The account of the settlement of Marseilles runs
as follows: Euxenus, a citizen of Phocaea, coming to Gaul in a merchant
galley, was invited by a Gallic chief to the marriage of his daughter;
according to the custom of this people, the young girl about the time
of the feast entered bearing a cup which she was to present to the one
whom she would choose for a husband; she stopped before the Greek and
offered him the cup. This unpremeditated act appeared to have been
inspired from heaven; the Gallic chief gave his daughter to Euxenus
and permitted him and his companions to found a city on the gulf of
Marseilles. Later the Phocaeans, seeing their city blockaded by the
Persian army, loaded on their ships their families, their movables,
the statues and treasures of their temple and went to sea, abandoning
their city. As they started, they threw into the sea a mass of red-hot
iron and swore never to return to Phocaea until the iron should rise to
the surface of the water. Many violated this oath and returned; but
the rest continued the voyage and after many adventures came to
Marseilles.
At Miletus the Ionians who founded the city had brought no wives with
them; they seized a city inhabited by the natives of Asia, slaughtered
all the men, and forcibly married the women and girls of the families
of their victims.
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