CHAP. considered as the characteristic of a Moslem III. dynasty and a barbarous people; the most discordant masses being collected from other works, and the Stéle of the sepulchres mixed with stones of all shapes and sizes in the materials then used; just as they now appear when heaped together, as it is commonly believed, by Romaic or by Turkish workmen. That the Antients may, therefore, have left examples of this promiscuous masonry, even in their works, is evident: but a search for inscriptions, and fragments of sculpture, in this country, is seldom more successful than when it is carried on among modern ecclesiastical buildings. The capitals of the columns of antient temples often serve in the Greek chapels for Christian altars: and when these chapels have been erected upon the site of a Heathen temple, those capitals not unfrequently denote the order of architecture observed in the original building, when every other trace of its history has been lost. The Monastery of St. Nicholo is among the number of modern edifices constructed from the ruins of a long-forgotten shrine; and a clue to its pristine sanctity and celebrity has been preserved, in the manner we Antiquities have mentioned. In a church near to the monasat the Mo- tery we found a long inscription upon the shaft discovered nastery of St. Nicholo of one of the pillars, distinctly mentioning the III. of the Fountain Aganippe of the certained. MOYZEIA, or GAMES SACRED TO THE MUSES; CHAP. (which Pausanias says were CELEBRATED NEAR A GROVE, UPON MOUNT HELICON); and contain- Situation ing the names of the CONQUERORS IN THOSE GAMES, WHEN AURELIUS CALLICLIANUS THE and Grove SON OF SOTERICHUS WAS PRESIDENT, ANDÂURE- Muses, asLIUS MUSEROS WAS ARCHON. This inscription therefore, added to other circumstances of collateral evidence, which we shall subsequently adduce, satisfied us of the propriety of the route we had chosen : it had already conducted us to THE FOUNTAIN AGANIPPE, AND TO THE GROVE OF THE MUSES. These land-marks being ascertained, the guidance afforded by Strabo and by Pausanias is sufficient for the rest. The rivulet below becomes at once the PERMESSUS, Permessus. named from the parent of AGANIPPE; called TERMESSUS by Pausanias'; and flowing, as he describes it, in a circuitous course, from MOUNT HELICON. Both the fountain and the river were sacred to the MUSES. Wheler calls this rivulet TERMESSUS, and very accurately describes its course, as beheld by him from the ruined tower at Panaja. He considered Panaja as having been antiently CERESSUS, a citadel of the Thespians. River (1) Pausan. Bæot. c. 29. p. 766. ed. Kuhn. III. CHAP. But he distinguishes the TERMESSUS of Pausanias from the PERMESSUS of Strabo; saying, that the former falls into the Gulph of Livadostro, and the latter into the Lake Copais'. This distinction, whether correct or not, has not been admitted by the commentators upon Pausanias; for they expressly state, that the two names apply to the same river'. Wheler, who seems to have taken uncommon pains in seeking for antiquities that might enable him to ascertain the situation of THESPIA, although he visited Neocorio upon one side of HELICON, and the Monastery of St. George upon the other side, yet knew nothing of this antient passage of the mountain from the former to the latter place: consequently, the remarkable fountain here falling into the PERMESSUs, and the remains of antiquity near to it, together with the other interesting objects occurring along this route, entirely escaped his observation. Yet with what zeal did he endeavour to penetrate the recesses of Helicon; retracing even his own (1) Journey into Greece, Book VI. p. 476. Lond. 1682. (2) σι (Τερμήσσον) Hartungus legit Περμησσοῦ: itidemque mox Περμησσὶς ex Strab. 469, 473. Ejusdem Пpunaroũ mentio est in Theogonia, et in Virgilii Bucolicis. A Nicandro in Theriacis appellatur Пapunovés. Tipunroos sanè per Straboni est urbs Pisidica, 764. pro qua Tsuivrò; legitur apud Stephanum. S. Vid. Annot. Sylburgii in Pausan. lib.ix. p. 766 edit. Kuhnii. footsteps, to find a position for the fountain HIPPOCRENE; and actually obtaining, with difficulty and danger, a distant prospect of the Vale of ASCRA, into which this road would easily have conducted him3. In the Inscription, of which the following copy is a fac-simile, the M occurs in the same form as in an inscription at Telmessus. There are also other proofs of its being written in a late age and were it not for the intelligence it affords respecting the place where it was found, we should not deem it worthy of being inserted in its entire state. CHAP. III. 66 (3) As to the fountain Hippocrene," (See Wheler's Journey into Greece, p. 478. Lond. 1682.) “the famous haunt of the Nine Sisters, it was then frozen up, if it were where I guessed it to have been. So that were I a poet, and never so great a votary of those Heliconian Deities, I might be excused from making verses in their praise; having neither their presence to excite, nor their liquor to inspire me. For having gone two or three miles forwards on the top, till I came to the snow, my further proceedings that way were hindered: only alighting, I made shift to clamber up the rocks somewhat higher, until I came to look down into a place encompassed round with the tops of mountains; so that the inclosed space seemed to me to be a lake frozen and covered with snow." It will afterwards appear plainly that this was Asera; and thither Wheler was directing his steps, in his endeavour to ascend Helicon, from the Monastery of St. George, on the side of Lebadéa. CHAP. Inscription relating to the Games called ΜΟΥΣΕΙΑ. ΑΓΑΘΗΤΥΧΗ ΑΓΩΝΟΘΕΤΟΝΤΟΕΤΩΝ ΜΕΓΑΛΩΝ KAI CAPΟΝΩΝ CORA TON LLOYCEI ΝΑΥΡΗΚΑΛΛΙΚΛΙ ΑΝΟΥ ΤΟYCWTHPI ΧΟΥ ΕΠΙΑΡΧΟNTOC ΠΥΡΦΟΡΟΥΝTOCAYPH ΑΡΙΣΤΟΚΛΕΟΥΣΤΟΥ ΕΠΙΚΤΑ ΝΟΥ ΕΝΕΙΚΑΝΟΙΔΕ ΣΑΛΠΙΚTΗ ΠΟΥΑΙΛΙΟΣΣΕΡΑ ΠΙΩΝΕΦΕΣIOCKhPYZJΑΥΡΗ Ο ΠΥΘΙΚΟCAYA THCLAYPH ΠΥΘΙΚΟ ΚΙΘΑΡΙΣΤΗ ΛΟΥ ΓΑΙOCATIOCΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ ΕΙΔΩΡΟΣ ΚΟΡΙΝΘΙΟΣ Κως Δο |