Delos
CYNTHUS, or ORTYGIA (now called SAILLES, SAYLLI, DELO, or DELI), is the smallest of the Cyclades, at the N. of Naxos, and was famous throughout antiquity as having been the birthplace of Apollo and Diana. According to the legend it was a floating island, but was rendered immovable in order that Latona might give birth in security to these two divinities. It was consecrated to the worship of Apollo and peopled by Ionians; and, in Homer's time, was the central seat of their political and religious union. Like all ancient temples of celebrity, that of Apollo at Delos was one of the great emporia for trade; and, after the fall of Corinth, the Delians, by wisely declaring their port tween the East and West of which that free, secured that vast commerce noble city had been the channel. Its mercial importance was further insured by the peculiar sanctity which attached to the island. Even hostile fleets rode quietly at anchor in its sacred harbor. The altar in the temple of Apollo is said to have been a perfect cube, and the doubling of it was a noted mathematical problem with the ancients, which went under the name of the problema Deliacum. The decline of Delos dates from the Mithridatic War, DELPHINUS when it was laid waste by one of the generals of Mithridates. a