Arcadia (ar-KAY-dee-uh). A mountainous region in central Greece; in romantic poetry, a pastoral idyll of shepherds and nymphs. Arcadia was appropriately the birthplace of the shepherd god Pan, whose mother was a nymph. It was also the location of the Stymphalian marsh, which was infested with man-eating birds that killed their prey with metallic feathers. Heracles dealt with these in the course of one of his Labors. The hero used noisemakers given him by Athena to make them take flight and his bow and arrows to bring them down.