Note 275 — ARRIAN ON COURSING.

Νυμφῶν. Beger’s list of these ladies does not much exceed one hundred in number, although it is said that Diana had above a thousand in her retinue. We may suppose those principally interested in Cynegetical pursuits to have been the Oreades, nymphs of the mountains; the νύμφαι Ὀρεστιάδες of Homer (Iliad. vi. 421.) the Ὀρείπλαγκτοι of Aristophanes (Thesmophoriazusæ); the Napææ, nymphs of the meadows, (of whom Virgil, “faciles venerare Napæas,”) and the Dryades and Hamadryades, nymphs of the woods, the φιλορνίθων Δρυάδων χορὸς of Oppian (Cyneg. i. vs. 78.) see claudian. de laudib. stilic. l. iii. for a description of the “acies formosa Dianæ,” and the Epicedium of Hercules Stroza; in which latter the names of many of these inferior Sylvan deities, “turbæ nemoralis,” are registered in chaste hexameters, addressed to the Duchess of Ferrara. Sometimes the Naiads also accompanied the land-nymphs in their hunting pranks:

Valer. Flacci Argon. L. iii. 530.

Tempest, Act v. sc. i.