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οἱ: ethical dative. For a pronoun's transposition cf. οἱ γάρ με κτλ., i. 115. 2. This use of captives to carry out public works is historical (cf. Exod. i. 11); some of the works are mentioned in c. 110.

For a picture of a colossus thus dragged cf. Rawlinson, ad loc. For a list of the buildings of Rameses II cf. Petrie, iii. 72 seq. The canal system, to which H. refers in i. 193 and iv. 47, for comparison with Babylonia and Scythia, is not the creation of any individual king; irrigation was essential to the very life of Egypt. What H. (§ 4) gives as cause is really effect; the cities were built on canals, not the canals made for the cities.

οὐκ ἑκόντες, ‘without intending it.’ Diodorus (i. 57) makes this the main motive. H. is not happy in his remark τὸ ... ἱππασίμην, chariots and horses do not appear on the Egyptian monuments before the eighteenth dynasty.

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