E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Violet-crowned City.
Aristophns calls Athens oεo (Equits, 1323 and 1329), and again in the Acharnians, 637. Macaulay uses the phrase, “city of the violet crown.” Ion (a violet) was a representative king of Athens, whose four sons gave names to the four Athenian classes; and Greece in Asia Minor was called “Ion-ia.” Athens was the city of Ion, crowned king, and hence the “Ion crowned” or violet-crowned.
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Similarly Paris is called the “City of Lilies,” by a pun on the word Louis (lys, a lily).
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