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When Erechtheus was at war with Eumolpus,1
he learned that he would conquer if he sacrificed his
daughter before the battle, and, communicating this
to his wife Praxithea, he sacrificed his daughter.2
Euripides3 records this in the Erechtheus.
When Marius was fighting the Cimbri and was being
worsted, he saw in a dream that he would conquer if
he sacrificed his daughter before the battle ; for he
had a daughter Calpurnia. Since he placed his fellow-citizens before the ties of nature, he did the deed and
won the victory. And even to this day there are two
altars in Germany which at that time of year send
forth the sound of trumpets. So Dorotheüs in the
fourth book of his Italian History.4
Plutarch. Moralia. with an English Translation by. Frank Cole Babbitt. Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press. London. William Heinemann Ltd. 1936. 4.
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