Colchicum was known to the Greeks under the name of KoXXucov, from KoXXIs, or Colchis, a country in which the plant grew; and it is described by Dioscorides as a poison.
It was there that they placed the scene of the sufferings of Prometheus (vide Aeschylus, Prometheus Vinctus), and there, in the land of Colchis, which corresponds to the valley of the Rion, that they sent the Argonauts to fetch the golden fleece.
The commerce of Athens extended from Egypt and Colchis to Etruria and Carthage, and her manufactures, which attracted skilled operatives from many lands, found a ready sale all over the Mediterranean.
He knew the course to Colchis, and offered to tell it, if the Argonauts would free him from the Harpies.
Here they found and took on board the four sons of Phrixus who, after their father's death, had been sent by Aeetes, king of Colchis, to fetch the treasures of Orchomenus, but had been driven by a storm upon the island.
