Kitap 7
frag.2
Among the Thesprotians and the Molossians old women are called “peliai” and old men “pelioi,” as is also the case among the Macedonians; at any rate, those people call their dignitaries “peligones” (compare the “gerontes”The senators at Sparta were called “gerontes,” literally “old men,” “senators.” among the Laconians and the Massaliotes).Cp. 4. 1. 5. And this, it is said, is the origin of the myth about the pigeons in the Dodonaean oak-tree.
frag.3
The proverbial phrase, “the copper vessel in Dodona,”The phrase was used in reference to incessant talkers (Stephanus Byzantinus, s.v. Δωδώνη). originated thus: In the temple was a copper vessel with a statue of a man situated above it and holding a copper scourge, dedicated by the Corcyraeans; the scourge was three-fold and wrought in chain fashion, with bones strung from it; and these bones, striking the copper vessel continuously when they were swung by the winds, would produce tones so long that anyone who measured the time from the beginning of the tone to the end could count to four hundred. Whence, also, the origin of the proverbial term, “the scourge of the Corcyraeans.”
