REEK CTUR

m\

THE

NEW YORK

PUBLIC LIBRARY

GREEK PICTURES
IDvawn
with

pen anb pencil

BY

J.

P.

MAHAFFY,

M.A.,

D.D.

FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN, AUTHOR OF 'SOCIAL LIFE IN GREECE, 'GREEK LIFE AND THOUGHT,' 'RAMBLES AND STUDIES IN GREECE,' ETC.

LONDON
THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY
56

PATERNOSTER Row,
AXI>

65

ST.

PAUL'S

CHURCHYARD

164

PICCADILLY

SOLE AGENT FOR THE UNITED STATES

: :

jf Icmimi 1b.

TRCVCII

NEW YORK:
12

CHICAGO:
148 ASD 150 MADISON STREET.

BIBLE HOUSE, ASTOR PLACE.

publiebor of Evangelical 'literature

1890

LONDON
PRINTED
l:v

WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS,

CROSS.

LIMITKI.,

STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING

CITY OF

PROPERTY OF THE NEW YORK

CH

'"'
~\

''-'''.'''

THE

VICTOR'S CROWN.

PREFACE.
Tins volume has been written
Religious
at

the

Tract Society, the publishers It is subject to the conditions applied to all the illustrated books of travel. volumes that is, it draws its pictures from all parts of Greece, and seeks to set forth latest and most accurate information in an interesting manner,
;

request of the

'

Committee of the Pen and Pencil series of

of

the

'

without going deeply into those matters which

can interest only the student

and the
It

specialist.

has not been an easy task to secure good engravings for the book. There are a large number of good photographs and sketches in existence of but the terror of the Greek famous temples, works of art, and antiquities
;

brigand seems

to

have hitherto
travelling
far

prevented
afield
in

the

artist

and

the professional

photographer from has been done in

Greece.
Hellenic

recent

years

by
in

the

Notwithstanding what Society, and by such

others,

amateurs as the
there
is

late

Mr.
be

Macmillan, the

Rev.
of

W. Covington and
making

much

yet

to

done

the

way

the fine scenery of

PREFACE.
Thessaly, Laconia, or Arcadia as familiar by means of sketches and photographs as Norway, or Russia, or Spain. Special thanks have to be given to Mr. G. A.'Macmillan for permission to use the photographs taken by his brother, the late Mr. Malcolm Macmillan, and Mr. Louis Dyer, from which the engravings are taken on pages 5, 167,
179,

and 192;
to

to

the

and

Messrs.

T.

Covington for those on pages 7 and 153, Cook and Sons for the use of the engravings on pages
Rev.
that

W.

216, 220, and 221. It is to be hoped

the

rapidly

improving

facilities

for

travel

in

Greece, and the increased safety for travellers and tranquillity of the country, will induce much larger numbers to go and study the battlefields of Marathon and Mantinea, the sites of Olympia and Sparta, the beauties of the Vale of

Tempe and
Euripides.

the Gulf of Nauplia,

and experience
familiar

to

the

full

the

fascination

of looking upon the scenes once

to Alcibiades,

Socrates, Plato, and

PART OF THE FRIEZE OF THE THEATRE OF DIONYSUS, ATHENS.

CONTENTS AND
Greek National Dance

LIST

OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
Frontispiece

The

Victor's

Crown

fage 5
.

Part of the Frieze of the Theatre of Dionysus, Athens

Map

of

Greece

.....
. .

10

CHAPTER
ceded Jannina, capital of Epirus one of the places to Greece by the Berlin Treaty page Salamis
:

I.

INTRODUCTION.
\

Equestrian Figure from the Frieze of the thenon l6

. .

Par-

page

CHAPTER
A
A
Greek Harvest

II.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

Home

18
'9

A A
.

Greek
Dress

Woman

of

Mantoudi

in

the

National

Homer
Modern Greek
in National Dress

...

23
26

22

Mountain View on the Gulf of Corinth

29

The

Castle of Suli, in Epirus

CHAPTER
CORINTH.

III.

Greek Musician Ruins of the old Temple

33
at

Corinth.

37

Ancient Greek Temple The Acro-Corinthus

at

Psestum

39 43

CHAPTER
Straits of Salamis

IV.

MEGARA, ELEUSIS, AND DAPHNE.

4&

The Monastery

of

Daphne

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER
Sunium
Eleusis

V.

Niches for Votive Offerings on the Sacred

....... .......
the

THE PLAINS OF ATTICA.

pagf 54
to

Pineus (restored), showing the

Way

The Mound
56

at

Marathon

....
Long Walls

page 57
59

CHAPTER
ATHENS.
The Acropolis from the South-west Temple of Theseus and Acropolis from
Pericles

VI.

Sophocles

The Temple of Victory, Acropolis The Steps and Propylrea of the Acropolis
Parthenon, Interior, Restored

........ .......
West

64
65

68 69
72
73

Stalls in the Theatre at Athens Doric Capital and part of Shaft Ionic Capital with Shaft

...
. .

91

92 92
93

Ruins of the Temple of Jupiter Olympius (looking

East)

....
.

Demosthenes

.......
....
.

76
77

Figures

Caryatid from the Erechtheum from the Pediment of

Attic Pottery An Attic Tomb Relief

96 98
99 100
101

(British Museum) The Erechtheum The Areopagus. The Theatre of Dionysus

...... ...... ......

the
at

Parthenon
78 79

Funeral Tablet from the Cerameicus, Athens Muffled Figure, Tanagra

Ancient Greek Methods of

Dressing the Hair.

.
.

83

(From

the Tanagra Figurines.)

102

Athens.

90

CHAPTER
The Laurium
Silver

VII.

CHRISTIAN ATHENS.
Mines
in

Greece

The Church

Details of Byzantine Church Ornamentation. 103 of St. Theodore at Athens 107

.
.

105

CHAPTER
BdOTIA.
Head-dresses from the Tanagra Figurines
Terra-cotta Figurine, Tanagra
.
. .

VIII.

10

112

Specimens of Greek Artistic Dress Ordinary Greek Dress

. .

"3
114

Aula with

Prsestas

115

CHAPTER
Mount Parnassus
121

IX.

PHOCIS-DELPHI.
Delphi as
it is

To-day

125

CHAPTER

X.

THE PELOPONNESUS-ACHvEA.
Greek Vases
Early Classical Period
. .

129

Plan of the Theatre and Stadium

.

at

Sikyon

View on

the Gulf of Corinth, near Vostitza

133

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER
Ruins of a Byzantine Church, near Elis

XI.

ELIS-OLYMPIA.
Greek Mountaineers Greek Hospitality
Athlete
using
the

.....
.

page 137
138

Head

of Zeus
.

(Jupiter),

known

as the

Otricoli

Strigil

or

Apoxyomenos

of Lysippus)

....
Flesh

-139
142 147

Brush

(the

Type The Venus of Melos (now in the Louvre) The Nike of Pcconius found at Olympia

page 148
.

149

149
.

Interior of the Great

Temple

at

Olympia

(restored)

Warrior of Marathon (about 480 B.C.) iEscliines the Orator (about 330 n.C.)

150
150

CHAPTER
ARGOS,
Citadel of Argos

XII.

MYKEN, AND
152 153
155

TIRYNS.
in

The Gate of Lions at Mykenre The Gulf of Nauplia

.

Nauplia, seen from Tiryns

Crete

....... .... ........

Gold Cups found by Dr. Schliemann Mykenre A Diadem of Gold from Mykenre
.

Tombs

at

'59
1

60

156

Pelasgic

Masonry

at

Tiryns 164

163

CHAPTER
The Plain of Messene The Valley of Sellasia
166
.

XIII.

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA, AND ARCADIA.

Greek

'

Pappas,' or Priest

184 192
at Bassre

167 173

The

Ancient Sparta (restored) Langgada Pass

179

Tegea Temple of Apollo the Helper Karytena

203

Battle-field of

.....

196

Cascade of the Styx

CHAPTER
Volo
.

XIV.

NORTHERN GREECE.
204
Venetian

Tower

at

Chalcis

Mount Olympus

212

CHAPTER
General View of Meteora
the

XV.

THE GREEK ASPECTS OF MACEDONIA.

Principal

Monasteries of

Mount Athos
216

....

Monastery of Holy Trinity, Trikkala

220 221

o H
Q w a w

PH

EQUESTRIAN FIGURE FROM THE FRIEZE OF THL PARTHENON.

CHAPTER

I.

INTRODUCTION.
the
first

reflection

of the

PERHAPS map of Greece,

of Europe,
is

ordinary man,
fraction
it

who

looks

at

the

and sees how tiny a

occupies of the

map

wonder how so small a place should have attained such great and lasting importance in the minds of men. How can it compare for one moment with those larger peninsulas which hold many millions more of
to

men
this

how

with

those large
civilised

powers

of the

world

kingdoms which are now ? A little more thought

naturally the leading will soon get rid of

any peculiar obstacle to the importance of Greece, for all real greatness, and real importance (beyond history supplying Even in the regiments), does not depend on size, but on other qualities. modern map of Europe, a visitor from another planet would not guess that the small island in the north-west called England was more important and more powerful than any area of the same size in the better climates and more fruitful soil of Southern Europe. And when we go back into the annals of the past, it seems almost a law that all the greatest interests of human nature are centred in some small spot, some focus of spiritual light, of intellectual energy, from which they radiate into the large tracts which have but small part in human progress. The area of Egypt is not nearly as large as that of Ireland, and yet
tells

difficulty as

us that

14

GREEK PICTURES.
many
centuries

for

Egypt exceeded

in

importance

all

the other nations

of

the world put together. The plain of from hence too the whole of Hither

Phoenicians swayed all the more astonishing problem, reproduced long after by Venice, of a people who had little more than a town for their country swaying large districts, and
instances, when we have in Palestine the and all ? When our Lord was made flesh and of them strangest greatest dwelt amongst us,' His wisdom chose, not the greatest country of the world in in circumstances, but a small and remote country, situation, in size, inhabited by a people small in numbers, and isolated from other nations. It might have seemed to human wisdom a strange choice for the cradle of
'

Mesopotamia was not larger, and yet Asia was ruled and civilised. The Mediterranean in their day, and here is the still

ruling over millions of men. But why delay over lesser

new religion, intended to conquer the world. Even human wisdom can be taught, however, that the Divine selection was according to the analogy of all history. The importance of a country and its people has never on The steadfast pertinacity of the depended quantity, but on quality.
a

Jews,
clearly

their

earnestness
to

in in

maintaining and
the
first

spreading

their

faith,

showed
to

nations,

through larger might the new faith be most fitly entrusted. Thus a small nation may have and perform a great mission, and so a small country may represent interests far vaster than were ever entrusted to the steppes of
Asia or the prairies of America. I suppose that, next to Palestine, no more signal example of the law have been explaining can be found than in the case of Greece. Unable cope
often
in
I

that

them

instance,

and

them

to

population or in held in subjection

resources
or
in

with

partial

kingdoms of the world, dependence by stronger neighbours,

the

great

passing at last from master to master into downright slavery beneath the Turks, this wonderful peninsula has asserted and reasserted itself time after time with indestructible energy. its invaders, leavened its It has absorbed

And so there is no spot of the same conquerors, dominated its masters. area in all the world, about which so much has been thought, and written,
and
said.

yet when we call Greece very small, it is by no means so small as might be inferred from a hasty look at the map. In the first place, its limits are not easily defined. Not only does it include the islands of the

And

Two greater days, the coasts of Asia Minor and the Sicilies were counted, fairly enough, as parts of Greece. For they were inhabited by the Greek people, and belonged to the same great unit known
Levant, but,
'

in

'

its

as Hellenic country.

But

taking us far beyond surface of Greece and

indications

even laying aside this once lawful extension, as the limits of a volume like the present, the actual
its

coast lines

are

quite

out
is

of

ordinary

maps.

For the country

of proportion to the almost wholly a moun-

INTRODUCTION.

I5

tainous country the islands are mountains, or chains of mountains, standing out of the sea, so that to cross any of these narrow shreds of land, as they The appear on the map, is far longer, even in miles, than to sail round it.
;

coast line

is

so

broken and indented, that

the bounding line of any the sea, the sea also runs
traveller

may

visit

almost

exceeds by hundreds of miles European kingdom. If the mountains run into into the mountains, so that from a yacht the in Greece without than more any spot spending
it

one night on shore.

scene,
plain,

There is, therefore, more to see, more to be done, more variety of more separation of landscape, than is at first conceivable. Each
the seat of old
cities

surrounding homesteads, is separated by chains of mountains, forming a real and lasting barrier. Bceotia is quite a new country, which you reach from Attica only Laconia i;, by climbing mountains and crossing passes. from even Arcadia, obstacles. Even Messene, separated Argos, by greater Corinth is severed from Megara, Megara from Eleusis, Eleusis from Athens, by barren and rugged hills, so that the traveller who passes from one to

with

their

from the next, either by

the sea or

the

other

feels

how
hills,

natural

it

was
In

to

have
itself,

in

each
I

of

them a separate
just said,

society
is

and a

distinct history.

Attica

as

have
so

Eleusis
that

separated

by

and

invisible

from

Athens,

much

so

the

historian tells us the people of Attica did not feel invaded so long as the that district. It was not till crossed the Pass of Spartans ravaged they and that the disaster to the came home Daphne occupied Acharme,

so also old legends speak of a time when not only Marathon, equally out of sight of the ultimate capital, were independent, and obeyed rulers of their own. This it was which not only made the physical, but the political surface ot Greece so various and The only modern parallel I can interesting.

Athenians.

And

Eleusis, but

quote

to

the

reader,

is

the

occurrence

of

many independent
in

cantons

in

valleys by sheets of water or great mountains. But whether it be severity of climate, or want of commercial outlets, or deficiency in that national genius which we are all trying to explain by natural causes, and without success, the

Switzerland, where

the

several

are parted, as

Greece, either

Swiss are

only like
service
;

the
in

Greeks

in

isolation,
in

love of liberty, and

love

of

mercenary literary fame despite Miirten greatness, and Morgarten, despite Geneva and the Calvinists Greece stands unchallenged and alone.
historic
It
is

all

the

more

necessary

to

insist

upon

the

beauty

of

Greek

landscape, because as yet there are very imperfect means of reproducing it to the general reader. No great painter has made that fairyland his special even the photographer has only penetrated its wilder parts to object
;

reproduce
aside

artistic

remains,

old

temples,

tomb
cold

reliefs

he

has

not

turned

how

could

he

to

give even

his

travesties

of the light

and

i6

GREEK PICTURES.
hills

While, therefore, our and the art treasures of antiquities till modern in we are the country, painters extend landscape very helpless, their view, and embrace upon their canvas this southern Norway, this marine Switzerland, this fairest and most fascinating of all the countries in
colour of the
dales,
fair
its

and

isles

and

woods.

pictures can give a very

idea of the

Europe.

SALAMIS.

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HOMER.

CHAPTER

II.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

THE voyage
will

day

is

not yet

past,
is

though
a

can

see

it

to

Greece

still

serious

thing,

to

passing away, when a be compassed with

consideration and with advice, with consultation of guide-books and of friends, with calculations of time and of money. Even still, therefore, most travellers

hardly escape the peculiar excitement which attends a first visit to this famous land, and will count it a great day in their experience. Nearly twenty years ago, I enjoyed this intense delight, and even now the pages in which I sought to record it appear to me hardly antiquated.

For many hours after the coasts of Calabria had faded into the night, and even after the snowy dome of Etna was lost to view, our ship steamed but we were told that early through the open sea, with no land in sight in the morning, at the very break of dawn, the coasts of Greece would be
' ;

visible.

So,

while

others

slept,

started

up at half-past

three
c 2

in

the.

20

GREEK PICTURES.
eager
to

morning,

possible sight of the land which still so a in our It was a soft, grey occupies large place thoughts. morning the was covered with broken the deck was wet with a passing clouds, light, sky and before us, shower, of which the last drips were still flying in the air

get

the

earliest

some ten miles away, the

coasts and promontories of the Peloponnesus were southward into the These long serrated ridges did not quiet sea. reaching look lofty, in spite of their snow-clad peaks, nor did they look inhospitable,
in

spite of their blue,

rough

deep purple
the ridge
all

were all toned in harmonious colour a with here and there, on the far Arcadian peaks, and on
outline,

but

of

Mount Taygetus, patches

of pure

snow.

In

contrast

to

the

its open seas, its long waves of mountain, was here broken, and rugged, and varied. The sea was studded with rocky islands, and the land indented with deep, narrow bays. I can never forget the strong and peculiar impression of that first sight of Greece nor can 1 cease to wonder at the strange likeness which rose in my mind, and which made me think of the bays and rocky coasts of the west and south-west of Ireland. There was the same cloudy, showery sky, which is so common there there was the same serrated outline of hills, the same richness in promontories, and rocky islands and land-locked bays. Nowhere have I seen a like purple colour, except in the wilds of Kerry and Connemara and though the general height of the Greek mountains, as the snow in May testified, was far greater than that of the Irish hills, yet on that morning, and in that light, they looked modest and homely, not displaying their grandeur, or commanding awe and wonder, but rather attracting the sight by their wonderful grace, and by their variety and richness of outline and colour.' This is the southern approach by sea perhaps, after all, the least For now most travellers will prefer to go by Corfu and through interesting. the Ionian islands to Patras, from whence a train yes, a puffing engine with square carriages brings them by Sicyon, Corinth, Megara, Eleusis, to the capital. Most of the essential features of Greek landscape disclose themselves to the wondering eye on this exquisite journey. At dawn of day you come in sight of the Acro-Ceraunian Mountains, and that wild country, now Albania, which of old nursed Pyrrhus, the scourge of Rome Olympias, and in after days a lesser the Titanic mother of Alexander the Great

large sweeps of the Italian coast,

'

Alexander, Scanderbeg, who was, neverthless, a great figure in the history of his day and as the Dorians of old came clown from their mountains, and
;

refreshed Southern Greece with their strong youth and their warlike virtues, Middle Ages, these Albanian mountaineers have brought both so, in the

warlike
race.

spirit,

bright costume, and beauty of person, to

still,
;

refresh the

Hellenic
is

There are
language

even
are

in

Attica,

districts

common

there
'

Albanian
tiiiJ

where names famous

3-5.

Albanian
in

the

Greek

annals,

Kaml'lfi

StuJi'a in

Grtcct, pp.

FIKST IMPRESSIONS.

21

especially in the great War of Independence (1821-31), and even among the sailors of Hydra, so famed for their commercial enterprise and their deeds of war, the chief families were Albanian in The Greeks, who
origin.

possess with the other Ionian islands, Corfu, since the cession, by Mr. Gladstone's influence, feel very sore that the mainland their opposite one sees principal island, the rugged nurse of the splendid

youths

weapons and ammunition Turks. But every effort

failed against

in

the market of Corfu, should

still

buying belong to the

to

possess

themselves of Joannina by diplomacy

Porte. At the present moment tough the Greeks a have (1889), very strong argument to urge in favour of their claims. While every spot in the kingdom of Greece is perfectly safe for

the

resistance of the

strangers,

and can be
the

visited

Joannina
the

ancient

without escort or alarm, this very province of Epirus is so insecure that neither the Turkish nor

English Government will sanction any attempt to travel through it. There could be no fairer and more characteristic way of entering Greece, now that railways are threatening to carry people there by sleeping-cars and
night mails, than to land from Corfu, and ride through Joannina over the This passes of Mount Pindus to Meteora in Thessaly, and so to Volo. excursion of four days from the Adriatic to the Levant would carry the traveller

through

splendid

green vegetation. homes, and would enjoy that peculiar pleasure, becoming rarer every day, of travelling in Europe his own master, unvexed by posts and their punctualities,

mountain passes, clothed with forest or with rich everHe would see true and undebauched mountaineers in their

officials

and
I

their

Before
characteristic

return

irksome patronage. from this Albanian digression,

will

the costume which has

feature
is

become the

national dress of the

say a word about The most Greeks.

which,
like

Scottish

kilt,

gives
'

its

the fnstanella, a name to the whole

'

white
attire.

petticoat,

the
in

Wearing

the fustanella

This petticoat is, however, Greece is like In the far more troublesome and exacting than its Highland brother. waist and round the this is as as must be first it possible tight place, it as their wear uniform, the reason that the king's guards at Athens, who If you want a man to stand thoroughly look so straight and well drilled.

wearing the

kilt

in

Scotland.

upright,

squeeze

in

his waist.

The amount

of white linen

or calico

is

also

that the whole perhaps twenty or thirty yards, plaited so densely a of ballet-dancer's attire. manner after the wearer from the thing stands out as it is At first sight this strikes the stranger as ungraceful, especially coupled with at the turned shoes and toes, with a tight leg-dress, large woollen up and are embroidered, But the gaiters or greaves rosettes upon them. richly

enormous

the open jacket or vest, with its hanging sleeves, is dark rich colours covered with rich ornament, and the broad leather belt is a study in itself, It is in fact the only pocket, and a not? holding knives, pistols, tobacco what
of
;

very capacious one,

in

the whole costume.

The

head-dress

is

not a

fez,

but a

22

GREEK PICTURES.

red cap with a long- blue tassel, fitted tight to the head, and generally worn The general effect of a crowd dressed in this way is rakishly on one side.
a great deal of white, both the clean white of linen and the duller cream-white of wool. This I take to have been the general tone of

very

brilliant

an old Greek crowd as well.

in

Then

the head-dresses,

and many

there are the brilliant patches of scarlet jackets of dark blue, maroon, rich brown, as
well as the beautiful embroideries

white

woollen

coats,
all.

most attractive of

upon which are the In wet weather,

or in the winter, they carry besides a huge capote of very rough frieze, of home manufacture, which serves them
as a saddle-cloth or a blanket as well
as an overcoat.

of the women, when they wear a national dress, is not so striking, nor do I feel very compestill

The dress

tent

to

describe

it.

The

obvious

features are the display of coins gold and silver in the form of a broad

necklace covering the throat, and so an Albanian or Phocian o mrl shows her fortune, and the large, loose great-coat

dressing-gown of wool, with red embroidery round the skirt, which is

or

a shapeless garment, though of course far better than the modern horrors

they adopt from the wandering traders, or the distorted echoes of European
fashion.
in this

One
century
lost

of the curious
is

features
for

the

admiration
all

national costume

among

the people

who have
for
it

it,

and the low esteem

A MODERN GREEK

IN

NATIONAL DRESS.

sess

among all those who still posit. We, who have sunk all

colour and design in grey tweeds and pot-hats, take artificial opportunities of decking ourselves out in these foreign and barbarous dresses, which the natural wearers lay aside, if possible, to

pay large prize, money, are now disappearing in the East before imitations of the staring To purchase a good Greek discords of modern German manufacturers. Athens Now you will not at was easy enough. rug twenty years ago

adopt our uniform hideousness of Eastern carpets, which we justly

attire.

Even
and
for

the

beautiful

tones

of

which

we

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.
see one
place,
taste.

in

thousand

at

the

bazaars
find

you

must go
relics

to

some

left-behincl

like

Salonica or
feel

Monastir, to

these

of unconscious

o-ood

spending too many pages on these external features, reader unduly on this entrance into Greece. delaying Though Corfu (the old Corcyra) is now an essential part of the Hellenic
I

J5ut

am

and

the

kingdom, and a frequent summer residence of the king, there are many things in it peculiar to the history of the island, and not
elsewhere to be found
waters.
It

in

these

Zante
islands,

shares, of course, with and the other Ionian

including

even

Cerigo

Cythera), the benefits derived from the English occu(the

old

pation houses,
hotels

good roads, proper lightand the notions of clean and civilised appointments.

These advantages make Corfu even now a pleasant and comfortable place for residence. In Corfu antiquities,
is
it

curiously
ol

poor,

seeing

that

was a well-known Hellenic centre

ous
its

wealth from old times, notoriindeed in Thucydides for

atrocities, as
it

that great artist

selected
picture on

for

the

gloomiest

his historical canvas,

but of course also abounding in those treasures which, if now unearthed, would make the fortune of any Greek town. But

except

the

circular

tomb

of

Menecrates with its old inscripand the famous archaic tion,

lion iivyj i

A GREEK WOMAN

OF MANTOUDI IN THE NATIONAL DRESS.

now preserved vv_^l

ii\_r \v

IJL \_O"^.l

ill in

the Cll\^ 1 W V CLI royal

Part of this dearth is no hardly anything to be studied. doubt due to the careful collections of precious things made by Lord Ockham (now Lord Lovelace), Mr. Wooclhouse, and others, who lived in Corfu, and
residence, there
is

bought when buying was

possible.

Any one who examines

the Wooclhouse

24

GREEK PICTURES.
specified,
in

now incorporated, but of this observation. the sense

Collection,
It
is

the

British

Museum,

will

see

remarkable that

Corfu

has

always held
it

the

the Ionian

islands, probably because

it

was the outpost

pre-eminence among to and from Italy.

;

Both

in

climate and in fruitfulness

is

not superior to Zante or Cephalonia

and contains mineral wealth peculiar to southern On the itself. slopes of Cephalonia, and at Zante, the currant The grape will grow, whereas even at Corfu the winters are too cold. these of Corfu. and Zante are to lemons Nevertheless, oranges imported southern islands have never attained to any fame, if we except the steep rock of Ithaca, which made its reputation ages ago, by the inventions of I dare not call him Homer, lest I the great poet who wrote the Odyssey. should be suspected of old-fashioned views, and of holding that he was also
indeed, the

former

is

even

fairer,

the

poet

of the

direction

when

wrote his poem.

rightly

already going very far in the retrograde speak of him in the singular, and when I say that he The curious thing about him is this that though he gives
Iliad.
I
:

am

the
to

general

character of
real

Ithaca, as

rocky and
in

barren

island,

he

seems
the

have

no

knowledge

attempts
sites
total

made by

firm believers like

picturesquely described But, nevertheless, Ithaca, as a name, will ever, and remains a monument of the power of poetry.
failure.

ingenious place Dr. Schliemann and others, to identify in the Odyssey, have resulted, I think, in
live
in

of the

detail.

The

story

for

But with this strange exception, and that of the Corcyrean massacres, to which I have already alluded, the statement with which I opened my Rambles and Studies remains true, that all the importance of Greece looks eastward, and that this Ionian or Adriatic side is the out-of-the-way, the Let me add another curious backward, the forgotten part of the country. which I When St. Paul have not before mentioned. negative testimony, came to preach the Gospel in Europe, he coasted the north and the east of The he preached at Philippi, Thessalonica, Athens, Corinth. the land even is never his labours extend mentioned. From Greece western country but he never takes the ordinary route. He never preaches at to Italy at at Nor hear of any of his fellowdo we Patron, Corcyra. Zacynthus, There were, of course, workers or followers coming or going to these parts. and for the of Western Greece in the period causes depopulation decay special The country had been laid waste by the preceding St. Paul's labours. Roman lords Romans, and had become mere pastures or barren lands.
;

like
like

Pomponius Atticus
Caius

owned

Antonius

could
at

Roman large tracts in Epirus. lord it as he chose in Cephalonia.

Patrae,

exile

There

no population to be comwas, except of the But at all times districts visited by the apostle. pared with that and at all epochs the unimportance of Western Greece is signal and
therefore,

Nicopolis and

curious.

IMPRESSIONS.

25

As

the steamer

makes her way southward, the great mountains unfold

that themselves, and disclose the entrance into the famous Gulf of Corinth long fiord which has witnessed more history and more politics than any To the right and to the left, library of books could adequately expound. as you enter this gulf, are the Alps, which have again and again been the nurses of liberty. There was a period in Greek history when all the states had become effete, had fallen under the power of Macedon, greater had sullied their great traditions, and were degraded to Mattery and

mendicancy

great historian of Greece, George Grote, when he comes to this condition of things at Athens, cites with disgust one of their fawning decrees, offering the honours of the state for a mess of pottage from a foreign king, and throws down his pen. 1
in

their

public

acts.

The

But in the mountains now before us, and on either side, both north and south, the hardy mountaineers of /Etolia and Achaia, hitherto hidden from history and from fame, formed a new political life, that of Confederations, and renewed in the Greece of Polybius what the Greece of Thucydides and Xenophon had so nobly begun. Political liberty in a new form the form copied by Switzerland and the United States of America became again the appanage of the Hellenic race, and the /Etolian and Achaean Leagues enabled towns and poor men to treat with kings and affect the policy of little When we are asked, as we sometimes are, what good there is in empires. have an answer spending our lives over the details of ancient history, we
ready, quite
is a good thing in apart from the proper reply, that learning and the itself, supposed advantages it may entail. requires no support from The answer in the case of this Greece of Polybius (300-150 B.C.) which Grote thought beneath his attention, is that the great practical politicians of America, Hamilton and Madison, who laid down in their paper, the Federalist, the lines upon which that noble commonwealth was set up, made a distinct study of the Achaean League, and adopted from its arrangements many practical devices for the republic which was then coming into To follow a successful experiment, or to avoid an acknowledged existence. mistake, is a very different thing from trying a brand new theory. so high a reputation. The /Etolians never They were undoubtedly

gained

accurate prototypes of those vigorous and turbulent clephts who contributed in this century with such vigour to the liberation of Greece, and at the same But both were the real and time took good care to fill their own pockets. and whatever boldness and independence existed sincere advocates of liberty in the later history of Greece was very much due to these wild moun;

taineers,
1

who earned gold by mercenary

:

service,

in

Syria,

Egypt,

and

both employed citizens, recompensed described by Herodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon, feels that the sadness and humiliation brings his narrative to a close.'

followed by a Crete's Greece, conclusion of Chap, xcvi., which is the real close of the great work, though ' missions are the deeds for which Athens such When are Graecia. The words on begging Magna long appendix an historian accustomed to the Grecian world as her most eminent and
life

has

departed

from his subject, and with

GREEK PICTURES.
Carthage, and then came home to spend it at their capital Thermon, which was at one time a very museum of art and architecture. Another generation or two of successful trading in this century would have made the island

such another settlement, fed and enriched by the labour of absentees, whose great ambition was to come home some day and display
of

Hydra

just

The interest luxury and hospitality among their kindred. of the northern coast used to centre at Naupactus, at the point where the two shores approached within two or three miles. There it was that various
their

wealth, in

A MOUNTAIN VIEW ON THE GULP OF CORINTH.

striking

incidents

both

of

war

and

diplomacy took place. In our day Naupactus no longer it is at Missolonghi that the exists
;

greatest
history

tragedies of Greece

in

the

took

modern At place.

Missolonghi the great poet Hellenic liberty lay down and

who
died,

stirred

all

Europe
task of

for

the

cause

ot

when

his

liberation

was

but

At Missolonghi the brave defenders of their households partly accomplished. and their homes showed the indomitable heroism which, in spite of their
defeat
anil

massacre,

proved

to

the

world

that
for

Greece

could

not

longer

Europe between witnessthe total of the or ing extirpation population, insisting upon the departure In this neighbourhood too, the other Philhellene to whom of the Turks. the Greeks owe most, nay, perhaps as much as they do to Byron, met his
exist in slavery,

and that there was no choice

FIRST fMPRESSTONS.

27

death from the stray bullet of an Albanian sharpshooter. The daring deeds ot Captain Abney Hastings have not received their full meed of praise in the current books upon Greece, though his friend Finlay has spoken out
clearly,
in

his unselfishness, of his clear insight, of his originality the discovered steam naval to warfare. applying newly power But our steamer brings us to the opposite shore, and we land at Patras. F"or to run a railway along the northern shore of the gulf would have been

and

told of

an engineering feat rather than a reasonable enterprise, seeing that the southern shore is a gentle slope, from which the mountains rise gradually into Arcadia. Patras, the ancient Patrae, was once a flourishing city in the

Achaean League.
friendship or

When

the

rest

of

Greece sank

under

the
still
it

the crushing vengeance of the Romans, Patraan important position as a trading port, and, moreover, here great Pompey settled a large number of the pirates whom

oppressive maintained

from
so

the Levant in
to the

his

was that the he had swept famous admiralship of the year 67 n.c. It sounds

modern reader that a settlement of pirates should be thrust upon a respectable city, and should make it flourish, that I shall take the opportunity of saying a word about this Levantine piracy, now happily and
odd
at last a

was thought Are you a merchant,' somebody asks, quite rather a respectable trade. or are politely, you making your livelihood by raiding upon the coasts ? In these early days, when Pluenicians and Greeks first ventured far away along barbarous coasts, it seemed not to matter very much whether they made five hundred per cent, in barter with the natives, or simply took away But what strikes us as what they could find, without paying for it at all. very curious, is that, even in civilised and historical days, this great imof the morality in condoning robbery and even murder on the highways It was the real merit sea never met with the stern reprobation it deserved. in the earliest of those naval empires which held sway over the Levant days Crete, then Athens, then Rhodes that by their vigorous police they But the instant this kept the seas tolerably clear and safe for commerce. and arch-pirates are spoken of in vigilance was relaxed pirates reappeared, the later days of Greek history (3rd and 2nd centuries li.c.) as a sort of naval magnates or admirals, with whom both Hellenistic kings and Roman There was a moment when the treated as an independent power.
In

matter of history only. early times, as the reader of

' '

Homer

knows,

piracy

'

generals

even became the problem of the world's peace. The exactions and violences of the Romans, the selling into slavery of vast numbers of
pirate question
free Greeks,

the destruction of ancient maritime cities with

a sailor

popula-

tion had thrown upon the world thousands of outcasts, in penury and want, and ready to live full of bitterness and hatred against the dominant power, The great speech their misfortunes. by violence, and revenge themselves for favour of the law proposed in of Cicero by Manilius, which made

GREEK PICTURES.
Pompey
admiralissimo of
all

frightful details of the daring

consider the circumstances

fleets and coasts, gives us such and the cruelty of these pirates, that we must have just named, to account for the dreadful dis-

the

Roman

organization of the world. But, on the other hand, Pompey's settlement gives us a clear sign that these people were to a great extent landsmen, and even landsmen of former For when he settled them at respectability turned loose upon the sea.

and elsewhere they seem to have returned to order and respectwhich buccaneers in the mediaeval sense would never have done. ability, in a famous passage in his Georgics, describes an old Cilician pirate Virgil, who had taken to gardening in his new home, near Tarentum in Italy a very mild and harmless pursuit for one who had perhaps made Roman officers walk the plank, and in any case had kidnapped and sold innocent All the plots of the extant Greek novels, which children into hopeless slavery.
Patras

The hero nowadays, turn upon adventures with pirates. or the heroine never escapes being kidnapped at some moment of their history. I will not follow the long history of violence and crime through all the Middle Ages, when Saracens, Turks, and so-called Christians, vied with each other in deeds of lawlessness, cruelty and revenge, through the coasts and islands of the Levant. Ultimately people ceased to inhabit the sea-board, on account of its insecurity and the main reason why the coasts of Southern still wear so desolate and lonely an aspect is that the Italy and of Greece ravages of pirates and disappearance of coast population has made the seanobody reads
;

board

in
It

now.

corsairs

most places a veritable solitude. These things are not so old even was within our own century that Lord Exmouth bombarded the of Algiers, and that Byron lived among the perils of pirates in

All through Byron's poetry, the pirate is represented as a sort of Greece. wild adventurer, revenging himself for some wrong of men or circumstances, I fear his picture of and not without noble and picturesque environments. the Greek or Albanian pirates, as regards good qualities, is no truer than

Cooper's pictures of the North American savages, whose falsehoods, meanness, and terrible cruelty he disguised under a guise of invented chivalry.
1

has really caused piracy to disappear from the Levant is not the increasing honesty or civilization of the people, for the brigand, or landstill quite a usual phenomenon (beyond the kingdom of Greece), pirate, is
the invention of steam, which has put into the hands of governments a for pursuing and destroying the fastest felucca, perfectly effectual engine

What

but

while the expenses of building and maintaining steamers

The real state of savages, when they were
1

are far

beyond the

Mr. Parkman's book on the Jesuit missions to these European immigration, but were still in what people imagine their pristine innocence and respectability. A more horrible picture of odious vice is hard to be found Anything I have ever known of Greek pirates from reliable hearsay, or of Greek brigands, still so anywhere. common in Levantine Turkey, corroborates my opinion that here too the influence of fiction has been to palliate odious crimes, and to cast a halo of poetry around the most degraded and disgusting of miscreants.
the case

may be

learned from

in

no way touched by the

vices of

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.
pirates. Certainly the nooks and corners, the safe and hiding-places, lofty look-out promontories, make this part of the world I curiously well adapted for marine dishonesty. believe the Malay Archi-

resources of tiny modern

pelago,

with

its

very

similar

natural

features,

still

maintains

reputation

Greece in this unenviable particular. analogous But we must leave these antiquarian considerations, and descend to the modern Patras, still a thriving port, and now the main point of contact between Greece and the rest of Europe. For, as a has now been opened railway from Patras to Athens, all the steamers from Brindisi, Venice, Trieste,
put
in

to that of Byron's

there,

and from thence the stream of

plan of more the once popular route round the Morea, which, abandoned; somewhat slower, at least saved the unshipping at LechcL-um, the drive
capital.
still

to the

The

old

travellers proceeds by the new line steaming up the long fiord to Corinth is
if

in

omnibuses across the isthmus, and reshipment at Cenchrea; all done with much confusion, and with loss and damage to luggage and temper. Not that there is no longer confusion. The railway station at Patras, and that at Athens, are the most curious bear-gardens in which business ever was done. The traveller (I speak of the year of our Lord 1889) is informed that unless he is there an hour before the time, he will not get his luggage and And when he comes down from the comfortable weighed despatched. hotel for so to Greece find out what it all means, he meets exceptionally the whole population of the town in possession of the station. Everybody who has nothing to do gets in the way of those who have everything is full of noise and confusion. I remember once waking up in an inn at Tripolitza I (in Arcadia) with the consciousness that there were people in the room.
;

people examining innocent curiosity my appointments, feeling the edge of razors, the use of tooth and nail brushes, wondering at tooth powder, even strained the lock of a bag, to peep in and see what was
splendidly
I

found

number

of

dressed

with

perfectly

hesitating over

&c.

They had

inside.

When

and bade them be gone with no small impatience, they went out without the least sense that they were intruding. quietly, They had heard that a stranger had arrived. Probably, as they get up very early, they had waited some time to see what I was like. Then their curiosity overcame The traveller in Greece must expect them, and they invaded my bedroom. of attention. He is stared at and criticised as fully as the this sort Athenians of old criticised St. Paul or any other stranger, but without malice
started up,

or ill-nature.

the train steams out of the station, and takes its deliberate way along the coast, through woods of fir trees, bushes of arbutus and mastic, and the many flowers which stud the earth. And here already the traveller,

At

last

looking out of the window, can form an idea of the delights of real Greek travel, by which he must understand mounting a mule or pony, and making
his

way along woody

paths, or

beside the

quiet sea, or

up the steep sides

32

GREEK PICTURES.

of a rocky defile. Every half-hour the train crosses torrents coming from the mountains, which in flood times colour the sea for some distance with
the
brilliant brick- red

The peacock

blue

the clay they carry with them from their banks. of the open sea bounds this red water with a definite

of

pale yellow many places, so that the of this exceeds I had ever seen in sea or lake. brilliancy gulf anything pass the sites of /Egion, now Vostitza, once famous as the capital or centre pass Sicyon, the home of Aratus, politically) of the Achaean League.
reflect
in
(

line, and the contrast banks of sand also

in

the bright sun

their

is

something very

startling.

Shallow

We
still

We

the great regenerator, the mean destroyer of read in Plutarch's fascinating life of the man.

that League, as

you can

But these
trace

places, like so

many
left

others in

Greece, once

famous, have

now no

of their greatness

above ground
will

The day may, however, still come, when another Schliemann unearth the records and fragments of a civilization distinguished even in Greece for refinement. Sicyon was a famous school of art. Painting and

sculpture flourished there, and there was a special school of Sicyon, whose features we can still recognise in extant copies of the famous statues they There is a statue known as the Canon statue, a model of human produced.

was the work of the famous Polycleitus of Sicyon, and which we know from various imitations preserved in Rome and elsewhere. But we shall return in due time to Greek sculpture as a whole, and shall not interrupt our journey at this moment. All that we have passed through hitherto may be classed under the title of first impressions.' The wild northern coast shows us but one inlet, the Gulf of Salona, with the little port of I tea at its mouth. This was the old highway to ascend to the oracle of Delphi on the snowy Parnassus, which we shall approach better from the Boeotian side. But now we strain our eyes to behold the great rock of Corinth, and to invade this, the first great centre of Greek life, which closes the long bay at its westernmost end.
proportions, which
'

C.REKK MUSICIAN.

CHAPTER
CORINTH.

III.

the earliest days down to the present century, Corinth has been just missing the position of the capital of Greece. Holding the key of Morea from crowned the almost the the north, by impregnable fortress once known among the fetters of Greece, provided with two harbours, and the

FROM

of eastern and western seas, the centre of the Hellenic peninsula, on the wonder is that from the outset Corinth the high road in all directions
traffic

And yet was there In very early days, at no time has this been the case. certainly a great Phoenician settlement there, to which we may attribute the worship of Heracles, descended from the Tyrian Melcarth, the worship of Aphrodite,
did not claim and hold the
first

place

among

the cities of Greece.

the

Sidonian Astarte, as well

city.

as

many

lesser

cults

which

characterise the

religion of this

The worship
side

that

it has been of the Mexican of their deities, or at main attributes and lust were the Aztecs, that cruelty least of the worship which was thought acceptable to these deities by their We do not know Corinth till the human sacrifices, which worshippers. D

peculiar Phoenicians.

licentious
It

of Aphrodite in particular was marked by which is so shocking in the idolatry of the

might almost be said of them, as

34

GREEK PICTURES.

there as elsewhere must have stained the city's conscience, had been abolished by Greek humanity but the practices which disgraced the worship of Astarte survived in the service of the Corinthian Aphrodite up to the days of Pindar (500 B.C.), who addresses the female ministrants of the goddess in an ode of
;

which, happily perhaps, but a brief fragment remains, of shocking significance. The Phoenicians left another indelible mark on Corinth, beside its religion.

impressed upon it that trading spirit which, apart from actual trade, makes the wealth so acquired always timid in its boldness, shortsighted in

They

left

its

policy, submissive in

reward, ever making wiser only for their generation than the children of light. Thus Athens, that risked all, won eternal supremacy over men. with Corinth, larger capital,

courage, never risking all for even the highest friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, and so
its

more
tant,

central

situation,

perhaps with

long start
it

in

culture,

for the first place.

In the

poems

of

Homer,

is

known

as rich

was never fit and impor-

but even then subject to the rule of Agamemnon of Mycenae, a city small and remote, with no such advantages as Corinth, and yet taking the supremacy in that part of the Peloponnesus. The very name of the city is not thoroughly fixed in Homer, who calls it Ephyre as well as Corinth, as
if

the latter

name had

difficulties

in

indeed, suggests the analogous name be Tirys or Tirynthus, the ending in ns being disagreeable to Greek ears. If there ever was such a form as Corins, it gave way to the name we know, which had supplanted Ephyre before proper history dawns in Greece. When the so-called Heracleids and Dorians invaded the Morea, Corinth, like the rest, became subject to a Doric aristocracy, afterwards wellknown as the Bacchiada;, who ruled over the older or Achaean population with more or less severity. But even then the trade of Corinth was assured, and there are few early facts or anecdotes about the city which do not turn upon the mercantile side of life. To Corinth belonged the honour

The very form, establishing its sway. of Tiryns, which in Greek should either

of founding Syracuse, the queen of Sicilian cities, as well as the historic city on the island of Corcyra, which under the name of Corfu has remained famous and popular as a summer resort for Greeks, a winter resort for

Archias of Corinth was the founder of present day. Sicilian greatness, and if his date was fixed at the tenth generation from his ancestor, the gocl Heracles, this invention of parentage and antiquity does
Northerns, up
to

the

not displace the fact that he carried the old Phoenician spirit of his city into the most brilliant of its developments, that of foreign colonization. At

Corinth were
at
B.C.

first

built

ships

of war, and
in

their mettle

first

tried

in

battle

between the mother

;

city

and

its

colony at Corfu.

Thucydides puts

this

event

664 my opinion, Grcecia and of Sicily was being undertaken.

my

about the time,

when

the colonization of

Magna

1 On this point I have given details in Hellenic Studies.

History of Greek Literature, vol.

i.

app. B, and in the Journal or

CORINTH.

35

Corinth, as might be expected, was the scene of one of those supplanof Doric aristocrats by a despot who protected and promoted the interests of the older population and the history of the dynasty of Cypselus, as well as of the early adventures and successes of the founder, form one of
tations
;

Here episodes in the fascinating history of Herodotus. is an extract for which the reader not familiar with that of narrators prince will thank me.
'

the most attractive

The

constitution of the Corinthians

was

formerly of this kind

it

was

an oligarchy, and those who were called Bacchiadae governed the city they intermarried only with their own family. Amphion, one of these men, had a lame daughter, her name was Labda as no one of the Bacchiadae would son of her, Eetion, Echecrates, who was of the district of Petra, marry though originally one of the Lapithae, and a descendant of Caeneus, had her. He had no children by this wife, nor by any other he therefore went to
;

and immediately as he entered, Delphi to inquire about having offspring " the Pythian saluted him in the following lines Eetion, no one honours of much Labda is honour. thee, though worthy pregnant, and will bring forth a round stone it will fall on monarchs, and will vindicate Corinth." This oracle, pronounced to Eetion, was by chance reported to the Bacchiadae, to whom a former oracle concerning Corinth was unintelligible,
;
:

of Eetion, and was in these and shall bring forth a lion, terms: the rocks; eagle Now ponder strong and carnivorous, and it shall loosen the knees of many. this well, ye Corinthians, who dwell around beauteous Pirene and frowning

and which tended

to the

same end
on

as

that
1

"An

broods

Corinth."
'

Now
;

this,

which

had

Bacchiadae

but now,

when they heard

been given before, was unintelligible to the that which was delivered to Eetion,

they presently understood the former one, since it agreed with that given to And though they comprehended, they kept it secret, purposing to Eetion. As soon as the destroy the offspring that should be born to Eetion.

woman brought

forth,

they sent

ten

of their
to death

where Eetion lived, to put Petra, and entered the court of

Labcla,

the child

own number to and when they

the

district

arrived
;

at

Eetion,

they
for

knowing nothing

of

the

purpose

asked for the child which they had come,

but

and

the. supposing that they asked for it out of affection for the father, brought Now, it had been deterchild, and put it into the hands of one of them.

the way, that whichever of them should first receive the When, however, Labda brought and child, should dash it on the ground. the of child, by a divine providence, smiled on the them, gave it to one man who received it and when he perceived this, a feeling of pity restrained

mined by them

in

him from
1

killing
'

it

and,
'

moved by compassion, he gave

'

it

to the
the

second,
intimating

The words

aiVrbs,

an eagle,' and

ire-rprim,

rocks,'

bear

an enigmatical meaning

former

'

Eetion,' and the latter his birthplace,

Petra.'

36

GREEK PICTURES.
to the third
;

being handed from one to another, and not one of them was willing the ten, passed through child again to its mother, and the therefore delivered to destroy it. Having gone out, they stood at the door, and attacked each other with mutual and especially the first who took the child, because he had recriminations

and he

thus the

infant,

the hands of

all

not done as had

been determined
to

at

last,

when some time had

elapsed,
in the

they determined murder.

'

go

in

again, and

that

every one should share

misfortunes should spring up to Corinth from For Labda, standing at the very door, heard all progeny and fearing that they might change their resolution, and that had passed the child a second time might kill it, she took and hid it, obtained having in a place which appeared least likely to be thought of, in a chest being that if should return and come back to would certain, search, very they they which in fact did happen, but when, having come and pry everywhere
it

But

was
of

fated

that

the

Eetion.

made a
and
tell
'

strict search,

those

who

they could not find the child, they resolved to depart, sent them that they had done all that they had commanded.

danger, the of Cypselus was given him, from the chest. When Cypselus reached man's estate, and consulted the oracle, an ambiguous answer was given him
this,

After

Eetion's son

grew

up,

and having escaped

this

name

at

Delphi

relying

on which, he

attacked

and got possession

;

of

Corinth.

man, who is come down to my dwelling; "Happy son of renowned Corinth he and his children, but Eetion, king of Cypselus, not his children's children." Such was the oracle. And Cypselus, having obtained the tyranny, behaved himself thus he banished many of the Corinthians, deprived many of their property, and many more of their life. When he had reigned thirty years, and ended his life happily, his son Periander at first was more mild than his father but when he had communicated by ambassadors with Thrasybulus, tyrant of Miletus, he became far more cruel than Cypselus. For having sent a nuncio to Thrasybulus, he asked in what way, having ordered affairs most securely, he might best govern the city. Thrasybulus conducted the person who came from Periander out of the city, and going into a field of corn, and as he went through the standing corn, questioning him about, and making him repeat over again, the account of his coming from Corinth, he cut off any ear that he saw taller than the rest, and having cut it off, he threw it away, in this manner he had destroyed the best and till deepest of the corn. Having gone through the piece of ground, and given no message at all, he
oracle

The

was

this:

this

'

dismissed

the

nuncio.
to

When
the

the

nuncio

returned

to
;

Corinth,

Periander

was

answer of Thrasybulus but he said that Thrasybulus had given him no answer, and wondered he should have sent him to such a man, for that he was crazy, and destroyed his own property, relating what he had seen done by Thrasybulus.
anxious

know

CORINTH.
'

37

But Periander, comprehending the meaning of the action, and understanding that Thrasybulus advised him to put to death the most eminent of the citizens, thereupon exercised all manner of cruelties towards his for whatever Cypselus had left undone, by subjects killing and banishing,
;

Periander completed.'
afterwards
us that

'

These were perhaps the greatest days of Corinth, for Periander counted among the Seven Sages of Greece, and Herodotus elsewhere tells

when gold
at
all

only be found
nevertheless,

offerings were first proposed for the gods, there could Corinth a sufficient quantity of that precious metal. But its commerce, and its power under the Cypselids, could not

^fiy/'^.

j^^^S>rs-^

RUINS OF THE OLD TEMI'LE AT CORINTH.

In the great struggle with Sparta and Athens. the Persians, Corinth fought indeed on the patriotic side, but not without In the following century we find the Corinthians the foremost of suspicion.

make

it

a serious rival

to

the second-class powers, representing the grievances and difficulties lesser members of the Spartan Confederation, but nowhere taking
lead in affairs.

of the

real

But

cannot here follow out

this

long and

intricate

history.

Suffice

it

Greek independence, or what claimed to be such, was fought before Corinth, and that the sack and burning of that
to say that the last struggle for old
1

Herodotus,

v.

92 (Bohn's

translation).

3S

GREEK PICTURES.
and splendid
city

(146 B.C.) has always Polybius witnessed this history. tragedies tossed about for the art treasures most terrible scene, and saw the precious Of all the Corinth which has so far sport of the boorish legionaries.
ancient

by the

Roman Mummius
in

counted as one of the great

occupied

us,

but

one

relic

like The style previous page. those of the great temple at Paestum in Italy, points to the seventh century B.C. in any case to a period not later than Periander, who was not
;

remains, the Doric pillars represented on of these pillars, in their proportions most

the

improbably their minds and hands

of their
cities.

builder,
in

tyrants always sought to occupy men's the outward appearance and public buildings beautifying
for

these

They were
of old

art-patrons on principle.
is

The

rest

Romans, for their and were ready enough

gone. merchants desired to

to
call

Corinth

The
kill

all

very site was cursed by the competition in their trade,

Nevertheless, religion to protect usury. the great Julius Caesar disregarded both the greed of the speculators and the sanctions of their interested creed, and undertook to restore both Corinth
in
its

and

sister

in

Carthage.

The
little

We
in

know

calamity as well as in mercantile prosperity, the city of idea of the great Caesar took hold on the trading world. that of the rebuilding of the city, save what Strabo tells us

digging for foundations people came upon the older tombs, in which were found quantities of antique pottery, which became high fashion at Rome under the title of Necro-Corinthia. It was the curious semi-Oriental So kind, with animals in red and black, now so common in our museums.

then under Augustus, in the first years of the Christian era, Corinth had as one of the most just risen from its ashes, and resumed its position And, as might be expected, the important trading towns in the Levant.
Jews,

two centuries past occupied trading ports on the coast of Asia Minor, were ready to take advantage of the new foundation, where they could reside with freedom and without social disabilities among the new and mongrel population of traders who thronged into this revived

who had

for

centre of business.

has not, perhaps, been sufficiently noticed that this is the kind of town chosen by the Apostle Paul as the fruitful seat of his missionary labours not the ancient seats of Greek aristocracy, such as Sparta, Argos, Athens, but those newer or newly-revived towns where there was a strong Jewish
It

due time

through
such

The Macedonian towns, to which we shall come in nucleus to begin with. The Epistles of St. in our peregrinations, were just of this kind. far with more important Paul to the Corinthians were fortunately occupied and its society, so that it is onlytopics than any description of the city indirect and casual allusion that they can give us any help. Still,
a careful
as

perusal

of them, especially of the

First,

does

show some
enterprise.

details
this

expected collection of mercantile people under the favour of

we

should

have

from

this

new-old

foundation,

Roman

The

w z H

CORINTH.

\\

by the way, are not addressed to Corinth only, but to the surrounding country, the Second formally to all the Christians in Achaia, which at that time meant the province of Achaia, and included all that we now call But there were only two other towns in this province of the same Greece. Patras, which I have already mentioned, composite character as Corinth and Nicopolis, whose ruins are still so imposing at the head of the Gulf of This latter was the foundation of Augustus, to celebrate his victory Arta. and he depopulated the neighbourhood to gather in people at Actium for his memorial city. enough It was to such composite cities that St. Paul specially turned his attention, in the first instance, no doubt, on account of the nucleus of Jews to be found there for though he was the Apostle of the Gentiles, the faith which he preached was always in connection with the Jewish religion, testified by So we find in the their sacred books, developed in and from their nation. in and Greeks he addresses that First Epistle turn, referring the Jews former, for instance, to the feast of unleavened bread in the fifth chapter and to the passage of the Red Sea, in the tenth while, again, the constant reminder that he is not talking wisdom or philosophy, but preaching Christ, is intended Thus he places in the forefront of the First Epistle these for Hellenic readers.
epistles,
;

words

'

And
or

I,

brethren,

when

came unto
to

of speech
1

of wisdom, proclaiming

you, came not with excellency you the mystery of God. For I

determined not to

know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him In addition to this we find distinctly Roman disciples mentioned, crucified.' and we even hear that the meat Fortunatus, Achaicus, Caius, Prisca He tells us, furthermore, market was known by its Latin name, macellum. as perhaps we might expect, that not many wise, or powerful, or noble first among persons had joined the new faith, which generally made its way
;

the poor and the distressed but still, in the Second Epistle, he presses upon them the importance of sending contributions to Jerusalem, with the distinct
;

far better able to contribute implication that the Corinthian brethren were It is not than those of Macedonia, who had shown far greater readiness. of to this to the Christians gifts sending Jewish usually noticed that was only the continuation of an old and universal habit among

Jerusalem

the diaspora, or Jews scattered abroad over the world, who had for centuries back supported and enriched the Temple with regular stated offerings, so that These facts here again Christian was concatenated with Jewish practice. of Jews and confusion the common for in are of great importance accounting Christians which took place among the Roman rulers of that century. Of course we might fairly expect that among so mixed a congregation variations of opinion should occur, and so the apostle urges a complaint not

only

of

the

heresies

an

old
or

and
1

mild

word
2.

for

peculiar

opinions

in

philosophy

but of the

clefts

schisms
I

a strictly
ii.

New

Testament word

Cor.

4:

GREEK PICTURES.

which agitated that Church. We are not surprised to find in the details which follow, that the sexual side of life occupied much of their attention. cults and so the It had long been painfully prominent in their heathen a strongly some to natural reaction against these shameful disorders led To ascetic and celibate theory, while others asserted the laws of Nature.
;

this

controversy St. Paul gives There is another problem

letters,

much

of his attention.

Corinthian
I

and

in

which we naturally find discussed in his manner perhaps to most readers unexpected

In a great trading port, or question of the gift of tongues. from pair of ports, such as Cenchrea: and Lechajum, which harboured ships must have of known men the all parts of world, many many languages
the

mean

sojourned, and here,

if anywhere, any miraculous power of teaching in foreign We find, too, that this gift was would naturally find its scope. tongues It asserted at Corinth, but never for the purpose of reaching foreigners. was exhibited within the Church, at her services, and, as St. Paul clearly For no one could says, to the confusion and detriment of these services. and so the apostle understand the speaker unless he were interpreted that the and use of the demands the restricts interpretation shall gift, accompany it. Nevertheless and this is a strong and curious corroboration he does not for a moment deny this miraculous of the narrative of the Acts he even claims himself to have the gift of tongues more than inspiration the he will not forbid it absolutely in the churches any of his readers that of moment that he thinks for one never exhorting strange thing is, this curious gift shall be applied to the conversion of the heathen who did He himself too, travelling over the not understand Greek or Hebrew. world, and often meeting with barbarians, never, so far as we know, used
; ; ; ;

any other language

the day, exceptionally, the Hebrew of bound of the So completely was in his teaching. up Christianity preaching with the language of the civilised world, which every cultivated man, Roman The gift of tongues, so far as we or Oriental, was bound to understand.

than Greek,

or,

are

informed
this

about

it,

was a miraculous manifestation of the

practical engine
for the

Spirit

upon

certain occasions,

and not a
then,

In

feature,

the

original

preaching of
pious

spreading of the Gospel. the Gospel differs widely

from
life

the

noble missionary efforts

of recent centuries,

when

the

Bible

has

been translated into

in the acquisition

myriad languages, and

of barbarous tongues.

men spend

years of their

but few. regards distinctly local allusions, they are, as I have said, which There is the well-known reference to the Isthmian games, might have Know ye not that they which been written and understood anywhere Even so run that ye ? run in a race run all, but one receiveth the

As

'

prize

may

obtain.

And
they
I

every

man
it

that striveth

in

the

games
;

is
;

temperate
but
fight
I,

in

all

things.

Now

do

to

receive
run,

a corruptible crown
not
uncertainly

we an
as

in-

corruptible.

therefore

so

as

so

not

CORINTH.

43

beating

the air but I buffet my body, and bring it into bondage lest by after that I have means, any preached to others, I myself should be rejected.' There is perhaps another local allusion in iii. 10-15 of the First which
:

Epistle talking of good architects laying good foundations, and building upon them with various materials, adds that the work of each will be tested by fire a curious and not very obvious application, unless we the writer to allude suppose to the re-opening and of the old ruins of the which had re-handling
;

in

city,

been burnt to the ground, by the builders of New Corinth. Doubtless they found that some foundations, and even some walls, had withstood the
conflagration, and so there

owing to the soundness of their construction others had not, may have been special aptitude for a metaphor which seems
;

far-fetched without

But

am

explanation. not going to write a commentary on St.

some such
this

Paul's

Epistles,

and

must

therefore

abandon

fascinating

digression,

which was

introduced

"

THE ACRO-CORINTHUS.

most pagan ot all earthquakes and malaria have cleared away all but the great Doric pillars of one old temple and so in our own century, when Corinth once more had the chance of becoming the of new the assembled of the nation Greece, (in 1829), after capital delegates and in favour of decided for the discussion, Corinth, Athens, long against new capital a great mistake from the archaeological point of view, for we should now have excavated the whole of ancient Athens, had its site lain clear, and possibly found precious things at Corinth, which has not yet been But the fate of Corinth, as usual, was against its supremacy. explored. Let us now, however, ascend the famous citadel, the Acro-Corinthus, so
only to give the Christian reader a special interest As I said before, Corinth is gone Hellenic cities.
in
:

this

often the scene of historic conflicts.

'

winding

path

leads

up
1

on
I

the
ix.

south-west

side

to

the

Turkish

Cor.

24-27.

44

GREEK PICTURES.
;

drawbridge and gate, which are now deserted and open nor is there a single guard or soldier to watch a spot once the coveted prize of contending In the days of the Achaean League, it was called one of the empires. fetters of Greece, and indeed it requires no military experience to see the extraordinary importance of the place. Strabo speaks of the Peloponnesus as the Acropolis of Greece Corinth may fairly be called the Acropolis of the Peloponnesus. It runs out boldly from the surging mountain-chains of the peninsula, like an outpost or sentry, guarding all approach from the In days when news was transmitted by fire signals, we can imagine north. how all the southern country must have depended on the watch upon the
rock of Corinth.
'

The day was

reach

too hazy

when we stood

there to

let

us measure the real

the eye southern

limits of

may

the view, and I cannot say in a suitable atmosphere.

how

near to

Mount Olympus
islands, the

But a host of

coasts of Attica

Acropolis of Athens, Salamis and /Egina, Helicon and Parnassus, and endless /Etolian peaks, were visible in one direction while, as we turned round, all the waving reaches of Arcadia and down to the approaches towards Mantinea and Karytena, lay Argolis,
Bceotia, the
;

and

stretched out

before us.

The

plain of

Argos, and the sea at that

side,

are

said,

hidden by the mountains. But without going into detail, this much may be that if a man wants to realise the features of these coasts, which he has long studied on maps, half an hour's walk round the top of this rock will give him a geographical insight which no years of study could attain.' The Isthmus, which is really some three or four miles north of Corinth, was of old famous for the Isthmian games, as well as for the noted diolkos, or road for dragging ships across. The games were founded about 586 B.C., a when strong suspicion had arisen throughout Greece concerning the fairness
'

of the Elean awards at Olympia, and for a long time Eleans were excluded. In later days the games became very famous, the Argives or Cleonseans It was at these laying claim to celebrate them. games that Philip V. heard of the
that

great defeat of the

colossal quarrel,

Romans by Hannibal, and resolved to which brought the Romans into Macedonia.

enter into

The

site

of the stadium and of the temple of Isthmian Zeus, though well determined, has not, so far as I know, been yet systematically excavated.

Close
at last

by

saw
its

in

to connect the eastern

1889 the interrupted work of the canal which was and western gulfs, and which when well nigh

funds dissipated by the terrible crash of the Credit and now awaits another enterprise. The idea is old, and often discussed, like that of the Isthmus of Suez. The Emperor Nero actually began the work, and the engineers of to-day resumed the cutting at the very spot where his workmen had left off. But if this very expensive work might have been of great service when sailing ships feared to round

completed
Mobilier

found

in

Paris,

Rambles and Studies

in

Grace, pp. 342-344.

CORINTH.
of

45

and when there was great trade from the Adriatic to the ports of Thessaly and Macedonia, surely all these advantages Steamers coming from the Straits of Messina would are now superseded.
the

notorious

Cape

Malea,

pay nothing to take the route of the Isthmus, in preference to rounding the Morea, and the main line of traffic is no longer to the Northern Levant, but Even goods despatched from Trieste or Venice may now to Alexandria. be landed at Patras, and sent on by rail to Athens so that the canal will now only serve the smallest fraction of the Levantine traffic, and even then, circumif the charges be at all adequate to the labour, will be avoided by Amid the promotion of many useful schemes of traffic, this navi"ation. its want of common sense. Indeed, undertaking seems to me to stand out by the that had it been really important at any date, we may be sure But Hellenistic Sovrans or Roman capitalists would have carried it out.
;

across upon days their smaller ships seem to have been dragged movable rollers by slaves without much difficulty.
in

classical

English Miles
5

10

20

ro

40

STRAITS OF SALAMIS.

CHAPTER

IV.

MEGARA, ELEUSIS, AND DAPHNE.

journey from Corinth to the capital may either be undertaken by sea, passing among those myriad headlands, islands, coasts, which make the landscape in Greece so distinctive and so beautiful, or in the railway which trends along the precipitous coast, skirting those Scironian hills once famous for brigands in Greek legend, and commanding from its

TH

it in April 1889, an enchanting prospect across the and the coasts of Argolis. The outlines Salamis, Argolic gulf /Egina, were gentle, but very various the setting sun was burnishing the glassy surface of the water into gold, and clothing the mountains and islands in

right

windows, as
to

saw

rich

and yet we were

Europe were quite familiar had that nowhere agreed any of us seen colour so rich, tones so soft, outlines so varied, not to speak of the great historic suggestions which make this tiny corner of Europe more satisfying to the
;

rose colour and in purple. Our party were Italy, Switzerland, and the northern highlands of
all

all

old

travellers,

to

whom

traveller

combined wealth and waste of the Western world. Here again, too, we have impressed upon us the natural isolation of each Greek city with its surrounding plain. Corinth is isolated by steep mounthan
all

the

MEGARA, ELEUSIS, AND DAPHNE.

tains

47

Megara, always Doric and Peloponnesian, by a strong bar ending in a bold promontory from Eleusis, the first Attic site on the way Eleusis again by a similar bar from the rest of Attica, so that the train wanders miles inland to find a pass into the proximate Athens. We cannot dally over Megara, in spite of its interesting history. It was the home of Theognis, the poet who of all others has painted for us the crimes

from

Megara

and violences of the old

in

aristocrats in the

Cypselus displaced which he displays is only equalled by that in France before the and indeed Thucydides details Revolution, which was so terribly avenged events at Corcyra in a civil war between the nobles and commons which Then we find equal in horrors the worst outrages of the Reign of Terror. the Doric whose people nevertheless Megara always outpost towards Attica,
classes
;

Corinth.

The

hatred

Greek cities, such as those whom and contempt for the lower

depended upon the Attic border markets, and when these were closed by war, Aristophanes brings upon his stage the starving Megarian ready to sell his daughters for bread. The port of Nicsea was joined to Megara by long and even now the site of port walls, in imitation of those of Themistocles and city is easily determined, as we land in the quiet bay, and look up at the thriving town, inhabited by Albanians still wearing the picturesque costume which Greek women so readily abandon for European tawdriness. Let us pass the barrier that separates us from Eleusis, and descend upon that more famous town. In these days it has even increased in interest, for the recent excavations have laid bare the old sites, and revealed to us the plan and peculiarities of the temple and service, which had no
;

knew well enough that great equal or rival in sanctity or in splendour. crowds attended the famous Mysteries of Demeter, but we did not know till the vast inner precincts of the lately that they were accommodated in
temple, which was cut out of the live rock in its inner parts, and furnished with three rows of steps cut in the rock, so as to accommodate a great crowd No other shrine, or inner room of a temple, is of anything like of people.

We

these dimensions, the temple itself being a Doric structure, with its front upon a lofty platform looking out on the Bay of Eleusis. I will only add, as regards the fine Doric style of the remains, that what at first appeared to us as clearly the work of the best Attic architects,

now

turns out to be excellent

Roman

imitation,

done

in

consequence of some

conflagration earthquake which, in the first or second century A.D. Both Dr. Ddrpfeld in Hadrian's time ruined the old Doric temple. perhaps and M. Philios, the learned Greek who is now set as overseer over these

or

remarkable

ruins,

seem agreed upon

example how

easily we imitates the genuine archaic. the Greater Eleusinia, as they 'It is, of course, the celebrated Mysteries were called which give to the now wretched village of Eleusis, with its

only one more can be imposed upon by good archaistic work, which
this

point,

and

it

is

48

GREEK PICTURES.
ruins,

hopeless

so

deep an
history,

interest.

This
its

wonderful

feast,

handed
all

down
when

from the remotest antiquity, maintained

greater ages of

august splendour

through the
trifling,

Greek
in

down

to the times of

decay and

everything else
did
it

owe

this

To what the country had become mean and contemptible. transcendent character ? It was not because it worshipped
for

exceptional

gods,
It

the
all

widely diffused various places.

cult

worship of over Greece

Demeter and Cora was an old and and there were other Eleusinia in

was not because the ceremony consisted of mysteries, of hidden acts and words, which it was impious to reveal, and which the For the habit of secret worship was practised initiated alone might know. where in every state, special clans were charged with the care of special secret services, which no man else might know. Nay, even within the Neither was it of the these homes Greeks there were Mysteries. ordinary because of the splendour of the temple and its appointments, which never
equalled

the

Panathenaea
is

at

the

Parthenon,

or

the
it

riches
is

Olympia. The doctrine taught in the Mysteries was a our serious authorities agree. and which faith which revealed hopeful things about the world to come not so much as a condition, but as a consequence, of this clearer light, this made them better citizens and better men. This faith was faith hisher O
;

There

only one reasonable cause, and

that

Delphi or upon which all

of

taught them through wild

not
fact,

in

the Mysteries through symbols, 1 through prayer and fasting, but, as Aristotle expressly tells us, it was reached rejoicings
;

by by being
'

intellectual

persuasion, but by spiritually revived.

change into a new moral

state

in

Here, then,

we have

religion in the

Greek

strangest and most striking analogy to our for here we have a higher faith publicly mythology
the
;

taught
the

any man might

worldling

opposition to the popular creed,

ordinary

present himself to be initiated and taught, not in but merely by deepening it, and showing to its The belief in the goddess spiritual power.
of the nether world, was, as I have even as nowadays we are told that

Demeter and her daughter, the queen

said,

there

common all may be two

of
all

over Greece but kinds of belief of the same truths

;

one of the head and

of

another
believes
sense,

the heart

just

as

the most excellent

is

man

the

world,

who

by

our

the creeds of the Church, Evangelical Christians

prayed and offered at the Temple at the Mysteries to be wallowing in the mire of ignorance, and stumbling in he was held to live without real light, and to die withthe night of gloom out hope, in wretched despair.'

an unbeliever, in the higher ordinary Greek, though he of Demeter, was held by the initiated
called
:

so

the

The
1

traveller

from

Eleusis will

prefer to

leave the train, and

go by a

quite inconsistent with spirit of the celebrants,

:

There seems no doubt that some of these symbols, derived from old Nature-worship, were very gross, and modern notions of religion. But even these were features hallowed and ennobled by the whose reverence blinded their eyes, while lifting up their hearts. Rambles and Studies in Greece, pp. 183-186.

MEGARA, ELEUSIS, AND DAPHNE.

far shorter
'

51

and more historical route along the sacred way,' up to the pass of Daphne, from whence he will presently obtain one of the finest views of Athens. But, before he comes to that, he will arrive at the curious Byzantine convent of Daphne, with its church still unrestored, and with its tombs of Prankish knights to remind him that when the old classical splendour was gone, Greece became in her turn the land of chivalry, where knights errant and crusaders turned aside from their sacred mission to indulge in the sports and amenities of the most luxurious and refined These were the days when the West indeed held the knightly courts.
East,

when

the

model

the pleasaunce of Thebes, of Mistra or Clarentza could pose of what the glories and delights of barons and ladies

as

might

attain.

And

with

them they sought

to introduce

the Latin Church

of the

West, which came into many a conflict with the bigoted, conservative, metaA good example of this hostile contact is afforded physical Eastern Church.

by the monastery of Daphne. This sanctuary, with its now decaying walls, succeeded as usual to a pagan shrine with hardly altered name. The saints, still pictured in black and gold upon the walls, and worshipped upon their festivals, have become fantastic and unreal beings, well enough adapted to that mixture of superstition and rationalism which is the body of the Greek religion, and, despite a purer creed, not very far removed from the religious
Five or six wretched monks still occupy vegetating in sleepy idleness they do nothing but repeat daily their accustomed prayers, and receive dues for allowing the people of the neighbouring hamlets to kiss, once or twice a year, a dreadfullooking Byzantine St. Elias, painted olive-brown on a gold background, or
instincts of the old

Hellenic race.

this dilapidated building,

to light the nightly

lamp

at the

wayside shrine of a saint black with smoke.

The structure as we now see it is the construction of the Cistercians who accompanied Otho de la Roche from Champagne to his dukedom of
Byzantine church and all mediaeval convents, it is fortified, and the whole settleLike monastery. ment, courts and gardens included, is surrounded by a crenelated wall There are occasional towers in the wall, and originally about thirty feet high. remains of arches supporting a walk all round the wall, of sufficient altitude The old church in the for the defenders to look over the battlements. centre of the court has had a narthex or nave added in Gothic style by the Benedictines, and here again are battlements, from which the monks could send down stones or boiling liquid upon assailants who penetrated the outer Three sides of the court are surrounded by buildings walls. beneath, massive arcades of stone for the kitchen, storerooms, and refectory above,
Athens,
established
far

and

was

round

older

wooden
ruins,
in
its

galleries supply the

monks with

their cells.

Most

of

it

is

now

in

occupied in part by peasants and their sheep. external simplicity and its internal grandeur,
of
its

splendid decoration

But the church, both is remarkable for the walls with mosaics, which, alas have been allowed
!

E 2

GREEK PICTURES.
to

decay as much from the indolence of the Greeks as the intolerance of the In fact, while some care and regard for classical remains have Turks. of course, money gradually been instilled into the minds of the inhabitants the respect for their splendid mediaeval value is an easily understood test
remains has only gained Western intellects within the last two or three years, so that we may expect another generation to elapse before this new kind of interest will be disseminated among the possessors of so great a bequest

from the Middle Ages.

The
the

interior oi

the church at
the
fallen to the

Daphne

is

a melancholy example.

From
of the

clamp have mosaic precious

glazed

effects

of

mortar has

loosened,

and
can

great

patches

ground.

You

and gilded fragments, of which the rich Here and there a Turkish bullet has defaced a solemn saint, while the fires lit by soldiers in days of war, and by shepherds in time of peace, have, in many roof beyond recognition. Within the central cupola, a places, blackened the gigantic head of Christ on gold ground is still visible, or was so when I saw the place in 1889 but the whole roof was in danger of falling, and the Greek Government, at the instigation of Dr. Dorpfeld, are undertaking to stay the progress of decay, and so the building was filled with scaffolding. This, however, enabled us to mount close to the figures, which in the short and high building are seen with difficulty from the ground, and so we distinguished clearly round the base of the cupola the twelve apostles, in
;

pick up handfuls of surfaces were composed.

now

the

arches the prophets, in the transepts the Annunciation, the the Baptism, and the Transfiguration of Christ all according to Nativity, the strict models laid down for such ornaments by the Greek Church.

bay

and grotesque, but the 'gloom and mystery of the building imperfections, and give to these imposing figures in black and gold a certain majesty, which must have been felt tenfold by simple
are indeed
all

The drawings

stiff

hide

worshippers not trained

in

the habits of aesthetic criticism.

We
is

the

We should and pestilences seldom mention their quiet life. M. Henri Belle, have followed the fortunes of these monks who
fair

have, unfortunately, no records of their history in these convents, as case in so many Western abbeys, and the old chronicles of wars
fain,
left

says

some
and

abbey

in

Burgundy

to

catechize

schismatics

in

this
;

distant

land,

but these crusaders bring their preaching to aid the sword of the crusaders were generally intent on exchanging their white cross for a crown, and were therefore not at all likely to favour the rigid proselytism of the Cistercians.

very interesting to know that Innocent III., that great pope, who from the outset disapproved of the violent overthrow of the Christian Empire of the East, was the first to recommend both to the conquerors and their clergy
It is

such moderation as might serve to bring back the schismatic Greeks to the Roman fold. There are still extant several of his letters to the abbeys of the Morea, and to this abbey of the duchy of Athens, showing that even

MEGARA, ELEUSIS, AND DAPHNE.

his authority

5J

and zeal in this matter were unable to restrain the bigotry of the Latin monks. There were frequent quarrels, too, between these monks of Daphne and their duke, and frequent appeals to the sovran pontiff to regulate the relations between the civil authority, which claimed the right of suzerain, and the religious orders, which claimed absolute independence, and immunity from all service. Still, in spite of all disputes, the abbey was the last resting-place of the Prankish Dukes of Athens, and in a vault beneath the narthex we have found several of their rude stone coffins, without inscription or ornament. One only has carved upon it the arms of the second Guy de la Roche, third Duke of Athens two entwined serpents surmounted with two fleurs-de-lis. Guy II., says the chronicle, behaved as a gallant lord, beloved of all, and attained great renown in every kingdom.
darkness of oblivion, but obscured by greater monuments of the greater dead. Yet I cannot but dally over this interesting piece of mediaeval history, the more so as it explains the strange title of r Theseus, Duke of Athens, in Shakespere's immortal Miihui/nnei' A ig/ifs
sleeps
here,

He

not in

the

Dream,

as

well

as

the

curious

fact,

at

least

to

classical

readers,

that

the

poet should have chosen Athens as a court of gracious manners, and suitable for the background of his fairy drama.

SUNIUM.

CHAPTER
THE

V.

PLAINS OF ATTICA.

monastery of Daphne brings us to the which we gain our first, and perhaps most turn of the slope from Nearer to us is the long dark green belt of splendid view of Athens.
minutes' drive from the
olives

FEW

Over against us Hymettus shuts along the valley of the Kephissus. To the north reaches off the further and wilder tracts of Southern Attica. the rich plain till closed by Mount Pentelicus, though we see the pass which
leads

Close under us, Marathon. stretching up towards Mount Panics, almost behind us to the north-west, is the great deme of Acharnae, of which we hear so much in Aristophanes. The view is very beautiful, varied, and richly coloured yet, after all, its
out

over

an

easy

incline

north-east to

history far
plain,

outruns

its

natural

features.

The

situation of

any
its

city in

such a
the

sea heights by various mountains, and many islands, could not but be celebrated. Yet if Athens were like Berlin, in the midst of a desert of sandy flats, and Berlin in the place of Athens, the Greek town would be fascinating and delightful, the German
girdled
relatively

commanding from

commonplace.
the
best
central

survey the principal I do not feel plain of Attica is from the Acropolis, or citadel of Athens. that I can acid much to what I have elsewhere written and rewritten on
point
to
this splendid
'

Of

course

from which

view

When

you
its

great part of

upon the Acropolis and look round upon history becomes immediately unravelled and clear.
stand

Attica,

You

see

THE PLAINS OF ATTICA.

at

55

once that you are placed in the principal plain of the country, surrounded with chains of mountains in such a way that it is easy to understand the old stories of wars with Eleusis, or with Marathon, or with any of the inland on the north as stand beside the side, outlying valleys. Looking you

Erechtheum, you see straight before you, at a distance of some ten miles, Mount Pentelicus, from which all the splendid marble was once carried to the rock around you. This Pentelicus is a sort of intermediate cross-chain between two main lines which diverge from either side of it, and gradually widen so as to form the plain of Athens. The left or north-western chain is Mount Parnes is the right or eastern Mount Hymettus. This latter,
;

however,
spreads

is

all

There
the
old

are,

only the inner margin of a large mountainous tract, which over the rest of South Attica down to the Cape of Sunium. of course, little valleys, and two or three villages, one of them

There is the town of Thorikos, near the mines of Laurium there are two modern called but on the both in ancient and modern whole, villages Marcopoulos
;

deme Brauron, which they now pronounce Vravron.

;

times,

this

south-eastern

part
little

of Attica, south

of
is

Hymettus, was, with the

exception of Laurium, of

moment.
north,

There

and

Hymettus, Marathon.
'

nearly
side
it

due
of

through

a gap between Pentelicus which the way leads out to

On

the

left

Pentelicus

almost closes with

at
it

far

you see the chain of Parnes, distance, and which stretches down
the
sea
as

which
all

the

west side of Attica,

to the island of

till

Salamis.

avoided by going up to
Bceotia
close

Corydallus, opposite In this long chain of Parnes (which can only be the northern coast at Oropus, and passing into

runs

into

Mount

by the sea) there are three passes or lower points, one far to the north that by Dekelea, where the present king has his countrybut of old Alcibiades planted the Spartan garrison which where palace, tormented and ruined the farmers of Attica. This pass leads you out to in Next Bceotia. to the some miles south, nearer, is the even more Tanagra from which famous pass of Phyle, Thrasybulus and his brave fellows This pass, when you reach its summit, recovered Athens and its liberty. looks into the northern point of the Thriasian plain, and also into the wilder regions of Cithceron, which border Bceotia. The third pass, and the
few miles beyond the groves of Academe is the pass of Daphne, which was the high road to Eleusis, along which the sacred and in this pass you still processions passed in the times of the Mysteries see the numerous niches in which votive tablets had been set by the worshippers at a famous temple of Aphrodite. If we turn and look southward we see a broken country, with several low hills between us and the sea hills tolerably well cultivated, and, when
lowest

but

'

saw them
reaped.

in

been

May, all coloured with golden stubbles, for the corn had just But all the plain in every direction seems dry and dusty

GREEK PICTURES.
Then and not rich alluvial soil, like the plains of Bceotia. " was he Attica undisturbed when back to words come us, says Thucydides' on account of the lightness of its soil," as early invaders rather looked out This reflection, too, of Thucydides applies equally to for richer pastures. Attica round Athens, which are not covered with rich of the mountains grass and dense shrubs, like Helicon, like Parnassus, like the hills of Arcadia, but seem so bare, that we wonder where the bees of Hymettus can find food for their famous honey. Jiut, amid all the dusty and bare features of the view, the eye fastens with delight on one great broad band of dark green, which, starting from the
arid,

too,

'

left

side of

Pentelicus, close to
valley,

Mount
two

Parties in the

north,

down

the

passing

about

miles

to

the

west

sweeps straight of Athens, and

*,'..".

-^.^'

'

;(

--

-^sP&mw -'-^r'^Aps^

NICHES FOR VOTIVE OFFERINGS ox IHE SACRED

WAY

TO KLEUSIS.

This is the plain of the Kephissus, and these are the famous olive woods which contain within them the deme Colonus, so celebrated by Sophocles, and the groves of Academe, at their nearest point The dust of Athens, and the bareness of the plain, make all to the city. walks about the town disagreeable, save either the ascent of Lycabettus, or a ramble into these olive woods. The river Kephissus, which waters them, is a respectable, though narrow river, even in summer often discharging a good deal of water, and dividing itself into trenches and arms, which are So there is a strip of country, fully ten very convenient for irrigation. miles long, and perhaps two wide on the average, which affords delicious shade and greenness and the song of birds, instead of hot sunlight and dust and the shrill clamours of the tettix without.
reaching to the Pintus.

THE PLAINS OF ATTICA.

'

57

the immediate vicinity of Athens of any The older buildings in the Pireeus are completely like beauty or interest. No trace of the docks or the deigma remains and the splendid gone. tells us, with cut stone, without mortar or mud, walls, built, as

There

is

no other excursion

in

Thucydides and fastened with clamps of iron fixed with lead We can been almost completely destroyed.
Attica
at
;

this splendid structure

find,

has
in

indeed,
of

elsewhere
this

of still better at Eleutherse specimens Phyle, Yet it but at the Piraeus there are only foundations remaining. building has the Pineus wall is not really true that the great totally surrounding

sort

-'

-$&

'-''

"
f
'

-' JH

PIR/EUS (RESTORED), SHOWING THE

LONG WALLS.

disappeared.

harbour, single stones may be seen lying along the rocky edge of the water, of which the size and the square But if the cutting prove the use for which they were originally intended.
at

Even

the

mouth of

the

visitor to the

the harbour

of

neat

little
all

sea-coast
wall,

the trouble to cross the hill, and walk round will find on the eastern point of the headland he Munychia, The cafe, with comfortable seats, and with a beautiful view. round this headland shows the bed of the surrounding sea
Piraeus will take

hewn

in the live

rock.

The

actual

structure

is

preserved

in
;

patches

on the western point of this harbour, where the coast is very steep but, in the place to which I refer, we can trace the whole course of the wall a few

GREEK PICTURES.
feet

know no scanty specimen I above the water, cut out in the solid rock. of Athenian work which gives a greater idea of the enormous wealth and had its own theatre and temples, energy of the city. The port of Munychia and it was here that Pausanias saw the altar to the gods called the unknown. The traces of the sea wall cease as soon as it reaches the actual narrow
mouth of the So much
little

harbour.'

for the

views and

visits

immediately round Athens.

But

this

is only a small fraction of the country which can be seen by easy excursions In every direction, towards every point of the from this famous capital.

or three days, all compass, are splendid walks and drives occupying one, two, with natural To the as as well beauty. replete with historical associations, north you may either ascend Mount Pentelicus with its marble quarries which
or turn to the right into the plain of supplied the Parthenon and Propylaa, Marathon, or to the left to Tatoi or Dekelea. Or else you may turn east into the Diakria, or highlands, and, crossing Hymettus and the narrowstraits,

sport.

and

its

Eubtea, where the wild boar will still afford you Or you can go south to the glittering Sunium, with its lead mines scoria; a rare specimen of old Greek ugliness, beside one of their
enter the wilds
of

fairest

temples and then to /Egina and Salamis, where every step reminds of the legends of Pindar, the narrative of Herodotus, and the stage of you or you may turn west to Daphne, to Phyle, and the wild Sophocles
;

mountains which lead to Citrueron, and into Bceotia. To describe in detail all this country would occupy the rest of this I must therefore be content with saying a word about two of these book. Each of them can be excursions, that to Phyle and that to Marathon.
accomplished
in a

longer time. threatened slavery,

r,.c.

the distance day, though for Marathon But each, as the scene of the liberation
is

demands a
of

rather

of

prime

historical

importance.

At

Athens from Marathon in

Persians,

some 10,000 Greeks defeated a very large army of 490 had effected a landing, and were at the time soldiers of

who

quite high In fact, Herodotus says that here first the Athenians repute as the Greeks. For these were still in that day dared to look the Persians in the face.

as

a great conquering race.

'

Let us come closer

to this historic scene.

as everybody knows, plain of Marathon, land of the shore, surrounded by an shaped strip by

The

which
to

may

be crossed

conveniently

in

three

long crescentamphitheatre of hills, places, but most easily towards

is

the south-west, along

the road which

Athens.

When

the

Athenians

we travelled, and which leads directly marched through this broad and easy

passage, they found that the Persians had landed at the northern extremity of the plain I suppose, because the water was there sufficiently deep to them land let Most of the shore, as you proceed southwards, conveniently.
is

lined

on the seaboard by swamps.

1

The Greek army must have marched

pp.

Raml'lcs

and

SluJii's,

131-138.

THE PLAINS OF ATTICA.

northwards, along the spurs of Pentelicus, and
the north of the plain.

59

taken up their position near There was evidently much danger that the Persians
the village of Marathon, farther

should force a passage through

north-west.

Had

descended the main

however, this defences at Marathon

by some The site of the battle is absolutely fixed by itself. the great mound, upon which was placed a lion, which has been carried off, no one knows where or whither. This mound is exactly an English mile from the steep slope of one of the hills, and about half a mile from the

they done this, they might have rounded plain of Attica, from the valley below Dekelea. pass was then guarded by an outlying fort, or

towards the Pentelicus, and

Perhaps,

THE MOUND AT MARATHON.

nor was there, when I saw it, any difficulty in walking present which shows, by its sedgy right to the shore, though a river flows out there, a a create and to banks marshy tract in rainy weather. lofty reeds, tendency
sea
at
;

But the mound is so placed that, if it marks the centre of the battle, the Athenians must have faced nearly north and, if they faced the sea eastward, as is commonly stated, this mound must mark the scene of the
;

The mound is very large I suppose thirty wing. of feet high earth, so far as we could see, and bears traces of altogether having been frequently ransacked in search of antiquities. Dr. Schliemann,
conflict

on their

left

its

latest investigator,

could find nothing there but pre-historic

flint

weapons.

6o

GREEK PICTURES.

Like almost every view in Greece, the prospect from this mound is full of of blue beauty and variety everywhere broken outlines, everywhere patches
sea,

everywhere silence and solitude. of the Greeks, Byron may well be excused his raving about the liberty thousand for truly their old conflict at Marathon, where a few ill-disciplined men repulsed a larger number of still worse disciplined Orientals, without heroism any recondite tactics perhaps even without any very extraordinary has maintained a celebrity which has not been the actual conflict in down to of the great battles of the world, from that day by any
'

equalled

our own. 'In spite

of

all

Marathon, whether whether well or ill trained, will ever be more famous than any other battle Even in this very or army, however important or gigantic its dimensions. war, the battles of Salamis and Platcea were vastly more important and more The losses were greater, the results were more enduring, hotly contested. whom the other names are yet thousands have heard of Marathon to

scepticism, in spite of all contempt, badly or well fought, and the troops

the
at

battle

of

Marathon,

unknown.

so much for the power of talking the Athenians was Marathon well about one's deeds. fought by Athenians the rest of eclipsed the other Greeks as far as the other Greeks eclipsed the became This battle in world the literary property of literary power.

So much

for

literary ability

the

city,

hymned by
infant
;

poet,

cited
it

by

orator,
its

told

stammering one of the greatest decisive battles which assured the

against Oriental despotism.'
'

and so

has

taken

by aged nurse, lisped by position, above all criticism, as

liberty of

the

West
and

The

trip

to

Phyle

is

hardly

less

to the foot of the It is through a very different country. for the and to mules or then have mountain, long and laborious ponies ready frontier seems to have The system of defence towards the Boeotian ascent.

interesting than usual to drive

to

Marathon,

been the establishing of strong

within
a short

forts,

not

within

sight

of the

enemy
into

but

distance
that

of the
in

summit

of the

passes

leading

Attica.

We

may presume

war times a picket or outpost was kept on the

summit, which was within easy signalling range of the fort. signals acquainted Athens with the enemy's movements.

Prom this, fireThe forts were

strong by position and structure, and so an invading force must either delay to besiege them, or have an active intrenched force in its rear, cutting oft supplies and intelligence from without, and ready to fall upon the retreating
if they were defeated. on the high road to Thebes, and

invaders,

Two

of these forts

that called

Eleutherse,

tion,

evidently built

at

the

the

age of

Pericles.

We
for
1

young

citizens

serve

are still in good preservathis one of Phyle best period of Greek building, and probably of know that it was the regular practice to make two years in outpost duty, before they settled
S/iuiics,

Humbles and

pp.

172-174, 176.

THE PLAINS OF ATTICA.

down
the
to

61

their civic duties. In these forts, then, they must have learned of war, the complicated passes and denies of the Attic highlands, and those various experiences which change the foolish and helpless recruit
art

our
or

into the smart, handy, resourceful soldier. Any regiments in Egypt when first arriving,
will

one who has seen, for example, and after a year or two of
Attic peripoli,
intricate

campaign,
patrols,

know

guarded

So the young exactly what I mean. the frontiers, and learned to know the

ways

through the mountains. The way from Athens leads north-west through the rich fields of the old deme of Acharme and we wonder at first why they should be noted as charcoal-burners. But as we approach Mount Fames, we find that the valley is bounded by tracts of hillsides fit for nothing but pine forest. A vast deal of wooding still remains it is clear that these forests were the largest and most convenient to supply Athens with fire-wood or
; ;

are many glens and river-courses through the which we ascend here and there a village, in one rugged country through secluded nook a little monastery, hidden from the world, if not from its
charcoal.

As

usual

there

cares.

There

is

the

usual

Greek vegetation beside

full

the
its

path,

not

perhaps

luxuriant to our Northern eyes, but anemone, the blood-red poppy, the
rather

of colour

delicate

foliage grey and silvery than green. breeze sweeps up the valleys, and lavish their vigorous fragrance through the air. There is something inexpressibly bracing in this solitude, if solitude it can be called, where forest speaks to the eye and ear, and fills the Now and then too tileimagination with the mystery of its myriad forms. cadence of those bells which varies peculiar hardly throughout all the lands

the glowing cistus on a rocky surface, with The pine trees sound as the

of

own

tells you that a flock of goats, or goat-like sheep, is near, solemn silent whose eyes seem to have no expression children, by beyond that of vague wonder in their gaze. These are the flocks of some village below, not those of the nomad Vlachs, who bring with them tents and dogs, and make gipsy encampments in the unoccupied country. At last we see high over us the giant fort of Phyle, set upon a natural Its sudden precipice, which defends it amply for half its circuit. appearance

of

the

South,

attended

Greek history is many murders and

in

in

the

days
of

of

the

exiles

patriotic

citizens

Thirty Tyrants (403 i:.c.), when had taken place, and the

fortunes of Athens, after the surrender of the city to the Spartans two years Her only remaining treasure that before, were indeed at the lowest ebb.
liberty

which had so often stirred the

;

citizens to great

deeds
fair
trial

was now taken

in

from her free discussion in the market-place, and were suppressed. It seemed, indeed, that all was
the news spread through Greece that the fort Thrasybulus, and a small party of Athenian exiles.

the

courts

lost, even honour, when of Phyle had been seized by It

is

quite

incorrect

to

say that he could

have

built

the

fort,

which

must have taken

years

and

GREEK PICTURES.
he may possibly have repaired some spots construct where the masonry had given way, for the Thirty Tyrants seem to have nor had the disasters of the previous years neglected this and other outposts allowed the Athenians to think about these outlying fortifications. The point of occupation was well chosen, for, while it was near enough to Athens to afford a sure refuge to those who could escape by night and fly to the mountain, its distance (some fifteen miles), and the steep and rugged ascent, made it impossible for weak and aged people to crowd into it, and
vast slave labour to
; ;

With the increase of his force of the garrison. raids into the successful plain, then a rapid movement to Thrasybulus began Piranis ultimately, as may be read in all the histories, he accomplished the Let me add, before passing on, that the conduct liberation of his native city.
mar
the
efficiency
;

of the restored democracy, both in discharging the state obligations incurred by the tyrants, and in adhering loyally to their generous act of amnesty, is

most remarkable passage in the history of a state which, if always But we too must intellectually brilliant, was not often morally splendid. we can sacred which see from afar down the no to invade city delay longer
quite the

through the valleys of Mount Parnes.

-.,:
(

'

^y.^gg*
*"
'
.

.*

y^

'

.7

O
in

-A

'
-

TEMPLE OF THESEUS AND ACROPOLIS FROM THE WEST.

CHAPTER
ATHENS.

VI.

geographer Strabo, who, though a great traveller, seems never to have visited Athens, puts off his readers very ingeniously with the exclamations of wonder borrowed from an artificial rhetorician. Any modern writer who takes upon him to describe this unique city cannot but feel some sympathy with this piece of literary dishonesty for as all men have agreed that no language can be adequate to the task, it seems an audacious thing Yet to write a book on Greece, and omit to court preordained failure.

THE

Much more reasonable is the course Athens, would of course be absurd. French Guides Joanne, who gives a the of the excellent editor pursued by separate volume on Athens and Attica, to be followed by a second on the This division expresses justly the relative importance of the rest of Greece.

66

CREEK PICTURES.

famous capital in regard to the rest of the country. What the readers of this book may reasonably expect is a sketch of Athenian history, avoiding details, and yet clear enough to afford them a picture which their imagination Let us then set ourselves to the task. can grasp and reproduce. The first appearance of Attica in legend is as that part of Greece (with Arcadia) which was not peopled by successive invaders, but by an old and

The legend is here false. For though that district indigenous population. was not, like Boeotia and other rich tracts of land, the constant battleground of new invaders, we know both that the Ionian Greeks came into
Attica with the migration of the Aryans from the East, and also that, long the Phoenicians had their settlements, and established their after that, The legends of the reign of Theseus, on the other hand, at Athens. religion

germs of the first important stage of Attic history. In the first was he who brought the neighbouring towns and villages together, place, and made Attica one, with Athens for the capital. Up to his day each had been separate and independent. This Eleusis, Marathon, &c. valley and it was precisely in proportion to the all Greece case over was the earliness and completeness of such amalgamations that Greek states attained So Sparta, Argos, Thebes gradually took the step taken far greatness. earlier by Attica, and, last of all, Epaminondas attempted the same thing for
contain
it
;

In the second place, the many Arcadia by the foundation of Megalopolis. with the Amazons the his conflicts stories of mythical garb of the armed show that Phoenician influences were priestesses of the Sidonian Astarte now opposed and overcome by the rising national spirit of the Greeks. When we come down to real history, this Eastern influence is gone, save perhaps in the luxury of dress and ornament described by Thucydides as
existing
in

older
old

Attic

life

flowing
rather

robes, long

tresses

of

hair,

and gold

ornaments being worn among men.

those of the

His language suggests to us figures like those of any Greeks we know in Assyrians From these days and these manners date the bee-hive tombs found at history. Menidi or Spata in Attica, where they laid their dead in vaulted chambers of stone, with urns, and ornaments of gold and ivory. The long line of mythical kings, with their adventures, which formed the subject of many tragedies, such as the Ercchthcus of Mr. Swinburne in our day, ended with the division of power among the rival families of at length annual and with nobles, who made the principal office rotatory date in the earliest Greek this change, in 683 B.C. (probably history), genuine But here, as elsewhere, the government by the annals of Attica commence. After the aristocratic clans turned out both tyrannous and extravagant. elaborate purifications for bloodguilt and consequent pestilence by Epimenides, a semi-fabulous wonder-worker, we have the great economic and political The recognition reforms of Solon, the second founder of Athenian greatness. of wealth as a sister claim with ancestry to power and authority in ruling
than
;

A THENS.

67

a generation.
poetry,
as

the state saved the Attic aristocracy, as it has saved the English, for many we have fragments of his Solon is a great historical figure
;

well

as

the

endorse the

general

general sketch of his legislation, and we can well verdict of the nation which placed him among the

Seven Sages of Greece.

He

foresaw clearly the chronic danger arising from

the non-existence of a standing military force in the hands of the governIf a revolution were ment. attempted, no prompt assistance could be

Hence it was that he made from peaceable and busy citizens. an idle enactment, but a declaration of neutrality in such a conilict penal
expected
political

foresight.

What
parties,

champion most and seized the But, power. supreme fortunately, he people, was far more than a mere tyrant, and by his wise patronage of art and For to literature may fairly be called the third founder of Attic greatness. him are due the first dissemination among the people of epic poetry, of the nascent drama, of a taste for architecture and plastic art, of that inclination for aesthetic pleasures whereby he sought to wean them from overOf course, his opposition to Solon, whom he merely set attention to politics.

Solon anticipated actually a clever and ambitious ^noble

happened.

Amid

the

conflicts

of

made

himself the

of

the

common

aside without a single act of unnecessary violence, his education of his sons, who, though his heirs in artistic matters, were also the distorters of his policy into that of licentious oppression, his many namesakes, inferior tyrants, that

made

the

title

to

stink in the
justly,

nostrils of

the nation

all

these
it

things

have
be

detracted,

perhaps
that

from

his

fame.

Nevertheless

can

never

Pisistratus was distinctly the first artistic his rude in those choral and gnomic clays tragedies Thespis began as as well the recitations of Homer, paved public poets at the Attic court, for the who could the understand and the public people, educating

forgotten

the

Athens of

Athens.

gods

way, by So too we may refer to him the first appreciate Pindar and /Eschylus. notions of great temples, which, by adorning the city, would also honour the and doubtless the curious figures recently found among the foundations
;

If, therebuildings on the Acropolis are to be referred to his clay. we know is Athens that of the first artistic first the Solon, fore, political in the middle of the sixth of B.C. Pisistratus, Athens is that century The Acropolis of that day was very far different even in surface from

of old

Instead of the great plateau, which the victorious the splendid area of Pericles. democracy created by tossing in all the ruins of the Persian fury between the surrounding wall and the central rock, we must conceive the surrounding
wall of the Acropolis, which was the refuge for the citizens from the open town below in case of danger, as a necklace, so to speak, round a high cone, on the sides and top of which were many small temples and secular
buildings.

All these and the votive offerings were painted with bright, even gaudy colours and the type of the many goddesses who stand perhaps
;

F 2

GREEK PICTURES.
in the

more Oriental than Greek, more barbaric than no recent discovery which has told us more of perhaps the cradle stage of Greek art, and which has more shocked the ordinary Here in the very heart and shrine of the purest and visitor to Athens. most perfect sculpture the world has ever seen, the astonished visitor walks
Acropolis

Museum,
is

is

civilised.

There

upon a gallery of stony smirking ladies, all with conventional dresses, and types of face, in whom beauty, or indeed nature, is
in

tresses,

totally

absent.

And

it

is

not

their rudeness so
us.

much

as

their conventionality

which shocks

Yet

this art

was the immediate antecedent to the really artistic work which led by natural development to Phidias. Nor was Phidias a hundred years posterior to this
apparently hide-bound growth. But consider what a hundred years they were In the middle of them came that great invasion and
!

overthrow of the Persians, which had upon Greece an effect as great as the French Revolution had

upon Europe in the last century. For this pressing danger was nearly synchronous with that great political development into civic liberty of which Athens was the clearest type. The tyrants were expelled for their private vices, and a constitution was formed, far in advance of that of Solon, which found its first trial in the defence of Greece against the overwhelming masses of the Oriental The liberation from the despots was in despot.
external

510 B.C. Apart from struggles with neighbours, such as yEgina, the Persian conflicts lasted from 490 to 479, and were doubtless viewed with terror a
year or two before the storm burst. I must refer to the immortal narrative of Herodotus, so often

transcribed

by

later

historians,

for

PERICLES.

chances and probabilities not only in the creation of men worthy of the occasion, but in the shaping of circumstances so as to turn human wisdom into folly, and human greatness into vanity ordained victory for the disunited, vacillating, quarrelling
Afflavit Deus, ct dissipati suuf, might have been the motto of the war, though there were three shocks of battle, in which both Athenians and

timidity and treachery tied the hands of the Greeks, how even the oracle of Delphi gave up the patriotic side, how, against all which man could compute, the hand of God shown

the details of this

war

how

Greeks.

Spartans showed that they could look the warlike Persians in the face. Out of this war then Athens came victorious, and presently the leader

A THENS.
of

69

Greece, rapidly assuming imperial powers, and acquiring a The marvellous circumstances of the wealth unknown to older generations. of that generation extraordinary energy, to whom even the city produced

maritime

modern Americans must cede in the pace of day when Attic art became the model when sculptors and for all the world
;

their

development.

This

is

the

architects attained, almost suddenly, that unequalled skill in portraying

and

idealising Nature, in planning

and

working splendid materials, which has ever since been the delight and the despair of artists. It is to the middle of the fifth century B.C., and
a
little later,

with

that

we
still

can refer those

buildings which to see their defaced

draw the world

fragments at

Athens, or in the
of the British

gloomy chambers Museum. This then is

the Athens which has fascinated the

imagination of men, the Athens of Pericles and Phidias, of Thucydides

and

of Sophocles, Myron and Polygnotus, of Aristophanes and Cleon, of Phormion and Demos1

thenes.

There are two towns

in

Europe

which remind the visitor strongly of The one is Edinburgh, Athens. Both have the other is Salzburg.
the
peculiarity

of

being

situated

round a rocky fortress, which rises both possess a from the streets
;

of less importance, though higher apparently dominating the town from But while Salza short distance.
hill

burg has besides many splendid subalpine

features,

rushing

river,
in

a
SOPHOCLES.

showy
ful

belt

of mountains

sight,

which make this town the most beautiin all

Athens.

Europe, Edinburgh has surroundings It has its castle, as I have said, and

far
its

more analogous to those oi Arthur's Seat, corresponding

;

to the Acropolis

and Mount Lycabettus

1

at

Athens

it

has also rolling country

The general

killed nt Syracuse.

70

GREEK PICTURES.
hills

around,
it

of moderate

height,
in

and a seaport within a few

miles.

commands

sea

and

hills

manner not unlike Athens.

Thus The modern

Athens has covered most of the ancient site first with poor hovels city of and shops, then with showy mansions, and so destroyed all the suggestions But out of it of antiquity which an abandoned site might have preserved. and over it stands the great rock, which even centuries of neglect and of violence could hardly impair, though they shattered and mangled its
buildings in detail.

any visitor must do is to ascend the rock, and study both the details around him and the panorama displayed on every side. The last thing he will do, after all his arrangements for departure are
first

The

thing

complete, is to hurry up once more to the immortal rock, to take another last view, and tear himself with a great wrench from the one spot which he may fairly say is the greatest and most fascinating he ever saw in his life.
traveller through America feels disposed to class the Americans in two into those who have, and those who have not, seen Europe. large categories In a similar kind of way, one feels inclined to class those who travel in Europe

The

instruction and for pleasure into two distinct classes those who have, and those who have not, seen the Acropolis. I do not, of course, include among the former those tourists who have stopped at the Piraeus for some hours, and driven up to Athens and back, who are told by some guidebooks still tolerated among semi-civilised men, that a few hours are enough to devote to Athens. Such people cannot be said to see any place they least of all Athens. But a proper honest study of the Acropolis is an visit,
for

epoch in the art training of any man, and, so far as the aesthetic side of man influences his morals, a progress in purity and in tolerance. I say the latter,
he will generally denied
because

perhaps conceded, but what was Gothic revival of the last generation, that great classic architecture can be as religious, as minutely conscientious, as dignified as the Norman French cathedrals. I say it furthermore because he will learn that the most artistic of all nations thought it right to colour the white marble of both statues and temples with brilliant hues. I say the former because he will learn how a great idea, a noble plan, should dominate even the most exquisite artistic details, how the sculptor, however great,
learn,
in
is

what

now

the

must subordinate himself to the architect, and work not for himself, but for the perfection of the building. He will further learn that the shackles so the far from artist, put upon checking his genius, have elicited the most The composition of a worthy group exquisite resources of his imagination.
formed by the east and west gables of a temple produced results greater than all the unshackled work of the same artists, just as the top of a round barrel suggested to Raphael one of his most charming subjects. But let us descend to some details. The sacred rock, as I have said,
to
fill

the

triangular

space (pediment)

A THENS.
was early
fortified

and covered with buildings and votive offerings. But the capture of the place by the Persians in 480 B.C., and the burning and defacing of all the monuments, left the victorious and returning Athenians What were they to do for the restoration in the face of a grave problem. The tamest and most obvious of the temples and shrines of their gods ? all that had been damaged, and course was to restore with minute fidelity make the Acropolis as like as possible to that of Pisistratus. But a great
original

age of
in

art,

growth
with

Athens was now richer, nobler, greater, than she I ever had been, and must accordingly live up to her enhanced renown. am not sure that the artists even regretted very deeply the hostile defacing
such

design a solution.

generation of unparalleled energy, a period of rapid and in the control of materials, could never be satisfied
a

monuments, for in this way only could they be set aside with No doubt safety, as no longer worthy of the gods and the imperial city. there must have been a conflict between the old-fashioned party and the new but if there was, the wisdom of the fathers was so completely turned to the children that the defaced buildings were not only pulled down, but, with the defaced statues, piled into the places where the declivity was being Never were the gods of a nation treated with transformed into a terrace. There are the archaic figures which have been more signal disrespect. discovered, one after another, in the excavations of the platform formed round the Parthenon and in the raised wall there are drums of the pillars of the older temples, notably of the Parthenon of Cimon, which was smaller and ruder than that of Pericles, though built on a much more carefully
of the
old
;

finished substruction

of stone slabs.

suppose

this

very careful building of

on stone foundations is the only point in Pisistratic or Themistoclean architecture which is not surpassed by the greater age which I remember Dr. Dorpfeld telling me at Athens that such was supervened. the exquisite care and finish of every detail in the Parthenon, notably of the invisible parts, that he regarded it as a piece of extravagance worth I observed that in the executing once, but never again to be repeated. men when to build and twelfth centuries, eleventh helped great churches as
walls

mere

a good
artistic

work,
care
that

to

effect

the

salvation of their

souls,

on
spirit

details

out

of sight

was
itself,

also

to

be found.

a similar lavishing Nor can

for

of

we
of
the

regret

which does work splendidly and exactly

love
of the

the

love

God, or for the praise of men.

work
his

regardless

of the

notice or

When
entrance

the visitor
or

now makes
in

way round

sanctuary, and comes

gate,

sight

of the

he sees crowned by a little Ionic temple, that of Athena as protruding surrounded by a parapet of upright marble was This building Victory. slabs adorned with figures of winged Victories, which are famous for their
Propylsa,
bastion

the approach to the famous great flight of stairs leading to the above him, on the right, a sort of

GREEK PICTURES.
delicate

affords

beauty. us the
pillars
in

The whole
first

structure

is

indeed of the same

character,

and

All the

example of what can be clone by sensible restoration. and walls were set up in recent years from the fragments
confusion where the Venetians or Turks had built their lofty

lying about
tower,

was

Nobody will now argue that this restoration fortunately removed. not really valuable and if the same principle was applied to the many
now
;

pillars

of the
in

Parthenon,
that

which

lie

prostrate

almost
regain

down

1687,

greater

building

would

they were blown some of its pristine

as

majesty.

But before us stands the great Propylaea, or entrance portico of the

gSii.-

^x^r^^^-^l _ "f
'.

-.'., -,_

'-^t-.KTaic

-^-ia -~' ^^"fts

itel^^^iti

THE TEMPLE OF VICTORY,

architect

ACROPOLIS.

Mnesicles, which was hardly less celebrated than the Parthenon, and which we find copied, alas by some Roman builder of Hadrian's time at Eleusis. But even there the building is so noble that it passed till for the work of the rival of Ictinus. The plan of this gateway is yesterday
I

that

now known

to

us

as

the

regular

palaces of Tiryns and of Troy.

Let

entrance more minutely. The actual set in the wall, where it turned upon wooden hinges set in bronze cups, which worked in a stone hollow fitted to them the frame or setting of the

design adopted at the describe this very ancient form of door, whether single or double, was
prehistoric

me

door

being

of

stone.

But

the

door was

protected

or

ornamented

both

A THENS.

73

inwards and outwards by a portico or vestibule, consisting of an architrave supported by two pillars, between which was the main entrance, while outside each of them was another side entrance, just as we see it carried
out
front wall

simpler temple fronts called temples in antis, where the so to is, speak, broken or stopped with pilasters, leaving an open In the front supported by two pillars, between which you enter the temple.
in
all

those

oldest buildings this construction was of sun-dried bricks and of wood. The and an end were of where and walls brick, they stopped, exposed likely to be worn by traffic or weather, they were finished with a wooden coating, of

THE

STEPS AND PROPYL.BA OF THE ACROPOLIS.

which the
spanning

later square pilasters

are the
also

survival in stone.

The upper beam

the

open passage was

a long

beam

Remains two wooden stems, set on stone bases. been found, and carefully described by Dr. Dorpfeld
to be found
in

of wood, supported by of this construction have

in his

masterly chapter

Dr. Schliemann's

Tiryns.

This, too, is the very plan which But all the Propylaea of Mnesicles.

we

earlier

see ennobled and perfected in the members of wood and brick

;

the depth of the porticoes is replaced by beautiful Pentelic marble and, for variety's sake, while the outer row of pillars in both directions are Doric, the richer Ionic order is employed for the inner are
increased,

now

74

GREEK PICTURES.

It had been easy supports, which are under the marble roof. enough, in to find a or the case of the old wooden porticoes, beams, of strong beam, But it required no small oak, long enough to span the opening above.

labour to quarry and bring up to the Acropolis, still more to set over pillars Yet this was twenty-five feet high, beams of marble twenty-two feet long.

one of them. be seen at the gateway, and lead the visitor at once to marvel with what mechanical appliances the For among other things noted by Athenians accomplished such triumphs. Plutarch in his Life of Pericles is the rapidity with which most of these
crack
in

done, care being taken, as in the case of almost use a pair of parallel beams, in case of a flaw or

all

stone

architraves, to

These mighty marble cross-beams are

still

to

and everlasting buildings were, so to speak, run up. There seems to be no evidence that they employed more than the primitive aids of ropes, rollers, and inclined planes, which we see at work in extant There pictures of Egyptian and Assyrian transportation of colossal statues.
perfectly
finished

Professor Tarbell pointed out to me, stray mentions of a windlass and once of a pulley (T/oo^iXta) in Aristophanes and in Plato but (e'Ai), even if these casual and rare notices be held to imply the common and
are,

as

developed use of such contrivances for great mechanical difficulties, the performances of the Athenian architects will appear very wonderful to those who study them. One power they possessed which can hardly be overan unlimited supply of slave labour, which they could apply lavishly, rated And we know that even and without care how many lives they sacrificed. now the human hand, with its manifold action directed by intelligence, is byfar the most perfect mechanical engine constructed. Balancing the temple of Nike on the right bastion, there is thrown forward on the left a beautifully simple Doric structure, which may have been a guard-room, or the artistic survival of that once requisite feature, for the city walls the defences of the Acropolis were now mere ornament
;

Here the visitor first sees what wall-building in were the real safeguard. marble could be, what the exquisite fitting of the blocks, what the contempt for mortar or other binding, when everything sat firm by its weight and The marble drums of the pillars are so smoothly joined that the fitting.
nail

runs without hindrance

down

the

fluting.

In the a a
circular

centre
piece

of each
of the
it

is

square plug of cypress wood, into which fits wood, so that it was possible to work round
on.

new block

after

same was set

places

But the

fluting

was no doubt worked on the

pillars after

they were set

deal of the surface finishing. up, as was no doubt a great the are still remaining protruding ends of stone left

In

many
an

on

otherwise

purpose of giving a hold for ropes to lift it to its the blue and gold of this majestic structure is gone colouring place. the and red have long since vanished but glaring white of the marble has

smoothed

surface,

for the

The

not been

recovered, save where

some new breakage shows

the

inside of a

PARTHENON, INTERIOR, RESTORED.

A THENS.
block
for all the Acropolis has
friable soil of Attica.

77

been toned

to

sandstone dust which now, as

light

in the

days of Aristophanes, sweeps

golden brown by the constant over the

and

When we

pass the Pro-

pykta, and stand before the temples which occupy the the of honour in places sacred enclosure, we have standing separately the most
perfect

specimens of

those

two orders of architecture which we saw combined in

the gateway. As the traveller stands
'

at

the

inner

gate

of

the

all

Propylaea, he notices at once the perfect features of

ruins.

the

Over

his

head

are the enormous architraves

of the Propykea blocks of white marble over twenty-

which span the gateway from pillar to pillar. Opposite, above him a and little to the right, is
feet

two

long,

the mighty
identical
in

Parthenon,
orientation,

not
as

the architects have observed, with the gateway, but varying from it slightly, so that

sun and shade would play

upon

it

at

moments

differing

from the rest, and thus produce a perpetual variety of This principle is lights.
observed
the the
left,

in

the

setting

of

Erechtheum also. To and directly over

temple,

A CARYATID FROM THE ERECHTHEUM.

or

the town, stands that beaulittle Ionic tifully decorated

stately caryatids

looking inwards and

towards

combination of temples, with the the Parthenon. These two

buildings are the most perfect examples we have of their respective styles. The one see the objects of the artists who built them, at first sight.

We

GREEK PICTURES.
embodiment of majesty, the other of grace. The very ornaments of the Parthenon are large and massive those of the Erechtheum for the most part intricate and delicate. Accordingly, the Parthenon is in the Doric style,
is

the

or rather in the Doric style so refined and adorned as to be properly called the Attic style.

sculptured decorations of the Parthenon are of three kinds, or In the first place, the two triangular applied in three distinct places. over the east and west fronts were each filled with a group of pediments
statues

The

more than

life-size

the other her contest with

the figures

the one representing the birth of Athene and Poseidon for the patronage of Athens. Some of

from one of these are the great draped headless women in the centre of the Parthenon room of the British Museum
:

other fragments of those are preserved at Athens.

broken by the Venetians

are, secondly, the or metopes, plaques of stone inserted into the frieze between the

There

triglyphs,

and carved

in relief with

a single small group on each.

The

height of these surfaces does

FIGURES FROM THE PEDIMENT OF THE PARTHENON (BRITISH MUSEUM).

exceed four feet. There was, thirdly, a band of reliefs running all round the external wall at the top of the cella, inside the surrounding pillars, and opposite to them, and this is known as the frieze of t]ic cella. It consists of a great Panathenaic procession, starting from the western front, and proceeding in two divisions along the parallel north and south walls, till they meet on the eastern front, which was the proper front of the temple. Among the Elgin marbles there are a good many of the metopes, and also
not

of

pieces of the cella frieze, preserved. are preserved at Athens, and altogether fourths of this magnificent composition.

the

Several

frieze

we can

other pieces of the reconstruct fully threeis

extraordinary power of grouping in the designs of Phidias completely shown us in the better-preserved band of the cella

'

The

very

frieze,

THE EKECHTHEUM.

ATHENS.
along which
the

Panathenaic procession winds its triumphal way. Over the eastern doorway were twelve noble sitting figures on either side of the officiating priest, presenting the state robe, or pcplos, for the vestment of Athene. These figures are explained as gods by the critics but they do in either not, beauty or dignity, excel those of many of the Athenians
splendid
;

forming the procession. is now to be seen in the

the

very

fine slab,

containing three of these figures,

little

main

entrance with

is

the

museum in the Acropolis. This group over end and summary of all the procession, and
ceremony
in
all

corresponds
entrance, or

the

yearly
led

in

this

way,

that,

as

the

state

the

Propylaea, Parthenon, the procession

sides of the

into

the Acropolis

at

the west

end, or
into

rear

of

probability
rear,

separated
first

two, which

went along both

Accordingly,
procession walls the
;

colonnade, and met again

the
starts

at the eastern door.

along being chiefly occupied with the cavalcade of the Athenian knights, the northern with the carrying of sacred vessels, and The frieze over the western door is leading of victims for the sacrifice.
southern
still

are

over the western end, or being made, which then

preparations of the the north and south

in its place

but,

at

great
pillars

the

height, and architrave

it

having and only

lost its bright colouring, and being in any case visible from close underneath, on account of
front,
it

in

Indeed, in ornament, spite of

In
its

discernible.

evidently was
its

produces no effect, and is hardly never more than an architectural

''

all

artistic beauty.

great days, and

even when the antiquarian

Pausanias saw

it

in

the second century, nay, even when Alaric the Goth surveyed it in the fifth, It was not the Acropolis was covered with statues, as well as with shrines. of Holies first in then even in the Christian times Hellenic, Holy merely was also a museum and palace of art. At every step and turn the it There were still many traveller met objects of veneration and of interest.

specimens, chiefly interesting to the antiquarian and the devotee, for since Hadrian's day the fashion of admiring the antique as such was as there were still, in spite of the widespread as it is in modern Europe
archaic
;

plundering

of enemies and lovers of

the

commanded
all

common

many of those masterpieces which admiration of the artist and of the public. Even
art,

with their

the sides and slopes of the rock were honeycombed into sacred grottoes, altars and their gods, or studded with votive monuments. Al.

The sacred caves were for these points of interest in their detail are gone. And now ages filled with rubbish, and desecrated with worse than neglect. has overcome of interest the that archaeological men, these ancient neglect
ornaments are defaced by the excavator, who, while he brings to light many treasures of history and of art, leaves the surface he has worked broken and There are left but the remnants of the defaced with hideous rubbish.
surrounding
wall,

the

marvellous array of archaic figures

1

in

the

museum,
G

Raml>/(s

and

Studies, pp. 85,

89, 92.

82

GREEK PICTURES.
ruins,

and the

already described, of the three principal buildings, which were the envy and the wonder of the civilised world. In the immediate neighbourhood of the Acropolis is a lesser hill, of

which the name

even more familiar to the ordinary reader the Areopagus. And sloping up against it, on another side, are the two theatres, that of Roman plan, due to Herodus Atticus in Hadrian's time, and that far more famous place where the tragedies and comedies of the great Greek masters
is

were produced, the theatre of Dionysus that is, sacred to the festivals of Within sight of this latter are the colossal columns of the great the god. Roman-Greek temple of Jupiter, remodelled and carried out by Hadrian while within view of the Areopagus is that gem of Doric grace, the
;

so-called temple of Theseus, contrasting in every way with the splendour of In the one, grace the Hellenistic conception of Hadrian and his architects.

and symmetry, in the other, size and ornate majesty, were the ideal in view. The Areopagus is now, as may be seen from the annexed cut, a bare rocky knoll, upon which evidences of old cutting show that it was smoothed for seats, and perhaps some wooden structure applied, to make It was suitable to that antique and the rude stones more comfortable.
that the judges, especially when trying cases of bloodof religious pollution, should have their sittings in the open guiltiness, This has, therefore, been a commonly adopted view of the working of air. this court, nor am I aware of any reason against it, save that so many of

venerable

court

and

our preconceptions about Greek

life

turn out

false.
first

Those who ascended from

the

Agora came

to a platform of considerable

Plato makes Socrates interest, upon which I will digress for a few moments. say, in his famous Defence, that a copy of Anaxagoras, even when scarce, could be bought on the orchestra for a drachme, which represented three I will now explain to days' wages of an ordinary labourer in those days. On the north-west slope of the Areopagus, and the reader what this means. not far above the level of the market-place or old Agora, there is a small semicircular platform, backed by the rising rock. This, or some platform close to it, which may now be hidden by accumulated soil, was the old orchestra^ possibly the site of the old theatre, but in historical times a sort of reserved platform, where the Athenians, who had their town bristling with statues, allowed no monument to be erected save the figures of Harmodius and Aristogiton, which were carried into Persia, replaced by others, afterwards recovered, and of which we may have a copy in the two fighting figures, of archaic character, now in the Museum It was doubtless on this orchestra, just above the bustle and of Naples. thoroughfare of the Agora, that booksellers kept their stalls, and here it was that the book of Anaxagoras could be bought for a drachme. Here then was the place where that physical philosophy was disseminated then, through Euripides, leavened which first gained a few advanced thinkers
' ' ;

A THENS.

85

the drama, once the exponent of ancient piety then, through the stage, the Athenian public also, till we arrive at those Stoics and Epicureans who came
;

to teach philosophy and religion, not as a faith but as a system, and to spend their time with the rest of the public in seeking out novelties of creed and of opinion, as mere fashions with which people chose to dress their minds.

And

this very Areopagus, where we are now standing, that these of fashion came into contact with the thorough earnestness, the philosophers the red-hot zeal of the Apostle Paul. The memory of profound convictions, that great scene still lingers about the place, and every guide will show you
it

was on

the exact place where the apostle stood, and in what direction he addressed his audience. There are, I believe, even some respectable commentators who
transfer their

own
it

and hold that

to

expound
to

his

estimate of St. Paul's importance to the Athenian public, was before the court of the Areopagus that he was asked This is more than doubtful. The blasts philosophers views.
their

who probably yawned over

eager
teach
the

own

lectures,

hearing of a
truth

new

lay preacher,

and apparently convinced of the

of what

he

said,

thought with out

novelty too delicious to be neglected, and brought him forthof the chatter and bustle of the crowd, probably past the very

orchestra where Anaxagoras' books had been proselytising before him, and where the stiff old heroes of Athenian history stood, a monument of the
It is even possible that the curious knot of escape from political slavery. idlers did not bring him higher than this platform, which might well be But if they chose to bring him to the top, there called part of Mars' Hill. was no hindrance, for the venerable court held its sittings in the open air,

on stone seats and when not thus occupied, the top of the rock may well have been a convenient place of retirement for people who did not want to be disturbed by new acquaintances, and the constant eddies of new
;

gossip in the market-place. 'It is, however, of far

less

Areopagus Paul

stood, than

to

import to know on understand clearly what

he sought to conciliate as well as to refute He starts naturally enough looked down upon him as an intellectual inferior. from the extraordinary crowd of votive statues and offerings, for which Athens was remarkable above all other cities of Greece. He says, with a slight touch of irony, that he finds them very religious indeed, so religious that he even found an altar to a god professedly unknown, or perhaps unknowable. Probably St. Paul meant to pass from the latter sense of the word ayi/ojcTTos, which was, I fancy, what the inscription meant, to the former, which gave him an excellent introduction to his argument. Even the use of
1

what spot of the he said, and how the philosophers who, no doubt,

may surely have this meaning, I do not find it suggested in any of the commentaries on suppose some superstitious precaution, or else some case of the real inscription being effaced by time, and supplied in this way. The expression in Pausanias the gods called unknown, TOIS ocojuosfojueVoij seems to suggest it as a regular title, and we know that there were deities whose name was secret, a.yvua-roiS'
Though
&yvwffTus
all

the passage.

They

and might not be pronounced.

But

in

the face of so

many

better critics, I will not insiot

upon

this interpretation.

86

CREEK PICTURES.

the singular may have been an intentional variation from the strict text, for Pausanias twice over speaks of altars to the gods, who are called the ayvoxnoi but I cannot find any citation of the inscription in the (or mysterious)
;

However that may be, our Authorized Version does singular form. " I find an altar," he says, preserve the neatness of St. Paul's point
:

not
"

to

an unknown god. Whom then ye unknowingly worship, Him I announce But then he develops a conception of the great One God, not at to you." He was preachall from the Jewish, but really from the Stoic point of view. to the advocates of prudence as the means, ing to Epicureans and to Stoics on the other and pleasure as the end of a happy life, on the one hand to the advocates of duty, and of life in harmony with the Providence which There could be no doubt to which side the governs the world for good.
;

must incline. Though the Stoics of the market-place at Athens might be mere dilettanti, mere talkers about the honcslnni, and the great soul of the world, we know that this system of philosophy produced at Rome the most splendid constancy, the most heroic endurance I had It was this stern and earnest almost said the most Christian benevolence. which all minds in the attracted serious decay of heathenism. theory Accordingly, St. Paul makes no secret of his sympathy with its noble features. He describes the God whom he preaches as the benevolent Author of the beauty and fruitfulness of Nature, the great Benefactor of mankind by His providence, and therefore not without constant and obtrusive But he goes much farther, witnesses of His greatness and His goodness. and treads close upon the Stoic pantheism when he not only asserts, in the words of Aratus, that we are His offspring, but that "in Him we live, and move, and have our being." His first conclusion, that the Godhead should not be worshipped or even imaged in stone or in bronze, was no doubt quite in accordance with more enlightened Athenian philosophy. But it was when he proceeded to preach the Resurrection of the Dead, that even those who were attracted by him, and sympathised with him, turned away in contempt. The Epicureans The Stoics thought that the human thought death the end of all things. of the Divine world-soul, would soul, the offspring nay, rather an offshoot be absorbed into its parent essence. Neither could believe the assertion of St. Paul. When they first heard him talk of Jesus and Anastasis, they them some new and strange deities. But when they learned that thought a was man ordained by God to judge the world, and that Anastasis Jesus was merely the Anastasis of the dead, they were greatly disappointed so some mocked, and some excused themselves from further listening.' I will add but one point of interpretation concerning this famous of the It is usual to criticise the Authorized Version, and Acts. chapter that St. Paul could not have meant at the outset of his speech to offend say
apostle
'

'

'

Rambles and Studies,

p.

20,

el set].

A THE. VS.
the

87

assembled philosophers by
is

calling

them

superstitions.

Accordingly the

preferred very religious. objectors seem not to be aware a that the word used by St. Paul, in comparative or weaker form, is the for the title of a famous used Deisidamon, word, play of Menander, in very which the principal character was a Superstitious !\fau. I think the Revised
translation

The

Version therefore rightly

translates

'
:

Ye men

of Athens,
it

in

all

things

perceive that ye are somewhat superstitious^ nor should in the margin as an alternative.

have given religious

of

These
history

reflections

lead
in

us

naturally to

the
will

consideration

the

early

Athens, postpone interesting As I said till we have done with classical and pagan Attica. before, subject we have within our close view the very perfect and interesting Temple of Theseus. This, like so many other of the Athenian ruins, owes its present to its transformation into a church, and so it remains to us, condition good
of
Christianity
this

but

we

giant brother at Paestum, the most complete example of that chaste and severe style. But, as is so common with our finest ruins, it is passed

with

its

by our classical texts, or at least so vaguely is it noticed, that to the present day no one can tell by whom or when it was built, or to The subjects treated in the what god or hero it was really dedicated. extant sculptures point as much to the worship of Herakles as of Theseus the peculiarities of its building for these temples, like the mediaeval Gothic churches, though all very similar, are yet all original and peculiar in some features point to a date earlier than the more graceful and perfect Parthenon. But then the builders of that day were quite capable of doing an archaic we know that Ictinus did so at Bassse piece of work by way of variety and for that reason our inference from its severer lines to its greater
over
in silence
;

antiquity

is

not quite safe.

pass from this side of the Acropolis to the south-east, and proceed to say a word upon the great theatre of Dionysus. But we pass on the way the lesser theatre of Herodus Atticus, which supplies us with an excellent

We

specimen of the
It
is

Roman
and
;

theatre, contrasted in
built

many

far

steeper,

up

at

the

back of the stage with

respects with the Greek. stories of

brickwork

stage walls are joined to the semicircle of the spectators' seats, instead of leaving open side entrances for the chorus to The effect of the whole building is cold and gloomy, enter the orchestra. oppressive with its high walls, and quite different in its effect from that
the
all the sunny cheerful relics of the bright Hellenic spirit. There had once been on or near this side a famous circular-roofed building for concerts, called the Odeum, and built in the days of Pericles. How far more precious would have been any relic of this perfect epoch As we wander on we come to the now unearthed foundations of the temple of /Esculapius, which was apparently, unlike the rest, deliberately

arcades

of

destroyed

by the Christians

in

the

fifth

century, because this

god

specially

88

GREEK PICTURES.
as

posed

the

saviour

of

men from

disease

and death, and

was

specially

credited with

But here there is nothing of more many we naturally hurry on to where the pickaxe has than antiquarian interest recovered for us, though not till 1862, something tangible and easy to be understood the very interesting remains of the famous theatre in which the Athenians received the higher and better part of their moral teaching. This is a point never to be forgotten by those in whom Puritan traditions have sown a wholesome dread of the modern stage and its surroundings. It is indeed true that all serious dramatists, even in modern days, have asserted themselves as moral teachers, and so have the better and greater novelists, who have succeeded to the work and popularity of the playwrights. But the accessories of the drama have been so unworthy of this mission actors as a class have been, since the days of Aristotle, so generally loose and reckless in their lives, that we cannot wonder at the strong prejudice
miracles of healing.
; ;

subsisting
teaching.

among

the

There was

graver classes against this form of so-called public no question about this when .Kschylus, Sophocles,

and

Euripides

gods, and

composed in rivalry pieces to be acted in honour of the for the benefit of the great imperial democracy of Athens. For, in

the first place, they represented no vulgar everyday griefs or misfortunes, but those of great legendary heroes and heroines far removed from their own in the second, they uniformly represented the triumph of virtue and days greatness over cruelty and vice, not in the vulgar form of earthly rewards
;

and earthly happiness, but in that nobler triumph which wins the sympathy of men, and proclaims the victory of human weakness even against all
the 'green bay tree' flourishing of the bad, the apparent succumbing in death of the hero, who conquers in the supremacy of his will while he resigns his life to the stress of evil fortune.
the successes

of tyranny,

There

is

importance. rehandle the

yet another point in this old Greek tragedy of no mean On the Attic stage the poets were allowed to criticise or

the gods. If these stories were so firmly based in popular belief that they could not be contorted into virtue, the poets at least criticised them openly in the mouth of their chorus, or
to

myths attributing immoralities

of those

who

suffered

by such

injustice,

and so the habit was engendered

so vital

among nations not enlightened as we are of trusting to conscience rather than to traditional theology, of putting the moral sense of a civilised society above the superstitious observances and beliefs of a pagan priesthood.
It

was

in this

sense, as

St.

Paul says, that the

Gentiles

'

became a law

to

themselves, -when they which have no [Divine] law, do by nature the things of the law, in that they show the work of the law written in their hearts,
therewith, and their thoughts one with another accusing or else excusing them.' Here is this inspired truth in the it be words of Sophocles lot to observe strict holiness in May my every
their

conscience

bearing
'
' :

witness

(Edipus Rex, vv. 863, 899.

A THENS.
word and deed
place far

whose august laws are proclaimed from their birthearth, for Heaven alone, and no mortal race of men, hath Great is the begotten them, nor will oblivion ever lull them to sleep. Divine Spirit in them, and of eternal youth.' These words are quoted from a famous drama which illustrates the awful fact that an early crime, perhaps in its inception the result of mere neglect of Divine warnings, or the
holiness

above the

ebullition of a hasty temper, may so grow in its hideous consequences as to mar the whole future of a splendid life, and turn the highest public spirit

and

self-sacrifice

and in many ancient must which of entertainment from another side how this kind religions, explains for we cannot deny that it was also such was consistent with the high moral objects which I have just explained. It is only with the rise of a the of hatred and asceticism, with suspicion of the flesh as growth opposed to the spirit, with a deep sense of the guiltiness of sin and the terrors of Divine wrath, that religion has again become what it was to All the insistance of primitive men, a doctrine of sadness and of fear. the New Testament writers upon the deep satisfactions, the pure joys of the Gospel have not been able to cure it of its sadness, its profound conviction
But
I

into a national calamity. 1 dwell upon another feature in Greek,

depravity of the human heart, of the sinfulness of earthly fact, of the sense of sin as necessarily adhering to the flesh and delights, But the days of old were days when religion was a matter all its desires.
of the

innate
in

not of not of continence, but of indulgence not of fasting, but of feasting when men came together to worship their gods contrition, but of hilarity in human pleasures. them to share Such feasts as those of by inviting
;

the yule log and of the harvest home have been now amalgamated with our in religion, but they stand out as rather isolated among our Christian feasts,

pagan complexion of jollity. The Greek religion was essentially a religion of joy, and no worship of the gods would have been considered acceptable by the public, if gloomy Thus it was that the or sad anticipations, were not banished. faces, Athenian State thought it just to apply the public funds to give every free
citizen a

that they retain a certain

day's wages, in order that he might be able to enjoy himself at Thus the dramas produced as part of the festival of the god Dionysus. and in the Attic comic there were combined drama, moral improvetragic
in

ment, political instruction, and religious enjoyment appreciate without long and careful study of old
therefore consider the moral

a manner very hard to Greek life. We cannot

attempts made

in

our

own day

aspects of Shakspere's plays, or the persistent to raise the tone of the theatre, as in any

sense close analogies to the work of the tragedians of Athens, who may be reo-arded as established ministers of the national religion. These considerations will lend interest to the remains of the Dionysiac
1

The

reader should consult what I have said in the

first

volume of my Greek Literatim;

p.

.297,

sq.

GREEK PICTURES.
theatre

even

with

those
will

who
notice

take

no

interest

in

modern

theatrical

performances.
play-houses.

not covered, but open to the weather, as it For though the pedants have must have been from its vast size. which says that ridiculously misunderstood a passage in Plato's Symposium, the tragic poet speaks to thirty thousand Athenians meaning thereby the have assumed that this and times at various who there whole population go

They The building was

immediately

many

contrasts

to our

modern

indeed

number

plan showed that room at a found perhaps twelve to fifteen thousand people could have hear the if so, the majority only saw the show, and did not performance

actually assembled within recent measurements Dr. Dorpfeld

the

enclosure
for

to

hear
his

human

voices,

the

made

me on

dialogue.

^gpZ^^Sf^x^
'

^^^SS^^^
1 Si..:

r~ >-"X>

- ic

*.

*N

Tvv-

P
.-'-*.
,

^C^S:,.'

'

A.^,..

--;'

W^W'.
THE THEATRE
OF DIONYSUS AT ATHENS.

*siys?/=(/'

Again, what
is

we

call

the pit was always

empty.

As

it

now remains

it

handsomely paved, and was reserved at first for the dancing of the The chorus, for which it was justly called the dancing place or orchestra.

modern orchestra in our theatres therefore only occupies a small slice of the room given to the old chorus, for their singing and dancing, together with
musical accompaniments. But the considerable height of the stage ten or twelve feet above this level indicates that if the chorus were sometimes
the
to

occupy a place on the stage, as we may infer from extant plays, they must have been raised on a wooden platform, and so brought within easy reach of the actors by ascending perhaps a single step. There appears to have been such an arrangement, called the tliyinclc, covering or surrounding an altar of Dionysus, which reminded the audience of the religious origin of the whole performance. The row of upright slabs running round this open pit or orchestra seems to have been a late addition, and I fear the theory is

A THENS.
Romans, brought in combats, arrangement was made to prevent the combatants from falling back to the front row of seats, and This front row consisted mainly of soiling the occupants with their blood. marble arm-chairs, with the names of religious officials inscribed upon them, which show that even in Roman days the whole ceremony was regarded as a festival to the gods. These front seats corresponded to the stalls in our cathedrals. The rest of the house was all let at the same price
correct,

that

when

the Athenians, out of (lattery to the

this

the fashion

of having gladiatorial

' 1

S*" -^^g

*
STALLS IN THE THEATRE AT ATHENS.

two obols per

as

seat

nor would
higher

the Athenians
fees.

reserving

seats for

have tolerated such a thing Such reservations were always purely

honorary.

Let us wander on But I cannot dwell long upon this fascinating subject. to where the Roman Emperor Hadrian has left his distinctive mark upon Athens, by rebuilding the temple long since begun by the early tyrants, but never finished, in the pompous Corinthian style which marks his constructions from Spain to Palmyra. The whole world is full of these majestic remains.

'

GREEK PICTURES.
of this

little known Gerasa are, with Palmyra, evidences in Southern remote Tambessa Syria. epoch Algiers, our Scottish the towns of Provence, the aqueducts in Spain, all attest his lavish cence in building. At

Baalbec and the

in

border,

magnifi-

Athens

alone the majestic splendour of the ruins of his temple fade into
insignificance

beside

the

calm

dignity of the Parthenon. these columns anywhere

Were
else,

they would indeed command the unqualified admiration of men.

himself he had thought completely outdone the work of Ictinus and

Phidias.
I

And no doubt Hadrian

will

only note
benefit

here
that

for

the

reader's

the

DORIC CAPITAL AND PART UK SHAFT.

Corinthian pillar and capital so universal in Roman and Renaissance architecture were very

in

rare in pure that style

sort

Greek building till the days of Alexander. The first building which we know is the monument of Lysicrates, set up at the time the young conqueror was on his into Asia other way specimens of this
;

of

capital

are

isolated

and

doubtful.

Nor can we
taste
it

question

the
in

of

the

Greeks
first

applying

in this

instance to a small and

very ornamental building, not to great massive temples like that of Hadrian now before
us.

\Ye
is

do

not

know
in

that

the any which connect this ornamental development with

truth
stories

there

Corinth

but

it

became

al-

most universal with the Roman dominion, and even in the scanty remains of Indo-Greek
art

IONIC CAPITAL WITH SHAFT.

preserved at the Museum of Lahore, we find that this beautiful decoration captivated the Oriental taste, and was applied by them in the second century u.c. I give the really Greek orders, the Doric and Ionic, as reminders to the reader, in the adjoining cuts.

A THENS.

95

paused in our sketch of Athenian history at the perfect development of Athenian genius, both political and artistic, in the middle of the fifth She was then the acknowledged head of the Greek, and therecentury i:.c. fore of the civilised world, and in the wonderful fifty years between the end of the Persian and the commencement of the Peloponnesian wars, she had attained perfection in almost every department of human glory. Perhaps in instrumental music, certainly in eloquence, some painting only, and in but in sculpture and advances may have been made by later ingenuity Still there architecture, as well as in poetry, the climax had been reached. was development and variation, if not improvement, and if the pediments of Phidias have left no rival, we may also assert that the Hermes of Praxiteles,
;

We

Olympian excavations, is also beautiful beyond compare. jealousy excited by Athens, and the harshness of her rule over her subjects, brought on the tedious and disastrous Peloponnesian war, during which Athens showed surprising energy and endurance, keeping up her artistic glories, her architecture, her splendid tragedies and comedies while she was contending with her foes from the Euxine to the Sicilian sea. Yet the end came with Lysander, when she lost her imperial power and grandeur in war, though she presently recovered her liberty, and assumed again a But great public very widely acknowledged supremacy in letters and in art. even enterprises gave way to more individual or private productions dramatic poetry, which required public outlay and perfect freedom of

the jewel- of the

The

passed out of fashion, to make way for the comedy of manners, which corresponds to our novel-literature, and philosophy, which, except in But while scene Plato's hands, cannot be classed among the fine arts. painting had suggested a study of the laws of perspective, and led the way to landscape painting, sculpture, in the hands of Scopas and Praxiteles,
criticism,

attempted more expression, new phases of character, and individual beauty The naked athlete had such as had hardly been thought of by Phidias. been represented by many older sculptors, the naked goddess was a daring venture, at which the more religious Attic school would have been shocked. The glory of Greek art in the fourth century is to have produced Plato

and Demosthenes, with their satellites, Zeuxis and Euphranor in painting, and to have held the torch aloft for Lysippus the sculptor, and Apelles the painter, both of whom were court artists to Alexander the Great, and therephase of art; but both of whom distinctly developed their respective arts by greater expression, a new ideal of beauty, and more These great masters complete control of the materials at their command. or us Hellenistic lead into the post-Alexandrian epoch, in which naturally
fore

mark a new

social

the

chief

glory

departed

from

Athens,

to

settle

in

Alexandria,

Antioch,

Pergamum, and Rhodes, each the centre of a great and fine arts, as they were understood and prized by these
fastidious Greeks.

rich display of the less pure and less

96

GREEK PICTURES.
This, then,

was perhaps the least prominent time for Athens, when her and she had not yet come under the sentimental political power was gone, For though every successor of Alexander felt honoured favour of the Romans. by the friendship of Athens, and her decrees of honour inscribed on marble slabs were a sort of patent of nobility, which were strangely persistent in
value, despite their prostitution to pur-

poses of political chicanery and public mendicancy, though a Ptolemy or an Attalus thought it a high honour to set

up a marble or build a school

city of the philosophers,
still

for the

of Hellenistic kings was criminate and lucrative as the

the flattery not so indisflattery

everything Athenian as the model of good taste. Hence arose a school of sculpture intended for the Roman market, not without great merits, as the extant

with which the

Romans adopted

boxer

of

Pasiteles,
at

Venus found

and the famous Milo, which dates from

about 200 D.C., amply testify. But I need hardly remind the reader that from the days of Alexander, Athens, as a political power, was of no
account.
tant

She possessed a very impor-

and strongly fortified harbour, the possession of which gave strategic adshe rose up vantages to any sovran to assert her liberty, once and again, till the obscure Chremonidean war aerainst o
;

the

power

of Antigonus
B.C.

Macedon about 260

and museums of
art

Gonatas of But it was

her schools of philosophy, her palaces

for

temples were

now
DEMOSTHENES.

treated as such

of marble and bronze in

her famous groups all her streets,

manded the indulgence of they came as conquerors

all

which gave her a prestige which comher conquerors. Presently the Romans, when
Greece,

into

according

to

Horace's

hackneyed
to eat

phrase, were themselves led captive. They affected to speak Greek, Greek dinners, and have their sons educated at the schools of Athens.

Thus

many Roman

nobles

sought

to

obtain

a reputation for

culture

by building

A THENS.
some monument
in

97

Appius Claudius built a second to the temple at Eleusis, and portico or gateway within the main approach to emulate this example. his letters, proposes Cicero, in one of Many doles and money were given by wealthy Roman sojourners, and the city <jf corn a flourished upon its foreign students, its tourists, and its casual benefactors Hadrian and the days when Herodes city of schoolmasters and beggars, till Atticus filled it with great public buildings and added a new quarter to the There is perhaps more building of this age in Athens and Attica city. Most of the great theatre, and than of all the other periods put together.
or

near

Athens.

An

its

neighbour, the great temple of Zeus, the splendid Doric gateway to the Eleusinian temple, nay that temple itself, the Tower of the Winds in the city, and many more porticoes and temples, date from these days of
lesser

Roman

favour.

This brings us to the period of the Antonines, when the world was apparently at peace and happy, and yet was big with the coming change. he had St. Paul had long since preached his discourse on the Areopagus of the Church to Corinth, his letters written Greece, represented by general But for all that Athens still remained the leading city in Roman Greece. Dionysius the Areopagite, and the woman named thoroughly pagan. Damaris, however legend was afterwards busy with them, were no Church,
;

and obtained no following. At Athens, if anywhere, the Gospel of Christ remained to the Greeks foolishness. Young men came in crowds to learn of the the current wisdom pagan world Stoicism, Epicureanism, the
Eclecticism
of the

new Academy,
upon
this

the archaicism
It

of old Ionic

theosophy
selling

and the
tributed

city lived

trade.

was as much a trade as the

of the silver

images of Diana at Ephesus, though of course it really conBut the Athenians were not going to to the culture of the world.
this

abandon

most venerable and profitable paganism for the upstart faith, And so while Christian communities with its novelties and its privations. were early formed at Antioch and Alexandria, at Rome and Corinth, at Ephesus and at Thessalonica, Athens was obdurate. Not even Constantine, with his declaration of Christianity as the religion of the Empire, not even Theodosius, with his closing of the Olympic Games (393 A.D.), were able to
It was kept alive not only by reactions subjugate the old spirit in Athens. like that of Julian, but by the persistence of the schools, the presence of the triumphal monuments of the old religion, and the want of thorough

proselytising,

It was for which the Byzantine Emperors had no leisure. schools who closed the his with (529 A.D.) all-embracing despotism, Justinian, and so put an end at least to the professed paganism of this great centre and rallying-point. Whether he indeed extirpated the old spirit is another

question, to which It city of Athens.

consider the Christianity of the was probably on account of her acknowledged pre-eminence of a centre as higher education, that Athens held fast so long to her pagan
revert

we may

when we

GREEK PICTURES.
schools

and

centuries

recasting

Sophists of the post-Christian could not face the problem of mythology, they the whole of their system just as our schoolmasters now-a-days
their
effete
in

creed.

Little as the

believed

this

who know
propose
its

the evils of the competitive

abolition.

system, stand

aghast

if

we

seriously

It is a matter of great satisfaction to the traveller that all the collected wealth of antiquities at Athens is distributed into various museums, and not The distances gathered into a bewildering mass, like our British Museum.

between
too
far,

these

smaller

arrays

are

short,

and

in

any case

the

intelligent

student must consider them at various times.

as,

for

example, when

the

This principle may be carried Greeks insist on having a little local

A nc POTTERY.
i

museum

every chief town of every province, to which access is difficult, and where very precious things, being often in the charge of poor and ignorant officials, may sometimes become the prey of ardent and unscrupulous visitors, The right mean or else be allowed to suffer from damp and exposure. must be found and observed in this as in other matters of taste. I suppose no one will dispute that the things found on the Acropolis are better kept there, where they are perfectly distinct and determined, than if they were
for

carried

down
bare

to

the

fine

central
for
in

museum, whose
furniture.

halls,

indeed,

still

look

rather

and

waiting

their

through
is

that

Europe, especially centralization in art

Germany and
collections

But my general experience France, as well as in England,

has

become

excessive,

and injures

the instructiveness of this kind of exhibition.

A THENS.

99

will
It
is

I have already said so much about the early or archaic things, that I add but little here on that most interesting side of the Attic museums.

of Apollo, to trace the gradual stiffness and conventional emancipation ornament to the perfect imitation of ideal forms. It can thus best be shown
possible
in

now, especially
the
old

the figures

of

artists

from

childish

that

whatever
art

Egyptian
of

suggestions this wonderful people received from Oriental or sources, and few will deny some such influences, the development
first

Greek
to

from

its

cradle

was indigenous, and

the
perfect

due

home

classical

Polyclitus, there is very little Phidias, Scopas, Praxiteles in the museums, except the remains of the

genius. that period

From
of

or

Myron,

Parthenon.
frieze are not

Some
in

of the slabs of the famous

London, but still at Athens, where bad plaster copies of Lord Elgin's spoils are set up to show the general plan of the whole composition. A few battered fragments
epoch, some headless trunks, or trunkless heads, always with the nose missing, are all that the visitor can find of what he
of the
best

But there are some inferior copies of the Athene of the Parthenon, which most longs
to see.

give us the design of that great figure there are precious inscriptions, one of which even leads us
;

and shows that that immaculate impeccable historian was very loose indeed in his transcripts and there are
to

verify Thucydides,

and

reliefs, beginning with especially archaic specimens, from the date of the very battle of Marathon and reaching down to Roman

reliefs,

tomb

days.
reliefs are perhaps quite a as anything at Athens. feature as distinctive Some of them are still where they were found, in the old Cerameicus, or western suburb of

These Attic tomb

AN ATTIC TOMB

RELIEF.

Athens, near the present railway station. But most of them are in the principal museum. They vary greatly in merit, from the very best to what is coarse and debased, but the whole impression they produce is one of great respect for the good feeling and delicacy of the regrets which they convey. It is plain, from the evidence of their poets, that the Greeks must have looked upon the death of those they loved with unmixed sorrow. It was the final parting, when all the good and pleasant things are remembered
;

when men

seek, as

it

were, to

increase the

pang, by clothing the

dead
2

in

100

GREEK PICTURES.
his

dearest presence. But this was not done by pompous nor a vain enumeration of all the deceased had inscriptions, by performed tell more of the inscriptions which, among us, vanity than of the grief of the survivors. The commonest epitaph was a simple x a ^P e or farewell, and it
all
'

sweetest and

is is

this single

word, so
the

full

and deep
reliefs.

in

its

meaning

to those

who

love,

which

pictured

in

tomb

They

are simple

parting scenes, expressing the grief of the survivors, and the great sadness of the
sufferer,

who

is

going to
strikes

his long

home. But what

us

most forcibly in these remarkable monuments is the chastened, modest expression of sorrow which they There is no viodisplay. lence, no despair, no extravagance

and noble
purity

all is simple thus combining of art with a far

;

a far nobler than the grief exaggerated and paintings sculptures which seek to express mourn-

deeper pathos

ing in later and

less culti-

vated ages.
art to

We

may

defy

FUNERAL TABLET FROM THE CERAMEICUS, ATHENS.

any produce truer or more poignant pictures of real sorrow a sorrow, as I have explained, far deeper and more hopeless than any Christian sorrow and yet there is no wringing of no no dehands, swooning, facing with sackcloth and
;

as in the celebrated
life

tomb of Dexileos, a mere

his tomb, and private of the record of his public services. presence Let me now turn to a far less affecting,
1

was put upon

Sometimes, indeed, of the dead in active portrait grief would not assert itself in
but not
the
less

ashes.

very

as

I did, indeed, see one relief at Athens, in which the relatives are represented as rushing forward in agony, this exception should be noted, as it It is right that were, to delay the departure of the fainting figure. shows that they understood what violent grief was, and yet as a rule avoided representing it. it

A THENS.

101

interesting relic of these tombs, I mean those little terra-cotta figures, which are found not only in Attica, but in far greater numbers at the necropolis in Bceotia, and indeed in most old Greek cemeteries in Cyrene, of

Tanagra

Rhodes, Greece, and Asia Minor.

These

figurines are, like the

tomb

reliefs,

of very various merit, a really well-

modelled one being very rare, and of a very great market value, so
so that they are now frequently counterfeited. They were evidently found in every house as to be

much

children's toys or as ornaments,

and

the making of them was a recognised trade with a definite name

(Kopo-n-XdOos).

Nobody
so

can

tell

why
in

frequently they tombs, for these tombs are surely not all those of children, and we do

are

found

not see any possibility of a religious

in them. The significance that these remains graceful

fact
little

figures,

were

groups of two figures, produced from the time of Plato onward, perhaps earlier, but not in most of our examples third reaching back further than the century. But we have no certain clue
or
to their dates.

What
learned
that

will

surprise

the
is

unfind
in

spectator the costume of the

figures,

most

to

women
the
lost

these

which,
the
differs

by

way,

often retain

colouring

on
the

the

statues,

much from

draping
heroines,
to

of

the

and

what

of the MUFFLED FIGURE, TANAGRA. dressing hair and the shady hats are quite what an elegant woman in the nineteenth century would adopt. This that the terra-cotta striking contrast, in which we may be perfectly sure and conventional were the figurines express actual life, shows how very ideal It is often complained that the types and figures representing the gods.

costume.

we The

goddesses approaches closely should call modern

and

Greek gods were purely anthropomorphic,

that

they

made

their

Divinities

102

GREEK PICTURES.

mere human beings with passions like themselves. This is indeed generally true, but if we consider the huge differences between the types of ladies in the figurines and of goddesses in the statues, we can well conceive that the gods, though of human shape, may have been felt very remote from ordinary life, and of so exalted a type as to preclude all physical comparison. I say this not in defence, but in mitigation of Greek idolatry. We may be sure that the use of these small ornaments and toys increased in the period when the Athenians had laid aside epic and tragic tastes, and were content with genteel comedy and ordinary life. Just as poetry went through all its greater phases, to end with the trilling elegy and smart epigram, so the plastic arts decayed, and mere household or We find, indeed, at personal ornaments represented the art of the nation. Athens numerous rude portrait statues of Romans donations, perhaps, or in Athenian the of days beggary, set up to flattering acknowledgments some Italian benefactor. We know that such men as Herod and Attains I.,
;

up large porticoes, or temples, or rows of But the Greeks themselves only produced here and statues, in Greek cities. for the rest they there a school of sculpture which worked for Roman patrons were content to admire the accumulated wealth of their former greatness.
as

well

as

the

Ptolemies,

set

ANCIENT GREEK METHODS OF DRESSING THE HAIR.

(FROM THE TANAGRA FIGURINES.)

-.--

..

..

1
S5*
f~-

1 J"*3^i^3iSte>i*p ^S*>S'^ fiil-i'^iV-

!1" 1

i "" ''* .-'^"'t*v*!>tiii'*l!iv-' '*

l

J*Jcta:M
r

-^^f^M;^^,
^--^iai^f^^

i^!te^ -^-? ; '^*ted|

THE LAURIUM SILVER MINES

IN

GREECE.

CHAPTER

VII.

CHRISTIAN ATHENS.
is

not

till

yesterday that

the

smallest

interest

has

arisen

An occasional public for the Christian remains at Athens. indeed spoke of Byzantine churches and the relics of Prankish knights, but not even the fact that Shakspere laid the scene of a romantic play at Athens, and gave a mediaeval title to the hero, Theseus, could wake any general interest in the city from which the pagan gods had departed When I first visited Greece in 1875, not only did no one regret the many
enthusiast

IT cultivated

among

the

ancient

churches

which

had

been

taken

clown

new cathedral, but there was serious Church of Kapnikarsea because it stood in the middle of Hermes Street, and so far obstructed the thoroughfare that the road went round it on either side. Up to yesterday not a thought was spent on these things, and all the dominations of Franks, Venetians, Turks, were lumped together into the period of decay and ruin, when nothing was worth studying about the place.
hideous

give materials for the talk of pulling down the old

to

Happily things are now rapidly changing. The presence at the English school of M. Schultz, a competent architect and artist, who devotes his time to this stratum of Attic remains, and that of M. Strekowski at the

German

school,

who

is

likewise learned in the

mediaeval side of Greek

art,

have awakened even the modern Greeks, so that a new field of interest, a new field of research, has been added to all those already existing in that The Church of Arta, the Pha;neromene at Salamis, the marvellous land.

104

GREEK PICTURES.

monastery of Daphne, the ruins of Mistra, are now favourite places to visit, and to admire. The larger histories of Finlay and Hopf on Mediaeval Greece
Gregorovius' recent History of Athens in the Rliddlc Ages, while fine books on the Byzantine art of Salonica, Trebizond, Constantinople, and Mount Athos, are disclosing to the intelligent traveller what he will find to admire in districts till now only
are

being

supplemented by special books,

like

visited for sport or adventure.

triumphed in this pagan Holy of Holies, the new religion seems to have been most eager to reconsecrate every spot Some few once dedicated to an idol for the purposes of Christian worship. the saviour of shrines, such as the temple of Asclepius, who had posed as but elsewhere the old temples were men, were deliberately destroyed It is to transformed into churches or chapels with very little alteration. this that we owe the preservation of the Parthenon, Erechtheum, and Temple
Christianity at last
;

When

of

Theseus.

But

in

hundred

other

cases

Athens was

filled

with

tiny

chapels on every spot -where an idol had been set up, so that the proportion of church room was vastly in excess of any possible congregation.

When
small
antiquarians themselves. the
real

was
to
It

in

Salonica

in

the

Byzantine

chapels in various the theory that rich

spring of 1889, parts of the town

citizens

new
had

discoveries
led

ot

the

local
for

got

private

chapels

built

seems

solution.

to me that the feeling I have just explained gives us The new Creed was afraid to leave any spot once

hallowed with the old associations untouched and unconverted, and so these shrines, in which perhaps service was but seldom held, were merely meant to occupy the ground claimed from the expelled deities.

complete change of external religion (even when lingered), comes at last a partial change of population. Hordes of Slavic tribes, ever since the first great invasion of Alaric (395 A.D.), had made their way into Greece, and settled in many places. It was once

Together with
beliefs
still

this

old

a popular theory of Fallmerayer, a

good deal favoured by Finlay

differences
faults of

in

his later

and disappointed days, when his personal Government led him to attribute to them thought foreign to the ideal Greeks for
these

with

the

new Greek

whom

heredity which he had he spent his life, that

is

Slavonic inroads, lasting

that

for several

centuries, gradually

old population, so

what we now have betore us

posing
as

replaced the Slavonic nation,

teachers

speaking

Greek, and

the

descendants

of our

old

and

masters, the Hellenes.

This theory, which though overdriven, had considerable facts to support now been reduced to its proper limits. It is certain that the cities it, at least were not Slavised, and that the tenacious culture of the old Greeks was able to conquer and assimilate these foreign elements. There are many such cases known to history, not indeed always where the higher and better Thus in our own day, or least our own century, there elements prevailed.
has

CHRISTIAN ATHENS.
were no more

105

rowdy

or

improvident

Irishmen

th;m

the

Galway

squires,

were descended from English of Dublin has been settled and inThe settlers not very long ago. city habited by Danes (Northmen) and English for centuries, and has even lost the use of its old language, and yet will anyone entering that city deny .ill The invaded people, if not formally that it is a thoroughly Irish town ? of which we know no historical examples, always remain the

who show by

their English

names

that they

extirpated,

themselves majority, and reassert as national in characteristics,

soon as intermarriages and other intercourse bring the victorious

minority into close contact with the established habits of their

'*.>.

'

f\

v/

<,{**-/ /.T>,

,">-

'V'^T-vvT

/:>",

'S>

\V

J/f*K)

new

habits based upon and other requirethe climate ments of the country. Even the victorious Alaric seems to have

home

been

so

civilisation

impressed with the of Athens, that he

spared her monuments as well and it is not a as her religion as has been little remarkable,
;

Gregopagan which and their splendour gods saved Athens, while Rome was protected from the same barrovius,

noted

by the
that

historian

it

was the

barian conqueror by
bishop.

its

Christian

The
far

more

city of at the

Athens suffered hands of Chris-

tian

emperors carrying away its treasures to set up at Constantinople

vaders.

than

But

from barbarian init is indeed strange

DETAILS OF BY/ANTINE CHURCH ORNAMENTATION.

and

word of notice. Many of them, such as the great statues of Athene in and beside the Parthenon, vanish in silence. I take the new barbarian or Slavonic elements in the Greek nation to have aided in both these results in the more easy reception of
a
offered no firm resistance, as well as and ignorance of the artistic value of the discarded images of the deposed gods. Eortunately the invading Huns and
Christianity, to
in

affecting how at this period of noblest statues disappear, with hardly

the

Christianisation

of

Greece, her

which

their

traditions

the growing

carelessness

io6

CREEK PICTURES.

Vandals, as well as most of the Goths, passed by the Greek peninsula to seek homes or plunder further west, and so the light of culture in the former died a natural, and therefore a slower death. The edict of Justinian

made

so

little
1

noise,

that

its

very

existence

is

now doubted

by many

authorities.

and gradual decay, together with the resetting of all the with Christian emblems without revolution or bloodshed, is probably temples the main reason why the history of early Christian Athens with its new
This slow shrouded in impenetrable mist. There is a Liber with care the history of the analogous changes at Pontificalis, preserving Rome at Athens not even the list of the early Christian bishops has been
Byzantine architecture
is
;

unsupported legend that the series began with As regards the churches convert, Dionysius the Areopagite. actually built, and not set up in accommodated heathen temples, the best architects will not refer them to the early date of such churches as St.
preserved,
St.

except

in

the

Paul's

Sophia,

or

St.

George of Salonica.
latter
taller

The mere
church,
in
is

stumpy and the multiplied cupolas are

regards
these

cupola, as seen in the

rotunda, with its flat and replaced by a richer design,

to

proportion

modern
the

churches, there exists extraordinary While one ascribes the descriptions of Athens.
century,

the building. But as variation in the several

oldest

of

them

to

as dating from the twelfth. has been made in the general progress understanding of Byzantine architecture. They would be impossible and absurd as regards either Greek, classical, or Gothic structures. 2 In a book intended for Christian readers I shall be expected to give

fourth

another speaks

of

them

Such variations only show how

little

special

attention

to

this

hitherto
for a

apologise for

keeping them
so
essential
Still,

they

consider

neglected side of Greece, and will not few pages from the topics which, perhaps, to a book upon Greece, that any parenthesis is
face

somewhat
Protestant

resented.

in

of

the

frequent

proposals

to

unite

the

Church of England with the old Orthodox Church of Eastern Europe and Asia Minor, it cannot be without importance to hear what is I will even the condition as to churches and ritual of the Orthodox Church. in due time take the reader beyond the limits of the kingdom to the heart and centre of that church, the famous promontory of Mount Athos, where

we may

best study the religion of that branch of Christianity. Indeed, the recent journey I made to that seat of learning and asceticism was specially intended to obtain information on this very important question of international
ecclesiastical policy.
is very remarkable that among all the various nationalities which a gained place upon the Byzantine throne, we do not find a single Athenian,

It

The very

Cf. the question discussed in Gregorovius' Athens, I., p. 56. practical and accurate guide-book, written for Baedeker

on

this

department of Attic antiquities, and prudently avoids

all

by my friend Dr. Lolling, mention of specific dates.

is

almost

silent

CHRISTIAN ATHENS.

107

nor do the Middle Ages afford us the name of a single eminent man from that former hotbed of intellectual On the other hand, three greatness.

Athenian ladies attained the dignity of empress Athenais, daughter of the philosopher Leontius, who became the empress of Theodosius II., under the name of Eudocia (421 A.D.) Irene, married to Leo IV. (before his accession) in 770, and Theophan, taken from her former husband and married in 807
;

to the

Ceesar Staurakios, the co-regent of

Nikephoros.

The

last-named had

THE CHURCH OF but

ST.

THEODORE AT ATHENS.

time of greatness, and disappeared after two years into a But the former two were great people in their day the first in obtaining relief from State burdens for her oppressed country, but unable to stem the tide of the new faith, which she was compelled to adopt at her marriage, and to which she was by heredity opposed. Indeed, the legends attribute to her no doubt falsely the building of twelve churches in newlyChristianised Athens. Irene comes in the time of the great conflict about that conflict now represented by the images, divergence between the Puritan
convent.

a short

io8

GREEK
ideal,

PICTURES.
her
forerunner
Athenais, was obliged under the shadow

and the Catholic

and

she,

like

to abjure her old convictions in favour of images, learned of the Parthenon, for the reformed faith. The death of

her weak husband

supported in her broke her solemn image-party, abjuration. Her machinations, always instinct with a deep interest for her old country, where she subdued Slavic invaders and built churches, and the vicissitudes of her life, ranging from her proposed marriage with Charlemagne to her exile and death at Lesbos, make her quite one of the most striking female The Church was not ashamed to reckon this figures in the Middle Ages. it adventuress who murdered her own son among its saints was her reward for recovering the right to set up images in churches, which her influence carried at the seventh (Ecumenical Council of Niccea, in 787 A.D. I saw at the great convent of Lavra, on Mount Athos, an entry in the huge Byzantine handwriting of that day, commemorating her benevolences I do not think the text implied any visit to that seat to the monks.
in

780 left her ambition by the

practically

empress,
ior

and

then

she

was

whom

she

of piety.

As

three Athenian

ladies

ascended

the

throne of the Eastern Caesars,

so three emperors in these early days are known to have visited Athens Zeno, the Isaurian, in 486, Constans II., in 662, and Basil II., in 1014.

The
facts

first
;

visit

the second and third,

excited no comment, and is merely to be inferred from other made by the emperors either at the opening or

a great campaign, were great events in their day. Constans found Athens formally under the new faith but many must have been the
the
close of
;

suggestions of paganism in the remaining monuments and the old superstitions of the people. Nothing seems to have helped the change more than
the easy transference of the virgin goddess of the Parthenon into the Virgin Mother of Christ. The magnificent temple of the former was changed into The west wall was broken through the metropolitan church of the latter.

an apse was let in, and a vaulted or cupola roof, such an entrance The inner surfaces were find in almost all Byzantine churches. covered with pictures of Christian saints, while from the outer walls the pediments, and metopes, and friezes of Phidias looked down with stony contempt on the degenerate age which could not understand their perfection. Constans may, as Gregorovius suggests, already have heard in this reformed
for
;

as

we

temple the popular hymn to the Virgin, composed by the Patriarch Sergius Hail thou that showest philosophers to be in 626, which commences hail thou hail thou that provest the cunning to be without sense fools
'
' : ;

that

unweavest the subtle meshes of the Athenians,' etc., nearly every line the dole of idols, the asophy of containing a pun which defies translation of the and so forth. philosophy, alogy technology, Basil II. came at the moment of his great and barbarous victory over
1

W.

Christ, Anthol.

Grizca, farm.

Christ (Lips.,

1871), p.

140, sq.

CHRISTIAN ATHENS.

109

the Bulgarians, when he had sent home 15,000 prisoners with their eyes and yet Basil, after this hideous act, put out to their defeated sovereign in the same and Thus worships presents it with precious gifts. great shrine,
;

and famous mosaic picture of the Virgin, porphyry pillars, its golden dove hanging from the roof, the emblem of the Holy Ghost, its jewelled robes and mitres for the bishops, the Parthenon becomes again noted by stray chroniclers as one of the Basil II. orders richest and most famous churches of Eastern Christendom. additional paintings to be made within its walls, and we can guess very well in a general way what these decorations were like from the traditional school of Panselones at Mount Athos, together with the official book there preserved, which tells us exactly how each saint and angel must be
defaced within, with with its cupola and
its
its

new

apse,

represented

I will not now pursue the fortunes of orthodoxy. Christian Athens beyond the year 1000, for I know that this comparatively new subject must be administered in small and easy doses. The contacts

to

satisfy

of

Normans and Franks with Eastern Christendom must be reserved

for

another chapter, when

my readers have heard something more of the classical remains, as well as the actual condition of the country.

'

.>,,

HEAD-DRESSES FROM THE TANAGRA FIGURINES.

CHAPTER
BCEOTIA.

VIII.

WE
historic
;

have perhaps delayed too long

the

in

Attica,

reader

over some
almost
as

other

historical

and must hasten scenes, about which

of
Attica.

to take

cluster

memories

splendid

as

those

The most

and rival of Athens all through her history was Thebes and had Thebes succeeded in amalgamating Bceotia with herself at an early date, after the manner of the legendary, but very real unification of Attica under Theseus, it is more than likely that Thebes would have For the been the real capital of Northern Greece in Hellas proper. and so of was rich Boeotia fruitful, especially very territory long as the Lake Copais in its centre was kept drained a piece of economy hardly
important

neighbour

ever practised since the days of the mythical Minyans who made Orchomenos The Theban the leading town of Boeotia down to the operations of 1886. in when was handled, superior always, properly fighting power to infantry and battles for of wars which the land and the the hoplite Attica, perpetual

they called it Mars' Parade must have inured the sounds and sights of war. Nevertheless Thebes and the surrounding Bceotia are only redeemed from the obscurity of Acarnania or Locris by this fact the constant recurrence of battles, and by the very occasional and sudden arising of some genius of the highest order, whom even Attic jealousy and detraction could

was but too notorious

peasant to the

B(EOTIA.

not class

among

the

Boeotian

pigs.

As

regards

the former point,

it

is

not

merely that famous fights, where famous men fell, were frequent in that hillsurrounded plain, but that several times the whole fate of Greece was Here are some of these capital determined by a single battle in Bceotia. In 478 B.C. the question of Persian domination over Greece was cases. the defeat and death of Mardonius at Plataea. Passing by finally settled by the great battles of the Peloponnesian War, the Spartan rule over Greece The liberties of was crushed by Epaminondas at Leuctra in 371 B.C. Greece finally succumbed to Philip at Chaeronea in 338, and to Alexander
at

Thebes
B.C.

Asiatic

The great issue between ;the 335 B.C. Mithridates was decided by the other great
in

Roman
fight

Sylla

and the
in

of Chaeronea

the later great Roman conflicts were decided further north, of Greece was certainly once more decided by the great the possession defeat of Walter de Brienne, Duke of Athens, with all his knights by

86

And

if

the

grand Catalan
i5th,

company
catalogue

of

Spanish
surely

mercenaries
to

near Orchomenos

on

March

1311 A.n.
is

This

strange
events.

enough

give

among

historians,

historical

to whom great battles are more important To those who desire intellectual glories

dignity to a country than any other

as a guarantee

for the greatness of Bceotia, the list opens with Hesiod, the rival, and even The earliest Greek the successful rival, according to legend, of Homer.

farming quite naturally comes into literature through a Boeotian singer. Then we have the Phoenix Pindar, matchless among lyric poets, and Corinna, who with Sappho vindicates the literary fame of the female sex among the Greeks.

and perhaps the greatest of Greek strategists and tacticians, in the proper sense, and his companion Pelopidas, were in their Then, after a long interval, comes the generation the first men in Greece. Chaeronean Plutarch, who in his own person makes a St. Martin's summer in Greek literature, and has perhaps influenced the world more than any Even in the mediaeval other single name in the whole of Greek letters. of St. Omer on the Cadmea of and castle the pleasaunce splendid gloom, of the acts St. Luke, attest that both Thebes, and the wonderful younger distinction in Bceotia than could be and asceticism attained higher luxury claimed either by Athens or by any other Greek city in the Middle Ages. We must not therefore accept the jibes of the witty Athenians, in whose assumed contempt of the Boeotians there lay the same suspicion of conscious But it was the inferiority that lies in the Irish ridicule of English stolidity.
Epaminondas, the
first

real misfortune of this important province or division of Thebes never attained to the complete supremacy gained

Hellas, that while

Athens,

in

their

respective

districts,

the lesser

towns,

by Argos, Sparta, such as Thespise,

never were able to stand independent and alone, and develop themselves into a separate stream of history beside the predominant was in fact a case of that partial It and often domineering Thebes.

Orchomenos,

Plataea,

112

GREEK PICTURES.
it

conquest which carries with

all

the disadvantages both of independence and

of subjection. Let us now therefore, without prejudice, leave Attica, and take a ramble It is separated from Attica by so complex through this interesting country.
a chain of mountains and defiles that no
traveller

can

be

surprised

at

the

contrasts

of
all

the

surmount
Citharron

It requires hours of driving or riding to two countries. the passes round Phyle or west of Eleusis, and penetrate over

Ki'theron, as they

pronounce it to the historic site of the border town of Plataea. I have in another work described the way, which passes by one of the
finest extant

Greek

forts

that

known

as Eleutherae

which unfortunately has not been pictured, so far as I know, since Dodwell brought out in the beginning of the century his famous

The ArcJi&ological Tour in Greece. of the fort is position closely analogous

to

that

have already described

very
first
is

at

Phyle.

The
the

place

on
its

our deor

scent into Boeotia

Platsea,

rather
site

miserable
so

village
in

on
the

Plataea

famous
less

thrilling

narrative of the ninth

dotus,
terrible

hardly
picture
its

book of Herofamous in the

records

of Thucydides, who sudden seizure in peace by

the Thebans, then, after their massacre, its great siege by the Lacedaemonians,

ending

with

its

surrender

after

the

by which most of night TEREA-COTTA FIGURINE, TANAGRA. the garrison escaped, and then the debate and judicial massacre of the contorted rhetoric does Thucydides and crabbed remainder. Nowhere in his approach real eloquence more than in the spirited defence he puts into the There is, then, no small town in mouth of the surrendering Plateaus. Greece with a more brilliant history, and none more completely effaced Nor has it attained as yet since its ruin by the Spartans and Thebans. its But day may yet come. any new celebrity by reason of excavations. From its streets, or, when it was fortified, from its walls, it was easy to command a view of all the hither plain of Boeotia. For Bceotia consists of two plains, separated by a low saddle of land, and surrounded with high
adventure,

BOLOTIA.

"3
rivers,

mountains,
country.

from the slopes of which tumble

flowing

inward into the

Thebes is now among the most uninteresting in Greece. Very few antiquities have been found there, nor is there, as at Tanagra, that rich treasure of tombs with their charming terra-cotta figurines, which It have taught us so much about the every-day dress of Greek ladies. is from these, some of them in house dress, some muffled for cold out of doors, that we find out how very different from ordinary life were the dresses of the statues of the gods and goddesses, which were once supposed

The

city of

to be taken
to

by the sculptors from actual life. Indeed, anyone who attempts drape herself in the garb of a Greek statue will find no small difficulty

SPECIMENS OF GREEK ARTISTIC DRESS.

doing, and for that reason we add to our pictures from the Tanagra figurines two studies of the method of assuming the classic garb, so majestic and apparently simple, in Greek statuary, where a single garment falls in
in

so

beautiful lines about the figure. It must be remembered that

dress, just as

our Greek statues are all in conventional our modern statues, which represent men not only in classical garb but in obsolete armour, or in knee-breeches and or some other bygone fashion, which is thought more dignified. pig-tails, sure that even the terra-cotta figurines are strictly true to ordinary not am I

much

as almost

all

life,

and so give a picture the work no doubt of reconstruction from the imagination which may possibly give a view as near to actual life as maybe of the interior of a Greek house, with the women at work.

114

GREEK PICTURES.
as the

The Greek mansion was always framed on the same plan it was a square palaces in Italy, which now represent it
:

modern

or

squares of

building round an open court, ornamented within with fountains and statues. The rooms round the court opened upon a colonnade, through which light reached the rooms, which were small, not well ventilated, and very dark, if we are to trust the evidence of Pompeii. But we must remember that the climate was hot, and that all public business was clone in the market-place,
or in large theatres constructed
for

the

purpose.

The

interior aspect of

ORDINARY GREEK DRESS.

Greek house,
refined
like

as given than splendid.

in
It

the

accompanying plate, was rather graceful and was only in Roman days that palaces grew up

our modern great private houses. All traces of the Cadmea, once a great and mighty fortress, are nowBut that is to be accounted for by the fact that the knights of the gone. noble family of St. Omer had made there the most splendid mediaeval
residence in Prankish Greece.
It

was the favourite

Attic

resort

of the

Dukes

of

Athens,

who

preferred

it

to

their

dominion.
frescoes,

pleasaunce was adorned with mosaics and

This famous castle and and is described as fit for

SCEOTIA.
an
old

emperor

in

the Chronicle of the Morca.

utilised
for
this

No

doubt

;ill

the

ruins of the

palace, where dwelt for a century the ideal of chivalry mailed knights that seemed giants to the Greeks, fair ladies with fairer provinces as their dower, troubadours, and minstrels. The court at Thebes as French as the Parisians and on Burgundian spoke good their way to the Holy Land the Crusaders loved to dally in this fascinating The deliberate and complete destruction of the outpost of Prankish culture.
;

Cadmea were

AlILA WITH

I'R.fcSTAS.

Castle by the brutal Catalans has deprived us of a very valuable and curious specimen of mediaeval architecture.
St.

Omer
Not

were wanting other Prankish castles in Greece. They crown many through the Morea with their bold remains, and under the modern Greek name of Palceocastra not less than one hundred We know that the castle of Clarentza in and fifty have been identified. Elis, of which a great tower remains, was also a happy resort for pilgrimthat there

noble sites

ii6

GREEK PICTURES.

knights on their way to Cyprus and Jerusalem, and the ruins of Mistra still show remains of solid and ornamental thirteenththe mediaeval Sparta century building.
for pleasure
;

But the
of

rest

seem

built in haste,

and

for

war rather than

that
that

so steep a

cliff

Hugo de Bruyeres at Karytena in Arcadia stands on we wonder how horses could have been brought into it.
to

There are many, however, which are due not

the Prankish but to the Venetian conquerors. The Prankish conquest of Constantinople in 1204 carried in its train this curious occupation of Greece for a century by these adventurers, who

them their language, their religion, their poetry, and their life, and who lived apart as a strange dominant race in their castles over a vastly more numerous submissive population of Greeks, who found these new masters perhaps less oppressive than the Byzantine governors. For
brought
with

manner of

Byzantine corruption in provincial administration may be compared with the worst days of the Roman praetors and proconsuls. Perhaps the only serious oppression now attempted was that by the Latin clergy, who tried to proselytise

Greek brethren, and wrest into property of the Orthodox Church.

their

their

own hands
ruling

all

the ecclesiastical

The
clerics,

curbed the grasping ambition of the

dioceses
still

survived, so that with the solid of the Greeks, a successful resistance was made to the

seem to have and many Greek churches and traditions and superior learning
knights
Latin invasion.

The

people adhered to their old ways, and when the conquerors were overthrown their influence vanished, and they left little trace of their occupation beyond their vacant and deserted castles. Once more the toughness or indeed the civilisation asserted itself. What hordes of of the Greek indestructibility Shu- barbarians could not do, companies of knights and missions of monks and bishops could not do more effectually. But the isolation of the races made this result inevitable. We know that the conquerors never thought of The Latin priests tried to force on adopting the language of the country. who an used people indigenous Liturgy the jargon of an unknown tongue. The minstrels ol the court not only sang in old French or Provencal, but It is very remarkable wholly ignored all the legends and glories of Greece. that even the conquered masses learned more of Western, than the Western

There are now published Greek mediaeval conquerors of Greek, literature. of Greek heroes features from which weave into the adventures epics Prankish legends so that actually in this obscure literature, only known to
;

the students of mediaeval Greek, there are some traces of what Gregorovius picturesquely calls the marriage of Faust and Helen.
'

The
wrecked
brief
1

vacant and modern Thebes, where even the in our day by earthquakes, and where

new houses have been now nothing seems

cultivated but

gardens of roses, is perhaps the best halting-place for this digression upon one of the most curious and neglected moments of
is

This

an allusion to the second part of Goethe's

/J.v../,

where

this

union has

its

mysiical meaning.

BCEOTIA.

117

to Athens and importance, especially on account of its silk manufactories, which had attracted many Jews, and which was an industry so thriving that

Greek

history.

In

those

days

Thebes was confessedly superior

in

wealth
the

conquered Bceotia, they took care to carry off to Sicily growers and weavers, in order to naturalise that in their Western craft Unless there may be some precious kingdom. I since saw the a few plain improvement years ago, its agriculture has gone back to the condition of old Hesiod, who in his U'orks and Days gives many advices, but omits all mention of manuring the land. If the farmer can move from field to field and take up fallow or unused land, when hehas for the moment exhausted his former holding, such an omission does not matter and this no doubt was the state of Bceotia in Hesiod's day. Such the new in of Greece till the been recent it has kingdom vigour and firmness of the Tricoupis Government has established safety, and so promoted industry throughout the land. There is no doubt that the soil of Boeotia is very rich and fertile, and ought to supply the growing capital with many things which come a long way in ships, especially with meat, which is now chiefly supplied in tins from America, for there is good grazing land here, while there is none in Attica. Hesiod, indeed, on the slopes of Ascra, speaks of the climate as bitter in winter, severe in summer, never pleasant, and the
first

when

Normans

a large number of the

silk

land he cultivated was probably not in the depth of the rich plain. But his tame and prosaic advices are in great contrast to Pindar's richness, who, if any poet can, reflects the deep soil, the fatness, the luxury of Boeotian life.
chastity of style which breathes the light air of Attic soil. The other towns in this Theban plain which once had a name were Tanagra in the north, the scene of more than one battle between Athenians Leuctra in the south, on the way to the Isthmus, where and Thebans his new tactics crushed the Spartan supremacy in a day with Epaminondas and Thespiae, mentioned by Aristotle for its exclusive con(371 B.C.) stitution, seeing that no tradesman might walk the agora of the privileged
;

There is no dry and pure

poet

more un-Attic

in

his

splendour,

more foreign

to

that

he had abandoned his money-making for ten years mentioned by later writers for its famous Eros of Praxiteles, which tourists thronged to see, which was plundered by Nero, restored, and then lost in the decay of
classes
till
;

all

the art of Greece.

So

it

is

where we cannot evoke great even to desolation and decay.

excavations
in

hardly a mile of this land memories which lend an imperishable charm The American school has recently undertaken
that

there

is

as yet the results are

Tanagra, but literally open up the soil, we may hope for striking discoveries, but the strange barrenness of results in the line which goes by the Isthmus to Patras makes us less Here, however, all deep cuttings were either unnecessary or were hopeful.
the
part
this

northern
not

of

plain,

not far

from

accessible.

\Yhenever railways

avoided, and so perhaps such finds as that of the

Roman

necropolis of

York

iiS

GREEK PICTURES.
to

were not
ancient

be expected.

Still,

Bceotia,

we may be

a country so densely populated as the certain that large disturbance of the soil will
in

certainly produce some startling discoveries. Let us now pass from the plain of Thebes

to

the

more western

plain

of Orchornenos,

recently occupied over more than halt its area by the It is lake. Copaic separated by a mere saddle of ground from the Theban In old days, district, and yet its history has been in many respects distinct. when the so-called Minyae were in Greece, Orchomenos was their principal We see upon the acropolis the walls of that stronghold, and stronghold.
till

Dr.

Schliemann

has

lately

excavated

the

great
in

tomb,

known

as

their

treasure-house to Pausanias.
for battles,

The

lesser

towns

this plain are also

famous

If the and battles often analogous to those of the Theban land. Spartans and Athenians crushed the eastern invaders ot Greece on the battlefield of Platea, the valour and efficiency of Sylla's Roman legions, deof Cha-ronea, feating vast numbers by discipline and steadiness on the plain had which Oriental the of the crushed Mithridates, poured out great army If Greek met Greek in the fatal tug of war at its multitudes over Greece. defeated Thebans where Leuctra, Spartan invaders, Greek met Macedonian on the plain of Choeronea also, when the heavy cavalry and phalanx of In each battle Philip overthrew the best infantry of Athens and of Thebes. the effect of an a in war new power a new genius showed Epaminondas attacking column at one point of the enemy's line, Alexander the similar I have already spoken of the famous effect of a charge of heavy cavalry.

battle of 1311

A.D.,

when

of that
knights,

arm

in

war

the Spanish over the feudal

to their

infantry re-established the superiority cavalry, cut to pieces the Frankish

'.

and succeeded

dominion.

these plains are peculiarly picturesque, the Attic side, looking towards the east, the rich slopes gloomy Cithaeron on of Helicon, which bound Bceotia on the south, sending their numerous silvery streams to water the over-fertile marshes about Copais to the west the
giant
loftier

The mountains which surround

veiling his head in the and gloomier mountains which make So here Switzerland of Northern Greece. of the which has section separate country,

Parnassus,

clouds,

the

outpost

of

the

still

Acarnania the true a distinctive and we have again an almost isolated position, and
of the general state
for

yEtolia and

follows out

its

o\vn interests, to the

damage or detriment
they
the

of

Greece.

The

Boeotians were

never famed
could

broad patriotism
to

what
their

Greeks
ambition
given,

indeed

ever

were

unless

contrive

cloak
rest

under plausible names.

are told, to

And

Bojotians
so

above
that

the

were
of
days,

we

sensual

things

described

by

and when no

law

Polybius, business had

1

when

luxury, so much there were

the

condition

more
for

festivals

than

altogether impossible.

seems to us of the the character country is redeemed Fortunately

been
transacted
years,
'

Of.

my

Girtk Life

and Thought,

\>.

467.

BCEOTIA.

119

days by the brilliant and gentle genius of Plutarch, who tells us that he dwelt in his small and deserted Chaeronea, lest it might grow smaller. 'The fort on the rock (called Petrachus in old days) is, indeed, very
in

later

large

perhaps the largest we saw

;

in

Greece, with the exception of that at

and, as usual in these buildings, the wall follows the steepest escarpments, raising the natural precipice by a coping of beautifully hewn and fitted The artificial wall is now not more than four or five feet square stones.

Corinth

but even so, there are only two or three places where it is at all high easy to enter the enclosure, which is fully a mile of straggling outline on the rock. The view from this fort is very interesting, commanding all the of the Lake Copais, it also gives a view of the sides of Parnassus, plain
;

and of the passes into Phocis, which cannot be seen till the traveller Above all, it looks out upon the gate of Elatea, about reaches this point. ten miles north-west, through which the eye catches glimpses of secluded
valleys in Northern Phocis. Having surveyed the view, and fatigued ourselves greatly by our climb in the summer heat, we descended to the old theatre, cut into the rock
'

where it ascends from the village the smallest and steepest Greek theatre I had ever seen. But, small as it is, there are few more interesting places than the only spot in Chceronea where we can say with certainty that here Plutarch sat a man who, living in an age of decadence, and in a country
of no importance, has, nevertheless, as much as any of his countrymen, made his genius felt all over the world. Apart from the great stores of history brought together in his Lives, which, indeed, even now are our
village

Greeks of the greatest epochs, the moral effect of these splendid biographies, both on From Shakpoets and politicians through Europe, can hardly be overrated. speare and Alfieri to the wild savages of the French Revolution, all kinds of patriots and eager spirits have been fascinated and excited by these wonderful Alfieri even speaks of them as the great discovery of his life, portraits. which he read with tears and with rage. There is no writer of the Silver
only
source
for

the

inner

life

and

spirit

of the

greatest

Age who
authors,

gives us anything

their general her best days, the personal features of Pericles, Cimon, Alcibiades, Nicias, as well as of Themistocles and of Aristicles, would be completely, or almost completely, lost, if this often despised but invaluable man had not And he is still more essentially a good man a written for our learning. man better and purer than most Greeks another Herodotus in fairness and

and

much valuable information about earlier More especially the inner history of character.
like so

Athens

in

in

we were obliged to leave this most interesting on our ride home to Lebadea. We had not gone a place, we most town when came the mile from the upon pathetic and striking of the famous lion of Chseronea, which the the remains in that country all
'

honesty. As the day was waning,

and

set off again

120

GREEK PICTURES.
set

countrymen who had fallen in the great battle It is of bluish-grey stone, against Philip of Macedon in the year 338 B.C. and is a work of the it Boeotian marble or limestone, call highest and they The lion is of that Asiatic type which has little or no mane, purest merit. and seemed to us couchant or sitting in attitude, with the head not lowered The expression of the face is ideally to the fore paws, but thrown up. perfect rage, grief, and shame are expressed in it, together with that The noble calmness and moderation which characterise all Greek art.

Thebans

up

to

their

object of the monument is simple, notice of Pausanias

quite
"
:

plain without

reading the

affecting,

though
"

On
in

tomb of the Boeotians who

tion
;

fell

but the image of a lion is of these men. The inscription has

is the the approach to the city," says he, It has no with the battle inscripPhilip. of the it as an emblem spirit placed upon

been omitted I suppose, because the gods had willed that their fortune should not be equal to their valour."' It is, I think, rather remarkable, that after Thebes had so long, in the Middle Ages, taken the lead from Athens, on account of the richness of its it should itself have given way to soil and its valuable silk manufacture, was made old which Livadia, the Lebadea, by the Turks the capital of this No doubt Livadia holds the keys of the roads province of their dominions. from Salona through Phocis, and so bars the way from western to eastern But then Elatea is just as important a pass from the north, Hellas by road. It is and so perhaps is Oropus, the northern town on the way into Attica. were the real reasons more than probable therefore that hygienic determinants,
1

and that the malarious character of the Boeotian plain was the real cause of We have the same causes here active that the desertion of the old capital. are so striking in that part of Italy which the Greeks had once peopled Where once with many rich towns, I mean the coasts of Magna Graecia. and the climate wholekept great wealth and industry tilled all the land, some, there is now such malaria, that the traveller along the line which
passes through the cities of Metapontum, Sybaris, Locri, down to Rhegium, sees at every station in the summer fever-stricken officials attended by
doctors,

When the themselves ordinary officials of the railway company. and bridges are broken by the torrents which rush from the now stripped barren mountains, it is hardly possible to mend them in summer, from the prostration of all the workmen with fever, whereas during most of the winter Yet formerly the superior the water is too high to permit any repairs. races had solved this and Italian and the of the Greek diligence energy
health

problem

and

overcome
1

this

difficulty,

which

puzzles

the

modern

engineer.
Rambles and Studies
in

Greece,

pp. 227-233.

MOUNT

PARNASSUS.

CHAPTER
PHOCIS

IX.

DELPHL

WE
at

start from Livadia into the Alps of Phocis, a country always poor, never remarkable for great men, but nevertheless very prominent

certain

moments

of

Greek

history.

There

is

hardly

any

distinction

between the adjoining districts of Phocis and Doris, which latter was always held to be the cradle of that Dorian race which once conquered the PeloponThe nesus, and ever after took the lead beside Athens in the Greek world. as had a mountaineers, Phocians, being hardy good reputation fighting men, which absorbed all the poorer population, armies the in mercenary especially But Phocis, unlike the sister that dwelt in barren glens and gorges. a was and Acarnania, districts of /Etolia thoroughfare for all the civilised world, since in its centre was the great temple, oracle, and bank of Delphi, of Livadia, or by sea from the Gulf approached either from Bceotia by way more beaten thoroughfares in the few There were probably of Salona. few roads more picturesque, or better worth while country, and, moreover,
for the

modern

tourist to attempt.

It

is

stiff

work, riding along precipices,

and up gloomy gorges, with rocks overhanging the way, and great pines

122

GREEK PICTURES.
in

sighing

the breeze.

The

country

is

now even more

desolate than

it

was

his pathetic picture of its ruin and enslavement by Yet of Macedon. twice at least, as we are told, Phocis was the centre Philip of interest in the liberation of Greece from barbarian invasion first, when a
:

when Demosthenes drew

the rich temple of Delphi, r,.c.) sought and were driven back in panic-stricken flight by the personal manifestation of the God Apollo, who crushed his foes with the aid of an earthquake, and The second instance, the left them an easy prey to the pursuing Phocians.
to rifle

division of the Persians (480

attack of the Gauls under Brennus, in 279 B.C., is reported in the last book of Pausanias with details so similar to those of Herodotus, that I have elsewhere conjectured his account to have been taken from a lost epic poet,

who

copied the narrative of Herodotus to adorn his song. These famous struggles, together with such legends as
1

the

battle

of
the

Apollo with
first

the the

Python, celebrated

in

the

extant Homeric
his
father,

Hymn, and
Laius, at

spot eastern slopes of Parnassus make of Phocis no outlying or semi-Hellenic land like /Etolia, but an Hellas which has fascinated the world. Mount integral portion of the Parnassus, too, with its snowy summit, its wild forest, its Corycian cave, has

act

in

where the

tragedy of Oedipus, road divided still shown

who
on

slew

the

become the conventional home for poetical inspiration, even down to the wretched book which sought to teach our hoys the quantities of Greek and Yet tor all that Mount Latin words, and was entitled (.iradns ad Parnassian.
Parnassus never produced, so
responses
far as

we know,

we have many, composed by the priests of have seemed with their deliberate very awful, though they may obscurity, to the anxious inquirer, have to us a very doggerel air. The best source for the extant specimens is the work of Herodotus, who quotes them on many
best poetic picture of this famous place is the beautiful play Euripides, which represents the fair boy living in the service of the temple, like another Samuel, in youth and purity, and yet made the centre of a great moral tragedy, and torn from his retreat into the turmoil
occasions.
called Ion of

a real poet Delphi, of which

for

the metrical

Our

The opening monody of this play is of royal state and a royal inheritance. among the finest passages of Greek tragedy. The only other picture of the country, and of the famous shrine, is the
work of the traveller Pausanias, to whom we owe an inestimable picture of the Greece of the second century A.D. He is particularly full and explicit on Phocis and its famous temple. Let us say a word on the important moral influence of this shrine and its effect upon Greek history. Homer speaks in the Iliad of the great wealth of the shrine and the
'
;

whole antecedents completed. But seeing that the god Apollo, though originally an Ionian god, as at Delos, was here worshipped distinctively by the Dorians, we shall not err if

Hymn

to

the

Pythian

Apollo

supposes

its

Cf.

Crak

Life

and Thought,

p.

158.

BCEOTIA.

123

consider the rise of the oracle to greatness coincident with the rise and spreading of the Dorians over Greece an event to which we can assign

we

no date, but which, on the threshold of

in legend,

comes next

after the

Trojan War, and seems

when they rose gradually came

religious world.

history. to power, confirmed the to be the Metropolitan

always used in neighbouring states were likely to quarrel, the oracle was often a peacemaker, and even acted as arbitrator a course often adopted in earlier Greek history, and in which they again anticipated the best results of our

Spartans, authority of the shrine, and so it See, so to speak, in the Greek It seems that the influence of this oracle was, in old days, the direction of good morals and of enlightenment. When

real

The

absolute

submission of the

So again, when excessive population demanded nineteenth-century culture. an outlet, the oracle was consulted as to the proper place, and the proper and so all the splendid commercial development of leader to be selected
;

the

sixth century B.C., if not produced, was at least guided and promoted the Delphic Oracle. Again, in determining the worship of other gods, by and the founding of new services to great public benefactors, the oracle

have been the acknowledged authority, thus taking the place of in Catholic Europe, as the source and origin of new dogmas, and of new worships and formularies. At the same time the treasure-house of the shrine was the largest and safest of banks, where both individuals and states might deposit treasure, and from which nay, even the states seem to have had separate chambers, in also borrow at fair times of war and public could interest, money, they The rock of Delphi was held to be the navel or centre of the earth's distress. surface, and, certainly in a social and religious sense, this was the case for Thus the priests were informed, by perpetual visitors all the Greek world. from all sides, of all the last news of the general aspect of politics of of the latest discoveries in outlying and the new developments of trade barbarous lands and were accordingly able, without any supernatural inspiration, to form their judgments on wider experience and better knowledge This advice, which was really sound than anybody else could command. and well-considered, was given to people who took it to be divine, and Of course the result was, in acted upon it with implicit faith and zeal. general, satisfactory, and so even individuals came to use it as a sort of high confessional, to which they came as pilgrims at some important crisis of their and finding by the response that the god seemed to know all about life the affairs of every city, went away fully satisfied with the divine authority

seems
the

to

Vatican
'

of the oracle.

and deserved general reputation was not affected by occasional rumours of bribed responses or of dishonest priestesses. Such as Lord must Bacon happen everywhere but, things long ago observed, human nature is more affected by affirmatives than negatives that is to
'

This

great

124

GREEK PICTURES.
a

say,

prophecy will outweigh a great number doubtful advices or even of acknowledged corruption. So the power of the Popes has lasted in some respects undiminished to the present day, and they are still regarded by many as infallible, even though historians have published many dreadful lives of some of them, and branded them as men of worse than average morals.
brilliantly

few

cases

of

accurate

of cases

of

'

The

lasted from

of the Delphic Oracle nay, the almost omnipotence greatness the invasion of the Dorians down to the Persian War, certainly

more than three centuries, when the part which it took in the later struggle gave it a blow from which it seems never to have recovered. When the invasion of Xerxes was approaching, the Delphic priests, informed accurately of the immense power oi the Persians, made up their minds that all resistance was useless, and counselled absolute submission or flight. According for nothing but a series of to all human probabilities they were right,
blunders could possibly have checked the Persians.
to

But surely the god ought patriotic responses, and thus to save themselves in case of such a miracle as actually happened. It is with some sadness that we turn from the splendid past of Delphi from which rose the to its miserable present. The sacred cleft in the earth, As it lay cold vapour that intoxicated the priestess, is blocked up and lost.

have inspired them

'

to utter

within the shrine of the temple, it may have been filled by the falling ruins, or still more completely destroyed by an earthquake. But, apart from these natural possibilities, we are told that the Christians, after the oracle was
closed by Theodosius,
a
special
'

filled

entrance

to hell,

up and effaced the traces of what they thought where communications had been held with the

Evil One.

The
first

The

three great fountains or springs of the town are still in existence. and most striking of these bursts out from between the

two shining peaks, which stand up one thousand feet over close together as to leave only a dark and mysterious gorge and so Delphi, not The aspect of these twin or fissure, twenty feet wide, intervening. peaks, so celebrated by the Greek poets, with their splendid stream, the Castalian fount, bursting from between them, is indeed grand and startling.
Phci-driades

mouth of the gorge but which made such havoc of Arachova, has been 1870, earthquake and has tumbled a block into this bath, thus covering huge busy here also, the old work, as well as several votive niches cut into the rocky wall. This was the place where arriving pilgrims purified themselves with hallowed
great square bath
of
is

cut in the rock, just at the

the

water.

great old days the oracle gave responses on the seventh of and even then only when the sacrifices were favourable. If each month, if the victims were not perfectly without blemish, they could not be offered all over not tremble when to the did the was altar, brought they day
'

In

the

PHOCIS DELPHI.
thought unpropitious.

125

The

with olive-garlands and stcmmata, or guardians of the temple, who were

priestesses, on officiated in turns

inquirers entered the great temple in festal dress, fillets of wool, led by the ocrtot, or sacred
five

of the

noblest

citizens of

Delphi.

The

the

contrary

there were
also,

three at the

same

time,

who

though
priestess

Delphians

were

not

considered

of noble

was placed on the sacred tripod by the chief or over the exhalations, she was seized with frenzy, interpreter, TT-/DO ^77779, often so violent that the 6'crtot were known to have fled in terror, and she herself to have become insensible, and to have died. Her ravings in this
family.

When

the

/
'

1 %

">'

.'
.

,?'.

F-*#f$ t
>

iist^snsBiS ".-, >-'' f

""^*
|

&;.?.:;$.'

fe.-f
..

..^v.'-

^v^-^7 *<Aj#B*nB ^&^f^iT'

;

ffiLa-u^

v^aSsfc^iP *

DELPHI AS

IT is TO-DAY.

were carefully noted down, and then reduced to sense, and of old always to verses, by the attendant priests, who, of course, interpreted disconnected words with a special reference to the politics and other circumstances
state

of the inquirers.
'

This was done

there

of

of corruption and of the whole the oracle and, indeed, style dignity partiality gradually Presently, when crowds came, and decayed with the decay of Greece itself. states were extremely jealous of the right of precedence in inquiring of the
religion
;

early clays in perfect were of course many

in

good
cases

faith.

With

the

decline

of

and

126

GREEK PICTURES.
it

god,

was found expedient

private
individuals,

to

give

responses
for

every

done
priests

to

and

even

trivial

day, reasons.

and

this

was
the

So

also
;

when
and

and longer took the trouble to shape the responses into verse Phocians in the Sacred War (355-46 B.C.) seized the treasures, applied to military purposes some ten thousand talents, the shrine
no
the

the quantity of blow from which it never recovered. Still, into votive which were not convertible ready money made splendid offerings it the most interesting place in Greece, next to Athens and Olympia, for and the statues, tripods, and other curiosities described lovers of the arts
suffered

there
its

by Pausanias, give a wonderful

'

picture

of the

mighty oracle even

in

decay.

When

the

Emperor
the
the

desired
" Tell

to consult

last Julian, the oracle on his way to

great
Persia,

champion of paganism,
in

362

A.D.,

it
:

replied

the king

fair-wrought

dwelling

has

sunk

into the dust

Phoebus

no longer a shelter or a prophetic laurel, neither has he a speaking Thus did the shrine confess, even to the fair water is dried up." fountain and that its the ardent hopeful Julian, power had passed away, and, as it were by a supreme effort, declared to him the great truth which he refused that paganism was gone for ever, and a new faith had arisen for to see
has
;

the nations of the

I

Roman
better

'

empire.'
to

know no

example

prove

the

moral
:

dignity

of

the

old

Delphic worship than the story told When Leutychides, on his arrival at Athens, demanded back the not wishing to give them hostages, the Athenians had recourse to evasions, up and said that two kings had deposited them, and it would not be right When the Athenians refused to deliver them up to one without the other.
' ;

by Herodotus

to

Leutychides addressed them as follows: "O Athenians, for if you deliver them up, you will do do whichever you yourselves wish
give

them

up,

I and if you do not deliver them up, the contrary. what is just however, tell you what once happened in Sparta respecting a deposit.
;

will,

We
in

Spartans

say

that

about

three

generations
;

before

my

time
that

there
this

lived

Laceda;mon one Glaucus, son of Epicycles

attained to the
first

we

relate

man both

respects, and also bore the highest time dwelt at Lacedcemon. all who at that of character for justice say certain Milesian, having that in clue time the following events befel him come to Sparta, wished to have a conference with him, and made the a Milesian, and am come, Glaucus, with the following statement: 'I am for since throughout all the rest of desire of profiting by your justice was great talk of your justice, I there in Ionia, Greece, and particularly considered with myself that Ionia is continually exposed to great dangers,

rank

in

all

other

We

and
that

that

on the contrary Peloponnesus is securely situated, and consequently with us one can never see the same persons retaining property.
1

Rambles and Studies in Grace, pp. 245-252.

PHOCIS DELPHI.

127

mined

Having, therefore, reflected and deliberated on these things, I have deterto change half of my whole substance into silver, and deposit it with Do you, being well assured that, being placed with you, it will be safe. take this and tokens and whosoever these you, then, money, preserve possessing these shall demand it back again, restore it to him.' '"The stranger who came from Miletus spoke thus. But Glaucus on received the deposit, the condition mentioned. After a long time had the sons of this man who had elapsed, deposited the money came to and addressed themselves to Glaucus, and shown the tokens, Sparta, having demanded back the money. Glaucus repulsed them, answering as follows
; :

matter, nor does it occur to of the circumstances you mention but if I can recall to do that is and if indeed willing everything just
I

'

neither

remember

the

me
it
I

that

know any
I

to

my

mind,
shall

am
it,

have received
I

desire

to

restore

it

correctly

recourse to the laws of the

this

matter with you for

'

but have not received it, Greeks against you. I therefore defer four months from the present time.'
;

if

have

settling

The Milesians, accordingly, considering it a great calamity, departed, as being deprived of their money. But Glaucus went to Delphi to consult the oracle, and when he asked the oracle whether he should make a booty
of the
'

"

oath, the Pythian assailed him in the following words son of Glaucus, Epicydes, thus to prevail by an oath, and to make a booty of the money, will be a present gain swear away then, for death awaits even the

money by an

man who keeps

his oath.
;

neither hands nor feet

the whole race, and all oath is afterwards more blessed.'

a nameless Child of Perjury, who has she pursues swiftly, until, having seized, she destroys the house. But the race of a man who keeps his

But there

is

god

to

pardon
tJic

the words

tempt

god,

and

to

Glaucus, having heard this, entreated the he had spoken. But the Pythian said, that to commit the crime, iccre tJie same tiling. Glaucus,
strangers,

therefore,

having sent

for the Milesian

restored

them the money.

With what design mentioned. There

house which is extirpated from

this story has been told you, Athenians, shall is at present not a single descendant of Glaucus, but he is supposed to have belonged to Glaucus
;

now be
nor any
utterly

Thus it is right to have no other thought Sparta. concerning a deposit, than to restore it when it is demanded." Leutychides having said this, but finding the Athenians did not even then listen to him,
'

departed.'

This narrative may well be compared with the splendid passage quoted from Sophocles, and may again remind us of the apostle's words, These, not knowing the law, are a law unto themselves, and do the works of the law
'

written
another.'

in

their
'

hearts,

their

consciences
in

accusing
of
the

or
'

else

excusing

one

And when
faith

he says

the

same connection,
speaks
vi.

The

by

his

(or

steadfastness),
1

and

grace

just shall live of God being

Herodotus,

86.

128

GREEK PICTURES.
from faith
these
to

'

revealed

faith'
lights

it

is

hard
set

to

avoid
as

the

conclusion
of

that

he

regarded
revelation

lesser

of

conscience
in

part

the

same

great

the candle of the

Lord
can
I

obscured
It
is

by

superstition,

but
if

men's hearts, which may be up be hardly extinguished without a long

national degradation, and,

hardly worth
into

wander

out

wild

say so, a special training in vice. while, in our artistic review of Greece, to which is but a repetition of Phocis, yEtolia,

may

our

interests. There was, indeed, a period when the wild /Etolians were the greatest power in Greece, and they were the last and of the the successors toughest champions for Greek liberty against Their capital, Thermus, too, was once Alexander, and against the Romans.

without the historical

filled

with statues and other works of

raids,

art,

which
not

they had

acquired
lucrative

in their
in

many
third

and
i:.c.

in

the

mercenary
all

service which

was so
trace

the

century
that the

But of

know

site

things of Thermus, which Philip V.

these

remains, nor do I of Macedon sacked, has

yet been

identified.

account
the

So too the Acarnanians, who lived further west still, were of little till the Emperor Augustus founded the city of Nicopolis on

Gulf of Arta, and drafted into it all the surrounding population. The remains of this city, on the Gulf of Arta, still attest its splendour, and we know from Strabo that it was a thriving centre in his dayone of the few that remained in Greece. The one town along the rough southern coast which attracts modern sympathies, is beside the giant headland over against Patras Missolonghi, noted for the heroic defence made by its Turks in the \Yar of Liberation, noted also for the population against of end. Here it was that perhaps the only pure the scene Byron's He was a ambition the poet ever showed was cut short by an early death. his in with the Greeks poems great power exciting European sympathy brought home the conflict to every house in England, and over the He continent of Europe few writers have had so universal a popularity. had but he survived might almost have attained to the throne of Greece, the purest and noblest part of his work for Greece was accomplished, and
;

the liberated nation

have
in

never

forgotten

their

obligations

to

Jllpvron, as

they spell his

name

modern Greek.

GREEK VASES

EARLY CLASSICAL PERIOD.

CHAPTER
T UK
PELOPONNESUS

X.
ACH/EA.

and Pelops,' a land narrowly escaping the fate of Sicily, or:ily held on to the continent by the isthmus of Corinth, which we have But the northern land, separated by the narrow fiord already described. called the Gulf of Corinth, approaches it so nearly in another place, the
ancient Naupactus, that invaders who could not pass the fortress of Corinth could easily cross by boats the narrow water not two miles, if I judged
It is, in fact, told in legend which divides the opposing capes. aright that the great Dorian invasion which altered the whole history of the In the Middle Ages, for some Peloponnesus took place by this route.
it

\\ 7"E P ass now VV 'Island of

from

what was considered continental

Greece

to

the

unexplained reason, the famous peninsula adopted a new name Morea, of which the origin is hidden in darkness, nor can scholars even agree upon Strabo compared its form to that of a the language from which it is taken. mulberry leaf, but he should have added, that it is laid upon a quadrilateral

Mount Kyllene (now Ziria), Mount Chelmos and Erymanthus together, Mount Lyka-on in Messene, the least distinct of the four groups, and Mount Taygetus in Laconia, the most distinct, next to the These Alps, surrounded generally by lesser mountains, rise solitary Kyllene.
of
four

very high points

to

an altitude above 6500

Arcadia.

feet,

and enclose a wild

the provinces,
if
I

district

<>t

gorges

and

valleys known as The general

character of

all

may

so

call

them, of the

island of Pelops are clearly marked. rich valleys, the alluvial deposit of

When

you approach the sea, you have and here of course were the rivers
;

130

CREEK PICTURES.
the

settled

the principal cities Argos on the valley of that of the Eurotas, Olympia on that of the Peneus.

The

Inachus, Sparta on natural site for the

capital of

famous

cities

Messene was the rich valley were others situated either

of

the

Pamisus.

But beside

these

close to seaports, like Corinth, Patree,

alpine plains, like Tegea and Mantinea, and afterwards Thus the Megalopolis. peninsula was an epitome of all the varieties and contrasts which made Greek life the brilliant, uncertain, picturesque medium
Pylos, or occupying

and energy" of all kinds. Corinth was the centre of trade; and was destroyed, Patrse took up its place, and has maintained it to this clay. Sikyon and Argos were centres of art, where great sculptors and made schools which attracted pupils from all Greek lands. painters Sparta was long the home and citadel of all the military perfection of Greece in and drill, so that Spartan infantry was for centuries thought training till one day it was crushed by the superior tactics of invincible, Epaminondas. In Elis was held the greatest of Greek festivals, whichcame in the end to mark the chronology of the whole people by its Olympiads and here every kind of art, music, poetry, sculpture, architecture, was called in to beautify the great shrine of the god, whose nod, as Homer
for

genius
it

after

says,

Every kind of government, too, monarchy, aristocracy, democracy, tyranny, was to be found within these narrow bounds and if actual men of letters, poets, and orators seem rare from this side of Hellas, the chief patronage which made them prosper came from Sikyon, Argos, Sparta, when the brilliancy of Athens had not shown itself, or was dimmed by disaster. The early lyric poets, especially, were stimulated by the favour of Sparta and the contests at Olympia, where
all

made

the

heavens

shake.

even

prose

authors

read

their

works,

while

rhetoricians

declaimed

their
to

But eloquence. the reader give

train

we must not prolong these some details.

Patras,

generalities,

and must hasten

and the landing there to take the the noble mountains of Achaea along to the and clown south, towering many torrents which rush red into sending the blue waves, as we saw them after a night's rain. And the reader knows with its and Corinth are two Between Patra; citadel. Corinth, already great remarkable sites, both famous in the last days of Greek politics /Egium (now both famous in the history of the Achaean League. The Vostitza) and Sikyon older Sikyon had been situate nearer the sea, but Demetrius, the famous Besieger, had laid out a new city on a higher site, and adorned it with all the appointments which were required for civilised life. We can still trace the theatre and stadium for races, but the town has not yet undergone This was the birthplace of the famous thorough excavation of the site. the hero of the Achaean League and the reader who wishes to Aratus, know more must open the fascinating Life of Aratus by Plutarch, and read how this famous man was exiled, and how he recovered by a daring enterthe
coast
for

Already we have spoken of

Corinth,

with

THE PELOPONNESUS ACHjEA.

prise
his

home,
while
against

and

freed

it

from

the

tyrants.

He
of

must

also,

remember,
Plutarch,

he reads the
tyrants,

constant

raving
to

that

according

the

Aratus, evidence of the

and

however, indeed of
sensible

Strabo, the

city

had long been ruled by

respectable
life

tyrants,

who
of
the

protected
citizens,

the

and

property
art,

and

always flourished under their hands. One of them, we are told, was murdered by conspirators while he was attending the lectures of a Peripatetic
patronised
philosopher, without ceremony or body-guard. But the mad

which

hatred of tyrants and tyranny has so long been a commonplace,

that

their

vileness

is

generally assumed as a ne-

cessary part of the definition of the title. Indeed, many

PLAN OK THE THEATRE AND STADIUM AT SIKYON.

great

Xenophon, and Plutarch, agree in their But they reflect and represent not the popular language on this point. which was never very averse to them they reflect the old aristocracy, feeling, K 2
authorities,

Herodotus,

Plato,

GREEK PICTURES.
tyrants were abominable, because the first step in a tyranny was disarm, exile, or shackle those wild aristocrats, who were in the habit of oppressing the people, and riding rough-shod over the poor and the weak.
to to

whom

To

these

latter a tyrant

was generally a great protection against turbulent

superiors, and hence it happened that, however much abused by the literary aristocrats, tyrants were perpetually reappearing at all epochs in all parts of the Greek world. There were, of course, cruel and bloodthirsty tyrants, like those notorious in story Phalaris of Agrigentum, Nabis of Sparta, Apollodorus of Cassandra like those painted in the Republic of Plato, the Hicro of Xenophon, and the Dion of Plutarch. But in all these cases the is it the notable excepaverage was good and profitable to the country tions which have been brought before the public, and have produced a false and unjust prejudice against a whole class. This much I feel bound to say in passing concerning the class which Aratus pursued all his life with relentless and unreasoning hate. All this fury did not save the great Achaean from crimes as great as theirs, when he betrayed his League to the Macedonian Antigonus, and abused the absolute power for a moment conferred upon him by committing a series of semi-judicial executions, which were simply murders, accompanied with torture of the victims. Let us pass on to yEgium, the modern Vostitza, which is at least still It was here that the old Achaean remarkable for its beautiful situation. of small when twelve Achaean towns, had its meetings. League, consisting It is now a small but pleasant town, with a population of fishermen and
; ;

vine-dressers,

or a

rather

currant-dressers,

for

here
(i.e.

popular

in

England under the name of currant

very
the

grape, so Corinthian grape), thrives

that

small

and

But to modern travellers stopping at Vostitza is that from this place we can most easily make an excursion to the largest and perhaps most famous of the single monasteries in Greece, the Great Cave, or Megawhere within a wall of rock are stories of chambers holding spelion, hundreds of monks, and reminding one either of a set of swallows' nests or as a matter of fact, the rocky wall of one side of a glen, a wasps' nest having three caves within it, one over the other. They have faced the three mouths with a great wall, about 180 feet long by 100 high, and pierced nine stories of tiny windows, from which the approaching traveller, labouring
produces
valuable

main

crop, reason for

as

well

as

excellent wine.

up the steep ascent to the gateway, can see curious faces peering in dozens. They have thrown out balconies too, just as on the walls of the Athos monasteries, and have an outer gate as well as an inner. Here, too, all the bells of the monastery jangle out of tune to proclaim the advent of a visitor, and the highly ornamented church occupies the central grotto. As regards the ornaments of this church, the nature of the services, and the manners
1

The

where they were

reader should carefully distinguish still buried in liter days.

it

from /Egse, near Pella,

the ancient seat of the Macedonian kings,

THE PELOPONNESUS ACH.E A.

of the monks,
I

will

reserve \vhut

have

to say

till

we

reach
his

Mount Athos,
find

on our
him,
is

exit

from

this

precisely

of

journey. the same

For the Greek monk, wherever you

type.

All

his

habits,

politenesses, his

questions, his views of religion and politics are the same, however, has the additional glory of having saved 3000

This great cavern,

women and
was the

children
fortress,

from the Turks and Egyptians

in

the

War

of Liberation, nor

VIEW ON THE GULF OF CORINTH, NEAR VOSTITZA.

with

extraordinary natural defences, ever subdued in that terrible war. The decoration of the church is due to an artist monk of Nauplia, who with the specimen we have of decorative painted it in 1653, and this, coupled of shows how a Phaeneromene Salamis, done in 1/23, painting at the flourished among the monks from early days. persistent school of painting The great master at Athos is Panselinos, who lived in the twelfth century.
its

134

GREEK PICTURES.
the
holiest

work of the Evangelist Luke. But the artist who has given rise to this story was a Cretan monk of the twelfth century, for whom they have substituted the greater name both here and elsewhere in Greece. The monks of Megaspelion are perhaps prouder

Here

eikon

is

shown

as

the

of their cellar than of their chapel, though the wine they make is not so as that to be found in many of the villages of these wild highlands.

good
But
white

whatever doubt
cross,

there

may be

about

these

points,

there

is

none that the

with
its

Archbishop Germanos here

raised

the

standard

of

revolt,

in 1821, and from this stronghold came forth those heroes of the War of Independence who can never be forgotten by their enfranchised country. The library is badly kept, and not rich in valuable documents. Probably

the charter of John Palseologus, or golden bulla, is the most interesting of their books. 'I had visited,' says M. Henri Belle, 'many convents in the

East and the West, and few have caused

me

such

disappointment as

that

of Megaspelion. I found there neither the ascetic spirit of Meteora, that other Greek monastery, nor the spirit of penitence of the Grande Chartreuse

nothing reminded me of the activity and industry of the abbeys of St. Gall in Switzerland, and of La Trappe in France, or of Mount Melleray in Ireland you find there no trace of the artistic and intellectual greatness of Monte
;

Cassino,

or

of

the

devotion

of

the

monks

of

St.

Bernard,

still

less

the

indefatigable energy of the monks of St. Benedict.' But there are few, if any, of the famous retreats laid in a scene so Nature has done all she could splendid as that of the Greek monastery.
to clothe
first
it

with

dignity.
falls

In

all

directions

there

are

splendid

excursions

Styx, which suggested to the ancients that river of the nether world, black and cold, which bound even the gods by the inviolable oath in its name. There are splendid alpine climbs up Mount Chelmos, and a very rough and precipitous way, leading by the The country is village of Kalavryta to Tripotamo, and thence to Olympia. wild beyond description, and yet perfectly safe for any traveller, without arms,
of
all

to the

of

the

see a

In the larger villages you without escort, without any precaution whatever. man walking about with a dog-whip, and you are told that this is the I will not say that policeman. Military pickets or patrols there are none. there is no crime whatever in the Morea. When elections take place, there is

such excitement
political

that

men

hate or jealousy.

are not rarely stabbed or shot, but this is from There are no doubt cases of theft, of murder from

But as offences against travellers, beyond jealousy among married women. occasional extortion, are unknown, so also, I was informed that illegitimate children hardly occur in the Morea. The penalties exacted death to the to the at the hands of her relatives have secured father, disgrace mother,
a population against this kind of vice and so we are in presence of so in others as to be in so barbarous, pure primitive society many respects and strict as to put to shame the leading nations of Europe.
the
;

THE PELOPONNESUS ACHsEA.

It
is

135

days the mountaineers in the wild centre of the Peloponnesus were regarded as poor behind-hand specimens of Greeks. It was in the plains and on the coast that the great races lived. have Things changed so completely now, that if you wish to see a pure Greek of a high type, with the fair skin, blue eyes, and flaxen hair which
in

remarkable that

old

Homer

praises

in

Menelaus, you must go

to

the mountains

or

to

remote

islands with

no

traffic.

The modern Greek

mongrel Levantine, with all the talents He it is who has given their races impressed upon his very countenance. bad name to the modern Greeks. He it is that once supplied pirates, and Like the waters of his ports, which sometimes now even supplies brigands. Levantine harbour in their tideless waves the filth of centuries, so the of human sink and been the have Greek Asiatic, depravity. long ports, But let no one transfer the impression they produce to the honest There he will find simplicity, fairness, mountaineers who inhabit Greece. and a natural dignity, as common features of the peasantry. great independence, The old inhabitants of Achaea, that strip of narrow coast and high slopes a poor and along the north shore of the Morea, were of this character, honest people, not distinguished in Greek history till the greater states had
decayed,

of the seaports is essentially a and vices of that conglomerate of

when
states,

their

League, of which we
affording
a

came

into

notice,
in

as

first hear about the year 300 r..c., model of confederation, or the union of

several

themselves

small
it

or

weak,

for

the

purpose

of

mutual

defence or protection.

was that the Achseans had sought to protect themselves against their stronger neighbours, above all, against the roving and marauders that became so notorious in the great wars after pirates When mercenary wars had lasted a long time, and many Alexander's death. Acheeans had earned wealth in Egypt and in Asia, this Achctan

Thus

poor

League began

The
the

to take a leading place in the Greek world. reader must consult the special histories, such as

Mr. Freeman's
to
its

Federal Government, or

my own Greek Life and Thought from Alexander

and

remarkable constitution, Conquest, for details as to this was the last, and in many respects It later Hellenistic effect upon history. and it is the most perfect essay in constitution-making of the Greeks the practical men who founded the American greatly to the credit of their Polybius, and framed many details Republic that they carefully studied of their Federation upon the examples to be found in the Achsea of Aratus.

Roman

numbers of the Federalist, conducted by Hamilton and Madison, which Mr. Freeman has quoted in his book, show very curiously how the same sort of solution was applied to the same kind of difficulty in far distant ages, far distant climes, and enormous disparity in area. When Pausanias, the famous traveller of the second century A.D., describes that this corner of Greece, its constitutional splendour was not what fascinated

The

early

antiquarian.

It

was rather the legendary splendour of having furnished royal

136

GREEK PICTURES.
ancient
colonists

families for the

who went from Greece proper

to settle in

Asia Minor. There, in great cities like Miletus, tradition the of their upheld origin nobility from Achaean chiefs, then perhaps a name widely applied over Greece, but in Pausanias' day identified with the strip of
the
rich coasts of

This League extended ultimately into Arcadia, which to be expected, for Northern Elis and Arcadia are from Acho_-a by no certain bounds indeed, in these wild mountain separated I found it well-nigh impossible to tell when I had passed from one gorges As therefore much of what I have now said applies to to the other. much so of what may hereafter be said of Arcadia applies to this Arcadia, The lotty watershed which separates the sources of what Hows country. into the gulf Irom what Hows into the Alpheus southward, is the only
land covered by the League.

was naturally

natural

boundary, but in marked nor easily found.

striking feature,
;

wilderness
ridge of

of

Alps
Elis

this

line

is

neither

well

The
pass

Erymanthus (Olonos)
northward,
great
or

very

looking

either

from

is indeed a from Patras

southward

but

when

we
are

eastward

of
so

this

snowy ridge
us
cross

the

heights by towards the south-west, and pass into Elis, the land of the Alpheus, the whilome sanctuary of Greece where the noise of arms was not heard, the meeting-place for exiles and long separated friends, the land hallowed by
the great

of

Chelmos

no

means

distinct.

Let

over

Olympic

festival.

RUINS UK A BYZANTINE CHURCH, NEAR

ELIS.

CHAPTER
KLIS
the

XI.

OLYMPIA.

AMONG
Acruea
coast,
to

many

beautiful rides through

Greece none
attraction

is

more

beautiful

than that

from either

Patras

or

Olympia, now

the

great

Vostitza, centre of

through the mountains of

in

Elis.

It

is

possible to skirt

round the mountains by driving round from Patras by the passing near the town of Clarentza, one of the principal residences of

where Olympia, and where all the solemn oaths and But preparations of the judges were made in preparation for the feast. these are now only sites, and the scenery is not to be compared to that of the other route, which though exceedingly rough has no dangers, and may be accomplished in two days. It is quite amazing what wonderful ascents and descents can be made

chivalry in mediaeval times, the training was done for

and

also near the site of the ancient Elis,

138

GREEK PICTURES.
Nothing seems too precipitous
accident
for

on the mules or ponies of the country. them, nor does one ever hear of an

from

their

falling.

You

wander along the sides of great gorges, sometimes descending to the rivers which hurry along beneath, sometimes rising to a thousand feet above the stream you pass through great undisturbed forests, where the leaves layered for centuries make the ground noiseless with their softness, and noisy with As you pass through these woods you see countless their myriad rustling.
;

especially anemones, irises, orchids, showing over the russet leaf mould, and are fain to dismount and seek the roots, to carry home as a

wild

(lowers,

trophy of your travel. Not once in ten miles do

you meet habitations, not twice a day any travellers.

It
is

curious

peaceful
isolation,

solitude, with stray patches

cultivated

in

generally in
of

some

position

strength or utter deviousness, which protected men from their foes in the
troubles ago.
\
'/

of

sixty

Here and

years there you

ot

come upon patches

pavement of small
torturing
foot,

Turkish road, a hard rough

stones,
to

the

human

and perhaps equally

were constructed. to great ascend you

so to the mules for which

GREEK MOUNTAINEERS.

they

When

saddle

cross some heights to the mountains, you obtain views over whole tracts of alpine country reaching far down into Arcadia, with long vistas into rich valleys and countless And then you plunge into the depths variety of peak and serrated ridge.
in

down some
it

strip of

pine

forest,

which reaches up from beneath and

its

makes

possible to clamber

down

zig-zag

almost perpendicular slope.

;

These experiences must be made to be understood to the stranger there is added the excitement of real and present danger, though one cannot hear that it is often turned into reality. Whether you come suddenly
upon one of the villages, or whether you climb into one you have seen across a deep ravine for some hours without being able to reach it, the inhabitants turn out to gaze at you they give you very good red wine for a copper when it is not full of resin, nothing can be more refreshing.
;

ELISOLYMPIA.

'39

But the habit of the country is to chop the stems of the fir trees you can see whole forests wounded in this way and gather the gum which flows from the tree, which they put into the wine, both to preserve it and to make it wholesome. As far back as Plutarch's day the nation had come to like it and it is said that at the royal table at Athens there are now
;

princesses

not drink any other beverage. There are several streams down which the traveller can
will

who
of

make

his

way

to

the valley
in

the
is

Alpheus,
situated
;

which Olympia

the rushing Erymanthus, past the site of the ancient Psophis, or down the
either

down

Ladon, which Pausanias

the
fairest

calls

of Greek rivers,

or

down
to

the Kladeos,

from

the old

Turkish fortress of
the

very site of Olympia. The country gradually grows tamer the rude mountains sink into undulat;

Lala

the rushing toring hills rents become babbling rivers

;
;

the trees increase in size and

variety,

and many flowering

especially

shrubs,

the

wild

pear and Judas tree, variegate the colour of the woods.

The only
journey

is

halting-place in this either Divri or

Tripotamo.

When
siders that

the traveller con-

every four years

all possible routes must have been thronged with crowds of

the ancient Greeks, especially the many exiles from their

GREEK HOSPITALITY.

could there only meet and talk with their relatives in safety when he remembers that these mountains must have seen artists, poets, musicians, orators making their way to the great assembly, he cannot but grieve over the beautiful desolation
;

homes, who

through which he now reaches the same goal Olympia, though the crowded is gone, and there remain only the ruins of its buildings to reward his enterprise and yet these ruins are hardly to be equalled in Europe for interest.
festival
;

140

CREEK PICTURES.

French under General Maison occupied the Morea in 1829, and so accomplished the good work commenced at Navarino of expelling the Egyptians and Turks, some French savants in his staff made superficial excavations here, which disclosed not only the tesselated floor of the temple, but some fragments of sculpture, which now adorn the museum of the Louvre. This was one of the many benefits conferred on art and to
the
civilisation

When

by

this well-timed occupation.

enter upon a closer description of the athletics of the Greeks, as well as the actual remains now visible at Olympia, it may be well to give the general reader some of the broad facts in the history of the famous

Before

we

place. times.

The Greeks,
It

one of
us a
his

his

had numerous adventures, and

account
of this

of course, traced the origin of the festival to mythical been established by the god Herakles, on his return from
Pindar, in

an extant ode, has given

poetic
day.
in

To
to

described
a
detail

foundation, according to the current beliefs of any one who considers that the athletic sports so brilliantlythe twenty-third book of Homer's Iliad correspond in hardly
at Olympia, this belief in a very early and the festival, even by some ancient hero turned into a And there was quite admiration, will not hold water.

those

established

solemn

initiation of

by popular another account of the matter, which recorded that the several contests were added one after the other at fixed and well-known intervals. Their successive 1 he additions are particularly specified in Pausanias' account of Olympia. establishment old and by complete archaeologists, however, held that the
passed into oblivion, and that the various contests a mere subterfuge gradually revived, but not originated in historical times to save the credit of Pindar and his legends.

god

Herakles

had

were

was that point on which most of the ancients were agreed the regular celebration every four years began with Iphitus, King of Elis, assisted or patronised by the celebrated Lycurgus though, so far as we can not does make out, the date assigned to Iphitus agree with the date assigned to Lycurgus, and though we know very well that the Spartan discipline

The

next

and preferred the pursuit of game hundred other field exercises. However, the short or sprint race of two yards, was the it because oldest, of the festival tlic event perhaps probably always his name to mark that period of because it was the first, and its victor
never encouraged athletic
training, but

gave have been won by Corcebus, in the year corresponding and from that time onward a regular register seems to have to our 776 B.C. been kept, by which ultimately the Greek historians came to mark events. the late copies This list was therefore held to be of the last importance the and even with care, sceptical Grote surviving of it have been edited as the point where real and trustworthy sets down the year 776 B.C.
four years

was

said to

Greek history begins. But the older Greeks

said that there were twenty-seven victors anterior

ELISOL YMPIA.
to Coroebus,

and that the list began properly with the god Herakles. And strict consonance with their practice in all this The genealogies. for were traced back in lists to the same example, Spartan kings, regular

was

in

8;od, Herakles. o

And

at

Halicarnassus Sir C.

Newton

found,

amongf o other

inscribed stones, a genealogy of priests, made in the second century B.C., that is to say, in late and sceptical times, when the list was traced back through
I twenty-six generations to the god Poseidon. suppose it was the fact that that twenty-seven names the Olympic register did not begin with a god that commencement of the series were which would have established

which deceived modern scholars, and made them believe in the So sure was I of the contrary that I genuineness of this wonderful list. positively predicted the excavations at Olympia would produce no evidence For Pausanias, in his long and elaborate survey of the of any such list. most ancient extant votive statues, could not find anything older than the so-called thirty-third Olympiad. But in addition to all these arguments, Plutarch, at the opening of his Life of Nmna, has actually told us who made out the register, and that he did it at a late period, and upon insufficient evidence. It was the sophist Hippias of Elis, who did this work for his fellow-citizens at some time Of course the early part of it was mostly made shortly after 400 B.C. up from guesses, traditions, and even from deliberate invention. So that we must no longer soothe ourselves with the convenient belief that we have a sure and fixed starting-point for our Greek chronology. There is far better evidence that shortly after the year 600 B.C. athletic contests came into fashion, and that the conduct of the Eleans in the management of the games was so censured that rival meetings sprang up, of which the Pythian (at and beneath the town of Delphi, already described), the Isthmian, on the narrow neck of land north of Corinth, and the Nemean, between Corinth and Argos, became famous. An echo reaches us of the cause of this movement, in the notice that no Elean was allowed to compete at the Isthmus, and also in the story told by Herodotus, that the Eleans sent to Psammetichus II., King of Egypt, about 590 r,.c., to ask him how they might
missing
best arrange the details of their festival. \Yhy they chose this distant king He replied that he should as they desired as an adviser does not appear. advise them to exclude every Elean from their own contest. his opinion

appears very plainly from this that they had been favouring unduly their own people, and had awarded prizes to them against other Greeks whom
It

These facts show that in the the audience thought entitled to the honour. the Olympic festival had become one of year 600 B.C., roughly speaking,
public interest to the Greeks of the Peloponnesus and of Phocis, and that a mere local It is likely that as the local management was distrusted.

meeting, the games were much older, but on this point we have no trustI think the oldest definite notice in Pausanias points worthy evidence.

142

GREEK PICTURES.
the

to

whether
tell.

twenty-ninth meeting, which corresponds to our 665 this date is not part of the artificial scheme of Hippias,
till

B.C.

But

we cannot
rise

It

was not

the

middle of the
the
arts,

sixth

century

B.C.

that the

of

luxury

at the

courts of the

tyrants,

and
fine

consequent
led
to

development of the
production
of

the

various

artistic

offerings,

statues.
set

The

of votive especially victor was permitted to

up a bronze or marble statue of himself at Olympia. Nothing contributed more to the development of Greek art As the competitors were than this fact.
then allowed to appear naked, the statues also, in contrast to the older clothed and
painted figures of wood, were made to represent the naked human form, and

attempting to represent ideal a beauty god, some attempt was made to reproduce the figure and face of a
in

instead of

perfectly

trained

and

developed

man.

Together with this stimulus to statuary, came the fashion of employing lyric poets to compose triumphal odes for the celebration of these victories.

And we

still

odes of Pindar magnificent of what could be produced by specimens the Greeks, even at demand and for pay, The poems of in the way of poetry.

have

in

the

Pindar have ever since been the unattainBut the able models for all lyric poets. and dance of music, which accompaniments
they
are

required

for

their
like

production

it

was a combination

Wagner's operas
odes English reader a
i i

now gone
will

irrevocably.

The

of
ATHLETE USING THE STRIGIL OR FLESH BRUSH (THE APOXYOMENOS OF LYSIPPUS).
j

Gray

give
,,

the
;

though to me the is perhaps more akin genius of Shelley so that I should prefer the opening of Qnecn Mab to that of Pindar, The rise of Athens and as a modern, though also a very faint, parallel. the Olympian games as the Sparta successively, neither of which patronised of lesser states did, appears to have damaged the international importance nevertheless they were still of such recognised public weight the games
f;l nt

ec h o

of

them

,-,.

ELISOLYMPIA.
that the territory of Elis

143

was considered

sacrosanct, that

the period

of

the

quadrennial games was regarded as a solemn truce in the time of war, and that all Greeks of all states were enabled to travel thither and meet their

enemies under the protection of this great national holyIt is a wonder that we do not hear more frequently of doings at the day. In two or three rare cases Sparta feast under these exceptional circumstances. and Argos had interfered, and taken the celebration out of the hands of the Eleans, but this was an outrage, and was remembered for centuries.
friends
their

and

The days came when even

life

this ancient

home

of peace
to

and of country
to

was

violated,
;

and

the

Eleans

were compelled

arm themselves

but with the decay of Greece, the subjugation by Macedonia, repel invasion and the consequent spread of Greek manners and customs over the world, It was the the importance of this and the other feasts distinctly increased. meeting-place for
states
pirates,
all

those
of

whom

the violent convulsions

had deprived
as
this

From

homes, and as aliens without mercenaries, centre all political news were
their
artists

among the various who were wandering about as

civic
rights,
in

strange
;

cities.

scattered

abroad

negotiations
;

performances conspiracies against the ruling powers were no doubt also frequent enough. Moreover, the habit for rhetoricians and lyric poets to advertise their works by recitation had come more and more into fashion, so that I conclude that
if

were here undertaken by the

who came

ostensibly for

athletic contests,

inferior or had degenerated in the way of mere had certainly not lost in what may be called national they So it was that when Alexander, wearied of the Hellenic importance. constant sullen resistance to his policy on the part of the leading Hellenic states, issued a public letter to the assembled Greeks at Olympia that he would restore all exiles to their homes, some twenty thousand such people heard the proclamation with transport, and immediately prepared to reassert We can imagine with what delight the relatives who their rights at home. had come from that home to see their exiled friends at the sacred truce embraced them, and began to lay plans for ousting the intruders who had and so we are not surprised that this taken possession of their property into a fever, and last missive of the great conqueror threw all Greece produced the Lamian War, in which Antipater, the regent of Alexander, was

the Olympic

games were

so nearly overpowered. With the subjugation of Greece under

the

Romans, Olympia naturally

to

declined

in

importance,

for the

Romans never condescended

enter

the

arena naked, and to contend with their subjects. Cicero, indeed, speaks with such annoyance of the report that he had gone to the games at the

moment
they had

of political

excitement between
to

Caesar and

Pompey,

that

we

feel

come down

something

like the

modern Derby.

As

regards the

decay of this kind of sport, I will only add that well as Philopcemen, the military genius of the

Alexander the Great, as Achaean League, disliked

144

GREEK PICTURES.
and soldiering most serious
;

kind of exercise, as not conducive to good disfavour of such leading men must have had
this

that
effect

the
in

turning ambitious young

men from engaging

exercise

in

them.
field

They advocated the

sports,

sound
hunting

principle

that

the

obtained
are

in

especially

in

dangerous game, practised special physical and without special contests upon fixed days as a climax of the training, is superior in many ways to the gymnasium and the racecourse. In our own day the same contrast subsists between the training of the sons of English gentlemen and the sons of foreigners of the same rank. While we regard such games as cricket and football, and such sports as hunting, shooting, and salmon fishing, the highest and best training for manly qualities, the Germans and other foreign nations are reduced to gymnastic exercises under the direction of a professional master, which may perhaps be better
training,

which

without

strengthening particular muscles, but wholly inferior in developing that spirited element in the soul which Plato considered the ally of reason against the inroads of the baser passions. At the Olympic games, just as at modern
in

meetings,
athletes

we hear of 'running for the pot,' and we know that there were who made the circuit of various such festivals for the purpose of gain.
aspect of things
is

professional sports, such as

This

well-nigh

Xenophon
details

loved,

and

impossible in genuine Alexander, and Philopcemen,

contests,

field

and

Polybius.

The
reader.

following

concerning

the

with great care,

1

and already expounded elsewhere,

which I have gathered will be of interest to the

Olympic games the running, which had originally been the The distance was once up the course, only competition, always came first. and seems to have been about two hundred yards. After the year 720 B.C., races of double the course, and long races of about three thousand yards, were added; races in armour were a later addition, and came at the end of
In

the

the sports.

were short races for boys at Olympia of half the course. Eighteen years was beyond the limit of age for competing, as a story in and a boy who won at the age of twelve was Pausanias implies thought wonderfully young. The same authority tells us of a man who won the short race at four successive meetings, thus keeping up his pace for a remarkable case. sixteen years There seems to have been no second
'

There

consequence of the abolition There was, naturally, a good deal of chance in the of material rewards. course of the contest, and Pausanias evidently knew cases where the winner For example, the races were run in heats of was not the best man. four, and if there was an odd man over, the owner of the last lot drawn could sit down till the winners of the heats were declared, and then run
prize in
historical

any of the

games, a natural

against

them without any previous

fatigue.

The

limitation

of each heat to

ELISOLYMPIA.
competitors clothes), and so
four
arose,
I

145

fancy,

from their not wearing

not

being easily distinguishable.

colours (or even were accordingly They

walked into the arena through an underground passage in the raised side of the stadium, and the name and country of each proclaimed in order by a herald. This practice is accurately copied in the present Olympic games held at Athens every four years. The next event was the wrestling match, which is out of fashion at
'

our

prize
is

There

meetings, though still a favourite sport in a very ample terminology for the various

many country
tricks

districts.

and devices

in

this contest, and they have been explained with much absurdity by scholiasts, both ancient and modern. It seems that it was not always enough to throw your adversary, but that an important part of the sport was the getting uppermost on the ground and in no case was a man declared beaten till he
;

times, and was actually laid on his back. When the wrestling was over, there followed the throwing of the but in what order is uncertain, for discus and the dart, and the long leap I cannot accept as evidence the pentameter line of Simonides, which enumerates the games of the pentathlon, seeing that it would be impossible to vary them from the order he gives without great metrical difficulties.

was thrown three

'

Our only

safe guide is, I think, the alleged date of the origin of each kind of competition, as it was plainly the habit of the Greeks to place the new event

The sole exceptions to this is in the already established. which seem always to have come immefor of contests boys, establishing But we only know diately before the corresponding competition for men.
next after those
that both wrestling

the

8th

and the contest of five events (pentathlon) were dated from Olympiad (710 B.C.), and are not informed in what order each was
question
of the

appointed.
'

The

long

jump

is

interesting,

as

it

still

forms a part

Greeks practised the It is not certain whether the old hear of a preliminary start, or the for we never high jump, running jump, as now call it. or of any difficulty about "breaking trig," Furtherpeople more, an extant epigram on a celebrated athlete, Phayllus of Kroton,
of our
contests.

he jumped clean over the prepared ground (which was broken with a spade) on to the hard ground beyond a distance of forty-nine feet. We cannot, of course, though some German professors believe it, credit this feat, if it were a single long jump, yet we can find no trace of anything like a hop, step, and a jump, so that it seems wonderful how such an But the exploit absurdity should be gravely repeated in an epigram. became proverbial, and to leap imep TO. a-Ka^fiara (beyond the digging) was a
asserts that

constantly repeated phrase. There remain the two

'

pankration. strength not being admitted

and

the

The former came

till

severest and' most objectionable sports first (Ol. 23), the other
Ol.

boxing
test

of

33 (650

B.C.).

But one

special occasion L

146

GREEK PICTURES.

mentioned when a champion, who was competing in both, persuaded the judges to change the order, that he might not have to contend against a For boxing specially famous antagonist when already wounded and bruised. was, even from Homeric times, a very dangerous and bloody amusement, in which the vanquished were always severely punished. The Greeks were not content with naked fists, but always used a special apparatus, called of a weight carried in the hand, and fastened IjjidvTe?, which consisted at first by thongs of hide round the hand and wrist. But this ancient cestus came to be called the gentle kind (jueiXt^at) when a later and more brutal invention introduced "sharp thongs on the wrist," and probably increased the weight of the instrument. The successful boxer in the Iliad (Epeius) confesses that he is a bad warrior, though he is the acknowledged champion in his own line but evidently -this sport was not highly esteemed in epic days. Little need be added about the pankration, which combined boxing and wrestling, and permitted every sort of physical violence except biting. In this contest a mere fall did not end the affair, as was usual in wrestling, but the conflict was always continued on the ground, and often ended in one of the combatants being actually choked, or having his fingers and toes broken. One man, Arrachion, at the last gasp, broke his adversary's toe, and made him give in, at the moment he was himself dying of strangulation. Such contests were not to the credit either of the humanity or of the good
is
;

'

taste of the Greeks.'

'

suggested Pausanias, only by description by early probing of Maison's Frenchmen (above, p. 140), have brought to light at Olympia artistic remains of architecture and sculpture, second in importance only to those at
not

The

recent

excavations

of

the

Germans,

which

had been

the

of

but

the

great temple of Zeus, the main edifice of the whole Altis, or sacred enclosure, has been unearthed, and found just as the great earthquake

Athens.

The

which destroyed it in the fifth or sixth century A.D. left it. All the pillars were luckily thrown outwards by a shock striking the floor from beneath, and the higher parts, containing the sculptures of the gable and frieze, were landed some fifty feet away in the soft alluvial clay, which received them gently, and presently, with new floods from the Alpheus, covered them up There were, of course, many pieces carried away for Byzantine in mud. building in the dark ages, and many portions of statues and reliefs were
doubtless put into the lime-kiln by the barbarians who occupied the Altis a wall of defence was even of constructed wholly ancient great Byzantine
;

debris

across

the

site.

But,

unusually favourable.

The

on the whole, the circumstances have been noses of most of the pediment figures are intact,

and to any one who has wandered through the museums of Greece and Italy, and felt the perpetual grief of beautiful faces marred by a shattered nose, and the annoyance of beautiful faces destroyed by a restored nose, will know
1

Rambles and Studies in Gmce, pp. 283-291.

ELISOLYMPIA.

how

important

is

this detail in

our

great drums of the Doric

pillars

appreciation of ancient sculpture. are lying so strictly in their order

The
that

they could be set together again with mere mechanical labour. This great temple of massive Doric style was adorned in its triglyphs with scenes from the life of Herakles, of which some slabs were discovered
in the the eastern by Pceonios, the gables with two great compositions western by Alkamenes, a rival of Pheidias of which the principal figures are

INTERIOR OF THE GREAT TEMPLE AT OLYMPIA (RESTORED).

i

recovered.

The

eastern

group

preparing wild confusion

for the chariot race

represents stationary group of figures of Pelops the western is tossed about in the
;

of the

conflict

of the

drunken Centaurs with the Lapithae

In the centre

at the marriage feast of the

hero

Peirithous.

of each group,

gable was at its full height and allowed scope for a large standing figure, was a god the Providence which guides human events At visibly portrayed, but calm and without emotion at the quarrels of men.
the

where

L 2

148

GREEK PICTURES.
flat

recumbent figures of the local rivers angles of the triangular space were the and nymphs, to indicate personified scenery in which the mythical events This habit of representing a mountain or a river by its took place. was a well-known device of the Greek sculptor, by which he
the
tutelary

god

avoided the
instinct of

difficulties
all

making

of representing scenery, and Nature full of conscious life.

also

satisfied

the

Greek

The

interior

of the

temple

is

always described as of a splendour not equalled even in the Parthenon; midst of for in the there,
countless treasures of offerings, was the colossal statue of Zeus

by Pheidias,
grandest
sculptor that

which was the

grandest has ever lived.

effort of the

Pausanias says the only fault in the aspect of it was that you felt if Zeus were to rise from
his throne his

through too low for the size of the In one hand he held figure. o a sceptre with a golden eagle

the

head would go roof, which was

on the

top,

in

the

other
;

the golden figure of victory is general type of the head probably reproduced in the

famous
J

bust

known

as

the

less

upiter of Otricoli. This matchwork of art was carried

to Constantinople,

away
the

when
into

games
the

were

abandoned
falling

and
HEAD OF ZEUS

temple

(JUPITER),

KNOWN

AS

THE OTRICOU TYPE.

decay, where it was burned in one of the many fires which

ravaged that capital

very curious
days.

but

it

is

quite within the Parthenon of Athens, a statue

extremities,

silently the great works of classic art disappeared in Byzantine The stray notice which I have just cited is only accidental, and not The other great masterpiece of Pheidias, the Athene trustworthy.

how

made of gilded disappeared no one knows how or whither

;

surface with
;

ivory

so

did

the

bronze Athene outside the temple so did, in fact, all the great which stood in the Greek temples. Perhaps we have a solitary specimen in the celebrated Venus of Milo or Melos, which was found on that island

great statues

ELISOLYMPIA.
near the ruins of a temple, and which we
of a
late

149

now know
and
copying

to

sculptor,

archaising

in

style,

the

have been the work great models of

Pheidias.

The two most

important

single

figures,

indeed the only

two single

THE VENUS OF MELOS (NOW

LOUVRE).

IN

THE

THE NIKE

OF P.TONIUS FOUND AT OLYMPIA.

Olympia, are the Nike (Victory) of Pceonius The former was set upon a very high and the Hermes of Praxiteles. and a represented winged woman just alighting from heaven. pedestal, But the Most of the figure, though mutilated, has now been picked up. face has apparently been hacked away from the head, and the arms are
figures of importance

found at

GREEK PICTURES.
Nevertheless, when compared with the reliefs of the Nike temple at Athens, and the splendid Nike of Samothrace, it gives us a very clear notion of the general type of the goddess in sculpture, a type almost as fixed as
missing.

the types in the iconography of the Byzantine saints.

This

figure,

which had

A WARRIOR

OF

MARATHON
B.C.).

/ESCHINES THE ORATOR (ABOUT 330

B.C.]

(ABOUT 480

just

been

discovered

when

was

for

the

second

time

at

Olympia, was

exaggerated enthusiasm, and, though dating from the best epoch, and the work of a sculptor of the highest repute, it does not compare favourably with the far later, and so far anonymous, work of the sculptor of Samothrace.

received

by

its

finders with an

ELISOLYMPIA.
In one respect, however, the excavations have proved disappointing. regards portrait statues of athletes, of which there were specimens by the great masters, even by Pheidias,

151

As
all

work,
type,

we
of a

hardly ever condescended to such have recovered only one bronze head, very realistic and coarse of
boxer.

who

beholden to the copies in Italian of Pythagoras Rhegium, of Polycleitus, and of More interesting perhaps, Lysippus, to tell us what these portrait statues were. as we are speaking of portraiture in sculpture, are the representations of
that

So

we

are

still

museums

of the athletes of

poets and of Homer,

sometimes purely imaginary, as is the famous bust sometimes only idealised Nature, like the famous statues of Sophocles (in the Lateran at Rome) and ^Eschines (in the Naples Museum). The development of these figures, and of the athlete of Lysippus already mentioned, from the rude reliefs in the days of the battle of Marathon, are very striking, and we accordingly give on the preceding page the extreme
artists,

members
up

of the series.

The

bust of Sophocles

in the restored or reconstructed theatre of

probably a copy of that set Dionysus at Athens by Lycurgus

is

when he was

minister of finance (about 330

B.C.).

The

other statues (of the

inter-

orators) are of about the

same

date.

Unfortunately our

mediate stages in sculpture are very scanty. in a few years further discoveries will enable us to show the particular steps in the rapid progress of this wonderful art from rude convention to truth, from truth to beauty, from beauty to perfection in the representation of the

examples of But we may hope that

human figure. The other

of
little

under the ashes of the great altar foundations of various treasure-houses, used as banks by sundry Greek cities But upon these the fragments of Alexandrian and Roman architecture.
;

objects of art found at votive cows in bronze, found

Olympia are archaic bronzes, hundreds

;

reader must consult

some more

special work.

CITADEL OF ARGOS.

CHAPTER
ARGOS,

XII.

MVKEN.K, AND TIRVNS.

shall now INSTEAD

of proceeding at once southward to Messene and Elis, we cross the peninsula and visit the other great site where
I

modern excavation has revealed to us the treasures of bygone days mean the province of Argos, known of old by its famous capital, but to us
by the astonishing discoveries made by my friend, Dr. Schliemann, on the I mean the sites of the two capitals older than Argos, and once its rivals There is also in this most important section sites of Mykenae and Tiryns. of the Peloponnesus the interesting fort and harbour of Nauplia, celebrated as far back as the oldest Greek legends, and Epidauros, where we have now recovered the great theatre built by the statuary Polycleitus, and once famed as the most perfect in Greece. So then Argos, where every step is
full

of historic

suggestions,

has

many

points

of the

highest

archaeological

interest.

There was a day when Argos, not Sparta, was the leading capital in the Peloponnesus, and this is expressed by the legend which gives to the
eldest

brother

of the
fixes

Heracleids

who conquered

the

land,

the province of

preference, and
royal
their

him at Argos. From this mythical personage the families of Argos, and even the noblest Corinthians, loved to derive and many a notable Argive personage, like the tyrant genealogy
;

w tf&^mrfK P
;

*M

*MiimW& &

jkMS^w*'

& -^**i^ H-,-*$F 4

.^yk

k^

/- 4

'*

CITADEL OF ARGOS.

155

Pheidon, has been put back a hundred years in time for the

purpose of calling him the tenth I have elsefrom Herakles. where shown this to have been

done
the of

in

the

case

of

Archias,

founder of Syracuse, who was considered a contemporary

It is one of the Pheidon. most ingenious points in CurGreek History to have tius'

proved the same kind of error We were all about Pheidon.

taught to put him in 747 B.C., which was called the eighth Olympiad he seems really to
;

belongo

to
is

the

year /

660

r,.r.

But

this

what may be

called

learned speculation. You can approach

Argos
from

through

the

mountains

Corinth, over rugged hills and dales covered with brushwood, and meadows full of arbutus

and

anemones and and sweetcistus, asphodel and then you smelling thyme, come into the valley of the
mastic,

Inachus, high
close
first

to

up from the sea, When I Mykena^.

this

went
a

route there

was

only

rough

riding

mule-track, it was.

and

very Since

then they have advanced to a carriage road, and now, I believe, to a branch railway from
Corinth, so that what once required two laborious days, now

can

be
that

performed

in

few

hours.

And
I

am
all

glad I saw Greece before

yet

how

these

modern
its

improvein' their

ments

with

women

GREEK PICTURES.
with even which now colours, rugs splendid modern German are being displaced by the taste. alas King Otho and his court have indeed much to answer for in Greece. They introduced at and bread the but Athens, good restaurants, good they also made dreadful things in dress the fashion, so that the poor country-women think it good style to abandon their picturesque woollen skirts and shaggy overcoats (I know no better name) for calicoes of arsenic green and magenta. You can also reach Argos by steamer from Athens one of the best of all ways to see Greek life and scenery to the best advantage landing at the picturesque port of Nauplia. The Gulf of Nauplia is very beautiful, and a sunset seen from the little port,
rich

home-made costume,
mules
covered

as

they

still

wear

it

about

Megara,

their

with

of

Oriental

with

the

gulf in

the

foreground,

and

the

sun
the
tains,

sinking

behind

Arcadian
is

moun-

a sight one

never forgets. From Nauplia to Argos is only a drive of an hour and a and on the way, half,
not
gates,
far

outside

the

we meet
of

with

the

rock

standing
plain.

out

Tiryns, of the
I

But
take
the

will

now
NAUPLIA, SEEN FROM TIRYNS.

reader

on

at

once to the old

before

capital,

enter upon the consideration of the pre-historic splendours around us. town of Argos is a typical Greek town, flat and unsightly, made of houses, with a semi-oriental bazaar, and hardly any accommodation for They naturally stay at Nauplia, so that an innkeeper would have strangers. and as it is the notion of this profession in Greece that little custom an occasional guest must be made to pay extravagantly, because the host has so few opportunities for profit, it is well to beware of venturing into any inn in such a town without a strict bargain. On the other hand, I found private hospitality here and everywhere in Greece most abundant and
;

we The mud

kindly, provided

travellers

will

not go

not

over

accommodation in at Argos have

the
I

modest met with

large parties, for whom there is homes of the willing hosts. Twice most generous treatment from the
in

ARGOS,
a

MYKEN&, AND

TIRYNS.

157

gentleman to name, lest demands.

It is

whom now, in the days of increased travelling, fear my gratitude might bring upon him new and unexpected
I

not

middle
within

of

fruit

mud

You find yourself in the easy to define the limits of Argos. with gardens, oranges, lemons, oleanders, roses, growing fences, and you imagine it a suburb of the town, whereas you
I

are really in its centre. peculiar character which

When seen from its fortress above, it shows that cannot remember anywhere else save in the towns oi Canada, of a collection of gardens and orchards with their houses making a The of the If you see the children up city. type people is peculiarly fair. coming out of school, you will be surprised how few have the brown skin and black eyes and hair of real Southrons. The most valuable produce of the
tobacco, which, if properly grown, would supply all the country round with considerable wealth. Turning round a corner, you stumble upon a
plain
is
'

followed by two acolytes carrying upon a cross-stick between them a It is copper cauldron of water, with the Byzantine cross upon the handle. the pappas returning from a baptism. The Orthodox Church still practises
priest,

For this purpose infants are generally carried by immersion. to the in case they are delicate, or in case their neighbouring church can a sufficient the to the fee, parents house, mumbles pay pappas goes some prayers among the assembled household, and, seizing the infant by the
baptism
;

arm,

plunges

it

three times
to

into

the

cauldron.

Though

this

treatment

is

sometimes

life, orthodoxy of the people and their not tolerate any modification of the ritual of this sacrament.' On the slope of the ascent to the Larissa or fortress

fatal

the

clergy will
is

great

theatre,

capable of holding 20,000 people. as a place of assembly for the whole free population as well as for a theatre. There are no ornaments or carved seats But the view from the higher tiers, preserved, as there are at Athens. is looking eastward towards Nauplia, across the rich plain and the

150

larger, yards in
it

think,

than

that
to

of

Athens

for

it

is

said

to

measure

diameter,

and

be

Of

course

was intended

gulf,

hardly less westward.

In

beautiful

than

that

from

Nauplia

over

the

same

ground

1822, the castle of Larissa, which looms down from the top of Mount 1000 feet above the theatre, was held by the Chaon, insurgents, whom the Turks besieged there for many weeks. In the end the Turkish army was taken in the rear by other insurgents coming from Corinth, and destroyed.

fought singing the patriotic songs of their poet Rhigas, which Wonderful stories shepherds and peasants into real soldiers. are now told of their individual heroism. Perhaps these acts have been but the fact that without remains, exaggerated, any leaders of genius, or turned their

The Greeks

even of high character, the Greek people persisted ten years, and finally obtained their liberty. It

in
is

this awful struggle for false and ridiculous to

58

GREEK PICTURES.

and ignorant shepherds into just and wise heroes, so that they have suffered unduly, when they were found to deviate widely from the antique type invented by the pedants for the old Greeks, and foisted by enthusiasts upon the new. When the heroism of this enslaved people is mentioned, there are never wanting those who expose in them acts of treachery, cruelty, and duplicity, which are so exaggerated as to obscure the grand general features of the insurrection the love of liberty and the spirit
translate these rude

of sacrifice.

Thus

the mountaineers of

summoned by the new national began, when they came from their homes, by
;

(the old free Laconians government to come and defend

'

Maina

'),

when

Argos,
villages

pillaging

all

the

Greek

which they found recently deserted, and they then went back and hid their spoil in the mountains but when this was over, they rallied round their standard, :ind fought with the utmost But the notion of bravery against the Turks. profiting by patriotism, of taking rewards or even pay for personal services while doing the service of the country, is as old as Demosthenes, and is

expounded in the coolest way by his rival Hypereides. But we must leave the capital, the historic centre of the province, to visit the pre-historic centres, which were famous long before Argos rose to power, and which have quite recently recovered their ancient importance, owing to the genius and perseverance of that indefatigable excavator, 1 )r. Schliemann. After he had won his first laurels by discovering the real site of New Ilium, and then proving that the universal belief of classical days was correct, which placed the Troy of Homer at or under the same site, he undertook to examine the old sites in Argolis, which are indeed well marked, but seemed such barren rock as to allow little chance of finding many
underground treasures. Let us consider for a moment what hints or suggestions were to be found in the old writers hints which seemed plain enough when he utilised them, though nobody else had ever thought of applying them in a practical
way.

The

relation of the three capitals of Argolis to each other

a triangle, of which we may and Tiryns Argos, the sides the eight miles from either to the vortex at Mykenae, far up the valley of the Inachus, this much is certain, that in Homer's poetry, Mykena; is the chief city, and the home of the most splendid royalty, while nevertheless one of the most notable heroes, He is also lord of Tiryns, which in the poem Diomede, is King of Argos. is alluded to as a strong fort, but no longer as a separate capital or residence. In the legends, however, of the Perseids, and of the birth of
easily determined. lour miles between

Lying

in

call

not very the base the

is

Herakles, Tiryns is so prominent that we can hardly avoid considering it as the earliest capital of the country, probably settled and fortified by invaders

who came from

they or some rival race founded and fortified Mykena;, head of the plain, so that evidently to defend the the principal danger then lay not seawards, but towards the mountains oi
the sea, and ruled
till

ARGOS, -MYKEN.-E,
Corinth.

AND

TIRYNS.

159

gravity,

It is probable that at this time forest and perhaps careful irrigation the head of the valley the most fertile part, whereas, when the trees of the hills were cut down, and the irrigation was neglected, the centre of down to Argos, near the sea, which Homer agriculturally, moved

made

seeing that the plain is watered by two rivers, considerable for that country, the Inachus and Erasinus, and that the coast between Argos and Tiryns was always marshy, so that even the legends which place there the famous swamps of Lerna, with its horrible hydra,
calls very thirsty

why

know

not,

Herakles slew.

Thus Argos succeeded

and destroyed these
cities,

to
for

the
the

heritage

of both

Tiryns

and

Mykense,

purpose of unifying or centralising the the under royalty of Pheidon, somewhere in the seventh power, probably Late Greek writers have spread the notion that Mykenae and century B.C.

GOLD CUPS FOUND BY DR. SCHLIEMANN

IN

TOMBS AT MYKEX.E.

Tiryns lasted

till

after

the

Persian wars,

because

citizens

from

both

are

named in the catalogue of the Greeks who conquered, both by Herodotus and on a tripod inscription recovered at Constantinople, which was actually But I was able to show that these were only a few loyal contemporary. when exiles, magnified in importance because of their loyalty to Greece, I also took the Persian side, or behaved with mean neutrality.
Argos
at Marathon and pointed out that /Eschylus, the patriotic poet who fought Salamis, who must have shared in the general ill-will against Argos, nevertheless knew so little about Mykense, that he violates all Homeric tradition, and lays the scene of his great dramas about Agamemnon at Argos, while he never even once mentions Mykenae. This proves so clearly that Argos and raze that city in consequence of the part she took in did not

conquer

the

Schliemann, when commencing his excavations, that he would find neither inscriptions, nor coins, nor any
Persian
wars,
that
I

predicted

to

Dr.

i6o

GKEEK PICTURES.
of

other

those
in

many
every
year

objects

which town

existed
after

Greek
B.C.

the

500

The

results verified exactly these

predictions.

All the treasure,

all

the stone carvings, all the ornaments found there were strictly
pre-historic,

or so

archaic as to

be rather pre- Homeric than postPersian

in

character.

But

must descend from these speculations to

some

easier details.

famous lion-gate at Mykenae was a thing long cited and admired, though the later Greeks, such as Pausanias and Strabo, seem either not to know But this it or to neglect it. massive portal, with its strange heraldic lions over the great

The

masonry of showed squared great had that here once plainly enough dwelt men who had vast resources of labour under their But it was not till hands.
lintel,

with

its

ashlar

stones,

ferences

Schliemann's researches that difwere observed in the

Most of building of the walls. the circuit was in polygonal or here irregular masonry, whereas
the ashlar or rectangular building was actually set as a facing of

ruder work behind

it,

evidently
likely,

by

later hands.

It

seemed

therefore, that

this

ancient

fort

had been occupied by successive races, who made improvements

in

their

art

of

construction.
hill

Burrowed
'

into

the
also

facing

famous and its Treasury of Athens built tombs beehive fellows

Mykenae were

the
'

ARC OS, MY KEN. S, AND TIRYNS.

with an art
so
fully

161

equal to that of the lion-gate, therefore probably belonging to the same race. Unfortunately this great beehive tomb has long since been
rifled,

that

we had no evidence

of

its

contents, save that

it

bronze plates, of which some of the fastening nails there was some ornament in the triangular aperture over the door corresponding to the lion-slab of the gateway. The aperture was intended
within with
that

was coated survive, and

we know

superincumbent weight, and it was So far then carved by way of ornament. we feel that a race of splendid builders had succeeded to an older and ruder people, and had either remodelled the older work or built additional monuments in their own style. Thus, in many cathedrals throughout Europe, old Romanesque or Norman work has been cut away, or faced with Perpento

relieve the lintel

stone

of excessive
slab

filled

with

thin limestone

dicular,

with Renaissance, or even eighteenth what was really beautiful with what we now
not positively hideous.

century classical
feel

work, hiding
far inferior,

to

have been

if

Mykenae, till Dr. Schliemann, finding within the circuit wall one spot with a deep accumulation of soil, probed this spot, and found first a circuit of upright slabs, then stone slabs which appeared to be sepulchral monuments, and at last, far beneath them,
felt

But no one

this duality of the

work

at

a group of tombs from that of the

into

full

of treasure, but of a very different construction indeed famous For here the bodies were crammed Treasury.'
'

a space too small for them, not laid in a great chamber with a high vaulted roof over them, and the offerings or other objects with them were simply thrown in upon them, not laid out, as they would be in a spacious

chamber.
place,

Not

that these

the head and

bust

In the first objects were either rude or cheap. of some of the dead were covered with golden

around and over them lay dozens of beautiful gold cups, of masks, which we give specimens on page 159, as well as rosettes of gold, an ox head in gold and silver, bronze swords, cauldrons, and many more objects of various kinds for which the reader must either consult Dr. Schliemann's splendid record RIykcnce, or go to the museum at Athens and examine them for himself. But I fear he will not see upon them the beautiful for the zealous red bloom that astonished us when we first beheld them curators of the Athenian Museum had unfortunately taken to polishing them when I was last at Athens, and so we shall lose that flavour of so suggestive of the fact that no lapse of antiquity so very exquisite, and to whereas it reduces silver vessels to mere cause will rust, centuries gold lumps of oxidised rust. This is the true value of gold, and the reason why the human race has from the first recognised its peerless qualities. Into the identifications of the bodies with Agamemnon and his family need not here enter. Nothing was more natural in the first moment I and yet now that we have been able to reflect over it of enthusiasm calmly, nothing seems to me more certain than that the bodies found by
while
;
;

,62

GREEK PICTURES.

Dr. Schliemann belong to a date far anterior to the Homeric poems, or even to the worthies whose traditions they preserved. For, in the first place, there succeeded, as I have said, another race of great builders, and even in

what we know of these

the manners, the
life

latter

we cannot

identify

the

dress,

the weapons,

of the

seems

to separate the

A huge gap heroes as described by Homer. of Schliemann from that of Homer, and but Mykenae

that the consistent epithet of much golden is especially applied to it by the poet or poets, we could well imagine the pre-historic greatness of the place to have passed into oblivion, and its Hellenic supremacy to have been a

new and

distinct

growth.

But

will

not

to assert the superior antiquity of thing told in Homer.

the

go so tombs and

far as

this

it

is

enough
to

their

occupants

any-

must not forget to add that in addition to these deep-sunk earthen tombs, Dr. Schliemann discovered several more beehive tombs in the immediate neighbourhood proving that the Treasury of Athens was no As but represented the deposit of one of a line of kings. solitary work, the Greek legends describe an earlier family, the Perseids, expelled by the richer Pelopids who came from Lydia, Adler has suggested calling the ruder tombs the Perseid, and the beehive buildings the Pelopid epoch of
'

We

'

Mykenae.
additional light have we obtained from the subsequent excavation For this too must be added to the crown of of the sister fort at Tiryns ?

What

glory earned by our veteran friend, whose book called Tiryns is hardly less It represents even a superior stage in the art interesting than his Mykence.

of excavation.

For while

in his

former researches

he

had mainly occupied

the

layers of soil, by which floors, walls, and This is the true method, by which we can so ground plans were disclosed. and by this find the successive dates of any building, represented by strata careful process it became possible for Dr. Dorpfeld to reconstruct the whole
;

himself digging holes, to probe, Tiryns consisted in taking off

and then

to reach his treasure,

work

at

palace Schliemann's book.

plan

of

the

at

Tiryns, which

the

reader

may wonder

at

in

Dr.

Did
from
giant
face

this

the
fort

To judge palace belong to the Perseid or the Pelopid era ? The building of the walls of Tiryns, I should say, the earlier.
is

put

together

of huge
to

rough

stones,
fit

certainly
easily,

not

squared,

though possibly roughly hewn,

make them

more

and present a

outwards. It has only recently been proved by Dr. Dorpfeld, through these very excavations, that there was once mortar in the interstices, though in all the exposed portions it was long since washed away. The oftdescribed galleries within the wall, with apertures looking outward made
like

very rude Gothic arches, seem to have been intended for granaries, perhaps sleeping room for slaves, but not for siege purposes. Far more interesting than these great walls, with their gate-tower

ARC OS, MYKEN&, AND

commanding
palace,

TIRYNS.

163

approach, which leads up so as to have the right or unshielded side of the assailants exposed to the defenders, is the plan of the
the

on the uppermost part of the rock, which is approached through two It is very interestseparate gates in addition to the main entrance gate. ing to note that the so-called temple in antis, that is to say, with only two pillars filling the opening left in the enclosing wall, which ends on either side of them in two square pilasters this simple plan, so common in the older or simpler temples, was copied from the pre-historic gateways evidently universal in early times. Those at Tiryns were partly of wood. The actual gate had a portico looking either way, with an upper cross-beam of wood forming the architrave, and supported by two pillars of wood, set on stone

PEI ASGIC

MASONRY AT TIRYNS.

bases, found

in

their

place

by Schliemann.

dried
it

bricks,

and to
in

was cased
either

wood

protect the prototype

side walls were of sunwas next the pillars, which the face or end of the square pilasters which stand

The

frame of the wide aperture in the front wall which forms the entrance. Within these gates were floors, stamped hard, of clay, on some of which were rude designs, and inside the court, one with evidences of a hearth in the middle for the men great chamber, detached from it, and not easily accessible, was a similar chamber intended The upper stories, being all of wood, and the roofs which for the ladies. of reeds and consisted, no doubt, as they now do through remoter Greece, wooden beams and laths are totally gone. But on shingle, laid flat upon some of the walls were rude but handsome ornaments, especially rosettes, in
outside
pillar,

forming

the

64

GREEK PICTURES.
we
still

that blue glass paste which

Egypt, and which is alluded to by Homer. There was even a bath-room found, of which the floor was made of one stone, twelve feet by nine, with a raised edge, into which upright wooden panels were set, to withstand the splashing of the walls and in the midst, the fragments of a large terra-cotta tub, in which the kings of Tiryns,
find in
;

pierced in the stone floor, with a pipe leading through the building outward, made the use of this room quite unmistakable. These are only a few of the many curiosities found at
or
their

guests,

bathed.

hole

Tiryns, and

destined

to

make

its

excavation

one of

the

most

important

performances

in recent archaeology.

There were,

then, once in

Argos great

kings, living in strong palaces, as

Homer described them, and in considerable luxury, being furnished not only with what the country could produce, but with the luxuries of foreign trade, ornaamber, gold,
ments of Egyptian and Oriental manufacture,

even

ostrich

eggs, of which a frag-

ment

was found at Let the Mykenae.

reader remember that the amber came from

the

North

Sea

or

Baltic, the ostrich egg from far inland in

and he will see that even in those remote days, a thousand

Africa,
CRETE.

years or more before Christ, there was that

traffic by caravans, and by ships, which meet us in the Bible narrative of the lives of the earliest patriarchs. The old Greek legends consistently

lively

ascribe

invaders.

early Argive power and civilisation to foreign and Oriental There seems little reason to doubt the truth of this impression. We know that the Phoenicians discovered and developed trade in the Mediterranean by means of their ships, and it is more than likely that the so-called kingdom of Minos in Crete, that great island fortress in the Southern Levant, with its mighty mountain tops in their snow the beacon for
this

southern

empire of these traders in the tents of Javan. Nothing was more natural, when they crept up the bleak and barren coast from Malea, which affords no refuge for ships, that they should hail with delight the first great open bay, with good anchorage and rich lands
sailors,
first

symbolises the

lying close to

the sea.

Thus

the

earliest

forts

of the

invaders

from

the

ARGOS, MYKEN.K,

AND

TIRYNS.

165

south-east would most naturally be placed in the very district where these pre-historic castles.
It

we

find

was formerly our great difficulty to fill the supposed gap between the days of Homer and the first dawn of real Greek history a gap imagined
small dimensions, but the gap which from what went before. For we have separates now discovered an early culture so different from what is known as Greek, that it is indeed hard to realise how Greek art and its style were developed from such beginnings. Oriental affinities are plain enough what we desire to learn, and some day we shall learn it, is the gradual progress from
r

It is be three centuries wide. which w e have reduced to very

to

now our

difficulty

to

fill,

not

this gap,

the

Homeric

civilisation

Tiryns and Mykena; to contemporary with the Persian wars.

the
art

of

the

archaic

art

of

the

Parthenon

THE PLAIN OF MESSENE.

CHAPTER

XIII.

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA, AND ARCADIA.

various ways of approaching Sparta, though in old days its great military strength consisted in not being accessible to an army except down the narrow and easily defended valley of the Upper
are

THERE
Eurotas.

days of peace, you can either go by sea to Gythium, the old port, and drive on a good carriage road, nay, even in a diligence, in or else you can approach it from Kalamata in five hours to New Sparta Messene, by coming through the splendid Langada pass in Mount Taygetus, or else of course you may approach by any of the northern paths till you come

Now,

in the

to Sellasia, the site of

power of Sparta (221 and rich valley of the old stronghold of Greek aristocracy. For at no time could any other Greeks pretend to the dignity of Spartan nobles. They
stood,
like

the great battle where Macedon finally overcame the and follow down the Eurotas into the famous B.C.),

the
still

ridiculed, but

English gentleman in Europe, perhaps disliked, envied, the type which every foreigner is proud to adopt, and

which he secretly admires.

",

;v ?*

SPARTA, MESSENE,

MA INA, AND

ARCADIA.

As we
suitable that

have
I

dallying in Argos, it will perhaps be most should repeat the experiences I had in 1884, when I passed
fair

now been

by way
'

of Astros into Sparta.

perfectly

The morning was

of the

and calm,

and

the

great

mountain

were mirrored in the opal sea, as we passed the picturesque rocky fort, which stands close to Nauplia in the bay, the The beauty of the Gulf of Argos residence of the public executioner. never seemed more perfect than in the freshness of the morning, with the Our progress was at first by the the lofty coasts. rising sun illuminating but as the morning advanced, there came down a slow labour of the oar wind from the fresh west mountains, which at intervals filled our lateen sail In three hours almost too well, and sent us flying along upon our way. we rounded a headland, and found ourselves in the pretty little bay of
chains
coast
;

Astros.
'

Of

course

the whole

population

came down
amused,
as

to

see

us.

They were
of an

apparently as
Irish village.

idle,

and

as ready to

be

the

inhabitants

But they are sadly wanting in fun. You seldom hear them a or make laugh, and their curiosity is itself curious from this aspect. joke After a good deal of bargaining we agreed for a set of mules and ponies to bring us all the way round the Morea, to Corinth if necessary, though
ultimately we were glad to leave them at Kyparissia, at the opposite side The bargain was eight of Peloponnesus, and pursue our way by sea. a or drachmas per day for each animal native, very experienced traveller,
;

could have got them for five to six drachmas. Our way led up a river-course, as usual, through fine olive trees and fields
'

scarlet anemones, till after a mile or two we began from the level of the coast to the altitudes of the central plateau, Here the flora of the coast gave or rather mountain system, of the Morea. and star-of- Bethlehem. Every fields of to irises, way sperge, hyacinths, and extended view back over coasts inch of ascent gave us a more splendid and islands. The giant tops of the inner country showed themselves still covered with snow. We were in that district, so little known in ancient and Sparta, history, which was so long a bone of contention between Argos whose boundaries seem never to have been fixed here by any national landmark. When we had reached the top of the rim of inland Alps, we ascended and descended various steeps, and rounded many glens, reaching in the end the village of H agios Petros, which we had seen before us for a long time, while we descended one precipice and mounted another to

of corn, studded with

to ascend

attain our goal.

were accommodated as well as the worthy demarch could manage and early in the morning we climbed up a steep ascent to night obtain the high plateau, very bleak and bare, which is believed by the people to have been the scene of the conflict of Othryades and his men
'

We

for the

170

GREEK PICTURES.
the

A particular spot is still called crrovs Argive three hundred. The high plain, about 3500 feet above (^feu/ASTOu;, "the place of the slain." the sea, was all peopled with country folk coming to a market at H agios and we had ample opportunity of admiring both the fine manly Petros appearance and the excellent manners of this hardy and free peasantry. The complex of mountains in which they live is the chain of Parnon, which ultimately extends from Thyreatis, through Kynuria, down to Cape Malea, but not without many breaks and crossings. The heights of Parnon (now still hid from us the farther called Malevo) Alps of the inner country. After a ride of an hour or two we descended to the village of Arachnva, much smaller and poorer than its namesake in Phocis, and thence to the valley of a stream now called Phonissa, the murderess, from its dangerous floods, but at the moment a pleasant and shallow stream. Down the narrow bed of this stream we went for hours, crossing and recrossing it, or riding along its banks, with all the verdure gradually increasing with the change of climate and of shelter, till at last a turn in
with
;
'

the river brought us suddenly again

in

sight of the

brilliant

serrated
'

crest

of Taygetus, glittering with

snow in the sunshine. Then we knew our and felt that we were indeed approaching Sparta.' proper landmark, The greatness of Sparta is plain enough in Homer, where Menelaus,
its

plays such a prominent part, not only as the innocent cause of the great war in the Iliad, but as the master of a refined and luxurious court, which Telemachus visits in the Odyssey, where he finds the king, with his
its

king,

recovered wife, now tempered with still holding her position as the

afflictions

peerless

and and

saddened with
semi-divine

regrets,

Queen

of

1 he But before real history commences all this is changed. Lacedaemon. Dorians have invaded the Morea, and made Sparta one of their headThe Dorian invaders form a new nobility, to which the old quarters. inhabitants are in various subjection, while, strange to say, the royal house from the is divided between two lines of kings, both alleging their descent had a which Achaean house, god Herakles, brothers originally of the same This pedigree of the legendary splendour unapproachable by any Dorians. which went back to Herakles, is an instructive Spartan kings, straight specimen of the manner in which history was woven into myth, without any There is a apparent break, by the early Greek priests and poets.
remarkable chapter in Herodotus, where he tells of the curious, antique, and perhaps even semi-Hellenic, customs, with which these unique monarchs or rather duarchs, were honoured. The Spartans have given the following privileges to their kings two
' :

Lacedaemonian Jupiter, and that of the Celestial and no war Jupiter; levy against whatever country they please, a curse one of the Spartans may impede this, otherwise he falls under
priesthoods,
that

of the

and

to

Gambles mid Studies in

Crciif,

pp. 376 -jSl.

SPARTA, ME$SNE, MAINA,

AND ARCADIA.
first,
:

171

when they march

hundred
they
the
skins
'

out

to

war,

the

kings go
in

and

retire

last

and a

chosen
as

sacrifice

men guard many cattle

all

them
as

the
please,

field

during

the

expeditions,

they

and chines of

the victims.

and take as their own share These are their privileges in time

of war.

The others, those during peace, have been given them as follows. If one make a public sacrifice, the kings sit first at the feast, and are first any each served, receiving double of whatever is given to the other guests. have the They right of beginning the libations, and are entitled to the skins of the cattle that are sacrificed. At every new moon, and on the seventh day of the current month, a perfect victim is presented to each of them at the public charge, for the Temple of Apollo and a medimnus of meal, and a Laconian quart of wine. At all public games they have seats of distinction it is their and appointed, by way prerogative to appoint such citizens as they please to be Proxeni, and also to choose each two Pythii. T he Pythii are persons who are sent to consult the oracle at Delphi, and are maintained with the When the kings do kings at the public charge. not come to the banquet, two measures of flour and a cotyle of wine are sent home to each of them but when they are present, a double portion of everything is given them, and when invited to a banquet by private persons, they are honoured in the same manner. They have the keeping of the oracles that are pronounced, but the Pythii are also privy to them. The alone have to determine a the to matters with kings respect following only who is to if and her father has not betrothed her virgin heiress, marry her, with respect to the public highways and if any one desires to adopt a son, it must be done in presence of the kings. They assist at the deliberations of the senators, who are twenty-eight in number and if they do not attend, those of the senators who are most nearly connected with them enjoy the privileges of the kings, giving two votes, and a third, their own.
;

given to the kings by the commonwealth of the and when Horsemen announce Spartans during they die, the following. through all Laconia what has happened, and women, going through the city, beat a cauldron when this accordingly is done, it is required that two free people of each house, a man and a woman, should go into mourning, in token of grief; and if they neglect to do so, heavy fines are imposed on them. The Lacedaemonians have the same custom with regard to the death of their kings as the barbarians in Asia. For when a king of the Lacedaemonians dies, it is required that from the whole territory of
privileges are
life
;
;

'

These

Lacedaemon, besides the Spartans, a certain number of the neighbouring inhabitants should attend the funeral when accordingly, many thousands of these, and of the Helots and of the Spartans have themselves, assembled together in one place, they promiscuously, with the women,
;

strike

their

foreheads

vehemently,

and give themselves

up

to

unbounded

i;2

GREEK PICTURES.
the king who has affirming that had. Should one of their kings die
just died in war,

lamentation,

was

the

best

they ever
his

having prepared expose it to public view on a couch richly ornamented and when they have buried him, no assembly takes place for ten days, nor is a meeting held for the election of magistrates, but they mourn
effigy,

they

during those
'

clays.
:

resemble the Persians in this other respect when on the king another king is appointed, he, on his accession, releases whatever debts may be due from any Spartan to the king or the public

They

also

death

of a

among the Persians, a newly-appointed arrears of tribute then due.

so,
1

king

remits

to all

the cities the

In this respect also the Lacedaemonians resemble the Egyptians their so that heralds, musicians, and cooks, succeed to their fathers' professions a musician is son of a musician, a cook of a cook, and a herald of a
: ;

herald

nor

do

others,

themselves to
practise
it

this

on account of the clearness of their voice, apply but they continue to profession, and exclude others
;

after their fathers.

is

These

1 things, then, are so.'

Sparta
but there
is

widely known as the city of Lycurgus and of his discipline evidence that before this severe simplicity was introduced, finer
;

manners and greater luxury prevailed, especially at the court of the kings, for we have in Alcman a poet, naturalised from Asia Minor, from the rich Sardis, and composing for the Spartans poetry anything but suited to the 2 And this poet is reported to have lived long sobriety of historical Sparta. after the date of is placed who before 776 B.C., whereas the poet Lycurgus, is about 600. This to me, what is in itself very probable, placed proves that the Sparta of Leonidas was a gradual growth in severity and strictness,

becoming rude

the gradual increase of the power of the ephors, who, like the Venetian Council of Five, became lords even over the nominal heads of the state. Every reform failed while this pig-headed
authority

to affectation with

remained
III.,

in

force.

It

was

the

first

act

of

the

innovator

the greatest of all the Spartan kings, who was only crushed the full by power of Macedon and Achaea at Sellasia in 221 B.C., to lay hold of and put to death the ephors. He got rid of the second king also but the execution of the ephors was the first token of a really thorough coup
;

Cleomenes

d'etat.

popular knowledge about Sparta is which Life of Lycurgus, many details are mythical, many traits of the habits of the Spartan youth exaggerated, but still a picture is which has fascinated the imagination of the world. Hardiproduced ness in games and sports, frugality in diet, silence and modesty in
great
all

The

source

of

the

Plutarch's

in

demeanour,
strict

briefness
in

of

speech

these

were
;for

the
the

qualities

secured
of war.
i.

by

training
1

common,
vi.

and

intended
2

purposes

Thus

Herodotus,

56-60.

Cf.

my

History oj Greek Literature,

p.

170

in
T3 f>

SPARTA, HfESSENE, MAINA,

was
created

AND ARCADIA.

175

unconquered for centuries, a type of aristowhich all the crat perfection unequalled in Greece, and a physical For the young Spartans athletics of the other Greeks could not attain. and not athletes were distinctly sportsmen, they spent their leisure with
infantry
;

an

dogs which reaches down

training morals,

in

the wilds of
did

Mount Taygetus,
in hill

and

or in the wild country to the south-east, The perfection of their forest to Malea.
literature,

not,

however,

include

or

proper

education

in

and so the day of their political greatness was also the day of their It was found that the rule of a Spartan harmost, or military governor fall. in a subject land, was that of a tyrant, corrupt in money matters, and unThey had been too long used to trampling feeling towards his inferiors. upon Helots and Periceci at home they had never been trained to the use
;

presence of large pecuniary so that Aristotle, commenting upon the Spartan type, censures it interests The case of the women as only fitted to make a soldier, not a free citizen. treated with almost modern he reports as even worse. Being under no control,
of

money,
;

or

to

the

self-control

required

in

deference by the men, they became so luxurious that, Aristotle says, upon occasion of a hostile invasion they made more confusion by their conduct than But this runs counter to the many stories of dignity and heroism the enemy.
in

The real outcome Spartan women with which the later historians abound. of all our evidence is that these women, who were allowed liberty and social equality with men, were nobler, chaster, better than other Greek women. If cases of female heroism are quoted, they are generally Spartan and thus we should have imagined that the rest of Greece might have learned the folly and mischief of that seclusion of women which is a blot
;

even upon Attic culture. But nothing is more curious than this, that while all Greece envied and admired the Spartans, while it was the greatest distinction to have even a Spartan nurse, while the rudenesses of a Spartan were thought better style than the urbanities of other men, no attempt was ever made by their The Greeks had neighbours to imitate their training or their institutions.
'
'

more sense than the modern Europeans in these matters. They knew that a successful state is a slow and natural growth, conditioned by special and permanent causes, and that to transplant such a system was absurd. Yet in modern Europe no wretched fragment of a nation attains its independence, but some travesty of English institutions, especially parliamentary institutions, forthwith foisted upon a populace of totally different ways, habits, and is
traditions.

The empty husk

of the Lycurgean

discipline

lasted with curious

persistence through centuries of obscurity and neglect, after Sparta had been The sentimental vulgarity of the Romans, when finally crushed at Sellasia.

they succeeded to the Macedonians, was eminently attracted by the fame of Spartan training, and from Augustus to Nero the emperors made themaintenance of the old Lycurgean forms a matter of their special interest.

176

GREEK PICTURES.

But this survival was not unique. Pausanias, travelling through the decayed and deserted Greece of the second century A.D., records how here a council, and there a confederacy, here archons, there priesthoods, kept alive if this fossil the names and memories of old Greek institutions. condition can be called life

So we may imagine the Spartan black broth, made served up to Augustus or Hadrian, ephors sitting

after the antique receipt,

in a drowsy council, and at ancient with and weariness in their hearts. discipline, youths playing contempt In the early Middle Ages we hear little of Sparta or of Lacedaemon,

save that this province, as well as the rest, suffered from invasions of Goths and settlements of Slavs. \Yhen the Franks invaded Greece, a very the remarkable family, V'illehardouins, seized this part of the Morea, and built above Sparta that famous and picturesque fort which in the Middle Ages, and indeed till the earthquake some thirty years ago, supplanted Mistra (the old French for maitressc, mistress altogether the old Sparta. was fortified on a spur of Mount town) Taygetus, about four miles west of it was adorned with fair Gothic churches and palaces, and surSparta mounted by a fortress still higher up. Twenty years after his conquest, Villehardouin was captured by the new Byzantine emperor, Palseologus, who was recovering his dominion. The Frank was obliged to cede him for his ransom the forts of Mistra and Moembasia, which from that time were
;

Still strongholds of the Byzantine power till the conquest of the Turks. the Villehardouins long kept hold of Kalamata and other forts and to the pen of one of them, Geoffrey, we owe the famous old chronicle La Conqncte de la, Morcc, which is unique in its importance, both as a specimen of old French and a piece of mediaeval history. The architecture of the place, begun at
;

was taken up by the Byzantine Greeks, so combined in the curious relics of the now deserted styles For since when an 1850, stronghold. earthquake shook down many houses, the population wandered to the revived Sparta, which is now a thriving But as the old Sparta in its greatest days was only a collection of town. shabby villages, showing no outward sign of its importance, so the new and vulgar Sparta has no attractions, save the lovely orange and lemon orchards
a noble
that

epoch by the

Latins,

we have both

round it, in comparison with the mediaeval Mistra. The houses are piled one over another till you reach the summit crowned by the citadel, which from the higher mountains at its back by a itself a mountain, is severed
'

The whole town is now nothing but tumbling river. You wander up rudely-paved streets ruined palaces, churches, and houses. and in beneath arches on which are carved the escutcheons pass zigzag, rising
deep gorge with
a

of

French knights. You memories of the Crusaders.

enter
It is

courts

overgrown with

grass,

but

full

of

through these streets, now Prankish tombs, among others that of Theodora Tocco, wife of the Emperor Constantine Palaeologus, who died in 1430.

the very home of the Middle Agres. Passing J O O the resort of lizards and serpents, you come upon

SPARTA, HfESSENE, MAINA,

'

AND ARCADIA.

177

a Latin basilica, with the only church well preserved a portico in the form of an Italian loggia, and a Byzantine tower added to it. This building is highly ornamented with delicate carving, and its walls
is

The Pantagia

are in
floor

alternate

courses

of brick

and
is

stone,

while

are

of marble.

The

interior

adorned
is

with

the gates, columns, and Byzantine frescoes of

the metropolitan church built by the Greeks, as soon as William Yillehardouin had surrendered the fort in This great church is not so beautiful as that already described, but 1263. has many peculiarities of no less interest. The palace of the Frank princes

scenes from the Old Testament.

Higher up

was probably on the wide place on a higher

level,

where the ruined walls

show

the remains of

by the Greek
in their

many Gothic windows. The citadel was first rehandled Palaeologi, then by the Turks, then by the Venetians, who,
mediaeval
in

turn,
all

seized this

"

Fetter

of Greece."

And now

all

the

traces of

these

conquerors are

decay.

The
is

heat of the sun

intense.

high walls,

lying together confused in silence and these narrow and stony streets, with their But you cannot but pause when you find in turn old

dedications, Roman inscriptions, Prankish devices, emblazoned on the walls. The Turkish baths alone are intact, and have resisted both weather and earthquake. The churches occupy the chief place and a as it were a monumental tear for then now still, stone, dropping their glorious past the Greek cross, the Latin cross, the crescent, have all ruled there in their turn. Even a pair of ruined minarets remain to show the traces of that slavery to which the people were subject for four hundred years.' In the last generation this splendid place was totally neglected by travellers for the slight and poor remains to be found about the site of old for we know that the traces of temples and of theatres date from Sparta the clays when the real Sparta was gone, and the city was ruled by tyrants like Nabis, or was in the pay of Hellenistic kings. The later Spartans, even their kings, were so exclusively trained for fighting, that they became mercenaries for any rich employer. So it was that many went to Alexandria, where they met the Jews, and established those curious relations mentioned several times by Josephus, who states that the Jews recognised

Greek carving, Byzantine

'

the Spartans as related in their ancestry to the chosen people. The valley of Sparta is certainly the most beautiful inland place in Greece, and its wealth and fair climate account for the early importance of Sparta before it

had been turned

into a training-school for soldiers.

Of
logical

late years

research.

Sparta has been rising in importance, as a field of archaeoSeveral quaint old reliefs may be seen in the museum,

showing how the early rulers ornamented their tombs, and as I am writing these pages (October, 1889) news reaches us that a splendid pre-historic tomb, with all its ornaments, has been unearthed in the neighbourhood.
1

Henri Belle, Voyage en Grice, pp. 306-10.

i;8

GREEK PICTURES.
details are yet so imperfect that
it
I

The

cannot describe

this

novelty for

my

readers, but

seems plainly not a relic of what is known as the Sparta of Lycurgus, but ot that older and more luxurious town which was changed by the tyranny of the discipline ascribed to that lawgiver. The exit from Sparta through the great gorge of Taygetus, called the Langgada Pass, is more picturesque than the approach down the valley of the From Sparta itself Lip to the gorge, through it, and to Kalamata ELI rotas.
is

rather too long a ride, perhaps fourteen hours. On the other hand, recent travellers who have taken the advice of the guide-books, and stopped for the

night at Trypi, a picturesque village piled up a steep slope at the mouth ot the pass, did not find that picturesqueness an adequate compensation for the exorbitant charges for lodging, charges which amounted to downright robbery.
I remember though rare, are not unknown in Greece. four of us being asked 118 francs for a night's lodging and supper at whereas the value Tripolitza, which we got the demarch to reduce to 78 These cases show that the bandit spirit, though received was certainly not 25. M. on the roads, still dwells here and there among Tricoupi repressed by the inhabitants just as I found that Scylla and Charybdis had adjourned from their old lurking-places in Ulysses' time to the harbours of Reggio and Messina, where under the guise of boatmen and ciceroni they still lie in Under these circumstances I should wait for the adventurous voyager. at Mistra there certainly try sleeping ought to be ghosts of knights and ladies fair wandering in the moonlight about their deserted pleasaunce,' and the people would be so taken by surprise by a visitor that most probably It is the guide-book's directions which they would not think of extortion. have raised the intelligence of the people of Trypi to resume their old trade

Cases of

this

kind,

'

in

the mountains.

The

pass

itself is

the most famous in Greece

as

famous

as,

and more

frequently visited than the Yale of Tempe, and in its way more beautiful, though it does not boast the splendid trees or the large river of the But for colours in the rocks, for fantastic shapes, for Thessalian vale.

northern slope, and when that is burnt southern sun, passing slope, which lives in perpetual shade for picturesque peasant children, reflecting wild Nature in their dreamy eyes, as they climb about the precipices in pursuit of their grotesque goats
beautiful

Mowers, clothing

first

the

by the

fierce

to

the

in

no spot in Europe short, more exceedingly beautiful. It has too that appearance of danger which makes mule-travelling so fascinating, and though I never could hear of a case where man or mule was precipitated into the abyss, it is certainly possible In fact, in days of snow or storm, the natives will not at any moment.
for wildness
is

and sweetness combined, there

So it is that some travellers are brought by a great circuit attempt the pass. into Messene, and lose this fairest of Morean sights. As the entry is sudden, when you go up from the valley of Sparta,

> i

'-

'

.-i

?<-'

".

& f'SKVm 'SSSr/*:!^

THE LANGGADA
(From a phctograph
by Messrs.

PASS.
Dyer, by permission of Mr. G, A. MacntiUan.}

M. Macmillan

&

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

so the descent into Messene
is

AND ARCADIA.

181

gradual you get fine views into the rolling country and the placid sea from far above, as you begin to descend from the highest point of the pass, and you see beneath the broad shallow bed of the Nedon, which enters the sea at the town and castle of Kalamata now a frequent calling-place for steamers when I first saw it, a mere road;
;

feluccas, which had perhaps not very long turned from piratical But the resources of Messene are so great that adventure to sober trade. this will be one of the chief places for with cultivation increasing

stead for

exportation.

Koron, and here also, in a deep nook, is a fine no which was doubt founded or enlarged upon Prankish castle, But the castle of Kalamata was the first and the permanent foundations. seat of the Villehardouins begun in 1205, the lion of St. Mark over the Some day gate shows that it was occupied in later days by the Venetians. there will be a special book on these fortresses, and Kalamata will occupy a Unfortunately, there seems to be no trace remaining prominent place in it. of the church or chapel which certainly formed a part of the early Prankish nor is there any convent near, where we might trace the consettlement Latin Churches, as at Daphni or at Mistra. flict of the Greek and But like Mr. careful some more of the search, Schultx, expert by very possibly of an which the disclose remains will amateur fails British School, to eye view is a and To the latter he hurries sufficient, very cursory distinguish. on to see the more historical port or bay of Navarino, or the famous convent of Vourkano, where the hospitality of the monks, combined with the
gulf
is

The

the Gulf of

Venetian

historical interests of the

to

long hidden corner of Europe, beyond the din of railways or the disturbance of The way up from the coast to this famous retreat leads telegraphic news. through the most fertile plain in Greece, where the very southern climate

abandon

all

neighbouring walls of Messene, makes the traveller hurry and hide himself for awhile in the recesses of a

and the warm aspect, together with the natural richness of the soil, suggest what a garden of Eden it might be, as well as what a field of blood and strife it was between the clans of Dorian invaders. The story of the Messenian wars is among the most picturesque in earlier Greek history but though the reality of the main facts is attested by the remaining fragments of Tyrtaeus, the lame Athenian schoolmaster of the hearts of the Spartans, few general legend, whose lays fortified the failing readers are aware that the usual detailed account which appears in our histories is taken from Pausanias, who wrote it out 800 years after the
;

a man of the post- Alexandrian alleged events from the epic poem of Rhianus, and from the prose account of epoch, probably of the second century B.C.,

more untrustworthy. This then is not the only piece of Greek history which we have upon the evidence of these Hellenistic authors, who had indeed access to many now inaccessible sources,
Peisander,

which

he

calls

even

GREEK PICTURES.

but

whose historic veracity or perspicacity we cannot now estimate, though In but too many of these cases we have much reason to suspect them. we must content ourselves with the profound remark of Aristotle in his
on Poetry, that the pictures represented by philosophically than those of history, because they features of human nature under given circumstances, broad sense true for all time. When the state of
treatise

(dramatic) poetry are truer fasten upon the universal

and so tell us what is in a Messene was reconstituted by Epaminondas, the great Theban leader, all manner of antiquarian glories were brought out of the lumber rooms of the people's imagination, and the Greek public took a keen interest in the reconstituting of Messene, not only

as a state to help in counterbalancing Spartan preponderance, but also as a state which had once been on equal terms with the highest, and had sent a All this was duly performed by the series of victors to the Olympic games.

and so we no doubt influenced by Epaminondas adventures of Aristomenes taking their place together with the new fortifications of Messene as an evidence that a famous old Hellenic the state, long crushed by the tyranny of Sparta, had at last risen from
literary

men

of that day,

have the

heroic

dust.

The more one

studies

the ruins of

the walls and

towers of

Messene,

which stretch from Mount Ithome round a large tract of country, the more one is persuaded that there was something exaggerated about the scheme of the great Theban, which the enormous plan of his other (Arcadian) It is fortunate for us that foundation, Megalopolis, makes even more certain. we have one of the Messenian gates tolerably preserved a fine specimen of Greek military architecture. But this and the long series of towers reaching into the country, and apparently enclosing a circuit of six miles, show plainly that the founder must have miscalculated the number of Messenians that could be recovered from the four winds of heaven whither they were
scattered.
It
is

likely

enough

that
it

many encouraged him

came
to

with

promises to

build

At all events, the generations. whole circuit could never be adequately defended by the inhabitants, and the great ceremony of founding Messene, though a permanent blow to Sparta, resulted in no great benefit to Greece.
for

the new city, who, when homes they had already held

the

point,

would not leave the

many

Let

us

mount

up

from

these

remains of

brilliant

failure

to

the

hospitable convent above, where there seems always ample entertainment for man and beast. The sight is perfectly beautiful, commanding a view of the

and beyond it the serrated tops of Mount Taygetus. All the slope descending from the convent, being watered with many springs, is luxuriant with shrubs and flowers, and about the strong walls of the
rich plain of Stenyclerus,

monastery some dark trees make a very picturesque group

buildings are great war.
Still,

in

the view.

The
the

unfortunately not old, but restored after a fire the aspect of the square court within, with

during
its

wooden

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

galleries

AND ARCADIA.

183

picturesque enough, were not the place church, standing, according to the usual disfigured by in the centre of the court. It was painted in scarlet, arsenic green, design, and blue, after a manner too odious to describe, but excited the pride of the
quaint corners, is a horribly gaudy

and

good monks, who showed

it

as the

main ornament of

their settlement.

travellers are so nearly alike in these monasteries that I will quote from M. Henri Belle instead of repeating my own words. After supper, when they gave us a jar of honey worthy of Hymettus, the Hegoumenos (abbot) brought us to the cells prepared for us,
all
'

The

experiences of

apologising
in

that

the
left

which

it

was

poverty of the monastery and the wretched condition by the government did not allow him to practise a

the bed consisted cell was large and airy hospitality. of a bench, fitted up beneath with drawers, and a rug. On the table were a few books and a copy of Pandora, a selection of modern Greek poems

more generous

My

at Constantinople in 1843, in which most of the popular melodies which are appended are clearly derived from the Turks. Even the words are frequently adapted from the same source. Everything was quiet, save in the neighbouring cell, in which were These plainly audible suppressed lamentations, with -prayers and quotations. monotonous sounds made me so impatient that I at last rose up, to try and induce the monk to moderate the transports of his devotion. The door of his cell was open, and a bronze lamp of classic work, with a smoking wick, There I saw a monk, still threw a sombre light through the chamber. young and tall, clothed in a long brown tunic, leaning against the wall, His feet together, his hands close by a large cross painted in black. stretched out, his face raised towards heaven, and clothed as with an aureole by the shock of fair bright hair which reached to his shoulders, his eyes lost in vague ecstasy, he was standing fixed, his lips alone moving to utter could only catch by their constant sighs and broken sentences, of which one this prayer: "Crucify me, O Lord, and make me suffer a repetition His refined pale face, half thousand deaths to attain my salvation." illuminated by the scanty flame of the lamp, the dark shadows on the wall, I could everything conspired to enhance the strange pathos of the scene.

printed

'

not

disturb

this

mediaeval
of

ascetic
his

in
;

the
softly

perhaps

the

fulfilment

vow

performance of his penitence, or I withdrew, and presently his

and intense silence reigned in the convent. Before retiring to sighs ceased, a I stood for moment at the which commanded a window, rest, however,
view into the plain. mountain seemed as

The moon showed me

if
;

the

sleeping

valley

the

floating

in

soft

mist,

and toned with a colour

rich odours were wafted up from the gardens mysteriously transparent about the walls, and in the cypresses of the cemetery an owl (the Attic bird, of Athene) was sounding at regular intervals its peculiar note, almost as
soft as the

humming

of the moths, which crowded about the lighted window.'

84

GREEK PICTURES.
The
reader
a

who

desires

to
if

without
Cassino,

journey to

Greece,

enjoy a very similar scene, can do so he will ascend to the monastery of Monte
Naples.
in

midway between Rome and

There too they a cell high up

will

put him

lofty wall,

from which the eye commands a its chains of rich valley, with
mountains, with mists,

morning pellucid moonAnd there perhaps he light. also find an instance of may that remorseful asceticism which M. Belle describes, but which so seldom appears under the sleepy dulness of the monk's cowl. Yet
its

with

its

in

the

very

neighbourhood

of

Vourkano he might have found another striking example of that

which seeks to storm heaven by force, and weary our Heavenly Father into forself-denial

giveness
sistence.
'

by

superhuman
us,

per-

on the sumMount Ithome the site of human sacrifices to Zeus Ithomates in days of trouble we saw a chapel on the highest top, two thousand five hundred feet Here they told over the sea.
mit of
us that a solitary anchorite spent his life, praying and doing service
at his altar, far

Far above

above the sounds

of

human

life.

We

made

concerning
saint,

the

who was
citizen,

history once a

inquiry of this

wealthy

Athenian
family. his sons
'

with a wife and

His wife was dead, and

A GREEK
his

PAITAS,' OR PRIES

i.

he
apart from

settled in the world, so resolved to devote the rest of

the ways of men. Once a and he the descended to the convent, fortnight only brought up necessary food. On his lonely watch he had no company but timid hares, travelling and an occasional eagle, that came and sat by him without fear, quail,
years
to

the

service

of

God

SPARTA,

ATESS ENE,

MA INA, AND

ARCADIA.

185

perhaps in wonder at this curious and silent friend. The monks below had often urged him to catch these creatures for their benefit, but he refused to So he sits, looking out from his watch upon profane their lofty asylum. and sunshine rain, upon hot calm and wild storm, with the whole Peloponnesus He sees from afar the works and ways of men, extended beneath his eyes. Is it not strange that still upon and the world that he has left for ever.
the
offer to their God these human sacrifices, changed, but in real substance the same ? indeed, appearance, from it we may either is about the centre point of Messene Vourkano go north into Arcadia to visit Bassae, or north-east to the little port of

same height men

in

'

we may turn once more Kyparissia, recently ruined by an earthquake, or south, to visit not only the wild province or district of Maina, but also This latter suits our present plan, and we the historic bay of Navarino. will go together into this most remote and uncivilised corner of the country. When a stranger enters one of the villages in these wilds, he causes a sort No one thinks at first of approaching you of amazement and disturbance. the children run except the dogs, which fly at the heels of the mules Some women open a chink of their as if they had seen a ghost.
;

away

the men stand upon the you with a suspicious eye threshold without moving, and look at you with a hard and somewhat fierce a mixture of shyness and wildness It is presently their expression. they drive away their dogs with stones, and their suspicions are allayed It must be of familiar and homely hospitality. a to sort reserve gives way remembered that the province of Maina was always independent of the Turks, save for the payment of a small tribute, and half a century ago every traveller was regarded as a Turkish spy coming to search out the

doors

and watch

riches of the land.

A
curious

page on the
it
is,

reader, as

be unwelcome to the peculiarities of Maina will not next to Acarnania, or in company with Acarnania, the most
of the of

primitive district

conditions

The traveller is struck at once with the country. While these people as compared with other Greeks.
'

through all other parts of the Morea, especially about Pyrgos, arts, industry, and education are making some progress, these rude mountaineers are, or were Here condition as under the Turks. till the last year or two, in the same

you can

genuine type of the klepht, jealous of his independence, armed against any oppression, rude in manners, not scrupulous as to other own with a determination often attaining people's property, but defending his
still

find the

to heroism.'

Maina

Cape Matapan,

the southern extremity of the Morea, running out to between the spurs of Mount Taygetus and the Gulf of
is

Koron. This corner of the country has been the home of liberty in the It was the refuge of the escaped criminal as well as most troublous times. the oppressed peasant the Turkish soldiers, strange to say, never penetrated thither, and the pacha governing at Tripolitza was content with a nominal tribute.
;

86

GREEK PICTURES.

You can observe even from the deck of the passing steamer how this district covered with fortified houses, square towers with parapets what we imagine French and German castles on a larger scale in the Middle Ages. The local squires with their vassals made war upon one another from these castles,
is
if

they had

no foreign

foe

to

threaten

them.

though the true ground of their influence is that they participate in the vices and violences of these There is now a de jure vassals, whom they do not excel in culture. of prefects, sub-prefects, demarchs, &c., while de facto the old government feudal arrangements remain almost intact. King Otho sent in troops to knock down the castles but the mountaineers rose in arms, and it was too costly For the castles are perched on the top of rocks, from to subdue them. which each captain could watch all the country and collect troops for his The square towers of stone were pierced with loopholes, and each defence. story was reached by a ladder from within, which was drawn up at night. They are still called by the old Greek name pyrgoi, and can now be studied by the traveller, seeing that some of them are abandoned to the hawks and owls. It was only very gradually that these wild people could give up the
;

military aristocracy, bringing in their train they professed to be responsible to the government,

But they formed a sort of their vassals, for whose conduct

habit of centuries

to

spend

all

their

time

in

raids

upon the

valleys,

when
to

under the lawful pretext of pillaging the Turks, they helped themselves
their

Greek neighbours' property. They are still armed with old-fashioned Oriental guns,
the
stocks,

on

castles.

enough

richly adorned about suspiciously as they appear outside their For local quarrels, disputes with neighbours, are always serious to keep them on their guard. Any excuse, the cutting down of

and look

a tree, the

raging passions only satisfied by shooting and stabbing men, without any attempt of the constituted authorities to violences. repress or punish these Vigorous prosecution of them would forthwith raise the whole district in rebellion,
so
is

stealing of

goat, excites

in

these

barbarians

government, wisely perhaps, closes the Corsican vendetta started, revenge

Mainotes.
lives
It

the

its

eyes.

When

once a quarrel

the

excuses

in

their

becomes the ruling passion of eyes every crime, and probably costs
Its

more

than

the war with the

Turks.

down from generation

to generation, but by most girls bring as part of their dowry three or four murders for their husbands to perform. When a man 'has blood on his hands,' he is ready to undergo any toil and privations. He lies hidden for weeks in the wild

responsibilities not only pass marriage into other clans, and

brakes during
waiting
for killed his

daytime, coming about the

his

man.

villages like a wolf in the night, opportunity, and literally afraid to come home till he has then becomes himself subject to a like pursuit on the

He

part of the family of his victim.

These savage

qualities

are,

as

in

other

races,

combined

with

certain

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

virtues
to

AND ARCADIA.
honour
in

187

fidelity

their
lies

chiefs,

simple

hospitality,
in

keeping

their

Greece, or indeed in any southern a stranger for a few shillings, murder would country. Though they readily they will receive you like a blood relation if recommended by one of their
not
chiefs,

word, and a dislike of

common

and

will

repayment. tobacco by way of gratitude. Their women, though condemned by the habits of the district to work like beasts of burden, and not allowed to sit down at meals with their
idle

give you what they have without tolerating any money They are unable to resist, however, a present of gunpowder or

still show the same fierce courage as the men, and in the war great distinguished themselves like the legendary Spartans, whom they claim to be their ancestors. They are in a way thoroughly respected, and violation of the due to them is punished by bullets. Indeed, any respect even the most peaceful ceremonies of life, from birth to the grave, are accompanied by discharges of musketry, which resound over the country and produce the feeling that a battle is in progress. Thus when a male child is born, its father goes into the street, or in front of his castle, and fires several shots to announce the news this is an invitation to his neighbours. They open their shutters (they have no window-glass), and blaze in return. This sort of conversation goes on most of the day. The baby is meanwhile rubbed all over with salt and pepper, mixed. The pappas then cuts some of its few hairs, to stick them on a taper from the altar, which is thrown into the baptismal water, and an amulet is put round its neck to keep it from harm. During its early years, the mother carries it on her back in a sort

husbands,

bag of sheep-skin, hanging the bag to a home, when she is at work, and singing to
of

tree
it

in

the

fields,

to

nail

at

the famous murders committed

by

its

ancestors.

between shooting a hare and shooting a man. We may mention, in conclusion, that, owing to internal dissensions, a chief called George Comnenus, with his followers, left his wilds in the year 1675, an d begging a new home from the republic of Genoa, was granted lands at Paomia in Corsica. They there turned to agriculture, and became so that the French rewarded them, in 1 768, with additional lands at prosperous Here there still remain the Greek customs, language, faith, and ritual. Cargere. These chiefs were recognised by Louis XIV. as descendants of the Comneni, the Byzantine emperors. These Corsican Mainotes have even recently formed a new colony in the province of Constantine in French Algiers. I have dwelt long on the wilds of Maina, and yet I feel that still we cannot leave the province of Messene without saying something of the famous bay, which under three names, Pylos, Sphakteria, Navarino, has been so famous in Greek history. Every one who reads Homer remembers
1 1

straight first the difference

the age of ten, the father begins to teach it to shoot at birds and hares but there is not much pains taken to teach
;

At

Henri

Belle, of.

cit.

p.

351.

88

GREEK PICTURES.
King
of Pylos, with his sage advice and his long-winded

the veteran Nestor,

stories,

with his fatherly hospitality to Telemachus, and his affectionate sons. The leaders of the great colony to Ionia in Asia Minor were reputed scions Neleids and great families at Ephesus traced their descent from of his house
;

when Pausanias saw them, a thousand years after his accredited date. We come next to the famous narrative in the fourth book of how the Spartans encamped on the island of Thucydicles, who tells mouth of the bay, making it from an open Sphakteria, which lies across the
Nestor,

roadstead into a spacious harbour, were cut off from all communication with the shore by the Athenian fleet, under the gallant Demosthenes, and closely a larger force sent out under besieged and ultimately killed or captured by Athenians to have made a favourable This was the moment for the Cleon. these citizens, and Spartan captives were a very peace, for the Spartans valued in rare article to give exchange for favourable conditions. But these things

and

Thucydides. of Navarino, an event recent enough to have a familiar name, while most people have, forgotten the circumstances.

their sequel

may be

read

in

We

come

thirdly to the affair

Indeed, this and the bombardment of Algiers by Lord Exmouth were the only naval actions fought by England during the long peace which lasted, 1815-48, throughout Europe, and they were both hardly within the limits of

Eor Turkish country any more than Algerian can hardly be called European in the general sense which that term implies, beyond mere The Greek insurrection had been dragging its long geographical lines. agony ever since 1821, tales of cruelty and horror were spreading through the press of England and France, Byron had stimulated all the romance of
Europe.
the rising generation into strong sympathy with the oppressed Greeks, when the Sultan bethought him of ending the war by a treaty with Mehemet All, ruler of Egypt, by which Mehemet's son, Ibrahim Pasha, was to land an army of Egyptians in the Morea, and subdue it for the Sultan. Ibrahim was a

capable general, and, moreover, the black troops of Egypt (not the fcllahiii)

had been disciplined by French officers, exiled after the restoration of the Bourbons to France. Finlay, the philosophical Hellene historian, who spent years helping the Greeks in their well-nigh hopeless struggle, saw at once that this disciplined army, under perfect control, must soon end the war. As a matter of fact, between the end of 1825 and 1827, the Morea was But the reports of Turkish and Egyptian cruelties completely subdued. increased, and above all, the conviction that a large part of the subdued The Hellenes were being carried away into Turkey and Egypt as slaves. Russian to humble with at combined this, intrigues Turkey, indignation was Admiral instructed in which that curious Codrington produced campaign, to prevent the re-victualling of the Egyptian fleet and army in the Morea, and consequently to observe the Turkish fleet, which they found in the Bay of
Navarino.

SPARTA, fifESSENE, MAINA,

AND ARCADIA.

189

English officer with a white flag in his boat, who was bringing a message to the Turks, brought on the action, which would have been forced on in any case by the Russians and French. The Turkish fleet was practically destroyed by powers which had not declared

The murder

of an

war so much so, that in the next opening of Parliament the great victory was spoken of as an untoward event, and Ibrahim was allowed to ship <>lt It was the bolder action of the French, who 2000 Greek slaves to Egypt.
landed
14,000 men forced the Egyptian
the

next

prince to

year under Marshal evacuate the Morea.

Maison,

We

which really have an affecting

description of

its condition from Chateaubriand, who landed there in 1831, will only mention a single fact I on his way from Paris to Jerusalem. from his account of the desolated country, in which the French troops only were making some efforts towards the re-establishing of roads and comWhen he landed, he noticed many little children led about by munications. their elder brothers and sisters because they were blind. Upon inquiring into the cause, he found that the Egyptian soldiers had poked out their eyes by way of vengeance, when they found their victories baulked by the

interference of the

European powers. Ibrahim, indeed, was very unfortunate in having his successes reversed In a brilliant campaign against the Sultan, a few by external interference. he could easily have marched across Asia Minor, that he showed years later,
and taken Constantinople, had not the powers again interfered, and put off him and his ambitious father, Mehemet Ali, with the independent sovereignty But these things are beyond the scope of our present horizon. of Egypt. I will only add in conclusion that M. Henri Belle, when he visited Navarino in 880, could see the remains of the Turkish vessels lying on the bottom through the clear water of the bay. From the earliest days there had been a close friendship between Messenians and Arcadians, doubtless on account of the common danger they In the old Messenian wars, Arcadians incurred from Spartan ambition. were ever the supporters and hosts of the exiled Messenians, and the
1

of a great treachery of an Arcadian king to his allies was made the subject of the the inhabitants Yet while national indignation. Happy Valley and the rich vale of Stenyclerus succumbed to Spartan valour, the hardier
'

'

Arcadians

fought

out

their

independence,

and

maintained
of the
is

especially in the town of Tegea, as a distinct The narrative of the early conflicts with

member
Sparta
so

themselves, Hellenic race.

told

with
that
I

great
will

picturesqueness by Herodotus, quote it for the reader.

'

in

passage

characteristic

the Spartans, having changed their laws, established good institutions and having erected a temple to Lycurgus after his death, they in their stead
;

Thus

held him in the highest reverence.

population, they quickly sprang

As

they had a good

flourished.

soil

up and

And now

and abundant they were no

J9 o

GREEK PICTURES.

but proudly considering themselves superior longer content to live in peace to the Arcadians, they sent to consult the oracle at Delphi, touching the and the Pythian gave conquest of the whole country of the Arcadians " Dost thou ask of me Arcadia ? thou askest a great them this answer
;

There are many acorn-eating men in Arcadia cannot grant it thee. I will give thee But I do not grudge thee all who will hinder thee. Tegea to dance on with beating of the feet, and a fair plain to measure When the Lacedaemonians heard this answer reported, out by the rod." and relying on an all Arcadia they laid aside their design against an led army against Tegea only, carrying fetters with equivocal oracle,
deal
;

But being were taken alive were in had the fetters to work, wearing brought, and measuring they compelled Those fetters in which they were the lands of the Tegeans with a rod. in even time, bound, were, preserved in Tegea, suspended around the my temple of Alean Athene. In the first war, therefore, they had constantly fought against the Tegeans with ill success but in the time of Crcesus, and during the reign of Anaxandrides and Ariston at Lacedaemon, they had at length become superior in the war, and they became so in the following manner: when sent to they had always been worsted in battle by the Tegeans, they what god they should propitiate, in order to inquire of the oracle at Delphi,
them, as defeated
if

they would surely reduce the Tegeans an engagement, as many of them as

to

slavery.

'

become become

The Pythian answered, they should Tegeans. so, when they had brought back the bones of Orestes, the son of Agamemnon. But as they were unable to find the sepulchre of Orestes, they sent again to inquire of the god in what spot Orestes lay interred and the Pythian gave this answer to the inquiries of those who came to consult her: "In the level plain of Arcadia lies Tegea, where two winds by hard compulsion blow, and stroke answers to stroke, and woe lies on woe. There life-engendering earth contains Agamemnon's son convey him home, and you will be victorious over Tegea." When the Lacedaemonians heard this, they were as far off the discovery as ever, though they searched till Lichas, one of the Spartans who are called Agathoergi, everywhere These Agathoergi consist of citizens who are discharged from found it.
victorious

over the

serving

in

the

cavalry,
in

such

as

are

senior,

five

in

duty during the year remain inactive, but

which they are discharged

it is their every year from the cavalry, not to

;

go to different places where they are sent by the commonwealth. Lichas, who was one of these persons, discovered Spartan For in Tegea, both meeting with good fortune and employing sagacity. it as the Lacedaemonians had at that time intercourse with the Tegeans, he, coming to a smithy, looked attentively at the iron being forged, and was The smith, struck with wonder when he saw what was being done. his and said: "O Laconian his desisted from astonishment, work, perceiving

H
<;

EH

PQ

mm r^-f^w
SW
>'f-ff^c.

^5* *2'

i"-*- -

11

?-

| |

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

stranger, you would certainly have been saw, since you are so surprised at the

AND ARCADIA.

193

astonished, had you seen what I working of iron. For as I was

endeavouring to sink a well in this enclosure, in digging, I came to a coffin seven cubits long and because I did not believe that men were ever taller than they now are, I opened it, and saw that the body was equal to the coffin in length and after I had measured it, I covered it up again." The man told him what he had seen but Lichas, reflecting on what was said, conjectured from the words of the oracle, that this must be the body of Orestes forming his conjectures on the following reasons seeing the smith's two bellows, he discerned in them the two winds, and in the anvil and hammer the stroke answering to stroke, and in the iron that was being forged the woe that lay on woe representing it in this way, that iron had been invented to the injury of man. Having made this conjecture, he returned to Sparta, and gave the Lacedaemonians an account of the whole
;
;

They, having brought a feigned charge against him, sent him into banishment. He then, going back to Tegea, related his misfortune to the and wished to hire the enclosure from him but the smith would not smith, let it. But in time, when Lichas had persuaded him, he took up his abode and having opened the sepulchre and collected the bones, he carried there
matter.
;

them away with him

to Sparta. From that time, whenever they made trial of each other's strength, the Lacedaemonians were by far superior in war and the greater part of Peloponnesus had been already subdued by them.' The high plain of which the territory of Tegea is the southernmost end, commanding the passes down to Sparta, is a large oval, with Tripolitza near
;

'

the

centre,

while

Mantinea further north, so celebrated

this plain of

for

its

battles,

is

ellipse. Though Tegea and Mantinea is rich arable land, it is very high and cold, some 2000 feet over the sea, while the plain of Megalopolis, another oval lying due west of it, is somewhat larger and much warmer. But, strange to say, this better valley had no remarkable city within it, till Epaminondas, whose foundation of Messene

another focus of

this

has been already mentioned, completed the fettering of Sparta by gathering all the Arcadians of the western plain into the great new city Megalopolis, which was to act as Tegea did, for a barrier against Spartan attempts to

break out of the valley of the Eurotas. Thus the Arcadians began to take a leading part in Greek politics, and from that day onward the ten thousand men of Arcadia are an assembly which figures in the Greece of Polybius, and which produced many of the greatest men in the sunset of Hellenic history.

For throughout the great days of Athens and of Sparta, Arcadia had been regarded as a retreat for wolves and bears, the home of old-fashioned and hardy mountaineers, who were glad to leave their sterile and wintry mountains for the purpose of enjoying other people's good things, even at the risk of their own lives. For they were always the typical mercenaries of Greece, ever
1

Herodotus,

i.

66-68.

94

GREEK PICTURES.

since

Agamemnon
War.

supplied them with ships, and took them to help

him

in

the Trojan

This description may seem strange to the modern reader, who associates Arcadia with the loves of shepherds and pastoral delights, with sweet music and gentle shade, with peace and harmony, not with rugged conflict and mercenary service. This now accepted notion of Arcadia is distinctly unhistorical, and even opposed to what we can prove from history and from and at the time when I first began to write about personal inspection
;

the cause of this little trouble to find out the time and Arcadia, of curious and striking change. Such falsifications history are very curious, and I will quote what I have formerly published on the subject.
I

took no

appears that from the oldest days the worship of Pan had its home in Arcadia, particularly about Mount Mcenalus, and that it was already The ancient when it was brought to Athens at the time of the Persian wars.
'

It

Pan among the Homeric hymns, which may have been composed shortly after that date, is very remarkable for its idyllic and picturesque tone, and shows that with this worship of Pan were early associated those trains of nymphs and rustic gods, with their piping and dance, which inspired Praxiteles inimitable Faun. These images are even transferred by Euripides to the Acrowhile polis, where he describes the daughters of Aglauros dancing on the sward, Such facts seem to show Pan is playing his pipe in the grotto underneath. a gentle and poetical element in the stern and gloomy mountaineers, who lived, like the Swiss of our day, in a perpetual struggle with Nature, and were all their lives harassed with toil, and saddened with thankless fatigue.
extant

hymn

to

This conclusion

is

who

in

his

fourth

sustained by the evidence of a far later witness, Polybius, book mentions the strictness with which the Arcadians
in music,

insisted

upon an education

as

and wilclness of their life. He even town (Kynaetha) was caused by a neglect of this salutary precaution. So it happens that although Theocritus lays his pastoral scenes in the uplands of Sicily, and the later pastoral romances, such as the exquisite Daphnis and
are particularly associated with the voluptuous Lesbos, Vergil, in several of his Eclogues, makes allusion to the musical talent of Arcadian shepherds,
C/iloc,

necessary to soften the harshness maintains that the savagery of one

and
in

But this prominent Msenalus. Greek from some borrowed, poet, though I Vergil suppose, know not from whom bore no immediate fruit. His Roman imitators, and and if they had, make no mention of Arcadia, Nemesianus, Calpurnius their works were not unearthed till the year 1534, when the poetical Arcadia had been already, as I shall show, created. There seems no hint of the
feature
in
I

brings the unhappy Gallus connection with the worship of Pan on

in

his tenth

into

direct

relation

to

Arcadia

for, early Italian poetry according to the histories of mediaeval literature, the pastoral romances did not originate until the very end of the

idea

in

/'//,

vv. 492,

sij,/.

SPARTA, MESS ENE,

MA INA, AND
;

ARCADIA.

195

fourteenth century, with the Portuguese Ribeyro and he lays all the scenes of his idylls, not in a foreign country, but in Portugal, his own home. Thus we reach the year 1500 without any trace of a poetical Arcadia. But at
that

very time

it

was being created by the

single

work

of a

single man.

The
the

celebrated Jacopo Sannazaro, known by the title of Actius Sincerus, in affected society of literary Naples, exiled himself from that city in

consequence of a deep and unrequited passion.

time,
it

He
a

lay concealed for a long

in

is

said,

in

the wilds

of

France,
his

possibly
in

Egypt,

but certainly

medley of prose idyllic complaint called Arcadia, and suggested, I believe, by the Gallus of Vergil. Though the learned and classical author despised this work in comparison with his heroic performance on the conception of
in

not

Greece,

and immortalised

grief

pastoral

description and

the Virgin Mary, the public of the day thought 1502, the Arcadia of Sannazaro went through

differently.

Appearing
during

in

sixty

editions

the

and so this single book created that imaginary home of innocence and grace which has ever since been attached to the name. Its occurrence henceforward is so frequent as to require no further illustration in this
century
;
'

place.
It

the

equally difficult to penetrate into Arcadia from any quarter, and country is not marked out by any definite features save those of the
is

two oval plains side by side, surrounded by complicated ranges of mountains. Let us begin with the plain of Megalopolis, bounded towards the south by the territory of that once famous town, of late marked by the modern A fresh and Leondari, which is now again assuming the classic name. the ran the old and we can still wonder Helisson, river, silvery through city, at the enormous proportions of the theatre, which seems really to have been constructed to hold the whole neighbouring population. The guide-books After all it hold the could nonsense 44,000 people. say they have talked about the Athenian theatre, which really could not have held more than
12,000, I repeat their estimate with great suspicion, but when I was and there, standing where the stage- once had been, I was not thinking of exact measurement, and can only say from general recollection that it seemed to me fully twice as large perhaps even three times as that of Athens. The seats are now overgrown with grass, and Pausanias tells us that even in his day the streets were in a similar condition. It was, like Messene,

about

far too
itself
;

Epaminondas' vaulting ambition overleaped gigantic in conception. and so the affecting words of Pausanias came true, which I shall

quote for the reader.

'Although the great city was founded with all zeal by the Arcadians, and with the brightest expectations on the part of the Greeks, I am not astonished that it has lost all its elegance and ancient splendour, and most
of
it

is

now

ruined

for
1

know

that
Greece,

Providence
pp. 305-308.

is

pleased

to

work

Rambles and Studies in

196

GREEK PICTURES.
change, and
life

perpetual

that all things alike, both strong and weak, both and coming passing into nothingness, are changed by a Fortune which controls them with an iron necessity. Thus Mykenae, Nineveh, and the Boeotian Thebes are for the most part completely deserted and but the name of Thebes has descended to the mere acropolis destroyed and very few inhabitants. Others, formerly of extraordinary wealth, the Egyptian Thebes, and the Minyan Orchomenos, and Delos, the common mart of the Greeks, are some of them inferior in wealth to that of a private
into
;

man
the

of

not the richest class

while

oracle

by

the

Athenians who

Delos, being deprived of the charge of settled there, is, as regards Delians,

-,

TEMPLE OF APOLLO THE HELPER AT

Of Babylon, the temple of Belus remains but of this Babylon, depopulated. once the greatest city under the sun, there is nothing left but the wall, as These the deity has reduced to naught. there is of Tiryns in Argolis. But the city of Alexander in Egypt, and of Seleucus on the Orontes, built the other da}-, have risen to such greatness and prosperity, because Fortune
;

Thus the affairs (if men have their seasons, and are by no means permanent. From Megalopolis we must turn north-west to visit the famous temple of Apollo the Helper at Bassa; or Phigaleia the work of Ictinus, the builder
favours them.
.
.

'

Pausanias,

viii.

33.

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

of the

AND ARCADIA.

197

Parthenon, but situated not in a plain, not in a city, not in a thoroughfare, but high up in the wildest part of the Arcadian mountains. When I first visited this wonderful place I was journeying from Olympia,

and had spent the night at Andritzena, a modern village of great discomfort. But from whatever side you approach the temple, the general description which I then gave will be found true in the main. The morning, as is not unusual in these Alps, was lowering and gloomy, and as we climbed out of the town up a steep ascent on our patient mules the rain began to fall in great threatening drops. But we would not be daunted. The way led among gaunt and naked mountain sides, and often up the bed of The lateness of the spring, for the snow was now hardly winter torrents. to the added gloom the summer shrubs and the summer grass were gone, not yet green, and the country retained most of its wintry bleakness. Now and then there met us in the solitude a shepherd coming down from the mountains, covered in his white woollen cowl, and with a lamb of the same It was the day of preparation for the soft dull colour upon his shoulders. Easter feast, and the lamb was being brought by this picturesque shepherd, not to the fold, but to the slaughter. Yet there was some strange and confused suggestion in the serious face surrounded by its symphony of white, in the wilderness around, in the helpless patience of the animal, and all framed in a background of grey mist, and dripping with abundant rain. As we wound our way through the mountains, we came to glens of richer The sound of merry boys and baying dogs colour and friendlier aspect. reached up to us from below as we skirted high up along the steep sides, Here the primrose and violet took still seeking a higher and higher level. the place of the scarlet and the purple anemone, and cheered us with the sight of northern flowers, and with the fairest produce of a northern spring. At last we attained a weird country, in which the ground was bare, save where a sheltered and sunny spot showed bunches of violets with long stalks, hanging in tufts, rare purple anemones, and here and there a great full iris yet these patches were so exceptional as to make a strong contrast But the main features were single oak trees with with the brown soil. pollard tops and gnarled branches, which stood about all over these lofty slopes, and gave them a melancholy and dilapidated aspect. They showed no mark of spring, no shoot or budding leaf, but the russet-brown rags o ( last year's clothing hung here and there upon the branches. These wintry signs, the gloomy mist, and the insisting rain, gave us the feeling of chill And yet the weird oaks, with their branches tortured as it were October. and frost these crippled limbs, which looked as if the pains of storm by age and disease had laid hold of the sad tenants of this alpine desert were All the stems were clothed with coloured with their own peculiar loveliness. a delicate silver-grey lichen, save where great patches of velvety, faded This beautiful contrast of green moss spread a warm mantle about them.
'
;

'

GREEK PICTURES.
grey and yellow green
winter,

may be seen upon many of our own oak trees in the and makes these the most richly coloured of all the leafless stems in our frosty landscape. But here and there were added among the branches huge tufts of mistletoe, brighter and yellower than the moss, yet of the same And there were trees so clothed grassy hue, though of different texture.
they looked like some quaint species of the summer's foliage must have really great evergreen. the character and the impaired beauty of this curious forest. Then we crossed a long flat summit, and began to descend, when we presently came upon the temple from the north, facing us on a lower part of the lofty ridge. As we approached, the mist began to clear away, and the sun shone out upon the scene, while the clouds rolled back towards the
with
this

foreign

splendour, that It seemed as

if

'

and gradually disclosed to us the splendid prospect which the sanctuary commands. All the Southern Peloponnesus lay before us. We could see the western sea, and the Gulf of Koron to the south but the long ridge of Taygetus and the mountains of Malea hid from us the eastern seas. The rich slopes of Messene, and the of Northern Laconia and rugged highlands of Arcadia, filled up the nearer view. There still remained here and there a cloud which made a blot in the picture, and marred the completeness of
east,
;

the landscape.

Nothing can be stranger than the remains of a beautiful temple in this Greek life is a sort of protest for cities and plains and alpine solitude. human culture against picturesque Alps and romantic scenery. Yet here we have a building of the purest age and type set up far from the cities and haunts of men, and in the midst of such a scene as might be chosen by the most romantic and sentimental modern. It was reputed in Pausanias' day the most beautiful temple in Peloponnext to that of Athene Alea at Tegea. Even its roof was of marble nesus, tiles and the cutting of the limestone soffits of the ceiling is still so sharp and clear that specimens have been brought to Athens, as the most perfect of the kind. The friezes, discovered years ago (1812), and quite close to the surface, by Mr. Cockerell and his friends, were carried away, and are now one of the greatest ornaments of the British Museum. Any one who desires to know every detail of the building, and see its general effect when restored, must consult Cockerell's splendid work on this and the temple of
' '
;

/Egina.
'

The

ruin, as

we saw

it,

was very
it

visited in Greece.

It is built

and unlike any other we had of the limestone which crops up all over the
striking,

mountain plateau on which

recent
rain,

stands, and, as

the

sun

shone upon

it

after

was of a
that

delicate
it

bluish-grey colour, so

like the

surface of the

ground

almost seemed to have grown out of the rock, as its natural product. The pillars are indeed by no means monoliths, but set together of short drums, of which the inner row are but the rounded ends
in tone,

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

AND ARCADIA.

201

But as the grain of the of longO blocks, which reach back to the cella wall. stone runs across the pillars, they have become curiously wrinkled with age,
transverse lines, which and fatigue, and weary of There is a great oak tree, such standing in this wild and gloomy solitude. beside the close as I have already described, temple, and the colouring of forms a curious contrast to the no less beautiful shading of the its stem time-worn pillars. Their ground being a pale greyish-blue, the lichens which invade the stone have varied the fluted surface with silver, with bright rose madder. Even under a mid-day orange, and still more with a delicate but what must they be at wonderful were sun these rich colours very
so that the artificial joinings are lost among the make us imagine the pillars sunk with years

wavy

'

sunset

Turning back again

into

the valley of Megalopolis,

we

find

ourselves

all that plain again in presence of the remarkable fortress which dominates from the north the fortress of Karytena, whose history is perhaps as prominent as that of any of the feudal castles. The situation is splendidtorrents mountains piled up in all directions around it, except on the south
;

neighbours, and its peak the highest fortified point in separating It was originally built by Hugo de Brienne, a companion of the Morea. But, as might be expected, so Villehardouin, and held in fief from him. strong a hold set its owner to think of dominion, and not submission, and
it

from

its

required a formal defeat (at Karydi) to make Hugo return to his feudal His son was that Walter de Brienne who became Duke of Athens, duties. His son Walter, and was killed by the Catalans in Bceotia (above, p. 111).
it

after

many

adventures,

became Lord of Florence, and was

even
in
its

killed

at

the

battle of Poitiers.

The

castle of Karytena,
in

ruins,

has a proud feudal aspect, and

our century, the stronghold of one of the most famous and He ranks as a hero in Colocotroni. notorious of the revolutionary chiefs moment when or at the a that war, or both, brigandage might be a brigand, So it was virtue, assassination an act of patriotism, robbery a necessity.

was again, early

but owing to, his cruelties, his avarice, his vanity, he was able to hold together the mountaineers that knew no discipline, and He is described as of the Albanian type inflict real defeats on the Turks. tall, lean, but exceedingly strong, with a low retreating forehead, high He had long cheekbones, a hook nose, and eyes glittering with ferocity.
that

not

in

spite

of,

been living on the plunder of his own countrymen, when the outbreak of the war set him to the more distinguished task of becoming a general and He even hoped to be the first President of the new plundering the Turks. could state, though he hardly sign his name, and knew no trade except a passing enemy. lying in wait behind a rock with his gun to watch for

He

ended by being condemned

1

to

death, but pardoned

into

insignificance.

Rambles and Studies in Grace, pp. 315-322.

202

GREEK PICTURES.
in

Yet

his

day he was strong

the
castle

enough

to

foil

even
it

Ibrahim
is

Pasha,
like

who
an

recoiled
eagle's

before
nest

at

present only a single possible ascent with at either side. The mediaeval sharp steep precipices and souvenirs of the lords of Karytena, must have been many arrangements, almost intact until the time when Colocotroni established his klephts there,

over the
crest,

Karytena. village, with

For

perched

along a

who destroyed everything they

rooms from materials taken
the

not absolutely require, and rebuilt some out of the walls of what was abandoned. Over
did

house of Brienne has So also arms of the knights were found and scattered by been torn out. the klephts. Far below the battlement two torrents, the Upper Alpheus and the Gortynius, rush round the rock, and make their way into the valley. Even the houses of the village below are built in ascending stairs against the The whole scene is wild and steep rock, with a deep ravine below them. grandiose, far different from the Arcadia of the poets, essentially the Arcadia
gate
the

stone

carrying

the

escutcheon

of

the

of history.

remarkable that the picturesqueness admired when the men of the Renaissance began to study Nature has now passed away with the recovery of a truer taste, and that the real Arcadia is not less delightful to our minds than was the imaginary one to those of the sixteenth century. It is
It
is

not very long since the Alps were regarded simply with fear and horror, as rich lawns, hideous wastes of snow hostile to civilisation and to pleasure well-kept forests, orderly agriculture, strict form in landscape was the only
;

The researches of Friedlander have shown that it is beauty appreciated. not much more than one hundred years since the delights of wild, rugged, Arcadia has been majestic Nature have become generally appreciated.
enough to maintain its reputation under these vagaries of aesthetic The mountains of Phocis and /Etolia are perhaps grander but the taste. milder climate of the Morea produces in the glens a richer vegetation and a warmer colour and had the English, in the days of their greatness, instead of being content w'ith Malta and the Ionian Islands, laid hold of the Peloponnesus, it would now be one of the most delightful health resorts in
fortunate
; ;

the world.

The

usual

virtues

of the

mountaineers are developed

in

these

Alps, and nothing seems more like a description of the Swiss or Tyrolese than the account given by Polybius of the peculiar and exceptional savagery of Cynujtha, as resulting from the mere force of climate, when not tempered by the careful training in music which is almost universal among

mountaineers.
the
the

The gloom of some of human heart dark and

waterfalls
Falls of

the Arcadian
sullen.

indeed enough to make There are two such places known by

gorges
not

is

their

the

Falls

of
far

the

Styx,

far

from
are

the Neda, not

forest

from

Bassaj, which
rich

Europe.

Immense

trees

and

evergreens

Megaspelion, and perhaps unique in people the slopes

SPARTA, MESSENE, MAINA,

wherever
river
least
is
is

AND ARCADIA.
stand
out bold
rocks,

203

soil

is

to

be had.

Among them

and the

hidden, if not (as in the case of the Neda) by superposed rocks, at by such a wealth of vegetation, that only its clear fall through the air visible. But both these wonderful scenes are very far from roads, very

difficult of access,

and seldom

visited

even by the adventurous

traveller.

CASCADE OF THE STYX.

Voi.n.

CHAPTER

XIV.

NORTHERN GREECE.

WE
The
than

have spent so long a time in the Morea, that we must hasten to Northern Greece before we part company, and give the reader some
It
is

notion of the country north of Attica. the land we have been surveying nor
;

not smaller or less beautiful than

is it in some respects less interesting. Island of Eubcea (Negropont) has often played a leading part in Greek history, and the great battles around its coasts are hardly less celebrated

Thessaly Thermopylae, Cynoscephala?, Pharsalia which have in one day determined the fate of empires. And yet these northern parts seem somewhat out of the way, and are generally visited last in a Greek The cession of Yolo to Greece by the Turks has indeed voyage. Eor since Volo has curiously added to the difficulties of the traveller. ceased to be a frontier town, its trade has diminished, steamers in the same
the
conflicts
in

direction

only

call

every

fortnight.

It

depends

upon

the

size

of

these

In the former case, the steamers whether they go outside or inside Eubcta. traveller has the opportunity of watching the notorious promontory of Caphareus, after he has seen that of Sunium with its snow-white temple.

The
since

east side of the

the

famous island was always celebrated Greek heroes returned from the Trojan War,

for its shipwrecks, since the Persian

NO R THERN GREE CE.

fleet

205

tried

to

surround
'

the
'

Greek

fleet

in

Chrysostom prefaced
these
ill-famed

his

delightful

idyll

the Straits of Chalcis, since Dio of country life by a shipwreck in

let

hollows

of Eubcea.

But

us

rehearse

few

of

the

VENETIAN TOWER AT CHALCIS.

traditions

long-stretched island, with its lofty mountains and its great forests, so famous. The towns of Chalcis and Eretria stand out in the very beginning of

which

make

this

genuine Greek history as famous

for

mining and

for

bold navigation, as the

206

GREEK PICTURES.
Metal-town and Rowing-place, as the Greeks probably underwould imply. Chalcis was, moreover, remarkable for its proud

very names stood them

aristocracy,

horses (a distinction of wealth in Greece), but who did not disdain close fighting on foot, and wore long hair, like the Spartans and

who kept

older lonians.
less of the details of Eretria save, that her colonies were renowned as those of the Chalcidians, and that when the two cities went to war about the Lelantine plain, which lay between them, all Greece, and even Asia Minor, took share in the conflict, so that Thucydides alludes to it as the one general disturbance in Greece before the Persian wars. These latter, however, did irreparable harm, especially to Eretria

We

know

almost

as

though the fierce rocks of the island avenged themselves on the Persian fleet, the population had been well-night swept by the process of netting,' which Herodotus describes a line of soldiers joining hands, and walking
for
'

straight across the country, catching every inhabitant, or driving him before them, and the people of Eretria were even carried off and settled by Darius
in

Babylonia.
Chalcis,

which was practically the capital of Eubcea ever after, was important and not very trustworthy dependency of Athens during her But the days were long gone by when Eubceans could settle greatness. in towns coasts of Thrace and when Dio great Sicily and on the or to have this island about the time of visited, Chrysostom visited, professed the Emperor Nero, he paints its condition as one of a country where grass
an
;

where the country people lived again in a perfectly primitive way, partly by rude tillage, partly by grazing a few cattle, partly by hunting the game animals with which the forests and brakes abounded. The town of Chalcis again became important
in

was growing

the

streets

of the

towns, and

passage from the land, straits, one about eighty, being the other one hundred and twenty feet wide, could easily be secured against the passage of ships. The present aspect of the Venetian forts, with the usual lion of St. Mark emblazoned upon them, is very striking. The tide or current in the channel, which always perplexed the ancients, is still not There is, no doubt, a real tide, as there is at Venice, but quite explained. other causes seem to contribute, which modify the regularity of the ebb and flow. Until recently a fixed bridge stopped all boat thoroughfare, but it has been for some years replaced by a swinging bridge a great boon to the
the

when

Venetians

refortified

the

old

bridge
into

or

which

divided by a

rocky island

two

traffic

of the town.

There are

still

many

traces

of the

importance of the

island in mediaeval days. Not only the forts at Chalcis, but many smaller castles high up in the mountains, tell the fact that the land was divided into

many fiefs, and held under feudal rights by Prankish Even in recent days, Euboea, or Negropont, as

knights. the Venetians called

it,

has been more than other parts of Greece the scene of enterprising attempts

NORTHERN GREECE.
to

207

make a home
account the fine

for

intelligent
settlers,

Western

agriculture

in

the

Levant.

Both

English and French

to

unfortunately isolated, have

soil

and lovely climate of the

attempted to turn island, but have hitherto

been baulked either by the violence or the sloth of the peasantry. In some cases the settlers were simply murdered, and their property looted by bands of organised brigands in others every attempt at improvement, such
;

of farming machines, was resented by the jealous idleness of the labourers in others again, the inconceivably mischievous Turkish method of insisting upon the taxation of standing crops, has paralyzed
introduction
;

as the

This most stupid and absurd system was absolutely adopted from the Turks by the newly-organised Greek government, and puts into the hands of the tax-collectors a power not less odious, and not less abused than that of the pitblicani under Rome, which was perhaps the main
industry.

Roman provinces. No peasant is allowed to reap the tax-gatherer has time and leisure, or some stronger inducethe payment is in kind, and the wretched peasant is ment, to examine it bound to deliver it at the government stores, perhaps a long way off, and
cause of the ruin of the
his crop
till
;

over miserable roads.

not go on with this description, as it is probable that the: of M. Tricoupis has already made it antiquated. rule There still enlightened remains another terrible abuse of liberty which does almost as much harm in Greece as the abuse of authority. The wild shepherds who roam about the
I

will

forest wherever even the government, and plant a barren district of mountain, they will come and graze it down if arrested, the chances are ten to one that no Greek jury or magistrate will This is the real of them. cause the punish wretchedly barren aspect of so in No one Greece. many mountains protects trees, and every one cuts them down or burns them as he chooses. But why should we blame poor savage

country with

their

flocks of
like
;

sheep and goats set

fire

to

and whenever they

if

any private

individual, or

country people, when the inhabitants of Athens show the same barbarism ? All the streets of the new town, which are excessively hot and glaring

during most

of the

year, are
trees,

planted with
thrive

trees

usually the very fragrant

and beautiful pepper But no sooner does

which
of

one

these

perfectly, when allowed to grow. trees venture to afford the panting

passenger any shade, than its branches are hacked away municipal authorities, or by the nearest resident, apparently should become tolerable for a pedestrian.
I

either
lest

by

the

the streets

think the

best

adieu

we can pay Eubcea

narrative of Herodotus upon the desperate the north headland of the island.
'

to quote the thrilling which took place round struggle

is

The Greeks
sea.
It

ment by

accordingly remained in Eubcea, and came to an engagehappened in this manner. When the barbarians arrived at
that a few Grecian

Aphetae, in the afternoon, having been already informed

2 oS

GREEK PICTURES.

them at Artemisium, they were ships were stationed, and then descrying them. of in the However, they did not think hope taking eager to attack, for the following reasons, lest the sail directly upon them, it advisable to
Greeks seeing them sailing towards them, should betake themselves to and the night should cover their retreat, by which means they would (light, but, according to their saying, they thought that not even the torchescape
;

bearer ought to escape alive.

this purpose, then, they had recourse to the following plan having sent them whole from the hundred round, two fleet, detached they ships outside Sciathus, that they might not be seen by the enemy sailing round that so they Eubcea, by Caphareus and round Gerastus to the Euripus in the place appointed in that might surround them, the one party arriving them in front. way, and intercepting their retreat, and themselves attacking the on this, they despatched ships appointed for this Having determined service, themselves not intending to attack the Greeks that day, nor before
'

For

given by those who sailed round, These, then, they sent round, and set about announcing at Aphetae. taking the number of the rest of the ships were 'At this time, while they taking the number of their ships, there best diver of his time he, in the was in this Scyllias, of Scione, the
the

agreed

should signal their arrival.

be

seen,

camp

shipwreck

that

happened

off

Pelion, had saved much of

their treasure for

This Scyllias had the Persians, and had acquired a good deal for himself. to the Greeks, but had had long before entertained the design of deserting In what way he at length made time. that no opportunity of doing so until his escape to the Greeks I cannot certainly affirm, and I wonder whether For it is said that, having plunged into the sea is true. the account
at

given he never rose Aphetae, distance through the sea,

things are related of this I are true. If, however,

until

as

he reached Artemisium, having passed this near as can be, eighty stadia. Many other
falsehood, and

man that are very like may give my opinion of

some

that

came to Artemisium commanders of the shipwreck, how

in a boat.

On

his arrival,
it

this matter, it is, that he he immediately informed the

had occurred, and of the ships

that

were sent round Eubcea.

The Greeks, having heard this, held a conference among themselves and, after much debate, it was resolved, that remaining there, and continuing in their station during that day, then, when midnight was passed, they would But after this, when round. proceed, and meet the ships that were sailing
'
;

no ship sailed against them, having waited for the evening of the day, they sailed of themselves against the barbarians, being desirous to make trial of their manner of fighting, and of breaking through the line. The other soldiers of Xerxes, and the commanders, seeing them sailing towards them with so few ships, attributed their conduct to madness, and on
'

their part

take got their ships under weigh, expecting that they should easily

NORTHERN GREECE.
them
;

209

were very reasonable, when they saw that the own many more in number, and better sailers. Taking these things into consideration, they enclosed them in the middle of a circle. Now, such of the lonians as were well affected to the Greeks, and joined the expedition unwillingly, regarded it as a great calamity, when they saw them surrounded, feeling convinced that not one of them would return, so weak did the Grecian forces appear to them to be. But such as were pleased with what was going on, vied with each other how each might be the first to take an Athenian ship, and receive a reward from the king. For throughout the fleet they had the highest opinion of the

and

their expectations

Grecian ships were few, and their

Athenians.
the signal was given to the Greeks, first of all turning their prows against the barbarians, they contracted their sterns inwardly to the middle and when the second signal was given, they commenced the attack,
'
;

When

though
occasion

enclosed

in

narrow

space,

and
the

that

thirty ships they Chersis, the brother of Gorgus,

in

took

of

barbarians,

prow to prow. and Philaon,

a

On
son

this

of

esteemed
the
first

their

of the

the Salaminians, man highly an son of was /Eschreus, Athenian, army. Lycomedes, Greeks who took a ship from the enemy, and he received

King of

the palm of valour.

this

engagement

But night coming on separated the combatants, who in The Greeks returned to fought with doubtful success.

Artemisium, and the barbarians to Aphetae, having fought with far different In this engagement Antidorus, a Lemnian, was success than they expected. the only one of the Greeks in the king's service who went over to the Greeks and on that account the Athenians presented him with lands in
;

Salamis.

was now the middle of summer, heavy and violent thunder about Pelion the through night, dead bodies and pieces of wreck were driven to Aphetce, and got entangled But the round the prows of the ships, and impeded the blades of the oars. on when heard the were were seized with soldiers who board, thunder, they terror, expecting that they must certainly perish, into such calamities had For before they had recovered breath, after the wreck and they fallen. tempest that had occurred off Pelion, a fierce engagement followed, and after the engagement, impetuous rain and mighty torrents rushing into the Such was the night to them. sea, and violent thunder. But to those who had been appointed to sail round Eubcea, this same night proved so much the more wild, in that it fell upon them while they for as they and the end was grievous to them were in the open sea were sailing, the storm and rain overtook them when they were near the hollows of Eubcea, and being driven by the wind, and not knowing where All this was done by they were driven, they were dashed upon the rocks.
'

When

night

came

on,

and

it

rain

fell

the whole

'

the

deity,

that

the

Persian

might

be

brought

to

an

equality with
p

the

2io

CREEK PICTURES.
Thus they perished near the

Greek, or at least not be greatly superior. hollows of Euboea. The barbarians at Aphetae, when, to
'

their great joy, day dawned, at and were after their rest, content, ships they had suffered so much, kept But three and fifty Attic ships came to to remain quiet for the present. and both these by their arrival gave them additional reinforce the Greeks
;

news that came at the same time, that those of the barbarians who were sailing round Euboea had all perished in the late storm therefore, having waited to the same hour, they set sail and attacked the Cilician ships, and having destroyed them, as soon as it was night they
courage, as did the
;

sailed
'

back to Artemisium.

On

the

third

being insulted longer waited

commanders of the barbarians, indignant at by so few ships, and fearing the displeasure of Xerxes, no for the Greeks to begin the battle but encouraging one
day,

the

It happened that another, got under weigh about the middle of the day. these actions by sea and those by land at Thermopylae took place on the same days and the whole struggle for those at sea was for the Euripus, the one party encouraging as for those with Leonidas to guard the pass each other not to suffer the barbarians to enter Greece, and the other, to destroy the Grecian forces, and make themselves masters of the channel. When the barbarians, having formed in line, sailed onwards, the but the barbarians, having drawn Greeks remained still at Artemisium up their ships in the form of a crescent, encircled them as if they would take them whereupon the Greeks sailed out to meet them, and engaged. In this battle they were nearly equal to one another; for the fleet of Xerxes, by reason of its magnitude and number, impeded itself, as the ships incommoded and ran foul of one another however, they continued to fight, and would not yield, for they were ashamed to be put to flight by a few Accordingly many ships of the Greeks perished, and many men ships. and of the barbarians a much greater number, both of ships and men. Having fought in this manner, they separated from each other. In this engagement the Egyptians signalised themselves among the for they both achieved other great actions, and took forces of Xerxes
; ' ;
;

'

five

Greek

ships,

with

their

crews.

On

the

part

of the

Greeks,

the

Athenians signalised themselves on this day, and among the Athenians, who at his own- expense joined the fleet with Cleinias, son of Alcibiades a two hundred men and ship of his own. When they had separated, each gladly hastened to their own stations but the Greeks, when, having left the battle, they had withdrawn, were in possession of the dead and of the wrecks yet, having been severely
;

'

half of whose ships were Athenians, a retreat into the interior of Greece. disabled, they consulted about But Themistocles, having considered with himself, that if the lonians

handled,
'

and

especially

the

the

NORTHERN GREECE.

211

and Carians could be detached from the barbarian, they would be able to overcome the rest as the Euboeans were driving their cattle down to the shore, he then assembled the Grecian commanders together, and told them that he thought he had a contrivance, by which he hoped to draw off the best of the king's allies. This, then, he so far discovered to them, but in the present state of affairs he told them what they ought to do every one should kill as many of the Eubcean cattle as he thought fit for it was better that their own army should have them than the He also enemy. advised them each to direct their own men to kindle fires and promised that he would choose such a time for their departure, that they should all arrive safe in Greece. These things they were pleased to do and forthkindled For the Eubceans, with, having fires, they fell upon the cattle. disregarding the oracles of Bacis, as importing nothing, had neither carried out anything to a place of safety, nor collected stores, as if war was The approaching and so had brought their affairs into a precarious state. " oracle of Bacis respecting them was as follows Beware of the barbarianwhen he shall cast a byblus-yoke across the sea, remove the tongued As they paid no attention to these verses, in bleating goats from Eubcea." the calamities then present, and those that were impending, they fell into
; ; ; ;

the greatest distress.' ' The reader should

of

notice

on

the

map how

the

apparently

Greek islands are really laid out in fixed groups. groups important group of the Cyclades is the prolongation of the chain of Eubcea, and parallel with it is another series practically of the high mountain tops which run on from the termination of Attica. There is a third group, the which in an eastern direction, starting from the spurs of Sporades, goes

random The most

Mount Othrys, immediately north of Eubcea, and now marking the limits which divide the Greek from the Turkish waters on the north. So also the chain of Othrys is the great boundary between these hostile nationalities, and indeed a boundary of climate, for north of the rich plain of Thessaly
Alps become cold and snowy, so that what grows and flourishes about Volo and Larissa will not live twenty miles to the north. There is now considerable railway communication through Thessaly, and the day is soon coming when the line will be carried over Mount Pindus across to Dalmatia, and from thence to Trieste. When this is accomplished, not Venice, not Brindisi, not even the convenient Salonica (of which more The existing anon), but the Piraeus, will be the port for Suez and the East. from Yolo the two branches of the Thessalian railways go up great plain, to Larissa, which brings the traveller within a day's excursion of the Vale of Tempe, and to Trikkala, which brings him towards the central (Pindus) chain of the peninsula, and to the wonderfully picturesque convents
the wild of Meteora.

The

plain itself

is
1

not so interesting as other parts of Greece,

viii.

Herodotus,

6-20.
I'

212

GREEK PICTURES.

for there are not

ruins

nor

was there
in

remaining any splendid ever a first-rate

the best epoch.
In

Greek

city there

later days,

when Macedonian kings and

were
the

Roman
mastery
"hessaly

nobles
of

disputing for the of world, the plains

situate d

became indeed famous. Yolo somewhere near the site of Demetrias, the city built and named
1

by

)emetrius

the

300 king of Macedon after Alexander the Great,

i!.r.
r

Besieger, about the first real

who mounted
of

to

the

throne by the murder all the legitimate

heirs.

But of

this city

we have no The
MOUNT OLYMPUS.
tified
-

remains.
plain

of

Pharsalia can be iden-

where the hardy

of Caesar de-

veterans
feated the proud but effeminate aristocracy led by his rival far is the broken very country known in antiquity as the

Pompey.
Dog's

Not Heads

NORTHERN GREECE.

213

(Cynoscephalse), where the Macedonian phalanx, which the Romans had not encountered since the invasion of King Pyrrhus, was defeated and destroyed The Romans who had fought in the through advancing over uneven ground.

Polybius they had never seen anything so formidable, and there is no reason to assert that the phalanx ever was defeated by another system of tactics under favourable circumstances. Still, Alexander the Great underbattle told

stood

so

perfectly
it

the

difficulties

of

moving

for

attack,

that

he

never
while
it

employed
he

in his

battles,

save
;

to
is

keep part
also

of the
to
at the

enemy engaged

won

the battle elsewhere

he

known

have been breaking

up

into smaller

and more

easily

worked formations

very time that death

stayed his further designs. There were many other campaigns through this country, notably those of the years preceding Cynoscephalae (197 B.C.), in which the Romans learned
to their cost

how

difficult

it

by a determined

enemy.
traveller

was to force passes and storm fortresses held But these things must be read in detail in the
goes to see two famous sights
the
in

Roman history. The modern

of

Thessaly,

the
the

one

natural,

other

artificial

mean

opposite ends the Vale of

is

Tempe, and

Peneus breaks

monasteries of Meteora. The famous vale the chain of through Othrys, and rushes into

where the
sea in a

the

Not only are splendid gorge between Mount Ossa and Mount Olympus. the surrounding rocks and mountains of this vale very striking, but the
forest
trees

which

grow
speak

near
of the

the

water,

magnificent, not to
trees,

forests

and agnus

castus,

festooned with

especially plane trees, are of willows, wild fig trees, Judas wild vines, ivy, and clematis. No

more beautiful spot is probably to be found in Europe, and now that the Greek frontier has been made perfectly safe by the care of M. Tricoupis and his proper management of the brigand question, no excursion will better For you cannot travel repay the labour of penetrating to this remote spot.
on to Salonica on horseback. As soon as you reach the slopes of Mount Olympus, on the other side, the danger from brigands becomes very serious
indeed.

The
perhaps This
of

notorious
in

case

of Colonel

Synge,

which
it

happened
be

in

1881,

is

not

the

recollection of

the

the condition
Irish

of the

Greeks

under
fit

reader, but Turkey not to

illustrates too

briefly stated

clearly here.

gentleman thought

to

occupy a farm on
with

the

northern

slopes

Mount Olympus, where he lived The fact that he was a British

the notorious bandit

some

stout

Albanian

dependants.

tempted
the

purpose

of

surprising

subject, and a man of social position and murderer, Niko, to organise a band for Colonel him, and extracting a large ransom.

Synge had some vague notice of their intentions, but trusted to his followers and to his own resources to resist them. When they attacked his house, he defended himself for some time, but when they proceeded to set fire to it, and

GREEK PICTURES.
it

became necessary

his care
in

whom

to retreat, he had a woman and young children under he could not desert, and who could not possibly be carried off

He was, therefore, compelled to surrender. Some of the a running fight. Albanians with him were murdered in cold blood, and he was carried off. Negotiations were then started by his writing to the British consul at Salonica, stating that the brigands, under pain of putting him to death with horrible tortures, demanded ,15,000 ransom. Agents from the consulate
proceeded to parley with agents of the brigands during a period of two months, while all police or military supervision of the district was stopped at the demand of the villains. During this interval twenty-seven honest people are said to have been robbed or murdered by these and other villains, The final result, as nearly as I can freed from all fear of punishment.

Each brigand of the band of thirty received a gold watch and chain; the ,15,000 was paid to them in gold by the consul (to be recovered from the Turks out of the tribute which Enelish o the English pay for Cyprus to the Sultan) furthermore, all Niko's friends then in jail under various charges of robbery and murder, which he alleged Then Colonel Synge was restored to his to be unjust, were liberated. Niko retired from his lucrative profession, and was said to be friends.
remember the
facts,

was

as follows.

one of the Greek islands when I heard the story. In consequence of this affair another Englishman was since seized in Macedonia, and the and now no British citizen can pass through that same ransom extracted
living in
;

province without fear of a similar fate. It is common in such cases to talk of Greek brigands, and such no doubt But in justice it should be added that they were these men were in race.
subjects of the iniquitous government of Turkey in Macedonia, and that no part of Greece has any such outrage happened for many years. As I have said, and as I have repeatedly proved by personal experience, any stranger can travel as he pleases all over Greece, and even up to the This result is attained very easily in Turkish frontier, with perfect safety. any province, Greek or Turkish, by arming the peasants, and putting a To the peasants these people are a great price on every brigand's head. and constant scourge, so that Greeks or Albanians will treat any vagrant as a brigand, and so make the business too dangerous to be a desirable The mountaineer who lives in these highlands is very profession in life. brave, and quite delighted to have a battue even for the most dangerous game. When the inducement of a reward in money is added, the sport becomes a passion with them.
all

in

These are the reasons why I (like other people who value their lives and liberty) was obliged to sail up the coast to Salonica, and so lose the splendid scenery of Mount Olympus, which would tempt any lover of the
beauties of Nature.

long

the sea the prospect is very beautiful. horn of land curving from the north to form the Gulf of Volo

Even from

The
is

the

NORTHERN GREECE.

215

once the

ancient and historic Pelion, a long ridge 5300 feet high, with gentle slopes, game preserves of the Macedonian kings, where the great Scipio .^Emilianus and Polybius had splendid sport after the defeat of King Perseus

Pydna (167 n.c.). Next to it on the north stands out the and higher steeper top of Ossa (7600 feet), and still further north the magnificent ascending scale is crowned by Mount Olympus, of which the highest top is nearly 10,000 feet, and hardly ever without its cap of snow. Then the traveller, looking from his ship on this splendid view, begins to feel the poetic propriety of piling Pelion upon Ossa, Ossa upon Olympus, as the Titans proposed to do in their attempt to scale the heavens, and
at the battle of

displace

its

hostile

monarch.

GENERAL VIEW OF THE PRINCIPAL MONASTERIES OF METEORA.

CHAPTER
THE GKKKK

XV.

ASI'KCTS OF MACEDONIA.

HAVE
I

purposely postponed mention of the convents of

Meteora,

in

the

heart of Thessaly, above Trikkala, which were till lately under Turkish rule, in order to treat uf them along with the iar more important but very similar convents on Mount Athos, which are essentially Greek, and with the
Christian
epistles

remains

in

Salonica,
Paul.
to

of the Apostle

once hallowed by the preaching and by the The bulk of the seaboard population all the
is

way

blood, in language, and in between Thessalonica, lying religion. Philippi on the east and Bercea on the west, has ever since St. Paul's day been a great centre of Christianity, and even now all the principal mosques are hardly disguised The old Macedonian kings, when they determined to Byzantine churches. I leave their splendid old capital mean splendid in site and come down

from

Olympus

Philippi

Greek

in

Salonica, the old

THE GREEK ASPECTS OF MACEDONIA.

217

near the sea or a navigable river to the commonplace Fella, also encouraged Greek speech and manners, by way of civilising their semi-barbarous Macedonian yeomen and feudal chiefs. Thus the language and habits of
that coast are thoroughly Greek, though groaning under the injustice and the incompetence of Turkish pashas. There is indeed no part of Greece proper where the splendours of early Byzantine church architecture, and the strange
spiritual
life

of the

Greek Church, can be studied so

well

as at
his

Salonica

and on

Mount Athos.

Nor

did

the

great

apostle

leave

impress so

strongly even in Corinth as on this northern side of the Greek world, as his two Epistles to the Thessalonians, his Epistle to the Philippians, and St, Luke's notice of the Berceans, distinctly imply.

The

reader

should

remember

that

the

Macedonia had been deliberately depopulated

after their conquest of the last
official,

splendid old and ruined by

in B.C.

kingdom
the

of

Romans

167 King Every noble, every person of any consequence, was either killed, sold into slavery, or interned in Italy, where these unhappy exiles disappear for ever from our view. The remaining peasant population was severed into four

of

Macedon

every

between the members of which no intermarriage or holding of All the cities once famous were depopulated property was allowed. and ruined, almost as much as Corinth was in the year 146 B.C. Nevertheprovinces,

common
less

the trading of Roman capitalists, of Jews settled Asia, of Greeks whose enterprise managed to earn

in

the

wealth

province of under hard with

a

conditions,

caused

several

of

the

coast

towns

to

revive,

new

population and broken traditions. It was in such a population, so

Corinth, that

like

what must have occupied the new

suitable
soil for

preaching of his new doctrine. Cities of ancient renown and conservative views, such as Athens, Sparta, Thebes, were far less likely to appreciate such novelties, This seems to me except as mere novelties, without practical importance. the reason why it is in a peculiar class of town, the new trading town of
the
recent origin or of re-foundation under Roman rule, that St. Paul made his chief missionary efforts. The traditions of his work at Salonica still survive,

the

apostle found

the most

preserved in separate halves, in two separate churches of the town, which is asserted to have been the pulpit he used for his preaching. In the succeeding centuries the importance of
tor

there

is

a fine

marble

pulpit

hessalonica as a Christian centre was only inferior to that of Constantinople, and a series of churches, dating from about the fifth to the twelfth centuries, show the wealth and splendour of the city. The remains of Roman gates,
I

and other Roman work, which has been but recently destroyed by modern vandalism, are as nothing compared with the Christian interest of the town. It is surrounded by huge walls reaching up to the great castle which surmounts the natural theatre presented by the city to the traveller These gigantic fortifications, which remind one approaching from the sea.

218

GREEK PICTURES.

of the walls round Constantinople, bear at least in one place an inscription The mentioning the pope Ormyzdas, and so fixing the date of that portion. walls which protected the city from the sea have unfortunately been removed

days of peace, since steam abolished piracy, and replaced by an open quay, more convenient, no doubt, but not half so picturesque. 'In the churches of Thessalonica,' says Mr. Bury, 'we find the new
in

these

Byzantine as developed from the Roman] in its perfection, especially original and peculiar development, the adorning of the domes The date of many of the churches at Thessalonica is uncertain, with mosaic.
art [the
in
its

most

and modern
buildings

specialists

are at

variance on

the

subject.

In
;

some
for

cases

the

themselves
in

afford

evidence

of great

antiquity

example,

the

nave of St. Demetrius once contained a fountain, which points to the custom of ablution, practised by Christians only in the earliest times, and the mosaic pictures in St. George's Church of saints who lived before the time of Constantine suggest an early period. The theory, too easily adopted by travellers, that many of the churches were built on the sites of heathen temples, has been contradicted and almost disproved by
atrium (vestibule)
the

Of the more ancient buildings in Thessalonica the churches of St. Demetrius and St. George are the most remarkable. The church of St. Demetrius is a basilica erected in honour of the saint early in the fifth
recent research.'
'

century.'

As

the learned author permits divergence of opinion,

is

will

here record
the
building

my

columns of the nave, However, of vcrd antico marble, are Ionic, and the carefully executed capitals might be called Corinthian, but for the eagles with which they are adorned. The dossercts [or cushions, like a second capital placed over the first] are marked with crosses, sometimes in the middle of foliage. The only decoration of this church consists in coloured marbles, and the effect is more temperate than if it were also embellished with mosaic.' I will add to this from my own observations (made in April, 1889) that the pillars of the nave were
of the

impression that this great church tenth century than the fifth.

much

later
'

more

like

the

alternated with piers, just like the early Romanesque churches in Germany (such as those of Brunswick or Fulda), and that the apse has four engaged As is usual in this school, Roman materials pillars separating the windows.

up with great skill. There is very good marble-inlaying on the round arches, and above them, in the nave. The interior has one hundred and sixty-five pillars in all, but, alas, the old marble is washed with pink, and the dosserets with green.
are used
'

The
'

ancient

church

of

St.

George

is

huge

circular

dome

in

and may have been erected The entire decoration consists century.' of the dome are perhaps the finest work
appearance,
1

in the early part of the fourth of mosaics, and the eight pictures of the kind extant.' I might call
p. 47.

History of the Later

Roman Emfirc (Macmilhn,

1889), vol.

ii.,

The chapter

in question is

by Mrs. Bury.

THE CREEK ASPECTS OF MACEDONIA.

it

219

as well

a sort of Pantheon, like that at Rome. There are architectural designs as figures, the colours employed being dull blue, green, gold, and brown, an occasional peacock in mosaic, and then a white figure of a priest.
I

Here and there vulgar modern painting replaces the fallen mosaic. When was there the Turks were repairing (?) the dome, and many pieces of this priceless mosaic had fallen upon the floor, from which I brought a piece to the Art Museum in Dublin, to show the method of its construction. There are four deep niches in the enormous wall, apparently built to resist even
earthquakes, of which the arched roofs are decorated with birds, flowers, and diaper pattern in lovely dull-toned mosaic.
I cannot delay to describe the Church of St. Sophia, an accurate copy on a smaller scale of its great namesake in Constantinople, or the Mosque of Cold Waters, a brick church with storks building on its cupola, while the

interior

was crowded with horribly

filthy

Bulgarian refugees.

Let us escape from this marvellous city, whose empty and deserted churches show no care for religion either in the Turks, who now own them, or in the Greeks, who are permitted on certain feasts to assemble in the Let us rather escape, and All are in shameful neglect and decay. basilica. conclude our survey of Greek land and people by a short visit to its great
monasteries, the vast assemblage of buildings and men gathered the upon Holy Mountain of Athos, which stands up 7000 feet from the sea If ever Nature could noblest the promontory, by far, in all Europe.

northern

suggest sublime thoughts to man,

it

is

in

this

enchanting place.

And what
!

of history are suggested by the very prospect from its summit As you stand on the pale blue cone, with its seams of snow in every crevice, the eye wanders, starting from the giant Olympus, with its ancient

volumes

legends of the

expatriated gods, into the wild regions of Macedonia, the cradle of that strong race which once conquered the whole Eastern world.

now

The Gulf
rather
of

of Salonica
central
lies

is

hidden by the two

flat

sister

by the

one, for the

and

fertile

promontories of Athos, or Pallene, once the territory

behind the rugged and wooded hills of Sithonia, which, Olynthus, rising above its western sister, forms a sort of gradation of land between Uue north lies Mount Pangreus, the low ground and the majestic Acte. which drew that from which Philip bought his way into many a gold fortress, and in which he coined those noble medals which are so dear, in

more senses than

you see the snowy Rhodope, about which cling the legends of Orpheus and his bloody fate, so exquisitely told in Vergil's famous episode. A little more to the north-east the Island of Thasos looks like a promontory from the coast, that lofty island which Herodotus saw all turned inside out, as he says, by
one, to the
collector.
far

And

behind

Panga;us

the

The days, in their search for precious metals. eye wanders towards the site of Philippi, not distinguishable from the rest of the lower coast, and is caught by the romantic forms of the majestic
Phoenicians
of ancient

GREEK PICTURES.
Samothrace,
the

home

of

art

and

of

mystery,

whose

occult

gods

have

The perplexed the modern scholar, as they amazed the ancient worshipper. outlines of Samothrace are far the most picturesque of all the islands visible,

MOUNT
as
its

ATIIOS.

and thus the tamer, Hatter Lemnos, to the south-east, at first disappoints the student who has it bound up in his mind with the sufferings and victory of Philoctetes, glorified by Sophocles in whose private his play, and by its historical connection with Athens,
history
is

the most

peculiar

THE GREEK ASPECTS OF MACEDONIA.

was for many generations. There is even the classical phrase To have sailed to Lcninos was said of an modern Levanting. Athenian who was wanted,' and was not forthcoming- on the day of trial. And yet to Athos this Lemnos stands in a peculiar relation of contrast. This was the island which Greek imagination fabled the scene of that a commonwealth of women, from which every male had fantastic experiment For the opposite experiment has been tried, and with much been extirpated. It is now six greater success, on the very promontory which we now occupy. or seven hundred years since any
property
it

parallel to the

'

woman
fane

has been

allowed to pro-

the

Holy
their

Mountain.
servants

The
are re-

monks and
cruited

by importation of boys and the mainland, and for centuries an armed watch guarding

men from

at the

very

site

of

Xerxes'

canal

kept off not only every woman, but every cow, she-goat, hen in fact, everything female which could not
take wings and mountain.
fly

on to the sacred
a

The

result

out parallel in

society withthe civilised world.

is

Many
their

thousands
servants,

of

monks
in

and

living

twenty

monasteries, most of them well endowed with lands, which they either cultivate on the promontory, or let

through Macedonia, here practise asceticism of a sort, and

to tenants

piety of a sort quite foreign to all The conWestern conceptions.

vents

Meteora in Thessaly, MONASTERY OF HOLY TRINITY, TRIKKAI.A. perched on the Summit of lofty rocks, which rise each in curious isolation from the valley above Trikkala, are equally secure from the F~or no one can reach them unless he climb some hundreds female sex. of feet up ladders hanging loose on the rocks, till he reaches a door Or else he must at the dizzy height, which the monks open for him. trust himself to a net let down from the upper air, in which he swings and turns while a capstan above winds the frayed and time-worn cable, and he But these convents is at last stranded like a fish in the sacred eyrie aloft. of Meteora are so decayed as to be hardly worth the horrible sensations
of

GREEK PICTURES.
suffered writes so
in

the

upward journey.
in his

All

their

fine

MSS., about which Curzon

Monasteries of the Levant, are either sold or are at where I examined many of them in the University Library. Athens, Athos, on the contrary, has withstood the stress of time wonderfully. Some indeed of the estates of the monks in Moldavia and Bulgaria have

much

most of the convents seem rich enough for the including occasional, but most generous hospitality to introduced to them and if it were not for the innovations of the two visitors Russian monasteries, which are propaganda of politics, and endeavour to introduce Russian ideas by vulgar ostentation and an affectation of modern enlightenment, the Holy Mountain is well-nigh as it has been for many New galleries of wood are added along the battlements of the centuries.
been confiscated, but wants of the monks,
still
;

some applications of walls for guest rooms, or for passages along the cells horrible sky-blue or red paint disfigure the sober tones of these mediaeval
;

other respects the strictest conservatism prevails. They a board call to prayer during the wooden called still night by sounding scmanti'on, though many of them have bells, and for special services they
fortresses,
in

but

made in imitation of the original wood. They no longer which they seem to have done very generally up to the fifteenth copy MSS., but as century, they were recopying the same books lessons from the Gospels, and Homilies, there was no possible use in continuing the practice. Not one in five hundred of them knows anything about MSS. and their Even the precious Kimclia (/cei/xrpua), with which old Byzantine value. empresses or princes have enriched them, have no value in their eyes in
use a bronze plate

comparison with the sacred relics, cased in gaudy envelopes of silver or gilding, which they bring out in their vestments, and with great reverence, and place on a holy table in their churches for .the faithful to revere. Their religion is measured by the orthodoxy of their opinions there is no inducement to variance or controversy and the length of their constant In such seasons as Passion Week, these services last through most services. of the day and night. I visited one which lasted from seven in the evening till nine in the morning fourteen hours! on the eve of Palm Sunday. And though some of the congregation came and went, the great body remained the same through the whole dreary night. They were singing psalms and Whosoever reading lessons in turn, and in various parts of their church. wishes full and sympathetic information on this curious phase of religion will find it in a very remarkable book, Mr. Athelstane Riley's Athos and its But even the clever photographs which Plonks, which is well worth reading. he took can give the reader little idea of the superb beauty of the scenery and the matchless picturesqueness of the monasteries, especially on the western side of the mount, which stand like great feudal fortresses upon high and almost inaccessible rocks, framed in a background of cliff and forest and rushing water. The vegetation of the promontory is not only

THE CREEK ASPECTS OF MACEDONIA.

rich,

223

which

but wonderfully various, owing to the contrasts of aspect and altitude, produce a climate changing from winter to spring, from spring to
in
it

summer,

And
its

a morning's ride. is a very fit adieu to

most beautiful of all Greek lands, most ascetic religionism, where the traveller can not only wonder at the Providence which has made all things beautiful in their kind, but also the strange devices of men to serve Him, not by enjoying, with thankful and reasonable devotion, the good things of life which He has given them with large hand, but by reversing His laws, and making the practice of religion a thing of fasting, of abstinence, of ritual, and of mental stagnation.

make to Greece, to visit last of all this the home of its most rigid devoutness, of

INDEX.
ACH.II AN

LEAGUE,
of,

Acharna, deme

the, 134 61

Eretria, 205

Oracle of Delphi, 122

off,

Acte, 219 jEtolia, 128 ^tolians, the, character of, 25 Agriculture, Greek, 117 Andritzena, 197 Arachova, 170 Aratus, story of, 130 Arcadia, state of, 193 origin of romance of, 194 Archias of Corinth, 34 Areopagus, the, 82 Argos, 152 Art, Greek, 92-96 Athenais, 107 Athene of Phidias, 148 Athens, situation of, 54; the Acropolis, history 54, 67 ; excursions from, 58 art of, 67 ; struggles in, 68 of, 66 ; of 72 Propylza, Victory, 71 Temple guard-room, 74 ; the Parthenon, 77 ; the the 82 the Areopagus, Erechtheum, 77 Agora, 82; bt- Paul at, 85; theatre of
; ; ; ;
;

Eubcea, 204 ; naval battle Eurotas, the, 166 Extortion, Greek, 178

207

Orchomenos, 118
Ossa, 215 Othrys Mountains, 211

FARMING, Greek, 207

Figurines, terra-cotta, 101 Frankish occupation of Greei
.
,

PALLENE, 219
ir

GIFT

of tongues, the, 42 Greater Eleusinia, the, 47 Gulf of Argos, 169 Gulf of Corinth, 25 Gulf of Koron, i8t Gulf of Nauplia, 156 Gulf of Salona, 32

Pan, worship of, 194 Pangaeus, Mount, 219 Pankration at Olympia, 146
Pantagia, the, 177 Parnes, chain of, 55 Parthenon, the, 77 Patras, 27 railway at, 31 Paul, St., in Greece, 24; at Corinth, 38; at Athens, 85 at Salonica, 217 Pausanias, quoted, on Leondari, 195 Pelion, 215 Peloponnesus, the, description of, 129 Pentelicus, 55 Persians in Greece, 63 Pharsalia, 212 Phidias, works of, 148 Phocis, description of, 121 shrine at, 122 Phyle, 60 Piracy, Greek, 27, 133 Pirsus, ruins in the, 57 Pisibtratus, influence of, 67 Plat^ea, 112 Plutarch, genius of, )
; ; ;

HAGIOS PETROL, 169

Hastings, Capt. A., 27 Helisson, the, 195 Hermes of Praxiteles, the, 149 Herodotus, quoted, on the constitution of Corinth, 35; on Delphic worship, 126 on the Spartan monarchs, 170 on the Spartans and Tegeans, 189 ; on the battle near Eubcea, 207 Houses, Greek, 114
; ;

Temple of ./Esculapius, Dionysus, 87 87 ; stage of, 88 ; religion of, 89 Temple art in, 95 ; history of, of Hadrian, 91 95 ; paganism of, 97 tomb reliefs at, 99 churches in, 103 Christianity in, 103 temples made into churches, 108 Athos, Mount, convents of, 222
;
; ; ; ; ; ;

INNOCENT

III.,

wisdom

of,

52

BASIL

II., 108
;

temple at, 198 Bassae, visit to, 96 Belle, M. Henri, his visit to a monastery
quoted, 183
Bceotia, battles in,

Ionic order, the, 92 Irene, 107 Isthmus of Corinth, 44 Itea, 32 Ithaca, Homer on, 24 Ithome, Mount, 182

Portrait statues, 151

RACING

at

Olympia, 144

Religion, Greek, 89

in
;

celebrities of,

in

Bury,

description of, 112 agriculture in, 117 character of people, 118 Boxing at Olympia, 145 Mr., quoted, on Byzantine architec;

JOANNINA, insecurity of, 21 Jumping at Olympia, 145

SAI.ONICA, St. Paul 218 Samothrace, 220

Sellasia, 166

at,

217

churches

of,

KALAMATA,

181
of, 116, of,

ture, 218 Brigands, Greek, 213 Byron, death of, 128 Byzantine chapels, 104 Byzantine churches, 218

Karytena, castle Kephissus, plain

201

56

Shepherds, Greek, 207 Sicyon, 32, 130 Sithonia, 219

Solon, 67 Sparta, 166; present state of, Pantagia, 177 Spartans, the, condition of, 170 Stage, Greek, 88 Sporades, the, 211 Stenyclarus, 183 Styx, Falls of the, 202

LABDA, story of, 35 Langada Pass, 178

Larissa, 157

17^; the

CADMEA,

114
the, 32
of,

Lebadea, 120 Lemnos, 220

Leondari, 195 Leuctra, 117 Lion-gate at Mykense, 160 Lycurgus, 172

Canon Statue,

Caphareus, 204 Chsronea, 119; lion

Chalcis, 205

120

Sunium,

Charcoal-burners, 61 Clarentza, castle of, 116 Colocotroni, the chief, 201 Comnenus, George, emigration of, 187 Confederation of Greece, the, 125 Constans II., 108 Convents, Greek, 51 Corfu, antiquities, 23 ; climate, 24
Corinth, position of, 33 religion of, 33 sack trade of, 34; government of, 34 St. Paul at, 38 of, 37 ; revival of, 38 ; the isthmus, the Acro-Corinthus, 43 44 the canal, 44 Corinthian order, the, 92 Cyclades, the, 211
;
;

58, 204 Synge, Col., capture

of,

213

MACEDONIA,

state

of,

216

Maina, 185 Mantinea, 191 Marathon, 58

Megalopolis, 193

TANAGRA,
Tatoi, 58

117

Megara, 47
Me^aspilion, monastery
at,

132

Messene, 181
Missolonghi, 26, 128 Mistra, 178 Mnesicles, his Propylaea, 72 Monasteries, Greek, 132; M. Belle'to, 183 Mountaineers, Greek, state of, 18*"

Taygetus, Mount, 182 Tegea, struggles of, 189 Thasos, 219 Theatres, Greek, 88-^91 Thebes, struggles with
dition
of,

legend

of,

I'teotia,

no:

con-

116
of,

Theophan, 107
\isit

Theseus, legends
ThespieC, 117

66

Thrasybulus at Phyle,
'1

Cynoscephalae, 213 Cypselus, dynasty of, 34

Munychia, harbour of, 57 Mykenae, 158 Mysteries ot Demeter, 47

Tomb

iryns, 162
reliefs,

99

DAPHNE, convent
Dekelea, 58 Delphi, shrine
of.

of,

51

church

Toys, Greek, 101 Travelling, Greek, 1^7

Trikkala, 221 Tripolitza, 178 Trypi, 178

of,

52

Death, Greek view

of,

100

NAUPACTUS,

26

122
of,

Demeter, mysteries

47

Demetrias, 212 Diakria, 58 Doric order, the, 92 Dress, Greek, 21, 113 Dukes of Athens, 52

Nauplia, 156 Navarino, memor.es of, 187 Necro-Corinthia, 38 Neda, Falls of the, 202 Nedon, the, 181 Nicsea, 47 Nicopolis, 128 Nike of Pceonios, the, 149 Niko, the brigand, 213

VALE

of Tempe, 213 Villehardouins, the, 176 Volo, 204 Vostilza, 32, 132 Yourkano, convent of, 181

EETION, story

of, 35 Eleusis, 47 Eieutherae, fort at, 60 Elis, 135 Erechiheum, the, 77

OLYMPUS, 214
Olympia, history of, 140 games of, 144; remains at, 146, temple of Zeus, 146;
;

WKESTLING

at Olympia, 145

statues

of,

148

ZENO, 108 Zeus of Phidias, the, 148

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