Xenophon Anabasis 5.3

[1]
  And now, seeing that Cheirisophus was not returned ¹ that they had not an adequate number of ships, ² and that it was no longer possible to get provisions, they resolved to depart by land. On board the ships they embarked the sick, those who were more than forty years of age, the women and children, and all the baggage which they did not need to keep with them. They put aboard also Philesius and Sophaenetus, the eldest of the generals, and bade them take charge of the enterprise;

[2] then the rest took up the march, the road having been already constructed. ³ And on the third day of their journey they reached Cerasus , a Greek city on the sea, being a colony planted by the Sinopeans in the territory of Colchis .

[3] There they remained ten days; and the troops were reviewed under arms and numbered, and there proved to be eight thousand six hundred men. ⁴ So many were left alive. The rest had perished at the hands of the enemy or in the snow, a few also by disease.

[4]
  There, also, they divided the money received from the sale of the booty. And the tithe, which they set apart for Apollo and for Artemis of the Ephesians, was distributed among the generals, each taking his portion to keep safely for the gods; and the portion that fell to Cheirisophus was given to Neon the Asinaean.

[5] As for Xenophon, he caused a votive offering to be made out of Apollo’s share of his portion and dedicated it in the treasury of the Athenians at Delphi , inscribing upon it his own name and that of Proxenus, who was killed with Clearchus; ⁵ for Proxenus was his friend. ⁶

[6] The share which belonged to Artemis of the Ephesians he left behind, at the time when he was returning from Asia with Agesilaus to take part in the campaign against Boeotia , ⁷ in charge of Megabyzus, the sacristan of Artemis, for the reason that his own journey seemed likely to be a dangerous one; and his instructions were that in case he should escape with his life, the money was to be returned to him, but in case any ill should befall him, Megabyzus was to cause to be made and dedicated to Artemis whatever offering he thought would please the goddess.

[7]
  In the time of Xenophon’s exile ⁸ and while he was living at Scillus, near Olympia , where he had been established as a colonist by the Lacedaemonians, Megabyzus came to Olympia to attend the games and returned to him his deposit. Upon receiving it Xenophon bought a plot of ground for the goddess in a place which Apollo’s oracle appointed.

[8] As it chanced, there flowed through the plot a river named Selinus ; and at Ephesus likewise a Selinus river flows past the temple of Artemis. In both streams, moreover, there are fish and mussels, while in the plot at Scillus there is hunting of all manner of beasts of the chase.

[9] Here Xenophon built an altar and a temple with the sacred money, and from that time forth he would every year take the tithe of the products of the land in their season and offer sacrifice to the goddess, all the citizens and the men and women of the neighbourhood taking part in the festival. And the goddess would provide for the banqueters barley meal and loaves of bread, wine and sweetmeats, and a portion of the sacrificial victims from the sacred herd as well as of the victims taken in the chase.

[10] For Xenophon’s sons and the sons of the other citizens used to have a hunting expedition at the time of the festival, and any grown men who so wished would join them; and they captured their game partly from the sacred precinct itself and partly from Mount Pholoe—boars and gazelles and stags.

[11]
  The place is situated on the road which leads from Lacedaemon to Olympia , and is about twenty stadia from the temple of Zeus at Olympia . Within the sacred precinct there is meadowland and treecovered hills, suited for the rearing of swine, goats, cattle and horses, so that even the draught animals which bring people to the festival have their feast also.

[12] Immediately surrounding the temple is a grove of cultivated trees, producing all sorts of dessert fruits in their season. The temple itself is like the one at Ephesus , although small as compared with great, and the image of the goddess, although cypress wood as compared with gold, is like the Ephesian image.

[13] Beside the temple stands a tablet with this inscription: