[1] Plutarch; Diodorus; Rollin; Sandwich.
[2] Pliny; Strabo; Plutarch; Diodorus; Wilkinson.
[3] Simon; Count Fedor de Karacray; Malte-Brun.
[4] "Ægina abounds," says Wheler, "with a sort of red-legged partridge,
against which, by order of the Epitropi, or the chief magistrate of the
town, all, both young and old, go out yearly, as the pigmies of old did
against the cranes, to war with, and to break their eggs before they are
hatched; otherwise, by their multitudes, they would so destroy and eat
up the corn, that they would inevitably bring a famine every year upon
the place."
[5] Mr. C. R. Cockerell and Mr. John Foster; W. Linckh and Baron Haller.
[6] Wheler; Chandler; Barthélemi; Sandwich; Lusieri; Clarke; Dodwell;
Williams; Leake.
[7] Rollin.
[8] Livy, Cicero, Diodorus Siculus, Rollin, Brydone; Encyl. Lond.,
Brewster's Encyl.
[9] Dionysius of Halicarnassus;--Sir W. Gell.
[10] Jose Almana.
[11] Browne.
[12] Myos Hormos.
[13] Four hundred and fifty talents of gold. See 2 Chron. viii. 18.
This, we may suppose, was the gross sum received; not the profit.
[14] A.M. 3685. Ant. J. C. 321. Diod. lib. xviii. p. 608, 610.
[15] This author lived in the fifteenth century.
[16] Earl of Sandwich.
[17] Some have commended Ptolemy for permitting the architect to put his
name in the inscription which was fixed on the tower, instead of his
own. It was very short and plain, according to the manner of the
ancients. _Sostratus Cnidius Dexiphanis F. Diis Servatoribus pro
navigantibus_, _i. e._, "Sostratus the Cnidian, son of Dexiphanes, to
the protecting deities, for the use of sea-faring people." But certainly
Ptolemy must have very much undervalued that kind of immortality which
princes are generally very fond of, to suffer that his name should not
be so much as mentioned in the inscription of an edifice so capable of
immortalising him. What we read in Lucian, concerning this matter,
deprives Ptolemy of a modesty, which indeed would be very ill-placed
here. This author informs us that Sostratus, seeing the king determined
to engross the whole glory of that noble structure to himself, caused
the inscription with his own name to be carved in the marble, which he
afterwards covered with lime, and thereon put the king's name. The lime
soon mouldered away: and by that means, instead of procuring the king
the honour with which he had flattered himself, served only to discover
to future ages his unjust and ridiculous vanity.--ROLLIN.
[18] Savary.
[19] Lib. xxii. c. 16.
[20] See his observations on the supposed conflagration of the
Alexandrian library, with a commentary on the 5th and 6th sections of
the first chapter of the tenth book of Quintilian.
[21] Rees.
[22] Browne.
[23] A very curious instance is afforded by Bruce, who wrote an account
of Alexandria, and, literally, did not spend one entire day in the city.
He was at sea on the morning of the 20th of June, 1768, previously to
his landing in Alexandria, (see Bruce's Travels, v. i. p. 7,) and in the
afternoon he left that city for Rosetta.--CLARKE.
[24] Browne.
[25] After the English were in possession of Alexandria, a subscription
was opened by the military and naval officers for the purpose of
removing the prostrate obelisk to England. With the money so raised they
purchased one of the vessels, sunk by the French in the old port of
Alexandria: this was raised, and prepared for the reception of the
obelisk. The French had already cleared away the heaps of rubbish which
enveloped it, and the English turned it round, and found it in a fine
state of preservation. It was moved towards the vessel, when an order
arrived from the Admiralty, prohibiting the sailors from being employed
at this work. No further attempts have been made to remove this fine
monument to Europe.--ANON.
[26] Wilkinson.
[27] Sonnini.
[28] He gives a full description of them.--Part iv. p. 285, 4to.
[29] Sat. Mag.
[30] Diodorus Siculus; Quintilian; Ammianus Marcellinus; Abulfaragius;
Prideaux; Rollin; Shaw; Harris; Gibbon; Johnson; Drake; Savary; Sonnini;
Sandwich; Rees; Miot; Clarke; Wilkinson; Browne; Parker; Knight.
[31] Rollin; Sandwich.
[32] A.M. 3604, A.C. 300.
[33] Wheler; Pococke; Chandler; Rees; Sandwich; Porter; Kinneir;
Buckingham; Carne; Robinson; Walpole.
[34] Rollin.
[35] Rollin.
[36] Clarke.
[37] The devastations of time and war have effaced the old city. The
stranger in vain inquires for vestiges of its numerous edifices, the
theatre, the gymnasium, the temples, and the monuments it once boasted,
contending even with Athens in antiquity and in favours conferred by the
gods.--CHANDLER.
[38] See Tiryns.
[39] Lib. vii.
[40] The district of Argol is first received colonies, who introduced
civilisation into Greece. It has been reckoned the cradle of the Greeks,
the theatre of events, which distinguished their earliest annals, and
the country which produced their first heroes and artists. It was
accordingly in the temple of Juno at Argos where the Doric order first
rose to a marked eminence, and became the model for the magnificent
edifices afterwards erected in the other cities, states, and
islands.--CIVIL ARCHITECTURE.
[41] Rollin; Rees; Clarke; La Martine.
[42] Chardin; Cartwright; Ouseley.
[43] Every nation had a great zeal for their gods. "Among us," says
Cicero, "it is very common to see temples robbed, and statues carried
off; but it was never known, that any person in Egypt ever abused a
crocodile; for its inhabitants would have suffered the most extreme
torments, rather than be guilty of such sacrilege." It was death for any
person to kill one of these animals voluntarily.
[44] Herodotus; Rollin; Savary; Belzoni; Rees.
[45] Strabo; Rees; Porter
[46] For the loves of Chosroes and Shirene, see D'Herbelot, and the
Oriental collections.
[47] Rees; Sir Robert Ker Porter.
[48] Brewster.
[49] The Attic stater was a gold coin weighing two drachms.
[50] Brewster.
[51] Dodwell.
[52] Diogenes, and Hermias; Eulalicus, and Priscian; Damaschius;
Isidore, and Simplicius.
[53] Anon.
[54] Hence Shakspeare, confounding dates, talks of Theseus, "Duke of
Athens."
[55] Quin's Voyage down the Danube.
[56] Dodwell.
[57] Hobhouse.
[58] Dodwell.
[59] Clarke.
[60] Dodwell.
[61] Clarke.
[62] Hobhouse, p. 343.
[63] Clarke.
[64] Clarke.
[65] The theatre of the ancients was divided into three principal parts;
each of which had its peculiar appellation. The division for the actors
was called in general the _scene_, or _stage_; that for the spectators
was particularly termed the _theatre_, which must have been of vast
extent, as at Athens it was capable of containing above thirty thousand
persons; and the _orchestra_, which, amongst the Greeks, was the place
assigned for the pantomimes and dancers, though at Rome it was
appropriated to the senators and vestal virgins.
The theatre was of a semicircular form on one side, and square on the
other. The space contained within the semicircle was allotted to the
spectators, and had seats placed one above another to the top of the
building. The square part, in the front of it, was the actors' division;
and in the interval, between both, was the orchestra.
The great theatres had three rows of porticoes, raised one upon another,
which formed the body of the edifice, and at the same time three
different stories for the seats. From the highest of those porticoes the
women saw the representation, covered from the weather. The rest of the
theatre was uncovered, and all the business of the stage was performed
in the open air.
[66] Boindin; Rollin.
[67] Plutarch, in his inquiry whether the Athenians were more eminent in
the arts of war or in the arts of peace, severely censures their
insatiable fondness for diversions. He asserts, that the money, idly
thrown away upon the representation of the tragedies of Sophocles and
Euripides alone, amounted to a much greater sum than had been expended
in all their wars against the Persians, in defence of their liberty and
common safety. That judicious philosopher and historian, to the eternal
infamy of the Athenians, records a severe but sensible reflection of a
Lacedæmonian, who happened to be present at these diversions. The
generous Spartan, trained up in a state where public virtue still
continued to be the object of public applause, could not behold the
ridiculous assiduity of the Choragi, or magistrates who presided at the
public shows, and the immense sums which they lavished in the
decorations of a new tragedy, without indignation. He therefore frankly
told the Athenians, that they were highly criminal in wasting so much
time, and giving that serious attention to trifles, which ought to be
dedicated to the affairs of the public. That it was still more criminal
to throw away upon such baubles as the decorations of a theatre, that
money which ought to be applied to the equipment of their fleet, or the
support of their army. That diversions ought to be treated merely as
diversions, and might serve to relax the mind at our idle hours, or when
over a bottle; if any kind of utility could arise from such trifling
pleasures. But to see the Athenians make the duty, they owed to their
country, give way to their passion for the entertainments of the
theatre, and to waste unprofitably that Footnote: time and money upon
such frivolous diversions, which ought to be appropriated to the affairs
and the necessities of the state, appeared to him to be the height of
infatuation."--MONTAGUE.
[68] He bequeathed to every Athenian a sum nearly equivalent to 3_l._ of
our money.
[69] The funeral of Herodes Atticus must have afforded one of the most
affecting solemnities of which history makes mention. He was seventy-six
years old when he died; and in the instructions which he left for his
interment, he desired to be buried at Marathon, where he was born; but
the Athenians insisted upon possessing his remains; and they caused the
youth of their city to bear him to the Stadium Panathenaicum, which he
had built; all the people accompanying, and pouring forth lamentations
as for a deceased parent.--CLARKE.
[70] Clarke.
[71] Dodwell.
[72] Sandwich.
[73] Clarke.
[74] Lord Sandwich.
[75] Sandwich.
[76] Hobhouse.
[77] Wheler.
[78] Dodwell.
[79] Clarke.
[80] Clarke.
[81] Dodwell.
[82] Dodwell.
[83] Idem.
[84] Rollin.
[85] "It is generally supposed," continues Mr. Williams, "the marble
temples are white; but, with the exception of the temple of Minerva at
Cape Colonna, (which is built of Parian marble,) this is not the case.
The marble of Pentelicus, with which all the temples at Athens were
built, throws out an oxide of iron of the richest yellow, and this
certainly makes them infinitely more picturesque than if they were
purely white."
[86] "The two principal statues among the Elgin marbles are those of
Theseus, the Athenian hero, and a recumbent figure, supposed to be the
river-god Ilissus (numbered in the Synopsis 93 and 99). They are
executed in a style of extraordinary breadth and grandeur. Theseus is
represented half reclined on a rock, covered with the skin of a lion,
and appears to be resting after some mighty labour. The figure of the
Ilissus is less robust: all his contours flow in lines of undulating
elegance. But in both these statues, that which chiefly strikes us, in
spite of the dilapidations which they have suffered, is the vitality
which seems to pervade them. In these, not only the office and
appearance of the muscles, whether in action or at rest, but the
bearings of the skeleton, are expressed with an accuracy which could
only have resulted from the most profound science, added to an acute and
perpetual observation of nature. The statue of the Ilissus is especially
remarkable for its graceful flexibility; and we would observe, without
going too technically into the subject, how different is the
indentation, formed by the lower line of the ribs in this figure, so
admirably expressing its position, from that geometrical arch by which
this part of the body is designated in the ordinary antique statues, and
which is so rarely accommodated to the action represented. The
principle, pointed out in this instance, may be traced throughout the
Elgin marbles, in which true art is never superseded by conventional
style. We believe that in the opinion of the majority of connoisseurs,
the statue of Theseus is considered superior to that of the Ilissus.
Canova, however, preferred the latter; and Raffaelle, who imported
designs from Greece, has adapted this figure to that of the fallen
Commander, in his picture of Heliodorus. It is well known that the
Ilissus was a small stream which ran along the south side of the plain
of Athens. The statue in which it is here personified occupied the left
angle of the west pediment of the Parthenon, and that of Theseus was
placed opposite to it on the east pediment next to the horses of
Hyperion."
[87] Herodotus; Thucydides; Pliny, the younger; Plutarch; Pausanias;
Wheler; Rollin; Chandler; Stuart; Barthelemy; Sandwich; Montague;
Brewster; Rees; Byron; Dodwell; Clarke; Hobhouse; Eustace; Quin;
Williams; De la Martine.
[88] Gen. c. x. v. 10.
[89] Gen. xi. v. 4.--"The schemes that men of coarse imaginations have
raised from a single expression in the Bible, and sometimes from a
supposition of a fact no where to be found, are astonishing. If you
believe the Hebrew doctors, the language of men, which, till the
building of Babel, had been one, was divided into seventy languages. But
of the miraculous division of the languages there is not one word in the
Bible."--"Dissertation on the Origin of languages," by DR. GREGORY
SHARPE, 2nd Ed. p. 24.
[90] The greatest cities of Europe give but a faint idea of the grandeur
which all historians unanimously ascribe to the famous city of
Babylon.--DUTENS.
[91] "It is conceivable," says an elegant writer on civil architecture,
"that walls of the height of the London monument might have, during the
long existence of a great empire, been raised to protect so great a city
as Nineveh; but it requires a much greater stretch of thought to
conceive them, as in the case of Babylon, to be raised to a height equal
to that of the cross which terminates the dome or cupola of St. Paul's
cathedral in London. Yet, when we recollect that Nebuchadnezzar was
intoxicated with conquest, in possession of unbounded power and riches,
and ambitious of erecting a metropolis for all Asia, upon a scale which
should surpass every city the world had seen, we shall hesitate in
condemning as improbable even the descriptions of Herodotus."
[92] It must be confessed, indeed, that in the comparison of ancient and
modern measures, nothing certain has been concluded. According to vulgar
computation, a cubit is a foot and a half; and thus the ancients also
reckoned it; but then we are not certainly agreed about the length of
their foot.--MONTFAUCON.
The doubt expressed by Montfaucon appears unnecessary; these measures
being taken from the proportions of the human body, are more permanent
than any other. The foot of a moderately-sized man, and the cubit--(that
is, the space from the end of the fingers to the elbow), have always
been twelve and eighteen inches respectively.--BELOE.
[93] Thus, saith the Lord, to his anointed, to Cyrus, I will go before
thee; I will break in pieces the gates of brass.--ISAIAH.
[94] The original Erythræan, or Red Sea, was that part of the Indian
ocean, which forms the peninsula of Arabia; the Persian and Arabian
gulfs being branches of it.--BELOE.
[95] It is necessary to bear in mind, that the temples of the ancients
were altogether different from our churches. A large space was inclosed
by walls, in which were courts, a grove, pieces of water, apartments
sometimes for the priests; and, lastly, the temple, properly so called,
and where, most frequently, it was permitted the priests alone to enter.
The whole inclosure was named [Greek: to hieron]: the temple, properly
so called, or the residence of the deity, was called [Greek: naos]
(_naos_) or the cell.--HARVEY.
[96] The streets crossed each other, and the city was cut into six
hundred and seventy-six squares, each of which was four furlongs and a
half on every side; viz., two miles and a quarter in circumference.
[97] Porter.
[98] Anon.
[99] This is said to have been done at the building of old London
Bridge.
[100] These canals having been suffered to decay, the water of the river
is much greater now than formerly.
[101] Herodotus. Megathenes says seventy-five feet. "We relate the
wonders of Babylon," says Rollin, "as they are delivered down to us by
the ancients; but there are some of them which are scarce to be
comprehended or believed; of which number is the lake. I mean in respect
to its vast extent."
[102] Vol. xlviii. 199.
[103] The reviewer then goes on to say:--"By way of comparing this with
a work of modern times, we may notice, that the Bristol ship canal, one
of the late projects, was intended to have been eighty miles long, one
hundred feet wide, and thirty feet deep; and the estimated cost was four
millions sterling. To be sure, labour was cheaper at Babylon than in
London, and well it might be; for if the Babylonian lake were to be made
now in England, it would cost the trifling sum of four thousand two
hundred and twenty-one millions sterling!"
[104] The reader will naturally be reminded of the tunnel now
constructing under the Thames; a much more difficult and extensive
undertaking.
[105] Going in and out, we should suppose, with every angle. Should any
one do this with a rule at St. Paul's Cathedral, it is probable he might
compass a mile.
[106] The largest pyramid is 110 feet higher than St. Paul's, with a
base occupying about the same area as Lincoln's Inn Fields.
[107] The advantageous situation of Babylon, which was built upon a
wide, extended, flat country, where no mountains bounded the prospect;
the constant clearness and serenity of the air in that country, so
favourable to the free contemplation of the heavens; perhaps, also, the
extraordinary height of the tower of Babel, which seems to have been
intended for an observatory; all these circumstances were strong motives
to engage this people to a more nice observation of the various motions
of the heavenly bodies, and the regular course of the stars.--ROLLIN.
[108] Diodorus states, that in his time many monuments still remained
with inscriptions upon them.
[109] Val. Max. ix. c. 3.
[110] A statue was erected in memory of this action, representing her in
that very attitude, and the undress, which had not prevented her from
flying to her duty.
[111] Daniel, c. iv.
[112] Diodorus; Prideaux.
[113] "The hanging gardens," says Major Rennell, "as they are called,
had an area of about three acres and a half, and in them were grown
trees of considerable size; and it is not improbable, that they were of
a species different from those of the natural growth of the alluvial
soil of Babylonia. These trees may have been perpetuated in the same
spot where they grew (or seeds from them), notwithstanding that the
terraces may have subsided, by the crumbling of the piers and walls that
supported them; the ruins of which may form the very eminences, spoken
of by M. Niebuhr, and which are covered with a particular kind of
trees." That is, with trees different from any that grow between the
ruins and the Persian gulf, in which space no other trees are to be
found but date and other fruit trees.
[114] Daniel, ch. v., ver. 25.
[115] Isaiah xiii. 19, 22; xiv. 23, 24.--It has been well observed by
Bishop Newton, that it must afford all readers of an exalted taste and
generous sentiments, a very sensible pleasure to hear the prophets
exulting over such tyrants and oppressors as the kings of Assyria. "In
the fourteenth chapter of Isaiah," continues he, "there is an Epinikion,
or a triumphant ode upon the fall of Babylon. It represents the infernal
mansions as moved, and the ghosts of deceased tyrants as rising to meet
the king of Babylon, and congratulate his coming among them."--"It is
really admirable for the severest strokes of irony as well as for the
sublimest strains of poetry. The Greek poet Alcæus, who is celebrated
for his hatred to tyrants, and whose odes were animated with the spirit
of liberty no less than with the spirit of poetry, we may presume to
say, never wrote any thing comparable to it."
[116] Partly, not entirely. "Herodotus states that Darius Hystaspes, on
the taking of Babylon by the stratagem of Zopyrus, 'levelled the walls
and took away the gates, neither of which Cyrus had done.' But let it be
remarked that Darius lived a century and a half before Alexander, in
whose time the walls appear to have been in the original state; or, at
least, nothing is said that implies the contrary; and it cannot be
believed, if Darius had taken the trouble to level thirty-four miles of
so prodigious a rampart as that of Babylon, that ever it would have been
rebuilt in the manner described by Ctesias, Clitarchus, and others, who
describe it at a much later period. Besides, it would have been quite
unnecessary to level more than a _part_ of the wall; and in this way,
probably, the historian ought to be understood."--RENNELL.
[117] Herod. Thalia. c. v. ch. ix.
[118] Cyrus; Cambyses; Smerdis Magus; Darius the son of Hystaspes;
Xerxes I.; Artaxerxes Longimanus; Xerxes II.; Sogdianus; Darius Nothus;
Artaxerxes Mnemon; Artaxerxes Ochus; Arses; and Darius Codomanus.
[119] "Babylon was designed by Alexander to be not only the capital of
his empire, but also a great port and naval arsenal. To contain his
fleet, he ordered a basin to be excavated, capable of admitting a
thousand sail, to which were to be added docks and magazines for stores.
The ships of Nearchus, as well as others from Phoenicia, were already
arrived. They had been taken to pieces on the Mediterranean coast, and
conveyed overland to Thapsacus, where they had been put together, and
then navigated down the Euphrates." The object of all this was to enable
him to invade Arabia.
[120] Sir John Malcolm says, that many traditions still exist in Persia,
in regard to this wonderful person. Amongst others, this:--"The
astrologers had foretold, that when Alexander's death was near, he would
place his throne where the earth was of iron and the sky of gold. When
the hero, fatigued with conquest, directed his march towards Greece, he
was one day seized with a bleeding at the nose. A general who was near,
unlacing his coat of mail, spread it for his prince to sit on; and, to
defend him from the sun, held a golden shield over his head. When
Alexander saw himself in this situation, he exclaimed, 'The prediction
of the astrologers is accomplished, I no longer belong to the living!
Alas! that the work of my youth should be finished! Alas! that the plant
of the spring should be cut down like the ripened tree of autumn!' He
wrote to his mother, saying, he should shortly quit the earth and pass
to the regions of the dead. He requested that the alms given at his
death should be bestowed on such as had never seen the miseries of the
world, and who had never lost those who were dear to them. In conformity
to his will, his mother sought, but in vain, for such persons. All had
tasted the woes and griefs of life; all had lost those whom they loved.
She found in this a consolation which her son had intended, for her
great loss. She saw that her own was the common lot of humanity."
[121] In describing the overthrow, the prophet is admirable; rising by a
judicious gradation into all the pomp of horror. _q. d._ "Now, indeed,
it is thronged with citizens; but the hour is coming, when it shall be
entirely depopulated, and not so much as a single inhabitant left.--Lest
you should think, that in process of time it may be re-edified, and
again abound with joyful multitudes, it shall never be inhabited more;
no, never to be dwelt in any more, from generation to generation; but
shall continue a dismal waste, through all succeeding ages.--A waste so
dismal, that none of the neighbouring shepherds shall make their fold,
or find so much as an occasional shelter for their flocks; where kings,
grandees, and crowds of affluent citizens were wont to repose themselves
in profound tranquillity. Even the rude and roving Arabian shall not
venture to pitch his tent, nor be able to procure for himself the poor
accommodation of a night's lodging; where millions of polite people
basked in the sunshine of profuse prosperity.--In short; it shall
neither be habitable, nor accessible! but a dwelling place for dragons,
and a court for owls; an astonishment, and a hissing. What was once the
golden city, and the metropolis of the world, shall be an everlasting
scene of desolation, a fearful monument of divine vengeance, and an
awful admonition to human pride."
[122] About the middle of the second century, when Strabo was there, the
walls were reduced to fifty cubits in height, and twenty-one in breadth.
[123] About the year 1169.
[124] The soil of Babylonia, in the time of Herodotus, may be in no
small degree judged of by what that historian states:--"Of all
countries, which have come under my observation, this is far the most
fruitful in corn. Fruit-trees, such as the vine, the olive, and the fig,
they do not even attempt to cultivate; but the soil is so particularly
well adapted for corn, that it never produces less than two-hundredfold;
in seasons which are remarkably favourable it will sometimes produce
three hundred; the ear of their wheat as well as barley is four digits
in size. The immense height to which millet will grow, although I have
witnessed it myself, I know not how to mention. I am well aware that
they who have not witnessed the country will deem whatever I may say
upon the subject, a violation of probability."--CLIO, CXCIII.
[125] There is a copy of Rauwolf's work in the British Museum, enriched
by a multitude of MS. notes by Gronovius, to whom it would seem the copy
once belonged.
[126] By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down; yea, we wept, when we
remembered Zion.