Listed 64 sub titles with search on: History for wider area of: "ATTIKI Region GREECE" .
TRIZIN (Ancient city) GREECE
The league, however, did not acquire any great strength until B.C. 251, when Aratus united Sicyon, his native place, with it, and some years later also gained Corinth for it. Megara, Troezen, and Epidaurus soon followed their example. Afterwards Aratus prevailed upon all the more important towns of Peloponnesus to join the confederacy, and Megalopolis, Argos, Hermione, Phlius, and others were added to it. In a short time the league thus reached its highest power, for it embraced Athens, Aegina, Salamis, and the whole of Peloponnesus, with the exception of Sparta, Tegea, Orchomenus, Mantinea, and Elis.
THORIKOS (Ancient city) ATTICA, EAST
AEGINA, AIGINA (Island) GREECE
Aigina. A mountainous and volcanic island in the Saronic gulf, halfway
between Attica and the Peloponnesos. Its geographic position explains its importance
in the commerce between the Greek states and around the Mediterranean basin
from the most remote periods of history. The island had commercial relations
with the Cyclades, with the cities along the coast of Anatolia, and with Egypt.
Archaeological remains indicate that the most ancient inhabitants
of the island came from the Near East. The first settlement, however, must have
been the result of a migration by Peloponnesian peoples around the end of the
4th millennium B.C. Remains testify to uninterrupted occupation and to a definite
cultural unity with the centers of population in the Peloponnesos, as well as
close ties with the Cyclades and S Greece.
Two great periods about which little is known can be identified:
one ca. 2000 B.C. with the appearance of peoples who used Minoan ware, the other
ca. 1400 B.C. when another people, of Achaian stock, brought Mycenaean ware.
The historic period begins around 950 B.C., probably after a brief
abandonment by the population in the 12th-10th c. Classical sources indicate
that the colonizers probably came from the Peloponnese, perhaps from Epidauros
(Herod. 8.46; Paus. 2.29.9). During the 7th and 6th c. B.C., Aigina became a
maritime power of the first order. There is no evidence of strong land ownership,
unlike the mainland where feudal concentration could provoke serious social
disturbances. Aigina had a stable and developed mercantile aristocracy which
spread the fame of its products, particularly pottery and bronze ware, throughout
the Mediterranean basin. In this connection, it is significant that the oldest
system of weights in the Classical world was developed on Aigina between 656
and 650 B.C., and the spread of Aiginetan money shows clearly her absolute supremacy.
At the beginning of the 6th c. B.C., Athens began to oppose the
supremacy of Aigina, and Solon passed special laws to limit the spread of Aiginetan
commerce, thereby causing the island to ally itself first with Sparta, then
with Thebes, and finally with Persia to oppose the rising Athenian power. In
488 B.C. the Aiginetan navy routed the Athenian ships, but 30 years later Athens
defeated the combined naval forces of Aigina and of Corinth, and in the following
years forced the island to surrender. In 431 B.C. Athens expelled the last of
the native population and apportioned the land among Athenians. After the Pergamene
conquest the island enjoyed a new period of prosperity (210 B.C.).
The most important archaeological sites on the island are near Cape
Colonna (named for the remains of a single column of a temple), on Mt. St. Elia,
and in the area of Mesagro. In the zone of Cape Colonna, the most important
and the oldest area, the remains of the stereobate of the temple mentioned above
are still visible, as well as some pedimental decorations of Parian marble.
The building was constructed of a yellowish, shell-bearing limestone
(a local poros), with a portico of Doric columns (6 x 12). In front of the cella
was a pronaos and behind the cella an opisthodomos from which the surviving
column comes. The date of the temple must be 520-500 B.C. At a lower level traces
of an older temple were discovered, dating from between the end of the 8th and
the beginning of the 6th c. A semicircular antefix from this temple has been
preserved. The archaic temple was dedicated to Apollo (to whom some inscriptions
refer) or to Poseidon. In the Late Roman period the temple was destroyed and
replaced by a building of huge proportions, similar to a fortress. Its cistern
has been found between the temple and the sea.
There are remains, SE of the temple, of an archaic propylon with
reliefs on the walls and an altar in the center, dating from the 6th c. It was
probably the Aiakeion. North of the archaic temple are traces of two small naiskoi
and of a round structure which was probably the tomb of Phokos (Paus. 2.29.9).
Farther W is a Pergamene building, perhaps the Attaleion. At the foot of the
hill, to the E, are a theater and a stadium. The outer wall of this sacred area
is partially preserved.
Excavations on the slopes of Mt. St. Elia have brought to light
a Thessalian settlement of ca. the 13th c. B.C. The site was abandoned at the
same time as the destruction of the Late Mycenaean centers of the area and was
reoccupied in the Geometric period; it took on a monumental character only in
the Pergamene era. In the Byzantine period a sanctuary, resembling a monastery
in structure, was built on the mountain; its remains can still be seen. With
regard to Mesagro, there are some Mycenaean ex-voto offerings, the oldest indications
of a religious practice. Around the middle of the 7th c., when the thalassocracy
of Aigina developed, a primitive sanctuary was built. Its sacred precinct included
a small altar, of which there are a few remains, and perhaps a small structure
for the image of Aphaia (Paus. 3.14.2), a divinity worshiped on the island in
this period who had a priestly service.
In the 6th c., when the thalassocracy of Aigina had reached its
greatest development, the sanctuary underwent modifications of a more monumental
character. The first temple (distyle in antis with a cella of three naves and
an adyton in two sections) was built; a second altar was set behind the first;
to the S, the monumental entrance to the sanctuary was constructed with an appropriate
propylon. To this building phase (the second) we may attribute a large inscription
which refers to the construction of an oikos of Aphaia during the hiereia of
a Kleoita or of a Dreoita.
The great building phase (the third) came at the beginning of the
5th c. The temple was enlarged and reoriented and the sacred area was tripled.
A large ramp was built from the temple to the altar, which was also enlarged
and made more imposing by a double staircase. The new temple was built on a
krepidoma of three steps. It was hexastyle, distyle in antis, with twelve columns
on the side; the cella had three naves with a double colonnade of five columns;
the limestone of the walls was covered by fine stucco. The pediment was painted
and the roof had marble tiles on the more visible portions and terracotta tiles
elsewhere. The acroterion consisted of an architectural motif with palmettes
flanked by two female figures. The first propylon gave access to the sacred
area and a second led to an inner division, on the S, for the priests.
The identity of the divinity to whom the sanctuary was dedicated
has been much discussed. The sculptures on the front clearly refer to Athena,
but an important dedicatory inscription mentions the building of an oikos of
Aphaia, a divinity named on numerous other inscriptions cut into the rock. Probably
the temple was dedicated to Athena but the local populace, assimilating this
divinity to their own autochthonous Aphaia, continued to use the name of the
old goddess to whom the archaic temple must have belonged.
The most important sculptures from Aigina are those of the front
of the temple of Aphaia, discovered in 1811. Seventeen statues from the pedimental
decoration are now in the Munich Glyptothek; they represent the first European
contact with archaic Greek art. Ten fairly well-preserved statues come from
the W pediment and five in less good condition from the E pediment; numerous
fragments come from at least two other statues, but it is impossible to establish
their positions.
The subject on both pediments is nearly the same: the struggle between
the heroes of Aigina and Troy in the presence of Athena. Comparison of the two
pediments reveals stylistic differences which raise the problem of contemporaneous
or successive production. The figures on the E side appear freer and less exact
in superficial detail, and present a more mature study of masses and of volumes.
The so-called archaic smile, obvious on the W side, is no longer present on
the E. A different date for the two pediments has therefore been proposed by
many scholars, but cannot be established with certainty, given the poor preservation
of the figures from the E side. If one accepts different dates, the W pediment
was probably completed just before the Persian wars and the E pediment after
the battle of Marathon.
Recent restorations of the groups in the Munich Glyptothek, carried
out by Italian experts under supervision of the museum staff, have fundamentally
changed their external appearance. Both the groupings and the positions of individual
statues against the background of the pediments have been altered.
Fragments of a third pediment group, now in the National Museum
at Athens, seem to complicate the problem of style. These fragments show obvious
stylistic affinities with the sculptures of the W pediment, so that we may reasonably
suppose this third group to be the original decoration of the E side of the
temple of Aphaia which was replaced by the new decoration mentioned above. This
would explain the obvious superiority shown by the W pediment grouping compared
to the E side. The first pediment probably remained on view inside the sacred
precinct, where it suffered badly from the weather. It is impossible, however,
to substantiate this conjecture as to the problem of the differences in style
between the two pediments; the problem remains open to discussion.
B. Conticello, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Oct 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
An island in the Sinus Saronicus, near the coast of Argolis.
The earliest accounts given by the Greeks make it to have been originally uninhabited,
and to have been called, while in this state, by the name of Oenone; for such
is evidently the meaning of the fable, which states that Zeus, in order to gratify
Aeacus, who was alone there, changed a swarm of ants into men, and thus peopled
the island. It afterwards took the name of Aegina, from the daughter of the Asopus.
But, whoever may have been the earliest settlers on the island, it is evident
that its stony and unproductive soil must have driven them at an early period
to engage in maritime affairs. Hence they are said to have been the first who
coined money for the purpose of commerce, used regular measures, a tradition which,
though no doubt untrue, still points very clearly to their early commercial habits.
It is more than probable that their commercial relations caused the people of
Aegina to be increased by colonies from abroad, and Strabo expressly mentions
Cretans among the foreign inhabitants who had settled there. After the return
of the Heraclidae, this island received a Dorian colony from Epidaurus and from
this period the Dorians gradually gained the ascendency in it, until at last it
became entirely Doric, both in language and form of government. Aegina, for a
time, was the maritime rival of Athens, and the competition eventually terminated
in open hostilities, in which the Athenians were only able to obtain advantages
by the aid of the Corinthians, and by means of intestine divisions among their
opponents. When Darius sent deputies into Greece to demand earth and water, the
people of Aegina, partly from hatred towards the Athenians, and partly from a
wish to protect their extensive commerce along the coasts of the Persian monarchy,
gave these tokens of submission. For this conduct they were punished by the Spartans.
In the war with Xerxes, therefore, they sided with their countrymen, and acted
so brave a part in the battle of Salamis as to be able to contest the prize of
valour with the Athenians themselves, and to bear it off, as well by the universal
suffrages of the confederate Greeks as by the declaration of the Pythian oracle.
After the termination of the Persian war, however, the strength of Athens proved
too great for them. Their fleet of seventy sail was annihilated in a sea-fight
by Pericles, and many of the inhabitants were driven from the island, while the
remainder were reduced to the condition of tributaries. The fugitives settled
at Thyrea in Cynuria, under the protection of Sparta, and it was not until after
the battle of Aegos-Potamos, and the fall of Athens, that they were able to regain
possession of their native island. They never attained, however, to their former
prosperity.
The situation of Aegina made it subsequently a prize for each
succeeding conqueror, until at last it totally disappeared from history. In modern
times the island nearly retains its ancient name, being called Aegina or, with
a slight corruption, Engia, and is often visited by travellers, being beautiful,
fertile, and well cultivated. As far back as the time of Pausanias, the ancient
city would appear to have been in ruins. That writer makes mention of some temples
that were standing, and of the large theatre built after the model of that in
Epidaurus. The most remarkable remnant of antiquity which this island can boast
of at the present day is the Temple of Pallas Athene, situated on a mount of the
same name, about four hours' distance from the port, and which is supposed to
be one of the most ancient temples in Greece, and one of the oldest specimens
of the Doric style of architecture.
This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Aegina (Aigina: Eth. Aiginhetes, Aegineta, Aeginensis, fem. Aiginetis: Adj. Aiginaios,
Aiginetikhos, Aegineticus: Eghina), an island in the Saronic gulf, surrounded
by Attica, Megaris, and Epidaurus, from each of which it was distant about 100
stadia. (Strab. p. 375) It contains about 41 square English miles, and is said
by Strabo (l. c.) to be 180 stadia in circumference. In shape it is an irregular
triangle. Its western half consists of a plain, which, though [p. 33] stony, is
well cultivated with corn, but the remainder of the island is mountainous and
unproductive. A magnificent conical hill now called Mt. St. Elias, or Oros (oros,
i. e. the mountain), occupies the whole of the southern part of the island, and
is the most remarkable among the natural features of Aegina. There is another
mountain, much inferior in size, on the north-eastern side. It is surrounded by
numerous rocks and shallows, which render it difficult and hazardous of approach,
as Pausanias (ii. 29. § 6) has correctly observed.
Notwithstanding its small extent Aegina was one of the most celebrated
islands in Greece, both in the mythical and historical period. It is said to have
been originally called Oenone or Oenopia, and to have received the name of Aegina
from Aegina, the daughter of the river-god Asopus, who was carried to the island
by Zeus, and there bore him a son Aeacus. It was further related that at this
time Aegina was uninhabited, and that Zeus changed the ants (mnruekes) of the
island into men, the Myrmidones, over whom Aeacus ruled (Paus.ii. 29. §2.; Apollod.iii.
12. § 6; Ov. Met. vii. 472, seq.) Some modern writers suppose that this legend
contains a mythical account of the colonization of the island, and that the latter
received colonists from Phlius on the Asopus and from Phthia in Thessaly, the
seat of the Myrmidons. Aeacus was regarded as the tutelary deity of Aegina, but
his sons abandoned the island, Telamon going to Salamis, and Peleus to Phthia.
All that we can safely infer from these legends is that the original inhabitants
of Aegina were Achaeans. It was after-wards taken possession of by Dorians from
Epidaurus, who introduced into the island the Doric customs and dialect. (Herod.
viii. 46; Paus. ii. 29. § 5.) Together with Epidaurus and other cities on the
mainland it became subject to Pheidon, tyrant of Argos, about B.C. 748. It is
usually stated on the authority of Ephorus (Strab. p. 376), that silver money
was first coined in Aegina by Pheidon, and we know that the name of Aeginetan
was given to one of the two scales of weights and measures current throughout
Greece, the other being the Euboic. There seems, however, good reason for believing
with Mr. Grote that what Pheidon did was done in Argos and nowhere else; and that
the name of Aeginetan was given to his coinage and scale, not from the place where
they first originated, but from the people whose commercial activity tended to
make them most generally known. (Grote, Hist. of Greece, vol. ii. p. 432.) At
an early period Aegina became a place of great commercial importance, and gradually
acquired a powerful navy. As early as B.C. 563, in the reign of Amasis, the Aeginetans
established a footing for its merchants at Naucratis in Egypt, and there erected
a temple of Zeus. (Herod. ii. 178.) With the increase of power came the desire
of political independence; and they renounced the authority of the Epidaurians,
to whom they had hitherto been subject. (Herod. v. 83.) So powerful did they become
that about the year 500 they held the empire of the sea. According to the testimony
of Aristotle (Athen. p. 272), the island contained 470,000 slaves; but this number
is quite incredible, although we may admit that Aegina contained a great population.
At the time of their prosperity the Aeginetans founded various colonies, such
as Cydonia in Crete, and another in Umbria. (Strab. p. 376.) The government was
in the hands of an aristocracy. Its citizens became wealthy by commerce, and gave
great encouragement to the arts. In fact, for the half century before the Persian
wars and for a few years afterwards, Aegina was the chief seat of Greek art, and
gave its name to a school, the most eminent artists of which were Callon, Anaxagoras,
Glaucias, Simon, and Onatas, of whom an account is given in the Dict. of Biogr.
The Aeginetans were at the height of their power when the Thebans
applied to them for aid in their war against the Athenians about B.C. 505. Their
request was readily granted, since there had been an ancient feud between the
Aeginetans and Athenians. The Aeginetans sent their powerful fleet to ravage the
coast of Attica, and did great damage to the latter country, since the Athenians
had not yet any fleet to resist them. This war was continued with some interruptions
down to the invasion of Greece by Xerxes. (Herod. v.81, seq., vi. 86, seq.; Thuc.
i. 41.) The Aeginetans fought with 30 ships at the battle of Salamis (B.C. 480),
and were admitted to have distinguished themselves above all the other Greeks
by their bravery. (Herod. viii. 46, 93.) From this time their power declined.
In 460 the Athenians defeated them in a great naval battle, and laid siege to
their principal town, which after a long defence surrendered in 456. The Aeginetans
now became a part of the Athenian empire, and were compelled to destroy their
walls, deliver up their ships of war, and pay an annual tribute. (Thuc. i. 105,
108.) This humiliation of their ancient enemies did not, however, satisfy the
Athenians, who feared the proximity of such discontented subjects. Pericles was
accustomed to call Aegina the eye-sore of the Peiraeus (he lheue ton Peirhaieos,
Arist. Rhet. iii. 10.; comp. Cic. de Off. iii. 1. 1); and accordingly on the breaking
out of the Peloponnesian war in 431, the Athenians expelled the whole population
from the island, and filled their place with Athenian settlers. The expelled inhabitants
were settled by the Lacedaemonians at Thyrea. They were subsequently collected
by Lysander after the battle of Aegospotami (404), and restored to their own country,
but they never recovered their former state of prosperity. (Thuc. ii. 27; Plut.
Per. 34; Xen. Hell. ii. 2. 9; Strab. p. 375.) Sulpicius, in his celebrated letter
to Cicero, enumerates Aegina among the examples of fallen greatness (ad Fam. iv.
5).
The chief town in the island was also called Aegina, and was situated
on the north-western side. A description of the public buildings of the city is
given by Pausanias (ii. 29, 30). Of these the most important was the Aeaceium
(Aihakeion), or shrine of Aeacus, a quadrangular inclosure built of white marble,
in the most conspicuous part of the city. There was a theatre near the shore as
large as that of Epidaurus, behind it a stadium, and likewise numerous temples.
The city contained two harbours: the principal one was near the temple of Aphrodite;
the other, called the secret harbour, was near the theatre. The site of the ancient
city is marked by numerous remains, though consisting for the most part only of
foundations of walls and scattered blocks of stone. Near the shore are two Doric
columns of the most elegant form. To the S. of these columns is an oval port,
sheltered by two ancient moles, which leave only a narrow passage in the middle,
between the remains of towers, which stood on either side of the entrance. In
the same direction we find another oval port, twice as large as the former, the
entrance of which is protected in the same manner by ancient walls or moles, 15
or 20 feet thick. The latter of these ports seems to have been the large harbour,
[p. 34] and the former the secret harbour, mentioned by Pausanias. The walls of
the city are still traced through their whole extent on the land side. They were
about 10 feet thick, and constructed with towers at intervals not always equal.
There appear to have been three principal entrances.
On the hill in the north-eastern extremity of the island are the remains
of a magnificent temple of the Doric order, many of the columns of which are still
standing. It stood near the sea in a sequestered and lonely spot, commanding a
view of the Athenian coast and of the acropolis at Athens. The beautiful sculptures,
which occupied the tympana of the pediment, were discovered in 1811, buried under
the ruins of the temple. They are now preserved at Munich, and there are casts
from them in the British Museum. The subject of the eastern pediment appears to
be the expedition of the Aeacidae or Aeginetan heroes against Troy under the guidance
of Athena: that of the western probably represents the contest of the Greeks and
Trojans over the body of Patroclus. Till comparatively a late period it was considered
that this temple was that of Zeus Panhellenius, which Aeacus was said to have
dedicated to this god. (Paus. ii. 30. § § 3, 4.) But in 1826 Stackelberg, in his
work on the temple of Phigalia, started the hypothesis, that the temple, of which
we have been speaking, was in reality the temple of Athena, mentioned by Herodotus
(iii. 59); and that the temple of Zeus Panhellenius was situated on the lofty
mountain in the S. of the island. (Stackelberg, Der Apollotempel zu Bassae in
Arcadien, Rom, 1826.) This opinion has been adopted by several German writers,
and also by Dr. Wordsworth, but has been ably combated by Leake. It would require
more space than our limits will allow to enter into this controversy; and we must
therefore content ourselves with referring our readers, who wish for information
on the subject, to the works of Wordsworth and Leake quoted at the end of this
article. This temple was probably erected in the sixth century B.C., and apparently
before B.C. 563, since we have already seen that about this time the Aeginetans
built at Naucratis a temple to Zeus, which we may reasonably conclude was in imitation
of the great temple in their own island.
In the interior of the island was a town called Oea (Oie), at the
distance of 20 stadia from the city of Aegina. It contained statues of Damia and
Auxesia. (Herod. v. 83; Pans. ii. 30. § 4.) The position of Oea has not yet been
determined, but its name suggests a connection with Oenone, the ancient name of
the island. Hence it has been conjectured that it was originally the chief place
of the island, when safety required an inland situation for the capital, and when
the commerce and naval power which drew population to the maritime site had not
yet commenced. On this supposition Leake supposes that Oea occupied the site of
Palea--Khora, which has been the capital in modern times whenever safety has required
an inland situation. Pausanias (iii. 30. § 3) mentions a temple of Aphaea, situated
on the road to the temple of Zeus Panhellenius. The Heracleum, or temple of Hercules,
and Tripyrgia (Tripyrghia), apparently a mountain, at the distance of 17 stadia
from the former, are both mentioned by Xenophon (Hell. v. 1. § 10), but their
position is uncertain. (Dodwell, Tour through Greece, vol. i. p. 558, seq.; Leake,
Morea, vol. ii. p. 431, seq., Peloponnesiaca, p. 270, seq.; Wordsworth, Athens
and Attica, p. 262, seq.; Boblaye, Recherches Geographiques, p. 64; Prokesch,
Denkwurdigkeiten, vol. ii. p. 460, seq.; Muller, Aegineticorum Liber, Berol. 1817.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited June 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Ephorus says that silver was first coined in Aegina, by Pheidon; for the island, he adds, became a merchant center, since, on account of the poverty of the soil, the people employed themselves at sea as merchants, and hence, he adds, petty wares were called Aeginetan merchandise.
Aegina was apparently the first Greek city state to adopt coinage and its system of weights became one of the earliest standards for trade in the Greek historical period.
...Herodotus states that it was Pheidon, king of Argos, who regulated the measures
of the Peloponnese (Herod. vi. 127); and Ephorus, quoted by Strabo (viii. pp.
358 and 376), says that he struck nomisma to te allo kai to arguroun at the island
of Aegina. Certainly some of the earliest of the coins of Greece proper were the
electrum and silver money of Aegina, bearing the type of a tortoise. According
to Herodotus (vi. 127), Pheidon's son was one of the suitors of Agariste, daughter
of Cleisthenes of Sicyon. If this be true, his date must be brought down to that
of Cleisthenes, about 600-580 B.C.; and we agree with Unger, who has discussed
the whole question of the date of Pheidon in the Philologus (vols. 28, 29), that
there is good reason to believe that there was a Pheidon ruling in Argos at that
period. The testimony of Herodotus is too clear and explicit to be rejected. And
this king it must certainly have been who introduced coins into Greece. It is
contrary to all evidence to place that introduction at so early a period as the
eighth Olympiad.
Whether it was this Pheidon who also regulated the measures of the
Peloponnese may be considered more doubtful. That the same ruler regulated the
weights also is not stated by Herodotus, but is probable. That there was an earlier
Pheidon is proved by a mass of testimony; and the explicit statement of Pausanias
(vi. 22, 2) that he presided at the eighth Olympic festival appears too definite
to be disputed. The conjecture of Weissenborn, who wishes to substitute twenty-eighth
for eighth, is rightly rejected by Unger, and has indeed nothing in its favour,
besides being quite inconsistent with the testimony of Herodotus; and it may be
this earlier Pheidon who regulated Peloponnesian weights and measures.
In any case we may allow the truth of the tradition that
silver coin was first struck in Hellas proper in the island of Aegina. Of
this very primitive coinage we possess many specimens. Their type is a turtle,
the emblem of the Phoenician goddess of trade. One specimen in the British Museum
weighs 211 grains, but few weigh more than 200 grains. It is difficult to determine
whence the Aeginetans or Argives derived this standard, which is called the
Aeginetan. It is possible that it is merely a slightly degraded form of the
Phoenician. Argos had been from early times in constant commercial intercourse
with the Phoenicians, and long before the invention of coinage the Argives must
have been in the habit of using bars of metal of fixed weight. It is possible
that Pheidon, in regulating the weight of the Aeginetan stater, thought best
to adapt it to the Babylonic gold standard, which was already in use, as we
shall see, in some parts of Greece for silver. The Babylonic stater weighing
130 grains, he may have lowered the standard of Phoenicia (supposing that to
have been in use at Argos) so that his new staters should weigh 195 grains,
and two of them exchange for three of the Babylonic staters. Of late years attempts
have been made to deduce the Aeginetic mina from the water-weight of the cube
of the Olympic foot, and so to connect it with Hellenic systems of metrology.
These, however, are speculations; what is. certain is, that the scale of the
coins with the tortoise on them, a scale henceforward called Aeginetan, spread
with great rapidity over Greece. It was in the sixth century used everywhere
in Peloponnesus except at Corinth, and was the customary standard in the Cyclades;
in Thessaly, Boeotia, and the whole of Northern Greece, except Euboea; and some
parts of Macedon. Its weights are as follows:
Grammes.
Grains.
Talent 37,800
585,000
Mina 630
9,750
Stater (didrachm) 12.60
195
Drachm 6.30
97
Obol 1.05
16
This extract is from: A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890) (eds. William Smith, LLD, William Wayte, G. E. Marindin). Cited Aug 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
ASPROPYRGOS (Town) ATTIKI
West of the plain of Athens, and separated from it by the range of
Aigaleos, is the Thriasian plain with its most important ancient centers at Eleusis
at the W end of the Bay of Eleusis and at Thria. The position of the latter is
not precisely located. What indications there are, however, point to the neighborhood
of the modern town of Aspropyrgos, once the rural community of Chalyvia, set towards
the E end of the plain about 3 km from the shore. Here, sculpture and inscriptions--one,
IG II2 6266, a grave monument for a demesman of Thria--have been discovered in
the walls of the houses and chapels in the vicinity. Moreover, in antiquity the
road leading into the plain of Athens through the gap between Parnes and Aigaleos
passed nearby. Today the only obvious ancient remain is a rectangular grave plot
of Early Roman Imperial date. It is enclosed with large white marble blocks, one
of which is decorated with a sculptured wreath and supports a marble table inscribed
with the names of the deceased, Straton of the deme of Kydathenaion, his wife,
and son. The grave lies some distance S of Aspropyrgos, alongside the Athens-Eleusis
highway, a few m W of the junction between it and the road to Aspropyrgos.
C.W.J. Eliot, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
ATHENS (Ancient city) GREECE
Archon was the title of the chief magistrates in many Greek states. The wide diffusion
of the name is attested by a multitude of inscriptions. We find it in Boeotia
applied both to federal and city magistrates; at Delphi, where a long list of
archons is preserved, and other towns of Phocis; towns in Thessaly, with three
archons to each; in Locris, in many islands of the Aegaean, and in outlying cities
like Cyzicus and Olbia.
At Athens, according to tradition, royalty was abolished on the death
of Codrus, B.C. 1068, and his son Medon became the first archon for life. The
archonship remained hereditary in the line of Medon and twelve successors, and
must have been a slightly modified royalty under another name; but there is no
sufficient ground for the conjecture (presently to be noticed) that neither the
name nor the attributes of royalty underwent any change at all. The next step,
dated B.C. 752, was to limit the continuance of the office to ten years, still
confining it to the Medontidae, or house of Codrus, in whose family it was hereditary.
Seven decennial archons are reckoned, Charops, Aesimides, Cleidicus, Hippomenes,
Leocrates, Apsandrus, Eryxias; but only the four first of these were of the ancient
royal race. In 713 a further revolution threw open the chief magistracy to all
the Eupatridae. With Kreon, who succeeded Eryxias, the archonship was not only
made annual, but put into commission and distributed among nine persons. It is
from this date, B.C. 683, that trustworthy Athenian chronology begins; and these
nine archons annually changed continue throughout the historical period, interrupted
only by the few intervals of political disturbance and foreign domination.
The essentially legendary character of these accounts of early times
would seem to render any criticism of their details, from the historical point
of view, more or less unprofitable. The broad fact remains that at Athens, as
elsewhere in Greece, hereditary monarchy passed into a commonwealth which at the
dawn of authentic history was still in its oligarchic stage. But when we find,
in works of high authority, attempts to reconstruct the Athenian constitution
for the four centuries assumed between Codrus and the annual archons, some notice
of them seems demanded. It has been maintained, as the result of a critical inquiry,
that the monarchy existed at Athens, without essential modifications, until B.C.
752; the hereditary successors of Codrus had therefore, during three centuries,
the same powers as their illustrious ancestor. We must therefore briefly touch
upon the questions how far (1) the powers and (2) the name of royalty were really
affected by the change traditionally associated with the death of Codrus.
The received view is thus stated in an often-quoted passage of Pausanias
(iv. 5,10): The people first deprived the successors of Melanthus [the father
of Codrus], who were called Medontidae, of the greater part of their authority,
and changed the monarchy into a responsible government (archen hupeuthunon); they
afterwards further limited their government to ten years. On this M. Caillemer
raises the objection, that we know of no political body to whom the archons can
have been responsible. The answer is obvious, to the general body of the Eupatridae,
who were at this time and long afterwards the demos at Athens, the only fully
enfranchised citizens. Even in the Heroic age the royal power had its limits (epi
rhetois gerasi, Thucyd. i. 13); and when the halo of divinity which attached to
the name of basilus had disappeared with the change of title, the controlling
influence of the nobles was doubtless augmented. Probably, like the barons in
feudal monarchies and the Venetian nobles under the early doges, they at least
exercised the right of deposition. We can hardly, therefore, accept the assertion
that the powers of royalty were not limited ; the prestige of royalty had vanished,
though Athens, like other ancient republics, granted a large amount of arbitrary
authority, even in matters of life and death, to her chief magistrates. And as
regards the mere name, too much has been made of Plato's essentially rhetorical
and dramatic language (Menex. 238 D; Sympos. 208 D), and of the casual expressions
of a writer so late as Pausanias, who couples the phrase tous apo Melanthou basileusantas
with the statement that Theseus introduced the democracy! (i. 3, cf. vii. 2,1)
or the still later and more uncritical Aelian (V. H. v. 13, viii. 10). It is enough
to say with Westermann that the archons are some-times called by the Beiname,
familiar or nickname, of basileuontes. The single archon, whether perpetual or
decennial, of course discharged those priestly duties of the old kings which were
afterwards assigned to a subordinate member of the Nine, the second or king-archon;
and this circumstance is quite sufficient to account for the occasional use of
the name.
The nine annual archons during nearly the first century of their existence
were still chosen from the Eupatridae exclusively, and by show of hands (arche
hairete or cheirotonete). They still in reality stood at the head of the state
as the supreme magistracy, combining the chief administrative and judicial functions.
It is probable that a law of Draco (621) transferred the jurisdiction in cases
of homicide from the archons and court of Areiopagus to the Ephetae; but, with
this exception, the entire judicial system seems to have been in their hands.
At the time of Cylon's revolt (about 612) they still managed the greater part
of the public affairs (Thucyd. i. 126). This arrangement continued till the timocracy
established by Solon, who made the qualification for office depend not on birth,
but property, still retaining the election by suffrage. Two important changes
remained to be made, before we arrive at the developed democracy as it stood from
the age of Pericles to that of Demosthenes: the abolition of the property qualification,
and the election by lot. The date and authorship of the former of these changes
are matters of little doubt. Aristides, who had himself been archon in 489, the
year after Marathon, under the old rule as a pentakosiomedimnos (Plut. Asrist.
1), ten years later, when all classes of citizens had been drawn together in enthusiastic
resistance to the Persian invader, proposed and carried a law that the archonship
and other offices should be open to all Athenians without distinction (ib. 22).
The effect of this chance was less sweeping than at first sight appears. We must
remember that the Solonian constitution had reckoned only income from land, not
personal property, in classifying the citizens; and the actual effect of Aristides'
law was solely to get rid of the monopoly of these offices by the larger landed
proprietors, in favour of the trading classes and of capitalists in general. Besides,
the devastation of Attica by the Persian invader had compelled many who had hitherto
been rich to part with their lands, and had created a dangerous class of discontented
Eupatrids who were not only impoverished but saw their political rights diminished,
and were ready to conspire against the constitution (Plut. Arist. 13).
The question at what time the election by lot was introduced is both
difficult and obscure, owing to the conflict of ancient authorities; and recent
scholars have arrived at very different conclusions. The notion that this change
was due to Solon may be at once dismissed; it rests only on the loose statements
of orators, who flattered their hearers by ascribing all democratic legislation
to the great lawgiver (Demosth. c. Lept. 90; c. Androt. 30). And Aristotle expressly
states that Solon made no change in the halresis or mode of election, but only
in the qualification for office (Pol. ii. 12,3). The introduction of the lot is
ascribed to Cleisthenes by Westermann. Among those who have upheld a later date
are Niebuhr and Grote; some regarding it as anterior to the battle of Marathon,
others as connected with Aristides' admission of all classes to the office, and
therefore later than the battle of Plataea. In favour of the earlier date are
the statements of Herodotus that Callimachus, the polemarch at Marathon, was ho
toi kuamho lachon (vi. 109); and of Plutarch, who uses the same words of Aristides'
archonship in 489 (Plut. Arist. 1). But the dates of political changes were, as
has been seen, so speedily forgotten by the Athenians themselves that we cannot
be surprised if Herodotus, a foreigner, made a mistake on this point though writing
in the next generation; while Plutarch mentions that the historian Idomeneus (circ.
310-270) had stated that Aristides was elected by suffrage. We may grant to Schomann
that Plutarch had no doubt that the lot was the rule, and yet argue that Idomeneus
may have preserved a genuine tradition which Plutarch, who records it, did not
know how to explain. There is, we think, a strong case to be made out in favour
of the view of Lugebil and Caillemer (ubi supra), that this was one of the reforms
of Ephialtes, the friend of Pericles, about 461-458. We may be allowed to see,
though Herodotus did not, the absurdity of supposing that Callimachus, as an archon
appointed by lot, could have had equal authority with the ten generals; and the
fact that, in the early part of the century, the ablest Athenian statesmen--Themistocles,
Aristides, Xanthippus the father of Pericles--were all eponymous archons, while
afterwards neither Pericles himself nor any Athenian known to history enjoyed
that honour, may fairly be balanced against the testimony of uncritical writers,
however numerous. On the whole, this late date for the change may be accepted,
not as certain, but as by far the most probable.
The frequent occurrence at Athens of boards of ten men, one from each
tribe, and the tribal constitution of the senate of 500 and its prytanies, have
led to the suggestion that the nine archons also belonged each to a different
tribe. This conjecture of H. Sauppe's is approved by Schomann. The tenth tribe
may have been represented by the grammateus or secretary, as suggested by Telfy,
rather than by the hieromnemon, as Sauppe thought. There is evidence that the
grammateus was on some occasions associated with the archons as a tenth man, e.
g. in drawing lots for the dicasts among the tribes (Schol. Aristoph. Plut. 277
; Vesp. 772).
Still,, after the removal of the old restrictions, some security was
left to insure respectability; for, previously to an archon entering on office,
he underwent a double dokimasia (not, like other magistrates, a single one [DOKIMASIA])
before the senate and before a dicastery. Pollux calls this inquiry anakrisis:
but that word has another technical sense, and in the Orators we only find the
verb anakrinein (Dem. c. Eubul. 66,70; Deinarch. in Aristog. 17; Pollux, viii.
85). The archon was examined as to his being a legitimate and a good citizen,
a good son, and his having served in the army, and, it is added, being qualified
in point of property (ei to timema estin autoi, Poll.); but this latter condition,
if it existed at all after the time of Aristides, soon became obsolete. We read
in Lysias (Or. 24, pro Inval.13) that a needy old man, so poor as to receive a
state allowance, was not disqualified from being archon by his indigence, but
only by bodily infirmity ; freedom from all such defects being required for the
office, as it was in some respects of a sacred character. Yet, even after passing
a satisfactory dokimasia, each of the archons, in common with other magistrates,
was liable to be deposed, on complaint of misconduct made before the people, at
the first regular assembly in each prytany. On such an occasion, the epicheirotonia,
as it was called, took place; and we read (Dem. c. Theocrin.28; Pollux, viii.
95; Harpocrat. s. v. kuria ekklesia) that in one case the whole body of thesmothetai
was deprived of office for the misbehaviour of one of their body: they were, however,
reinstated, on promise of better conduct for the future.
We are enabled, by means of inscriptions, to trace the archonship
through the greater part of the Roman period. Athens as a libera civitas (eleuthera
kai autonomos) was freed from the duty of receiving a Roman garrison, and had
the administration of justice (jurisdictio) according to its own laws. But, as
with the consulate at Rome, the archonship now became merely honorary, and the
dignity of eponumos was given by way of compliment to distinguished foreigners,
like king Rhoemetalkes of Thrace and the emperor Hadrian. In these instances,
at least, it would seem that election by lot was no longer the rule.
With the growth of democracy, the archons gradually lost the great
political power which they had possessed as late as the time of Solon, perhaps
even of Cleisthenes. They became, in fact, not as of old, directors of the government,
but merely municipal magistrates, exercising functions and bearing titles which
we will proceed to describe.
It has been already stated that the duties of the single archon were
shared by a college of nine. The first or president of this body was called ho
archon, by way of pre-eminence; and in later times eponumos, from the year being
distinguished by and registered in his name. But this phrase, contrary to the
general opinion, did not come into use until after the Roman conquest. The second
was styled basileus, or the king-archon; the third, polemarchos, or commander-in-chief;
the remaining six, thesmothetai, or legislators. As regards the duties of the
archons, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish what belonged to them individually
and what collectively. It seems, however, that a considerable portion of the judicial
functions of the ancient kings devolved upon the Archon Eponymus, who was also
constituted a sort of state protector of those who were unable to defend themselves
(Lex ap. Dem. c. Macart. 75; Pollux, viii. 89). Thus he had to superintend orphans
and their estates, heiresses, families losing their representatives (oikoi hoi
exeremoumenoi), widows left pregnant, and to see that they were not wronged in
any way. Should any one do so, he was empowered to inflict a fine of a certain
amount, or to bring the parties to trial. Heiresses, indeed, seem to have been
under his peculiar care ; for we read (Lex ibid. 54) that he could compel the
next of kin either to marry a poor heiress himself, even though she were of a
lower class, or to portion her in marriage to another. Again we find (Lex ibid.
16; Pollux, viii. 62) that, when a person claimed an inheritance or heiress adjudged
to others, he summoned the party in possession before the archon-eponymus (epidikasia:
cf. HERES),
who brought the case into court, and made arrangements for trying the suit. We
must, however, bear in mind that this authority was only exercised in cases where
the parties were citizens, the polemarch having corresponding duties when the
heiress was an alien. It must also be understood that, except in very few cases,
the archons did not decide themselves, but merely brought the causes into court,
and cast lots for the dicasts who were to try the issue (Dem. c. Steph. ii.22,
23). Another duty of the archons was to receive informations against individuals
who had wronged heiresses, children who had maltreated their parents, and guardians
who had neglected or defrauded their wards [KAKOSIS].
The various modes of prosecution, by apagoge, ephegesis, endeixis, eisangelia,
or phasis, came as a rule before all the archons indiscriminately; but we find
the endeixis especially connected with the office of the thesmothetae (Dem. c.
Timocr. 23). The last office of the archon which we shall mention was of a sacred
character; we allude to his superintendence of the greater Dionysia and the Thargelia,
the latter celebrated in honour of Apollo and Artemis. (Pollux, viii. 89; cf.
Meier, Att. Process)
The functions of the basileus, or King Archon, were almost all connected
with religion: his distinguishing title shows that he was considered a representative
of the old kings in their capacity of high priest, as the Rex Sacrificulus was
at Rome. Thus he presided at the Lenaean or older Dionysia ; superintended the
mysteries and the games called lampadephoriai, and had to offer up sacrifices
and prayers in the Eleusinium, both at Athens and Eleusis. Moreover, indictments
for impiety, and controversies about the priesthood, were laid before him; and,
in cases of murder, he brought the trial into the court of the Areiopagus, and
voted with its members. His wife, also, who was called basilissa basilinna, had
to offer certain sacrifices, and therefore it was required that she should be
a citizen of pure blood, and not previously married. His court was held in what
was called he tou basileos stoa (Dem. c. Neaer. 74, 75; c. Androt. 27: Lysias,
c. Andoc. 4, where the duties are enumerated; Elmsley, Ad Aristoph. Acharn. 1143,
et Scholia; Harpocr. s. v. Epimeletes ton musterion: Plato, Euthyphr. ad init.
et Theaet. ad fin.; Pollux, viii. 90). The Polemarch was originally, as his name
denotes, the commander-in-chief (Herod. vi. 109, 111; Pollux, viii. 91); and we
find him discharging military duties as late as the battle of Marathon, in conjunction
with the ten strategol: he there took, like the kings of old, the command of the
right wing of the army. This, however, seems to be the last occasion on record
of this magistrate being invested with such important functions; and in after
ages we find that his duties ceased to be military, having been in a great measure
transferred to the protection and superintendence of the resident aliens, so that
he resembled in many respects the praetor peregrinus at Rome. In fact, we learn
from Aristotle, in his Constitution of Athens, that the polemarch stood in the
same relation to foreigners as the archon to citizens (Arist. ap. Harpocr. s.
v.; Pollux, viii. 91, 92). Thus, all actions affecting aliens, the isoteles and
proxeni, were brought before him previously to trial; as, for instance, the dike
aprostasiou against a metoikos, for living in Athens without a patron; so was
also the dike apostasiou against a slave who failed in his duty to the master
who had freed him. Moreover, it was the polemarch's duty to offer the yearly sacrifice
to Artemis, in commemoration of the vow made by Callimachus at Marathon, and to
arrange the funeral games in honour of those who fell in war. The functions of
the three first archons are very clearly distinguished in a passage of Demosthenes,
c. Lacr. 48. These three archons--the eponumos, basileus, and polemarchos--were
each allowed two assessors (paredroi) to assist them in the discharge of their
duties.
The Thesmothetae did not act singly, but formed a collegium (sunedrion,
Hyperid. pro Eux. col. 22). They appear to have been called legislators, because
in the absence of a written code they might be said to make laws (thesmoi, an
older word for nomoi), though in reality they only declared and explained them.
They were required to review, every year, the whole body of laws, that they might
detect any inconsistencies or superfluities, and discover whether any laws which
had been repealed were wrongly retained in the public records (Aeschin. c. Ctes.38,
39). Their report was submitted to the people, who referred the necessary alterations
to a jury of sworn dicasts impanelled for the purpose, and called nomothetai [NOMOTHETAE].
In the Athenian legal system the thesmothetae had a more extensive
jurisdiction than the three archons who, in point of dignity, enjoyed precedence
over them. It may be said, indeed, that all cases not specially reserved to other
magistrates came naturally before them. Their duties included the receiving of
informations, getting up cases as juges d'instruction, and presiding at the trial
before a jury (hegemonia dikasteriou). The following are instanced as being under
their jurisdiction: endeixis, eisangelia other than kakoseos (see above), probolai,
the Dokimasia of magistrates generally and the Euthynae of the Strategi; among
public causes, graphai agraphiou, agraphou metallou, adikiou, apateseos tou demou,
bouleuseos, dekasmou, doroxenias, doron, exagoges, hetaireseos, kataluseos tou
demou, moicheias, nomismatos diaphthoras, xenias, proagogeias, prodosias, sukophantias,
turannidos, hubreos, pseudengraphes, pseudokleteias: among private ones, dikai
ageorgiou, ameliou (an obscure case hardly to be distinguished from ageorgiou)
anagoges, arguriou, bebaioseos, blabes, engues, enoikiou, exoules, kakegorias,
klopes, parakatathekes, sumbolaion parabaseos, chreous: and finally, all dikai
emporikai, metallikai, eranikai, and dikai apo sumbolon. We also find, in the
Orators, informations laid before the thesmothetae in the following cases: For
breach of the law against cutting down olive-tress (Dem. c. Macart. § 71); conspiracy
to defeat the ends of justice (Dem. c. Steph. ii. 35 f.); if a foreigner married
a citizen, or a man gave in marriage as his own daughter the child of another,
or confined as an adulterer one who was not so (Dem. c. Neaer.17, 52, 66). If
a man banished for homicide returned without a legal pardon, the thesmothetae
might order him to summary execution (Dem. c. Aristocr. 31). The name thesmothetae
is sometimes applied to all the nine, and not merely to the six minor archons:
mostly, no doubt, in late inscriptions (C. L. G. 380) and grammarians (Arg. to
Dem. c. Androt.), but occasionally even in classical writers. For instance, in
Dem. c. Eubul. 66, the phrase tous thesmothetas anakrinete must be equivalent
to tous ennea archontas anakrinete in the concluding section of the speech. On
the other hand, the words archai and archontes are used in reference to magistrates
in general, not to the nine exclusively. Thus in Isaeus (Or. 1,Cleonymus, 14)
certain archontes are spoken of who (in 15) are shown to be the astunomoi.
In their collective capacity the archons also superintended to epicheirotonia
of the magistrates, held every prytany (eperotosin ei dokei kalos archein), and
brought to trial those whom the people deposed, if an action or indictment were
the consequence of it. Moreover, they attended jointly to the annual ballot for
the dicasts or jurymen, and presided in the assemblies for the election of strategi,
taxiarchs, hipparchs, and phylarchs (Pollux, viii. 87, 88; Harpocrat. s. v. katacheirotonia).
The places in which the archons exercised their judicial power were,
with the exception of that assigned to the Polemarch, without doubt all situated
in the market. That of the first archon was by the statues of the ten Eponymi;
that of the archon Basileus beside the so-called Bucolium, a building not otherwise
known, in the neighbourhood of the Prytaneum, or else in the so-called Hall of
the King; that of the Thesmothetae in the building called after them Thesmothesium,
in which they, and perhaps the whole nine, are said to have dined at the public
expense. The Polemarch had his office outside the walls, but quite close to the
city, adjoining the Lyceum. In their oath of office the archons promised faithfully
to observe the laws and to be incorruptible, and in the case of transgression
to consecrate at Delphi a golden statue of the same size as themselves (isometreton,
Plat. Phaedr. 235 D). Suidas improves upon this, making them three statues instead
of one, at Athens, Delphi, and Olympia (s. v. chruse eikon). The simplest explanation
of this absurdity is Schomann's, that it is an ancient formula used to denote
an impossible penalty, the non-payment of which of necessity entailed Atimia.
A few words will suffice for the privileges and honours of the archons.
The greatest of the former was the exemption from the trierarchies--a boon not
allowed even to the successors of Harmodius and Aristogeiton. As a mark of their
office, they wore a chaplet or crown of myrtle; and if any one struck or abused
one of the thesmothetae or the archon, when wearing this badge of office, he became
atimos, or infamous in the fullest extent, thereby losing his civic rights (Dem.
c. Lept. 28, c. Meid. 33; Pollux, viii. 86). The archons, at the close of their
year of service, when they had delivered their account and proved them-selves
free from blame, were admitted among the members of the Areiopagus. [AREIOPAGUS]
The Archon Eponymus being an annual magistrate at Athens, like the consul at Rome,
it is manifest that a correct list of the archons is an important element in the
determination of Athenian chronology. Now from Creon (B.C. 683), the first annual
archon, to Myrus (B.C. 499), we have the names of about thirty-four. From B.C.
495 to 292, Diodorus and Dionysius of Halicarnassus furnish an almost unbroken
succession for a period of nearly 200 years. After B.C. 292, about 166 names have
been recovered, mostly from inscriptions, and many of them undated, down to the
latest Roman period; the latest with a date being A.D. 485 (Meier, Index Archontum
eponymorum qui post Ol. cxxi. 2 eum magistratum obtinuerunt; Marin. Vit. Proc.
36).
(Appendix). Against the received tradition that the Medontidae, the early successors
of Codrus, held office for life, but without the title of king, the contention
of Lugebil and Caillemer that both the name and the attributes of royalty survived
almost unchanged, has now received important confirmation. In Ath. pol. c. 3 it
is stated that in the times before Draco the head of the state was styled basileus,
and ruled for life; next to him was a polemarchos, or commander-in-chief, who
indeed dates back to the period of the real kings; thirdly, an archon, or chief
civil magistrate. These two officers were probably elected for a term of years
by the Eupatrids, and formed an important check on the autocracy of the titular
king. Mr. Kenyon remarks: The abolition of the title of king as that of the chief
magistrate of the state probably took place when the decennial system was established.
The name was then retained only for sacrificial and similar reasons, and, to mark
the fact that the kingly rule was actually at an end, the magistrate bearing the
title was degraded to the second position, while the Archon, whose name naturally
suggested itself as the best substitute for that of king, was promoted to the
titular headship of the state.
Fresh light is also thrown on the question as to the time when the
election by lot was introduced. We find the following stages in the history of
the method of election to this office: (1) prior to Draco, the archons were nominated
by the Areopagus; (2) under the Draconian constitution they were elected by the
ecclesia; (3) under the Solonian constitution, so far as it was not disturbed
by internal troubles and revolutions, they were chosen by lot from forty candidates
selected by the four tribes; (4) under the constitution of Cleisthenes they were
directly elected by the people in the ecclesia; (5) after 487 B.C. they were appointed
by lot from 100 (or 500, see below) candidates selected by the ten tribes; (6)
at some later period the process of the lot was adopted also in the preliminary
selection by the tribes (Ath. pol. c. 22). As regards the number of candidates
selected under the arrangement of 487 B.C. the MS. here gives 500, but the writer
had previously stated (c. 8) that each tribe chose ten candidates, making a total
of 100. It is probable that for pentakosion (ph') we should read ekaton (r').
After the expulsion of Damasias, who in a two years' archonship (B.C.
582-1) tried to establish a tyranny, we have for one year the unprecedented number
of ten archons, of whom five were Eupatrids, three agroikoi = Geomori, and two
Demiurgi (c. 13). The conjecture that the tenth tribe, which did not elect an
archon, was compensated by having the appointment of the secretary (grammateus),
is stated as a fact (Ath. pol. c. 55).
The received account of the abolition of the property qualification
must also be modified. If, according to Plutarch's account, Aristides in 479 B.C.
widened the area of eligibility, he may at most have extended it from the pentakosiomedimnoi
to the hippeis. It is now definitely stated (Ath. pol. c. 26) that the zeugitai
first became eligible in 457 B.C., five years after the death of Ephialtes: which
shows incidentally that the murder of Ephialtes must have taken place immediately
after the triumph of his democratic legislation in 462. It is a further curious
fact, that the property qualification was never entirely abolished by law. The
thetikon telos or lowest class, was still in theory ineligible for any office,
but in the time of Aristotle a member of that class was allowed to represent himself
as a zeugites by a legal fiction (c. 7).
In the archons' oath we get a rational explanation of the chruse eikon
without the absurd addition isometretos. The archons and, it would seem, the diaetetae
also, swore that if they accepted bribes they would dedicate a golden image -presumably
of equal value to the amount received, though this is not explicitly stated. A
somewhat similar explanation is given by Thompson on Plat. Phaedr. 235 D (Ath.
pol. cc. 7, 54).
It has generally been held, as by Schomann, that all magistracies (archai in the
technical sense) were unpaid at Athens (cf. HYPERETES).
The treatise before us mentions, on the contrary, the pay of many public officers;
and there is reason to think that that of the archons was four obols a day, though
the passage (Ath. pol. c. 62) is mutilated and the words enn[ea archon]tes partly
conjectural.
The Athenian name for the supreme authority established on the abolition of royalty. On the death of the last king, Codrus, B.C. 1068, the headship of the state for life was bestowed on his son Medon and his descendants under the title of Archon. In B.C. 752 their term of office was reduced to ten years; in 714 their exclusive privilege was abolished, and the right to hold the office thrown open to all the nobility, while its duration was diminished to one year; finally in B.C. 683 the power was divided among nine Archons. By Solon's legislation his wealthiest class, the pentakosiomedimnoi, became eligible to the office; and by Aristides' arrangement after the Persian Wars, it was thrown open to the whole body of citizens, Clisthenes having previously, in the interests of the democracy, substituted the drawing of lots for election by vote . . .
This extract is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Demus (demos). A word which originally denoted a district or
country. Then, because in the early days the lower classes lived in the country
and the nobles in the city, it received the meaning of commons or common people.
A third use, likewise derived from the original signification, is seen in its
application to the local divisions, or townships as it were, of Attica.
A certain number of these demoi, or demes, were included in
each of the ten tribes established by Clisthenes to replace the four old Ionic
tribes. Their exact number at that time is not positively known, though it is
supposed by some, from a statement of Herodotus, to have been one hundred. In
the third century before Christ, at all events, they numbered one hundred and
seventyfour. The names of one hundred and forty-five of these are known to us
from inscriptions. If, however, we consider the division of some demes into kathuperthen
and hupenerthen, and of others between two different tribes, this sum is increased
to one hundred and fifty-six. The names were derived in part from places, as in
the case of Acharnae, Rhamnus, etc., and in part from the founders of the demes,
as in the case of Erchia and of Daedalidae. The largest deme, according to Thucydides,
was Acharnae, which in the Peloponnesian War was able to furnish three thousand
heavily armed troops.
At the time of his reforms Clisthenes admitted many resident
aliens and even slaves to citizenship, and to this fact is due that alteration
in the official designation of citizens which he also introduced. They were no
longer designated by the father's name only, but also by the name of the deme
to which they belonged. The demes now became the centres of the local administrative
power, and are said by Aristotle to have taken the place of the naucraries. Each
deme had its register of citizens, its own property, its own meetings and religious
observances, and its own demarch. This officer made out the lists of the deme's
property, kept in his possession the lexiarchic register, or register of qualified
citizens, and convened the demesmen at will (Harpocration, s. v. Demarchos). At
these meetings the public business of the deme was transacted, such as the leasing
of property, the election of officers, the revision of the lexiarchic register,
and the enrolment of new members.
When a man was first admitted to citizenship he had the right
to choose his own tribe and deme, but otherwise a man belonged to the same deme
as his natural or adoptive father. The legitimate children of citizens could be
enrolled on attaining their majority at the age of eighteen, and adopted children,
whenever presented by their adoptive fathers. The enrolment took place in the
presence of the assembled demesmen. If any member questioned the candidate's eligibility
the matter was settled by a majority vote of those presentIllegal registration,
however, was not uncommon, and certain demes, as Potamus for example, were notorious
for this abuse. To counteract this evil an official investigation of those inscribed
in the register, called diapsephisis (Harpocration, s. v. Diapsephisis), was held
at various times by the deme. A similar examination was also held if, by any chance,
the lexiarchic registers were lost or destroyed. If any one in the course of this
inquiry was disfranchised by vote of the demesmen, he had the right of appeal
to the courts. If the decision of the deme were sustained he was sold as a slave
and his property was confiscated. But were he successful in his suit his name
was restored to the register of the deme.
A man was not obliged to reside within the limits of the deme
of which he was a member. But he could only hold property in another deme upon
payment to the demarch of a tax, called enktetikon. This tax, however, was sometimes
remitted by the demes in the case of individuals to whom they desired to grant
special privileges or honours.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Nov 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
MEGARA (Ancient city) GREECE
Towards the end of the 11th c. BC Doric tribes from Argolis
settled in Megaris and
built the first villages. Much later, five villages merged to found Megara. The
oldest finds go back to the 8th c. BC, and the first border clashes with neighbouring
Corinth started at around
the end of the century. The first colony was founded in Sicily (Megara
Hyblaea, 728 BC) at about the same time, and this was followed by other colonies
in the next century in Propontis, the most important being Byzantium
(660 BC). Ca. 600 BC Megara came under the rule of the tyrant Theagenes. The expansion
of Athens in the 6th
c. BC created serious problems for the city, which resulted in the loss of Salamis
and Nisaea.
In the 2nd half of the same century Megara's prosperity, which arose
from its flourishing industry, stockfarming and trade generally, was also reflected
in its architecture with the construction of many public buildings. The important
figures in this period were the engineer Eupalinos and the poet Theognis, at this
time when severe social upheavals were occurring. During the Persian Wars Megarian
ships took part in the naval battle of Salamis and Megarian hoplites in the Battle
of Plataea. A few years
later a war between Megara and Corinth broke out (460 BC) and the Megarians were
forced to ally themselves with Athens.
The Megarian Decree (432 BC), which excluded Megarian ships from every commercial
harbour controlled by the Athenian state, was one of the causes of the Peloponnesian
War, in the course of which the Megarians suffered terrible hardships.
In the 4th c. BC, in spite of the fact that the city was occasionally
embroiled in wars and disputes with Corinth in 395 BC, with Athens over the sacred
earth (orgas) shortly before 350 BC and with Philip II in 339 BC, Megara followed
a pacific policy which contributed to the expansion of its economy. For the first
time the city struck its own silver coin with symbols Apollo's head and a lyre.
Along with the great building activity, public places and sanctuaries were embellished
with works by the the great sculptors of the period, as well as the philosopers
Eucleides and Stilpon of the Philosophical School of Megara, were active at this
time. The capture of the city by Demetrios Poliorcetes in 307 BC and the seizure
of its numerous slaves were a great blow to the economy. During the Hellenistic
period Megara entered the Achaean and Boeotian League, In 146 BC it was taken
by the Romans, who destroyed it in 45 BC. The 2nd c. AD brought a new period of
growth and prosperity, especially under the emperor Hadrian, when many public
works were carried out. Politically Megara belonged to Boeotia until 395 AD, when
it was definitely destroyed by the Goths. In the 2nd half of the same century
Megara's prosperity, which arose from its flourishing industry, stockfarming and
trade generally, was also reflected in its architecture with the construction
of many public buildings. The important figures in this period were the engineer
Eupalinos and the poet Theognis, at this time when severe social upheavals were
occurring. During the Persian Wars Megarian ships took part in the naval battle
of Salamis and Megarian hoplites in the Battle of Plataea. A few years later a
war between Megara and Corinth broke out (460 BC) and the Megarians were forced
to ally themselves with Athens. The Megarian Decree (432 BC), which excluded Megarian
ships from every commercial harbour controlled by the Athenian state, was one
of the causes of the Peloponnesian War, in the course of which the Megarians suffered
terrible hardships. In the 4th c. BC, in spite of the fact that the city was occasionally
embroiled in wars and disputes with Corinth in 395 BC, with Athens over the sacred
earth (orgas) shortly before 350 BC and with Philip II in 339 BC, Megara followed
a pacific policy which contributed to the expansion of its economy. For the first
time the city struck its own silver coin with symbols Apollo'd head and a lyre.
Along with the great building activity, public places and sanctuaries were embellished
with works by the the great sculptors of the period, as well as the philosopers
Eucleides and Stilpon of the Philosophical School of Megara, were active at this
time. The capture of the city by Demetrios Poliorcetes in 307 BC and the seizure
of its numerous slaves were a great blow to the economy.
During the Hellenistic period Megara entered the Achaean and Boeotian
League, In 146 BC it was taken by the Romans, who destroyed it in 45 BC. The 2nd
c. AD brought a new period of growth and prosperity, especially under the emperor
Hadrian, when many public works were carried out. Politically Megara belonged
to Boeotia until 395
AD, when it was definitely destroyed by the Goths.
PNYKA (Hill) ATHENS
Ecclesia. The assembly of the people, which in Greek cities had the power
of final decision in public affairs.
(1) At Athens every citizen in possession of full civic rights
was entitled to take part in it from his twentieth year upwards. In early times
one ecclesia met regularly once a year in each of the ten prytanies of the Senate;
in later times four, making forty annually. Special assemblies might also be called
on occasion. The place of meeting was in early times the marketplace, in later
times a special locality, called the Pnyx; but generally the theatre, after a
permanent theatre had been erected. To summon the assembly was the duty of the
Prytanes, who did so by publishing the notice of proceedings. There was a special
authority, a board of six Lexiarchi (lexiarchoi) with thirty assistants, whose
business it was to keep unauthorized persons out of the assembly. The members
on their appearance were each presented with a ticket, on exhibiting which, after
the conclusion of the meeting, they received a payment of an obolus (about three
cents), in later times of three obols. After a solemn prayer and sacrifice the
president (epistates) communicated to the meeting the subjects of discussion.
If there were a previous resolution of the Senate for discussion, he put the question
whether the people would adopt it or proceed to discuss it. In the debates every
citizen had the right of addressing the meeting, but no one could speak more than
once. Before doing so he put a crown of myrtle on his head. The president (but
no one else) had the right of interrupting a speaker. If his behaviour were unseemly,
the president could cut short his harangue, expel him from the rostrum and from
the meeting, and inflict upon him a fine not exceeding 500 drachmae ($83). Cases
of graver misconduct had to be referred to the Senate or Assembly for punishment.
Any citizen could move an amendment or counter-proposal, which he handed in writing
to the presiding prutaneia. The president had to decide whether it should be put
to vote. This could be prevented, not only by the mere declaration of the president
that it was illegal, but by any one present who bound himself on oath to prosecute
the proposer for illegality. The speaker might also retract his proposal. The
votes were taken by show of hands. The voting was never secret, unless the question
affected some one's personal interest, as in the case of ostracism. In such cases
a majority of at least 6000 votes was necessary. The resolution (psephisma) was
announced by the president, and a record of it taken, which was deposited in the
archives, and often publicly exhibited on tables of stone or bronze. After the
conclusion of business, the president, through his herald, dismissed the people.
If no final result was arrived at, or if the business was interrupted by a sign
from heaven, such as a storm or a shower of rain, the meeting was adjourned. Certain
classes of business were assigned to the ordinary assemblies.
The functions of the ecclesia were:
(a) To take part in legislation. At the first regular assembly
in the year the president asked the question whether the people thought any alteration
necessary in the existing laws. If the answer were in the affirmative, the proposals
for alteration were brought forward, and in the third regular assembly a legislative
commission was appointed from among the members of the Heliaea or jury for the
current year. The members of this commission were called nomothetai. The question
between the old laws and the new proposals was then decided by a quasi-judicial
process under the presidency of the thesmothetai, the proposers of the new law
appearing as prosecutors, and advocates, appointed by the people, coming forward
to defend the old one. If the verdict were in favour of the new law, the latter
had the same authority as a resolution of the ecclesia. The whole proceeding was
called "voting (epicheirotonia) upon the laws." In the decadence of
the democracy the custom grew up of bringing legislative proposals before the
people, and having them decided at any time that pleased the proposer.
(b) Election of officials. This only affected, of course, the
officials who were elected by show of hands, as the strategi and ministers of
finance, not those chosen by lot. In the first ecclesia of every prytany the archon
asked the question whether the existing ministers were to be allowed to remain
in office or not, and those who failed to commend themselves were deposed.
(c) The banishment of citizens by ostracism.
(d) Judicial functions in certain exceptional cases only. Sometimes,
if offences came to its knowledge, the people would appoint a special commission
of inquiry, or put the inquiry into the hands of the Areopagus or the Senate.
Offences committed against officials or against private individuals were also
at times brought before the assembly, to obtain from it a declaration that it
did, or did not, think the case one which called for a judicial process. Such
a declaration, though not binding on the judge, always carried with it a certain
influence. (e) In legal co-operation with the Senate the ecclesia had the final
decision in all matters affecting the supreme interests of the State, as war,
peace, alliances, treaties, the regulation of the army and navy, finance, loans,
tributes, duties, prohibition of exports or imports, the introduction of new religious
rites and festivals, the awarding of honours and rewards, and the conferring of
the citizenship.
This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
POROS (Island) GREECE
Poros was known in ancient times as Kalavria. Sferia, where the city
of Poros is situated today, was uninhabited. Neolithic findings have been
located on the Methana peninsula and in Poros near the Poseidon
sanctuary.
Kalavria was the sacred site, where Poseidon and Apatouria Athena
were worshipped and where the amphictiony (confederation of states) of Kalavria
was developed. In the particular amphictyony (alliance) participated the seven
most important city-states of the area: Athens,
Aegina, Epidaurus,
Hermione, Prasies,
Nauplion, Orchomenos
and enjoyed its acme from the last prehistoric years until the 5th century B.C.
However, the Poseidon
Temple continued to be a site of cult and inviolable asylum for fugitives.
The most famous of them, the orator Demosthenes, was opposed to the Macedonian
imperialism and tried to turn his compatriots against Alexander the Great. When
Athens was dominated by the
Macedonians, he was accused of misappropriation and not being able to pay the
fine, he escaped to Aegina
and from there he continued his opposition. He was then sentenced to death, and
took refuge to the sanctuary
of Poseidon in Poros, but his opponents discovered him and he committed suicide
poisoning himself.
This text (extract) is cited December 2003 from the Galata
& Poros Rented Apts & Rooms Association tourist pamphlet.
Island in the Saronic Gulf to the NE of Troizen. It was known as Kalauria (Strab. 8.6.14) and Kalaureia (Apoll. Rhod. III 1243) in antiquity. Chanddler (Voy. As. Mm. Grece I 228) identified Poros as Kalauria. The ancient city was located at the highest part of Poros. At first it was independent, with a high magistrate called tamias but later came under the dominion of Troizen. The area was inhabited from the Early Helladic period. The city preserves sections of the Hellenistic walls, a contemporary stoa and an unidentified heroon that lie at the agora. The harbor of the city was named Pogon. A street led from it to the Temple of Poseidon through a propylon. The cult on the area dates to the beginning of the 8th c. B.C. The temple, enclosed in a peribolos, is a Doric peripteros (6 x 12 columns) and dates to ca. 520 B.C. Between the temple and the propylon there were three stoas dating in the 4th c. B.C. and a fourth dating ca. 420 B.C. Another long stoa and a rectangular building lie SW of the hieron. The latter has been associated with the convention of the maritime amphictyony of Kalauria (Strab. 8.6.14). The tomb of Demosthenes, who poisoned himself at the sanctuary in 332 B.C., was still preserved in the time of Pausanias (2.33.3).
D. Schilardi, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains 12 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
The modern Poro; a small island in the Saronic Gulf off the coast of Argolis and opposite Troezen, possessing a celebrated Temple of Poseidon, which was regarded as an inviolable asylum. Hither Demosthenes fled to escape Antipater, and here he took poison, B.C. 322. His tomb was one of the sights of the island.
This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Now Poros; an island off the coast of Troezen, in Argolis, and between it and the island of Calauria.
Troezen is sacred to Poseidon, after whom it was once called Poseidonia. It is situated fifteen stadia above the sea, and it too is an important city. Off its harbor, Pogon by name, lies Calauria, an isle with a circuit of about one hundred and thirty stadia. Here was an asylum sacred to Poseidon; and they say that this god made an exchange with Leto, giving her Delos for Calauria, and also with Apollo, giving him Pytho for Taenarum. And Ephorus goes on to tell the oracle: "For thee it is the same thing to possess Delos or Calauria, most holy Pytho or windy Taenarum." And there was also a kind of Amphictyonic League connected with this temple, a league of seven cities which shared in the sacrifice; they were Hermion, Epidaurus, Aegina, Athens, Prasieis, Nauplieis, and Orchomenus Minyeius; however, the Argives paid dues for the Nauplians, and the Lacedaemonians for the Prasians. The worship of this god was so prevalent among the Greeks that even the Macedonians, whose power already extended as far as the temple, in a way preserved its inviolability, and were afraid to drag away the suppliants who fled for refuge to Calauria; indeed Archias, with soldiers, did not venture to do violence even to Demosthenes, although he had been ordered by Antipater to bring him alive, both him and all the other orators he could find that were under similar charges, but tried to persuade him; he could not persuade him, however, and Demosthenes forestalled him by suiciding with poison. Now Troezen and Pittheus, the sons of Pelops, came originally from Pisatis; and the former left behind him the city which was named after him, and the latter succeeded him and reigned as king. But Anthes, who previously had possession of the place, set sail and founded Halicarnassus; but concerning this I shall speak in my description of Caria and Troy.
This extract is from: The Geography of Strabo (ed. H. L. Jones, 1924), Cambridge. Harvard University Press. Cited Oct 2003 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains comments & interesting hyperlinks.
THORIKOS (Ancient city) ATTICA, EAST
Situated on the E coast about 10 km N of Sounion, it was one of
the 12 independent cities of this area said to have been unified by Theseus
under Athenian hegemony (Strab. 9.1.20). In the later years of the Peloponnesian
War it was fortified (Xen. Hell. 1.2.1) in order to protect the sea route to
Athens and to help protect the silver mines at Laurion. Under the Romans it
fell into decay, but its earliest habitation remains, dating from the Neolithic
period, and numerous tomb groups indicate that it had a long and continuous
history up to this time.
The site consists of three areas: the plain of Thorikos where the
Society of the Dilettanti in 1812 uncovered part of an ancient building, now
no longer visible, the hill of Velatouri where the majority of ancient remains
have been found, and the peninsula of Haghios Nikalaos, now the site of a modern
chemical plant.
The ancient theater, located on the S slope of Velatouri and excavated
in 1886, is notable for the irregular shape of its orchestra. It was originally
thought that the roughly rectangular orchestra reflected the early date of the
theater. Further study, however, suggests that the theater was primarily constructed
in the 5th c. B.C., and that its irregular orchestra reflects the gradual enlargement
of the theater's seating capacity. It would appear that the original stone seats,
made of local bluish stone, consisted of 19 straight rows. These were later
expanded by the addition of curved sections to E and W, and still later in the
4th c. a curved section of 12 new rows was added to the N. Scanty remains of
a temple can be seen to the W of the orchestra; an altar lies to the E. Along
the S side lies a terrace wall built to support the orchestra; this wall appears
to be the oldest surviving architectural feature of the theater.
On the hill above the theater, excavations have uncovered remains
of the city's industrial quarter. Here traces of houses, stairs, and roads can
be seen. A series of basins connected by channels formed part of a metal-working
establishment. Nearby a Mycenaean tholos tomb, graves from various periods,
and parts of a prehistoric settlement, including a Mycenaean metal-working establishment,
have been uncovered.
Fortifications consisting of over 600 m of walls can be traced
on the peninsula; at least six towers, four stairways, and seven gateways were
included in this fortification system.
I. M. Shear, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Sep 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains 33 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
Thorikos: Eth, Thorikios: Theriko. A town of Attica on the SE. coast,
and about 7 or 8 miles N. of the promontory of Sunium, was originally one of the
twelve cities into which Attica is said to have been divided before the time of
Theseus, and was afterwards a demus belonging to the tribe Acamantis. (Strab.
ix. p. 397.) It continued to be a place of importance during the flourishing period
of Athenian history, as its existing remains prove, and was hence fortified by
the Athenians in the 24th year of the Peloponnesian War. (Xen. Hell. i. 2. 1)
It was distant 60 stadia from Anaphlystus upon the western coast. (Xen. de Vect.
4 § 43.) Thoricus is celebrated in mythology as the residence of Cephalus, whom
Eos or Aurora carried off to dwell with the gods. (Apollod. ii. 4. § 7; Eurip.
Hippol. 455.) It has been conjectured by Wordsworth, with much probability, that
the idea of Thoricus was associated in the Athenian mind with such a translation
to the gods, and that the Thlorician stone (Thorikios petros) mentioned by Sophocles
(Oed. Col. 1595), respecting which there has been so much doubt, probably has
reference to such a miglration, as the poet is describing a similar translation
of Oedipus.
The fortifications of Thoricus surrounded a small plain, which terminates
in the harbour of the city, now called Porto Mandri. The ruins of the walls may
be traced following the crest of the hills on the northern and southern sides
of the plain, and crossing it on the west. The acropolis seems to have stood upon
a height rising above the sheltered creek of Frasngo Limiona, which is separated
only by a cape from Porto Mandri. Below this height, on the northern side, are
the ruins of a theatre, of a singular form, being an irregular curve, with one
of the sides longer than the other. In the plain, to the westward, are the remains
of a quadrangular colonnade, with Doric columns.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited June 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
MARATHON (Ancient demos) ATTICA, EAST
The Persian was going about
his own business, for his servant was constantly reminding him to remember the
Athenians (1) and the Pisistratidae were at his elbow maligning
the Athenians; moreover, Darius desired to take this pretext for subduing all
the men of Hellas who had
not given him earth and water. He dismissed from command Mardonius, who had fared
so badly on his expedition, and appointed other generals to lead his armies against
Athens and Eretria,
Datis, a Mede by birth, and his own nephew Artaphrenes son of Artaphrenes; the
order he gave them at their departure was to enslave Athens and Eretria and bring
the slaves into his presence.(2)
When these appointed generals on their way from the king
reached the Aleian plain in Cilicia,
bringing with them a great and well-furnished army, they camped there and were
overtaken by all the fleet that was assigned to each; there also arrived the transports
for horses, which in the previous year Darius had bidden his tributary subjects
to make ready. Having loaded the horses into these, and embarked the land army
in the ships, they sailed to Ionia with six hundred triremes. From there they
held their course not by the mainland and straight towards the Hellespont
and Thrace, but setting forth
from Samos they sailed by
the Icarian sea and from
island to island; this, to my thinking, was because they feared above all the
voyage around Athos, seeing that in the previous year they had come to great disaster
by holding their course that way; moreover, Naxos
was still unconquered and constrained them.
When they approached Naxos from the Icarian sea and came to land
(for it was Naxos which the Persians intended to attack first), the Naxians,
remembering what had happened before,(3) fled away to the mountains
instead of waiting for them. The Persians enslaved all of them that they caught,
and burnt their temples and their city. After doing this, they set sail for
the other islands.
While they did this, the Delians also left Delos
and fled away to Tenos. As
his expedition was sailing landwards, Datis went on ahead and bade his fleet anchor
not off Delos, but across the water off Rhenaea.
Learning where the Delians were, he sent a herald to them with this proclamation:
"Holy men, why have you fled away, and so misjudged my intent? It is my own
desire, and the king's command to me, to do no harm to the land where the two
gods1 were born, neither to the land itself nor to its inhabitants. So return
now to your homes and dwell on your island." He made this proclamation to
the Delians, and then piled up three hundred talents of frankincense on the altar
and burnt it.
After doing this, Datis sailed with his army against Eretria first,
taking with him Ionians and Aeolians; and after he had put out from there, Delos
was shaken by an earthquake, the first and last, as the Delians say, before
my time. This portent was sent by heaven, as I suppose, to be an omen of the
ills that were coming on the world. For in three generations, that is, in the
time of Darius son of Hystaspes and Xerxes son of Darius and Artaxerxes son
of Xerxes, more ills happened to Hellas than in twenty generations before Darius;
some coming from the Persians, some from the wars for preeminence among the
chief of the nations themselves. Thus it was no marvel that there should be
an earthquake in Delos when there had been none before. Also there was an oracle
concerning Delos, where it was written:
"I will shake Delos, though unshaken before."
In the Greek language these names have the following meanings: Darius is the
Doer, Xerxes the Warrior, Artaxerxes the Great Warrior. The Greeks would rightly
call the kings thus in their language.
Launching out to sea from Delos, the foreigners put in at the islands
and gathered an army from there, taking the sons of the islanders for hostages.
When in their voyage about the islands they put in at Carystos,
the Carystians gave them no hostages and refused to join them against neighboring
cities, meaning Eretria and Athens; the Persians besieged them and laid waste
their land, until the Carystians too came over to their side.(4)
When the Eretrians learned that the Persian expedition was
sailing to attack them, they asked for help from the Athenians. The Athenians
did not refuse the aid, but gave them for defenders the four thousand tenant farmers
who held the land of the Chalcidian horse-breeders.(5) But it
seems that all the plans of the Eretrians were unsound; they sent to the Athenians
for aid, but their counsels were divided. Some of them planned to leave the city
and make for the heights of Euboea;
others plotted treason in hope of winning advantages from the Persians. When Aeschines
son of Nothon, a leading man in Eretria, learned of both designs, he told the
Athenians who had come how matters stood, and asked them to depart to their own
country so they would not perish like the rest. The Athenians followed Aeschines'
advice.(6)
So they saved themselves by crossing over to Oropus;
the Persians sailed holding their course for Temenos and Choereae
and Aegilea, all in Eretrian territory. Landing at these places, they immediately
unloaded their horses and made preparation to attack their enemies. The Eretrians
had no intention of coming out and fighting; all their care was to guard their
walls if they could, since it was the prevailing counsel not to leave the city.
The walls were strongly attacked, and for six days many fell on both sides; but
on the seventh two Eretrians of repute, Euphorbus son of Alcimachus and Philagrus
son of Cineas, betrayed the city to the Persians. They entered the city and plundered
and burnt the temples, in revenge for the temples that were burnt at Sardis;
moreover, they enslaved the townspeople, according to Darius' command.
After subduing Eretria, the Persians waited a few days and
then sailed away to the land of Attica,
pressing ahead in expectation of doing to the Athenians exactly what they had
done to the Eretrians. Marathon was the place in Attica most suitable for riding
horses and closest to Eretria, so Hippias son of Pisistratus led them there.
When the Athenians learned this, they too marched out to Marathon,
with ten generals leading them. The tenth(7) was Miltiades,
and it had befallen his father Cimon son of Stesagoras to be banished from Athens
by Pisistratus son of Hippocrates. While in exile he happened to take the Olympic
prize in the four-horse chariot, and by taking this victory he won the same
prize as his half-brother Miltiades. At the next Olympic games he won with the
same horses but permitted Pisistratus to be proclaimed victor, and by resigning
the victory to him he came back from exile to his own property under truce.
After taking yet another Olympic prize with the same horses, he happened to
be murdered by Pisistratus' sons, since Pisistratus was no longer living. They
murdered him by placing men in ambush at night near the town-hall. Cimon was
buried in front of the city, across the road called "Through the Hollow",
and buried opposite him are the mares who won the three Olympic prizes. The
mares of Evagoras the Laconian did the same as these, but none others. Stesagoras,
the elder of Cimon's sons, was then being brought up with his uncle Miltiades
in the Chersonese. The younger was with Cimon at Athens, and he took the name
Miltiades from Miltiades the founder of the Chersonese.
It was this Miltiades who was now the Athenian general, after coming
from the Chersonese
and escaping a two-fold death. The Phoenicians pursued him as far as Imbros,
considering it of great importance to catch him and bring him to the king. He
escaped from them, but when he reached his own country and thought he was safe,
then his enemies(8) met him. They brought him to court and prosecuted
him for tyranny in the Chersonese, but he was acquitted and appointed Athenian
general, chosen by the people(9).
While still in the city, the generals first sent to Sparta(10)
the herald Philippides, an Athenian and a long-distance runner who made
that his calling. As Philippides himself said when he brought the message to the
Athenians, when he was in the Parthenian
mountain above Tegea
he encountered Pan. Pan called out Philippides' name and bade him ask the Athenians
why they paid him no attention, though he was of goodwill to the Athenians, had
often been of service to them, and would be in the future. The Athenians believed
that these things were true, and when they became prosperous they established
a sacred precinct of Pan beneath the Acropolis.
Ever since that message they propitiate him with annual sacrifices and a torch-race(11).(see
Spartathlon)
This Philippides was in Sparta on the day after leaving the city
of Athens(12), that time when he was sent by the generals and
said that Pan had appeared to him. He came to the magistrates and said, "Lacedaemonians,
the Athenians ask you to come to their aid and not allow the most ancient city
among the Hellenes to fall into slavery at the hands of the foreigners. Even
now Eretria has been enslaved, and Hellas has become weaker by an important
city." He told them what he had been ordered to say, and they resolved
to send help to the Athenians, but they could not do this immediately, for they
were unwilling to break the law. It was the ninth day of the rising month, and
they said that on the ninth they could not go out to war until the moon's circle
was full.(13)
So they waited for the full moon(14), while the foreigners
were guided to Marathon by Hippias son of Pisistratus. The previous night Hippias
had a dream in which he slept with his mother. He supposed from the dream that
he would return from exile to Athens, recover his rule, and end his days an old
man in his own country. Thus he reckoned from the dream. Then as guide he unloaded
the slaves from Eretria onto the island of the Styrians
called Aegilia, and brought to anchor the ships that had put ashore at Marathon,
then marshalled the foreigners who had disembarked onto land. As he was tending
to this, he happened to sneeze and cough more violently than usual. Since he was
an elderly man, most of his teeth were loose, and he lost one of them by the force
of his cough. It fell into the sand and he expended much effort in looking for
it, but the tooth could not be found. He groaned aloud and said to those standing
by him: "This land is not ours and we will not be able to subdue it. My tooth
holds whatever share of it was mine."
Hippias supposed that the dream had in this way come true. As the
Athenians were marshalled in the precinct of Heracles, the Plataeans
came to help them in full force. The Plataeans had put themselves under the protection
of the Athenians, and the Athenians had undergone many labors on their behalf.
This is how they did it: when the Plataeans were pressed by the Thebans,
they first tried to put themselves under the protection of Cleomenes son of Anaxandrides
and the Lacedaemonians, who happened to be there. But they did not accept them,
saying, "We live too far away, and our help would be cold comfort to you.
You could be enslaved many times over before any of us heard about it. We advise
you to put yourselves under the protection of the Athenians, since they are your
neighbors and not bad men at giving help." The Lacedaemonians gave this advice
not so much out of goodwill toward the Plataeans as wishing to cause trouble for
the Athenians with the Boeotians.
So the Lacedaemonians gave this advice to the Plataeans, who did not disobey it.
When the Athenians were making sacrifices to the twelve gods, they sat at the
altar(15) as suppliants and put themselves under protection.
When the Thebans heard this, they marched against the Plataeans, but the Athenians
came to their aid. As they were about to join battle, the Corinthians,
who happened to be there, prevented them and brought about a reconciliation. Since
both sides desired them to arbitrate, they fixed the boundaries of the country
on condition that the Thebans leave alone those Boeotians who were unwilling to
be enrolled as Boeotian. After rendering this decision, the Corinthians departed.
The Boeotians attacked the Athenians as they were leaving but were defeated in
battle. The Athenians went beyond the boundaries the Corinthians had made for
the Plataeans, fixing the Asopus
river as the boundary for the Thebans in the direction of Plataea
and Hysiae. So the Plataeans
had put themselves under the protection of the Athenians in the aforesaid manner,
and now came to help at Marathon.
The Athenian generals were of divided opinion, some advocating not
fighting because they were too few to attack the army of the Medes; others,
including Miltiades, advocating fighting. Thus they were at odds, and the inferior
plan prevailed. An eleventh man had a vote, chosen by lot to be polemarch of
Athens, and by ancient custom the Athenians had made his vote of equal weight
with the generals. Callimachus of Aphidnae was polemarch at this time. Miltiades
approached him and said, "Callimachus, it is now in your hands to enslave
Athens or make her free, and thereby leave behind for all posterity a memorial
such as not even Harmodius and Aristogeiton left. Now the Athenians have come
to their greatest danger since they first came into being, and, if we surrender,
it is clear what we will suffer when handed over to Hippias. But if the city
prevails, it will take first place among Hellenic cities. I will tell you how
this can happen, and how the deciding voice on these matters has devolved upon
you. The ten generals are of divided opinion, some urging to attack, others
urging not to. If we do not attack now, I expect that great strife will fall
upon and shake the spirit of the Athenians, leading them to medize. But if we
attack now, before anything unsound corrupts the Athenians, we can win the battle,
if the gods are fair. All this concerns and depends on you in this way: if you
vote with me, your country will be free and your city the first in Hellas. But
if you side with those eager to avoid battle, you will have the opposite to
all the good things I enumerated."
By saying this Miltiades won over Callimachus. The polemarch's vote
was counted in, and the decision to attack was resolved upon. Thereafter the
generals who had voted to fight turned the presidency over to Miltiades as each
one's day came in turn. He accepted the office but did not make an attack until
it was his own day to preside.
When the presidency came round to him, he arrayed the Athenians
for battle, with the polemarch Callimachus commanding the right wing, since
it was then the Athenian custom for the polemarch to hold the right wing(16).
He led, and the other tribes were numbered out in succession next to each other.(17)
The Plataeans were marshalled last, holding the left wing. Ever since
that battle, when the Athenians are conducting sacrifices at the festivals every
fourth year (18), the Athenian herald prays for good things
for the Athenians and Plataeans together. As the Athenians were marshalled at
Marathon, it happened that their line of battle was as long as the line of the
Medes. The center, where the line was weakest, was only a few ranks deep, but
each wing was strong in numbers.(19)
When they had been set in order and the sacrifices were favorable,
the Athenians were sent forth and charged the foreigners at a run. The space
between the armies was no less than eight stadia. The Persians saw them running
to attack and prepared to receive them, thinking the Athenians absolutely crazy,
since they saw how few of them there were and that they ran up so fast without
either cavalry or archers.(20) So the foreigners imagined,
but when the Athenians all together fell upon the foreigners they fought in
a way worthy of record. These are the first Hellenes whom we know of to use
running against the enemy(21). They are also the first to endure
looking at Median dress and men wearing it, for up until then just hearing the
name of the Medes caused the Hellenes to panic.(22)
They fought a long time at Marathon. In the center of the line the
foreigners prevailed, where the Persians and Sacae (see Scythia)
were arrayed.(23) The foreigners prevailed there and broke through
in pursuit inland, but on each wing the Athenians and Plataeans prevailed. In
victory they let the routed foreigners flee, and brought the wings together to
fight those who had broken through the center. The Athenians prevailed, then followed
the fleeing Persians and struck them down. When they reached the sea they demanded
fire and laid hold of the Persian ships.
In this labor Callimachus the polemarch was slain, a brave man,
and of the generals Stesilaus son of Thrasylaus died. Cynegirus son of Euphorion
fell there, his hand cut off with an ax as he grabbed a ship's figurehead. Many
other famous Athenians also fell there.(24)
In this way the Athenians overpowered seven ships. The foreigners
pushed off with the rest, picked up the Eretrian slaves from the island where
they had left them, and sailed around Sunium
hoping to reach the city before the Athenians. There was an accusation at Athens
that they devised this by a plan of the Alcmaeonidae, who were said to have arranged
to hold up a shield as a signal once the Persians were in their ships.
They sailed around Sunium, but the Athenians marched back to defend
the city as fast as their feet could carry them and got there ahead of the foreigners.
Coming from the sacred precinct of Heracles in Marathon, they pitched camp in
the sacred precinct of Heracles in Cynosarges.
The foreigners lay at anchor off Phalerum,
the Athenian naval port at that time(25). After riding anchor
there, they sailed their ships back to Asia.(26)
In the battle at Marathon about six thousand four hundred men of
the foreigners were killed, and one hundred and ninety-two Athenians; that many
fell on each side. The following marvel happened there: an Athenian, Epizelus
son of Couphagoras, was fighting as a brave man in the battle when he was deprived
of his sight, though struck or hit nowhere on his body, and from that time on
he spent the rest of his life in blindness. I have heard that he tells this
story about his misfortune: he saw opposing him a tall armed man, whose beard
overshadowed his shield, but the phantom passed him by and killed the man next
to him.(27) I learned by inquiry that this is the story Epizelus
tells.(28)
Datis journeyed with his army to Asia, and when he arrived at Myconos
he saw a vision in his sleep. What that vision was is not told, but as soon as
day broke Datis made a search of his ships. He found in a Phoenician
ship a gilded image of Apollo, and asked where this plunder had been taken. Learning
from what temple it had come, he sailed in his own ship to Delos. The Delians
had now returned to their island, and Datis set the image in the temple, instructing
the Delians to carry it away to Theban Delium,
on the coast opposite Chalcis.
Datis gave this order and sailed away, but the Delians never carried that statue
away; twenty years later the Thebans brought it to Delium by command of an oracle.
When Datis and Artaphrenes reached Asia in their voyage, they carried
the enslaved Eretrians inland to Susa.
Before the Eretrians were taken captive, king Darius had been terribly angry with
them for doing him unprovoked wrong; but when he saw them brought before him and
subject to him, he did them no harm, but settled them in a domain of his own called
Ardericca(29)
in the Cissian land; this place is two hundred and ten stadia distant from Susa,
and forty from the well that is of three kinds. Asphalt and salt and oil are drawn
from it in the following way: a windlass is used in the drawing, with half a skin
tied to it in place of a bucket; this is dipped into the well and then poured
into a tank; then what is drawn is poured into another tank and goes three ways:
the asphalt and the salt congeal immediately; the oil, which the Persians call
rhadinace, is dark and evil-smelling. There king Darius settled the Eretrians,
and they dwelt in that place until my time, keeping their ancient language. Such
was the fate of the Eretrians.(30)
After the full moon two thousand Lacedaemonians came to Athens,
making such great haste to reach it that they were in Attica on the third day
after leaving Sparta. Although they came too late for the battle, they desired
to see the Medes, so they went to Marathon and saw them. Then they departed
again, praising the Athenians and their achievement.(31)
Commentary
1. When it was reported to Darius that Sardis had been taken
and burnt by the Athenians and Ionians and that Aristagoras the Milesian had
been leader of the conspiracy for the making of this plan, he at first, it is
said, took no account of the Ionians since he was sure that they would not go
unpunished for their rebellion. Darius did, however, ask who the Athenians were,
and after receiving the answer, he called for his bow. This he took and, placing
an arrow on it, and shot it into the sky, praying as he sent it aloft, "O
Zeus, grant me vengeance on the Athenians" Then he ordered one of his servants
to say to him three times whenever dinner was set before him, "Master,
remember the Athenians." (Hdt.
5.105)
2. Medes
were occasionally employed in high commands, Mazares and Harpagus by Cyrus, the
sons of Datis by Xerxes, and by Darius earlier in his reign, Tachamaspates, and
Intaphres. Here Datis is evidently in command; Artaphrenes, who was probably still
young, seems to hold an honorary position. He is son of Artaphrenes, brother of
Darius, once satrap of Sardis.
3. This probably refers to the Persian treatment of rebels,
described in Hdt. 6.31
and 32. Though the resistance of the Naxians was successful in 500 B. C., the
hardships of the four months' siege may have been severe. Further, the failure
of the Ionic revolt had no doubt dispirited the Greeks of the islands. Plutarch
(de Mal. Her. 36, Mor. 869 B) follows the Naxian chroniclers (horographoi) in
declaring that Datis, after laying waste the town and part of the island, was
repulsed by the Naxians. But the subjugation of Naxos is proved by viii. 46.
3, and could only be doubted by a blind patriotism.
4. Carystus, famous for its green and white marble (cipollino),
lay in a deep bay on the south coast of Euboea. The Carystians, being Dryopians
(Thuc. vii. 57), were not kinsmen of Ionians. Their unwillingness to attack
their neighbours may have been prompted by trade connexions (iv. 33 n.). They
suffered later for yielding now and for joining Xerxes in 480 B. C. (viii. 66.
112). Indeed, their subjugation by Athens (ix. 105; Thuc. i. 98) was doubtless
justified by the charge of Medism.
5. See Hdt
5.77
6. Clearly H. is anxious to justify the Athenian people for
not sending succour from Attica, and the Athenian cleruchs for leaving Eretria
to its fate, by emphasizing the divided counsels and positive treachery of the
Eretrians. After Marathon it may well have been thought that a bold stand might
have been made at Eretria. At the time so heroic a counsel could only be justified
if the Eretrians, like the Athenians, were willing to meet the Persians in the
open field. It is likely enough that in Eretria, which had favoured Pisistratus
(i. 62), the Medizing party was strong, but H. implies that there was but one
true man, Aeschines, in a rotten State. Curiously enough Xenophon (Hell. iii.
1. 6) says there was but one Eretrian who Medized, Gongylus; and his treachery
seems to have been of later date, as he is lieutenant and agent of Pausanias
in Byzantium B. C. 478-477 (Thuc. i. 128).
7. Stein holds that the order of the Strategi followed the annual
order of the tribes which they commanded, and to which they belonged, and that
in this year the Oeneid tribe to which Miltiades of Laciadae
belonged must have been tenth and last: but the phrase suggests rather dekatos
autos (Thuc. i. 116, ii. 13), which implies superiority over colleagues.
8. These enemies were probably the same who prosecuted him
later with more success (ch. 136), Xanthippus and his Alcmaeonid friends. They
might easily excite the people against a tyrant whose dominion over the Chersonese
had the support of the Pisistratidae, although his father had been murdered
by them. For internal politics at Athens cf. v. 103 n., vi. 21 n.; App. XVIII,
§ 6.
9. If this means election by the Ecclesia, and not by a single
tribe, it is an anachronism (Ath. Pol. 22, cit. sup.), but probably H. is only
contrasting the people as an electoral body with the judicial dicastery.
10. It is most improbable that Athens had no understanding
with Sparta before the mission of Philippides. Indeed, his hasty dispatch by
the generals seems an appeal to an existing ally to fulfil her obligations.
But if, as Busolt (ii. 580) suggests, Sparta had concluded only an epimachia
with Athens, the casus foederis would only arise when the Persians directly
attacked Attica (Thuc. i. 44; v. 47, 48, &c.). Nor could the Athenians reasonably
demand aid until they had resolved to risk a battle in the field (Hauvette,
250).
11. Browning in his Pheidippides (ii. 582, ed. 1896) accepts
Lucian's addition to the story that Pheidippides ran back to fight at Marathon,
and died after bringing the news of the victory to Athens, a feat commemorated
by the Marathon races of to-day.
12. The distance traversed is 240 klm.
13. This statement probably applies only to the month Carneius
(Attic Metageitnion), when the Carneia was celebrated at Sparta in honor of
Apollo, from the 7th to the 15th of the month. (see Diomeia)
14. ... that a full moon should fall on the ninth of the month
would imply a grossly disordered calendar, and the answer must be taken to mean
that the Spartans could not go out on the 9th or any day till the 15th (full moon).
The ancient authorities (Paus. i. 28. 4; Plut. infr.; Schol. Arist. Ach. 84, &c.)
speak as if this rule was valid for all months, but H. may only mean it to apply
to the month Carneius (Attic Metageitnion),
when the Carneia,
in honour of Apollo Carneius, were celebrated 7th-15th, i. e. up to the full moon
(Eur. Alc. 449-51), and all Dorians abstained from warfare (H. vii. 206; Thuc.
v. 54. 75). It is, however, to be noticed that in other like cases (vii. 206,
ix. 7) he specifies the festival which hindered action. Plutarch's criticism of
H. (de Malign. 26) ou gar monon allas murias exodous kai machas pepoientai menos
histamenou me perimeinantes ten panselenon, alla kai tautes tes maches heptei
Boedromionos histamenou genomenes oligon apeleiphthesan is in the first part vague
and inaccurate, and in the second rests on a confusion between the actual day
of the battle and that of the yearly festival at which, in fulfilment of a vow
of the Polemarch, five hundred goats were sacrificed to Artemis Agrotera (cf.
Boeckh, Kl. Schr. iv. 85 f., vi. 329 f.). The most probable date is Metageitnion
17 = Sept. 12, i. e. the full moon of the month Metageitnion which preceded the
festival. The speed of the Spartan march seems to show that their desire to help
Athens was genuine, and that the battle took place on the first day it was lawful
for them to march.
15. This altar, like that in the Pythium (cf. Hicks, 10), was
set up by Pisistratus, son of Hippias, as archon in the Agora, and was afterwards
enlarged (Thuc. vi. 54). It was the 'miliarium aureum' of Athens, whence roads
in all directions started and distances were measured (ii. 7. 1; Arist. Av.
1005; C. I. A. ii. 1078). It was specially honoured with offerings and processions
(Xen. Hipp. iii. 2; Pind. fr. 45). For its use as an asylum for suppliants cf.
Diod. xii. 39; Plut. Per. 31. The twelve gods (ii. 4. 2) at Athens were Zeus,
Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Apollo, Artemis, Hephaestus, Athene, Ares, Aphrodite,
Hermes, Hestia.
16. The right wing was the post of honour and of danger in
Greek armies (ix. 28. 46; Thuc. v. 71), and was naturally led by the king (Eur.
Supp. 657) and by his successor in command (Ath. Pol. 3. 2), the Polemarch;
cf. App. XVIII, § 4.
17. The fixed official order instituted by Cleisthenes (v. 66.
2) --Erechtheis, Aegeis,
Pandionis, Leontis,
Acamantis, Oeneis,
Cecropis, Hippothoontis,
Aeantis, Antiochis--is
followed on inscriptions of the time of the Peloponnesian war (C. I. A. i. 443,
446, 447). As arrangement by tribes is expressly attested by Pausanias (i. 32.
3) for the monument at Marathon, and is confirmed by the stele of the tribe Erechtheis
(459-458 B. C., Hicks 26), this would seem to be the natural meaning here. It
is, however, inconsistent with the traditions in Plutarch (Aristid. 5) that the
tribes Antiochis and Leontis stood together in the centre, and (Mor. 628 D) that
the Aeantis stood on the right of the line. The latter point is confirmed by a
reference to an elegy of Aeschylus, and might be explained by the fact that the
Polemarch belonged to the tribe Aeantis, only in that case H. would naturally
have written hai allai phulai. Plutarch implies (Mor. 628 D) that the Aeantis
was prutaneuousa phule at the time of Marathon. It is likely enough that the order
of the tribes in battle was determined by lot, as was that of the Prytanies (Ath.
Pol. 43. 2), but improbable that the two were identical. Stein's argument (ch.
103 n.) for placing the Oeneis under Miltiades on the left is not convincing.
18. Five such quadrennial festivals--Delia,
Brauronia,
Heracleia,
Eleusinia,
and Panathenaea--are
enumerated (Ath. Pol. 54. 7; cf. ch. 87 n.). Of these the Panathenaea was far
the most important.
19. It is most unlikely that this arrangement was accidental
(Stein) or that this weakening of the centre is a fiction designed to explain
its defeat. No doubt it was intended to prevent outflanking, but it would seem
probable that the centre was obstructed by plantations of olives and vines (cf.
Corn. Nep. 5), and that Miltiades therefore decided to concentrate a decisive
force on either wing where the country was open, and suitable for a charge of
hoplites.
20. The existence at Athens of a class of hippeis, and the
alleged furnishing of two horsemen by each naucrary, might seem to prove that
Athens possessed cavalry. But Helbig has shown (Les Hippeis Atheniens, p. 191
f.) from vases, &c., that these knights were, at least till 478 B. C., equipped
not as true cavalry but as mounted infantry. Hence Athens depended on Thessalian
horse in 510 B. C. (v. 63), and in 490 B. C. had certainly no cavalry fit to
meet the Persian (cf. also ix. 40, 68, 69). At Salamis (Plut. Them. 14; Aesch.
Pers. 460) the Athenians had archers, and at Plataea (ix. 22. 1, 60. 3) a regular
corps of bowmen. The barbarians' astonishment at the absence of these forces
may fairly be held to imply the presence of archers on their side otherwise
unmentioned. For the cavalry cf. App. XVIII, § 8.
21. The thrice-repeated statement that the Athenians charged
at the double (§§ 2, 3) is not to be explained away as an inference from the
festival of the Boedromia (A. Mommsen, Feste Athen. 176) or by making dromoi
the opposite of baden (ix. 57. 1), 'quick' and 'slow' march. On the other hand,
an orderly and effective charge after a mile's run in full armour would be beyond
the power of any large body of soldiers, however well trained. The 'mile', however,
is probably an inference from the distance between the Athenian position near
Vrana and the place where they charged the Persians near the Soros. No doubt
the advance was rapid, but only for the last 200 yards, when within bowshot,
would the Attic hoplites charge at full speed. I have shown (C.Q. xiii (1919),
pp. 40-2) that in accounts of battles baden means 'at foot's pace', and dromoi
'at the double'.
22. The statement, taken literally, is an exaggeration, disproved
by the conduct of the Greeks in resisting the conquest of Ionia (i. 169) and
in the Ionic revolt (v. 2, 102, 110, 113; vi. 28). Yet the fear of the Mede
is proved by Theognis 764 pinomen charienta met' alleloisi legontes i meden
ton Medon deidiotes polemon (cf. 775), and the first occasion on which the Greeks
won [p. 113] a clear victory in the open field might well be described by an
Athenian as the first occasion on which Greeks dared to face the Mede (cf. Introd.
§ 32 (2)). The Persians had borrowed the Medic dress (cf. i. 135; vii. 62).
23. The centre appears to have been the regular post of the
best troops in Persian as in Turkish armies (cf. Arrian, Anab. ii. 8. 11; Xen.
Anab. i. 8. 21-3), though not at Plataea (ix. 31). The Sacae or Amyrgian Scyths
(iii. 93. 3; vii. 64. 2 nn.) were among the troops selected by Mardonius (viii.
113. 2).
24. In the picture of Marathon in the Stoa Poikile there were
figures of Miltiades cheering on his men with extended hand (Aeschin. c. Ctes.
iii. 186; Corn. Nep. Milt. 6), of Callimachus (Paus. i. 15. 3, with Frazer),
of Cynegirus (Plin. N. H. xxxv, § 57), and apparently of his brother Aeschylus
(Paus. i. 21. 2), who is said to have caused the fact to be recorded on his
tomb as his greatest distinction. There were also figures of Datis and Artaphrenes
(Plin. l. c.) and of Epizelus (117 n.).
25. until Themistocles made the triple harbour of Piraeus the
[p. 114] port and arsenal of Athens. Even if he began this work in 493 B. C.
(vii. 143. 1 n.; Thuc. i. 93), it would not be finished in 490.
26. The distance from Marathon to Athens (twenty-five miles
by the modern road, twenty-two by Kephisia and the hills) is more than an army
could march after a pitched battle, nor could the Athenians leave Marathon before
they were certain of the intentions of the enemy. But the voyage round Sunium
(seventy miles) would take longer. Hence both march and voyage, placed by Plutarch
(Arist. 5) on the same day as the battle, should probably be assigned to the
following day. If the Athenians really by a heroic effort marched back on the
actual day of battle, it must have been to meet a detachment carried by a flying
squadron which set sail before the battle (J. H. S. xxxi. 104, and App. XVIII,
§§ 8, 9).
27. The number of the slain (as of captured ships, ch. 115)
is probably trustworthy. The names of the Athenians would be recorded on the
stelae which once adorned the great mound (Soros) over the tomb of the fallen
heroes (Paus. i. 32. 3). That the Soros is the grave of the victors has been
proved by recent excavations (Frazer, ii. 433-4). The barbarian dead may well
have been counted on the field. The moderation of the estimate contrasts most
favourably with later exaggerations--the 200,000 of the inscription in the Stoa
Poikile (Suidas), 300,000 of Pausanias (iv. 25. 5), or the innumerable multitude
of Xenophon (Anab. iii. 2. 12) and Plutarch (de Malign. 26; 862 B). It is noticeable
that H. gives no figures for the total number engaged on either side. Both Justin
(ii. 9) and Nepos (Milt. 5) give 1,000 Plataeans, a good round exaggeration
(ix. 28. 6 n.); but the former puts the Athenians at 10,000, the latter at 9,000
(cf. Paus. iv. 25. 5; x. 20. 2). These numbers are probably derived from Ephorus,
and rest on a calculation of 1,000 men to a tribe. Yet they may well be near
the truth, allowing for the total omission of light-armed troops. On the other
hand, even the lowest ancient estimate of the Persians--200,000 foot (of whom
only 100,000 fought in the battle) and 10,000 horse (Nep. Milt. 4, 5)--is greatly
exaggerated, not to speak of the 500,000 of Plato (Menex. 240 A) and Lysias
(Epitaph. 21), or the 600,000 of Justin (ii. 9). Modern estimates rest on conjecture
or on the number of the Persian ships (vi. 95 n.), an insecure foundation. Duncker's
60,000 is an outside estimate; perhaps 40,000 would be nearer the mark.
28. Epizelus was depicted in the Stoa Poikile (Aelian, N. H.
vii. 38). Blindness following on a vision is not in itself incredible (Acts
ix. 1-9). But the vision is recorded with some doubt by H. It is strange that
he, unlike Pausanias (i. 15), puts the supernatural aid on the side of the Persians,
not of the Greeks. Cf. also App. XVIII, §§ 1 and 3.
29. Ardericca in Cissia (cf. iii. 91. 4), not the village on
the Euphrates (i. 185. 2), may be at Kir-Ab, thirty-five miles from Susa, where
there are remains of an ancient road and town, and where bitumen is still collected
in the way described by H. His description suggests a visit, though the phrase
mechri emeo (§ 4) does not affirm it (cf. Introd. § 16 (4)). Strabo (747) places
Eretrians in Gordyene on the upper Tigris, but H. is supported by the epigram
of Plato, Anth. Pal. vii. 259.
30. Diodorus (xvii. 119) says that some Boeotians, settled
by Xerxes beyond the Tigris, still spoke their mother-tongue when Alexander
came there.
31. According to Plato (Laws 698 E; cf. Menex. 240 C) the Spartans
came the day after the battle, and H. implies that they arrived before the burial
of the Persian dead. Isocrates (Paneg. 87) allows three days and nights for
the march of 1,200 stades, but even so the feat is wonderful (cf. 106).
This extract is from: Herodotus. The Histories (ed. A. D. Godley, 1920), Cambridge. Harvard University Press. Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains comments & interesting hyperlinks.
The Battle of Marathon: Thomas R. Martin, An Overview of Classical Greek History from Homer to Alexander
TRIZIN (Ancient city) GREECE
Putting out from Epidaurus, they (the Athenians) laid waste the territory of Troezen, Halieis, and Hermione, all towns on the coast of Peloponnese, and thence sailing to Prasiai, a maritime town in Laconia, ravaged part of its territory, and took and sacked the place itself; after which they returned home, but found the Peloponnesians gone and no longer in Attica.
...In this year (419 BC) the Argives, charging the Lacedaemonians (1)
with not paying the sacrifices to Apollo Pythaeus,(2) declared
war on them; and it was at this very time that Alcibiades, the Athenian general,
entered Argolis with an army. Adding these troops to their forces, the Argives
advanced against Troezen, a city which was an ally of the Lacedaemonians, and
after plundering its territory and burning its farm-buildings they returned home.
The Lacedaemonians, being incensed at the lawless acts committed against the Troezenians,
resolved to go to war against the Argives... (Diod. 12.78.1)
Commentary:
1. The Epidaurians, not the Lacedaemonians (see Thuc. 5.53); but Diodorus frequently
uses the term "Lacedaemonian" in a wide sense to refer to any ally of
Sparta.
2. The temple is likely the one in Asine, which was the only building spared by
the Argives when they razed that city (cp. Paus. 2.36.5; Thuc. 5.53.1).
...Epameinondas, who had with him the bravest of the Thebans, with great effort
forced back the Lacedaemonians, and cutting through their defence and bringing
his army through, passed into the Peloponnese, thereby accomplishing a feat no
whit inferior to his former mighty deeds. Having proceeded straightway to Troezen
and Epidaurus, he ravaged the countryside but could not seize the cities, for
they had garrisons of considerable strength... (Diod. 15.68.5-69.1)
DEKELIA (Ancient demos) ACHARNES
The aftermath of the defeat in Sicily
Alcibiades' desertion turned out to cause Athens more trouble after the catastrophic end of the Sicilian expedition in 413. While at Sparta he advised the Spartan commanders to establish a permanent base of operations in the Attic countryside. In 413 they acted on his advice. Taking advantage of Athenian weakness in the aftermath of the enormous losses in men and equipment sustained in Sicily, they installed a garrison at Decelea in northeastern Attica, in sight of the walls of Athens itself only a few miles distant. Spartan forces could now raid the Athenian countryside year around instead of only for a limited time, as in the earlier years of the war when the annual invasions dispatched from Sparta could never linger longer than forty days in Athenian territory. The presence of the garrison made agricultural work in the fields of Attica too dangerous and forced Athens to rely on food imported by sea even more heavily than in the past. The damage to Athenian fortunes increased when twenty thousand slaves owned by the state and who worked in Athens' silver mines ran away to seek refuge in the Spartan camp. The loss of these slave miners put a stop to the flow of revenue from the veins of silver ore. So immense was the distress caused by the crisis that an extraordinary change was made in Athenian government: a board of ten officials was appointed to manage the affairs of the city, virtually supplanting the council of five hundred
War and the finances of Athens
The financial health of the city-state of Athens suffered during the Peloponnesian War from the many interruptions to agriculture and from the catastrophic loss of income from the state's silver mines that occurred after the Spartan army took up a permanent presence in 413 B.C. Work could thereafter no longer continue at the mines, especially after the desertion of thousands of slave mine workers to the Spartan fort at Decelea. Some public building projects in the city itself were kept going, like the Erectheum temple to Athena on the acropolis, to demonstrate the Athenian will to carry on and also as a device for infusing some money into the crippled economy. But the demands of the war depleted the funds available for many non-military activities. The scale of the great annual dramatic festivals, for example, had to be cut back. The financial situation had become so desperate by the end of the war that Athenians were required to turn in their silver coins and exchange them for an emergency currency of bronze thinly plated with silver. The regular silver coins, along with gold coins that were minted from golden objects borrowed from Athens' temples, were then used to pay war expenses.
This text is from: Thomas Martin's An Overview of Classical Greek History from Homer to Alexander, Yale University Press. Cited July 2005 from Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
ATHENS (Ancient city) GREECE
Athenocles (Athenokles). The leader of an Athenian colony, who settled at Amisus in Pontus, and called the place Peiraeeus. The date of this event is uncertain. (Strab. xii.)
Damon. An Athenian, who joined his countryman Philogenes in supplying ships to the Phocians and leading them into Asia at the time of the Ionian migration. These were the settlers by whom Phocaea was founded. (Paus. vii. 2, 3; comp. Herod. i. 146; Strab. xiv.)
ACROPOLIS (Acropolis) ATHENS
The Acropolis... is a square craggy rock, rising abruptly about 150 feet, with
a flat summit of about 1,000 feet from east to west, by 500 feet broad from north
to south. It is inaccessible on all sides, except the west, where it is ascended
by a steep slope. It was at one and the same time the fortress, the sanctuary,
and the museum of the city. Although the site of the original city, it had ceased
to be inhabited from the time of the Persian wars, and was appropriated to the
worship of Athena and the other guardian deities of the city. It was one great
sanctuary, and is therefore called by Aristophanes abaton Akropolin, hieron temenos
(Lysistr. 482). By the artists of the age of Pericles its platform was covered
with the master-pieces of ancient art, to which additions continued to be made
in succeeding ages. The sanctuary thus became a museum; and in order to form a
proper idea of it, we must imagine the summit of the rock stripped of every thing
except temples and statues, the whole forming one vast composition of architecture,
sculpture, and painting, the dazzling whiteness of the marble relieved by brilliant
colours, and glittering in the transparent clearness of the Athenian atmosphere.
It was here that Art achieved her greatest triumphs; and though in the present
day a scene of desolation and rain, its ruins are some of the most precious reliques
of the ancient world.
The Acropolis stood in the centre of the city. Hence it was the heart
of Athens, as Athens was the heart of Greece; and Pindar no doubt alluded to it,
when he speaks of asteos omphalos thuoeis en tais hierais Athanais.It was to this
sacred rock that the magnificent procession of the Panathenaic festival took place
once in four years. The chief object of this procession was to carry the Peplus,
or embroidered robe, of Athena to her temple on the Acropolis Panathenaea.
In connection with this subject it is important to distinguish between the three
different Athenas of the Acropolis. The first was the Athena Polias, the most
ancient of all, made of olive wood, and said to have fallen from heaven; its sanctuary
was the Erechtheium. The second was the Athena of the Parthenon, a statue of ivory
and gold, the work of Pheidias. The third was the Athena Promachus, a colossal
statue of bronze, also the work of Pheidias, standing erect, with helmet, spear,
and shield. Of these three statues we shall speak more fully hereafter; but it
must be borne in mind that the Peplus of the Panathenaic procession was carried
to the ancient statue of Athena Polias, and not to the Athena of the Parthenon.
I. Walls of the Acropolis.
Being a citadel, the Acropolis was fortified. The ancient fortifications are ascribed
to the Pelasgians, who are said to have levelled the summit of the rock, and to
have built a wall around it, called the Pelasgic Wall or Fortress (Pelasgikon
teichos, Herod. v. 64). The approach on the western side was protected by a system
of works, comprehending nine gates, hence called enneapulon to Pelasgikon. These
fortifications were sufficiently strong to defy the Spartans, when the Peisistratidae
took refuge in the Acropolis (Herod. v. 64, 65); but after the expulsion of the
family of the despot, it is not improbable that they were partly dismantled, to
prevent any attempt to restore the former state of things, since the seizure of
the citadel was always the first step towards the establishment of despotism in
a Greek state. When Xerxes attacked the Acropolis, its chief fortifications consisted
of palisades and other works constructed of wood. The Persians took up their position
on the Areiopagus, which was opposite the western side of the Acropolis, just
as the Amazons had done when they attacked the city of Cecrops. From the Areiopagus
the Persians discharged hot missiles against the wooden defences, which soon took
fire and were consumed, thus leaving the road on the western side open to the
enemy. The garrison kept them at bay by rolling down large stones, as they attempted
to ascend the road; and the Persians only obtained possession of the citadel by
scaling the precipitous rock on the northern side, close by the temple of Aglaurus
(Herod. viii. 52, 53). It would seem to follow from this narrative that the elaborate
system of works, with its nine gates on the western side, could not have been
in existence at this time. After the capture of the Acropolis, the Persians set
fire to all the buildings upon it; and when they visited Athens in the following
year, they destroyed whatever remained of the walls, or houses, or temples of
Athens (Herod. viii. 53, ix. 93).
The foundations of the ancient walls no doubt remained, and the name
of Pelasgic continued to be applied to a part of the fortifications down to the
latest times. Aristophanes (Av. 832) speaks of tes poleos to Pelargikon, which
the Scholiast explains as the Pelargic wall on the Acropolis; and Pausanias (i.
28.3) says that the Acropolis was surrounded by the Pelasgians with walls, except
on the side fortified by Cimon. We have seen, however, from other authorities
that the Pelasgians fortified the whole hill; and the remark of Pausanias probably
only means that in his time the northern wall was called the Pelasgic, and the
southern the Cimonian. When the Athenians returned to their city after its occupation
by the Persians, they commenced the restoration of the walls of the Acropolis,
as well as of those of the Asty; and there can be little doubt that the northern
wall had been rebuilt, when Cimon completed the southern wall twelve years after
the retreat of the Persians. The restoration of the northern wall may be ascribed
to Themistocles; for though called apparently the Pelasgic wall, its remains show
that the greater part of it was of more recent origin. In the middle of it we
find courses of masonry, formed of pieces of Doric columns and entablature; and
as we know from Thucydides (i. 93) that the ruins of former buildings were much
employed in rebuilding the walls of the Asty, we may conclude that the same was
the case in rebuilding those of the Acropolis.
The Pelasgicum signified not only a portion of the walls of the Acropolis,
but also a space of ground below the latter (to Pelasgikon kaloumenon to hupo
ten Akropolin, Thuc. ii. 17). That it was not a wall is evident from the account
of Thucydides, who says that an oracle had enjoined that it should remain uninhabited;
but that it was, notwithstanding this prohibition, built upon, in consequence
of the number of people who flocked into Athens at the commencement of the Peloponnesian
war. Lucian (Piscator. 47) represents a person sitting upon the wall of the Acropolis,
and letting down his hook to angle for philosophers in the Pelasgicum. This spot
is said to have been originally inhabited by the Pelasgians, who fortified the
Acropolis, and from which they were expelled because they plotted against the
Athenians (Paus. i. 28.3). It is placed by Leake and most other authorities at
the north-western angle of the Acropolis. A recent traveller remarks that the
story of the Pelasgic settlement under the north side of the Acropolis inevitably
rises before us, when we see the black shade always falling upon it, as over an
accursed spot, in contrast with the bright gleam of sunshine which always seems
to invest the Acropolis itself; and we can imagine how naturally the gloom of
the steep precipice would conspire with the remembrance of an accursed and hateful
race, to make the Athenians dread the spot.
The rocks along the northern side of the Acropolis were called the
Long Rocks (Makrai), a name under which they are frequently mentioned in the Ion
of Euripides, in connection with the grotto of Pan, and the sanctuary of Aglaurus:
entha prosborrhous tetras Pallados hup ochthoi tes Athenaion chthonos Makras kalousi
ges anaktes Atthidos. This name is explained by the fact that the length of the
Acropolis is much greater than its width; but it might have been given with equal
propriety to the rocks on the southern side. The reason why the southern rocks
had not the same name appears to have been, that the rocks on the northern side
could be seen from the greater part of the Athenian plain, and from almost all
the demi of Mt. Parnes; while those on the southern side were only visible from
the small and more undulating district between Hymettus, the Long Walls, and the
sea. In the city itself the rocks of the Acropolis were for the most part concealed
from view by houses and public buildings.
The surface of the Acropolis appears to have been divided into platforms,
communicating with one another by steps. Upon these platforms stood the temples,
sanctuaries, or monuments, which occupied all the summit. Before proceeding to
describe the monuments of the Acropolis, it will be adviseable to give a description
of the present condition of the walls, and of the recent excavations on the platform
of the rock, for which we are indebted to Mr. Penrose's important work.
On the ascent to the Acropolis from the modern town our first attention
is called to the angle of the Hellenic wall, west of the northern wing of the
Propylaea. It is probable that this wall formed the exterior defence of the Acropolis
at this point. Following this wall northwards, we come to a bastion, built about
the year 1822 by the Greek general Odysseus to defend an ancient well, to which
there is access within the bastion by an antique passage and stairs of some length
cut in the rock. Turning eastwards round the corner, we come to two caves, one
of which is supposed to have been dedicated to Pan; in these caves are traces
of tablets let into the rock. Leaving these caves we come to a large buttress,
after which the wall runs upon the edge of the nearly vertical rock. On passing
round a salient angle, where is a small buttress, we find a nearly straight line
of wall for about 210 feet; then a short bend to the south-east; afterwards a
further straight reach for about 120 feet, nearly parallel to the former. These
two lines of wall contain the remains of Doric columns and entablature, to which
reference has already been made. A mediaeval buttress about 100 feet from the
angle of the Erechtheium forms the termination of this second reach of wall. From
hence to the north-east angle of the Acropolis, where there is a tower apparently
Turkish, occur several large square stones, which also appear to have belonged
to some early temple. The wall, into which these, as well as the before mentioned
fragments, are built, seems to be of Hellenic origin. The eastern face of the
wall appears to have been entirely built in the Middle Ages on the old foundations.
At the south-east angle we find the Hellenic masonry of the Southern or Cimonian
wall. At this spot 29 courses remain, making a height of 45 feet. Westward of
this point the wall has been almost entirely cased in mediaeval and recent times,
and is further supported by 9 buttresses, which, as well as those on the north
and east sides, appear to be mediaeval. But the Hellenic masonry of the Cimonian
wall can be traced all along as far as the Propylaea under the casing. The south-west
reach of the Hellenic wall terminates westwards in a solid tower about 30 feet
high, which is surmounted by the temple of Nike Apteros, described below. This
tower commanded the unshielded side of any troops approaching the gate, which,
there is good reason to believe, was in the same position as the present entrance.
After passing through the gate and proceeding northwards underneath the west face
of the tower, we come to the Propylaea. The effect of emerging from the dark gate
and narrow passage to the magnificent marble staircase, 70 feet broad, surmounted
by the Propylaea, must have been exceedingly grand. A small portion of the ancient
Pelasgic wall still remains near the south-east angle of the southern wing of
the Propylaea, now occupied by a lofty mediaeval tower. After passing the gateways
of the Propylaea we come upon the area of the Acropolis, of which considerably
more than half has been excavated under the auspices of the Greek government.
Upon entering the enclosure of the Acropolis the colossal statue of Athena Promachus
was seen a little to the left, and the Parthenon to the right; both offering angular
views, according to the usual custom of the Greeks in arranging the approaches
to their public buildings. The road leading upwards in the direction of the Parthenon
is slightly worked out of the rock; it is at first of considerable breadth, and
afterwards becomes narrower. On the right hand, as we leave the Propylaea, and
on the road itself, are traces of 5 votive altars, one of which is dedicated to
Athena Hygieia. Further en, to the left of the road, is the site of the statue
of Athena Promachus. Northwards of this statue, we come to a staircase close to
the edge of the rock, partly built, partly cut out, leading to the grotto of Aglaurus.
This staircase passes downwards through a deep cleft in the rock, nearly parallel
in its direction to the outer wall, and opening out in the face of the cliff a
little below its foundation. In the year 1845 it was possible to creep into this
passage, and ascend into the Acropolis; but since that time the entrance has been
closed up. Close to the Parthenon the original soil was formed of made ground
in three layers of chips of stone; the lowest being of the rock of the Acropolis,
the next of Pentelic marble, and the uppermost of Peiriaic stone. In the extensive
excavation made to the east of the Parthenon there was found a number of drums
of columns, in a more or less perfect state, some much shattered, others apparently
rough from the quarry, others partly worked and discarded in consequence of some
defect in the material. The ground about them was strewed with marble chips; and
some sculptors' tools, and jars containing red colour were found with them. In
front of the eastern portico of the Parthenon we find considerable remains of
a level platform, partly of smoothed rock, and partly of Peiraic paving. North
of this platform is the highest part of the Acropolis. Westwards of this spot
we arrive at the area between the Parthenon and Erechtheium, which slopes from
the former to the latter. Near the Parthenon is a small well, or rather mouth
of a cistern, excavated in the rock, which may have been supplied with water from
the roof of the temple. Close to the south, or Caryatid portico of the Erechtheium,
is a small levelled area on which was probably placed one of the many altars or
statues surrounding that temple.
Before quitting the general plan of the Acropolis, Mr. Penrose calls
attention to the remarkable absence of parallelism among the several buildings.
Except the Propylaea and Parthenon, which were perhaps intended to bear a definite
relation to one another, no two are parallel. This asymmetria is productive of
very great beauty; for it not only obviates the dry uniformity of too many parallel
lines, but also produces exquisite varieties of light and shade. One of the most
happy instances of this latter effect is in the temple of Nike Apteros, in front
of the southern wing of the Propylaea. The facade of this temple and pedestal
of Agrippa, which is opposite to it, remain in shade for a considerable time after
the front of the Propylaea has been lighted up; and they gradually receive every
variety of light, until the sun is sufficiently on the decline to shine nearly
equally on all the western faces of the entire group. Mr. Penrose observes that
a similar want of parallelism in the separate parts is found to obtain in several
of the finest mediaeval structures, and may conduce in some degree to the beauty
of the magnificent Piazza of St. Marc at Venice.
2. The Propylaea.
The road up the western slope of the Acropolis led from the agora, and was paved
with slabs of Pentelic marble. At the summit of the rock Pericles caused a magnificent
building to be constructed, which might serve as a suitable entrance (Propulaia)
to the wonderful works of architecture and sculpture within:
Opsesthe de: kai gar anoignumenon psophos
ede ton Propulaion.
All ololuxate phainomenaisin tais archaiaisin Athenais,
Kai thaumastais kai poluumnois, hin ho kleinos Demos
enoikei. (Aristoph. Equit. 1326.)
The Propylaea were considered one of the masterpieces of Athenian art, and are
mentioned along with the Parthenon as the great architectural glory of the Periclean
age. When Epaminondas was urging the Thebans to rival the glory of Athens, he
told them that they must uproot the Propylaea of the Athenian Acropolis, and plant
them in front of the Cadmean citadel.
The architect of the Propylaea was Mnesicles. It was commenced in
the archonship of Euthymenes, B.C. 437, and was completed in the short space of
five years (Plut. Pericl. 13). The building was constructed entirely of Pentelic
marble, and covered the whole of the western end of the Acropolis, which was 168
feet in breadth. The central part of the building consisted of two Doric hexastyle
porticoes, covered with a roof of white marble, which attracted the particular
notice of Pausanias (i. 22.4). Of these porticoes the western faced the city,
and the eastern the interior of the Acropolis; the latter, owing to the rise of
the ground, being higher than the former. They were divided into two unequal halves
by a wall, pierced by five gates or doors, by which the Acropolis was entered.
The western portico was 43 feet in depth, and the eastern about half this depth;
and they were called Propylaea from their forming a vestibule to the five gates
or doors just mentioned. Each portico or vestibule consisted of a front of six
fluted Doric columns, supporting a pediment, the columns being 4 1/2 feet in diameter,
and nearly 29 feet in height. Of the five gates the one in the centre was the
largest, and was equal in breadth to the space between the two central columns
in the portico in front. It was by this gate that the carriages and horsemen entered
the Acropolis, and the marks of the chariotwheels worn in the rock are still visible.
The doors on either side of the central one were much smaller both in height and
breadth, and designed for the admission of foot passengers only. The roof of the
western portico was supported by two rows of three Ionic columns each, between
which was the road to the central gate.
The central part of the building which we have been describing, was
58 feet in breadth, and consequently did not cover the whole width of the rock:
the remainder was occupied by two wings, which projected 26 feet in front of the
western portico. Each of these wings was built in the form of Doric temples, and
communicated with the adjoining angle of the great portico. In the northern wing
(on the left hand to a person ascending the Acropolis) a porch of 12 feet in depth
conducted into a chamber of 35 feet by 30, usually called the Pinacotheca, from
its walls being covered with paintings (oikema echon graphas, Paus. i. 22.6).
The southern wing (on the right hand to a person ascending the Acropolis) consisted
only of a porch or open gallery of 26 feet by 17, which did not conduct into any
chamber behind. On the western front of this southern wing stood the small temple
of Nike Apteros (Nike Apteros), the Wingless Victory (Paus. i. 22.4). The spot
occupied by this temple commands a wide prospect of the sea, and it was here that
Aegeus is said to have watched his son's return from Crete. From this part of
the rock he threw himself, when he saw the black sail on the mast of Theseus.
Later writers, in order to account for the name of the Aegaean sea, relate that
Aegeus threw himself from the Acropolis into the sea, which is three miles off.
There are still considerable remains of the Propylaea. The eastern
portico, together with the adjacent parts, was thrown down about 1656 by an explosion
of gunpowder which had been deposited in that place; but the inner wall, with
its five gateways, still exists. The northern wing is tolerably perfect; but the
southern is almost entirely destroyed: two columns of the latter are seen imbedded
in the adjacent walls of the mediaeval tower.
The Temple of Nike Apteros requires a few words. In the time
of Pericles, Nike or Victory was figured as a young female with golden wings (Nike
petetai pterugoin chrusain, Aristoph. Av. 574); but the more ancient statues of
the goddess are said to have been without wings. Nike Apteros was identified with
Athena, and was called Nike Athena. Standing as she did at the exit from the Acropolis,
her aid was naturally implored by persons starting on a dangerous enterprise.
(Nike t' Athana Polias, he sozei m aei, Soph. Philoct. 134.) Hence, the opponents
of Lysistrata, upon reaching the top of the ascent to the Acropolis, invoke Nike
(despoina Nike xungenou), before whose temple they were standing. This temple
was still in existence when Spon and Wheler visited Athens in 1676; but in 1751
nothing remained of it but some traces of the foundation and fragments of masonry
lying in the neighbourhood of its former site. There were also found in a neighbouring
wall four slabs of its sculptured frieze, which are now in the British Museum.
It seemed that this temple had perished utterly; but the stones of which it was
built were discovered in the excavations of the year 1835, and it has been rebuilt
with the original materials under the auspices of Ross and Schaubert. The greater
part of its frieze was also discovered at the same time. The temple now stands
on its original site, and at a distance looks very much like a new building, with
its white marble columns and walls glittering in the sun.
This temple is of the class called Amphiprostylus Tetrastylus, consisting
of a cella with four Ionic columns at either front, but with none on the sides.
It is raised upon a stylobate of 3 feet, and is 27 feet in length from east to
west, and 18 feet in breadth. The columns, including the base and the capital,
are 13 1/2 feet high, and the total height of the temple to the apex of the pediment,
including the stylobate, is 23 feet. The frieze, which runs round the whole of
the exterior of the building, is 1 foot 6 inches high, and is adorned with sculptures
in high relief. It originally consisted of fourteen pieces of stone, of which
twelve, or the fragments of twelve, now remain. Several of these are so mutilated
that it is difficult to make out the subject; but some of them evidently represent
a battle between Greeks and Persians, or other Oriental barbarians. It is supposed
that the two long sides were occupied with combats of horsemen, and that the western
end represented a battle of foot soldiers. This building must have been erected
after the battle of Salamis, since it could not have escaped the Persians, when
they destroyed every thing upon the Acropolis; and the style of art shows that
it could not have been later than the age of Pericles. But, as it is never mentioned
among the buildings of this statesman, it is generally ascribed to Cimon, who
probably built it at the same time as the southern wall of the Acropolis. Its
sculptures were probably intended to commemorate the recent victories of the Greeks
over the Persians.
Pedestal of Agrippa. On the western front of the northern wing of the
Propylaea there stands at present a lofty pedestal, about 12 feet square and 27
high, which supported some figure or figures, as is clear from the holes for stanchions
on its summit. Moreover we may conclude from the size of the pedestal that the
figure or figures on its summit were colossal or equestrian. Pausanias, in describing
the Propylaea, speaks of the statues of certain horsemen, respecting which he
was in doubt whether they were the sons of Xenophon, or made for the sake of ornament
(es euprepeian); and as in the next clause he proceeds to speak of the temple
of Nike on the right hand (or southern wing) of the Propylaea, we may conclude
that these statues stood in front of the northern wing (Paus. i. 22.4). Now, it
has been well observed by Leake, that the doubt of Pausanias, as to the persons
for whom the equestrian statues were intended, could not have been sincere; and
that, judging from his manner on other similar occasions, we may conclude that
equestrian statues of Gryllus and Diodorus, the two sons of Xenophon, had been
converted, by means of new inscriptions, into those of two Romans, whom Pausanias
has not named. This conjecture is confirmed by an inscription on the base, which
records the name of M. Agrippa in his third consulship; and it may be that the
other Roman was Augustus himself, who was the colleague of Agrippa in his third
consulship. It appears that both statues stood on the same pedestal, and accordingly
they are so represented in the accompanying restoration of the Propylaea.
3. The Parthenon.
The Parthenon (Parthenon = the Virgin?s House) was the great glory of the Acropolis,
and the most perfect production of Grecian architecture. It derived its name from
its being the temple of Athena Parthenos (Athena Parthenos), or Athena the Virgin,
a name given to her as the invincible goddess of war. It was also called Hecatompedos
or Hecatompedon, the Temple of One Hundred Feet, from its breadth; and sometimes
Parthenon Hecatompedos. It was built under the administration of Pericles, and
was completed in B.C. 438. We do not know when it was commenced; but notwithstanding
the rapidity with which all the works of Pericles were executed, its erection
could not have occupied less than eight years, since the Propylaea occupied five.
The architects, according to Plutarch, were Callicrates and Ictinus: other writers
generally mention Ictinus alone (Strab. ix.; Paus. viii. 41.9). Ictinus wrote
a work upon the temple. (Vitruv. vii. Praef.) The general superintendence of the
erection of the whole building was entrusted to Pheidias.
The Parthenon was probably built on the site of an earlier temple
destroyed by the Persians. This is expressly asserted by an ancient grammarian,
who states that the Parthenon was 50 feet greater than the temple burnt by the
Persians (Hesych. s. v. Hekatompedos), a measure which must have reference to
the breadth of the temple, and not to its length. The only reason for questioning
this statement is the silence of the ancient writers respecting an earlier Parthenon,
and the statement of Herodotus (vii. 53) that the Persians set fire to the Acropolis,
after plundering the temple (to hiron), as if there had been only one; which,
in that case, must have been the Erechtheium, or temple of Athena Polias. But,
on the other hand, we find under the stylobate of the present Parthenon the foundations
of another and much older building; and to this more ancient temple probably belonged
the portions of the columns inserted in the northern wall of the Acropolis, of
which we have already spoken.
The Parthenon stood on the highest part of the Acropolis. Its architecture
was of the Doric order, and of the purest kind. It was built entirely of Pentelic
marble, and rested upon a rustic basement of ordinary limestone. The contrast
between the limestone of the basement and the splendid marble of the superstructure
enhanced the beauty of the latter. Upon the basement stood the stylobate or platform,
built of Pentelic marble, five feet and a half in height, and composed of three
steps. The temple was raised so high above the entrance to the Acropolis, both
by its site and by these artificial means, that the pavement of the peristyle
was nearly on a level with the summit of the Propylaea. The dimensions of the
Parthenon, taken from the upper step of the stylobate, were about 228 feet in
length, 101 feet in breadth, and 66 feet in height to the top of the pediment.
It consisted of a sekos or cella, surrounded by a peristyle, which had eight columns
at either front, and seventeen at either side (reckoning the corner columns twice),
thus containing forty-six columns in all. These columns were 6 feet 2 inches in
diameter at the base, and 34 feet in height. Within the peristyle at either end,
there was an interior range of six columns, of 5 1/2 feet in diameter, standing
before the end of the cella, and forming, with the prolonged walls of the cella,
an apartment before the door. These interior columns were on a level with the
floor of the cella, and were ascended by two steps from the peristyle. The cella
was divided into two chambers of unequal [Figure] size, of which the Eastern chamber
or naos was about 98 feet, and the Western chamber or opisthodomus about 43 feet.4
The ceiling of both these chambers was supported by inner rows of columns. In
the eastern chamber there were twenty-three columns, of the Doric order, in two
stories, one over the other, ten on each side, and three on the western return:
the diameter of these columns was about three feet and a half at the base. In
the western chamber there were four columns, the position of which is marked by
four large slabs, symmetrically placed in the pavement. These columns were about
four feet in diameter, and were probably of the Ionic order, as in the Propylaea.
Technically the temple is called Peripteral Octastyle.
Such was the simple structure of this magnificent building, which,
by its united excellencies of materials, design, and decorations, was the most
perfect ever executed. Its dimensions of 228 feet by 101, with a height of 66
feet to the top of the pediment, were sufficiently great to give a appear. ance
of grandeur and sublimity; and this impression was not disturbed by any obtrusive
subdivision of parts, such as is found to diminish the effect of many larger modern
buildings, where the same singleness of design is not apparent. In the Parthenon
there was nothing to divert the spectator's contemplation from the simplicity
and majesty of mass and outline, which forms the first and most remarkable object
of admiration in a Greek temple; for the statues of the pediments, the only decoration
which was very conspicuous by its magnitude and position, having been inclosed
within frames which formed an essential part of the designs of either front, had
no more obtrusive effect than an ornamented capital to an unadorned column. The
whole building was adorned within and without with the most exquisite pieces of
sculpture, executed under the direction of Pheidias by different artists. The
various architectural members of the upper part of the building were enriched
with positive colours, of which traces are still found. The statues and the reliefs,
as well as the members of architecture, were enriched with various colours; and
the weapons, the reins of horses, and other accessories, were of metal, and the
eyes of some of the figures were inlaid.
Of the sculptures of the Parthenon the grandest and most celebrated
was the colossal statue of the Virgin Goddess, executed by the hand of Pheidias
himself. It stood in the eastern or principal apartment of the cella; and as to
its exact position some remarks are made below. It belonged to that kind of work
which the Greeks called chryselephantine; ivory being employed for those parts
of the statue which were unclothed, while the dress and other ornaments were of
solid gold. This statue represented the goddess standing, clothed with a tunic
reaching to the ankles, with her spear in her left hand, and an image of victory,
four cubits high, in her right. She was girded with the aegis, and had a helmet
on her head, and her shield rested on the ground by her side. The height of the
statue was twenty-six cubits, or nearly forty feet. The weight of the gold upon
the statue, which was so affixed as to be removable at pleasure, is said by Thucydides
(ii. 13) to have been 40 talents, by Philochorus 44, and by other writers 50:
probably the statement of Philochorus is correct, the others being round numbers.
It was finally robbed of its gold by Lachares, who made himself tyrant of Athens,
when Demetrius was besieging the city (Paus. i. 25.5). A fuller account of this
masterpiece of art is given in the Dictionary of Biography (see Pheidias,
the ivory and gold statue of Atlena in the Parthenon).
The sculptures on the outside of the Parthenon have been described
so frequently that it is unnecessary to speak of them at any length on the present
occasion. These various pieces of sculpture were all closely connected in subject,
and were intended to commemorate the history and the honours of the goddess of
the temple, as the tutelary deity of Athens.
1. The Tympana of the Pediments (i. e. the inner flat portion of the triangular
gable-ends of the roof above the two porticoes) were filled with two compositions
in sculpture, each nearly 80 feet in length, and consisting of about 24 colossal
statues. The eastern or principal front represented the birth of Athena from the
head of Zeus, and the western the contest between Athena and Poseidon for the
land of Attica. The mode in which the legend is represented, and the identification
of the figures, have been variously explained by archaeologists, to whose works
upon the subject a reference is given below.
2. The Metopes, between the Triglyphs in the frieze of the entablature (i. e.
the upper of the two portions into which the surface between the columns and the
roof is divided), were filled with sculptures in high-relief. Each tablet was
4 feet 3 inches square. There were 92 in all, 14 on each front, and 32 on each
side. They represented a variety of subjects relating to the exploits of the goddess
herself, or to those of the indigenous heroes of Attica. Those on the south side
related to the battle of the Athenians with the Centaurs: of these the British
Museum possesses sixteen.
3. The Frieze, which ran along outside the wall of the cella, and within the external
columns which surround the building, was sculptured with a representation of the
Panathenaic festival in very low relief. Being under the ceiling of the peristyle,
the frieze could not receive any direct light from the rays of the sun, and was
entirely lighted from below by the reflected light from the pavement; consequently
it was necessary for it to be in low relief, for any bold projection of form would
have interfered with the other parts. The frieze was 3 feet 4 inches in height,
and 520 feet in length. A large number of the slabs of this frieze was brought
to England by Lord Elgin, with the sixteen metopes just mentioned, and several
of the statues of the pediments: the whole collection was purchased by the nation
in 1816, and deposited in the British Museum.
Among the many other ornaments of the temple we may mention the gilded
shields, which were placed upon the architraves of the two fronts beneath the
metopes. Between the shields there were inscribed the names of the dedicators.
The impressions left by these covered shields are still visible upon the architraves;
the shields themselves were carried off by Lachares, together with the gold of
the statue of the goddess (Paus. i. 25.5). The inner walls of the cella were decorated
with paintings; those of the Pronaos, or Prodoms, were partly painted by Protogenes
of Caunus (Plin. xxxv. 10. s. 36.20); and in the Hecatompedon there were paintings
representing Themistocles and Heliodorus (Paus. i. 1.2, 37.1).
We have already seen that the temple was some-times called Parthenon,
and sometimes Hecatompedon; but we know that these were also names of separate
divisions of the temple. There have been found among the ruins in the Acropolis
many official records of the treasurers of the Parthenon inscribed upon marble,
containing an account of the gold and silver vessels, the coin, bullion, and other
valuables preserved in the temple. From these inscriptions we learn that there
were four distinct divisions of the temple, called respectively the Pronaos (Pronaos,
Proneion), the Hecatompedon (Ekatompedon), the Parthenon (Parthenon), and the
Opisthodomus (Opisthodomos).
Respecting the position of the Pronaos there can be no doubt, as it
was the name always given to the hall or ambulatory through which a person passed
to the cella. The Pronaos was also, though rarely, called Prodomus (Prodomos,
Philostr. Vit. Apoll. ii. 10), But as to the Opisthodomus there has been great
difference of opinion. There seems, however, good reason for believing that the
Greeks used the word Opisthodomus to signify a corresponding hall in the back-front
of a temple; and that as Pronaos, or Prodomus, answered to the Latin anticum,
so Opisthodomus was equivalent to the Latin posticum. (To pro [tou sekou] prodomos,
kai to katopin opisthodomos, Pollux, i. 6; comp. en tois pronaois kai tois opisthodomois,,
Diod. xiv. 41). Lucian (Herod. 1) describes Herodotus as reading his history to
the assembled Greeks at Olympia from the Opisthodomus of the temple of Zeus. If
we suppose Herodotus to have stood in the hall or ambulatory leading out of the
back portico, the description is intelligible, as the great crowd of auditors
might then have been assembled in the portico and on the steps below; and we can
hardly imagine that Lucian could have conceived the Opisthodomus to be an inner
room, as some modern writers maintain. Other passages might be adduced to prove
that the Opisthodomus in the Greek temples ordinarily bore the sense we have given
to it (comp. Paus. v. 13.1, 16.1); and we believe that the Opisthodomus of the
Parthenon originally indicated the same part, though at a later time, as we shall
see presently, it was used in a different signification.
The Hecatompedon must have been the eastern or principal chamber of
the cella. This follows from its name; for as the whole temple was called Hecatompedon,
from its being 100 feet broad, so the eastern chamber was called by the same name
from its being 100 feet long (its exact length is 98 feet 7 inches). This was
the naos, or proper shrine of the temple; and here accordingly was placed the
colossal statue by Pheidias. In the records of the treasures of the temple the
Hecatompedon contained a golden crown placed upon the head of the statue of Nike,
or Victory, which stood upon the hand of the great statue of Athena, thereby plainly
showing that the latter must have been placed in this division of the temple.
There has been considerable dispute respecting the disposition of the columns
in the interior of this chamber; but the removal of the Turkish Mosque and other
incumbrances from the pavement has now put an end to all doubt upon the subject.
It has already been stated that there were 10 columns on each side, and 3 on the
western return; and that upon them there was an upper row of the same number.
These columns were thrown down by the explosion in 1687, but they were still standing
when Spon and Wheler visited Athens. Wheler says, on both sides, and towards the
door, is a kind of gallery made with two ranks of pillars, 22 below and 23 above.
The odd pillar is over the arch of the entrance which was left for the passage.
The central column of the lower row had evidently been removed in order to effect
an entrance from the west, and the arch of the entrance had been substituted for
it. Wheler says a kind of gallery, because it was probably an architrave supporting
the rank of columns, and not a gallery. Recent observations have proved that these
columns were Doric, and not Corinthian, as some writers had supposed, in consequence
of the discovery of the fragment of a capital of that order in this chamber. But
it has been conjectured, that although all the other columns were Doric, the central
column of the western return, which would have been hidden from the Pronaos by
the statue, might have been Corinthian, since the central column of the return
of the temple at Bassae seems to have been Corinthian.
If the preceding distribution of the other parts of the temple is
correct, the Parthenon must have been the western or smaller chamber of the cella.
Judging from the name alone, we should have naturally concluded that the Parthenon
was the chamber containing the statue of the virgin goddess; but there appear
to have been two reasons why this name was not given to the eastern chamber. First,
the length of the latter naturally suggested the appropriation to it of the name
of Hecatompedon; and secondly, the eastern chamber occupied the ordinary position
of the adytum, containing the statue of the deity, and may therefore have been
called from this circumstance the Virgin?s-Chamber, though in reality it was not
the abode of the goddess. It appears, from the inscriptions already referred to,
that the Parthenon was used in the Peloponnesian war as, the public treasury;
for while we find in the Hecatompedon such treasures as would serve for the purpose
of ornament, the Parthenon contained bullion, and a great many miscellaneous articles
which we cannot suppose to have been placed in the shrine alongside of the statue
of the goddess. But we know from later authorities that the treasury in the temple
was called Opisthodomus; and we may therefore conclude, that as the Parthenon
was the name of the whole building, the western chamber ceased to be called by
this name, and acquired that of the Opisthodomus, which was originally the entrance
to it. It appears further from the words of one of the Scholiasts (ad Aristoph.
l. c.), as well as from the existing remains of the temple, that the eastern and
western chambers were separated by a wall, and that there was no direct communication
between them. Hence we can the more easily understand the account of Plutarch,
who relates that the Athenians, in order to pay the greatest honour to Demetrius
Poliorcetes, lodged him in the Opisthodomus of the Parthenon as a guest of the
goddess (Plut. Demetr. 23).
In the centre of the pavement of the Hecatompedon there is a place
covered with Peiraic stone, and not with marble, like the rest of the pavement.
It has been usually supposed that this was the foundation on which the statue
of then goddess rested; but this has been denied by K. F. Hermann, who maintains
that there was an altar upon this spot. There can however be little doubt that
the common opinion is correct, since there is no other place in the building to
which we can assign the position of the statue. It could not have stood in the
western chamber, since this was separated by a wall from the eastern. It could
not have stood at the western extremity of the eastern chamber, where Ussing places
it, because this part of the chamber was occupied by the western return of the
interior columns (see ground-plan). Lastly, supposing the spot covered with Peiraic
stone to represent an altar, the statue could not have stood between this spot
and the door of the temple. The only alternative left is placing the statue either
upon the above-mentioned spot, or else between it and the western return of the
interior columns, where there is scarcely sufficient space left for it.
There has been a great controversy among modern scholars as to whether
any part of the roof of the eastern chamber of the Parthenon was hypaethral, or
pierced with an opening to the sky. Most English writers, following Stuart, had
arrived at a conclusion in the affirmative; but the discussion has been recently
reopened in Germany, and it seems impossible to arrive at any definite conclusion
upon the subject. We know that, as a general rule, the Grecian temples had no
windows in the walls; and consequently the light was admitted either through some
opening in the roof, or through the door alone. The latter appears to have been
the case in smaller temples, which could obtain sufficient light from the open
door; but larger temples must necessarily have been in comparative darkness, if
they received light from no other quarter. And although the temple was the abode
of the deity, and not a place of meeting, yet it is impossible to believe that
the Greeks left in comparative darkness the beautiful paintings and statues with
which they decorated the interior of their temples. We have moreover express evidence
that light was admitted into temples through the roof. This appears to have been
done in two ways, either by windows or openings in the tiles of the roof, or by
leaving a large part of the latter open to the sky. The former was the case in
the temple of Eleusis. There can be little doubt that the naos or eastern chamber
of the Parthenon must have obtained its light in one or other of these ways; but
the testimony of Vitruvius (iii. 1) cannot be quoted in favour of the Parthenon
being hypaethral, as there are strong reasons for believing the passage to be
corrupt. If the Parthenon was really hypaethral, we must place the opening to
the sky between the statue and the eastern door, since we cannot suppose that
such an exquisite work as the chryselephantine statue of Athena was not protected
by a covered roof.
Before quitting the Parthenon, there is one interesting point connected with its
construction, which must not be passed over without notice.
It has been discovered within the last few years, that in the Parthenon,
and in some others of the purer specimens of Grecian architecture, there is a
systematic deviation from ordinary rectilinear construction. Instead of the straight
lines in ordinary architecture, we find various delicate curves in the Parthenon.
It is observed that the most important curves in point of extent, are those which
form the horizontal lines of the building where they occur; such as the edges
of the steps, and the lines of the entablature, which are usually considered to
be straight level lines, but in the steps of the Parthenon, and some other of
the best examples of Greek Doric are convex curves, lying in vertical plains;
the lines of the entablature being also curves nearly parallel to the steps and
in vertical plains. The existence of curves in Greek buildings is mentioned by
Vitruvius (iii. 3), but it was not until the year 1837, when much of the rubbish
which encumbered the stylobate of the Parthenon had been removed by the operations
carried on by the Greek government, that the curvature was discovered by Mr. George
Pennethorne, an English architect then at Athens. Subsequently the curves were
noticed by Messrs. Hofer and Schaubert, German architects, and communicated by
them to the Wiener Bauzeitung. More recently a full and elaborate account of these
curves has been given by Mr. Penrose, who went to Athens under the patronage of
the Society of Dilettanti for the purpose of investigating this subject, and who
published the results of his researches in the magnificent work, to which we have
already so often referred. Mr. Penrose remarks that it is not surprising that
the curves were not sooner discovered from an inspection of the building, since
the amount of curvature is so exquisitely managed that it is not perceptible to
a stranger standing opposite to the front ; and that before the excavations the
steps were so much encumbered as to have prevented any one looking along their
whole length. The curvature may now be easily remarked by a person who places
his eye in such a position as to look along the lines of the step or entablature
from end to end, which in architectural language is called boning.
For all architectural details we refer to Mr. Penrose's work, who
has done far more to explain the construction of the Parthenon than any previous
writer. There are two excellent models of the Parthenon by Mr. Lucas, in the Elgin
Room at the British Museum, one a restoration of the temple, and the other its
ruined aspect.
It has been already stated that the Parthenon was converted into a
Christian church, dedicated to the Virgin-Mother, probably in the sixth century.
Upon the conquest of Athens by the Turks, it was changed into a mosque, and down
to the year 1687 the building remained almost entire with the exception of the
roof. Of its condition before this year we have more than one account. In 1674
drawings of its sculptures were made by Carrey, an artist employed for this purpose
by the Marquis de Nointel, the French ambassador at Constantinople. These drawings
are still extant and have been of great service in the restoration of the sculptures,
especially in the pediments. In 1676 Athens was visited by Spon and Wheler, each
of whom published an account of the Parthenon (Spon, Voyage du Levant, 1678; Wheler,
Journey into Greece, 1682).
In 1687, when Athens was besieged by the Venetians under Morosini,
a shell, falling into the Parthenon, inflamed the gunpowder, which had been placed
by the Turks in the eastern chamber, and reduced the centre of the Parthenon to
a heap of ruins. The walls of the eastern chamber were thrown down together with
all the interior columns, and the adjoining columns of the peristyle. Of the northern
side of the peristyle eight columns were wholly or partially thrown down; and
of the southern, six columns; while of the pronaos only one column was left standing.
The two fronts escaped, together with a portion of the western chamber. Morosini,
after the capture of the city, attempted to carry off some of the statues in the
western pediment; but, owing to the unskilfulness of the Venetians, they were
thrown down as they were being lowered, and were dashed in pieces.
At the beginning of the present century, many of the finest sculptures
of the Parthenon were removed to England, as has been mentioned above. In 1827
the Parthenon received fresh injury, from the bombardment of the city in that
year; but even in its present state of desolation, the magnificence of its ruins
still strikes the spectator with astonishment and admiration.
4. The Erechtheium.
The Erechtheium (Erechtheion) was the most revered of all the sanctuaries of Athens,
and was closely connected with the earliest legends of Attica. Erechtheus or Erichthonius,
for the same person is signified under the two names, occupies a most important
position in the Athenian religion. His story is related variously; but it is only
necessary on the present occasion to refer to those portions of it which. serve
to illustrate the following account of the building which bears his name. Homer
represents Erechtheus as born of the Earth, and brought up by the goddess Athena,
who adopts him as her ward, and instals him in her temple at Athens, where the
Athenians offer to him annual sacrifices (Hom. Il. ii. 546, Od. vii. 81). Later
writers call Erechtheus or Erichthonius the son of Hephaestus and the Earth, but
they also relate that he was brought up by Athena, who made him her companion
in her temple. According to one form of the legend he was placed by Athena in
a chest, which was entrusted to the charge of Aglaurus, Pandrosus, and Herse,
the daughters of Cecrops, with strict orders not to open it; but that Aglaurus
and Herse, unable to control their curiosity, disobeyed the command; and upon
seeing the child in the form of a serpent entwined with a serpent, they were seized
with madness, and threw themselves down from the steepest part of the Acropolis
(Apollod. iii. 14.6; Hygin. Fab. 166; Paus. i. 18.2). Another set of traditions
represented Erechtheus as the god Poseidon. In the Erechtheium he was worshipped
under the name of Poseidon Erechtheus; and one of the family of the Butadae, which
traced their descent from him, was his hereditary priest (Apollod. iii. 15.1;
Plut. Vit. X. Orat. ; Xen. Sympos. 8.40). Hence we may infer with Mr. Grote that
the first and oldest conception of Athens and the sacred Acropolis places it under
the special protection, and represents it as the settlement and favourite abode
of Athena, jointly with Poseidon; the latter being the inferior, though the chosen
companion of the former, and therefore exchanging his divine appellation for the
cognomen of Erechtheus.
The foundation of the Erechtheium is thus connected with the origin
of the Athenian religion. We have seen that according to Homer a temple of Athena
existed on the Acropolis before the birth of Erechtheus; but Erechtheus was usually
regarded as the founder of the temple, since he was the chief means of establishing
the religion of Athena in Attica. This temple was also the place of his interment,
and was named after him. It contained several objects of the greatest interest
to every Athenian. Here was the most ancient statue of Athena Polias, that is,
Athena, the guardian of the city. This statue was made of olive-wood, and was
said to have fallen down from heaven. Here was the sacred olive tree, which Athena
called forth from the earth in her contest with Poseidon for the possession of
Attica; here also was the well of salt water which Poseidon produced by the stroke
of his trident, the impression of which was seen upon the rock; and here, lastly,
was the tomb of Cecrops as well as that of Erechtheus. The building also contained
a separate sanctuary of Athena Polias, in which the statue of the goddess was
placed, and a separate sanctuary of Pandrosus, the only one of the sisters who
remained faithful to her trust. The more usual name of the entire structure was
the Erechtheium, which consisted of the two temples of Athena Polias and Pandrosus.
But the whole building was also frequently called the temple of Athena Polias,
in consequence of the importance attached to this part of the edifice. In the
ancient inscription mentioned below, it is simply called the temple which contained
the ancient statue (ho neos en ho to archaion agalma).
The original Erechtheium was burnt by the Persians; but the new temple
was built upon the ancient site. This could not have been otherwise, since it
was impossible to remove either the salt well or the olive tree, the latter of
which sacred objects had been miraculously spared. Though it had been burnt along
with the temple, it was found on the second day to have put forth a new sprout
of a cubit in length, or, according to the subsequent improvement of the story,
of two cubits in length (Herod. viii. 55; Paus. i. 27.2). The new Erechtheium
was a singularly beautiful building, and one of the great triumphs of Athenian
architecture. It was of the Ionic order, and in its general appearance formed
a striking contrast to the Parthenon of the Doric order by its side. The rebuilding
of the Erechtheium appears to have been delayed by the determination of the people
to erect a new temple exclusively devoted to their goddess, and of the greatest
splendour and magnificence. This new temple, the Parthenon, which absorbed the
public attention and means, was followed by the Propylaea; and it was probably
not till the completion of the latter in the year before the Peloponnesian war,
that the rebuilding of the Erechtheium was commenced, or at least continued, with
energy. The Peloponnesian war would naturally cause the works to proceed slowly
until they were quite suspended, as we learn from a very interesting inscription,
bearing the date of the archonship of Diodes, that is, B.C. 409-8. This inscription,
which was discovered by Chandler, and is now in the British Museum, is the report
of a commission appointed by the Athenians to take an account of the unfinished
parts of the building. The commission consisted of two inspectors (epistatai),
an architect (architekton) named Philocles, and a scribe (grammateus). It appears
from this inscription that the principal parts of the building were finished;
and we may conclude that they had been completed some time before, since Herodotus
(viii. 55), who probably wrote in the early years of the Peloponnesian war, describes
the temple as containing the olive tree and the salt well, without making any
allusion to its being in an incomplete state. The report of the commission was
probably followed by an order for the completion of the work; but three years
afterwards the temple sustained considerable damage from a fire (Xen. Hell. i.
6.1). The troubles of the Athenians at the close of the Peloponnesian war must
again have withdrawn attention from the building; and we therefore cannot place
its completion much before B.C. 393, when the Athenians, after the restoration
of the Long Walls by Conon, had begun to turn their attention again to the embellishment
of their city. The words of Xenophon in the passage quoted above -ho palaios tes
Athenas neos- have created difficulty, because it has been thought that it could
not have been called the old temple of Athena, inasmuch as it was so new as to
be yet unfinished. But we know that the old temple of Athena was a name commonly
given to the Erechtheium to distinguish it from the Parthenon. Thus Strabo (ix.)
calls it, ho archaios naos ho tes Poliados
The Erechtheium was situated to the north of the Parthenon, and close
to the northern wall of the Acropolis. The existing ruins leave no doubt as to
the exact form and appearance of the exterior of the building; but the arrangement
of the interior is a matter of great uncertainty. The interior of the temple was
converted into a Byzantine church, which is now destroyed; and the inner part
of the building presents nothing but a heap of ruins, belonging partly to the
ancient temple, and partly to the Byzantine church. The difficulty of understanding
the arrangement of the interior is also increased by the obscurity of the description
of Pausanias. Hence it is not surprising that almost every writer upon the subject
has differed from his predecessor in his distribution of some parts of the building;
though there are two or three important points in which most modern scholars are
now agreed. The building has been frequently examined and described by architects;
but no one has devoted to it so much time and careful attention as M. Tetaz, a
French architect, who has published the results of his personal investigations
in the Revue Archeologique for 1851 (parts 1 and 2). We, therefore, follow M.
Tetaz in his restoration of the interior, with one or two slight alterations,
at the same time reminding our readers that this arrangement must after all be
regarded as, to a great extent, conjectural. The walls of the ruins, according
to the measurement of Tetaz, are 20.034 French metres in length from east to west,
and 11.215 metres in breadth from north to south.
The form of the Erechtheium differs from every other known example
of a Grecian temple. Usually a Grecian temple was an oblong figure, with two porticoes,
one at its eastern, and the other at its western, end. The Erechtheium, on the
contrary, though oblong in shape and having a portico at the eastern front, had
no portico at its western end; but from either side of the latter a portico projected
to the north and south, thus forming a kind of transept. Consequently the temple
had three porticoes, called prostaseis in the inscription above mentioned, and
which may be distinguished as the eastern, the northern, and the southern prostasis,
or portico. The irregularity of the building is to be accounted for partly by
the difference of the level of the ground, the eastern portico standing upon ground
about 8 feet higher than the northern; but still more by the necessity of preserving
the different sanctuaries and religious objects belonging to the ancient temple.
The skill and ingenuity of the Athenian architects triumphed over these difficulties,
and even converted them into beauties.
The eastern portico stood before the principal entrance. This is proved
by its facing the east, by its greater height, and also by the disposition of
its columns. It consisted of six Ionic columns standing in a single line before
the wall of the cella, the extremities of which are adorned with antae opposite
to the extreme columns. Five of these columns are still standing.
The northern portico, called in the inscription he prostasis he pros
tou thuromatos, or the portico before the thyroma, stood before the other chief
entrance. It also consisted of six Ionic columns, but only four of these are in
front; the two others are placed, one in each flank, before a corresponding anta
in the wall on either side of the door. These columns are all standing. They are
about 3 feet higher, and nearly 6 inches greater in diameter, than those in the
eastern portico. It must not, however, be inferred from this circumstance that
the northern portico was considered of more importance than the eastern one; since
the former appeared inferior from its standing on lower ground. Each of these
porticoes stood before two large doors ornamented with great magnificence.
The southern portico, though also called prostasis in the inscription,
was of an entirely different character. Its roof was supported by six Caryatides,
or columns, of which the shafts represented young maidens in long draperies, called
hai Korai in the inscription. They are arranged in the same manner as the columns
in the northern portico -namely, four in front, and one on either anta. They stand
upon a basement eight feet above the exterior level; the roof which they support
is flat, and about 15 feet above the floor of the building. The entire height
of the portico, including the basement, was little more than half the height of
the pitched roof of the temple. There appears to have been no access to this portico
from the exterior of the building. There was no door in the wall behind this portico;
and the only access to it from the interior of the building was by a small flight
of steps leading out into the basement of the portico between the Caryatid and
the anta on the eastern flank. All these steps may still be traced, and two of
them are still in their place. At the bottom of them, on the floor of the building,
there is a door opposite the great door of the northern porch. It is evident,
from this arrangement, that this southern portico formed merely an appendage of
that part of the Erechtheium to which the great northern door gave access. A few
years ago the whole of this portico was in a state of ruins, but in 1846 it was
restored by M. Piscatory, then the French ambassador in Greece. Four of the Caryatides
were still standing; the fifth, which was found in an excavation, was restored
to its former place, and a new figure was made in place of the sixth, which was,
and is, in the British Museum.
The western end of the building had no portico before it. The wall
at this end consisted of a basement of considerable height, upon which were four
Ionic columns, supporting an entablature. These four columns had half their diameters
engaged in the wall, thus forming, with the two antae at the corners, five intercolumniations,
corresponding to the front of the principal portico. The wall behind was pierced
with three windows in the spaces between the engaged columns in the centre.
The frieze of the building was composed of black Eleusinian marble,
adorned with figures in low relief in white marble; but of this frieze only three
portions are still in their place in the eastern portico.
With respect to the interior of the building, it appears from an examination
of the existing remains that it was divided by two transverse walls into three
compartments, of which the eastern and the middle was about 24 feet each from
east to west, and the western about 9 feet. The last was consequently a passage
along the western wall, of the building, at one end of which was the great door
of the northern portico, and at the other end the door of the staircase leading
to the portico of the Caryatides. There can, therefore, be little doubt that this
passage served as the pronaos of the central compartment. It, therefore, appears
from the ruins themselves that the Erechtheium contained only two principal chambers.
This is in accordance with the statement of Pausanias,who says (i. 26.5) that
the Erechtheium was a double building (diploun oikema). He further states that
the temple of Pandrosus was attached to that of Athena Polias (toi naoi tes Athenas
Pandrosou naos suneches, i. 27.2). Now since Herodotus and other authors mention
a temple of Erechtheus, it was inferred by Stuart and others that the building
contained three temples -one of Erechtheus, a second of Athena Polias, and a third
of Pandrosus. But, as we have remarked above, the Erechtheium was the name of
the whole building, and it does not appear that Erechtheus had any shrine peculiar
to himself. Thus the olive tree which is placed by Herodotus (viii. 55) in the
temple of Erechtheus, is said by other writers to have stood in the temple of
Pandrosus (Apollod. iii. 14.1; Philochorus, ap. Dionys. de Deinarch. 3). We may
therefore safely conclude that the two temples, of which the Erechtheium consisted,
were those of Athena Polias and of Pandrosus, to which there was access by the
eastern and the northern porticoes respectively. That the eastern chamber was
the temple of Athena Polias follows from the eastern portico being the more important
of the two, as we have already shown.
The difference of level between the floors of the two temples would
seem to show that there was no direct communication between them. That there was,
however, some means of communication between them appears from an occurrence recorded
by Philochorus (ap. Dionys. l. c.), who relates that a dog entered the temple
of Polias, and having penetrated (dusa) from thence into that of Pandrosus, there
lay down at the altar of Zeus Herceius, which was under the olive tree. Tetaz
supposes that the temple of Polias was separated from the two lateral walls of
the building by two walls parallel to the latter, by means of which a passage
was formed on either side, one on the level of the floor of the temple of Polias,
and the other on the level of the floor of the Pandroseium; the former communicating
between the two temples by a flight of steps, and the latter leading to the souterrains
of the building.
A portion of the building was called the Cecropium. Antiochus, who
wrote about B.C. 423, related that Cecrops was buried in some part of the temple
of Athena Polias (including under that name the whole edifice). In the inscription
also the Cecropium is mentioned. Pausanias makes no mention of any sepulchral
monuments either of Cecrops or of Erechtheus. Hence it may be inferred that none
such existed; and that, as in the case of Theseus in the Theseium, the tradition
of their interment was preserved by the names of Erechtheium and Cecropium, the
former being applied to the whole building, and the latter to a portion of it.
The position of the Cecropium is determined by the inscription, which speaks of
the southern prostasis, or portico of Caryatides, as he prostasis he pros toi
Kekropioi. The northern portico is described as pros tou thuromatos. From the
pros governing a different case in these two instances, it has been justly inferred
by Wordsworth, that in the former, the dative case signifies that the Caryatid
portico was a part of, and attached to, the Cecropium; while, in the latter, the
genitive indicates that the northern portico was only in the direction of or towards
the portal. In addition to this there is no other part of the Pandroseium to which
the Cecropium can be assigned. It cannot have been, as some writers have supposed,
the western compartment -a passage between the northern and southern porticoes-
since this was a part of the temple of Pandrosus, as we learn from the inscription,
which describes the western wall as the wall before the Pandroseium (ho toichos
ho pros tou Pandroseiou). Still less could it have been the central apartment,
which was undoubtedly the cella of the Pandroseium. We may, therefore, conclude
that the Caryatid portico, with the crypt below, was the Cecropium, or sepulchre
of Cecrops. It is evident that this building, which had no access to it from the
exterior, is not so much a portico as an adjunct, or a chapel of the Pandroseium,
intended for some particular purpose, as Leake has observed.
We may now proceed to examine the different objects in the building
and connected with it. First, as to the temple of Athena Polias. In front of the
portico was the altar of Zeus Hypatus, which Pausanias describes as situated before
the entrance (pro tes esodou). In the portico itself (eselthousi, Paus.) were
altars of Poseidon-Erechtheus, of Butes, and of Hephaestus. In the cella (en toi
naoi), probably near the western wall, was the Palladium, or statue of the goddess.
In front of the latter was the golden lamp, made by Callimachus, which was kept
burning both day and night; it was filled with oil only once a year, and had a
wick of Carpasian flax (the mineral Asbestus), whence the lamp was called ho asbestos
luchnos (Strab. ix.). It is mentioned as one of the offences of the tyrant Aristion,
that he allowed the fire of this lamp to go out during the siege of Athens by
Sulla. Pausanias says, that a brazen palm tree rising above the lamp to the roof
carried off the smoke. In other parts of the cella were a wooden Hermes, said
to have been presented by Cecrops, a folding chair made by Daedalus, and spoils
taken from the Persians. The walls of the temple were covered with pictures of
the Butadae.
The statue of Athena Polias, which was the most sacred statue of the
goddess, was made of olive wood. It is said to have fallen down from heaven, and
to have been a common offering of the demi many years before they were united
in the city of Athens. It was emphatically the ancient statue; and, as Wordsworth
has remarked, it had, in the time of Aeschylus, acquired the character of a proper
name, not requiring to be distinguished by the definite article. Hence Athena
says to Orestes (Aesch. Eum. 80.): hizou palaion ankathen labon bretas. It has
been observed above that the Panathenaic peplos was dedicated to Athena Polias,
and not to the Athena of the Parthenon. This appears from the following passage
of Aristophanes (Au. 826), quoted by Wordsworth:
tis dai theos Poliouchos estai;
toi xanoumen ton peplon;
ti d'oui?? Athenaian eomen Poliada;
Upon which passage the scholiast remarks: tei Athenai Poliadi ousei peplos egineto
pampoikilos hon anepheron en tei pompei ton Panathenaion. The statue of Athena
seems to have been covered with the peplus. A very ancient statue of Athena, which
was discovered a few years back in the Aglaurium, is supposed by K. O. Muller
to have been a copy of the old Athena Polias. A description of this statue, with
three views of it, is given by Mr. Scharf in the Museum of Classical Antiquities.
It is a sitting figure, 4 feet 6 inches in height. It has a very archaic character;
the posture is formal and angular; the knees ate close together, but the left
foot a little advanced; the head and arms are wanting.
With respect to the objects in the Pandroseium, the first thing is
to determine, if possible, the position of the olive tree and the salt well. That
both of these were in the Pandroseium cannot admit of doubt. Two authors already
quoted (Apollod. iii. 14.1; Philochor. ap. Dionys. de Deinarch. 3) expressly state
that the olive tree stood in the temple of Pandrosus; and that such was the case
with the salt well, also, appears from Pausanias (i. 26.5), who, after stating
that the building is twofold, adds: in the inner part is a well of salt water,
which is remarkable for sending forth a sound like that of waves when the wind
is from the south. There is, also, the figure of a trident upon the rock: these
are said to be evidences of the contention of Poseidon (with Athena) for Attica.
This salt well is usually called Xalassa Erechtheis, or simply Xalassa (Apollod.
iii. 14.1; Herod. viii. 55); and other writers mention the visible marks of Poseidon's
trident. Leake supposed that both the well and the olive tree were in the Cecropium,
or the southern portico, on the ground that the two were probably near each other,
and that the southern portico, by its peculiar plan and construction, seems to
have been intended expressly for the olive, since a wall, fifteen feet high, protected
the trunk from injury, while the air was freely admitted to its foliage, between
the six statues which supported the roof. But this hypothesis is disproved by
the recent investigations of Tetaz, who states that the foundation of the floor
of the portico is formed of a continuous mass of stones, which could not have
received any vegetation. The olive tree could not, therefore, have been in the
southern portico. M. Tetaz places it, with much probability, in the centre of
the cella of the Pandroseium. He imagines that the lateral walls of the temple
of Polias were continued under the form of columns in the Pandroseium, and that
the inner space between these columns formed the cella of the temple, and was
open to the sky. Here grew the olive-tree under the altar of Zeus Herceius according
to the statement of Philochorus (ap. Dionys. l. c.). The description by Virgil
(Aen. ii. 512) of the altar, at which Priam was slain, is applicable to the spot
before us: Aedibus in mediis, nudoque sub aetheris axe Ingens ara fuit, juxtaque
veterrima laurus Incumbens arae atque umbra complex Penates.
The probable position of the salt well has been determined by Tetaz,
who has discovered, under the northern portico, what appear to be the marks of
Poseidon's trident. Upon the removal, in 1846, of the remains of a Turkish powder
magazine, which encumbered the northern portico, Tetaz observed three holes sunk
in the rock; and it is not unlikely that this was the very spot shown to devout
persons, and to Pausanias among the number, as the memorial of Poseidon's contest
with Athena. A drawing of them is given by Mr. Penrose, which we subjoin, with
his description.
They occur upon the surface of the rock of the Acropolis, about seven
feet below the level of the pavement. These singular traces consist of three holes,
partly natural and partly cut in the rock; that lettered a in the plan is close
to the eastern anta of the portico; it is very irregular, and seems to form part
of a natural fissure; b and c, near the surface, seem also to have been natural,
but are hollowed into a somewhat cylindrical shape, between 2 and 3 feet deep
and 8 and 9 in diameter; d is a receptacle, as may be presumed, for water, cut
1.0 deep in the rock, and connected with the holes b and c by means of a narrow
channel, alto about 1.0 deep. The channel is produced for a short distance in
the direction of a, but was perhaps discontinued on its being discovered that,
owing to natural crevices, it would not hold water. At the bottom of b and c were
found fragments of ordinary ancient pottery. There appears to have been a low
and narrow doorway through the foundation of the wall, dividing this portico from
the temple, to the underground space or crypt, where these holes occur, and also
some communication from above, through a slab rather different from the rest,
in the pavement of the portico immediately over them.
Pausanias has not expressly mentioned any other objects as being in
the Pandroseium, but we may presume that it contained a statue of Pandrosus, and
an altar of Thallo, one of the Horae, to whom, he informs us elsewhere (ix. 35.1),
the Athenians paid divine honours jointly with Pandrosus. He has also omitted
to notice the oikouros ophis, or Erechthonian serpent, whose habitation in the
Erechtheium was called drakaulos, and to whom honey cakes were presented every
month. We have no means of determining the position of this drakaulos.
The Erechtheium was surrounded on most sides by a Temenos or sacred
inclosure, separated from the rest of the Acropolis by a wall. This Temenos was
on a lower level than the temple, and the descent to it was by a flight of steps
close to the eastern portico. It was bounded on the east by a wall, extending
from this portico to the wall of the Acropolis, of which a part is still extant.
On the north it was bounded by the wall of the Acropolis, and on the south by
a wall extending from the southern portico towards the left wing of the Propylaea.
Its limits to the west cannot be ascertained. In the Temenos, there were several
statues mentioned by Pausanias, name y, that of the aged priestess Lysimacha,
one cubit high (comp. Plin. xxxiv. 8. s. 19. 15); the colossal figures in brass
of Erechtheus and Eumolpus, ready to engage in combat; some ancient wooden statues
of Athena in the half burnt state in which they had been left by the Persians;
the hunting of a wild boar; Cycnus fighting with Hercules; Theseus finding the
slippers and sword of Aegeus under the rock; Theseus and the Marathonian bull;
and Cylon, who attempted to obtain the tyranny at Athens. In the Temenos, also,
was the habitation of two of the four maidens, called Arrephori, with their sphaerestra,
or place for playing at ball. These two maidens remained a whole year in the Acropolis;
and on the approach of the greater Panethenaea they received from the priestess
of Polias a burden, the contents of which were unknown to themselves and to the
priestess. With this burden they descended into a subterraneous natural cavern
near the temple of Aphrodite in the gardens, where they deposited the burden they
brought, and carried back another burden covered up (Paus. i. 27.3; Plut. Vit.
X. Orat.; Harpocr., Suid., s. v. Deipnophoroi). It is probable that the Arrephori
passed through the Aglaurium in their descent to the cavern above mentioned. The
steps leading to the Aglaurium issued from the Temenos; and it is not impossible,
considering the close connexion of the worship of Aglaurus with that of her sister
Pandrosus, that the Aglaurium may have been considered as a part of the Temenos
of the Erechtheium.
5. Other Monuments on the Acropolis.
The Propylaea, the Parthenon and the Erechtheium were the three chief buildings on the Acropolis; but its summit was covered with other temples, altars, statues and works of art, the number of which was so great as almost to excite our astonishment that space could be found for them all. Of these, however, we can only mention the most important.
(i.) The Statue of Athena Promachus, one of the most celebrated works of Pheidias,
was a colossal bronze figure, and represented the goddess armed and in the very
attitude of battle. Hence it was distinguished from the statues of Athena in the
Parthenon and the Erechtheium, by the epithet of Promachus. This Athena was also
called The Bronze, the Great Athena (he chalke he megale Athena, Dem. de Fals.
Leg.). Its position has been already described. It stood in the open air nearly
opposite the Propylaea, and was one of the first objects seen after passing through
the gates of the latter. It was of gigantic size. It towered even above the roof
of the Parthenon; and the point of its spear and the crest of its helmet were
visible off the promontory of Sunium to ships approaching Athens (Paus.i.28.2;
comp.Herod.v.77). With its pedestal it must have stood about 70 feet high. Its
position and colossal proportions are shown in an ancient coin of Athens, containing
a rude representation of the Acropolis. It was still standing in A.D. 395, and
is said to have frightened away Alaric when he came to sack the Acropolis (Zosim.
v. 6). The exact site of this statue is now well ascertained, since the foundations
of its pedestal have been discovered.
(ii.) A brazen Quadriga, dedicated from the spoils of Chalcis, stood on the left
hand of a person, as he entered the Acropolis through the Propylaea. (Herod. v.
77; Paus. i. 28.2)
(iii.) The Gigantomachia, a composition in sculpture, stood upon the southern
or Cimonian wall, and just above the Dionysiac theatre; for Plutarch relates that
a violent wind precipitated into the Dionysiac theatre a Dionysus, which was one
of the figures of the Gigantomachia (Paus. i. 25.2; Plut. Ant. 60). The Gigantomachia
was one of four compositions, each three feet in height, dedicated by Attalus,
the other three representing the battle of the Athenians and Amazons, the battle
of Marathon, and the destruction of the Gauls by Attalus. If the Gigantomachia
stood towards the eastern end of the southern wall, we may conclude that the three
other compositions were ranged in a similar manner upon the wall towards the west,
and probably extended as far as opposite the Parthenon. Mr. Penrose relates that
south-east of the Parthenon, there has been discovered upon the edge of the Cimonian
wall a platform of Piraic stone, containing two plain marble slabs, which are
perhaps connected with these sculptures.
(iv.) Temple of Artemis Brauronia, standing between the Propylaea and the Parthenon,
of which the foundations have been recently discovered (Paus. i. 23.7). Near it,
as we learn from Pausanias, was a brazen statue of the Trojan horse (hippos doureios),
from which Menestheus, Teucer and the sons of Theseus were represented looking
out (huperkuptousi). From other authorities we learn that spears projected from
this horse (Hesych. s. v. dourios hippos; comp. doureios hippos, krupton ampischon
doru, Eurip. Troad. 14); and also that it was of colossal size (hippon huponton
megethos hoson ho dourios, Aristoph. Av. 1128; Hesych. s. v. Krios aselgokeros).
The basis of this statue has also been discovered with an inscription, from which
we learn that it was dedicated by Chaeredemus, of Coele (a quarter in the city),
and that it was made by Strongylion.
(v.) Temple of Rome and Augustus, not mentioned by Pausanias, stood about 90 feet
before the eastern front of the Parthenon. Leake observes that from a portion
of its architrave still in existence, we may infer that it was circular, 23 feet
in diameter, of the Ionic or Corinthian order, and about 50 feet in height, exclusive
of a basement. An inscription found upon the site informs us that it was dedicated
by the Athenian people theai Hpomei kai Eebastoi Kaisari. It was dedicated to
Rome and Augustus, because this emperor forbade the provinces to raise any temple
to him, except in conjunction with Rome.
In following Pausanias through the Acropolis, we must suppose that he turned to the right after passing through the Propylaea, and went straight to the Parthenon; that; from the Parthenon he proceeded to the eastern end of the Acropolis; and returned along the northern side, passing the Erechtheium and the statue of Athena Promachus.
This extract is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited Aug 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
In nearly all the cities of Greece, which were usually built upon a hill or some natural elevation, there was a kind of tower or citadel, reared upon the highest part, to which the name akropolis (upper town) was given. At Rome, the Capitolium was analogous in its purposes to the acropolis of Greek cities. The Acropolis of Athens was situated on a plateau of rock, about 200 feet in height, 1000 in breadth from east to west, and 460 in length from north to south. It was originally called Cecropia, after Cecrops, the ancestor of the Athenians, whose grave and shrine were shown on the spot. On the north side of the Acropolis was the Erechtheum, the common seat of worship of the ancient gods of Athens, Athene Polias, Hephaestus, Poseidon, and Erechtheus himself, who was said to have founded the sanctuary. His house was possibly northeast of the Erechtheum. Pisistratus, like the ancient kings, had his residence on the Acropolis, and may have added the stylobate to the temple of Athene recently identified, south of the Erechtheum. The walls of the fortress proper were destroyed in the Persian wars, 480 and 479 B.C., and restored by Cimon. But the wall surrounding the foot of the hill, called the Pelasgicon or Pelargicon, and supposed to be a relic of the oldest inhabitants, was left in ruins. Cimon also laid the foundation of a new temple of Athene on the south side of the hill. This temple was begun afresh and completed in the most splendid style by Pericles, and called the Parthenon. Pericles at the same time adorned the approach to the west side of the Acropolis with the glorious Propylaea, and began to rebuild the Erechtheum in magnificent style. There were several other sanctuaries on the Acropolis--that, for instance, of Artemis Brauronia, on the southeastern side of the Propylaea; the beautiful little temple of Athene Nike, to the southwest; and the Pandroseum, adjoining the temple of Erechtheus. There were many altars--that of Zeus Hypatos, for example--and countless statues, among them that of Athene Promachos, with votive offerings. Among the numerous grottos in the rock, one on the north side was dedicated to Pan, another to Apollo.
This text is cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
ARIOS PAGOS (Hill) ATHENS
A Christian writer, called Areopagita, from his having been
a member of the court of Areopagus at Athens. He was converted to Christianity
by St. Paul's preaching . He is reported to have been the first bishop of Athens,
being appointed to that office by the apostle Paul, and to have suffered martyrdom
under Domitian. His fundamental thought is the absolute transcendence of God.
During the Middle Ages a great number of writings were circulated under his name,
and were collected together and printed at Cologne in 1536, and subsequently at
Antwerp in 1634 and at Paris in 1646. They have now, for a long time, been deemed
spurious, although scholars differ in respect to the times and authors of the
fabrication. The most probable reasoning, however, fixes them at the end of the
fourth century. The standard text is that of Corderius, reprinted by the Abbe
Migne. Trans. by Parker (1894).
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Nov 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
An Athenian statesman, a friend and partisan of Pericles, whom he assisted in carrying his political measures. He was instrumental in abridging the powers of the Areopagus--a measure assailed by Aeschylus in his Eumenides. Ephialtes thus made himself so obnoxious to the aristocratic party that his enemies had him assassinated, probably in the year B.C. 456.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Nov 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Dionysius, Surnamed Areopageita, an Athenian, who is called by Suidas a most eminent man, who rose to the height of Greek erudition. He is said to have first studied at Athens, and afterwards at Heliopolis in Egypt. When he observed in Egypt the eclipse of the sun, which occurred during the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, he is said to have exclaimed, "either God himself is suffering, or he sympathises with some one who is suffering". On his return to Athens he was made one of the council of the Areiopagus, whence he derives his surname. About A. D. 50, when St. Paul preached at Athens, Dionysius became a Christian (The Acts, xvii. 34), and it is said that he was not only the first bishop of Athens, but that he was installed in that office by St. Paul himself (Euseb. H. E. iii. 4, iv. 23; Suidas). He is further said to have died the death of a martyr under most cruel tortures. Whether Dionysius Areiopageita ever wrote anything, is highly uncertain; but there exists under his name a number of works of a mystico-Christian nature, which contain ample evidence that they are the productions of some Neo-Platonist, and can scarcely have been written before the fifth or sixth century of our era. Without entering upon any detail about those works, which would be out of place here, we need only remark, that they exercised a very great influence upon the formation and development of Christianity in the middle ages. At the time of the Carlovingian emperors, those works were introduced into western Europe in a Latin translation made by Scotus Erigena, and gave the first impulse to that mystic and scholastic theology which afterwards maintained itself for centuries.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited June 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Ephialtes. An Athenian statesman and general, son of Sophonides, or, according to Diodorus, of Simonides, was a friend and partizan of Pericles, who is said by Plutarch to have often put him forward as the main ostensible agent in carrying political measures when he did not choose to appear prominently himself (Ael. V. H. ii. 43, iii. 17; Plut. Peric. 7; Diod. xi. 77). Thus, when the Spartans sent to ask the assistance of the Athenians against Ithome in B. C. 461, he endeavoured to prevent the people from granting the request, urging them not to raise a fallen rival, but to leave the spirit of Sparta to be trodden down; and we find him mentioned in particular as chiefly instrumental in that abridgment of the power of the Areiopagus, which inflicted such a blow on the oligarchical party, and against which the "Eumenides" of Aeschylus was directed (Arist. Polit. ii. 12; Diod. l. c.; Plut. Cim. 10, 15, 16, Pericl. 7, 9; Cic. de Rep. i. 27). By this measure Plutarch tells us that he introduced an unmixed democracy, and made the city drunk with liberty; but he does not state clearly the precise powers of which the Areiopagus was deprived, nor is it easy to decide this point, or to settle whether it was the authority of the court or the council that Pericles and Ephialtes assailed. The services of Ephialtes to the democratic cause excited the rancorous enmity of some of the oligarchs, and led to his assassination during the night, probably in B. C. 456. It appears that in the time of Antiphon (see de Caed. Her.) the murderers had not been discovered; but we learn, on the authority of Aristotle (ap. Plut. Pericl. 10), that the deed was perpetrated by one Aristodicus of Tanagra. The character of Ephialtes, as given by ancient writers, is a high land honourable one, insomuch that he is even classed with Aristeides for his inflexible integrity. Heracleides Ponticus tells us that he was in the habit of throwing open his grounds to the people, and giving entertainments to large numbers of them, a statement which seems inconsistent with Aelian's account, possibly more rhetorical than true, of his poverty. (Plut. Cim. 10, Dem. 14; Ael. V. H. ii. 43, xi. 9, xiii. 39; Val. Max. iii. 8. Ext. 4; Heracl. Pont. 1.)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited July 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
ANTIKYTHIRA (Island) GREECE
Antikythera has had many names in its history. Its ancient name was
"Aigila" or "Aigilia". Subsequently it became known as "Lioi"
and "Sigilio", names that were used until the seventeenth century. From
the eighteenth century on it was called "Cerigotto". (The larger island
of Kythera was then called "Cerigo", thus Cerigotto meant "little
Cerigo"). The name Antikythera came later.
The island lies 22 nautical miles south of Kythera
and 18 miles north of Crete,
in a location that controls the passage from the Aegean
towards the open sea of the western Mediterranean.
Today the only useful anchorage of the island is in the Bay of Potamos,
exposed to the prevailing northerly winds. In ancient Antikythera, however, the
seashore seems to have been about two and a half meters higher than it is today.
As a result, until the early Christian era, the small Bay of Xeropotamos extended
deeper inland, and provided a small but relatively safe "secret" harbor.
Archeological finds show that the oldest settlement on the island
was established in the late Neolithic period and the early Bronze Age, or 4000-3000
BC. The Minoans left few traces on the island, but it is likely that it came under
their control as they sought to secure navigation throughout the Aegean. No evidence
has been found of settlement between the Minoan period and the end of the fourth
century, though we know that the island, by virtue of its location, was always
a useful hideout and base of operations for pirates.
After about 300 BC the island played an important part in piracy undertaken
by nearby Cretan cities, each of which claimed the island for themselves. Each
wanted it as a lookout post and lair for attacks on those ships that dared to
pass through the surrounding seas. We also have evidence of expeditions undertaken
from Rhodes against the Antikytherans (who are referred to as 'the Aegilian robbers').
Plutarch writes that the island was "occupied" by King Kleomenes
the third of Sparta on his way to Egypt after his defeat in Sellasia
in 222 BC. Plutarch recounts that Thirykion, a faithful follower of Kleomenes
who as a Spartan could not bear to retreat, chose to commit suicide on Antikythera.
From very early, the Cretan city of Falasarna
seems to have taken control of the island.
We know that settlements on the island and in Falasarna were destroyed
between 69 and 67 BC, as part of the efforts by Rhodes
to quell piracy in the Mediterranean basin. The island was again inhabited towards
the end of the Roman Imperial Era, in the fourth and fifth century AD. Soon afterwards
Arabian pirates occupied both Crete and Kythera and no doubt influenced life on
the island of Antikythera as well. We know little of the island's subsequent history
until the Third crusade in 1204, when the island was granted to the Venetian Iakovos
Viaros. Towards the end of the thirteenth century, the Venetians, who wanted the
island in order to secure passage to and from the Aegean, stationed a small garrison
on the island.
Because the island was isolated, and repeatedly abandoned by its inhabitants,
it served as a refuge for people wanted by the Turks in the neighbouring Turkish-held
regions. Initially, most came from Crete, where there were frequent revolts under
the Ottomans. By the end of the eighteenth century, fugitives from Crete had settled
on the island. During the years of the Greek Revolution, Greek families fled from
Turkish occupied areas of Peloponnesos and Crete to both Antikythera and Kythera.
After the Revolution, since Crete was still under Ottoman occupation, some Cretan
refugees chose to stay on the island.
Antikythera remained in Venetian hands until the Napoleonic wars.
After the fall of Venetian democracy in 1797, in the midst of the general chaos,
it was left with no government: no one was interested in the sovereignty of a
small island.
In 1815, Antikythera, like the other Ionian
Islands, passed into English sovereignty. During the English occupation, Antikythera
became a place of exile for revolutionaries from the Ionian Islands, including
Ilias Zervos-Iakovatos, Stamatelos Pilarinos, Gerasimos Metaksas Liseos, Fragiskos
Domenegines, Dimitrios Kallinikos, and Stamatelos Bourstis. In 1864, together
with the rest of the Ionian Islands, Antikythera became part of Greece, and for
fifty years it was the southernmost point of Greek territory, since Crete remained
under Ottoman rule until 1910.
The last wave of fugitives from Crete settled on the island in the
second half of the 19th century after the series of Cretan uprisings against the
Ottomans starting in 1864.
During the Greek 'National Schism' between the King and the Prime
Minister in 1916-1917, both Antikythera and Kythera took the side of the provisional
government of Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos and the Allies, perhaps partly
because the French fleet was based in the islands. During the Second World War,
the island initially came under Italian control. After Italy capitulated in 1943,
it came under German rule. On May 7, 1944, the Germans deported all the residents
of Antikythera to exile in Crete, probably because they were unable to control
the locals' contacts both with the English fleet and with the Greek naval resistance
(the ELAN). After the Greek civil war, the island again became a place of exile,
this time for political exiles sent there by the Greek government, an era that
lasted until 1964.
From the mid-eighteenth century to the mid-twentieth century, Antikythera
had a population of roughly 800-1,000 people. After World War II, however, the
hardships of Antikythera's way of life drove many residents of the island to emigrate.
Some moved to cities and others to America and Australia. Today the island has
only two or three dozen permanent residents, and most of them are elderly. The
diaspora population, another thousand or so Antikythirians living elsewhere, maintains
their strong connections with the island.
In the middle of the 1980s, investments greatly improved the infrastructure
of the island. A harbour was built together with a shelter for fishermen to use
during storms. The National Electric Company (DEI) installed an electric power
generation facility. From 1999 onwards, a series of other public investment projects
were completed: a heliport was built; electric and telephone lines were extended
to all the island's settlements; the roads were paved; and parts of the island
were provided with a water supply network. Despite this flurry of public works,
the island's permanent population has continued its dramatic decline. The 2001
census showed only 45 permanent residents, who are joined during the summer by
300-400 others.
Aris Tsaravopoulos
Stratos Charchalakis
This text is cited June 2005 from the Community of Antikythira URL below
KESSARIANI (Suburb of Athens) ATTIKI
Up there in Hymettus
"Up there in Hymettus there's a secret ...", a song by Manos
Hadjidakis used to say. And it is true! There is a secret, impenetrable, yet mysteriously
enchanting, a secret of centuries that fills man with awe, as on this mountain
the footprints of man can be seen, from his first appearance up to our days...
Hymettus is an important component of Attica's greenfield, along with the other
mountains that together form the circular plain. It takes up an area of 81.230
acres, of the whole 436.500 acres of the basin's greenfield. It begins from the
point "Stavros" (N) and reaches up to cape "Poundes", in Vouliagmeni
(S). Hymettus is particularly elongated (22 to 24 km.). The valley of Prinaris
splits it into: the Great Hymettus of the Ancient, at the height of 1026 meters,
and the second, Anidros (water-barren) Hymettus or Elaton, reaching 774 meters
on its highest peak. It is also known for its caves and precipipices. The most
common caves are "tou Liontariou" (Lion's Cave), the cave of Peania,
of Archedimos, of Korakovouni, the great precipice of Asterio etc. 601 plant species
have been found on Hymettus, among which are some rare ones, while more than 100
bird and animal species (amongst them foxes and rabbits) have been noted down.
The mountain nowadays, is one of the few biotopes and places of natural amusement
still left in Athens. At the same time, the existence of important archaeological
sites makes the mountain an irreplaceable part of our natural and cultural heritance.
Prehistoric times
The history of the area of Kessariani is thus connected to the history of Hymettus.
The magnificent western slope of Hymettus created propitious circumstances for
the primitive man to settle. The archaeological excavations confirmed this, bringing
to light blades and obsidian pieces, proper to the Neolithic age. The mountain's
name looks to its long history. Probably comes from a series of words preserved
in the greek vocabulary by the neolithic habitants of the hellenic ground. These
habitants, "Kares", "Leleges", "Lykeoi", "Minnes",
were named altogether Pre-Greeks or according to the Greek traditions, "Pelasgi".
According to more recent research, these pre-hellenic races were not "Pelasgi",
but "Kares" and "Leleges", coming from the area of Minor Asia.
Reasonably enough, the place names coincide with similar from Minor Asia, pointing
out a close relation of the first habitants in Greece to those in Minor Asia.
According to the version reported by N. Nezis, the word Hymettus comes from the
Pre-Hellenic "Umait" or "Hemyt", which meant hard, coarse,
rocky place. Others derive its name from the alteration of the word "Thymet"
(thymos/anger - thymari/thyme) Hymet-Hymettus.
Historic Times
Ancient World
During the historic times, while Athens is economically and culturally
growing, the large area of Hymettus appears to be a place of worship for the ancient
gods, as well as healing place, due to the therapeutic properties of Hymettus'
springs. Pausanias, the traveller, reports there was a statue of the "Hymettuous
Zeus" in Hymettus", as well as altars for "Omvrios" (pluvial)
Zeus and "Proopsios" (end planned) Apollo. Finally, the altar of "Omvrios"
Zeus, was used to propitiate the god to offer rainfalls, necessary for the agriculture.
Hymettus had also been a religious centre for the gathering of the ancient demos
(people/citizens). Venus' sanctum lied, according to information, at the area
called "Kalopoula" nowadays. This sanctum is associated with the spring
"Kilou Pira", which, according to tradition, facilitated pregnant women
and caused progeniture to the barren. There are various
aspects concerning its name, "Kalopoula", "Kalia", "Kilia",
"Kilou Pira". Pausanias, the traveller certifies that the vegetation
in Hymettus was appropriate for bees. Agriculture and stock raising were the alternative
activities that took place. It should be noted that, the object of great exploitation,
those years, was Hymettus' perse marble. In the 4th century B.C., the quarries
of Hymettus were still active, while at the Roman times, a great demand had led
to a great intensification of the marble production. In the 8th century B.C.,
significant lands at the foot of Hymettus are being granted, and thereafter tithed
(that is taxed for one tenth) over the fruit of the earth, by the state. On the
6th century, Pissistratos, the tyrant of Athens, exonerates the colonists of Hymettus
from tithe, particularly stock breeders, farmers and others who used the area.
In the Roman times Hymettus kept its radiance, up to a point, as a spiritual,
philosophical and religious centre. Byzantine world After the appearance and consolidation
of Christianity the city of Athens was associated with idolatry. This, of course,
diminished all intellectual and spiritual activities in the city. The area of
Kessariani, thus, went through a period of stagnation and, thereafter, a period
of changes. This long transitional stage in the history of Kessariani meant the
end of the ancient world. At this point, the remarkable monastic societies were
formed, on the foundations of the ruined idolatrous temples.
Frank - Turkish rule
The conquest of the Hellenic ground by the Franks and the Venetians, followed
by the Ottomans defined a series of changes, delays and expulsions on the Hellenic
ground. During this period naturally, the functions and the activities of Kessariani
were diminished too. Hymettus' name, during the Turkish rule was different for
every nationality. The Greeks named the mountain "Trelos" (crazy), the
Turkish "Delly Dayh", that meant Crazy-mountain, and the Franks "Monte
Matto" (Crazy-mountain), which was obviously an alteration of the original
(Monte Ymeto). These three terms reveal the instability of the clouds at the top
of the mountain. But according to another version its name derives from the alteration
of the French phrase "tres long" (elongate)
Modern times
Nowadays Hymettus regardless of the encroachments made from time to
time, regardless of the growth of the residential district, despite the occasional
fires that burned it, despite the property disputes, and despite the unreasonable
appropriations of significant grounds made by private individuals, especially
by the Philo-forestal Union of Athens (F.E.A.), still remains a living ecosystem.
This text is cited December 2004 from the Municipality of Kessariani URL below, which contains images
AGISTRI (Island) ATTIKI
Antiquity
The ancient name of the island was Kekrifalia that means "embellished head".
Agistri is referred by this name by Homer as ally of Aegina
island in Trojan War (Iliad, epos A', raps. B', verse 562). Thucydides (470-335
B.C.) and Diodoros (90-21 B.C.) also refer to Agistri by the name "Kekrifalia".
Excavations have brought to light several archaeological finds of great interest
that show that the island was inhabited 2500 years ago.
Agistri together with the surrounding islands constituted the kingdom
of Aegina under the mythical King Aeakos. Several areas are of archaeological
interest such as Megaritissa, Aponissos,
as well as Kontari. Agistri, many times was subjected the influence of Aegina's
tumultuous history.
Along the west coast and at close to the surface of the water one
can see remnants of buildings from the pre-christian period.
Αrchaeological findings of the island are exhibited in the Cultural
Centre in Megalochori
(Milos).
14th century - 20th century
The island became a haven for Albanian refugees (Arvanites) from Serbian
imperial expansion in the fourteenth century under Stephen Dusan and later in
the years when the region was part of the Ottoman Empire. The Albanian influence
can still be seen in the long colourful dresses and headscarves of some of the
older women, particularly in Megalochori (Milos).
Agistri was not inhabited continuously. It appears that at the end
of the 17th century it was abandoned, most possibly because of the frequent pirate
raids in the area to which a small island such as this was particularly vulnerable.
In 1821 the island was inhabited although the population was too small
to be mentioned in a census of the time. By 1835, however, a municipality
in Agistri was formed by Royal Decree and 248 inhabitants were mentioned.
20th century - Today
In the 1920's Agistri was again barely inhabited but in the period
between the 1940's and the 1990's, Agistri was one of the few smaller Greek Islands
whose population actually increased. Today the population is just over 1000 that
reaches around the 4.500 during the summer. Until 1960 the island had no direct
boat connection with Piraeus. In 1973 electricity was introduced to the island
and in the late 1970's a road was built to Limenaria. Since 1981 a small 12 seater
bus has operated on the island travelling between Skala - Megalochori (Milos)
- Limenaria. Traditionally the island's main products have been pine resin (used
for making retsina), olive oil, figs, barley and fruit. However during the latter
half of the 20th century the economy has come to be based on tourism rather than
agriculture. Today the island has 4 communities: Megalochori (or Milos), Skala,
Metochi and Limenaria.
This text is cited February 2005 from the Yialos
Studios & Tavern URL below, which contains images.
KESSARIANI (Suburb of Athens) ATTIKI
The German-Italian occupation
Kesariani's population (mostly refugees) took part massively at the national-liberating fight. In this small neighbourhood of Athens a lot of blood was shed, a lot of lives were wasted and heroic acts were written down. In Kessariani, Aris Velouchiotis, the legend of the National Resistance, organized the first meeting that launched the Resistance. With him was Manolis Tsafos from Kessariani, who was killed later with Aris. For about 49 times the German conquerors and the security orders will attempt to conquer the free land of Kessariani, but for an equal amount of times they will fail. The heroic fights of all the people of the colony will constantly prevent the entrance of the conquerors in their area. One of the top, but also the most tragic acts, was that of June 16th 1944, that took place near the Monastery of Kessariani; great forces of greek soldiers and Germans had rounded the area up to Hymettus. Ten brave men was the death toll on the altar of freedom. Apollo Davlakos, Prodromos Adramitoglou, Sotiris Venieris, Andreas Kristalakos, Michalis Menegakis, Nikos Dalianis, Giorgos Polemarchakis were killed in battle.
Stefanos Tsafos was arrested wounded and was carried to Goudi on a donkey, where they finished him off. Kiriakos Ferendinos and Germanos Chadjinopoulos were arrested at the cemetery. This small suburb has its history as a rebellious and martyr town and this is its heritage to those who dwell on its grounds today. Liberation comes with Nestor Zoedis as a mayor.
Nazi executions
The highest and most tragic moment in the Shooting Gallery's history was the mass shooting of 200 patriots-communists on May 1st, in 1944. The vast majority were inmates of Akronafplia, given in to the army of occupation by the dictatorship of Metaxas, deprived of the chance to defend their country. From the camp at Chaidari the 200 patriots, led by Napoleon Soukadjidis, were transferred and shot at the Shooting Gallery, in retaliation for some dead German soldiers at Molai, in Lakonia. On the way to the Shooting Gallery, the fighters were tossing notes to their beloved ones, which were collected by the women of Kessariani. The condemned fighters were standing in front of the executioners, brave, in a dominant feeling of self sacrifice that embodied the highest ideal of man. The fighters died singing the national anthem and hailing for the E.A.M. (National Liberating Front).
Liberation-December 1944 and Civil war
At the conflict of December 1944 the vast majority of the people of Kessariani remain on the side of E.L.A.S.(left wing liberating party), fighting now the English and their allies. During these battles the suburb is deserted from women and children, the English and the "Riminites" bombed anything that moved in the city, with mortars and machine guns, indiscriminately. The brave men of the suburb make a heroic defence. After this uneven battle, the English and their native allies enter Kessariani and the "alliance" occupation begins in Kessariani. The new now conquerors occupy the gym of Near East and the Shooting Gallery, in which they practice shooting, thus offending the memory of the fighters of freedom who were shot there. This effort to undermine the democratic morale and tatter human decency, despite the tremendous terrorism, does not seem to have the results its instigators expected. The final effort brings along a lot of dead and wounded. Next comes a cavalry for the whole nation: the Makronissi island and others, terrorism, imprisonment, and persecution of the fighters. Kessariani
gains place in the black list and is put "under surveillance". A series of Mayors appointed by the central authority are - showing no substantial interest - at the helm of the Municipality.
Kessariani from 1951 onwards
The suburb whose blood was shed in the national war for independence, the one that revealed the collaborationists, one that tried to thwart the schemes for enslavement, is now eclipsed or, better said, isolated. This free spirit and attitude will be paid for for several decades… the irregular order of the appointed and ceased mayors ends in 1951, when Leonidas Manolidis is adventurously elected mayor. In a tract distributed before the elections, the party "Kessariani
- Laos - Manolidis" in April 5th 1951, notes that: "During these years several mayors that were appointed and not elected threshed and shattered the place. They did nothing for the sake of this land, left Kessariani barely alive, deserted like a dirty thorp. Its streets are miserable; there is no water, no neatness. No drainage and sewers. We are in danger of drowning whenever it rains, we suffocate from the dust of the avenue when the wind blows or a car drives by. Our children's schools are in a miserable state. Athleticism was neither supported, nor did it ever concern anyone seriously, and to its worth. As for medical treatment, especially for the poor families, it does not exist. And worst of all, Kessariani was turned into the dump of the other Municipalities". His being elected will start a new era for Kessariani, since fighting mayors, coming from the left-wing
democratic movement, will always be at the helm of the Municipality.
This text is cited December 2004 from the Municipality of Kessariani URL below
SALAMINA (Island) ATTIKI
The Athenians soon after (the battle at Thermopylae) proved their
mettle. Rather than surrender when Xerxes arrived in Attica with his army, they
abandoned their city for him to sack. The Athenian commander Themistocles (c.
528-462 B.C.) then maneuvered the other Greeks into facing the larger Persian
navy in a sea battle in the narrow channel between the island of Salamis and
the west coast of Attica. Athens was able to supply the largest contingent to
the Greek navy at Salamis because the assembly had been financing the construction
of warships ever since a rich strike of silver had been made in Attica in 483
B.C. The proceeds from the silver mines went to the state andat the urging of
Themistocles, the assembly had voted to use the financial windfall to build
a navy for defense, rather than to distribute the money among individual citizens.
As at Thermopylae, the Greeks in the battle of Salamis in 480 B.C. used topography
to their advantage. The narrowness of the channel prevented the Persians from
using all their ships at once and minimized the advantage of their ships' greater
maneuverability. In the close quarters of the Salamis channel, the heavier Greek
ships could employ their underwater rams to sink the less sturdy Persian craft.
When Xerxes observed that the most energetic of his naval commanders appeared
to be the one woman among themArtemisia of Caria (the southwest corner of Turkey),
he reportedly remarked, "My men have become women, and my women, men".
End of the Persian Wars
The Greek victory at Salamis in 480 B.C. sent Xerxes back to Persia,
but he left behind an enormous infantry force under his best general and an
offer for the Athenians (if only they would capitulate): they would remain unharmed
and become the king's overlords over the other Greeks. The assembly refused,
the Athenian population evacuated its homes and city once again, and Xerxes'
general wrecked Athens for the second time in as many years. In 479 B.C., the
Greek infantry headed by the Spartans under the command of a royal son named
Pausanias (c. 520-470 B.C.) outfought the Persian infantry at the battle of
Plataea in Boeotia, just north of Attica, while a Greek fleet caught the Persian
navy napping at Mykale on the coast of Ionia. The coalition of Greek city-states
had thus done the incredible: they had protected their homeland and their independence
from the strongest power in the world.
Political Freedom and Greek Courage
The Greeks' superior armor and weapons and their adroit use of topography to
counterbalance the enemy's greater numbers explain their victories from a military
perspective. What is truly remarkable about the Persian Wars, however, is that
the citizen militias of the thirty-one Greek city-states decided to fight in
the first place. They could have surrendered and agreed to become Persian subjects
to save themselves. Instead, eager to defend their freedom despite the risks
and encouraged to fight by the citizens of their communities, these Greeks chose
to strive together against apparently overwhelming odds. Since the Greek forces
included not only aristocrats and hoplites (who had to be financially capable
of supplying their own armor and weapons), but also thousands of poorer men
who rowed the warships, the effort against the Persians cut across social and
economic divisions. The decision by Greeks to fight the Persian Wars demonstrated
courage inspired by a deep devotion to the ideal of the political freedom of
the city-state, which had emerged in the preceding Archaic Age.
This text is from: Thomas Martin's An Overview of Classical Greek History from Homer to Alexander, Yale University Press. Cited Sep 2002 from Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
Short after the battle of Thermopylae)
At the request of the Athenians,
the fleet of the Hellenes came from Artemisium
and put in at Salamis. The Athenians requested them to put in at Salamis so that
they take their children and women out of Attica
and also take counsel what they should do. They had been disappointed in their
plans, so they were going to hold a council about the current state of affairs.
They expected to find the entire population of the Peloponnese
in Boeotia awaiting(1)
the barbarian, but they found no such thing. They learned that they were
fortifying the Isthmus instead and considered the defense of the Peloponnese the
most important thing, disregarding all the rest. When the Athenians learned this,
they asked the fleet to put in at Salamis.
While the others put in at Salamis, the Athenians landed in their
own country. When they arrived, they made a proclamation that every Athenian should
save his children and servants as he best could. Thereupon most of them sent the
members of their households to Troezen,
and some to Aegina and Salamis.
They were anxious to get everything out safely because they wished to obey the
oracle, and also not least because of this: the Athenians say that a great snake(2)
lives in the sacred precinct guarding the acropolis. They say this and even put
out monthly offerings for it as if it really existed. The monthly offering is
a honey-cake. In all the time before this the honey-cake had been consumed, but
this time it was untouched. When the priestess interpreted the significance of
this(3), the Athenians were all the more eager to abandon the
city since the goddess(4) had deserted the acropolis. When they
had removed everything to safety, they returned to the camp.
When those from Artemisium had put in at Salamis, the rest of the
Hellenic fleet learned of this and streamed in from Troezen, for they had been
commanded to assemble at Pogon (5), the harbor of Troezen. Many
more ships assembled now than had fought at Artemisium(6), and
from more cities. The admiral was the same as at Artemisium, Eurybiades son of
Euryclides, a Spartan but not of royal descent. The ships provided by the Athenians
were by far the most numerous and the most seaworthy.
The following took part in the war:
From the Peloponnese, the Lacedaemonians
provided sixteen ships; the Corinthians
the same number as at Artemisium(40 ships); the Sicyonians
furnished fifteen ships, the Epidaurians
ten, the Troezenians five,
the Hermioneans three. All
of these except the Hermioneans are Dorian and Macedonian and had last come from
Erineus and Pindus
and the Dryopian region. The Hermioneans are Dryopians, driven out of the country
now called Doris by Herakles
and the Malians.These, then,
were the Peloponnesians who took part in the war.
From the mainland outside the Peloponnese came the following:
The Athenians provided more than all the rest, one hundred and eighty ships.(7)
They provided these alone, since the Plataeans
did not fight with the Athenians at Salamis for this reason: when the Hellenes
departed from Artemisium(8) and were off Chalcis,
the Plataeans landed on the opposite shore of Boeotia
and attended to the removal of their households. In bringing these to safety they
were left behind. The Athenians, while the Pelasgians ruled what is now called
Hellas, were Pelasgians,
bearing the name of Cranai. When Cecrops was their king they were called Cecropidae,
and when Erechtheus succeeded to the rule, they changed their name and became
Athenians. When, however, Ion son of Xuthus was commander(9) of
the Athenian army, they were called after him Ionians.
The Megarians provided the same number as at Artemisium (20 ships).
The Ampraciots came to help with seven ships, and the Leucadians, who are Dorians
from Corinth, with three.(10)
Of the islanders, the Aeginetans provided thirty ships. They had other
manned ships, but they guarded their own land with these and fought at Salamis
with the thirty most seaworthy. The Aeginetans are Dorians from Epidaurus, and
their island was formerly called Oenone. After the Aeginetans came the Chalcidians
with their twenty ships from Artemisium, and the Eretrians
with the same seven; these are Ionians. Next were the Ceans,
Ionians from Athens, with the same ships as before. The Naxians
provided four ships. They had been sent by their fellow citizens to the Persians,
like the rest of the islanders, but they disregarded their orders and came to
the Hellenes at the urging of Democritus, an esteemed man among the townsmen and
at that time captain of a trireme. The Naxians are Ionians descended from Athens.
The Styrians provided the
same number of ships as at Artemisium, and the Cythnians
one trireme and a fifty-oared boat; these are both Dryopians. The Seriphians,
Siphnians, and Melians
also took part, since they were the only islanders who had not given earth and
water to the barbarian.
All these people who live this side of Thesprotia
and the Acheron river took
part in the war. The Thesprotians border on the Ampraciots
and Leucadians, who were
the ones who came from the most distant countries to take part in the war. The
only ones living beyond these to help Hellas in its danger were the Crotonians,
with one ship. Its captain was Phayllus,(11) three times victor
in the Pythian games. The Crotonians are Achaeans by birth.
All of these came to the war providing triremes, except the Melians
and Siphnians and Seriphians, who brought fifty-oared boats. The Melians (who
are of Lacedaemonian stock)(12) provided two; the Siphnians and
Seriphians, who are Ionians from Athens, one each. The total number of ships,
besides the fifty-oared boats, was three hundred and seventy-eight.
When the generals from the aforementioned cities, met at Salamis,
they held a council and Eurybiades proposed that whoever wanted to should give
his opinion on what place under their control was most suitable for a sea battle.
Attica was already lost, and he proposed that they consider the places which were
left. The consensus of most of the speakers was to sail to the Isthmus and fight
at sea for the Peloponnese, giving this reason: if they were defeated in the fight
at Salamis they would be besieged on an island, where no help could come to them,
but if they were at the Isthmus they could go ashore to their own lands.
While the generals from the Peloponnese considered this argument,
an Athenian came with the message that the barbarians had reached Attica and were
laid destroying it by fire. The army with Xerxes had made its way through Boeotia
and burnt the city of the Thespians,
who had abandoned it and gone to the Peloponnese, and Plataea
likewise. Now the army had come to Athens and was devastating everything there.
The army burnt Thespia and Plataea upon learning from the Thebans
that they had not medized.
Since the crossing of the Hellespont,
where the barbarians began their journey, they had spent one month there crossing
into Europe and in three more months were in Attica, when Calliades was archon
at Athens.(13) When they took the town it was deserted, but in
the sacred precinct they found a few Athenians, stewards of the sacred precinct
and poor people, who defended themselves against the assault by fencing the acropolis
with doors and logs. They had not withdrawn to Salamis not only because of poverty
but also because they thought they had discovered the meaning of the oracle the
Pythia had given, namely that the wooden wall would be impregnable. They believed
that according to the oracle this, not the ships, was the refuge.
The Persians took up a position on the hill opposite the Acropolis,
which the Athenians call the Areopagus,
and besieged them in this way: they wrapped arrows in tar and set them on fire,
and then shot them at the barricade. Still the besieged Athenians defended themselves,
although they had come to the utmost danger and their barricade had failed them.
When the Pisistratids proposed terms of surrender, they would not listen but contrived
defenses such as rolling down boulders onto the barbarians when they came near
the gates. For a long time Xerxes was at a loss, unable to capture them.
In time a way out of their difficulties was revealed to the barbarians,
since according to the oracle all the mainland of Attica had to become subject
to the Persians. In front of the acropolis, and behind the gates and the ascent,
was a place where no one was on guard, since no one thought any man could go up
that way. Here some men climbed up, near the sacred precinct of Cecrops' daughter
Aglaurus(14), although the place was a sheer cliff. When the
Athenians saw that they had ascended to the acropolis, some threw themselves off
the wall and were killed, and others fled into the chamber. The Persians who had
come up first turned to the gates, opened them, and murdered the suppliants. When
they had levelled everything, they plundered the sacred precinct and set fire
to the entire acropolis.
So it was that Xerxes took complete possession of Athens, and he sent
a horseman to Susa to announce his present success to Artabanus. On the day after
the messenger was sent, he called together the Athenian exiles who accompanied
him and asked them go up to the acropolis and perform sacrifices in their customary
way, an order given because he had been inspired by a dream or because he felt
remorse after burning the sacred precinct. The Athenian exiles did as they were
commanded.
I will tell why I have mentioned this. In that acropolis is a shrine
of Erechtheus, called the "Earthborn," and in the shrine are an olive
tree and a pool of salt water. The story among the Athenians is that they were
set there by Poseidon and Athena as tokens when they contended for the land(15).
It happened that the olive tree was burnt by the barbarians with the rest of the
sacred precinct, but on the day after its burning, when the Athenians ordered
by the king to sacrifice went up to the sacred precinct, they saw a shoot of about
a cubit's length sprung from the stump, and they reported this.
When this business concerning the Athenian acropolis was announced
to the Hellenes at Salamis, some of the Peloponnesian generals became so alarmed
that they did not even wait for the proposed matter to be decided, but jumped
into their ships and hoisted their sails for flight. Those left behind resolved
that the fleet should fight for the Isthmus. Night fell, and they dissolved the
assembly and boarded their ships.
When Themistocles returned to his ship, Mnesiphilus, an Athenian,
asked him what had been decided. Learning from him that they had resolved to sail
to the Isthmus and fight for the Peloponnese, he said, "If they depart from
Salamis, you will no longer be fighting for one country. Each will make his way
to his own city, and neither Eurybiades nor any other man will be able to keep
them from disbanding the army. Hellas will be destroyed by bad planning. If there
is any way at all that you could persuade Eurybiades to change his decision and
remain here, go try to undo this resolution."(16)
This advice greatly pleased Themistocles. He made no answer and went
to the ship of Eurybiades. When he arrived there, he said he wanted to talk with
him on a matter of common interest, so Eurybiades bade him come aboard and say
what he wanted. Themistocles sat next to him and told him all that he had heard
from Mnesiphilus, pretending it was his own idea and adding many other things.
Finally by his entreaty he persuaded him to disembark and gather the generals
for a council of war.
When they were assembled and before Eurybiades had a chance to put
forward the reason he had called the generals together, Themistocles spoke at
length in accordance with the urgency of his request. While he was speaking, the
Corinthian general Adeimantus son of Ocytus said, "Themistocles, at the games
those who start before the signal are beaten with rods." Themistocles said
in justification, "Those left behind win no crown."(17)
He answered the Corinthian mildly and said to Eurybiades nothing of
what he had said before, how if they put out from Salamis they would flee different
ways, for it would be unbecoming for him to accuse the allies in their presence.
Instead he relied on a different argument and said, "It is in your hands
to save Hellas, if you will obey me and remain here to fight, and not obey the
words of these others and move your ships back to the Isthmus. Compare each plan
after you have heard. If you join battle at the Isthmus, you will fight in the
open sea where it is least to our advantage, since our ships are heavier and fewer
in number.(18) You will also lose Salamis and Megara
and Aegina, even if we succeed in all else. Their land army will accompany their
fleet, and so you will lead them to the Peloponnese and risk all Hellas. But if
you do what I say, you will find it useful in these ways: first, by engaging many
ships with our few in the strait, we shall win a great victory, if the war turns
out reasonably, for it is to our advantage to fight in a strait and to their advantage
to fight in a wide area. Second, Salamis will survive, where we have carried our
children and women to safety. It also has in it something you are very fond of:
by remaining here you will be fighting for the Peloponnese just as much as at
the Isthmus, and you will not lead them to the Peloponnese, if you exercise good
judgment. If what I expect happens and we win the victory with our ships, you
will not have the barbarians upon you at the Isthmus.
They will advance no further than Attica and depart in no order, and we shall
gain an advantage by the survival of Megara, Aegina, and Salamis, where it is
prophesied that we will prevail against our enemies. Men usually succeed when
they have reasonable plans. If their plans are unreasonable, the god does not
wish to assent to human intentions."
As Themistocles said this, Adeimantus the Corinthian attacked him
again, advising that a man without a city should keep quiet and that Eurybiades
should not ask the vote of a man without a city. He advised Themistocles to contribute
his opinion when he provided a city--attacking him in this way because Athens
was captured and occupied. This time Themistocles said many things against him
and the Corinthians, declaring that so long as they had two hundred manned ships,
the Athenians had both a city and a land greater than theirs, and that none of
the Hellenes could repel them if they attacked. Next he turned his argument to
Eurybiades, saying more vehemently than before, "If you remain here, you
will be an noble man. If not, you will ruin Hellas. All our strength for war is
in our ships, so listen to me. If you do not do this, we will immediately gather
up our households and travel to Siris
in Italy, which has been ours since ancient times, and the prophecies say we must
found a colony there. You will remember these words when you are without such
allies."(19)
When Themistocles said this, Eurybiades changed his mind. I think
he did so chiefly out of fear that the Athenians might desert them if they set
sail for the Isthmus. If the Athenians left, the rest would be no match for the
enemy, so he made the choice to remain there and fight.
After this skirmish of words, since Eurybiades had so resolved, the
men at Salamis prepared to fight where they were. At sunrise on the next day there
was an earthquake on land and sea, and they resolved to pray to the gods and summon
the sons of Aeacus as allies. When they had so resolved, they did as follows:
they prayed to all the gods, called Ajax and Telamon to come straight from Salamis,
and sent a ship to Aegina for Aeacus and his sons.
Dicaeus son of Theocydes, an Athenian exile who had become important
among the Medes, said that at the time when the land of Attica was being laid
waste by Xerxes' army and there were no Athenians in the country, he was with
Demaratus the Lacedaemonian on the Thriasian plain(20) and saw
advancing from Eleusis a
cloud of dust as if raised by the feet of about thirty thousand men. They marvelled
at what men might be raising such a cloud of dust and immediately heard a cry.
The cry seemed to be the "Iacchus" of the mysteries, and when Demaratus,
ignorant of the rites of Eleusis, asked him what was making this sound, Dicaeus
said, "Demaratus, there is no way that some great disaster will not befall
the king's army. Since Attica is deserted, it is obvious that this voice is divine
and comes from Eleusis to help the Athenians and their allies. If it descends
upon the Peloponnese, the king himself and his army on the mainland will be endangered.
If, however, it turns towards the ships at Salamis, the king will be in danger
of losing his fleet. Every year the Athenians observe this festival for the Mother
and the Maiden, and any Athenian or other Hellene who wishes is initiated. The
voice which you hear is the 'Iacchus' they cry at this festival."(21)
To this Demaratus replied, "Keep silent and tell this to no one
else. If these words of yours are reported to the king, you will lose your head,
and neither I nor any other man will be able to save you, so be silent. The gods
will see to the army." Thus he advised, and after the dust and the cry came
a cloud, which rose aloft and floated away towards Salamis to the camp of the
Hellenes. In this way they understood that Xerxes' fleet was going to be destroyed.
Dicaeus son of Theocydes used to say this, appealing to Demaratus and others as
witnesses.
When those stationed with Xerxes' fleet had been to see the Laconian
disaster at Thermopylae,
they crossed over from Trachis
to Histiaea, waited three
days, and then sailed through the Euripus,
and in three more days they were at Phalerum,
the port of Athens. I think no less a number invaded Athens by land and sea than
came to Sepias and Thermopylae.
Those killed by the storm, at Thermopylae, and in the naval battles at Artemisium,
I offset with those who did not yet follow the king: the Melians and Dorians and
Locrians and the whole force
of Boeotia except the Thespians and Plataeans; and the Carystians
and Andrians and Teneans
and all the rest of the islanders, except the five cities whose names I previously
mentioned. The farther into Hellas the Persian advanced, the more nations followed
him.
All these came to Athens except the Parians.
The Parians stayed behind in Cythnus watching to see which way the war turned
out. When the rest of them reached Phalerum, Xerxes himself went down to the ships,
wishing to mix with the sailors and hear their opinions. He came and sat on his
throne, and present at his summons were the tyrants of all the peoples and the
company leaders from the fleet. They sat according to the honor which the king
had granted each of them, first the king of Sidon,
then the king of Tyre, then
the rest. When they sat in order one after another, Xerxes sent Mardonius to test
each by asking if they should fight at sea.
Mardonius went about questioning them, starting with the Sidonian,
and all the others were unanimous, advising to fight at sea, but Artemisia said,
"Tell the king, Mardonius, that I, who neither was most cowardly in the sea
battles off Euboea nor performed the least feats of arms, say this: 'Master, it
is just for me to declare my real opinion, what I consider to be best for your
cause. And I say to you this: spare your ships, and do not fight at sea. Their
men are as much stronger than your men by sea as men are stronger than women.
Why is it so necessary for you to risk everything by fighting at sea? Do you not
possess Athens, for which you set out on this march, and do you not have the rest
of Hellas? No one stands in your way. Those who opposed you have received what
they deserved. I will tell you how I think the affairs of your enemies will turn
out: If you do not hurry to fight at sea, but keep your ships here and stay near
land, or even advance into the Peloponnese, then, my lord, you will easily accomplish
what you had in mind on coming here. The Hellenes are not able to hold out against
you for a long time, but you will scatter them, and they will each flee to their
own cities. I have learned that they have no food on this island, and it is not
likely, if you lead your army against the Peloponnese, that those of them who
have come from there will sit still, nor will they care to fight at sea for Athens.
But if you hurry to fight at sea immediately, I fear that your fleet if reduced
to cowardice may also injure your army on land. In addition, my King, take this
to heart: Good people's slaves tend to be base, and the slaves of the base tend
to be good. You, who are best among men, have base slaves, who are accounted your
allies, the Egyptians and
Cyprians and Cilicians
and Pamphylians, who are
of no use at all.' "
When she said this to Mardonius, all who were well disposed towards
Artemisia lamented her words, thinking she would suffer some ill from the king
because she advised against fighting at sea. Those who were jealous and envied
her, because she was given honor among the chief of all the allies, were glad
at her answer, thinking she would be killed. But when the counsels were reported
to Xerxes, he was greatly pleased by Artemisia's opinion. Even before this he
had considered her of excellent character, and now he praised her much more highly.
Still he ordered that the majority be obeyed, for he believed that at Euboea they
had purposely fought badly because he was not there. This time he had made preparations
to see the battle in person.
When the command to put out to sea was given, they set sail for Salamis
and were calmly marshalled in line. There was not enough daylight left for them
to fight, since night came on, so they made preparations for the next day. Fear
and dread possessed the Hellenes, especially those from the Peloponnese. They
were afraid because they were stationed in Salamis and were about to fight at
sea on behalf of the land of the Athenians, and if they were defeated they would
be trapped on an island and besieged, leaving their own land unguarded.
That very night the land army of the barbarians began marching to
the Peloponnese. Yet every possible device had been used to prevent the barbarians
from invading by the mainland. As soon as the Peloponnesians learned that Leonidas
and his men at Thermopylae were dead, they ran together from their cities and
took up their position at the Isthmus. Their general was Cleombrotus son of Anaxandrides,
the brother of Leonidas. When they were in position at the Isthmus, they demolished
the Scironian road and then, after resolving in council, built a wall across the
Isthmus. Since there were many tens of thousands and everyone worked, the task
was completed, as they brought in stones and bricks and logs and baskets full
of sand. At no moment of the day or night did those who had marched out there
rest from their work.(22)
These were the Hellenes who marched out in a body to the Isthmus:
the Lacedaemonians and all the Arcadians,
the Eleans and Corinthians
and Sicyonians and Epidaurians and Phliasians
and Troezenians and Hermioneans. These were the ones who marched out and feared
for Hellas in her peril. The rest of the Peloponnesians cared nothing, though
the Olympian
and Carnean
festivals were now past.
Seven nations inhabit the Peloponnese. Two of these are aboriginal
and are now settled in the land where they lived in the old days, the Arcadians
and Cynurians. One nation,
the Achaean, has never left
the Peloponnese, but it has left its own country and inhabits another nation's
land. The four remaining nations of the seven are immigrants, the Dorians and
Aetolians and Dryopians and Lemnians.
The Dorians have many famous cities, the Aetolians only Elis,
the Dryopians Hermione and Asine
near Laconian Cardamyle,
the Lemnians all the Paroreatae.
The Cynurians are aboriginal and seem to be the only Ionians,(23)
but they have been Dorianized by time and by Argive
rule. They are the Orneatae
and the perioikoi(24). All the remaining cities of these seven
nations, except those I enumerated, stayed neutral. If I may speak freely, by
staying neutral they medized.
Those at the Isthmus were involved in so great a labor, since all
they had was at stake and they did not expect the ships to win distinction. Those
at Salamis heard of their labors but still were full of dread, fearing not for
themselves but for the Peloponnese. For a time each man talked quietly to his
neighbor, wondering at Eurybiades' folly, but finally it came out into the open.
They held an assembly and talked at length on the same matters as before: some
said they must sail away to the Peloponnese and risk battle for that country,
not stay and fight for a captured land; but the Athenians and Aeginetans and Megarians
said they must stay and defend themselves.
When the Peloponnesians were outvoting him, Themistocles secretly
left the assembly, and sent a man by boat to the Median fleet after ordering him
what to say. His name was Sicinnus, and he was Themistocles' servant and his sons'
attendant. Later Themistocles enrolled him as a Thespian, when the Thespians were
adopting citizens,(25) and made him wealthy with money. He now
came by boat and said to the generals of the barbarians, "The Athenian general
has sent me without the knowledge of the other Hellenes. He is on the king's side
and prefers that your affairs prevail, not the Hellenes'. I am to tell you that
the Hellenes are terrified and plan flight, and you can now perform the finest
deed of all if you do not allow them to escape. They do not all have the same
intent, and they will no longer oppose you. Instead you will see them fighting
against themselves, those who are on your side against those who are not."
After indicating this to them he departed.
Finding the message credible, they first landed many of the Persians
on the islet of Psyttalea,
which lies between Salamis and the mainland. When it was midnight, they brought
their western wing in a circle towards Salamis, and those stationed at Ceos
and Cynosura(26) also put out to sea, occupying all the passage
as far as Munychia with their ships. They launched their ships in this way so
that the Hellenes would have no escape: they would be trapped at Salamis and pay
the penalty for the battles at Artemisium. The purpose of their landing Persians
on the islet called Psyttalea was this: when the battle took place, it was chiefly
there that the men and wrecks would be washed ashore, for the island lay in the
path of the impending battle. The Persians would be able to save some of those
who washed up and kill the others. They did this in silence for fear that their
enemies hear, making their preparations at night without sleep.
I cannot say against oracles that they are not true, and I do not
wish to try to discredit them when they speak plainly. Look at the following matter:
"When the sacred headland of golden-sworded Artemis and Cynosura by the sea
they bridge with ships,
After sacking shiny Athens in mad hope,
Divine Justice will extinguish mighty Greed the son of Insolence
Lusting terribly, thinking to devour all.
Bronze will come together with bronze, and Ares
Will redden the sea with blood. To Hellas the day of freedom
Far-seeing Zeus and august Victory will bring."
Considering this, I dare to say nothing against Bacis concerning oracles when
he speaks so plainly, nor will I consent to it by others.
Among the generals at Salamis there was fierce argument. They did
not yet know that the barbarians had encircled them with their ships, supposing
them still marshalled in the place where they had seen them by day. As the generals
disputed, Aristides son of Lysimachus, an Athenian, crossed over from Aegina.
Although he had been ostracized by the people, I, learning by inquiry of his character,
have come to believe that he was the best and most just man in Athens. This man
stood at the assembly and called Themistocles out, although he was no friend of
his, but his bitter enemy. Because of the magnitude of the present ills, he deliberately
forgot all that and called him out, wanting to talk to him. He had already heard
that those from the Peloponnese were anxious to set sail for the Isthmus, so when
Themistocles came out he said, "On all occasions and especially now our contention
must be over which of us will do our country more good. I say that it is all the
same for the Peloponnesians to speak much or little about sailing away from here,
for I have seen with my own eyes that even if the Corinthians and Eurybiades himself
wanted to, they would not be able to escape. We are encircled by the enemy. Go
in and indicate this to them."(27)
Themistocles answered, "Your exhortation is most useful and you
bring good news. You have come as an eyewitness of just what I wanted to happen.
Know that I am the cause of what the Medes are doing. When the Hellenes would
not willingly enter battle, it was necessary to force them against their will.
Since you have come bringing good news, tell it to them yourself. If I say these
things, they will think I invented it, and they will not believe that the barbarians
are doing this. Go in yourself and let them know how it stands. It would be best
if they believe you when you tell them, but if they find these things incredible
it is all the same to us. They will not be able to run away, if indeed we are
surrounded on all sides as you say."
Aristides went in and told them, saying that he had come from Aegina
and had barely made it past the blockade when he sailed out, since all the Hellenic
camp was surrounded by Xerxes' ships. He advised them to prepare to defend themselves.
He said this and left, and again a dispute arose among them. The majority of the
generals did not believe the news.
While they were still held by disbelief, a trireme of Tenian deserters
arrived, captained by Panaetius son of Sosimenes, which brought them the whole
truth. For this deed the Tenians were engraved on the tripod at Delphi with those
who had conquered the barbarian(28). With this ship that deserted
at Salamis and the Lemnian which deserted earlier at Artemisium, the Hellenic
fleet reached its full number of three hundred and eighty ships, for it had fallen
short of the number by two ships.
When they found the words of the Tenians worthy of belief, the Hellenes
prepared to fight at sea. As dawn glimmered, they held an assembly of the fighting
men, and Themistocles gave the best address among the others. His entire speech
involved comparing the better and lesser elements in human nature and the human
condition. He concluded his speech by advising them to choose the better of these,
then gave the command to mount the ships. Just as they embarked, the trireme which
had gone after the sons of Aeacus arrived from Aegina.
Then the Hellenes set sail with all their ships, and as they were
putting out to sea the barbarians immediately attacked them. The rest of the Hellenes
began to back water and tried to beach their ships, but Ameinias of Pallene, an
Athenian, charged and rammed a ship. When his ship became entangled and the crew
could not free it, the others came to help Ameinias and joined battle. The Athenians
say that the fighting at sea began this way, but the Aeginetans say that the ship
which had been sent to Aegina after the sons of Aeacus was the one that started
it. The story is also told that the phantom of a woman appeared to them, who cried
commands loud enough for all the Hellenic fleet to hear, reproaching them first
with, "Men possessed, how long will you still be backing water?".
The Phoenicians were marshalled against the Athenians, holding the
western wing toward Eleusis. Against the Lacedaemonians were the Ionians, on the
eastern wing toward Piraeus, and a few of them fought badly according to Themistocles'
instructions, but the majority did not. I can list the names of many captains
who captured Hellenic ships, but I will mention none except Theomestor son of
Androdamas and Phylacus son of Histiaeus, both Samians. I mention only these because
Theomestor was appointed tyrant of Samos by the Persians for this feat, and Phylacus
was recorded as a benefactor of the king and granted much land. The king's benefactors
are called "orosangae" in the Persian language.
Thus it was concerning them. But the majority of the ships at Salamis
were sunk, some destroyed by the Athenians, some by the Aeginetans. Since the
Hellenes fought in an orderly fashion by line, but the barbarians were no longer
in position and did nothing with forethought, it was likely to turn out as it
did. Yet they were brave that day, much more brave than they had been at Euboea,
for they all showed zeal out of fear of Xerxes, each one thinking that the king
was watching him.
I cannot say exactly how each of the other barbarians or Hellenes
fought, but this is what happened to Artemisia, and it gave her still higher esteem
with the king: When the king's side was all in commotion, at that time Artemisia's
ship was pursued by a ship of Attica. She could not escape, for other allied ships
were in front of her and hers was the nearest to the enemy. So she resolved to
do something which did in fact benefit her: as she was pursued by the Attic ship,
she charged and rammed an allied ship, with a Calyndian
crew and Damasithymus himself, king of the Calyndians, aboard. I cannot say if
she had some quarrel with him while they were still at the Hellespont, or whether
she did this intentionally or if the ship of the Calyndians fell in her path by
chance. But when she rammed and sank it, she had the luck of gaining two advantages.
When the captain of the Attic ship saw her ram a ship with a barbarian crew, he
decided that Artemisia's ship was either Hellenic or a deserter from the barbarians
fighting for them, so he turned away to deal with others.
Thus she happened to escape and not be destroyed, and it also turned
out that the harmful thing which she had done won her exceptional esteem from
Xerxes. It is said that the king, as he watched the battle, saw her ship ram the
other, and one of the bystanders said, "Master, do you see how well Artemisia
contends in the contest and how she has sunk an enemy ship?" When he asked
if the deed was truly Artemisia's, they affirmed it, knowing reliably the marking
of her ship, and they supposed that the ruined ship was an enemy. As I have said,
all this happened to bring her luck, and also that no one from the Calyndian ship
survived to accuse her. It is said that Xerxes replied to what was told him, "My
men have become women, and my women men." They say this is what Xerxes said.
In this struggle the general Ariabignes died, son of Darius and the
brother of Xerxes. Many other famous men of the Persians and Medes
and other allies also died, but only a few Hellenes, since they knew how to swim.
Those whose ships were sunk swam across to Salamis, unless they were killed in
action, but many of the barbarians drowned in the sea since they did not know
how to swim. Most of the ships were sunk when those in the front turned to flee,
since those marshalled in the rear, as they tried to go forward with their ships
so they too could display some feat to the king, ran afoul of their own side's
ships in flight.
It also happened in this commotion that certain Phoenicians
whose ships had been destroyed came to the king and accused the Ionians of treason,
saying that it was by their doing that the ships had been lost. It turned out
that the Ionian generals were not put to death, and those Phoenicians who slandered
them were rewarded as I will show. While they were still speaking, a Samothracian
ship rammed an Attic ship. The Attic ship sank and an Aeginetan ship bore down
and sank the Samothracian ship, but the Samothracians, being javelin-throwers,
by pelting them with missiles knocked the fighters off the ship that had sunk
theirs and boarded and seized it. This saved the Ionians. In his deep vexation
Xerxes blamed everyone. When he saw the Ionians performing this great feat, he
turned to the Phoenicians and commanded that their heads be cut off, so that they
who were base not slander men more noble. Whenever Xerxes, as he sat beneath the
mountain opposite Salamis which is called Aegaleos,
saw one of his own men achieve some feat in the battle, he inquired who did it,
and his scribes wrote down the captain's name with his father and city of residence.
The presence of Ariaramnes, a Persian and a friend of the Ionians, contributed
still more to this calamity of the Phoenicians. Thus they dealt with the Phoenicians.
The barbarians were routed and tried to flee by sailing out to Phalerum,
but the Aeginetans lay in wait for them in the strait and then performed deeds
worth telling. The Athenians in the commotion destroyed those ships which either
resisted or tried to flee, the Aeginetans those sailing out of the strait. Whoever
escaped from the Athenians charged right into the Aeginetans.
The ships of Themistocles, as he was pursuing a ship, and of Polycritus
son of Crius, an Aeginetan, then met. Polycritus had rammed a Sidonian ship, the
one which had captured the Aeginetan ship that was on watch off Sciathus,
and on it was Pytheas son of Ischenous, the one the Persians marvelled at when
severely wounded and kept aboard their ship because of his virtue. This Sidonian
ship carrying him with the Persians was now captured, so Pytheas came back safe
to Aegina. When Polycritus saw the Attic ship, he recognized it by seeing the
flagship's marking and shouted to Themistocles, mocking and reproaching him concerning
the Medizing of the Aeginetans(29). After ramming an enemy ship,
Polycritus hurled these insults at Themistocles. The barbarians whose ships were
still intact fled and reached Phalerum under cover of the land army.
In this battle the Hellenes with the reputation as most courageous
were the Aeginetans, then the Athenians. Among individuals they were Polycritus
the Aeginetan and the Athenians Eumenes of Anagyrus
and Aminias of Pallene, the
one who pursued Artemisia. If he had known she was in that ship, he would not
have stopped before either capturing it or being captured himself. Such were the
orders given to the Athenian captains, and there was a prize offered of ten thousand
drachmas to whoever took her alive, since they were indignant that a woman waged
war against Athens. But she escaped, as I said earlier, and the others whose ships
survived were also in Phalerum.
The Athenians say that when the ships joined battle, the Corinthian
general Adeimantus, struck with bewilderment and terror, hoisted his sails and
fled away. When the Corinthians saw their flagship fleeing, they departed in the
same way, but when in their flight they were opposite the sacred precinct of Athena
Sciras on Salamis, by divine guidance a boat encountered them. No one appeared
to have sent it, and the Corinthians knew nothing about the affairs of the fleet
when it approached. They reckon the affair to involve the gods because when the
boat came near the ships, the people on the boat said, "Adeimantus, you have
turned your ships to flight and betrayed the Hellenes, but they are overcoming
their enemies to the fulfillment of their prayers for victory." Adeimantus
did not believe them when they said this, so they spoke again, saying that they
could be taken as hostages and killed if the Hellenes were not seen to be victorious.
So he and the others turned their ships around and came to the fleet, but it was
all over. The Athenians spread this rumor about them(30), but
the Corinthians do not agree at all, and they consider themselves to have been
among the foremost in the battle. The rest of Hellas bears them witness.
Aristides son of Lysimachus, the Athenian whom I mentioned a little
before this as a valiant man, did this in the commotion that arose at Salamis:
taking many of the armed men who were arrayed along the shore of Salamis, he brought
them across and landed them on the island of Psyttalea, and they slaughtered all
the Persians who were on that islet.(31)
When the battle was broken off, the Hellenes towed to Salamis as many
of the wrecks as were still there and kept ready for another battle, supposing
that the king could still make use of his surviving ships. A west wind had caught
many of the wrecks and carried them to the shore in Attica called Colias.
Thus not only was all the rest of the oracle fulfilled which Bacis and Musaeus
had spoken about this battle, but also what had been said many years before this
in an oracle by Lysistratus, an Athenian soothsayer, concerning the wrecks carried
to shore there. Its meaning had eluded all the Hellenes:
"The Colian women will cook with oars. But this was to happen after the king
had marched away"
When Xerxes understood the calamity which had taken place, he feared
that some of the Ionians might advise the Hellenes, if they did not think of it
themselves, to sail to the Hellespont and destroy the bridges. He would be trapped
in Europe in danger of destruction, so he resolved on flight. He did not want
to be detected either by the Hellenes or by his own men, so he attempted to build
a dike across to Salamis, and joined together Phoenician cargo ships to be both
a bridge and a wall, making preparations as if to fight another sea battle. All
who saw him doing this confidently supposed that he fully intended to stay and
fight there, but none of this eluded Mardonius, who had the most experience of
the king's intentions. While doing all this, Xerxes sent a messenger to Persia
to announce the disaster.
While Xerxes did thus, he sent a messenger to Persia with news of
his present misfortune. Now there is nothing mortal that accomplishes a course
more swiftly than do these messengers, by the Persians' skillful contrivance.
It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the
men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of
a day's journey. These are stopped neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness
from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed. The first rider delivers
his charge to the second, the second to the third, and thence it passes on from
hand to hand, even as in the Greek torch-bearers' race in honor of Hephaestus.
This riding-post is called in Persia, angareion.(32)
Such was the plight of the Persians for all the time until the coming
of Xerxes himself ended it. Mardonius, however, seeing that Xerxes was greatly
distressed because of the sea-fight, and suspecting that he planned flight from
Athens, thought that he would be punished for persuading the king to march against
Hellas and that it was better for him to risk the chance of either subduing Hellas
or dying honorably while engaged in a noble cause; yet his hope rather inclined
to the subduing of Hellas. Taking all this into account, he made this proposal:
"Sire, be not grieved nor greatly distressed because of what has befallen
us. It is not on things of wood that the issue hangs for us, but on men and horses;
furthermore, there is no one among these men, who thinks that he has now won a
crowning victory and will disembark from his ship in an attempt to withstand you,
no, nor anyone from this mainland. Those who have withstood us have paid the penalty.
If then you so desire, let us straightway attack the Peloponnese, or if it pleases
you to wait, that also we can do. Do not be downcast, for the Greeks have no way
of escaping guilt for their former and their later deeds and from becoming your
slaves. It is best then that you should do as I have said, but if you have resolved
to lead your army away, even then I have another plan. Do not, O king, make the
Persians the laughing-stock of the Greeks, for if you have suffered harm, it is
by no fault of the Persians. Nor can you say that we have anywhere done less than
brave men should, and if Phoenicians and Egyptians and Cyprians and Cilicians
have so done, it is not the Persians who have any part in this disaster. Therefore,
since the Persians are in no way to blame, be guided by me; if you are resolved
not to remain, march homewards with the greater part of your army. It is for me,
however, to enslave and deliver Hellas to you with three hundred thousand of your
host whom I will choose."
When Xerxes heard that, he was as glad and joyful as a man in his
situation might be and said to Mardonius that he would answer him after deliberating
which of the two plans he would follow. When he consulted with those Persians
whom he summoned, he resolved to send for Artemisia as well, because he saw that
she alone at the former sitting had discerned what was best to do. When Artemisia
came, Xerxes bade all others withdraw, both Persian councillors and guards, and
said to her: "It is Mardonius' advice that I should follow here and attack
the Peloponnese, for the Persians, he says, and the land army are not to blame
for our disaster; of that they would willingly give proof. Therefore he advises
me to do this, or else he offers to choose three hundred thousand men of the army
and deliver Hellas to me enslaved, while I myself by his counsel march homeward
with the rest of the host. Now I ask of you, seeing that you correctly advised
me against the late sea-fight, counsel me as to which of these two things would
be best for me to do."
When she was asked for advice, she replied: "It is difficult,
O king, to answer your plea for advice by saying that which is best, but in the
present turn of affairs I think it best that you march back and that Mardonius,
if he so wishes and promises to do as he says, be left here with those whom he
desires. For if he subdues all that he offers to subdue and prospers in his design,
the achievement, Sire, is yours since it will be your servants who have accomplished
it. If, on the other hand, the issue is contrary to Mardonius' expectation, it
is no great misfortune so long as you and all that household of yours are safe;
for while you and the members of your household are safe, many a time will the
Greeks have to fight for their lives. As for Mardonius, if any disaster befalls
him, it is does not much matter, nor will any victory of the Greeks be a real
victory when they have but slain your servant. As for you, you will be marching
home after the burning of Athens, which thing was the whole purpose of your expedition."
Artemisia's counsel pleased Xerxes, for it happened that she spoke
what he himself had in mind. In truth, I think that he would not have remained
even if all men and women had counselled him so to do--so panic-stricken was he.
Having then thanked Artemisia, he sent her away to take his sons to Ephesus,
for he had some bastard sons with him.
This extract is from: Herodotus. The Histories (ed. A. D. Godley, 1920), Cambridge. Harvard University Press. Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains comments & interesting hyperlinks.
Commentary: (selection from W.W. How, J.Wells works)
1. Meyer (iii, § 222) holds that this idea only grew up after
the campaign of Plataea, and that immediately after Thermopylae no one would have
contemplated a pitched battle in Boeotia with Xerxes. The Spartans
had no doubt promised that Attica should be defended, but they meant to fulfil
their promise at Thermopylae and not on Mount
Cithaeron. And whatever the 'man in the street' at Athens may have expected,
the leaders must have known that resistance in Boeotia was out of the question,
and must have ordered the evacuation of Attica as soon as they heard that Thermopylae
was lost, since the people had time to emigrate en masse before Xerxes reached
Attica.
2. This snake was known as oikouros ophis (Aristoph.
Lys. 758). In the earliest form of the legend Erichthonius (Erechtheus) was
the sacred serpent (Paus. i. 24. 7; J. H. S. xxi. 329); later he becomes the child
of Earth and foster son of Athena hidden in a chest, being half-man, half-serpent
(Hyginus, fab. 166), or a child guarded by serpents (Eur. Ion 20 f., 267-74; Apollodorus
iii. 14. 6).
3. Hdt. will not pledge himself to the existence of the snake,
which was believed to be concealed in a secret chest or chamber of the temple
(probably the Erechtheum), and to prove its existence by the disappearance of
the honey-cake offered every new moon(Plutarch. Them. 10) declares that Themistocles
suggested to the priests the interpretation of the portent that the cake on this
occasion remained untouched.
4. The snake was the symbol of her foster-child, Erichthonius,
and sacred to the goddess herself. For gods deserting a doomed city cf. Aesch.
Sept. c. Theb. 304 f.; Eur.
Tro. 25; Virg.
Aen. ii. 351; Hor.
Odes ii. 1. 25; Tac.
Hist. v. 13.
5. The haven of Pogon lies between the island of Calauria
and Troezen. The spacious bay sheltered by the island, with a broad entrance from
the north-east giving access to the largest ancient ships, formed an ideal meeting-place.
6. There were fifty-four more ships at Salamis than at Artemisium,
and nine new states (Hermione, Ambracia, Leucas, Naxos, Cythnos, Seriphos, Siphnos,
Melos, Croton) were represented, while only one, Opuntian
Locris, has meanwhile gone over to the enemy.
7. Hdt.'s figures, 180 as against 198 from all other states,
compare favourably with those of the Attic orator in Thucydides (i. 74), a little
less than two-thirds of 400, and with those of Demosthenes (de Cor. § 238), 200
out of 300.
8. At Artemisium the Plataeans had helped to man the Athenian
ships (ch. 1); now the Athenians are said not only to have made good their heavy
losses there (ch. 16 and 18), but to have filled the places of the Plataeans.
According to Aristotle (Ath. Pol. ch. 23; cf. Cic. de Off. i. 22. 75) the Areopagus
enabled the fleet to be fully manned by providing eight drachmas for each man;
Cleidemus (fr. 13, F. H. G. i. 362) ascribed this, too, to a stratagem of Themistocles,
but his story deserves little credit (Plut.
Them. 10).
9. He gained the victory for the Athenians in the war between
Erechtheus (his grandfather) and Eumolpus of Eleusis. The accepted tradition represented
him as of foreign origin, the son of Xuthus or Apollo and Creusa daughter of Erechtheus,
and king of the Aegialees. Yet his sons give their names to the four old Attic
(Ionic) tribes. Clearly Ion played too important a part in old Attic mythology
to be altogether ignored, but he could not be fitted into the received genealogy
of the Attic kings, which ran in unbroken line from Cecrops to Theseus. Hence
his ambiguous position and foreign origin, which is strongly affirmed by Euripides.
10. The Bacchiadae of Corinth are said to have claimed suzerainty
over Megara till Orsippus headed his countrymen in a successful revolt a little
after 720 B. C. (Paus.
i. 44. 1). Leucas and Ambracia, as well as Anactorium,
were founded by sons of Cypselus, and Potidaea
by a son of Periander, but the theory that there is a separate list of Corinthian
allies either here or on the inscription at Delphi
is untenable.
11. Aristophanes twice (Ach. 215; Vesp. 1206) alludes to Phayllus
as a noted runner of the olden time, and probably refers to the hero of the Persian
wars, though if so the scholiast is wrong in calling him Olumpionikes. The epigram
(Anth. Pal. App. 297) ascribing to him a jump of 55 feet and a discus throw of
95 feet appears to be late, and is worthless as an authority. It is noticeable
that but one trireme came from Greater Greece, and that furnished by a volunteer
who had a special connexion with the mother country through his athletic victories.
Paus. (10.9.2)
refers "There is a statue at Delphi of Phaylus of Crotona. He won no victory
at Olympia, but his victories at Pytho were two in the pentathlum and one in the
foot-race. He also fought at sea against the Persian, in a ship of his own, equipped
by himself and manned by citizens of Crotona who were staying in Greece. Such
is the story of the athlete of Crotona."
12. Melos was believed to have been colonized from Lacedaemon
at the time of the Dorian invasion (Thuc.
v. 84. 112) before 1100 B. C.
13. Though the regular dating by archons is believed by many
to go back to the institution of the annual archonship, 683 B. C., and almost
certainly extends as far back as Solon, no trace of its use is found in the fragments
of historians earlier than Hdt.; Hdt. employs it here only, and Thucydides twice
(v. 25, ii. 2).
14. Pausanias (i. 18. 2) repeats this, adding the myth of Aglauros
(Agraulos) and her sisters who opened the chest in which Erichthonius was hidden
and then cast themselves down from the rocks above the precinct of Aglauros. ?It
has generally been supposed that the escalading party either climbed up in the
open, where they could hardly have escaped notice, or else ascended by the direct
but narrow staircase that may still be seen above the grotto of Aglauros; but
so obvious a way if not strongly barricaded, could hardly have been left unguarded.
Recent excavations have shown a much more likely route. A natural cleft in the
rock runs under or within the northern wall of the Acropolis; its western entrance
is in the projecting face of rock just to the west of the cave of Aglauros; it
has also an outlet at the eastern end, nearly opposite the west end of the Erechtheum.
Where this cleft is within the wall of the Acropolis, it has an opening at the
top which gives access to the plateau above it; but there is a sheer drop of about
twenty feet, which might well lead the defenders to regard it as needing no guard;
and an attacking party, once within the cleft, could ascend at their leisure with
scaling ladders or ropes?.
15. The myth (see Apollod.
iii. 14. 1) was that Poseidon came first, and, striking with his trident,
created the salt well on the Acropolis, then Athena made the olive; and the land
was adjudged to Athena by the witness of Cecrops. The scene was represented on
the west gable of the Parthenon at the moment of Athena's triumph. There seems
no earlier authority for the legend, which may be a reminiscence of a struggle
between the worshippers of Poseidon and of Athene.
16. In the suggestions that the absolute necessity of fighting
at Salamis was seen first by Mnesiphilus, and that Themistocles adopted his plan
without acknowledgment, we may see the prejudice of Hdt.'s Attic informants (cf.
ch. 4. 2 n.; Introd. § 31). We may set against the story Themistocles' reputation
for matchless wisdom immediately after Salamis (ch. 124), and his dedication after
the battle of a shrine to Artemis Aristoboule (Plut. Them. 22; de Mal. Herod.
37), and above all Thucydides' insistence on his originality (i. 138) phuseos
men dunamei, meletes de brachuteti kratistos de houtos autoschediazein ta deonta
egeneto. The dispute whether statesmanship was innate or acquired became a favourite
topic in philosophic circles (Xen. Mem. iv. 2. 2; Symp. viii. 39; Plat. Men. 93
B, 99 B), and Themistocles was a leading instance (Bauer, Them. p. 72). We may
see the result of this in Plutarch, who by silence (Them.) or explicitly (de Mal.
l.c.) rejects the intervention of Mnesiphilus on this occasion, and yet retains
him as the pupil of Solon and teacher of Themistocles in politics (Them. 2; Moral.
154, 795 C). The anecdote here is surely apocryphal (cf. Busolt, ii. 641 n.; Meyer,
iii. § 223 n.).
17. All the later writers (Plut. Them. 11; Aelian, V. H. xiii.
40; Aristid. ii. p. 258, Dind.) except Pseud. Plut. Mor. 185 B represent the scene
as taking place between Eurybiades and Themistocles, thus unduly emphasizing the
rivalry between Sparta and Athens and obscuring the hostility of Corinth. They
add more picturesque detail, e. g. Plut.
Them. 11
18. In the open sea the enemy could surround the weaker Greek
fleet, in the narrows their very numbers would be against them as well as their
ignorance of the fairway. The Greek ships were inferior to the enemy in manoeuvring.
Only the great superiority in this acquired by the Athenians between 480 and 430
B. C. (cf. Thuc.
i. 49) justified the opposite tactics of Phormio (Thuc.
ii. 90).
19. Siris, fabled to be of Trojan
origin (Strabo 264), was on the river of the same name half-way between Sybaris
and Tarentum. Apparently
it was colonized from Colophon
and imitated Sybaris in wealth and luxury. Probably it also resembled Sybaris
in the possession of an overland trade, since we find alliance coins with the
names of Siris and Pyxus on
them. It is said to have been conquered by its Achaean neighbours, Sybaris, Croton,
and Metapontum (before 510
B. C.). Later, after 440, Siris was refounded by Thurii
and Tarentum jointly, though accounted a Tarentine colony. Finally, 433-431 B.
C., most of its inhabitants removed to Heraclea,
Siris remaining the port of that colony.
The claims of Athens to Siris seem shadowy, resting only on her headship
of the Ionic race. But that the idea of westward expansion, afterwards so popular
at Athens, had occurred to Themistocles is suggested by the names of his daughters
Italia and Sybaris (Plut.
Them. 32), by his supposed relations with Hiero (Plut.
Them. 24, 25), if they be not fictions of Stesimbrotus and Theophrastus, and
by his interest in Corcyra
(Plut. Them. 24; Thuc. i. 136). It is, however, possible that Themistocles, following
the oracle, only threatened westward emigration vaguely, and that the precise
spot was fixed on later, when Athenian interest had become centred on New Sybaris
(450 B. C.) and Thurii (445 B. C.). At that time there would be many old oracles,
real or spurious, encouraging colonization there. The idea of emigration en masse
had been mooted more than once in Ionia, but would have been hard to carry out
in this case.
20. The Eleusinian plain lies south-west of Mount
Parnes, being divided from the Attic plain by Mount
Poikilon and Daphni, and
bounded on the north and west by Cithaeron
and the highlands of Megara. It is called Thriasian from the important deme of
Thria, which lay probably
at Kalyvia, three miles east-north-east of Eleusis. The regular route from Thebes,
by which the Persian infantry would naturally come, led to the Thriasian plain
a little north of Eleusis. Plutarch (Them. 15) puts this vision on the day of
the battle, which would thus be on the 20th Boedromion (Plut. Phocion 28, Camill.
19). It is, however, evident that Plutarch derived all the details of his account,
except 'a great light that shone from Eleusis', from Hdt., and that the historian
believed that Dicaeus saw the portent at least a day, and perhaps several days,
before the battle. Busolt (ii. 703-4) argues that the battle took place a few
days after the 20th Boedromion (= Sept. 22) and some days before the eclipse (Oct.
2, 480), which prevented Cleombrotus from molesting the retreat of Xerxes (ix.
10), probably Sept. 27 or 28.
21. The great procession from Athens to Eleusis along the sacred
way took place on the 20th Boedromion (Eur. Ion 1076). It bore the name Iacchus
because in it the statue of the child Iacchus, with his cradle and playthings,
was borne, escorted by Ephebi and followed by the Mystae bearing torches and singing
hymns (Arist. Ran. 398-413). Frequent sacrifices and ceremonies on the road made
the procession last from daybreak till late at night. All through the day there
was constant invocation of the god.
22. This wall, from the materials and haste with which it was
built, would seem to have been a temporary field-work. Neither Thucydides nor
Xenophon alludes to any such impediment to the march of troops across the Isthmus.
In 369 B. C. (Diod. xv. 68) an ineffectual attempt was made to bar the Isthmus
against Epaminondas by making a palisade and trench from Cenchreae
to Lechaeum. A wall seems
to have protected the Peloponnese against the Gallic invasion, 279 B. C. (Paus.
vii. 6. 7), and more certainly in the days of Valerian (253 A. D.) there was a
wall, repaired later by Justinian, and last used by the Venetians in 1463 and
1696. It may still be traced from sea to sea running along a line of low cliffs,
a little south of the modern canal, and is best preserved near the Isthmian sanctuary;
cf. Frazer, Paus. iii. 5-6.
23. The meaning seems to be: 'The Cynurians being autochthonous,
appear to be Ionians, and the only ones left in the Peloponnese' (the Aegialians
having been driven out). Pausanias (iii. 2. 2) would derive them from the preDorian
inhabitants of Argos. It is probable that they belong to the aboriginal population,
but there seems no special reason for holding them to be Ionic. Hdt. here as elsewhere
(cf. i. 56) makes Ionians a branch of Pelasgi.
24. Apparently the town Orneae
(about thirteen miles north-west of Argos)
was reduced by Argos to a status similar to that of the Laconian Perioecic towns
under Sparta. Hence all the
other Perioeci of Argos were termed Orneatae; cf. the Caerites at Rome. Stein
holds that kai perioikoi is an adscript, on the grounds that Cynuria had belonged
to Sparta at least since about 550 B. C. (i. 82; Thuc. v. 41), and that the Argive
Perioeci, some of whom are said to have been enfranchised (Ar. Pol. 1303 a 8),
and who were all, including the Orneatae (Thuc. v. 67), treated as summachoi (Thuc.
v. 47, 77), had been united with Argos (Paus. viii. 27. 1). But perioikoi may
well be an explanation of Orneatai.
25. Losses at Thermopylae and elsewhere (vii. 222; ix. 30) had
so much diminished the number of Thespians that the city was glad to welcome immigrants
(epoikous). That Sicinnus was a Greek is stated by Aeschylus (Pers. 355) and supported
by his enfranchisement. Plutarch (Them. 12) must be wrong in calling him a Persian,
though he may have been an Asiatic Greek.
26. These names cause a difficulty. They seem to be taken from
the oracle of Bacis
(ch. 77). That oracle may well have had reference originally not to Salamis but
to Artemisium; if so, Ceos would be the well-known island, Cynosura the promontory
near Marathon, and the temple
of Artemis that at Brauron.
Afterwards the prophecy was applied to Salamis and the temple of Artemis identified
with that at Munychia. Blakesley, following Larcher, believes that Hdt. intends
to describe the closing up of Persian squadrons from these distant points, but
the nearest of them, Ceos, is forty miles off Salamis, while Cynosura is sixty
miles away, so that the supposed movement is impossible. It seems probable that
Cynosura (dog's tail) really was the name of the long tongue of land reaching
out from Salamis towards Psyttaleia, and that Ceos and Munychia are mentioned
because the prophecy must be fulfilled. Stein and Hauvette believe Ceos to be
identical with Cynosura, the former, as the regular name, coming first and explaining
the obsolete synonym; for this use of te kai cf. ch. 43, 73. 3. Beloch's (Klio
viii. 477) suggestion that Ceos is the old name of Lipso Kutali (Psyttaleia) and
his attempt to find the true Psyttaleia in the isle of St. George are not acceptable.
27. The narrative of Hdt. suggests, though it does not assert,
that this was the first return of Aristides to his country after his ostracism,
which took place at the time of Themistocles' increase of the fleet in 483-482,
or a little before (484-483, Jerome, Eusebius). But it appears that the general
return of exiles must be placed in the archonship of Hypsichides, i. e. before
June 480, though Plutarch (Arist. 8) makes it synchronize with Xerxes' march through
Thessaly and Boeotia (July-August). Again, Xanthippus, who had also been ostracized,
returned before the evacuation of Attica. Finally, in the capture of Psyttaleia,
Aristides acts as general in command of a large force of Attic hoplites, i. e.
appears to be one of the strategi (ch. 95 n.). If so, he must have been sent to
Aegina on some mission, perhaps to take Athenian refugees thither, or to fetch
the Aeacidae thence. The objection that while Aristides reached Salamis overnight,
the trireme with the Aeacidae is not reported to have arrived till next morning
(viii. 83), is parried by Burrows' remark (Cl. Rev. xi. 258) that Aristides did
not arrive till after midnight (viii. 76, 81), so that the sailors would have
already turned in, and so would not welcome the Aeacidae till daybreak. Nor is
it easy to see how any ship could have evaded the Persian blockade after Aristides.
The objections remain that the trireme which fetched the Aeacidae must surely
have been Aeginetan (viii. 64, 83, 84), and that, had Aristides been commissioned
to escort the Aeacidae, Hdt. would have known and mentioned so interesting a fact.
28. Diodorus (xi. 17) speaks of a Samian sent by the Ionians,
and Plutarch, or his copyist (Them. 12), of a Tenedian ship, but Tenos duly appears
on the snake supporting the tripod dedicated at Delphi (ix. 81 n.) as well as
on the base of the statue of Zeus at Olympia (Paus. v. 23).
29. The point of Polycritus' taunt is that Athens ten years
before had charged the Aeginetans in general, and his own father Crius (vi. 50
n.) in particular, with Medism (vi. 49, 73, 85).
30. That this Athenian story was a late and malicious invention
is hinted by Hdt. himself in the words (§ 4) martureei de sphi kai he alle Hellas.
Indeed, the phrase phatis echei is itself a note of uncertainty; cf. vii. 3. 2;
ix. 84. 2. There is no trace of any such charge elsewhere, and immediately after
the battle the Athenians allowed the following epitaph to be placed on the tomb
of the Corinthians buried at Salamis (Hicks, 18; cf. Plut. Mor. 870 E) [O xeine,
euudr]on pok' enaiomes astu Korinthou [Nun d' hame Aia]ntos [nasos echei Salamis]....
31. Aeschylus distinctly put this exploit after the defeat of
the Persian fleet, when the Greeks can surround the island with their ships and
land from them (Pers. 455 f.). Hdt. seems to date it at the time of the Persian
rout. Plutarch mistakenly makes Aristides land from boats with some picked volunteers
at the beginning of the sea-fight, and adds other untrustworthy details from Phanias
(Them. 13; Arist. 9). Bury argues forcibly that Aristides, being given so important
a duty, must have been a Strategus.
32. Torch races were held at the Panathenaea, and the festivals
of Prometheus, Hephaestus, Pan (vi. 105. 3), Bendis (Plato, Rep. i. 328 A), Hermes,
and Theseus. They appear to have been of two kinds. In the simpler, a number of
runners each with a lighted torch started abreast, and the one who first carried
his torch alight to the goal won (Paus. i. 30. 2). The other was a relay or team
race. There were several lines of runners; the first man in each line had his
torch lighted at the altar and ran with it at full speed to the second, to whom
he passed it on, the second to the third, and so on till the last man carried
it to the goal. The line of runners which first passed its torch alight to the
goal was the winning team. Cf. Lucr. ii. 79; Aesch. Ag. 312 f.; and of the similar
horse race to Bendis, Plato, l. c. lampadia echontes diadosousin allelois hamillomenoi
tois hippois (cf. also Laws 776 B). The torch race arose from the custom of transmitting
a new and sacred fire from the altar to hearths polluted by death or the enemy's
presence (Plut. Arist. 20). In such cases the old fire was extinguished and new
pure fire carried as quickly as possible by runners to the hearths awaiting it
(cf. Frazer, Paus. ii. 392).
Hdt. gives no details of the losses on either side, Ctesias (Pers.
26) gives the Persian loss in ships as 500, Diodorus (xi. 19, Ephorus) says 40
Greek ships were destroyed and over 200 Persian besides those captured.
This extract is from: A Commentary on Herodotus (ed. W. W. How, J. Wells). Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
CHOLARGOS (Municipality) ATTIKI
The first historical report to Cholargos as a municipality dates 2500 years ago. The most famous resident was Pericles of the ancient Athenian Democracy. Pericles was born around 494 b.c. possibly at his father's country house (his father's name was Xanthipos) of Cholargos. The main street of the city is named after him and the main city entrance is decorated with Pericles bust. Local authorities use the bust of Pericles on the municipal insignia stating that Cholargos is the native land of the most glorious man in the ancient Athenian Democracy. According to the report of archaeologist’s Mr. Nikolaou Liarou the area that the recent municipality of Cholargos occupies, includes archaeological inhabitancy remains from the ancient years. The first inhabitancy indications date back to the prehistoric years. Next inhabitancy indications are reported later on in the Classical and Hellenistic years.
In the area of the 5th bus stop in Cholargos important grave monuments of the 5th and 6th century were found in 1964. Inhabitancy indications of the Classical, Roman and Byzantine times were recently found on the north side of Korakovouni mountain. In the same area at the histero-Byzantine times, the temple of Ag Eleousa was build possibly at around 13th century. Northwest of the temple the mid-Byzantine monastery of Ag Ioannis Theologos stands as the only remain of those years. The recent history of Cholargos begins in 1926 with the creation of a building co-operative. Cholargos was declared a Community(small municipality) in 1933. The first community president was Mr. Nikolaos Vitalis. Cholargos was declared a Municipality in 1963.
NEO PSYCHIKO (Municipality) ATTIKI
(Following URL information in Greek only)
VOULIAGMENI (Suburb of Athens) ATTIKI
The legend
At the beaches of Saronicos
bay, 24 km south of the city of Athens and from the preclassical years till
today, the ancient Demos of Aexonidon Alon - the today's Vouliagmeni keeps thriving
and developing.
The legend binds with an unbroken historical link the beautiful city
of Vouliagmeni to the Kyklades Islands, the sacred Delos
and the birth of the Olympian Gods.
According to the historian Pausanias, the young Titan Leto, pregnant
with the children of Zeus, father of Gods, and hunted by the jealous Hera was
desperately searching for a place where she could give birth to them. During the
pursuit and uncomfortable from the pains, Leto throws her belt over the sandy
and full of pine trees thin strip of land with the beautiful beaches on both its
sides, the region known today as Lemos
of Vouliagmeni.
The area will be named "Zostir" (Belt) after Leto's garment,
with a second explanation offered again by Pausanias and referring to the weapons
that Apollo put in his belt in order to protect his mother.
A brief history of Vouliagmeni
The exquisite beaches of the city had long attracted human activity
since the early historical years. The 'Makra Akra' (Long Edge), as the peninsula
of Lemos was characteristically known, was one of the areas of Attica where the
archaeological excavations brought into the light many remains of human settlements
during the end of the Neolithic Period (3.000 bC.)
Human presence becomes even more prominent during the next centuries,
as the archeological findings at Mikro Kavouri reveal several Proto-Hellenic settlements
and some quantities of obsidian, a hard volcanic stone that can be found only
in the islands of Milos
and Nissyros. These
findings reveal a maritime communication with these islands, at least 4.500 years
ago.
Archeological excavations
During the pre-classical years and around the second half of the 8th
century, a temple is built in Vouliagmeni, with three altars that are dedicated
to Leto, goddess of the night and patron of the women who are going to give birth,
and to her twins, Artemis and Apollo.
During the later years new additions were built to the temple, one
in the 6th century and a second during the last half of the 4th century. History
shows that the temple was active till the end of the 2nd century AD. There is
another temple in the area which is dedicated to Athena, the goddess of wisdom,
whose exact location has not yet been found.
In 1938, another archaeological excavation at Lemos of Vouliagmeni
revealed a small settlement which was believed to belong to priests, dated somewhere
between the end of 5th and the beginning of the 6th century. At the time of the
excavation, its central building was regarded as a unique example of an ancient
house of this period. Also, during the same years the excavations revealed a fortification
tower built by the Athenians around 429 bC, according to the ancient historian
Thucydides.
Many of these findings are exhibited at the Archaeological
Museum of Athens.
This text is cited June 2005 from the Municipality of Vouliagmeni URL below
ATHENS (Ancient city) GREECE
. . . next to these six hundred Plataeans. At the end, and first in the line, were the Athenians who held the left wing. They were eight thousand in number, and their general was Aristides son of Lysimachus.
The following took part in the war: . . the Athenians provided more than all the rest, one hundred and eighty ships.
The Athenians furnished a hundred and twenty-seven ships
TRIZIN (Ancient city) GREECE
. . . By these one thousand Troezenians were posted, and after them two hundred men of Lepreum
The following took part in the war: from the Peloponnese... the Troezenians furnished five ships...
The Troezenians furnished five ships
Those who fought best after the Athenians were the men of Corinth and Troezen and Sicyon.
ATHENS (Ancient city) GREECE
Thurii. It was one of the latest of all the Greek colonies in this part of Italy, not
having been founded till nearly 70 years after the fall of Sybaris. The site of
that city had remained desolate for a period of 58 years after its destruction
by the Crotoniats; when at length, in B.C. 452, a number of the Sybarite exiles
and their descendants made an attempt to establish themselves again on the spot,
under the guidance of some leaders of Thessalian origin; and the new colony rose
so rapidly to prosperity that it excited the jealousy of the Crotoniats, who,
in consequence, expelled the new settlers a little more than 5 years after the
establishment of the colony (Diod. xi. 90, xii. 10). The fugitive Sybarites first
appealed for support to Sparta, but without success: their application to the
Athenians was more successful, and that people determined to send out a fresh
colony, at the same time that they reinstated the settlers who had been lately
expelled from thence. A body of Athenian colonists was accordingly sent out by
Pericles, under the command of Lampon and Xenocritus; but the number of Athenian
citizens was small, the greater part of those who took part in the colony being
collected from various parts of Greece. Among them were two celebrated names,
-Herodotus the historian, and the orator Lysias, both of whom appear to have formed
part of the original colony (Diod. xii. 10; Strab. vi.; Dionys. Lys.; Vit. X.
Orat.; Plut. Peric. 11, Nic. 5).
This extract is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited July 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Hagnon, son of Nicias. was the Athenian founder of Amphipolis, on the Strymon. A previous attempt had been crushed twenty-nine years before, by a defeat in Drabescus. Hagnon succeeded in driving out the Edonians, and established his colony securely, giving the name Amphipolis to what had hitherto been called "the Nine Ways." (Thue. iv. 102.) The date is fixed to the archonship of Euthymenes, B. C. 437, by Diodorns (xii. 32). . .
ACROPOLIS (Acropolis) ATHENS
The Acropolis. A few remains of the Mycenaean period and considerable
remnants of the Pelargikon remain on the top of the hill from prehistoric times.
No remains of the Geometric period have been discovered. The first shrines must
be dated at the earliest to the 8th c. B.C. In 566 B.C., the year when Peisistratos
instituted the festival and games of the Great Panathenaia, the highest section
of the Mycenaean tower in front of the entrance to the Acropolis was taken down
and the first altar was consecrated there to Athena Nike. At the same time a straight
ramp was built up the hill to help the procession in its ascent and the first
temples were built inside the Acropolis: the Hekatompedon in 570-566 on the site
where the Parthenon was later erected, the Old Temple of Athena in 529-520 whose
foundations have been preserved, and a number of smaller buildings.
In the period from 490 to 480 B.C. the Acropolis was still surrounded
by the Pelargikon wall, but this had lost its defensive role. In 485 B.C. a new
propylon had replaced the old entrance, and near the Altar of Athena Nike a small
poros temple was built. The Hekatompedon was torn down and in its place the first
marble Parthenon was begun. This was in a half-finished state when the Acropolis
was razed by the Persians in 480 B.C. A new program for rebuilding the temples
and other buildings which had been destroyed was started in 448 B.C. after the
signing of Kallias' Peace Treaty with the Persians at Susa. Among the first works
on the Acropolis was the construction of strong retaining walls, partly to level
the area, but chiefly to enlarge the area of the Acropolis. Then followed monuments
which still remain today in a remarkable state of preservation: the Parthenon
in 447-438 B.C., the Propylaia in 437-432, the Erechtheion in 421-406, the Temple
of Brauronian Artemis, the Chalkotheke, and other small temples and altars.
In Hellenistic and Roman times only minor buildings were constructed
on the Acropolis. Immediately after 27 B.C. the Erechtheion was repaired and a
circular temple of Rome and Augustus was built to the E of the Parthenon. The
temples of the Acropolis remained virtually untouched through the whole mediaeval
period, save for their conversion to Christian churches. Their destruction and
demolition began in the middle of the 17th c. A.D. and continued until the Greek
War of Independence.
Around the Acropolis. In the whole area around the Acropolis
remains and sherds from the Neolithic through the Late Geometric periods are found.
From the 7th, but chiefly from the 6th c. B.C. through the Roman period, all along
the Peripatos road which surrounds the Acropolis numerous shrines and other buildings
were constructed. In 465 B.C. the Klepsydra fountain was built and at some time
after the Persian wars the cult of Pan was instituted in a small cave above it,
next door to a cave in which Apollo Hypoakraios had been worshiped since an early
period. East of it, in the cave of Aglauros, a fountain had been built in Mycenaean
times, which communicated directly to the Acropolis by means of a stair. Even
after the destruction of the fountain, the stair was still used by the Arrephoroi
to get down to the neighboring Shrine of Aphrodite and Eros. On the S slope of
the Acropolis were the Odeion of Perikles and W of it on the ruins of the old
Theater of Dionysos Eleuthereus, the new theater, which was finally completed
under Lykourgos (338-326 B.C.). At the highest point behind the theater the monument
of Thrasyllos was built in 321-320 B.C., while to the S of the scene building
was the Sanctuary of Dionysos Eleutheros, including a stoa and two temples. The
cult of Asklepios was founded in 419-418 B.C. to the W of the theater, with a
sanctuary incorporating numerous buildings. Later a stoa was built in front of
it by Eumenes II (197-159 B.C.). Above the E end of this was the monument of Nikias
(320-319) and at the other end, the Odeion of Herodes Atticus which was built
soon after A.D. 160. The Shrine of the Nymphs was uncovered in front of the odeion.
Sherds found in it dated from about the middle of the 7th c. B.C.
Besides the Peripatos, the street of the Tripods surrounded the Acropolis.
This started at the Prytaneion and ended in front of the propylon of the Shrine
of Dionysos Eleuthereus. Along this were numerous choregic monuments, of which
many bases have been found, and one of which, the monument of Lysikrates (335-334
B.C.), is nearly intact. The Prytaneion was in the Agora of Theseus, where the
street of the Tripods branches off from the Panathenaic Way. Near this spot the
Eleusinion was built around the middle of the 6th c. B.C.
This extract is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites, Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Aug 2005 from Perseus Project URL below, which contains 671 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
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