women privately sacrificed to Ares independently of the men for the
victory, and gave no share of the flesh of the victim to the men. That
is why Ares was called Gynæcothœnas (_i.e._ _Women’s Feast_). There
is also an altar and square statue of Adult Zeus. Square statues the
Arcadians seem greatly to delight in. There are also here the tombs of
Tegeates the son of Lycaon, and Mæra the wife of Tegeates, who they say
was the daughter of Atlas, and is mentioned by Homer[46] in Odysseus’
account to Alcinous of his journey to Hades and the souls he saw there.
And in the market-place at Tegea there is a temple of Ilithyia, and
a statue called Auge on her knees, and the tradition is that Aleus
ordered Nauplius to take his daughter Auge and drown her in the sea,
and as she was being led there she fell on her knees, and gave birth to
a son on the spot where is now the temple of Ilithyia. This tradition
differs from another one, which states that Auge gave birth to Telephus
unbeknown to her father, and that he was exposed on Mount Parthenium
and suckled by a doe, though this last part of the tradition is also
recorded by the people of Tegea. And near the temple of Ilithyia is
an altar to Earth, and close to the altar is a pillar in white stone,
on which is a statue of Polybius the son of Lycortas, and on another
pillar is Elatus one of the sons of Arcas.
[45] Odyssey, vi. 162 _sq._
[46] Odyssey, xi. 326.