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The Lycians are in good truth anciently from Crete; which island,
in former days, was wholly peopled with barbarians. A quarrel arising
there between the two sons of Europa, Sarpedon and Minos, as to
which of them should be king, Minos, whose party prevailed, drove
Sarpedon and his followers into banishment. The exiles sailed to
Asia, and landed on the Milyan territory. Milyas was the ancient
name of the country now inhabited by the Lycians: the Milyae of the
present day were, in those times, called Solymi. So long as
Sarpedon reigned, his followers kept the name which they brought with
them from Crete, and were called Termilae, as the Lycians still are
by those who live in their neighbourhood. But after Lycus, the son
of Pandion, banished from Athens by his brother Aegeus had found a
refuge with Sarpedon in the country of these Termilae, they came, in
course of time, to be called from him Lycians. Their customs are
partly Cretan, partly Carian. They have, however, one singular
custom in which they differ from every other nation in the world. They
take the mother's and not the father's name. Ask a Lycian who he
is, and he answers by giving his own name, that of his mother, and so
on in the female line. Moreover, if a free woman marry a man who is a
slave, their children are full citizens; but if a free man marry a
foreign woman, or live with a concubine, even though he be the first
person in the State, the children forfeit all the rights of citizenship.
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