in antiquity, a company of illustrious Greeks, who embarked along with Jason, in the ship Argo, from Colchis, with a design to obtain the golden fleece.

The occasion of this expedition is thus represented by Greek writers. Phryxus, flying with his sister Helle from the rage of their stepmother Io, the daughter of Cadmus, went on board a ship, whose ensign was a golden ram, and sailed to Colchis (now Mingrelia, part of Georgia). Helle was drowned by the way, in that sea which from her was called the Hellefountain, now the Dardanelles. This, according to some, was the ground of the poetical fable, that a ram with a golden fleece swam away with them to Colchis; and that the Argonauts undertook their famed expedition, in order to find that fleece. But Strabo and Arrian inform us, that it was a practice of the Colchians to collect gold on Mount Caucasus by extending fleeces across the beds of the torrents; and as the water passed, the metallic particles remained entangled in the wool; hence, according to those historians, the adventure was named the expedition of the golden fleece. Sir Isaac Newton thinks that this expedition was really an embassy sent by the Greeks, during the intestine divisions of Egypt in the reign of Amenophis, to persuade the nations upon the coasts of the Luxine and the Mediterranean seas, to take that opportunity of shaking off the yoke of Egypt, which Setostris had laid upon them; and that fetching the golden fleece, was only a pretence to cover their true design.

But the most judicious and satisfactory account of the Argonautic expedition seems to be that given by Dr Gillies in his history of Greece. "The northern districts of Thessaly being peculiarly exposed to the dangerous fury of invaders, the petty princes of that province entered into a confederacy for their mutual defence. They assembled in spring and autumn at Thermopylae, a place afterwards so illustrious, and then governed by Amphictyon, a descendant of Deucalion, whose name is immortalized in the Amphictyonic council. The advantages which the confederates derived from this measure, were soon perceived by their neighbours. The central states gradually acceded..." Argonauts, ed to their alliance; and about the middle of the 14th century before Christ, Acrisius king of Argos, and other princes of Peloponnesus, were allowed to share the benefits and security of this useful association. See Amphictyons.

"After this event, the Amphictyons appear to have long confined themselves to the original purpose of their institution. The states, whose measures were directed by this assembly, found sufficient occupation in defending their own territories; and near a century elapsed, before they undertook, by common consent, any distant expedition. But it was not to be expected that their restless activity could always be exhausted in defensive war. The establishment of the Amphictyons brought together the chiefs most distinguished by birth and bravery. Glory and emulation prompted them to arms, and revenge directed those arms against the barbarians. Jason, Admetus, and other chieftains of Thessaly, having equipped a small fleet in the neighbouring harbour of Iolcus, and particularly the ship Argo of superior size and construction to any before known, were animated with a desire to visit foreign lands, to plant colonies in those parts of them that appeared most delightful, and to retort on their inhabitants the injuries which Greece had suffered from strangers. The princes of the north having proclaimed this spirited design over the central and southern provinces, the standard of enterprise and glory was speedily surrounded by the flower of the Grecian youth, who eagerly embraced this honourable opportunity to signalize their manly valour. Peleus, Tydeus, Telamon, and in general the fathers of those heroic chiefs who in the succeeding age shone with distinguished lustre in the plains of Troy, are numbered among the leaders of the Argonauts. They were accompanied by the chosen warriors, and by the venerable prophets, of their respective tribes; by an Ecbulapius, the admired father of the healing art; and by the divine Orpheus, whose sublime genius was worthy to celebrate the amazing series of their adventures.

"These adventures, however, have been too much adorned by the graces of poetry, to be the proper subject of historical composition. The designs of the Argonauts are veiled under the allegorical, or at least doubtful, phrase, of carrying off the golden fleece; which, though easily explained, if we admit the report that the inhabitants of the eastern banks of the Euxine extended fleeces of wool, in order to collect the golden particles which were carried down by the torrents from Mount Caucasus, is yet described in such various language by ancient writers, that almost every modern who examines the subject, thinks himself entitled to offer, by way of explanation, some new conjecture of his own. But in opposition to the most approved of these conjectures, we may venture to affirm, that the voyage to Colchis was not undertaken with a view to establish extensive plans of commerce, or to search for mines of gold, far less to learn the imaginary art of converting other substances into that precious metal; all such motives expressing a degree of speculation and refinement unknown in that age to the gallant but uninstructed youth of Thessaly. The real object of the expedition may be discovered by its consequences. The Argonauts fought, conquered, and plundered; they settled a colony on the shores of the Euxine; and carried into Greece a daughter of the king of Colchis, the celebrated Medea, a princess of Egyptian extraction, whose crimes and enchantments are condemned to eternal infamy in the immortal lines of Euripides."

Argonauts of St Nicholas, was the name of a military order instituted by Charles III, king of Naples, in the year 1382, for the advancement of navigation, or, as some say, merely for preserving amity among the nobles. They wore a collar of shells, enclosed in a silver crescent, whence hung a ship, with this device, Non credo temporis, "I do not trust time." Hence these Argonaut knights came to be called knights of the shell. They received the order of St Basil, archbishop of Naples; and held their assemblies in the church of St Nicholas, their patron.