<*> ναύλοχα “κ.τ.λ.” Wishing to call up a general picture of the whole region, the poet takes Thermopylae as his central point. From the cliffs of Oeta, which overhang that pass, his thought passes to the highlands (“<*>ους Οἴτας”) of Malis, and thence descends to the seaboard,—bringing us back to Thermopylae by the mention of the Amphictyons. θερμὰ λουτρὰ: the wa<*>m springs at Thermopylae are situated between the Malian gulf on the N. (να<*>λοχα), and the cliffs of Oeta on the south (πετραῖα). They gush from the foot of the mountain,—that spur of Oeta which Livy and Strabo call Callidromus,—a little west of the point where the pass is narrowest. They were locally called “χ<*>ροι”, from the natural basins of rock; and near them was an altar of Heracles, for whose use Athena was said to have called them forth ( Her.7. 176: Peisander ap. schol. Nub. 1050). ναύλοχα: Strabo 9. 428 speaks of a “λιμὴν μέγας” near Thermopylae. Here the word suggests the expected landing of Heracles. πάγους Οἴτας: the “Τρηχινιαι πέτραι” of Her.7. 198, spurs from the main range of Oeta, which enclose the plain of Malis on s. and w.: see Introd. to the Philoctetes, pp. ix. f. παραναιετάοντες with acc.: cp. Isocr. or. 4 § 162 “Ἕλληνες τὴν Ἀσίαν παροικοῦσιν”, dwell along its coasts. οἵ (art.) τε, sc. “ναιετάονρες”, following the direct vocative (633): cp. Xen. Cyr.3. 3. 20“ὦ Κῦρε καὶ οἱ ἄλλοι <*>ρσαι.—μέσσαν Μηλίδα … λί<*>ναν”, the part of the gulf between the two extremities, i.e., the innermost part of the deep <*> which it forms. It is in this part that the shores of the gulf belonged to Malis,—viz., from the neighbourhood of Thermopylae to that of Anticyra. χρυσαλακάτου τ᾽ ἀκτὰν κόρας: merely another way of describing the same seaboard: they live by the “λίμνη”, and on the “ἀκτή”. Artemis, one of whose attributes was “λιμενοσκόπος”, was worshipped all along these eastern coasts, since the whole maritime life of Greece Proper looked mainly towards the Aegaean. Apoll. Rhod. 1. 571 (referring to the coasts about Pagasae and Iolcus in Magnesia), “Ἄρτεμιν, ἣ κείνας σκοπιὰς ἁλὸς ἀμφιέπεσκεν”. Cp. 212 f.—The schol. wrongly takes “ἀκτὰν” here as meaning that “αἰγιαλός” in the N.W. of Euboea which was called “Ἀρτεμίσιον” ( Her.7. 176). χρυσαλακάτου: this Homeric epithet of the goddess ( Il.16. 183) is rightly explained by Hesych. as=“καλλίτοξος: ἠλακάτη γὰρ ὁ τοξικὸς κάλαμος”. Cp. “ἄτρακτος”=“οἰστός”. Artemis had nothing to do with a distaff.
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Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part V: The Trachiniae. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1902.
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