The locale [khōrion] known as the Kerameikos has its name from the hero Keramos, and they say that he too was son of Dionysus and Ariadne. First on the right is what is called the Royal Portico [Sto**ā Basileios], where is seated the archon-king [arkhōn basileus] when holding the yearly rulership [arkhē] that is named after the arkhōn basileus. On the tiling [keramos] of this portico [stoā] are statues [agalmata] made of terracotta, Theseus throwing Skiron into the sea and Day [Hēmerā] carrying away Kephalos, who they say was most beautiful and was abducted [harpazein] by Day, who conceived-a-passion [erasthēnai] for him. His son was Phaethon, afterwards abducted [harpazein] by Aphrodite) […] and he was made a guardian [phulax] of her temple [nāos]. That is what is said by Hesiod, among others, in his verses [epos plural] having to do with women.

Near the portico [stoā] stand [the statues of] Konon, Timotheus his son, and Euagoras,¹ King of Cyprus, who exacted a gift of Phoenician trireme ships to be given to Konon by King Artaxerxes. This he did as an Athenian whose ancestry connected him with Salamis, for he traced-his-lineage [geneālogeîn] back to Teukros as also to the daughter of Kinyras. Here stand [the statue of] Zeus, called Zeus Eleutherios [‘of Freedom’], and [the statue of] ‘King’ [basileus] Hadrian, who made-public-displays [apo-deiknusthai] of his benefactions to all the populations that he ruled [arkhein]—and especially to the city of the Athenians.

Another portico [stoā] is built behind [the one I just talked about], and this one has paintings [graphai] of the gods called the Twelve. On the wall opposite are painted [graphesthai] Theseus, [personified] Democracy [Dēmokratiā], and [personified] Dēmos. The painting [graphē] represents Theseus as the one who established for the Athenians a system of governance [politeuesthai] on-an-equal-footing [ex isou]. In other ways as well did the story [phēmē] spread among the people—the story that Theseus bestowed upon them the management of their own affairs [pragmata], and that from his time onward the people continued to have-a-democratic government [dēmokrateîsthai], until the emergence of Peisistratos, who became-tyrant [turanneîn].¹ Granted, the majority of people tell and are told many other things as well—things that are not true [alēthē], since people are ignorant of scientific-research [historiā] and consider trustworthy whatever they have heard, from childhood onward, in choruses [khoroi] and tragedies [tragōidiai]. There are stories like that also concerning Theseus, who himself became king, and afterwards, when Menestheus died, the descendants of Theseus remained rulers even to the fourth generation [geneā]. But if I cared about tracing-lineages [geneālogeîn] I should have included in the counting, besides these, the kings starting from Melanthos extending all the way to Kleidikos the son of Aisimides.

Also painted [graphesthai] here is the exploit, near Mantineia, of the Athenians who were sent to help the Lacedaemonians.¹ Xenophon among others has written a history of the whole war—the taking of the Kadmeia, the defeat of the Lacedaemonians at Leuktra, how the Boeotians invaded the Peloponnesus, and the contingent sent to the Lacedaemonians from the Athenians. The painting [graphē] shows a cavalry battle, in which the most famous men are, among the Athenians, Grylos the son of Xenophon, and, in the Boeotian cavalry, Epameinondas the Theban. These paintings [graphai] were painted [graphein] for the Athenians by Euphranor, and he also did the Apollo surnamed Patrōos [‘Ancestral’] in the temple [nāos] close by. In front of the temple [nāos] is an Apollo that Leokhares made [poieîn]; [also in front is] another Apollo, called Alexikakos [‘averter of evil’], made by Kalamis. They say that the god received this name because, by way of an oracular pronouncement [manteion] from Delphi, he stopped the pestilential disease [nosos] that afflicted the Athenians at the time of the Peloponnesian War.²

Here is built also a sanctuary [hieron] of the Mother of the gods; she [= her statue] is by Pheidias. Close by is the council-chamber [bouleutērion] of those called the Five Hundred, who for a term of a year act-as-councilors [bouleuein] on behalf of the Athenians. In it are a wooden-statue [xoanon] of Zeus Boulaios and an Apollo, the work [tekhnē] of Peisias, and a [personified] Dēmos, a work [ergon] by Lyson. As for the lawgivers [thesmothetai], they were painted [graphein] by Protogenes¹ of Kaunos, and Olbiades painted Kallippos, who led the Athenians to Thermopylae to stop the incursion of the Gauls [Galatai] into Greece [Hellas].²