"There is an isle called Syria (Syros), west of Ortygia (Delos), where are the turnings of the sun": M. Lebégue takes this to mean; "where the course of the sun on the ecliptic is observed from the grotto on Cynthus." Eustathius took ὅθι τροπαὶ ἠελ. to mean, "where (at Syria) is the sunset"; but adds this remarkable comment:—ἕτεροι δέ φασι σπήλαιον εἶναι ἐκεῖ, δι' οὗ τὰς ἡλίου, ὡς εἰκός, ἐσημειοῦντο τροπάς, ὅ καὶ ἡλίου διὰ τοῦτο σπήλαιον ἔλεγον. Didymus, also, in his commentary on the Odyssey, mentioned the ἡλίου σπήλαιον. Nothing could be more brilliant, more tempting, than this combination. It is an ungracious task to confess the fear that it is too brilliant. Yet I cannot but think that the words ὅθι τροπαὶ ἠελίοιο merely express a hazy notion of the poet's—whence derived, the Muses alone can tell—that "the Syrian isle" lay beneath a turning-point in the sun's heavenly course. As to the comment of the old grammarians, I conceive that it blends two elements. (i) This grotto in Delos may have been anciently called "the Cavern of the Sun" because a solar god had been worshipped there; and (ii) τροπαὶ ἠελίοιο at once suggested the familiar word ἡλιοτρόπιον, a sun-dial[1].
Scarcely any objects of ancient art have been discovered at Delos, except marble statues, more or
- ↑ Among the miscellaneous objects found on the top of Cynthus was part of a ἡλιοτρόπιον—viz.: the two supports, and a piece of the dial, which was almost vertical, like the hemisphere at Ravenna and the old solar dials in the Naples Museum (Lebégue, p. 136).
