a waterfall of Greece, descending from a lofty rock above the town of Nonacris, in the N.E. of Arcadia, and forming a stream that falls into the Crathis. The descriptions given by Homer and Hesiod of the water of the Styx agree with the natural features of this mountain-torrent; and Pausanias states that the passage in which Homer represents Juno as swearing by the Styx seems just as if the poet had the waterfall before his eye. The water was supposed by the Greeks to be poisonous, and to destroy everything that was thrown into it; and there was a report that Alexander the Great was poisoned by the water of the Styx. A similar belief has prevailed in the vicinity down to the present day. In Greek mythology, the Styx was represented as a river of hell, round which it flows nine times. The gods held its waters in such veneration, that to swear by them was reckoned an oath altogether inviolable. If any of the gods had broken this oath, Jupiter obliged them to drink the waters of the Styx, which lulled them for a whole year into a senseless stupidity. It is said that this veneration was shown to the Styx, because it received its name from the nymph Styx, who, with her three daughters, assisted Jupiter in his war against the Titans. Styx was a river which it was necessary for departed shades to pass before they could enter the infernal regions; and it was the office of Charon to ferry them over. Mythological writers have said that the Egyptians framed both this and some other fables relating to the dead, from certain customs peculiar to their country; that in particular there was, not far from Memphis, a famous burying-place, to which the dead bodies were conveyed in a boat across the Lake Acherusia; and that Charon was a boatman who had long officiated in that service.