Note 2 — Chapter XVIII · CLOSING EVENTS OF LEGENDARY GREECE.—PERIOD OF INTERMEDIATE DARKNESS, BEFORE THE DAWN OF HISTORICAL GREECE.

Diodôr. iv. 37-60; Apollodôr. ii. 7, 7; Ephorus ap. Steph. Byz. Δυμᾶν, Fragm. 10, ed. Marx.

The Doric institutions are called by Pindar τεθμοὶ Αἰγιμίου Δωρικοί (Pyth. i. 124).

There existed an ancient epic poem, now lost, but cited on some few occasions by authors still preserved, under the title Αἰγίμιος; the authorship being sometimes ascribed to Hesiod, sometimes to Kerkops (Athenæ. xi. p. 503). The few fragments which remain do not enable us to make out the scheme of it, inasmuch as they embrace different mythical incidents lying very wide of each other,—Iô, the Argonauts, Pêleus, and Thetis, etc. But the name which it bears seems to imply that the war of Ægimius against the Lapithæ, and the aid given to him by Hêraklês, was one of its chief topics. Both O. Müller (History of the Dorians, vol. i. b. 1, c. 8) and Welcker (Der Epische Kyklus, p. 263) appear to me to go beyond the very scanty evidence which we possess, in their determination of this last poem; compare Marktscheffel, Præfat. Hesiod. Fragm. cap. 5, p. 159.