Iardanos (river in Elis)
The Iardanos or Iardanus (Greek: Ιάρδανος, Ancient Greek: Ἰάρδανος) is a river in Greece which flows into the Ionian Sea at the Monastery of Skafidia, north of Katakolo, in Elis.[1] It is apparently the same as the river, referred to in Homer's Iliad as being near Pheia in ancient Elis.[2] Homer has Nestor the legendary king of Pylos recall seeing, as a young man, the Pylians and Arcadians fighting by the river Celadon:
beneath the walls of Pheia, about the streams of Iardanus.[3]
Strabo describing the coast of Elis, says:
After Chelonatas comes the long seashore of the Pisatans; and then Cape Pheia. And there was also a small town called Pheia: "beside the walls of Pheia, about the streams of Iardanus,"[4] for there is also a small river near by. According to some, Pheia is the beginning of Pisatis.[5]
While describing the river Anigrus in Elis that descends from Mount Lapithas, the geographer Pausanias, possibly referring to this river, reports having "heard from an Ephesian" that the Acidas, a tributary of the Anigrus, "was called Iardanus in ancient times", adding that "I repeat [this], though I have nowhere found evidence in support of it."[6]
Notes
- ^ Axis of Katakolo - Ancient Olympia: Monastery of Skafidia.
- ^ Autenrieth, s.v. Ἰάρδανος 2; Smith, s.v. Pheia, which says that the Iliad 's Iardanus "is apparently the mountain torrent north of Ichthys [now Cape Katakolo], and which flows into the sea on the northern side of the lofty mountain Skaphídi".
- ^ Homer, Iliad 7.132–135.
- ^ Here quoting Homer, Iliad 7.135.
- ^ Strabo, 8.3.12.
- ^ Pausanias, 5.5.8–9.
References
- Autenrieth, Georg, A Homeric Dictionary for Schools and Colleges, translated by Robert P. Keep, revised by Isaac Flagg, New York, Harper and Brothers, 1895. Internet Archive.
- Homer, The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1924. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Pausanias, Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, London (1854). Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Strabo, Geography, translated by Horace Leonard Jones; Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. (1924). LacusCurtis, Online version at the Perseus Digital Library, Books 6–14.