|
Below, in the same precinct, there is a second temple, in which is a
sitting figure of Jupiter, all of gold. Before the figure stands a
large golden table, and the throne whereon it sits, and the base on
which the throne is placed, are likewise of gold. The Chaldaeans
told me that all the gold together was eight hundred talents' weight.
Outside the temple are two altars, one of solid gold, on which it is
only lawful to offer sucklings; the other a common altar, but of great
size, on which the full-grown animals are sacrificed. It is also on
the great altar that the Chaldaeans burn the frankincense, which is
offered to the amount of a thousand talents' weight, every year, at
the festival of the God. In the time of Cyrus there was likewise in
this temple a figure of a man, twelve cubits high, entirely of solid
gold. I myself did not see this figure, but I relate what the
Chaldaeans report concerning it. Darius, the son of Hystaspes,
plotted to carry the statue off, but had not the hardihood to lay his
hands upon it. Xerxes, however, the son of Darius, killed the
priest who forbade him to move the statue, and took it away. Besides
the ornaments which I have mentioned, there are a large number of
private offerings in this holy precinct.
|
|