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The remains of some of these edifices, still extant in the acropolis, cannot be beheld without admiration.

The acropolis has now, as formerly, only one entrance, which fronts the Piræus. The ascent is by traverses and rude fortifications, furnished with cannon, but without carriages and neglected. By the second gate is the station of the guard, who sits cross-legged under cover, much at his ease, smoking his pipe, or drinking coffee; with his companions about him in like attitudes. Over this gate-way is an inscription in large characters on a stone turned upside down, and black from the fires made below. It records a present of a pair of gates.

Going farther up, you come to the ruins of the propyléa, an edifice, which graced the entrance into the citadel. This was one of the structures of Pericles, who began it when Euthymenes was archon, four hundred and thirty-five years before Christ. It was completed in five years, at the expense of two thousand and twelve talents. It was of marble, of the doric order, and had five doors to afford an easy passage to the multitudes, which resorted on business, or devotion, to the acropolis.

While this fabric was building, the architect, Menesicles, whose activity equalled his skill, was hurt by a fall, and the physicians despaired of his life; but Minerva, who was propitious to the undertaking, appeared, it was said, to Pericles, and prescribed a remedy, by which he was speedily and easily cured. It was a plant or herb growing round about the acropolis, and called afterwards parthenium.

The right wing* of the propyléa was a temple of victory.

* Pausanias, p. 20. Των δε Προπυλαίων εν δεξια-εν αρισερα οίκημα έχον γραφας.

They related that Ægeus had stood there, viewing the sea, and anxious for the return of his son Theseus, who was gone to Crete, with the tributary children to be delivered to the Minotaur. The vessel, which carried them, had black sails suiting the occasion of its voyage;and it was agreed, that, if Theseus overcame the enemy, their colour should be changed to white. The neglect of this signal was fatal to Ægeus, who on seeing the sails unaltered, threw himself down headlong from the rock, and perished. The idol was named Victory without wings; it was said, because the news of the success of Theseus did not arrive, but with the conqueror. It had a pomegranate in the right hand, and a helmet in the left. As the statue was without pinions, it was hoped the goddess would remain for ever on the spot.

On the left wing of the propyléa, and fronting the temple of Victory, was a building decorated with paintings by Polygnotus, of which an account is given by Pausanias. This edifice, as well as the temple, was of the doric order, the columns fluted, and without bases. Both contributed alike to the uniformity and grandeur of the design; and the whole fabric, when finished, was deemed equally magnificent and ornamental. The interval between Pericles and Pausanias consists of several centuries. The propyléa remained entire in the time of this topographer, and, as will be shewn, continued nearly so to a much later period. It had then a roof of white marble, which was unsurpassed either in the size of

Wheler, p. 358, and Spon, p. 137, not attending enough to this passage, have mistaken. one wing for the other; substituting the right and left of the human body, for the right and left of the propyléa.

the stones, or in the beauty of their arrangement; and before each wing was an equestrian statue.

The propyléa have ceased to be the entrance of the acropolis. The passage, which was between the columns in the centre, is walled up almost to their capitals, and above is a battery of cannon. The way now winds before the front of the ancient structure, and, turning to the left hand among rubbish and mean walls, you come to the back part, and to the five door-ways. The soil without is risen higher than the top of the two smaller. There, under the vault and cannon, lies a heap of large stones, the ruin of the roof.

The temple of Victory, standing on an abrupt rock, has its back and one side unincumbered with the modern ramparts. The columns in the front being walled up, you enter it by a breach in the side within the propyléa. It was used by the Turks as a magazine for powder, until about the year 1656; when a sudden explosion, occasioned by lightning, carried away the roof, with a house erected on it, belonging to the officer who commanded in the acropolis, whose whole family, except a girl, perished. The women of the Aga continued to inhabit in this quarter, but it is now abandoned and in ruins.

The cell of the temple of Victory, which is of white marble, very thick, and strongly cemented, sufficiently witnesses the great violence it has undergone; the stones in many places being disjointed, as it were, and forced from their original position. Two of these making an acute angle, the exterior edges touching, without a crevice; and the light abroad being much stronger than in the room, which has a modern roof and is dark; the portion in contact becoming pellucid, had illumined the vacant space with a dim colour, resembling that of amber. We were desired to examine this extraordinary

appearance, which the Greeks regarded as a standing miracle, and which the Turks, who could not confute them, beheld with equal astonishment. We found in the We found in the gap some coals, which had been brought on a bit of earthen ware for the purpose of burning incense, as we supposed, and also a piece of wax taper, which probably had been lighted in honour of the saint and author of the wonder; but our Swiss unfortunately carrying his own candle too far in, the smoke blackened the marble, and destroyed the phænomenon. The building opposite to the temple has served as a foun-dation for a square lofty tower of ordinary masonry. The columns of the front are walled up, and the entrance is by a low iron gate in the side. It is now used as a place of confinement for delinquents; but in 1676 was a powder magazine. In the wall of a rampart near it are some fragments of exquisite sculpture, representing the Athenians fighting with the Amazons. These belong to the frieze, which was then standing. In the second century, when Pausanias lived, much of the painting was impaired by age, but some remained, and the subjects were chiefly taken from the Trojan story. The traces are since vanished.

The pediment of the temple of Victory, with that of the opposite wing, is described as remaining in 1676; but on each building a square tower had been erected. One of the steps. in the front of the propyléa was entire, with the four columns, their entablature and the pediment. The portico, to which the five door-ways belonged, consisted of a large square rooin, roofed with slabs of marble, which were laid on two great marble beams, and sustained by four beautiful columns. These were Ionic, the proportions of this order best suiting that purpose, as taller than the doric; the reason

it was likewise preferred in the pronaos of the temple of Victory. The roof of the propyléa, after standing above two thousand years, was probably destroyed, with all the pediments, by the Venetians in 1687, when they battered the castle in front, firing red-hot bullets, and took it, but were compelled to resign it again to the Turks in the following year. The exterior walls, and, in particular, a side of the temple of Victory, retain many marks of their hostilities.

Pausanias was really, or pretended to be, ignorant, to whom the equestrian statues, before the wings of the propyléa, belonged. One of the pedestals, which remains, will supply this deficiency. The whole is immured, except the front; which has been much battered by cannon-shot; and on this, my companions, while busied in measuring and drawing, discovered some Greek letters, high above the ground. After repeated trials, in which I was assisted by a pocket-telescope, I procured the inscription, which may be thus translated; "The people have erected Marcus Agrippa, son of Lucius, thrice consul, the friend of Caius." The third consulate of Marcus Agrippa falls on the year of Rome, seven hundred and twenty six,* when his colleague was the Caius here recorded, Caius Cæsar Octavianus the seventh time consul, who was dignified by the Roman senate, in this memorable year, with the title of Augustus; by which he was distinguished after the 16th of February. The consulate commenced on the calends or 1st of January. It follows, that the pedestal was inscribed between this day, and the 16th of the succeeding month; or, at farthest, before the notification of this signal and recent honour had arrived in Greece; for after

* Before Christ, 27.

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