Note 731 — Chapter XV · LEGEND OF TROY.

To mark the way in which these legendary events pervaded and became embodied in the local worship, I may mention the received practice in the great temple of Asklêpius (father of Machaôn) at Pergamus, even in the time of Pausanias. Têlephus, father of Eurypylus, was the local hero and mythical king of Teuthrania, in which Pergamus was situated. In the hymns there sung, the poem and the invocation were addressed to Têlephus; but nothing was said in them about Eurypylus, nor was it permitted even to mention his name in the temple,—“they knew him to be the slayer of Machaôn:” ἄρχονται μὲν ἀπὸ Τηλέφου τῶν ὕμνων, προσᾴδουσι δὲ οὐδὲν ἐς τὸν Εὐρύπυλον, οὐδὲ ἀρχὴν ἐν τῷ ναῷ θέλουσιν ὀνομάζειν αὐτὸν, οἷα ἐπιστάμενοι φονέα ὄντα Μαχάονος (Pausan. iii. 26, 7).

The combination of these qualities in other Homeric chiefs is noted in a subsequent chapter of his work, ch. xx. vol. ii.