XXX.  His friendship for Peirithous is said to have arisen in the following manner:  He had a great reputation for strength and courage; Peirithous, wishing to make trial of these, drove his cattle away from the plain of Marathon, and when he learned that Theseus was pursuing them, armed, he did not retire, but turned and faced him.  Each man then admiring the beauty and courage of his opponent, refrained from battle, and first Peirithous holding out his hand bade Theseus himself assess the damages of his raid upon the cattle, saying that he himself would willingly submit to whatever penalty the other might inflict.  Theseus thought no more of their quarrel, and invited him to become his friend and comrade; and they ratified their compact of friendship by an oath.  Hereupon, Peirithous, who was about to marry Deidameia, begged Theseus to come and visit his country and meet the Lapithae.  He also had invited the Centaurs to the banquet; and as they in their drunken insolence laid hands upon the women, the Lapithae attacked them.  Some of them they slew, and the rest they overcame, and afterwards, with the assistance of Theseus, banished from their country.  Herodorus, however, says that this is not how these events took place, but that the war was going on, and that Theseus went to help the Lapithae and while on his way thither first beheld Herakles, whom he made a point of visiting at Trachis, where he was resting after his labours and wanderings; and that they met with many compliments and much good feeling on both sides.  But one would more incline to those writers who tell us that they often met, and that Herakles was initiated by Theseus’s desire, and was also purified before initiation at his instance, which ceremony was necessary because of some reckless action.

XXXI.  Theseus was fifty years old, according to Hellanikus, when he carried off Helen, who was a mere child.  For this reason some who wish to clear him of this, the heaviest of all the charges against him, say that it was not he who carried off Helen, but that Idas and Lynkeus carried her off and deposited her in his keeping.  Afterwards the Twin Brethren came and demanded her back, but he would not give her up; or even it is said that Tyndareus himself handed her over to him, because he feared that Enarsphorus the son of Hippocoon would take her by force, she being only a child at the time.  But the most probable story and that which most writers agree in is the following:  The two friends, Theseus and Peirithous, came to Sparta, seized the maiden, who was dancing in the temple of Artemis Orthia, and carried her off.  As the pursuers followed no farther than Tegea, they felt no alarm, but leisurely travelled through Peloponnesus, and made a compact that whichever of them should win Helen by lot was to have her to wife, but must help the other to a marriage.  They cast lots on this understanding, and Theseus won.  As the maiden was not yet ripe for marriage he took her with him