Question 7. What sort of clouds are the Ploiades?

Solution. Showering clouds which were carried up and down were, for the most part, called Ploiades, as Theophrastus hath said expressly in his fourth book of Meteors: Whereas indeed the Ploiades are those clouds which have a consistency and are not so movable, but as to color white, which discover a kind of different matter, neither very watery nor very windy.

Question 8. Who is called Platychaetas among the Boeotians?

Solution. They that had many neighboring houses or bordering fields were so called in the Aeolic dialect, as having wide domains.See the word πλατυχαίτας (probably corrupt) in Liddell and Scott’s Greek Lexicon. (G.) I will add one saying out of the Thesmophylacian law, seeing there are many....

Question 9. Who is he among the people of Delphi who is called Ὁσιωτήρ? And why do they call one of the months Bysius?

Solution. They call the slain sacrifice Ὁσιωτήρ when the ὅσιος (the holy one) is declared. There are five of these holy ones for life, and these transact many things with the prophets, and sacrifice together with them, supposing that they are descended from Deucalion. The month Bysius, as many think, is the same as Φύσιος (natural), for it is in the beginning of the spring, when most things do sprout and put forth buds. But this is not the true reason. For the Delphians do not use b for ph (as the Macedonians, who say Bilippus, Balacrus, and Beronica, for Philippus, Phalacrus, and Pheronica), but instead of p; they for the most part saying βατεῖν for πατεῖν, and βικρόν for πικρόν. Therefore they say Bysius for Pysius, because in that month they enquire of and consult their God Apollo. This is their genuine and country way of speaking. For in that month an oracle is given forth, and they call that week the nativity of Apollo, and the name is Polythous, not because of their baking a sort of cakes called Pthides, but because then their oracle is full of answers and prophecies. For it is but of late that oraculous answers were given to the enquirers every month. In former times Pythia gave answers only once a year, which was on this day, as Callisthenes and Anaxandridas have told us.