with water for the purifications customary on entering their mosques. In it, on the left hand, is

the rubbish of the pile, erected to supply the place of a column; and on the right", a staircase, which leads out on the architrave, and has a marble or two with inscriptions, but worn so as not to be legible. It belonged to the minaret, which has been destroyed.

The travellers to whom we are indebted for an account of the mosque, have likewise given a description of the sculpture then remaining in the front. In the middle of the pediment was seen a bearded Jupiter, with a majestic countenance, standing, and naked; the right arm broken. The thunderbolt, it has been supposed, was placed in that hand, and the eagle between his feet. On his right was a figure, it is conjectured, of Victory, clothed to the mid-leg; the head and arms gone. This was leading on the horses a of a car, in which Minerva sat, young and unarmed; her headdress, instead of a helmet, resembling that of a Venus. The generous ardour and lively spirit visible in this pair of celestial steeds was such as bespoke the hand of a master, bold and delicate, of a Phidias or Praxiteles. Behind Minerva was a female figure, without a head, sitting, with an infant in her lap; and in this angle of the pediment was the emperor Hadrian, with his arm round Sabina, both reclining, and seeming to regard Minerva with pleasure. On the left side of Jupiter were five or six other trunks to complete the

y left hand,] right hand entering from the west end of the temple. R.

1 on the right,] These words are erased by Revett.
a These horses are mentioned in a letter to Crusius.

assembly of deities, into which he received her. These figures were all wonderfully carved, and appeared as big as life. Hadrian and his consort, it is likely, were complimented by the Athenians with places among the marble gods in the pediment, as benefactors. Both of them may be considered as intruders on the original company; and possibly their heads were placed on trunks, which before had other owners. They still possess their corner, and are easy to be recognised, though not unimpaired. The rest of the statues are defaced, removed, or fallen. Morosini was ambitious to enrich Venice with the spoils of Athens, and by an attempt to take down the principal group hastened their ruin. In the other pediment is a head or two of sea-horses, finely executed, with some mutilated figures; and on the architrave beneath them are marks of the fixtures of votive offerings, perhaps of the golden shields, or of festoons suspended on solemn occasions, when the temple was dressed out to receive the votaries of the goddess b.

It is to be regretted that so much admirable sculpture as is still extant about this fabric should be all likely to perish, as it were immaturely, from ignorant contempt and brutal violence. Numerous carved stones have disappeared; and many lying in the ruinous heaps, moved our indignation at the barbarism daily exercised in defacing them. Besides the two pediments, all the metopes were decorated with large figures in alto relievo, of which several are almost entire on the side next Hymettus. These

66

b After "goddess," Revett has added, "this being the principal front."

the side next Hymettus.] the south side. R.

are exceedingly striking, especially when viewed with a due proportion of light and shade, the sun rising behind the mountain. Their subject is the same as was chosen for the sandals of Minerva, or the battle of the Centaurs and Lapithæ. On the frieze of the cell was carved, in basso relievo, the solemnity of a sacrifice to Minerva d; and of this one hundred and seventy feet are standing, the greater part in good preservation, containing a procession on horseback e. On two stones, which have fallen, are oxen led as victims. On another, fourteen feet long, are the virgins called Canephori, which assisted at the rites, bearing the sacred canisters on their heads, and in their hands each a taper; with other figures, one a venerable person with a beard, reading in a large volume, which is partly supported by a boy. This piece, now inserted in the wall of the fortress, is supposed to have ranged in the centre of the back front of the cellf. The sacrifice designed to be represented was probably that performed at stated times by the Athenian cavalry; and perhaps the figure last mentioned is the herald praying for the prosperity of the Athenians and Plateæensians, as was usual, in commemoration of their united bravery at Marathon. We purchased two fine fragments of the frieze, which we found inserted over doorways in the town; and were presented with a beautiful trunk, which had fallen from the metopes, and lay neglected in the garden of a Turk.

The marquis de Nointell, ambassador from France to the Porte in the year 1672, employed a painter to

d Most likely the procession at the festival of the Panathenea. R. * After "horseback," Revett has added, "and in chariots, &c." f back front of the cell.] south side of the cell. R.

delineate the frieze; but his sketches, the labour of a couple of months, must have been very imperfect, being made from beneath, without scaffolding, his eyes straining upwards. Mr. Pars devoted a much longer time to this work, which he executed with diligence, fidelity, and courage. His post was generally on the architrave of the colonnade, many feet from the ground, where he was exposed to gusts of wind, and to accidents in passing to and fro. Several of the Turks murmured, and some threatened, because he overlooked their houses; obliging them to confine or remove the women, to prevent their being seen from that exalted station. Besides views and other sculptures, he designed one hundred ninetysix feet of bass-relief in the acropolis.

CHAP. XI.

OF THE ERECHTHEUM-TEMPLE OF NEPTUNE-TEMPLE OF MINERVA POLIAS-STORY OF PANDROSOS-PRESENT STATE OF THE TEMPLES OF NEPTUNE AND MINERVA-OF THE PANDROSEUM-BUSINESS OF THE VIRGINS CALLED CANEPHORI-IMAGES OF MINERVA-THE TREASURY-INSCRIP

TIONS.

WE proceed now to the cluster of ruins on the north side of the Parthenon, containing the Erechtheum, and the temple of Pandrosos, daughter of Cecrops.

Neptune and Minerva, once rival deities, were joint and amicable tenants of the Erechtheum, in which was an altar of Oblivion. The building was double, a partition-wall dividing it into two temples, which fronted different ways. One 8 was the temple

That toward the east. R.

of Neptune-Erechtheus, the other of Minerva Polias. The latter was entered by a square portico connected with a marble skreen, which fronts h toward the Propylea. The door of the cell was on the left hand, and at the farther end of the passage was a door leading down into the Pandroseum, which was contiguous.

Before the temple of Neptune-Erechtheus was an altar of Jupiter the supreme, on which no living thing was sacrificed; but they offered cakes without wine. Within it was the altar of Neptune and Erechtheus; and two, belonging to Vulcan and a hero named Butes, who had transmitted the priesthood to his posterity, which were called Butada. On the walls were paintings of this illustrious family, from which the priestess of Minerva Polias was also taken. It was asserted that Neptune had ordained the well of salt water, and the figure of a trident in the rock, to be memorials of his contending for the country. The former, Pausanias remarks, was no great wonder, for other wells of a similar nature were found inland; but this, when the south wind blew, afforded the sound of waves.

The temple of Minerva Polias was dedicated by all Attica, and possessed the most ancient statue of the goddess. The demi, or towns, had other deities, but their zeal for her suffered no diminution. The image, which they placed in the Acropolis, then the city, was, in after-ages not only reputed consummately holy, but believed to have fallen down from heaven in the reign of Erichthonius. It was guard

h

a marble skreen, which fronts] Revett has erased these words, and substituted "the front."