Note 26 — Chapter V · THE CULT OF SOULS

Strabo viii, 373—the same is reported by Call. fr. 110 of the inhabitants of Αἰγιαλός (prob. = Sikyon, where there was a cult of Demeter, Paus. 2, 11, 2–3; cf. 2, 5, 8. Hesych. ἐπωπίς· Δημήτηρ παρὰ Σικυωνίοις), where, at any rate, there was a καταβάσιον ᾅδου.—The name “Hermione” seems almost to have acquired a generic sense. In the Orphic Argonautica a city Hermioneia is said to be situated in the fabulous north-west of Europe in the neighbourhood of the gold-bearing river Acheron, where (as always on the margin of the οἰκουμένη) there dwell γένη δικαιοτάτων ἀνθρώπων, οἷσιν ἀποφθιμένοις ἄνεσις ναύλοιο τέτυκται, etc. (1135-47). Thus Hermione in this case lies immediately in the country of souls and blessedness, which the ancient inhabitants of the Peloponnesian city rather supposed to be in the neighbourhood of their own country.—Hesych. strangely: Ἑρμιόνη· καὶ ἡ Δημήτηρ καὶ ἡ κόρη ἐν Συρακούσαις. Was there a place called Hermione there too? See Lob., Paralip. 299.