10.10.1 On the base below the wooden horse is an inscription saying that the images [eikones] were dedicated from a tithe of the spoils taken in the great deed [ergon] [of the battle] at Marathon. They are Athena, Apollo, and Miltiades, one of the generals. Of those called heroes [hērōes] there are Erekhtheus; Kekrops; Pandion; Leōs; Antiokhosson of Hēraklēs by Mēdā daughter of Phylas; also Aigeus; and Akamas, one of the sons of Theseus. These [heroes] gave names, in compliance with an oracular pronouncement [manteuma] from Delphi, to “tribes” [phūlai] in Athens. Kodros, however, the son of Melanthos, also Theseus also Neleus, these are not givers-of-names [ep-ōnumoi] to “tribes” [phūlai].

10.10.2 The statues enumerated were made by Pheidias, and really are a tithe of the spoils of the battle. But the statues of Antigonos, of his son Demetrios, and of Ptolemy the Egyptian, were sent to Delphi by the Athenians afterwards. The statue of the Egyptian they sent out of good will [eunoiā]; those of the Macedonians were sent out of dread [deos].

10.10.3 Near the horse are also other votive offerings [anathēmata] from the Argives.There are the leaders of those who with Polyneikes made war on Thebes: Adrastos the son of Talaos; Tydeus son of Oineus; the descendants of Proitos, namely, Kapaneus son of Hipponoos and Eteoklos son of Iphis; Polyneikes; and Hippomedon, son of the sister of Adrastos. Nearby has been made the chariot of Amphiaraos, and in it stands Baton, who was charioteer of Amphiaraos and who had a relationship with Amphiaraos in other ways as well. The last of them is Alitherses.

10.10.4 These are works of Hypatodoros and Aristogeiton, who made them, as the Argives themselves say, from the spoils of the victory that they and their Athenian allies won over the Lacedaemonians at Oinoe in Argive territory.^* From spoils of the same deed [ergon] [of victory], it seems to me, the Argives set-up-as-votive-offerings [anatithenai] statues of those whom the Greeks call the Epigonoi. I say this because there are set up [keisthai] images [eikones] of these also: Sthenelos, Alkmaion, who I think was honored before Amphilokhos on account of his age, Promakhos also, Thersandros, Aigialeus, and Diomedes. Between Diomedes and Aigialeus is Euryalos.

10.10.5 Opposite them are other statues [andriantes], dedicated by the Argives who participated with the Thebans led by Epameinondas to found Messene. The statues are images [eikones] of heroes [hērōes]: Danaos, the most powerful king of Argos, and Hypermnestra, who alone of her sisters kept her hands undefiled. By her side is Lynkeus also, and the whole lineage of them going back to Hēraklēs, and further back still, to Perseus.

10.10.6 The bronze horses and captive women dedicated by the people of Tarentum were made from spoils taken from the Messapians, a barbarian population bordering on the territory of Tarentum, and are works of Ageladas the Argive. Tarentum is a colony of the Lacedaemonians, and its founder was Phalanthos, a Spartan. On setting out to found a colony, Phalanthos received an oracular pronouncement [logion] from Delphi, declaring that when he feels rain under a cloudless sky [aithrā], he will then win both a territory [khōrā] and a city [polis].

10.10.7 At first, he neither questioned the oracular pronouncement [manteuma] himself nor consulted any of his interpreters but came to Italy with his ships. But when, although he won victories over the barbarians, he succeeded neither in taking a city [polis] nor in making himself master of a territory [khōrā], he he arrived at a recall [ana-mnēsis] of the oracular pronouncement [khrēsmos] and thought that the god had foretold an impossibility. For never could rain fall from a clear and cloudless sky. When he was in despair, his wife, who had accompanied him from home, among other endearments placed her husband’s head between her knees and began to pick out the lice. And it chanced that the wife, such was her affection, wept as she saw her husband’s fortunes coming to nothing.

10.10.8 As her tears fell in showers, and she wetted the head of Phalanthus, he realized the meaning of the oracle, for his wife’s name was Aithra. And so on that night, he took from the barbarians Tarentum, the largest and most prosperous city on the coast. They say that Taras the hero was a son of Poseidon by a nymph of the country, and that after this hero were named both the city and the river. For the river, just like the city, is called Taras.