Love Stories (4)

Phocus was by birth a Boeotian, for he was from the town of Glisas, and he was the father of Callirrhoê, who excelled in beauty and modesty. She was wooed by thirty young men, the most highly esteemed in Boeotia; but Phocus found one reason after another for putting off her marriage, for he was afraid that violence would be done to him[*]; at last, however, he yielded to their demands, but asked to leave the choice to the Pythian oracle. The suitors were incensed by the proposal, rushed upon Phocus, and killed him. In the confusion the maiden got away and fled through the country, but the young men pursued her. She came upon some farmers making a threshing-floor, and found safety with them, for the farmers hid her in the grain, and so her pursuers passed by. But she waited in safety until the festival of the Pamboeotia, when she went to Coroneia, took her seat on the altar of Athena Itonia,[*] and told of the lawless act of the suitors, giving the name and birthplace of each. So the Boeotians pitied the maid and were angry with the young men. When they learned of this, they fled for refuge to Orchomenus, and when the Orchomenians refused to receive them, they forced their way into Hippotae, a village lying on the slope of Mount Helicon between Thisbe and Coroneia. There they were received. Then the Thebans sent and demanded the slayers of Phocus, and when the people of Hippotae refused to deliver them, the Thebans, along with the rest of the

Boeotians, took the field under the command of Phoedus, who at that time administered the government of Thebes. They besieged the village, which was well fortified, and when they had overcome the inhabitants by thirst, they took the murderers and stoned them to death and made slaves of the villagers; then they pulled down the walls and the houses and divided the land between the people of Thisbê and of Coroneia. It is said that in the night, before the capture of Hippotae, there was heard many times from Helicon a voice of someone saying I am here, and that the thirty suitors recognized the voice as that of Phocus. It is said also that on the day when they were stoned to death the old man’s monument at Glisas ran with saffron; and that as Phoedus, the ruler and general of the Thebans, was returning from the battle, he received the news of the birth of a daughter and, thinking it of good omen, he named her Nicostrata.[*]