6. What
can you say
as to this, that it is attested by the writings of authors, that many
of these temples which have been raised with golden domes and lofty
roofs cover bones and ashes, and are sepulchres of the dead? Is
it not plain and manifest, either that you worship dead men for
immortal gods, or that an inexpiable affront is cast upon the deities,
whose shrines and temples have been built over the tombs of the
dead? Antiochus,
4597
in the ninth
book
of his
Histories
, relates that Cecrops was buried in the temple of
Minerva,
4598
at Athens;
again, in the temple of the same goddess, which is in the citadel of
Larissa,
4599
it is related
and declared that Acrisius was laid,
and
in the sanctuary of
Polias,
4600
Erichthonius;
while
the brothers Dairas and Immarnachus
were
buried
in the enclosure of Eleusin, which lies near the
city. What say you as to the virgin daughters of Celeus? are they
not said to be buried
4601
in the temple of Ceres at Eleusin?
and
in the shrine of Diana,
which was set up in the temple of the Delian Apollo, are not Hyperoche
and Laodice buried, who are said to have been brought thither from the
country of the Hyperboreans? In the Milesian
Didymæon,
4602
Leandrius
says that Cleochus had the last honours of burial paid to him.
Zeno of Myndus openly relates that the monument of Leucophryne is in
the sanctuary of Diana at Magnesia. Under the altar of Apollo,
which is seen in the city of Tel
messus, is it not invariably declared by
writings that the prophet Telmessus lies buried? Ptolemæus,
the son of Agesarchus, in the first book of the
History of
Philopator
4603
which he
published, affirms, on the authority of literature, that Cinyras, king
of Paphos, was interred in the temple of Venus with all his family,
nay, more, with all his stock. It would be
4604
an endless and boundless task to
describe in what sanctuaries they all are throughout the world; nor is
anxious care required, although
4605
the Egyptians fixed a penalty for any one
who should have revealed the places in which Apis lay hid, as to those
Polyandria
4606
of
Varro,
4607
by what
temples they are covered, and what heavy masses they have laid upon
them.
4597
A Syracusan historian. The rest of the chapter is almost
literally translated from Clement, who is followed by Eusebius also
(
Præp. Evang.
, ii. 6). [See vol. ii. p. 184, this
series.]
4598
i.e., the Acropolis.
4599
In
Thessaly, whither (acc. to Pausanias) he had fled in vain, to avoid the
fulfillment of the oracle that he should be killed by his
daughter’s son.
4600
i.e., Athena Polias, or guardian of cities. Immediately
below, the
ms.
reads
Immarnachus
,
corrected in LB. and Orelli
Immarus
from Clem., who speaks of
“Immarus, son of Eumolpus and Dæira.”
4601
So the unintelligible reading of the
ms.
,
humation-ibus officia
, was emended by
Heraldus, followed by LB. and Orelli,
is habuisse.
4602
i.e., the temple near Didyma, sacred to Apollo, who was worshipped then
under the name Didymus.
4603
i.e., “lover of his father,” the name given ironically to
the fourth Ptolemy, because he murdered his father.
4604
Lit., “is.”
4605
So the
ms.
, both Rom. edd., Hild., and
Oehler, reading
quamvis pœnam
; Gelenius, Canterus,
Elm., and Oberthür omit
vis
, and the other edd.
v
,
i.e., “as to what punishment the Egyptian,” etc. This
must refer to the cases in which the sacred bull, having outlived the
term of twenty-five years, was secretly killed by the priests, while
the people were taught that it had thrown itself into the water.
4606
i.e., “burial-places.” By this Oehler has attempted
to show is meant the
Hebdomades vel de Imaginibus
of Varro, a
series of biographical sketches illustrated with portraits, executed in
some way which cannot be clearly ascertained.
4607
ms.
Barronis.