2.27.1 The sacred grove of Asklepios is surrounded on all sides by boundary marks. No death or birth takes place within the enclosure the same custom prevails also in the island of Delos. All the offerings, whether the offerer be one of the Epidaurians themselves or a stranger, are entirely consumed within the bounds. At Titane too, I know, there is the same rule.

2.27.2 The statue [agalma] of Asklepios [inside his temple] is, in size, half as big as the Olympian Zeus in Athens, and is made of ivory and gold. An inscription reveals that the artist was Thrasymedes, a Parian, son of Arignotos. The god is sitting on a seat throne [thronos] grasping a staff [baktēriā]; the other hand he is holding over the head of the serpent [drakōn]; there is also a figure of a dog lying by his side. On the throne [thronos] are worked in relief the deeds [erga] of Argive heroes [hērōes]—Bellerophontes against the Chimaera, and Perseus, who has cut off the head of Medusa. Over on the side of the temple is the place where the suppliants [hiketai] of the god fall asleep [= go into a state of incubation].

2.27.3 Nearby [= near the Temple of Asklepios] has been built a circular building [oikēma … peripheres] of white marble, called Tholos, which is worthy of viewing [théā]. In it is a picture by Pausias representing Love, who has cast aside his bow and arrows, and is carrying instead of them a lyre that he has taken up. Here there is also another work of Pausias, Drunkenness drinking out of a crystal cup. You can see even in the painting a crystal cup and a woman’s face through it. Within the enclosure [peribolos] stood slabs [stēlai]; in my time six remained, but in ancient times there were more. On them are inscribed the names of both men and women who have been healed by Asklepios, also the disease also from which each suffered, also the means of cure. The dialect is Doric.

2.27.4 Apart from the others is an ancient [arkhaiā] slab [stēlē]. It says [that is, the inscription on it says] that Hippolytus dedicated twenty horses to the god [Asklepios]. What is said by the people of Aricia agrees with the inscription on this slab, that when Hippolytus was killed because of the curses [ārai] of Theseus, Asklepios resurrected [an-histanai] him from the dead. When he came-back-to-life [authis biōnai] he refused to forgive his father for rejecting his entreaties, and he went to the people of Aricia in Italy. There he became king [basileusai] and dedicated a precinct [temenos] to Artemis, where down to my time there was a contest-for-prizes [āthla]—a contest of single-combat [monomakhiā]—and [among the prizes was the provision] that the winner [of the contest] was to be consecrated-as-priest] [hierâsthai] to the goddess [theos (feminine)]. The contest [agōn] was not open to free men, but only to slaves [oiketai] who had run away from their masters [despotai].

2.27.5 The people of Epidaurus have a theater [theātron] within the sacred space [hieron], and it is in my opinion very much worthy of viewing [théā]. I say this because, while the Roman theaters are far superior to those anywhere else in their splendor, and the Arcadian theater at Megalopolis is unequalled for size, what architect could seriously rival Polyclitus [Polykleitos] in symmetry [harmoniā] and beauty? It was Polyclitus who built both this theater [theātron] and the circular building [oikēma … peripheres]. Within the grove are a temple of Artemis, a statue [agalma] of Epione, a sanctuary of Aphrodite and Themis, a race-course consisting, like most Greek race-courses, of a bank of earth, and a fountain worth seeing for its roof and general splendor.

2.27.6 A Roman senator, Antoninus, made in our own day a bath of Asklepios and a sanctuary of the gods they call Bountiful.^* He made also a temple to Hygieia, Asklepios, and Apollo, the last two surnamed Egyptian. He moreover restored the portico that was named the Portico of Cotys, which, as the brick of which it was made had been unburned, had fallen into utter ruin after it had lost its roof. As the Epidaurians about the sanctuary were in great distress, because their women had no shelter in which to be delivered and the sick breathed their last in the open, he provided a dwelling, so that these grievances also were redressed. Here at last was a place in which without sin a human being could die and a woman be delivered.

2.27.7 Above the grove are the Nipple and another mountain called Cynortium; on the latter is a sanctuary of Maleatian Apollo. The sanctuary itself is an ancient one, but among the things Antoninus made for the Epidaurians are various appurtenances for the sanctuary of the Maleatian, including a reservoir into which the rainwater collects for their use.