Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 2.djvu/102

94 STRABO. CASAUB. 402. wrong, in either case they were right ; for if she had uttered a deceitful answer she was duly punished ; but if not, they had only complied with the command of the oracle. Those in charge of the temple did not like to put to death, particu- larly in the temple, the perpetrators of this act without a formal judgment, and therefore subjected them to a trial. They were summoned before the priestesses, who were also the prophetesses, being the two survivors out of the three. The Boeotians alleged that there was no law permitting women to act as judges ; an equal number of men were therefore chosen. The men acquitted ; the women condemned. As the votes were equal, those for acquittal prevailed. Hence at Dodona it is to the Boeotians only that men deliver oracles. The prophetesses however give a different meaning to the answer of the oracle, and say, that the god enjoins the Boeotians to steal the tripods used at home, and to send them annually to Dodona. This they did, for they were in the habit of carry- ing away by night some of the dedicated tripods, which they concealed in their clothes, in order to convey them clandes- tinely as offerings to Dodona. 5. After this they assisted Penthilus in sending out the ^Eolian colony, and despatched a large body of their own peo- ple with him, so that it was called the Boeotian colony. A long time afterwards the country was devastated during the war with the Persians at Plataeae. They afterwards so far recovered their power, that the Thebans, having van- quished the Lacedaemonians in two battles, 1 disputed the sove- reignty of Greece. Epaminondas, however, was killed, and they were disappointed in their hope of obtaining this supre- macy. They, nevertheless, fought in defence of the Greeks against the Phocseans, who had plundered their common tem- ple. Reduced by this war, and by the Macedonians, at the time they invaded Greece, they lost their city, which was afterwards restored to them, and rebuilt by the Macedonians themselves, who had razed it. 2 From that period to our own 1 Leuclra and Mantineia. 3 The Thebans, who were formerly the allies of the Macedonians, were opposed to Philip of Macedon at the battle of Chseroneia. On the acces- sion to the throne of Alexander, the city was destroyed, B. c. 335 ; 6000 of the inhabitants were killed, and 30,000 sold as slaves. The city was rebuilt, B. c. 316, by Casander. Pausanias, ix. 7. The ravages com-