OLYMPUS, the name of several mountains; one bounding Bithynia on the south. Another in the island of Cyprus, on whose top was a temple of Venus, which women were not permitted either to enter or to see, (Strabo.) A third Olympus of Galatia, (Livy.) A fourth, of Lycia, with a noble cognominal town, near
Ombre. near the sea-coast, (Strabo, Cicero); extinct in Pliny's time, there remaining only a citadel: the town was destroyed by P. Servilius Hauricus, (Florus); having been the retreat of pirates. From this mountain there was an extensive prospect of Lycia, Pamphylia, and Pisidia, (Strabo.) A fifth Olympus of Mylia, (Ptolemy); thence furnished Olympena, anciently Minor; one of the highest mountains, and furnished Myliar, (Theophrastus); situate on the Propontis, and thence extending more inland. A sixth, on the north of Thessaly, or on the confines of Macedonia; famous for the fable of the giants, (Virgil, Horace, Seneca); reckoned the highest in the whole world, and to exceed the flight of birds, (Apuleius); which is the reason of its being called heaven, than which nothing is higher: the serenity and calmness which reign there are celebrated by Homer, Lucan, and Claudian.