CHAPTER II.

Phocæa—Smyrna—Clazomenæ—Erythræ—Teos—Colophon—Ephesus—Mr. Wood—Miletus—

Branchidæ or Didyma—Sacred Way—Mr. Newton—Thyateira—Magnesia ad

Sipylum—Philadelphia—Tralles—Sardes—Halicarnassus—Mausoleum—Cnidus—

Demeter—Lion-Tomb—Mr. Pullan—Physcus—Caunus—Stratonicea—Aphrodisias—

Mylasa and Labranda.

PHOCÆA—the most northern of the Ionian cities—founded by emigrants from

_Phocis_, under two Athenian chiefs, soon, from the excellence of its

harbour, secured a prominent place among the early maritime states of

the world, and was the first to establish colonies on the Adriatic, the

coasts of Etruria, Gaul, and Spain. It is reported that Arganthonius,

then king of Tartessus (probably Tarshish), did all he could to persuade

these enterprising strangers to stay in his land; and that, failing

this, he gave them large sums of money to build (or rebuild) the walls

of their native town. Phocæa is often mentioned subsequently, though it

does not appear to have performed any very memorable actions. It may be

traced by its coins, and by the annalists and ecclesiastical writers to

the latest period of the Byzantine empire. Indeed, so late as A.D. 1421,

the Genoese built a new town near its ancient site, which still retains

the name of _Palaio-Phoggia_.

A little further to the S. we come to SMYRNA, one of the most celebrated

cities of Asia Minor, though it was comparatively late in attaining this

eminence. It was situated on a bay of unrivalled beauty and commercial

excellence; and, almost alone of the great cities or ports of Western

Asia has preserved its eminence to the present day, being now, as it has

long been, the chief emporium of the Levant trade. In remote times,

Smyrna successfully resisted the attacks of Gyges, king of Lydia, and

was, in consequence, taken and destroyed by his successor, Alyattes. It

is said, that, after this blow, it was nearly deserted for 400 years,

but was, at length, rebuilt by Antigonus and Lysimachus, though not

exactly on the same site. With this rebuilding its great prosperity

commenced. Nor were the claims to distinction advanced by itself

inferior to its real greatness. Inscriptions abound (some of the best,

indeed, among the marbles at Oxford), where, as on its coins, it calls

itself ΠΡΩΤΗ ΑCΙΑC, the “first city of Asia”; and so, indeed, it long

continued, though at times suffering severely from civil wars and

earthquakes, and most of all from the merciless treatment of Tímúr.

Smyrna claimed, especially, to be the birthplace of Homer, and dedicated

a temple to him. A cave was also shown there, in which the poet was said

to have composed his verses (Pausan. Ach. 5). Smyrna is not, however,

mentioned by Homer. In the reign of Tiberius, Smyrna contended with ten

other cities for the honour (?) of erecting a temple to that worthless

ruler, and won the prize; and here, not many years later, the Christian

Church flourished under Polycarp, its first bishop, who is believed to

have suffered martyrdom in its stadium about A.D. 166.

Next to Smyrna we may take CLAZOMENÆ, a town whose date is probably not

earlier than the Ionic migration. It was famous as the birthplace of

Anaxagoras, the philosopher, whose disciple Archelaus taught Socrates

and Euripides; and, also, as one of the states which joined with the

Phocæans in founding the naval colony of Naucratis in Egypt (Herod. ii.

178). It retained its name and existence till late in the Byzantine

period (Plin. v. 31; Ptol.; Hierocl. Synecd.), but, towards the middle

of the eleventh century, was finally destroyed by the Turks.

ERYTHRÆ, celebrated as the home of one if not of two Sibyls—and a town

whose life is traceable by coins and inscriptions to a late period of

the Roman empire, and, from the acts of Councils and other

ecclesiastical documents, was manifestly for some time an episcopal see.

Its land produced good wine [being called in a distich preserved by

Athenæus φερεστάφυλος Ἐρύθρα (Erythra yielding bunches of grapes)],[18]

and fine wheaten flour:—TEOS (now Sighajik), the birthplace of Anacreon

and of Hecatæus the historian; famous, too, for its temple, dedicated to

Bacchus, some remains of which have been published by the Society of

Dilettanti, and, recently, more fully examined by Mr. Pullan:—COLOPHON,

an early Ionian settlement, once the possessor of a flourishing navy,

and of cavalry reputed victorious wherever employed;[19] and illustrious

for its poets, Mimnermus, Phœnix, and Hermesianax, and, possibly even

Homer; till at length it was destroyed by Lysimachus:—PRIENE, the

birthplace of the philosopher and statesman Bias, and still identifiable

by considerable ruins near the Turkish village of Samsoun, to the S. of

Mycale, with a famous Temple of Minerva Polias, the ruins of which have

been engraved in the “Ionian Antiquities.” In Chandler’s time, about 100

years ago, the whole circuit of the city walls was still standing.

Footnote 18:

The lines are—

ἐν δἐ φερεσταφύλοις Ἐρυθραῖς ἐκ κλιβάνου ἐλθὼν

λευκòς ἁβραῖς θάλλων ὥραις τἐρψει παρά δεῖπνον.

Archestr. ap. Athen. iii. 112, B.

Footnote 19:

From this continued success arose the proverb, τὸν Κολοφῶνα ἐπέθηκεν

“he has brought the work to a completion.” And, hence, the final

letters or signature at the end of a book have been termed the

_colophon_.

But of the cities of W. Asia, no one took a higher place than EPHESUS;

though not one of the most ancient, or noticed by Homer. Pliny ascribes

its origin to the Amazons; and Strabo gives an excellent account of its

site, the chief feature of which was a celebrated port called Panormus,

with the temple of Diana, one of the Seven Wonders of the world, at a

little distance without the city walls. The worship of this Diana (of

Asiatic origin, and symbolized by her peculiar statue) was earlier than

the planting of the Ionian colony by Androcles, as has been reasonably

suspected, on a hill called Coressus, the lower ground (ultimately the

chief part of the city) having been only gradually built over. After its

first colonization we hear nothing of Ephesus till the time of Crœsus,

who is said to have failed to take the town, owing to a device of a

certain Pindarus, who attached the city to the temple by a rope, thus

making the intervening space sacred, or an asylum. On this the story

goes, that Crœsus, of all princes then ruling, a lover of the gods,

spared, indeed, the city, but showed his common sense by changing its

constitution and banishing Pindarus. It further appears that Crœsus

dedicated golden bulls at Ephesus, and helped largely in the

construction of the first temple dedicated there. The temple we now know

was about 1,400 yards from the city, a fact, apparently, not anticipated

by the first modern investigators of its site.

The inhabitants of Ephesus, as a rule, were time-servers, and ready to

court the support of whosoever for the time being were their most

powerful neighbours. Thus, at first, they joined the Ionian revolt;

then, on the overthrow of Xerxes, were for a while tributary to Athens;

and then, again, after the victories of Lysander, permitted their city

to be the head-quarters of the Spartan operations against Asia Minor;

though he could not, however, persuade the people to change the name of

their city to that of his wife Arsinoe. After the overthrow of

Antiochus, Ephesus was added by the Romans to the kingdom of Pergamus.

Again, when Mithradates was all-powerful, we find the people of Ephesus,

to please him, joining in a general massacre of the Romans in their

town; indeed, going to such lengths as not to respect the asylum of

their own temple; the natural result being a severe punishment of this

fickle population on the ultimate success of the Romans. On an

inscription, however, recently discovered, we believe, by Mr. Wood, but

now at Oxford, the people assert that they had been compelled to act

against their will, and that they were none the less, at heart, the

devoted friends of the Romans. As a place of commercial importance,

Ephesus did not survive the first three centuries of the Roman empire,

as the city was sacked by the Goths in A.D. 262, and its famous temple

burnt, an event of which some traces have been detected during the

recent excavations on its site. In later days it passed into the hands

of the Seljuks and Turks, and a great mosque was built there by Selim I.

on the rising ground overlooking the port. The long occupation of the

site of Ephesus by a mixed population is attested by the discovery there

by Mr. Wood of a hoard of coins, belonging chiefly to the Western States

of Europe, and struck during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

Among these are some of the Christian subjects of Saro-khan, an emir of

Magnesia in the fourteenth century.[20] It is believed that the present

name of its site, Aiosoluk, is a corruption of Hagios Theologos (St.

John), the name borne by Ephesus during the Middle Ages.

Footnote 20:

An interesting account of these coins (2,231 in number) has been given

in the Numism. Chron., vol. xii. New Ser., 1872, by Mr. H. A. Grueber,

of the British Museum. The whole “find,” with some lumps of metal,

weighed more than seventeen pounds of silver. Among these were coins

of Naples, of Rhodes, of the Seljuk Amírs, of Venice, Genoa, and of

the Papal States, their dates embracing a period of about eighty

years, from A.D. 1285.

The chief glory of Ephesus was its temple. According to the most ancient

reports, there had been in remote times one, at least, of the grandest

proportions which Herodotus claims, with that of Juno at Samos, as among

the greatest works of the Greeks. Its architect is said to have been

contemporary with Theodorus and Rhœcus, the builders of the Samian

Heræum, early in the sixth century B.C.; and Xenophon, especially,

notices it, as he deposited there the share entrusted to him of the

tenth, arising from sale of the slaves of the Ten Thousand at Cerasus,

which was appropriated to Apollo and Artemis.[21] We have here an

instance of a custom noticed elsewhere,—viz., that the great temples of

the Hellenic world were often used as banks of deposit, where treasure

was collected, not merely in the form of _anathemata_ or dedicated

objects, but, also, in large quantities of bullion, &c., _in trust_.

Many inscriptions in Boeckh show clearly that the administrators of the

temples employed these treasures as loans. Artemis was, in fact, a

queen, whose dower was the wealth accumulated in her temple. As is well

known, the original (or the second temple of Artemis, for this point is

not clear) was burnt by Herostratus, in B.C. 356, traditionally, on the

same night on which Alexander the Great was born, but it was soon

rebuilt. It would take a whole book, says Pliny, to describe all its

details, and it is admitted to have been the largest temple of

antiquity.

Footnote 21:

In Pausanias, vii. 11, will be found a very full and interesting

account of the worship of the Ephesian Artemis, but it is too long to

quote here. Pindar says, the worship was instituted by the Amazons,

Crêsos or Korêsos, an autochthon, and Ephesus, the son of the river

god Cayster, being the first builders of the temple. For details of

the older temples, see Strab. xiv. 641; Xen. Anab. v. 3; Plin. xvi.

79; and Vitruv. x. 6.

Among other valuables, the temple contained the famous picture by

Apelles of Alexander, while the circuit round it was an asylum where

debtors and worse rogues could screen themselves from justice, an evil

which, as an inscription recently found there shows, Augustus found it

needful to restrain within reasonable limits. Ephesus, too, was the

usual port where the Roman proconsuls landed, on their way to their

several provinces. Thus, Cicero came to Ephesus when going to his

government in Cilicia. So, too, Metellus Scipio put in there before

Pharsalia, and M. Antonius after Philippi. There, too, also, was

collected the fleet of Antony and Cleopatra before the fatal day of

Actium.[22]

Footnote 22:

Le Quien’s “Oriens Christianus” gives a list of seventy Christian

bishops of Ephesus from Timothy to A.D. 1721. A good many of the later

ones could only have been bishops in name.

But the most interesting matter to us in connection with Ephesus have

been Mr. Wood’s excavations there, with his discovery not only of many

unexpected monuments of the ancient town, but of undoubted relics of the

famous temple itself. Mr. Wood, as the constructing engineer of the

Smyrna and Aidin Railway, had naturally become well acquainted with the

neighbourhood of Ephesus, and, hence, so early as 1863, had made, at his

own expense, some excavations, clearing out thereby the Odeum, and

ascertaining the true position of the Magnesian and Coressian gates. In

these researches, he met with several valuable inscriptions, one of them

referring to a certain Roman, Publius Vedius Antoninus, who was at the

time the γραμματεὺς—the Scribe or Town-clerk—of the city.[23] By degrees

the position of the Theatre, the scene of the tumult at the time of St.

Paul’s visit, was clearly made out; but where was the Temple? In the

prosecution of his excavations Mr. Wood had, however, met with many

decrees of the people of Ephesus relating to the Temple,—one of them

containing much curious information about the ritual used in the Temple-

worship, with lists of the votive offerings, to be carried on certain

days in procession “through the Magnesian Gate to the Great Theatre, and

thence back again through the Coressian Gate to the Temple.” Among the

list of statues are several of Diana, probably, such as those which

“Demetrius and his craftsmen” manufactured in the days of St. Paul.

Footnote 23:

Colonel Leake, in 1824, seems to have given the first sensible

suggestion as to where the temple ought to be sought for. The

Admiralty chart of 1836 (the foundation of the maps of Kiepert 1841-

1846) and of Guhl (1843), afforded also the first accurate survey of

the Gulf of Scala Nova. In 1862, Mr. Falkener suggested the head of

the harbour to the west of the city as the most likely site.

[Illustration:

DRUM OF PILLAR.

]

At length, in April, 1869, Mr. Wood came upon some massive walls, which

were proved to have been those of the courtyard in which the Temple had

once stood, by an inscription in Greek and Latin, stating that Augustus

had rebuilt them; and, finally, in 1870, a marble pavement was lighted

on, at the depth of nineteen feet below the alluvial soil of the present

plain, together with drums of columns, quite six feet high, one base

being still attached to its plinth. The site of the Temple of Diana had

been reached, and its style was, at once, seen to have been similar to

that of the Temple of Athene Polias at Priene, and of Apollo at

Branchidæ. It is scarcely possible to speak too highly of Mr. Wood’s

tact and sagacity. Thus, considering the accounts of ancient authors too

vague as guides for excavation, his first diggings were essentially

tentative, and with the view of meeting with some illustrative

inscriptions. In the Great Theatre he was more likely to find them than

anywhere else, and here, indeed, he discovered six large stones,

originally from the cella of the Temple, and each bearing various

decrees. Indeed, by the most important of these, to which we have

already alluded, the real clue was afforded as to its whereabouts. The

of finding this inscription confirmed Mr. Wood’s original idea of

feeling his way to the Temple from one of the city gates, the result

being the discovery of two roads,—one of them leading round the mountain

Prion or Pion, the other towards the town of Magnesia. He wisely

determined to trace the one which showed the greatest amount of wear or

use, assuming that if either of them led to the Temple it would be the

most used one. In the one round Mount Prion he found four distinct ruts,

deeply cut in its pavement of huge blocks of marble, while the other

road was worn scarcely at all. He then devoted all his energy, to use

his own words, “in exploring the road round Mount Pion,[24] which

eventually led to the Temple.”

Footnote 24:

The spelling of the name of this little eminence does not seem to be

quite certain. Pausanias and Pliny call it Pion; Strabo, on the other

hand, Prion. There was a mountain so named in the island of Cos. Comp.

_Priene_.

In this way, the peribolus, or courtyard wall of the Temple, was soon

reached, and, not long after, as before stated, the drums of several of

the columns were exhumed, lying in a confused mass as they had fallen,

sixteen or seventeen centuries ago. The largest and best preserved of

these drums, of which a sketch is given as the frontispiece for this

volume, was found on February 3rd, 1871; it is somewhat more than 6 feet

high and 18½ feet in circumference, and weighs 11¼ tons. From the

figures carved on it, one of which represents Mercury, it may be fairly

presumed that it was one of the thirty-six “columnæ cælatæ” recorded by

Pliny. Mr. Wood states that though this splendid building was not only

destroyed by earthquakes and the malice of man, all the stones,

moreover, having been carried away that could be used for building

purposes, enough still remained to enable him to draw out on paper an

accurate plan of its original shape and _contour_. He adds that, in the

course of his excavations, he “discovered the remains of three distinct

temples, the last but two, the last but one, and the last. The former

must have been that built 500 B.C., for which the solid foundations

described by Pliny and Vitruvius were laid.... Between 5 and 6 feet

below the pavement and under the foundations of the walls of the cella,

I found the layer of charcoal, 4 inches thick, described by Pliny. This

was laid between two layers of a composition about 3 inches thick,

similar to, and of the consistency of, glazier’s putty.”

In conclusion, we may add that Mr. Wood found abundant instances of the

use of colour, chiefly vermilion and blue, and one specimen of gold

inserted, as a fillet; together with several pieces of friezes much

shattered, but, evidently, of the same size and artistic character as

the reliefs on the drum. The reliefs themselves do not exhibit any great

artistic merit, though they fairly represent the characteristic style of

the Macedonian period: their general effect must, however, have been

very rich and gorgeous, and quite in character with what we know of rich

and luxurious Ephesus. We have not, at present, any evidence that the

columns, as well as the drums, were covered with sculpture. Mr. Wood, we

believe, thinks they were, but a medallion in the Bibliothèque at Paris,

which gives the front of the Temple, rather suggests the contrary.

Passing on from Ephesus we come to the scarcely less celebrated city of

MILETUS, the parent, according to Pliny, of more than 80 colonies.[25]

Situated at the mouth and, on the left bank, of the Mæander, Miletus

more strictly belongs to Caria; but it was, also, one of the most

conspicuous members of the Ionian confederacy. It is believed that it

was originally founded by a colony from Crete, under the leadership of

Sarpedon, the brother of Minos; an idea, in some degree, confirmed by a

notice in Homer (Il. ii. 867). Herodotus (ix. 97) only mentions

Sarpedon’s establishing himself in Lycia. The advantageous position of

the town, with a harbour capable of holding a large fleet, naturally

gave it, from the earliest times, the lead in maritime affairs. Its most

important colonies were Abydus, Lampsacus, and Parium on the Hellespont;

Proconnesus and Cyzicus on the Propontis; Sinope and Amisus on the

Euxine; with several more on the coast of Thrace and Tauris, and on the

Borysthenes. The period, however, of Miletus’s chief power was comprised

between its Ionian colonization and its conquest by the Persians in 494

B.C. After that period, it did not maintain the same lead among the

seaports of the Asiatic Greeks; indeed, during the time of its greatest

fame, peace was practically unknown among its people, who were

constantly distracted by factions aristocratic or democratic.

Footnote 25:

Rambach—De Mileto ejusque coloniis (Hal. Sax. 1790)—has attempted, not

without success, to identify the larger number of them.

As was natural, the kings of Lydia made many attempts to possess

themselves of Miletus. In the reign of Alyattes, however, the Lydian and

Milesian quarrel was, for the time, made up, the Lydian king having been

supposed to have incurred the wrath of the gods, as his troops had burnt

a temple dedicated to Minerva at Assessos. Some of the rulers of the

town were men of historic note, especially Thrasybulus, the friend of

the Corinthian Periander. Somewhat later, the Milesians made a treaty

with Crœsus, and, what was of more importance to them, secured its

maintenance by Cyrus; hence, their town was spared much of the misery

inflicted on the other Ionian states in the first war with the Persians

(Herod. i. 141, 143). But if Miletus had been previously fortunate, this

good luck deserted her during the great Græco-Persian war; nor could she

indeed complain, as the chief promoter of this rebellion was her

“tyrannus” Histiæus. As will be remembered, it was mainly through

Histiæus and his kinsman Aristagoras, that Ionia revolted against the

Persians; and, further, that, to the instigations of the latter, was due

the needless burning of the great western capital of the Persians,

Sardes. An immediate attack on Miletus by the Persian satraps was the

natural reply to this treachery; and the city was eventually taken by

storm, with all the horrors consequent thereon.[26] It may be doubted,

whether after this fall, Miletus ever again recovered her former glory.

Footnote 26:

Herodotus, vi. 18-21, states that the Athenians were so much

distressed at the fall of Miletus, that they fined the poet Phrynichus

1,000 drachmæ for putting on the stage a drama entitled “The Capture

of Miletus.”

Subsequently, Miletus made many spasmodic efforts to regain her freedom,

but with little avail, though it still existed till the decline of the

Byzantine empire—its Church being under the direction of bishops who

ranked as Metropolitans of Caria (Hierocl.).[27] A pestilential swamp

now covers the birthplace of Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes.[28]

Footnote 27:

At Miletus, St. Luke tells us that St. Paul sent to his chief

disciples at Ephesus (distant about thirty miles) to come to see him.

This was their last opportunity, as he was then on his final journey

to Jerusalem (Acts xx. 17).

Footnote 28:

A proverb cited by Athenæus from Aristotle may refer to the condition

of the Milesians after the capture of their city by the Persians:—

Πάλαι ποτ’ ἦσαν ἄλκιμοι Μιλήσιοι.

In the neighbourhood of Miletus stood, at BRANCHIDÆ or Didyma, the

famous temple of Apollo Didymæus, the site, we feel pleased to say, of

one of Mr. Newton’s most valuable researches. It was known in Greek

history from the remotest times, as the site of a shrine and of an

oracle second only in sanctity and importance to that of Delphi; as the

spot where Pharaoh Necho dedicated the armour he had worn when he took

the city of Cadytis (Herod, ii. 159), and as a place which received from

Crœsus, before his war with Cyrus, golden offerings equal in weight to

those he gave to Delphi. It was plundered and burnt by Darius I., and, a

second time, by Xerxes, its sacred family of priests having been, on

this occasion, swept off to Sogdiana by the conqueror; but it revived

again, in renewed splendour, towards the close of the Peloponnesian war,

when rebuilt on a scale so vast that, according to Strabo, it could not

be roofed over: it was memorable, especially, too, for a succession of

oracles ascending to a period before the commencement of history, yet

not wholly extinct even so late as the days of Julian. It was reasonable

to expect that such a place would retain some relics of its past

greatness, and of its pre-eminence among the sacred shrines of

antiquity. Indeed, many travellers, before Mr. Newton, had spoken of the

ruins of the Temple and of the Sacred Way leading to it, and, from the

notices in Wheler (1685), Gell, Leake, the “Ionian Antiquities,” and

Hamilton, much valuable information may be gathered.

It was left to Mr. Newton to complete what had been indeed, hardly done

at all before, and to secure for England the most important sculptures

still _in situ_. The Temple of Apollo Didymæus[29] was originally

approached from the sea by a “SACRED WAY,” on each side of which had

once been a row of seated statues, sepulchral _sori_, tombs, &c. Along

this “Way” Mr. Newton discovered eight seated statues, generally about 4

feet 6 inches high, by 2 feet 9 inches broad and deep; the character of

their workmanship being, at the first glance, strikingly Egyptian, at

least in this respect, that their drapery, extending from the shoulders

to the feet, consists of one closely-fitting garment (_chitōn_), and of

a light shawl (_peplos_). One only of the figures retains its head, the

sculptured treatment of it being that usually recognized as the most

archaic Greek, in that the hair is arranged in long parallel tresses, as

in the earliest coins of Syracuse. With two exceptions, all these

statues belong to the same period of art. Mr. Newton says, it is evident

that no one of them occupied, when he discovered them, exactly its

original position, and that they must, at some time or other, have been

thrown down and partially removed—an opinion confirmed by a somewhat

later discovery of about eighty feet of the original paving of the

“SACRED WAY,” together with some bases, not improbably those on which

these statues had been originally placed. The “SACRED WAY” can still be

traced for about 580 yards.

Footnote 29:

Didyma was the ancient name of the site where the temple stood; hence

the building was sometimes called the “Didymæum.” Strabo speaks of it

as τοῦ ἐν Διδύμοις ναοῦ. On the pretence that the priests of Branchidæ

voluntarily returned with Xerxes to Persia, their descendants were

cruelly murdered by Alexander the Great (Strabo, xiv. 634, xi. 517;

Quint. Curt., vii. 5).

[Illustration:

INSCRIPTION OF CHARES.

]

In a wall extending along it are, here and there, masses of polygonal

masonry, with individual stones of immense size, the remains, probably,

of an original Hellenic wall. At a short distance from the last of the

seated statues, Mr. Newton met with two remarkable monuments—a colossal

lion and a female sphinx—both, unfortunately, much injured. The sphinx

was completely buried under the earth, and had nothing in its form to

recommend it, but the lion had, on its side, a very ancient inscription,

which the barbarous Greeks of the neighbourhood had done all they could

to obliterate. The important question is, to what period are these works

to be assigned? Now, of direct evidence we have none; for, though

history speaks of the two temples at this spot, we have no record of the

statues themselves; the probability being that they were damaged nearly

as much as at present before Herodotus visited the spot, and, probably,

by the Persians. Yet, in spite of the silence of history, we have some

indirect evidence from the monuments themselves; enough, at least, to

determine their age within tolerably accurate limits. In the first

place, we have the character of their art, which is, unquestionably,

very archaic; secondly, on three of the chairs are inscriptions in the

oldest Greek character; on the most important one written

_boustrophedon_ (_i.e._ backwards and forwards, as an ox ploughs);

thirdly, a long inscription on the recumbent lion, and another, quite as

old, on a detached block, the base, possibly, of a statue now lost. In

order that the nature of the characters used may be comprehended, we

annex a woodcut of the legend on one of the chairs of the seated

figures, the translation of which is, “I am Chares, son of Clesis, ruler

of Teichaoessa, a [dedicatory] monument of Apollo.”[30] On the block

found near the chair, the inscription states that “the sons of

Anaximander have [dedicated a statue?] of Andromachus,” and that

“Terpsicles made it”: while that, on the side of the lion,—the most

curious of them all,—declares that “the sons of Python, Archelaos,

Thales, Pasikles, Hegesander, and Lysias, have dedicated the offerings,

as a tenth, to Apollo.” Some years since, a still more perfect seated

figure was in existence, on the chair of which was an inscription copied

by Sir W. Gell and Mr. Cockerell, and published by Boeckh and Rose.[31]

Footnote 30:

This inscription was probably attached to a portrait statue.

Teichioessa, or Teichiousa, we know from Thucydides (viii. 26, 28),

was a strong place near Miletus. Athenæus (viii. 351) spells it

Teichiûs. Mr. Newton suggests that Chares was probably one of the

petty rulers on the western coast of Asia Minor in the sixth and fifth

centuries B.C., of whom Herodotus notices more than one. A _bon-mot_

of Stratonicus the musician is recorded by Athenæus: “As Teichioessa

was inhabited by a mixed population, he observed that most of the

tombs were those of foreigners, on which he said to his lad, ‘Let us

be off, since strangers seem to die here, but not one of the natives’”

(viii. p. 351). Teichoessa was also famous for the excellence of its

mullets (Ital. _triglia_),

... χειμῶνι δὲ τρίγλην

ἔσθι’ ἐνὶ ψαφαρῇ ληφθεῖσαν Τειχιοέσσῃ

Μιλήτου κώμῃ.—Archestr. ap. Athen. _l. c._

Footnote 31:

Colonel Leake (Journal of a Tour in Asia Minor, Lond., 1824, p. 239)

has given an account of this chair, and suggests that the arrangement

of these statues is similar to that of the avenues of the temples in

Egypt. In a note to p. 342 of Colonel Leake’s work, is a brief memoir

by the late C. J. Cockerell, in which he suggests that the temple at

Branchidæ was never completed, as the flutings of the columns are not

finished (see, also, pp. 347, 348). There is an engraving of this

chair in the “Ionian Antiquities.”

[Illustration:

CHAIR FROM BRANCHIDÆ.

]

We cannot discuss here the character of the inscriptions quoted above,

but all palæographers admit that the writing belongs to the earliest

Greek period, not improbably anterior to the year B.C. 520. It may be

still earlier, as, on the lion inscription, we find the name of

Hegesander and another name, which, though the first letter has met with

an injury, we agree with Mr. Newton in thinking, must be read as Thales,

while, on the detached block, we have that of Anaximander. Now it is

certainly remarkable that on two adjoining stones, found close to the

most sacred temple of the Milesians, the names of two of the most

celebrated philosophers of that town should occur. If, then, these be

really the names of those philosophers, they may be supposed to have

joined with other citizens of Miletus in dedicating the figure of the

lion, and of the object (whether statue or otherwise) once attached to

the second inscription; and, if so, the dates of these works would be

between B.C. 470 and B.C. 560. Anaximander was born about B.C. 610, and

Hegesander was probably the father of Hecatæus, who was himself born

about B.C. 520.

It is worthy of remark that, unlike so many other early Greek works,

these sculptures exhibit no trace of an Asiatic or Assyrian origin. The

only style they recall is that of Egypt, while the only Assyrian

monument they resemble is the semi-Egyptian seated figure brought by Mr.

Layard from Kalah Sherghat. Mr. Newton has justly pointed out that the

resemblance to Egyptian work “is seen not only in the great breadth of

the shoulders, but also in the modelling of the limbs, in which the

forms of the bones and muscles are indicated with far greater refinement

and judgment than at first sight seems to be the case ... the subdued

treatment of the anatomy contributes to the general breadth and repose

for which these figures are so remarkable, and suggests the idea that

they were executed by artists who had studied in Egypt.” We know that

the Greeks were intimately connected with Psammetichus I., Amasis, and

Neco; while the tombs at Cameirus, in Rhodes, have yielded works almost

certainly imitated from Egyptian prototypes by early Greek artists. We

have, too, the statement of Diodorus, that Theodorus of Samos and his

brother Telecles of Ephesus, the sons of Rhoecus, derived the canon of

their sculptures from Egypt. The general character, however, of the

ornamentation, the mæander-pattern, and the lotos and borders on the

garments of the seated figures, agreeing, as these do, with the same

patterns on early Greek vases, tend to show that their actual artists

were Greeks. Thus, too, the archaic statue of Athene in the Acropolis at

Athens is essentially Greek, and not Egyptian. Pliny has further noticed

that two Cretan sculptors, Dipænos and Scyllis, were the first artists

(about B.C. 580) of note, as workers in marble: it is, therefore, quite

conceivable that they may have been the actual artists of these

monuments.

We shall now say a few words of THYATEIRA, MAGNESIA AD SIPYLUM,

PHILADELPHIA, and TRALLES with some rather fuller remarks on the

celebrated city, SARDES, the capital of Lydia.

THYATEIRA was a place of considerable importance, and probably of early

origin, but of no great rank among the surrounding towns till the time

of the Macedonians; its best known name, according to Steph. Byzant.,

being due to Seleucus Nicator. To us, its chief interest is its

connection with early Christianity, as the home of “Lydia the seller of

purple” (Acts xvi. 14), and as one of the Seven Churches of the

Apocalypse. There are still, according to Sir Charles Fellows, remains

of a considerable city; and it is also, under the name of Ak-Hissar, a

flourishing commercial town. Close to the Lake Gygæa, not far from

Sardes, was the sepulchral mound of Alyattes, considered by Herodotus

one of the wonders of Lydia. This remarkable tumulus, which is about 280

yards in diameter, has been recently excavated by M. Spiegenthal, who

discovered in its centre a sepulchral chamber of highly polished marble

blocks, and of about the same size as that of the tomb of Cyrus. Such

tumuli are common in Asia Minor; indeed, round the same lake, are three

or four more, probably, as Strabo has suggested, the tombs of other

early Lydian kings. Sir Gardner Wilkinson has pointed out that their

structure—a stone basement with a mound of earth above—resembles the

constructed tombs of Etruria.

The _Lydian_ MAGNESIA—usually called “_Ad Sipylum_,” to distinguish it

from the Magnesia of Ionia—was the scene of the great victory gained by

the two Scipios in B.C. 190, over Antiochus the Great though aided by

the Gauls, which handed over Western Asia to the Romans. Hence, in the

Mithradatic war, the Magnesians stood firmly by Rome. A coin of this

place has on it the head of Cicero, and is interesting as the only

portrait (good or bad) we have of that great orator. In legendary

history, Mount Sipylus, which overhangs Magnesia on the S., was famous

as the residence of Tantalus and Niobe; and here, too, was a town of the

same name as the mountain, said to have been converted into a lake by

volcanic action[32] (Paus.). Homer alludes to the mountain in speaking

of Niobe’s transformation (Il. xxiv. 614), as do also Sophocles (Antig.

v. 822), and Ovid (Metam. vi. 310). The story of the weeping Niobe was

probably an optical illusion (Paus. Attic. c. 21), and, curiously, the

origin of it has been clearly shown by Chandler, who says, “The phantom

of Niobe may be defined as an effect of a certain portion of light and

shade on a part of Sipylus, perceivable at a particular point of view.

The traveller, who shall visit Magnesia after this information, is

requested to observe carefully a steep and remarkable cliff, about a

mile from the town; varying his distance, while the sun and shade, which

come gradually on, pass over it, I have reason to believe he will see

Niobe” (Travels, p. 331). The magnetic influence on the compass is

confirmed by Arundell, but the name “Magnet” has been derived from other

towns of the same name.

Footnote 32:

Hamilton (vol. i. p. 49) confirms the identity of Sipylus and its

neighbourhood with the legend of Tantalus, by the discovery of his

friend Mr. Strickland (it had been previously, however, noticed by

Chishull) of a remarkable statue sculptured on the rocky base of the

mountain. “This statue” Mr. Strickland states, “is rudely sculptured

out of the solid rock. It represents a sitting figure contained in a

niche, and its height from the base to the top of the head may be

about twenty feet.” “There can be little doubt that this is the

ancient statue of Cybele mentioned by Pausanias,” but it can scarcely

be, as some other travellers have supposed, Niobe.

PHILADELPHIA, named from Attalus Philadelphus, suffered more than any

other Lydian town from earthquakes, so that, after that in the reign of

Tiberius it was well-nigh deserted. It continued, however, to hold its

own for many years, and is memorable for the long and gallant resistance

it made to the Turks. It submitted, at length, in A.D. 1390, to Bayazíd,

and is still a place of some size under its new name of Allah-Shehr.

Philadelphia is noticed in the Revelations (iii. 7) as one of the Seven

Churches. A story long prevailed of a wall made of bones of the citizens

slain by Bayazíd; and Rycaut remarks, that “these bones are so entire

that I brought a piece thereof with me from thence.” Chandler, however,

found a simple solution for this wonder in a petrifying stream, like

that at Laodicea. “This,” says he, “encrusted some vegetable substances

which have perished, and left behind, as it were, their moulds.” Gibbon

particularly notices the gallantry of the Philadelphians:—“At a

distance,” says he, “from the sea, forgotten by the Emperor, encompassed

on all sides by the Turks, her valiant citizens defended their religion

and freedom above fourscore years, and, at length, capitulated with the

proudest of the Ottomans in 1390. Among the Greek colonies and Churches

of Asia, Philadelphia is still erect, a column in a scene of ruins.”

TRALLES, in the time of Strabo, was one of the most flourishing cities

of Asia Minor; indeed, situated as it was, on the high road from Ephesus

through Lydia and Phrygia, it could hardly have failed to be a place of

great traffic (Cic. Ep. ad Att. v. 14; Artemid. ap. Strab. xiv. p. 663).

Hence its citizens were generally selected to fill the expensive offices

of Asiarchs, or Presidents of the games celebrated in the province.

Though abundant ruins may be seen over the whole site of the ancient

city, they have been so shattered by earthquakes as to be now scarcely

recognizable.

We come now to SARDES, by far the most important city of Lydia. The date

of its foundation has not been recorded, but it must have early been a

place of note, as Herodotus states that it was plundered by the

Cimmerians, though they could not capture its citadel.[33] Its real

importance, however, evidently began when it became the capital of the

Lydian monarchs, men whose unusual wealth has been fully attested by

Herodotus, who had himself seen the gifts of Crœsus in the treasury at

Delphi. The story of the mode whereby the citadel of Sardes was taken by

Cyrus is most likely true; indeed is, in some degree, confirmed by a

later capture, under circumstances not unsimilar, by Lagoras, a general

of Antiochus the Great (Polyb. vii. 4-7).

Footnote 33:

Sardes, from Σάρδεις; but it is often written Sardis.

Under the reign of Crœsus, Sardes was unquestionably a great and

flourishing city, the resort of men of learning and ability, who were,

Herodotus tells us, attracted thither by the fame and hospitality of the

king (i. 29): on the success of Cyrus, it was simply transferred from

the native dynasty of rulers to the conquering Persians, becoming thus,

not only the capital of Persian Asia Minor, but the occasional residence

of the monarch himself. Thus Xerxes spent the winter there when

preparing his unwise invasion of Greece (Herod. vii. 32-37); and here,

too, Cyrus the Younger collected the army so easily crushed on the fatal

day of Cunaxa. Xenophon remarks that the beauty of its gardens excited

the admiration of even the Spartan Lysander, who was amused by the tale

that Cyrus himself had often played there the part of gardener (Œcon. p.

880; cf. Cic. de Senect. c. 17). The town itself seems to have consisted

chiefly of thatched houses, and so was easily burnt by the Ionians in

their revolt. The burning of Sardes was felt by the Persian monarch to

be a gross insult, the more so that his rule had been notoriously mild

and equitable. Sardes made no resistance to Alexander the Great; hence,

its people were permitted by that monarch to retain their ancient laws

and customs (Arrian, i. 17). During the wars of the Seleucidæ it was, at

different times, subject to the prevailing ruler of that house, and,

hence, passed over to the Romans after the defeat of Antiochus at

Magnesia.[34] Colonel Leake has given, in his Asia Minor, some

interesting notes by Mr. Cockerell on the antiquities of this town, with

a special account of the famous temple of Cybele, or the Earth, which

stood on the banks of the Pactolus, and of which three great columns

were then standing.[35] This temple was burnt by the Ionians in B.C.

503, and never completely reconstructed.[36] Most interesting to the

Christian are the remains of two churches, one supposed to be that of

the Church of the Panagia, and another, in front of it, said to be that

of St. John. The former is almost wholly constructed of magnificent

fragments of earlier edifices, and is, perhaps, as Colonel Leake

thought, “the only one of the Seven churches of which there are any

distinguishable remains.” Bearing in mind, too, St. Paul’s residence for

three years in the neighbouring town of Ephesus, we must suppose the

capital of Lydia was included in the declaration of St. Luke that “all

they which dwelt in Asia (_i.e._ Roman Proconsular Asia) heard the word

of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks” (Acts xix. 10; compare also 1

Cor. xvi. 19, and Rev. iii. 1-5). In later days, more than one Council

was held here. Indeed, this famous city may be traced through a long

period of Byzantine history (Eunap. p. 154; Hierocl. p. 669). The

emperor Julian made Chrysanthius, of Sardes, pontiff of Lydia; but his

attempt to restore the heathen worship was a failure. About A.D. 400 it

was plundered by the Goths under Tribigild and Cainas, officers in Roman

pay; in the eleventh century it was seized by the Turks, and, two

centuries later, nearly destroyed by Tímúr. A miserable village, called

Sart, now occupies its site; and so completely has it passed away, that

we might inquire with Horace, “Quid Crœsi regia Sardes?” if we may not

quite add the commencement of the following line, “Smyrna quid?” (Horat.

Epist. I. i. 2). No remains of its ancient grandeur now exist, and the

“princes” of Lydia, her wise men, her captains, and “her rulers and her

mighty men” have long been asleep in the innumerable tumuli spread over

all the level country around.

Footnote 34:

A part of the fortifications of Sardes bore the same name, Prion,

which we find at Ephesus (Polyb. vii. 4-7). Is the name in any way

connected with Priene? As a Greek word, πρίων means a saw; hence,

possibly, a serrated ridge of hills—the Spanish _sierra_.

Footnote 35:

There are only two now (Arundell).

Footnote 36:

Colonel Leake, in 1824, supposed the Temple of Ephesus was the largest

temple of antiquity. It is now known that it was really the sixth in

size—that of Agrigentum in Sicily being the largest.

We proceed now to notice some of the more important towns of CARIA, and

take first HALICARNASSUS (now Budrum) which had achieved the most

enduring fame, as the site of the Mausoleum or Tomb of Mausolus, once of

the Seven Wonders of the World. Originally, a colony from Trœzene, in

Argolis, Halicarnassus had early adopted Asiatic tastes and habits;

hence, firmly adhering to the Persians, its Queen Artemisia I., the

widow of Lygdamis, fought for Xerxes at Salamis. A remarkable vase in

Egyptian alabaster, with the name and titles of Xerxes on it in the

three forms of the cuneiform writing, discovered by Mr. Newton in the

Mausoleum, was, perhaps, the reward-gift of the Persian monarch for this

service. To her namesake, the second Artemisia, we owe the building of

the Mausoleum, 130 years subsequently.

With regard to the history of this remarkable monument, it is well known

that, on the death of Mausolus, B.C. 353, Artemisia, his widow and

sister, resolved to celebrate his memory by all the honours the art and

literature of the period could bestow, and to employ, for this purpose,

four of the most celebrated sculptors of antiquity,—Bryaxis, Timotheus,

Leochares or Scopas, and Praxiteles.[37] It is said that this queen’s

short reign, of two years only, did not enable her to witness the

completion of her grand design, but that these great sculptors finished

the work after her death for their own honour and the glory of art. Much

of what they accomplished was, certainly, extant till comparatively

modern times. Thus, the building is noticed, first by Strabo and Pliny,

then by Gregory of Nazianzus in the fourth, by Constantinus

Porphyrogenitus in the tenth, and by Eudocia in the eleventh centuries

respectively; all these accounts implying that it was still visible.

Again, Frontanus, the historian of the siege of Rhodes, states that a

German knight, Henry von Schlegelholt, constructed the citadel at Budrum

out of the Mausoleum. Yet, even then, it was only partially destroyed,

for when Cepio visited Budrum in 1472 he mentions seeing its remains

among the ruins of the ancient town. In the later repairs, however, of

the citadel, the masonry of the substructure of the Mausoleum must have

been wholly removed; the result being that visitors to Budrum, before

Mr. Newton commenced his excavations, could not determine its site.

Footnote 37:

Its architects were Satyrus and Phiteus, and the building itself a

parallelogram surrounded by thirty-six columns, supporting a pyramid

of twenty-four steps, which tapered to the top like a _meta_, or goal.

Its height was 140 feet. Martial describes it as “Aere vacuo pendentia

Mausolea.” Pausanias states that the Romans admired it so much that

they called all similar buildings “Mausolea”; while Eustathius, in the

twelfth century, observes of it, Θαῦμα καὶ ἦν καὶ ἔστι (“it was and is

a wonder”) clearly implying its existence, in some form or other, even

then. In M. Guichard’s “Funérailles de Romains,” &c., Lyons, 1581, the

sculptured reliefs and “certain white marble steps” (possibly those of

the pyramid) are noticed. This information, he says, he had from M.

Dalechamps—the editor of Pliny—and he, again, from M. de la Tourette,

who was present, in 1522, when its last stones were finally removed to

build the castle.

About the middle of the last century, the Greek sculptures built into

the walls of the fortress were published in Dalton’s “Views in Greece

and Egypt, 1751-81,” and were subsequently described by Choiseul-

Gouffier, Moritt, Prokesch von Osten, W. J. Hamilton, as, also, in the

second volume of “Ionian Antiquities.” Nothing, however, was done

towards a more complete examination of them, till, in 1845, Sir

Stratford Canning (now Lord Stratford de Redcliffe), then H.M.

Ambassador at Constantinople, was able to extract them from these walls,

and to present them to the British Museum in February, 1846. The chief

subject of these sculptures is the contest between the Greeks and the

Amazons, and their artistic style may be compared with that of the slabs

on the Choragic monument of Lysicrates at Athens, of the date of B.C.

334. The pieces thus recovered were evidently but subordinate portions

of a much larger design.

From this time nothing further was done till Mr. Newton was sent by Lord

Stratford de Redcliffe, in the early part of 1856, on a cruise to the

south of the Archipelago; on which occasion he landed at Budrum, and

partially examined the site, but without detecting any visible evidence

of the Mausoleum.[38] In October of the same year, however, Mr. Newton

took up his abode at Budrum with a few sappers under the command of

Lieut. Smith, R.E. Mr. Newton commenced his excavations on the same spot

he had previously slightly examined, and, for some time, met with little

except abundant mosaics, the remains of a splendid villa, some of them

inscribed with the names of the persons represented,—such as Meleager

and Atalanta, Dido and Æneas. A little further on, Mr. Newton found in

the rubble several drums of columns, with late and shallow Doric

flutings, and, at one corner of the building, a well, in which was a

small head in white marble, a bronze lamp, and some other objects: many,

too, of the rooms still retained their skirting of white marble. But

still no Mausoleum appeared.

Footnote 38:

Admiral Spratt, R.N., a veteran surveyor, proposed his site for the

Mausoleum, because, 1. he thought it coincided with the description of

Vitruvius; 2. on the eastern side there are still portions of an

Hellenic wall; 3. on the N. side were several fragments of columns of

large diameter; and, 4. it might be inferred that the Mausoleum stood

on a mound. He did not, however, follow the example of Prof. Ross, in

writing a paper against Mr. Newton’s early account of the Mausoleum in

the “Classical Museum,” with a sneer at the possibility of any

student, who had not himself surveyed the place, forming a conception

of the real position of the great building. It is satisfactory to know

that Prof. Ross’s personal survey proved to be even less satisfactory

than that of Capt. Spratt.

At length, however, Mr. Newton commenced digging on a spot where, nearly

sixty years ago, Professor Donaldson had noticed the remains of “a

superb Ionic edifice,” and soon came on many small fragments of a frieze

in high relief, and on a portion of a colossal lion resembling in

execution the lions’ heads built into the walls of the castle. Mr.

Newton next fell in with a mass of ruins lying just below the surface,

one column, indeed, standing nearly upright but inverted, and 10 feet

below, a little further on, with the edge of a pavement or step, about 6

inches below which the native rock had been levelled for a floor. In the

earth on this floor was found the body of a colossal statue from the

waist to the ankle, and another mass of sculpture—a warrior on horseback

in a Persian or Oriental costume, in itself a most remarkable specimen

of ancient sculpture. There could be no doubt now that these were relics

of the Mausoleum, the smoothed rock being the bed on which the building

had once stood. The work, in all cases, was of the best, the fragments

of the small figures being generally better preserved than those on the

frieze already in the British Museum. The discovery of the column just

alluded to had this especial value, that, by its measurement and order,

a judgment could be formed of the size of the building to which it had

belonged: ultimately these measurements showed that the building itself

must have had much resemblance in style to the temple at Priene.

By the spring of the next year (1857) Mr. Newton had determined the

base-lines of the original building, and proved it must have been a

parallelogram 116 feet long on the west by 126 feet on the south side,

its entire circumference having been about 472 feet. The inner part of

this quadrangle was paved with large slabs of a greenish-grey stone 1

foot thick. The cause of the ruin of the building was, also, clear

enough; first, earthquakes shook down a considerable portion, and then

the Knights of Rhodes, and, after them, the Turks, used up every

available stone above ground for building purposes. Fortunately,

however, the plunderers only took what was ready to their hand; hence

the massive courses of the foundation-stones were left, because unseen.

On the western side, a grand staircase of twelve steps, 30 feet wide,

led from the base of the hill to the western side of the precincts of

the Mausoleum. Near these were found the vase of Xerxes, and a gigantic

stone weighing more than ten tons, which probably once closed the

entrance to the actual tomb. No remains of the tomb itself were found;

yet, there is reason for believing that some portion of it, if not the

actual body of the king, was visible during the demolition by the

Knights. On the east side of the Mausoleum, a colossal seated male

figure was next discovered, of a grand style, but sadly shattered; and

then, on the north, a similarly colossal female figure, which must have

been originally scarcely less than 12 feet high. Here, also, was found a

very beautiful fragment of one of the friezes, representing a female

figure stepping into a chariot, the face of which, happily but slightly

injured, retains even now the finish of a cameo.

Mr. Newton’s next plan of ascertaining, if possible, the boundary-wall

of the _temenos_ was a happy one, as he thus, at once, discovered a mass

of marble blocks, piled one above another, and intermixed with fragments

of statues; and thus unearthed, (1) a colossal horse, in two pieces, and

part of the head of another horse, with the bronze bridle still adhering

to it; (2) a lion in fine condition, and another in two pieces; (3) a

draped female figure broken in half; (4) a head of Apollo. All these

sculptures were found heaped together, and had evidently not been

disturbed since they had fallen.

The conclusion was inevitable, that parts of the colossal horses of the

quadriga from the top of the monument had now been met with; and that

this quadriga and much of the pyramid, its support, had been simply

hurled upon and over the wall of the _temenos_, and that Mr. Newton had,

in fact, found them just as they had fallen, it may be 1,700 years

ago.[39] Near to the horse’s head, too, was found a face of a colossal

male head, presumably that of some personage connected with the

quadriga, and, from its general style, which is analogous to the

idealized portrait of Alexander the Great on the coins of Lysimachus,

most likely from a statue of Mausolus himself. The face has a noble

expression, and by a happy accident, the outlines of the features have

remained uninjured. Though we have no actual evidence on this subject,

it is probable that the statue we have called Mausolus was standing in

the chariot at the top of the monument. On the south side of the

building Mr. Newton found several portions of what, when put together,

were clearly parts of one of its wheels. The fragments consisted of part

of the outer circle, half the nave, and a piece of one of the spokes.

The wheel, originally, had six spokes, the alternate intervals between

each spoke having been closed to ensure by its solidity the strength of

the whole wheel. As what has been found shows that the wheel was 7.7

inches in diameter; and as the horses could scarcely have been less than

10 feet in length, we may fairly suppose the top of the pyramid on which

the quadriga stood was at least 24 feet long. From other calculations it

may be shown that the pyramid was 23½ feet high: but for these and other

similar details we must refer our readers to Mr. Newton’s work on the

Mausoleum.

Footnote 39:

It is reasonable to conjecture that the first ruin of the Mausoleum

was due to the earthquakes of the first and second centuries A.D., to

which we have already alluded.

We must, however, add that the measurements of the height and tread of

the blocks of marble believed to have been the steps of the pyramid,

formed an essential feature of the calculation. The results arrived at

were mainly due to the ingenuity and mathematical knowledge of Lieut.

Smith, R.E., who was also able to distribute Pliny’s 36 columns over a

circumference of 412 feet, so as to preserve a uniform intercolumniation

on each side of the building.

[Illustration:

STEPS OF THE PYRAMID.

]

The difficulty of Lieutenant Smith’s theory is that so large a space

from the centres of the columns to the walls of the cella is left

unsupported; but the plan of support he has suggested occurs in other

and nearly contemporaneous structures, as, for instance, in a tomb at

Mylasa. Again the great height, 65 feet, between the bases of the

columns and the ground, is found to agree with the proportions of other

tombs, as in Lycia and at Souma in Algeria. In all probability, this

lofty basement was ornamented by one or more friezes, while the lions,

of which Mr. Newton found remains of no less than fourteen, may have

stood between the columns or at the corners, looking out on the plain.

Since their arrival in England, great skill has been shown in uniting

the innumerable fragments into which some of the slabs and statues had

been broken; and visitors to the British Museum are now able to form a

good idea of the grandeur and beauty of the equestrian or Amazonian

figure, whose costume resembles that of the Persians on the temple of

the Wingless Victory at Athens; and of the two great statues it has been

agreed to call Mausolus and Artemisia. In the same room, there may,

also, now be seen the whole of the frieze that has been recovered; and

it is interesting to observe how much less injured are the portions

excavated by Mr. Newton, than those which, built into the castle wall,

have for four centuries, at least, been exposed to the corroding action

of the sea-breezes.

We take next CNIDUS, at the S.W. end of Asia Minor, and, after

Halicarnassus, the most celebrated city of Caria. The description of its

position by Strabo and Pausanias coincides exactly with the observations

of modern travellers. Thus, Strabo speaks of its two ports, one of which

can be closed; and of an island (now Cape Krio) in front of the city,

lofty, in the form of a theatre, and joined by a causeway to the

mainland; both of which statements are completely confirmed by Beaufort

and Hamilton. Pausanias adds that the island was connected by a bridge.

The whole district is covered by ruins, the northern wall being,

according to Hamilton, nearly perfect: he adds, that “there is a round

tower of great beauty at the extremity of the peninsula, near the

northern harbour” (ii. 40). Some of the most important architectural

features of the town may be seen in the “Ionian Antiquities.”

Cnidus is noticed first in the Homeric hymns, and later as a

Lacedæmonian colony, and as a member of the Dorian Hexapolis, or

assembly of six cities, whose place of meeting was the temple of the

Triopian Apollo, on Cape Krio.[40] As a population, the Cnidians were

great traders, combining with this a love for, and a high sense of, art.

Thus we find them at a remote period in Egypt (Herod. ii. 178), and

possessing a treasury at Delphi, while Lipara, near Sicily, was one of

their colonies. In the various wars of the fifth and fourth centuries

B.C., we find the Cnidians sometimes on one side and sometimes on the

other. Thus, they submitted to Harpagus, the general of Cyrus;[41] then

supported Athens, then deserted her after her losses in Sicily,[42] and

then, again, in Roman times, were, generally, on the side of Rome.[43]

The Cnidians derived much fame from their patronage of art. Thus, the

famous painting of Polygnotus in the Lesche at Delphi was their

gift;[44] as were also a statue of Jupiter at Olympia, and one at

Delphi, of their founder, Triopas; with other statues of Leto, of

Apollo, and of Artemis shooting arrows at Tityus. The most famous art-

possession of Cnidus was the naked statue by Praxiteles so well known as

the Cnidian Venus,[45] of which abundant notices are extant, especially

in Lucian. It stood in a chamber with two doors, so that it could be

seen all round, and many people visited Cnidus solely for this purpose.

So proud were the Cnidians of this statue that, when Nicomedes offered

to pay the whole public debt of Cnidus in return for the statue, they

preferred keeping their statue and their debts. This statue, justly

considered the fittest representation of the “Regina Cnidi Paphique,”

continued long uninjured, and is mentioned by Philostratus in his life

of Apollonius of Tyana; but, in the reign of Theodosius, having been

removed to Constantinople, it was totally destroyed by fire in the

palace of Lausus, about A.D. 475. There were also preserved at Cnidus

two statues by Bryaxis and Scopas, two of the sculptors of the

Mausoleum. Cnidus was also famous for her pottery, well known in ancient

times by the name of “Κεράμια Κνίδια.”[46]

Footnote 40:

Near this temple the Cnidians held their assemblies and the games

(αγῶνες τοῦ Τριοπίου Ἀπόλλωνος, Herod. i. 144, or Ἀγὡν Δώριος, Arist.

ap. Schol. Theocr. Idyll. xvii. 69). The officer in charge of these

games was called δαμιουργὸς (Leake, p. 227).

Footnote 41:

The Cnidians wished to cut through the narrow neck of land between

their two harbours; but the Delphic oracle replied that, had Jupiter

intended Cape Krio should have been an island, he would have made it

so:—

Ζεὺς γὰρ κ’ ἔθηκε νῆσον εἴ κ’ ἐβούλετο—Herod. i. 174.

Footnote 42:

Cnidus paid dear for this desertion by loss of all her ships (Thucyd.

viii. 35, 42).

Footnote 43:

Hamilton (ii. 42) shows that more than one of Julius Cæsar’s personal

friends were connected with Cnidus.

Footnote 44:

See papers by W. W. Lloyd in “Museum of Classical Antiquities,” vol.

i. 1851.

Footnote 45:

Praxiteles made two statues of Venus, one naked, the other veiled. The

Coans chose the latter, the Cnidians the former.

Footnote 46:

The territory round Cnidus was rich in wine, corn, oil, and various

vegetables, noticed by Athenæus (i. p. 33, ii. p. 66), and by Pliny

(xiii. 35, xix. 32, &c.). Pliny adds (xvi. 64) that Cnidian reeds made

excellent pens; hence the fitness of Catullus’s lines—

“Quæque Ancona Cnidumque arundinosam

Colis” (Carm. xxx. vi. 11).

The historian Ctesias, Eudoxus, a disciple of Plato, and Agatharcides,

were natives of Cnidus. From Hierocles, the Notitiæ and the Acts of

Councils, it would seem to have existed as late as the seventh and

eighth centuries.

The report of the Dilettanti Society, to which we have alluded, and

those of Captain Beaufort and others, having excited much interest in

England, it was thought advisable that careful excavations should be

made at a spot where there was so much promise of successful results;

hence Mr. Newton, at the close of his work at Halicarnassus, resolved to

do for Cnidus what he had done for the other Carian city.

[Illustration:

DEMETER FROM CNIDUS.

]

Mr. Newton commenced his operations by examining a platform supported by

polygonal masonry, and jutting out like a pier from the side of the

mountain, soon discerning that he was on the site of the _temenos_ of

Demeter, as a niche in the face of the rock above still retained a

portion of a dedicatory inscription to that goddess. Shortly afterwards

he found a small _stele_, and, near it, the statue noticed by the

Dilettanti mission, the head, hands, and feet of which were wanting.

Enough, however, remained to show that it had once been a work “of fine

style and execution.” Inscriptions soon after turned up on the same

spot: one of them recording the dedication of an edifice (οἶκος) and of

a statue (ἄγαλμα) to Demeter and Persephone, and, what was of far higher

interest, the head of the seated figure just noticed, exhibiting a

countenance of exquisite beauty, with a most tender and refined

expression. This head has recently been specially studied by Professor

Brunn, and his paper on it (translated by Mr. Murray, of the British

Museum) published in vol. xi. pt. 1 of the Trans. of the Royal Society

of Literature. In this paper Professor Brunn traces, with a masterly

hand, the intercrossing ideas suggested by the mixed character of

Demeter as a wife, a mother, and a widow. “The character,” says he, “of

mother pervades the whole mythology of Demeter: the mother who, without

a husband, lived only for her child; who had to lose her child, and to

be filled with anxiety for her; to have her anxiety lessened, but never

silenced or removed, by occasional visits from her daughter.... The eye

is sunk in the socket, as if physically weary; but anxiety of mind

fights against the weariness, and will not yet surrender to it. The look

is not sunk, but is directed upwards, only a little less sharply.” ...

“Can it be,” adds the Professor, “only the result of chance that

Christian artists have also represented the Madonna wearing the veil?

... In the centre of the Christian religion, also, is the figure of a

mother who lives only for her Child and in her Child, who, in the same

way, grieves for the loss of her Son, and finds blessedness in the

spiritual contemplation of Him. Suppose a Christian artist were to give

his Madonna the head of our Demeter, he would certainly not be censured

for it.”

About the same time Mr. Newton met with two other statues, each of

considerable interest: the one representing a female figure with a

modius on her head, partially covered by the peplos, and in her right

hand a pomegranate; the other, a female statue nearly six feet high,

with its body draped to the feet. Its general character is that of an

elderly woman wasted with sorrow, with little of that matronly

comeliness which, in ancient art, generally characterizes Demeter. From

the Homeric hymn to Demeter we learn that the goddess, while wandering

in search of her daughter Persephone, was wont to assume the garb of an

old woman, and thus traversed the earth for days without tasting food.

She is likened, also, to an aged nurse or housekeeper in a regal house,

a description well agreeing with this statue. This type of the sorrowing

Demeter has not, we believe, been previously recognized in any extant

monument of ancient art. A passage, however, in Clemens Alexandrinus

(Cohort. ad Gentes, i. 30, ed. Potter) suggests that she was sometimes

represented in sculpture under this aspect.

Near the first statue of Demeter, the sitting figure, were several thin

nearly decayed sheets of lead, which, on being unrolled, proved to have

been inscribed with curses and imprecations in the names of Demeter,

Persephone, and other of the infernal gods. Such inscriptions have been

occasionally met with before, and are known by the name of _Diræ_.

On pursuing his researches in this _temenos_, Mr. Newton came upon the

entrance to a large chamber, full of miscellaneous antiquities,

including many bases of former statues, some with remains of stelæ,

others with hollowed spaces for the feet of statues. Most of them bore

dedications to Demeter in the Doric dialect; and, with them, were many

other objects connected with her worship, as three boar pigs, a

calathus, and many votive female breasts in marble. The date of these

objects is probably, as Mr. Newton suggests, about B.C. 370-320. Below

these, again, were layers of lamps, _amphoriskoi_, vessels in Samian

ware, hair-pins of bone, bodkins, and glass bottles, all probably Roman.

It is likely that this chamber was formerly a treasury connected with

one of the temples; and, that it has never been disturbed since it

became a ruin is certain from the fact that the edges of the fractured

stones are still clean and sharp. It is curious that, besides the marble

pigs, the bones of many young pigs were also found, manifest remains of

sacrifices to Demeter.

The clearing out of the Theatres did little to reward Mr. Newton’s

labours; indeed, it soon became but too clear that all, or nearly all,

the finer works had long since been removed, probably, like the Venus,

to Constantinople. Hence, shortly afterwards, he gave his chief

attention to a thorough examination of the Necropolis, the vast extent

of which naturally inspired hopes of important discoveries. This

necropolis, the general character of which is very well shown in one of

the plates in the “Ionian Antiquities,” must in former days have been

one of the most striking features of the town. One of the structures

still remaining _in situ_ was, Mr. Newton observes, not unlike in form

to an early Christian church, with a chamber, vestibule, and apse or

alcove at the south end. On each side were smaller apses, and, in front

of each of them, a marble sarcophagus. The sarcophagi generally exhibit

good Roman work of the time of Domitian, but have suffered much by the

fall of the roof; they must once have been magnificent specimens of the

decorative style of their day, though they exhibit the decay of good

taste in the lavish prodigality of ornament with which they have been

covered. In the earth around were abundant fragments of Greek

inscriptions, nearly all of them decrees of the Senate and people of

Cnidus. One of the tombs Mr. Newton considered to have been that of a

certain Lykæthus, as an inscription records decrees in his favour, by

show of hands (χειροτονία), at the festival of the greater Dionysia,

together with the erection of a statue to him at the public expense.

There is no satisfactory proof as to when this Lykæthus lived; but his

tomb would seem to date from the early Seleucidan period, when Cnidus

was a free city.

Having completed the survey of Cnidus itself, Mr. Newton proceeded next

to examine the villages in the neighbourhood, the result being the

discovery of a colossal lion. Reports of its existence had reached him

before, but it was left to Mr. Pullan, the architect of the expedition,

to make its actual discovery, at a distance of between three and four

miles to the E. of Cnidus, in a position wherein, except by accident, it

might have remained unnoticed for another twenty-one centuries. The

exact spot where the lion was found may be seen in the Admiralty chart,

which shows, on the summit of a cliff, opposite Cape Crio, the ruins of

an ancient tomb, which are strewn all around. Below this, some 60 feet,

the lion was reposing on a ledge of rock, beneath which, again, is a

sheer precipice of 300 feet into the sea. The lion was lying on its

right side, and its upper portion had suffered much from exposure to the

weather. It had been carved, as well as the base on which it reposes, of

one piece of Parian marble, and measures nearly 10 ft. in length, by 6

ft. in height. This noble lion is probably earlier than the Mausoleum,

and exhibits a more severe and majestic style than those of the

Mausoleum.[47] The removal of the lion was a labour of much toil and

difficulty; indeed, could hardly have been accomplished had Mr. Newton

not had the aid of some sailors from an English ship of war.

Footnote 47:

See Frontispiece.

The tomb itself was a nearly equal square of 39 ft. 2¾ inches, with the

remains of a pyramid like that of the Mausoleum.[48] Its present height

is about 17 ft.; the four lower feet being composed of immense blocks of

marble, supporting eleven courses of travertine. On the west, and most

perfect side, a portion of the lower step of the stylobate still

remains. No _data_ have been obtained of the exact height of the columns

once round the monument; but, as, in an angle step, one tread was 13½

inches, and the other only 10½, it is clear that this structure, like

the Mausoleum, was oblong. Although the action of an earthquake was

probably the primary cause of the ruin of this monumental tomb, there

can be no doubt, also, that it has suffered much from plunderers, who,

in search for treasure, have torn up as much of the inner pavement as

they could move. The jambs of the doorway still exist, and the interior

was shaped like a beehive. The top has been closed in by one immense

block, and, as its upper side was somewhat broader than the lower, this

block must have been dropped into its position, like the bung of a

gigantic cask, after the rest of the building was finished. The chamber,

itself, exhibits in its sides a series of openings expanding outwards

like embrasures—no doubt, θῆκαι, or resting-places for bodies: indeed,

on clearing the rubbish away, a number of human bones were met with. Mr.

Newton considers this monument can hardly be later than 350 B.C., and

that it was built as a monument to many citizens who had fallen in

battle. To what period, then, can it be assigned? Probably to either the

repulse of the Athenians by the Cnidians in B.C. 412; or to the defeat

of the Lacedæmonians by Conon in B.C. 394; and, of the two, it is more

likely it was erected in commemoration of the former event, which was

one of much glory to the town. To the north and further inland, are two

other tombs of precisely similar construction, but inferior in size.

Footnote 48:

Mr. Falkener found at Ouran, in Phrygia, a monument he has restored as

similar to this Lion-tomb. We wish he had also given a sketch of the

ruin as he found it. (Museum Class. Antiq. i. p. 174.)

Having now devoted a considerable space to Halicarnassus and Cnidus,

owing to their being, from recent researches, of such high importance,

we must notice very briefly the other towns of Caria. The small town of

PHYSCUS is chiefly of interest for its magnificent bay and harbour, so

well known to modern navigators (under the name of Marmorice), as one of

the finest in the world for vessels of the largest size. Possibly it was

this very character that led to its being so little noticed in

antiquity, as ancient galleys did not value depth of water. The capacity

of the bay of Marmorice will be best comprehended, when we remind our

readers that Nelson anchored his whole fleet within it, just before the

battle of the Nile. Not far from this was CAUNUS, the ancient capital of

a population whom Herodotus held were not Carians; indeed, their coins

and architecture seem to prove them Lycians. The site of Caunus has been

identified, there being still considerable monumental remains and walls

of so-called Cyclopean masonry. The Caunians were an active and high-

spirited race, and made a gallant resistance to the Persians, a few

years later joining with equal enthusiasm in the great Ionian revolt

(Herod. v. 103). Towards the close of the Peloponnesian war we find

Caunus constantly mentioned. Having been rejected by the Romans in a

petition against Rhodes, they conceived against them the bitterest

hatred, and hence carried out with great atrocity the massacre of the

Romans planned by Mithradates (Appian, Mithr. c. 23). Caunus was so

unhealthy in the summer that “pale-faced Caunians” became a proverb.

STRATONICEA (now Eski-hissar), one of the chief inland towns of Caria

and mainly built by Antiochus Soter, derived its name from his wife

Stratonice. The great Mithradates married thence his wife Monima. Not

far from the town was the famous temple of Jupiter Chrysaorius, the

centre of the political union of the Carian states. Stratonicea has been

much explored by travellers; and, so early as 1709, Mr. Consul Sherard

presented to the Earl of Oxford a book of Greek inscriptions copied by

him at various places in Asia Minor. This volume is now in the Harleian

collection. The most important monument of the town is the celebrated

edict of Diocletian—in Greek and Latin—the first copy of which, by

Sherard, is in the volume just mentioned. The late Colonel Leake[49] has

shown that its date is about A.D. 303, and its object to direct those

engaged in the traffic of provisions not to exceed certain fixed prices

in times of scarcity. Fellows states that the names of many of the

articles of food enumerated therein are still used by the peasantry of

Asia Minor. _Inter alia_, we learn that silken garments were in common

use, as Ammianus[50] pointed out, seventy years later; as also the rough

coat or _birrhus_, the _caracallis_, or hooded cloak (afterwards adopted

by the monks), the Gallic breeches and socks. The late date of the

inscription is shown by its barbarous Latinity, above all, by the

reduced value of the _drachma_ or _denarius_. Thus a denarius appears as

the equivalent of a single oyster, or of the hundredth part of a lean

goose! The names of the provisions recorded not only indicate the

ordinary food of the people, but also the costly dainties of the

epicure. Thus several kinds of honey, of hams, of sausages,[51] of salt

and fresh-water fish, of asparagus and of beans, are noted. Gibbon has

not failed to notice this inscription, though, in his day, it had been

very imperfectly copied.

Footnote 49:

See Trans. Roy. Soc. of Literature, 1st series, 4to. vol. i. p. 181.

1826.

Footnote 50:

Ammianus was not acquainted with the true origin of silk. He still

describes it, as did Virgil and Pliny, as a sort of woolly substance

(_lanugo_) combed from a tree in China.

Footnote 51:

The derivation of the word “sausage” may not be generally known.

“Icicium” means “minced meat”; “salsum icicium,” the same salted. From

the latter comes the Italian _salsiccio_, the French _saucisse_, and

the English sausage. So _jecur ficatum_ (Greek, συκωτὸν), hog’s liver,

derived from the fattening of geese with figs (“pinguibus et ficis

pastum jecur anseris albi,” Horat. Satir. ii. 8, 88) is preserved in

the Italian _fegato_ and the modern Greek συκώτι, used for liver in

general. It is curious to meet on a decree on the walls of a temple in

Caria with _pernæ Menapicæ_, Westphalian hams.

APHRODISIAS was a considerable place, and, at a very late period, as

appears from Hierocles, the capital of Caria. It is but little mentioned

in ancient history, but Tacitus records that, setting forth decrees of

Cæsar and Augustus in its favour,[52] it pleaded before the Senate for

the right of sanctuary attached to its temples, when Tiberius was wisely

attempting to abridge these injurious immunities. Aphrodisias was

chiefly famous for its magnificent Ionic temple of Venus, many columns

of which are still standing. They may be seen in the third volume of the

“Ionian Antiquities,” 1840,[53] and in Mr. Pullan’s work.

Footnote 52:

“Dictatoris Cæsaris ob vetusta in partes merita et recens Divi Augusti

decretum” (Tacit. Ann. iii. 62). An inscription published by Chishull

in his Antiq. Asiat. (p. 152), but, we believe, first copied by

Sherard, confirms the statement of Tacitus.

Footnote 53:

The name of Aphrodisias was more than once changed. Thus when

Christianity began to prevail, the first change was to Tauropolis (as

is shown on an inscription copied by Fellows), and, again, to

Stauropolis (or the city of the Cross). When, however, towards the end

of the fifth century, the festivals of Venus were revived by

Asclepiodotus of Alexandria, the ancient name was revived also.

Sir Charles Fellows has given an excellent description (Lycia, p. 32) of

the state in which he found the ruins, with a beautiful drawing of the

Ionic temple. “I never,” says he, “saw in one place so many perfect

remains, although by no means of a good age of the arts”: he thinks,

too, that the early city must have been in great measure destroyed.

“These (the later) walls are,” he adds, “composed of the remains of

temples, tombs, and theatres removed, although uninjured. The reversed

inscriptions, and inverted bas-reliefs bear testimony to this change.”

Sir Charles Fellows quotes one inscription as showing how carefully the

owners of these tombs endeavoured to secure their preservation and sole

occupancy. “But if,” says the legend, “contrary to these directions,

anybody shall bury another (in this monument), let him be accursed, and

besides pay into the most holy treasury 5,000 denarii, of which one-

third is to be his who institutes the proceedings.” Inscriptions with

similar curses are, indeed, common enough.

MYLASA _and_ LABRANDA may be taken together, as from the former a Sacred

Way led to Labranda. The former was, no doubt, in early times one of the

chief places in Caria, before Halicarnassus was adopted as the royal

residence; indeed, we find a proof of this in the fact that it had a

temple to which Lydians and Mysians were alike admitted (Herod, i. 171).

Physcus, to which we have already referred was considered as its port.

Mylasa, in ancient times, as Strabo avers, a city of great beauty, owed

much to its having been built close to a mountain of the finest white

marble. It was, indeed, so close, that one of the provincial governors

observed that the founder of the town ought to have been ashamed of his

blunder, if not frightened.[54] It was, also, so full of sacred

buildings, that when Stratonicus came there, thinking there were more

temples than people, he exclaimed, in the middle of the forum, “Hear, oh

ye temples”! (Athen. viii. p. 348).

Footnote 54:

Strabo’s words are: Ταύτην γὰρ, ἔφη, τὴν πόλιν ὁ κτίσας εἰ μὴ

ἐφοβεῖτο, ἆρ’ οὐδ’ ᾐσχύνετο; (xiv. 659).

The people of Mylasa having made a successful resistance to the attacks

of Philip, the son of Demetrius, were rewarded by being made “free” by

the Romans. Modern travellers, from Pococke to Chandler, fully confirm

the statements of the ancients as to the abundance of marble monuments;

and Colonel Leake adds that, since they were there, the Turks have

pulled down the best ruin, that of the Temple of Romulus and Augustus.

Sir Charles Fellows, on his second journey, observed on the key-stone of

a gateway the double-headed axe (bipennis), indicating that the building

to which it belonged had once been consecrated to the Jupiter of

Labranda, a name said to have been derived from λαβρὺς, the Carian word

for an axe;[55] and succeeded, also, in identifying it (pp. 66-67). He

says of it, “The only conspicuous building of the place is a beautiful

temple of the Corinthian order, but I think not of the finest age.... It

stands in a recess in the hills, and is consequently not seen without

approaching close to it.”[56]

Footnote 55:

Strabo calls the temple νεὠς άρχαῖος, and Herodotus adds that there

was a holy grove of plane-trees near it, ἅγιον ἂλσος πλατανίστων (v.

119). Plutarch (ii. p. 302 A) states that λαβρὺς was the Lydian and

Carian word for axe (which we find represented also on the coins of

Mausolus and Pixodarus). On one of the Oxford marbles (ii. 12),

probably an altar, occur the words Διός Λαβραύνδου.

Footnote 56:

Since Sir Charles’s visit, this spot has been carefully examined by

Mr. Pullan, who states that the building (of which the fifteen columns

still stand) is really of Roman times and work, though engraved (under

the auspices of Dr. Chandler) as a Greek temple in the “Ionian

Antiquities,” vol. i. (Pullan, “Ruins of Asia Minor,” p. 26).

------------------------------------------------------------------------