Herodotus, The Histories, Book 9, chapter 73

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Of the Athenians, Sophanes son of Eutychides is said to have won renown, a man from the town of Decelea, whose people once did a deed that was of eternal value, as the Athenians themselves say. [2] For in the past when the sons of Tyndarus were trying to recover Helen,¹ after breaking into Attica with a great host, they turned the towns upside down because they did not know where Helen had been hidden, then (it is said) the Deceleans (and, as some say, Decelus himself, because he was angered by the pride of Theseus and feared for the whole land of Attica) revealed the whole matter to the sons of Tyndarus, and guided them to Aphidnae, which Titacus, one of the autochthonoi, handed over to to the Tyndaridae. [3] For that deed the Deceleans have always had and still have freedom at Sparta from all dues and chief places at feasts. In fact, even as recently as the war which was waged many years after this time between the Athenians and Peloponnesians, the Lacedaemonians laid no hand on Decelea when they harried the rest of Attica.²

1 According to legend, the Dioscuri came to recover their sister Helen, who had been carried off to Aphidnae in Attica by Theseus and Pirithous.

2 But in the later part of the Peloponnesian war the Lacedaemonians established themselves at Decelea and held it as a menace to Athens (413 B.C.).

Herodotus, with an English translation by A. D. Godley. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. 1920.

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Cross-references to this page (5):
- The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites, LIMES, ATTICA Greece.
- A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), ATELEIA
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), APHIDNA
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), A´TTICA
- Smith's Bio, DIOSCU'RI
Cross-references in notes to this page (1):
- Apollodorus, Library, Apollod. 3.10
Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page (9):
- LSJ, Δεκέλεια
- LSJ, δῆμος
- LSJ, ἀνίστημι
- LSJ, ἀτέλ-εια
- LSJ, καταπρο-δίδωμι
- LSJ, κομι^δή
- LSJ, πλῆθος
- LSJ, προεδρ-ία
- LSJ, ὑπέκ-κειμαι

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Herodotus, The Histories
A. D. Godley, Ed.

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Herodotus, The Histories A. D. Godley, Ed.

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Herodotus, The Histories
A. D. Godley, Ed.