Those of Cyprus
pleaded right of sanctuary to three of their temples: the most ancient
founded by Aerias to the Paphian Venus; another by his son Amathus to the
Amathusian Venus; the third to the Salaminian Jupiter by Teucer, the son
of Telamon, when he fled from the fury of his father.
The deputies too of other cities were heard. But the Senate tired with so
many, and because there was a contention begun amongst particular parties
for particular cities; gave power to the Consuls "to search into the
validity of their several pretensions, and whether in them no fraud was
interwoven;" with orders "to lay the whole matter once more before the
Senate." The Consuls reported that, besides the cities already mentioned,
"they had found the temple of AEsculapius at Pergamus to be a genuine
sanctuary: the rest claimed upon originals, from the darkness of
antiquity, altogether obscure. Smyrna particularly pleaded an oracle of
Apollo, in obedience to which they had dedicated a temple to Venus
Stratonices; as did the Isle of Tenos an oracular order from the same God,
to erect to Neptune a statue and temple.
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