CORINTH—TIRYNS—ARGOS—NAUPLIA—HYDRA—ÆGINA—EPIDAURUS.
The Gulf of Corinth is a very beautiful and narrow fiord, with chains of
mountains on either side, through the gaps of which you can see far into
the Morea on one side, and into northern Greece on the other. But the bays
or harbors on either coast are few, and so there was no city able to wrest
the commerce of these waters from old Corinth, which held the keys by land
of the whole Peloponnesus, and commanded the passage from sea to sea. It
is, indeed, wonderful how Corinth did not acquire and maintain the first
position in Greece. It may, perhaps, have done so in the days of
Periander, and we hear at various times of inventions and discoveries in
Corinth, which show that, commercially and artistically, it was among the
leading cities of Greece. But, whenever the relations of the various
powers become clear, as in the Persian or Peloponnesian Wars, we find
Corinth always at the head of the second-rate states, and never among the
first. This is possibly to be accounted for by the predominance of trade
interests, which are the source of such material prosperity that men are
completely engrossed with it, and will not devote time and labor to
politics, or stake their fortunes for the defence of principle. Thus it
seems as if the Corinthians had been the shopkeepers of Greece.
But as soon as the greater powers of Greece decayed and fell away, we find
Corinth immediately taking the highest position in wealth, and even in
importance. The capture of Corinth, in 146 B. C., marks the Roman conquest
of all Greece, and the art-treasures carried to Rome seem to have been as
great and various as those which even Athens could have produced. Its
commercial position was at once assumed by Delos. No sooner had Julius
Cæsar restored and rebuilt the ruined city than it sprang at once again
into importance,(146) while Delos decayed; and among the societies
addressed in the Epistles of St. Paul, none seems to have lived in greater
wealth or luxury. It was, in fact, well-nigh impossible that Corinth
should die. Nature had marked out her site as one of the great
thoroughfares of the old world; and it was not till after centuries of
blighting misrule by the wretched Turks that she sank into the hopeless
decay from which not even another Julius Cæsar could rescue her.(147)
These were our reflections as we passed up the gulf on a splendid summer
evening, the mountains of Arcadia showing on their snowy tops a deep rose
color in the setting sun. And passing by Ægion and Sikyon, we came to
anchor at the harbor of Lechæum. There was a public conveyance which took
the traveller across the isthmus to Kenchreæ, where a steamboat was in
readiness to bring him to Athens. But with the usual absurdity of such
services, no time was allowed for visiting Corinth and its Acropolis.(148)
We, however, stayed for the night in the boat, and started in the morning
for our ride into the Peloponnesus. This arrangement was then necessary,
as the port of Lechæum did not afford the traveller even the luxury of a
decent meal. The Greek steamers are, besides, of considerable interest to
any observant person. They seem always full of passengers with their dogs,
and as the various classes mix indiscriminately on deck, all sorts of
manners, costume, and culture can be easily compared.
The fondness of the Greeks for driving a bargain is often to be noticed.
Thus, a Greek gentleman on this boat, perceiving that we were strangers in
pursuit of art and antiquities, produced two very fine gold coins of
Philip and Alexander, which he offered for £5. That of Philip was
particularly beautiful—a very perfect Greek head in profile, crowned with
laurel, and on the reverse a chariot and four, with the legend,
_Φίλιππος_. Not being a very expert judge of coins, and supposing that he
had asked more than the value, I offered him £2: 10s. for this one, which
was considerably the larger; but he would not take any abatement. He
evidently was not anxious to sell them, but merely took his chance of
getting a good price, and investing it again at better interest. Seeing
that the coin seemed but little heavier than our sovereign, and is not
uncommon in collections, I fancy the price he asked was excessive. The
Athenian shops, which are notorious for their prices to strangers, had
similar coins, for which about £4 was asked. On this, and a thousand other
points, the traveller should be instructed by some competent person before
he sets out. Genuine antiquities seem to me so common in Greece, that
imitations are hardly worth manufacturing. Even with a much greater
market, the country can supply for generations an endless store of real
remains of ancient Greece. But, nevertheless, the prices of these things
are already very high. The ordinary tourist does not infest these shores,
so that the only seekers after them are enthusiasts, who will not hesitate
to give even fancy prices for what they like.
The form of the country, as you ascend from Lechæum to Corinth, is very
marked and peculiar. At some distance from the flat shore the road leads
up through a steep pass of little height, which is cut through a long
ridge of rock, almost like a wall, and over which lies a higher plateau of
land. The same feature is again repeated a mile inland, as the traveller
approaches the site of ancient Corinth. These plateaus, though not lofty,
are well marked, and perfectly distinct, the passes from one up to the
next being quite sufficient to form a strong place of defence against an
attacking force. How far these rocky parapets reach I did not examine.
Behind the highest plateau rises the great cliff on which the citadel was
built. But even from the site of the old city it is easy to obtain a
commanding view of the isthmus, of the two seas, and of the Achæan coast
up to Sikyon.
The traveller who expects to find any sufficient traces of the city of
Periander and of Timoleon, and, I may say, of St. Paul, will be grievously
disappointed. In the middle of the wretched straggling modern village
there stand up seven enormous rough stone pillars of the Doric Order,
evidently of the oldest and heaviest type; and these are the only visible
relic of the ancient city, looking altogether out of place, and almost as
if they had come there by mistake. These pillars, though insufficient to
admit of our reconstructing the temple, are in themselves profoundly
interesting. Their shaft up to the capital is of one block, about
twenty-one feet high and six feet in diameter. It is to be observed that
over these gigantic monoliths the architrave, in which other Greek temples
show the largest blocks, is not in one piece, but two, and made of beams
laid together longitudinally.(149) The length of the shafts (up to the
neck of the capital) measures about four times their diameter, on the
photograph which I possess; I do not suppose that any other Doric pillar
known to us is so stout and short. The material is said almost universally
to be limestone, but if my eyes served me aright, it was a very porous and
now rough sandstone, not the least like the bluish limestone in which the
lions of the gate of Mycenæ are carved. The pillars are said to have been
covered with stucco, and were of course painted. Perhaps even the figures
of the pediment were modelled in clay, as we are told was the case in the
oldest Corinthian temples, when first the fashion came in of thus
ornamenting an otherwise flat and unsightly surface. The great temple of
Pæstum—which is, probably, the next oldest, and certainly the finest
extant specimen of the early Doric style—has no figures in the pediment,
and seems never to have had them, unless, indeed, they were painted in
fresco on the stucco, with which it was probably covered. Those who have
seen the temple at Pæstum are, perhaps, the only visitors who will be able
to frame to themselves an image of the very similar structure at Corinth,
which Turks and earthquakes have reduced to seven columns. There must have
been in it the same simplicity, the same almost Egyptian massiveness, and
yet the same unity of plan and purpose which excludes all idea of
clumsiness or disproportion.
[Illustration: Temple of Corinth]
The longer one studies the Greek orders of architecture, the more the
conviction grows that the Doric is of all the noblest and the most
natural. When lightened and perfected by the Athenians of Pericles’s time,
it becomes simply unapproachable; but even in older and ruder forms it
seems to me vastly superior to either of the more florid orders. All the
massive temples of Roman times were built in the very ornate Corinthian,
which may almost be called the Græco-Roman, style; but, notwithstanding
their majesty and beauty, they are not to be compared with the severer and
more religious tone of the Doric remains. I may add that the titles by
which the orders are distinguished seem ill-chosen and without meaning,
except, perhaps, that the Ionic was most commonly used, and probably
invented, in Asia Minor. The earliest specimens of the Corinthian Order
are at Epidaurus, Olympia, and Phigalia;(150) the most perfect of the
Doric is at Athens, while Ionic temples are found everywhere. But it is
idle now to attempt to change such definite and well-sanctioned names.
[Illustration: Scene near Corinth, the Acro-Corinthus in the Distance]
Straight over the site of the town is the great rock known as the
Acro-Corinthus. A winding path leads up on the south-west side to the
Turkish drawbridge and gate, which are now deserted and open; nor is there
a single guard or soldier to watch a spot once the coveted prize of
contending empires. In the days of the Achæan League it was called one of
the fetters of Greece, and indeed it requires no military experience to
see the extraordinary importance of the place. Strabo speaks of the
Peloponnesus as the Acropolis of Greece—Corinth may fairly be called the
Acropolis of the Peloponnesus. It runs out boldly from the surging
mountain-chains of the peninsula, like an outpost or sentry, guarding all
approach from the north. In days when news was transmitted by fire
signals, we can imagine how all the southern country must have depended on
the watch upon the rock of Corinth. It is separated by a wide plain of
land, ending in the isthmus, from the Geranean Mountains, which come from
the north and belong to a different system.
Next to the view from the heights of Parnassus, I suppose the view from
this citadel is held the finest in Greece.(151) I speak here of the large
and diverse views to be obtained from mountain heights. To me, personally,
such a view as that from the promontory of Sunium, or, above all, from the
harbor of Nauplia, exceeds in beauty and interest any bird’s-eye prospect.
Any one who looks at the map of Greece will see how the Acro-Corinthus
commands coasts, islands, and bays. The day was too hazy when we stood
there to let us measure the real limits of the view, and I cannot say how
far the eye may reach in a suitable atmosphere. But a host of islands, the
southern coasts of Attica and Bœotia, the Acropolis of Athens, Salamis and
Ægina, Helicon and Parnassus, and endless Ætolian peaks were visible in
one direction; while, as we turned round, all the waving reaches of
Arcadia and Argolis, down to the approaches toward Mantinea and Karytena,
lay stretched out before us. The plain of Argos, and the sea at that side,
are hidden by the mountains.(152) But without going into detail, this much
may be said, that if a man wants to realize the features of these coasts,
which he has long studied on maps, half an hour’s walk about the top of
this rock will give him a geographical insight which months of reading
could not attain.
The surface is very large, at least half a mile each way, and is covered
inside the bounding wall with the remains of a considerable Turkish town,
now in ruins and totally deserted, but evidently of no small importance in
the days of the War of Liberation. The building of this town was a great
misfortune to antiquarians, for every available remnant of old Greek work
was used as material for the modern houses. At all parts of the walls may
be seen white marble fragments of pillars and architraves, and I have no
doubt that a careful dilapidation of the modern abandoned houses would
amply repay the outlay. There are several pits for saving rain-water, and
some shallow underground passages of which we could not make out the
purpose. The pits or tanks must have been merely intended to save trouble,
for about the middle of the plateau, which sinks considerably toward the
south, we were brought to a passage into the ground, which led by a rapid
descent to the famous well of Pirene, the water of which was so perfectly
clear that we walked into it on going down the steps, as there was
actually no water-line visible. It was twelve or fourteen feet deep, and
perhaps twenty-five feet long, so far as we could make it out in the
twilight underground. The structure of marble over the fountain is the
only piece of old Greek work we could find on the rock. It consists of
three supports, like pillars, made of several blocks, and over them a sort
of architrave. Then there is a gap in the building, and from the large
number of fragments of marble lying at the bottom of the well we concluded
that the frieze and cornice had fallen out. The pediment, or rather its
upper outline, is still in its place, clear of the architrave, and built
into the rock so as to remain without its supporting cornice.
There are numerous inscriptions as you descend, which I did not copy,
because I was informed they had already been published, though I have not
since been able to find them; but they are, of course, to be found in some
of the Greek archæological newspapers. They appeared to me at the time to
be either hopelessly illegible, or suspiciously clear. This great well,
springing up near the top of a barren rock, is very curious, especially as
we could see no outlet.(153) The water was deep under the surface, and
there was no sign of welling up or of outflow anywhere; but to make sure
of this would have required a long and careful ride round the whole ridge.
Our guide-book spoke of rushing streams and waterfalls tumbling down the
rock, which we searched for in vain, and which may have been caused by a
winter rainfall without any connection with the fountain.(154)
The Isthmus, which is really some three or four miles north of Corinth,
was of old famous for the Isthmian games, as well as for the noted
_diolkos_, or road for dragging ships across. The games were founded about
586 B. C., when a strong suspicion had arisen throughout Greece concerning
the fairness of the Elean awards at Olympia, and for a long time Eleans
were excluded. In later days the games became very famous, the Argives or
Cleonæans laying claim to celebrate them. It was at these games that
Philip V. heard of the great defeat of the Romans by Hannibal, and
resolved to enter into that colossal quarrel which brought the Romans into
Macedonia. The site of the stadium, and of the temple of Isthmian
Poseidon, and of the fortified sanctuary, were excavated and mapped out by
M. Monceaux in 1883. A plan and details are to be found in the French
_Guide Joanne_.(155) Close by I saw in 1889 the interrupted work of the
canal which was at last to connect the eastern and western gulfs, and
which when well-nigh completed found its funds dissipated by the terrible
crash of the Credit Mobilier in Paris, and now awaits another enterprise.
The idea is old and often discussed, like that of the Isthmus of Suez. The
Emperor Nero actually began the work, and the engineers of to-day resumed
the cutting at the very spot where his workmen left off.
But if this very expensive work might have been of great service when
sailing-ships feared to round the notorious Cape of Malea, and when there
was great trade from the Adriatic to the ports of Thessaly and Macedonia,
surely all these advantages are now superseded. Steamers coming from the
Straits of Messina would pay nothing to take the route of the Isthmus in
preference to rounding the Morea, and the main line of traffic is no
longer to the Northern Levant, but to Alexandria. Even goods despatched
from Trieste or Venice may now be landed at Patras, and sent on by rail to
Athens; so that the canal will now only serve the smallest fraction of the
Levantine trade; and even then, if the charges be at all adequate to the
labor, will be avoided by circumnavigation. Amid the promotion of many
useful schemes of traffic, this undertaking seems to me to stand out by
its want of common sense. Indeed, had it been really important at any
date, we may be sure that the Hellenistic Sovrans or Roman capitalists
would have carried it out. But in classical days their smaller ships seem
to have been dragged across upon movable rollers by slaves without much
difficulty.
But we had already delayed too long upon this citadel, where we would have
willingly spent a day or two at greater leisure. Our guide urged us to
start on our long ride, which was not to terminate till we reached the
town of Argos, some thirty miles over the mountains.(156)
The country into which we passed was very different from any we had yet
seen, and still it was intensely Greek. All the hills and valleys showed a
very white, chalky soil, which actually glittered like snow where it was
not covered with verdure or trees. Road, as usual, there was none; but all
these hills and ravines, chequered with snowy white, were clothed with
shining arbutus trees, and shrubs resembling dwarf holly. The purple and
the white cistus, which is so readily mistaken for a wild rose,(157) were
already out of blow, and showed but a rare blossom. Here and there was a
plain or valley with great fields of thyme about the arbutus, and there
were herds of goats wandering through the shrubs, and innumerable bees
gathering honey from the thyme. The scene was precisely such as Theocritus
describes in the uplands of Sicily; but in all our rides through that
delightful island(158) we had never found the thyme and arbutus, the goats
and bees, in such truly Theocritean perfection. We listened in vain for
the shepherd’s pipe, and sought in vain for some Thyrsis beguiling his
time with the oaten reed. It was almost noontide—noon, the hour of awe and
mystery to the olden shepherd, when Pan slept his mid-day sleep,(159) and
the wanton satyr was abroad, prowling for adventure through the silent
woods; so that, in pagan days, we might have been afraid of the
companionship of melody. But now the silence was not from dread of Pan’s
displeasure, but that the sun’s fiercer heat had warned the shepherds to
depart to the snowy heights of Cyllene, where they dwell all the summer in
alpine huts, and feed their flocks on the upland pastures, which are
covered with snow till late in the spring.
They had left behind them a single comrade, with his wife and little
children, to protect the weak and the lame till their return. We found
this family settled in their winter quarters, which consisted of a square
enclosure of thorns _θρίγκος ἀχέρδου_, built up with stones, round a very
old spreading olive-tree. At the foot of the tree were pots and pans, and
other household goods, with some skins and rude rugs lying on the ground.
There was no attempt at a roof or hut of any kind, though, of course, it
might be set up in a moment, as we had seen in the defiles of Parnassus,
with skins hung over three sticks—two uprights, and the third joining
their tops, so as to form a ridge.
To make the scene Homeric,(160) as well as Theocritean, two large and very
savage dogs rushed out upon us at our approach, but the shepherd hurried
out after them, and drove them off by pelting them vigorously with stones.
“Surely,” he said, turning to us breathlessly from his exertions, “you had
met, O strangers! with some mischief, if I had not been here.” The dogs
disappeared, in deep anger, into the thicket, and, though we stayed at the
place for some time, never reappeared to threaten or to pursue us on our
departure. We talked as best we could to the gentle shepherdess, one of
whose children had a fearfully scalded hand, for which we suggested
remedies to her occult and wonderful, though at home so trite as to be
despised by the wise. She gave us in return great bowls of heated milk,
which was being made into cheese, and into various kinds of curds, which
are the very best produce of the country. They would take no money for
their hospitality, but did not object to our giving the children coins to
play with—to them, I am sure, a great curiosity.
Most of our journey was not, however, through pastures and plains, but up
and down steep ravines, where riding was so difficult and dangerous that
we were often content to dismount and lead our horses. Every hour or two
brought us to a fountain springing from a rock, and over it generally a
great spreading fig-tree, while the water was framed in on both sides with
a perfect turf of maiden-hair fern. The only considerable valley which we
saw was that of Cleonæ, which we passed some miles on our left, and about
which there was a great deal of golden corn, and many shady plane-trees.
Indeed, the corn was so plentiful that we saw asses grazing in it quite
contentedly, without any interference from thrifty farmers. We had seen a
very similar sight in Sicily, where the enormous deep-brown Sicilian oxen,
with their forward-pointing horns, were stretching their huge forms in
fields of half-ripe wheat, which covered all the plain without fence or
division. There, too, it seemed as if this was the cheapest grazing, and
as if it were unprofitable labor to drive the cattle to some untilled
pasture. As for the treading-out of corn, I saw it done at Argos by a
string of seven horses abreast, with two young foals at the outside,
galloping round a small circular threshing-floor in the open field, upon
which the ripe sheaves had been laid in radiating order. I have no doubt
that a special observer of farming operations would find many interesting
survivals both in Greece and the Two Sicilies.
Toward evening, after many hours of travel, we turned aside on our way
down the plain of Argos, to see the famous ruins of Mycenæ. But we will
now pass them by, as the discoveries of Dr. Schliemann, and a second visit
to the ruins after his excavations, have opened up so many questions, that
a separate chapter must be devoted to them.
The fortress of Tiryns, which I have already mentioned, and which we
visited next day, may fitly be commented on before approaching the
younger, or at least more artistically finished, Mycenæ. It stands several
miles nearer to the sea, in the centre of the great plain of Argos, and
upon the only hillock which there affords any natural scope for
fortification. Instead of the square, or at least hewn, well-fitted blocks
of Mycenæ, we have here the older style of rude masses piled together as
best they would fit, the interstices being filled up with smaller
fragments, and, as we now know, faced with mortar. This is essentially
Cyclopean building.(161) There is a smaller castle of rectangular shape,
on the southern and highest part of the oblong hillock, the whole of which
is surrounded by a lower wall, which takes in both this and the northern
longer part of the ridge. It looked, in fact, like a hill-fort, with a
large enclosure for cattle around it.
Just below the north-east angle of the inner fort, and where the lower
circuit is about to leave it, there is an entrance, with a massive
projection of huge stones, looking like a square tower, on its right side,
so as to defend it from attack. The most remarkable feature in the walls
are the covered galleries, constructed within them at the south-east
angle. The whole thickness of the wall is often over twenty feet, and in
the centre a rude arched way is made—or rather, I believe, two parallel
ways; but the inner gallery has fallen in, and is almost untraceable—and
this merely by piling together the great stones so as to leave an opening,
which narrows at the top in the form of a Gothic arch. Within the passage
there are five niches in the outer side, made of rude arches, in the same
way as the main passage. The length of the gallery I measured, and found
it twenty-five yards, at the end of which it is regularly walled up, so
that it evidently did not run all the way round. The niches are now no
longer open, but seem to have been once windows, or at least to have had
some look-out points into the hill country.
[Illustration: Gallery at Tiryns]
It is remarkable that, although the walls are made of perfectly rude
stones, the builders have managed to use so many smooth surfaces looking
outward, that the face of the wall seems quite clean and well-built.(162)
At the south-east corner of the higher and inner level we found a large
block of red granite, quite different from the rough gray stone of the
building, with its surface square and smooth, and all the four sides
neatly bevelled, like the portal stones at the treasury of Atreus. I found
two other similar blocks close by, which were likewise cut smooth on the
surface, and afterward, in company with Dr. Schliemann, a large Doric
capital. The intention of these stones we could not guess, but they show
that some ornament, and some more finished work, must have once existed in
or near the inner building. Though both the main entrances have massive
towers of stone raised on their right, there is a small postern at the
opposite or west side, not more than four feet wide, which has no defences
whatever, and is a mere hole in the wall.
The whole ruin was covered in summer with thistles, such as English people
can hardly imagine. The needles at the points of the leaves are fully an
inch long, extremely fine and strong, and sharper than any two-edged
sword. No clothes except a leather dress can resist them. They pierce
everywhere with the most stinging pain, and make antiquarian research in
this famous spot a veritable martyrdom, which can only be supported by a
very burning love for knowledge, or the sure hope of future fame. The
rough masses of stone are so loose that one’s footing is insecure, and
when the traveller loses his balance, and falls among the thistles, he
will wish that he had gone to Jericho instead, or even fallen among
thieves on the way.
Such was the aspect of Tiryns when I visited it in the years 1875 and in
1877. In 1884 I went there again with Dr. Schliemann, who was uncovering
the palace on the height. The results of his discoveries are so important
that I shall review them in another chapter.
We rode down from Mycenæ to Argos late in the evening, along the broad and
limpid stream of the river Inachus, which made us wonder at the old epic
epithet, _very thirsty_, given to this celebrated plain.(163) Though the
night was getting dark, we could see and smell great fields of wild
rose-red oleander, blooming along the river banks, very like the
rhododendrons of our demesnes. And, though not a bird was to be heard, the
tettix, so dear to the old Greeks, and so often the theme of their poets,
was making the land echo with its myriad chirping. Aristophanes speaks of
it as crying out with mad love of the noonday sun.(164) We found it no
less eager and busy in late twilight, and far into the night. I can quite
understand how the old Greek, who hated silence, and hated solitude still
more, loved this little creature, which kept him company even in the time
of sleep, and gave him all the feelings of cheerfulness and homeliness
which we northerns, in our wretched climate, must seek from the cricket at
the fireside.
At ten o’clock we rode into the curious dark streets of Argos, and, after
some difficulty, were shown to the residence of M. Papalexopoulos, who
volunteered to be our host—a medical man of education and ability, who, in
spite of a very recent family bereavement, opened his house to the
stranger, and entertained us with what may well be called in that country
real splendor. I may notice that he alone, of all the country residents
whom we met, gave us wine not drenched with resin—a very choice and
remarkable red wine, for which the plain of Argos is justly celebrated. In
this comfortable house we slept, I may say, in solitary grandeur, and
awoke in high spirits, without loss or damage, to visit the wonders of
this old centre of legend and of history.
It is very easy to see why all the Greek myths have placed the earliest
empires, the earliest arts, and the earliest conquests, in the plains of
Argolis. They speak, too, of this particular plain having the benefit of
foreign settlers and of foreign skill. If we imagine, as we must do, the
older knowledge of the East coming up by way of Cyprus and Crete into
Greek waters, there can be no doubt that the first exploring mariners,
reaching the barren island of Cerigo, and the rocky shore of Laconia,
would feel their way up this rugged and inhospitable coast, till they
suddenly came in sight of the deep bay of Argolis, stretching far into the
land, with a broad plain and alluvial soil beyond its deepest recess.
Here, first, they would find a suitable landing-place, and a country fit
for tillage; and here, accordingly, we should expect to find, as we
actually do, the oldest relics of habitation, beyond the huts of wandering
shepherds or of savages. So the legend tells us that Cyclopes came from
Lycia to King Prœtus of Argos, or rather of the Argive plain, and built
him the giant fort of Tiryns.(165)
This was evidently the oldest great settlement. Then, by some change of
fortune, it seems that Mycenæ grew in importance, not impossibly because
of the unhealthy site of Tiryns, where the surroundings are now low and
marshy, and were, probably, even more so in those days. But the epoch of
Mycenæ’s greatness also passed away in historical times; and the third
city in this plain came forward as its ruler—Argos, built under the huge
Larissa, or hill-fort, which springs out from the surrounding mountains,
and stands like an outpost over the city.(166) Even now it is still an
important town, and maintains, in the midst of its smiling and
well-cultivated plain, a certain air of brightness and prosperity which is
seldom to be seen elsewhere through the country.
We went first to visit the old theatre, certainly the most beautifully
situated,(167) and one of the largest I had ever seen. It is far finer
than even that of Syracuse, and whoever has seen this latter will know
what such a statement implies. If the Greek theatre at Syracuse has a view
of the great harbor and the coast around, this view can only have been
made interesting by crowded shipping and flitting sails, for the whole
incline of the country is very gradual, and not even the fort of Ortygia
presents any bold or striking outline.
The Argive theatre was built to hold an enormous audience. We counted
sixty-six tiers of seats, in four divisions—thus differing from the
description of Colonel Leake, which we had before us at the time. As he
observes, there may be more seats still covered with rubbish at the
bottom—indeed this, like all the rest of Argos, ought to yield a rich
harvest to the antiquarian, being still almost virgin soil, and never yet
ransacked with any care. From the higher seats of the theatre of Argos,
which rise much steeper than those of Syracuse, there is a most enchanting
prospect to the right, over a splendid rich plain, covered, when we first
saw it, with the brilliant emerald-green of young vines and tobacco
plants, varied with the darker hue of plane-trees and cypresses. After the
wilderness through which we had passed this prospect was intensely
delightful. Straight before us, and to the left, was the deep blue bay of
Argolis, with the white fortifications of Nauplia crowning its picturesque
Acropolis. All around us, in every other direction, was a perfect
amphitheatre of lofty mountains. This bay is, for its size, the most
beautiful I ever saw, and the opinion which we then formed was
strengthened by a sunset view of it from the other side—from Nauplia—which
was, if possible, even finer, and combined all the elements which are
conceivable in a perfect landscape. Near the theatre there is a remnant of
Cyclopean building, apparently the angle of a wall, made of huge uncut
blocks, like those at Tiryns. There are said to be some similar
substructures on the Larissa, which is, however, itself a mediæval ruin,
and therefore, to us, of slight interest.
All the children about brought us coins, of every possible date and
description, but were themselves more interesting than their coins. For
here, in southern Greece, in a very hot climate, in a level plain, every
second child is fair, with blue eyes, and looks like a transplanted
northern, and not like the offspring of a southern race. After the deep
brown Italian children, which strike the traveller by their southernness
all the way from Venice to Reggio, nothing is more curious than these
fairer children, under a sunnier and hotter sky; and it reminds the
student at once how, even in Homer, yellow hair and a fair complexion is
noted as belonging to the King of Sparta. This type seems to me common
wherever there has not arisen a mixed population, such as that of Athens
or Syra, and where the inhabitants appear to live as they have done for
centuries. Fallmerayer’s cleverness and undoubted learning persuaded many
people, and led many more to suspect, that the old Greek race was
completely gone, and that the present people were a mixture of Turks,
Albanians, and Slavs. To this many answers suggest themselves,—to me,
above all things, the strange and accurate resemblances in character
between ancient and modern Greeks,—resemblances which permeate all their
life and habits.
But this is a kind of evidence not easily stated in a brief form, and
consists after all of a large number of minute details. The real
refutation of Fallmerayer’s theory consists in exposing the alleged
evidence upon which it rests. He puts forth with great confidence
citations from MS. authorities at Athens, which have not been verified;
nay, he is even proved to have been the dupe of some clever forgeries. A
careful examination of the scanty allusions to the state of Greece during
the time of its supposed _Slavisation_, and the evidences obtained from
the lives of the Greek saints who belong to this epoch, have proved to
demonstration that the country was never wholly occupied by foreigners, or
deserted by its old population. The researches of Ross, Ellissen, and
lastly of Hopf,(168) have really set the matter at rest; but,
unfortunately, English students will for some time to come be misled by
the evident leaning of Finlay toward the Slav hypothesis. As has been
fairly remarked by later critics, Finlay did not test the documents cited
by Fallmerayer; and until this was done, the case seemed conclusive enough
for the total devastation of Greece during four hundred years, and its
occupation by a new population. But all this is now relegated to the
sphere of fable. There is, of course, a large admixture of Slavs and
Albanians in the country; the constant invasions and partial conquests for
several centuries could not but introduce it. Still, Greece has remained
Greek in the main, and the foreigners have not been able to hold their own
against the stronger nationality of the true Hellenes.
Another weighty argument seems to me to be from language.(169) There is
really very little difference between the language of Plato and that of
the present Greeks. There is, of course, development and decay, there are
changes of idiom and corruptions of form, there are a good many Slav
names, but the language is essentially the same. The present Greek will
read the old classics with the same trouble with which our peasants could
read Chaucer. It is, in fact, most remarkable, assuming that they are the
same people, how their language has not changed more. Had the invaders
during the Middle Ages really become the main body of the population, how
is it that they abandoned their own tongue, and adopted that of the
Greeks? Surely there must be at least a fusion of different tongues, if
the population were considerably leavened. There are still Albanian
districts in Greece. They are to be found even in Attica, and close to
Athens. But these populations are still tolerably distinct from the
Greeks; their language is quite different, and unintelligible to Greeks
who have not learned it.
Again, the Greek language is not one which spread itself easily among
foreigners, nor did it give rise to a number of daughter languages, like
the Latin. In many Hellenic colonies, barbarians learned to speak Greek
with the Greeks, and to adopt their language at the time; but in all these
cases, when the Greek influence vanished the Greek language decayed, and
finally made way for the old tongue which it had temporarily displaced.
Thus the evidence of history seems to suggest that no foreigners were ever
really able to make that subtle tongue their own; and even now we can feel
the force of what Aristotle says—that however well a stranger might speak,
you could recognize him at once by his use of the particles.
These considerations seem to me conclusive that, whatever admixtures may
have taken place, the main body of the people are what their language
declares them to be, essentially Greeks. Any careful observer will not
fail to see through the wilder parts of the Morea types and forms equal to
those which inspired the old artists. There are still among the shepherd
boys splendid lads who would adorn a Greek gymnasium, or excite the praise
of all Greece at the Olympian games. There are still maidens fit to carry
the sacred basket of Athene. Above all, there are still many old men fit
to be chosen for their stalwart beauty to act as _thallophori_ in the
Panathenaic procession.
These thoughts often struck us as we went through the narrow and crowded
streets of Argos, in search of the peculiar produce of the place—raw
silks, rich-colored carpets and rugs, and ornamental shoes in dull red
“morocco” leather.
We were taken to see the little museum of the town—then a very small one,
with a single inscription, and eight or ten pieces of sculpture. But the
inscription, which is published, is exceedingly clear and legible, and the
fragments of sculpture are all both peculiar and excellent. There is a
female head of great beauty, about half life-size, and from the best, or
certainly a very good, period of Greek art, which has the curious
peculiarity of one eye being larger than the other. It is not merely the
eyeball, but the whole setting of the eye, which is slightly enlarged, nor
does it injure the general effect. The gentlemen who showed this head to
me, and who were all very enthusiastic about it, had indeed not noticed
this feature, but recognized it at once when pointed out to them. Beside
this trunkless head is a headless trunk of equal beauty—a female figure
without arms, and draped with exquisite grace, in a manner closely
resembling the famous Venus of Melos. The figure has one foot slightly
raised, and set upon a duck, as is quite plain from the general form of
the bird, though the webbed feet are much worn away, and the head gone. M.
Émile Burnouf told me that this attribute of a duck would determine it to
be either Athene or Artemis. If so, the general style of the figure, which
is very young and slight, speaks in favor of its being an Artemis. I trust
photographs of this excellent statue may soon be made, and that it may
become known to art students in Europe.
We also noticed a relief larger than life, on a square block of white
marble, of the head of Medusa. The face is calm and expressionless,
exactly the reverse of Lionardo da Vinci’s matchless painting, but archaic
in character, and of good and clear workmanship. The head-dress, which has
been finished only on the right side, is very peculiar, and consists of
large scales starting from the forehead, and separating into two plaits,
which become serpents’ bodies, and descend in curves as low as the chin,
then turning upward and outward again, till they end in well-formed
serpents’ heads. The left serpent is carved out perfectly in relief, but
not covered with scales.
I was unable to obtain any trustworthy account of the finding of these
marbles, but they were all fresh discoveries, especially the Medusa head,
which had been only lately brought to the museum, when we were first at
Argos. Future visitors will find this valuable collection much increased;
and here in this important town it is advisable that there should be a
local museum.
If we look at Dorian art, as contrasted with Ionian, there can be no doubt
that the earliest centre was Corinth in the Peloponnesus, to which various
discoveries in art are specially ascribed. In architecture, there were
many leading ideas, such as the setting up of clay figures in the tympanum
of their temples, and the use of panels or soffits, as they were called,
in ceilings, which came first from Corinth. But when we descend to
better-known times, there are three other Dorian states which quite
eclipse Corinth, I suppose because the trading instinct, as is sometimes
the case, crushed out or weakened her enthusiasm for art. These states are
Ægina, Sikyon, and Argos. Sikyon rose to greatness under the gentle and
enlightened despotism of Orthagoras and his family, of whom it was noticed
that they retained their sovereignty longer than any other dynasty of
despots in Greece. Ægina seems to have disputed the lead with Corinth as a
commercial mart, from the days of Pheidon, whose coinage of money was
always said to have been first practised at Ægina.(170) The prominence of
Ægina in Pindar’s Epinikian Odes shows not only how eagerly men practised
athletics, and loved renown there, but how well able they were to pay for
expensive monuments of their fame. Their position in the Persian war,
among the bravest of the Greeks, corroborates the former part of my
statement; the request of an Ionian Greek lady, captured in the train of
Mardonius, to be transported to Ægina, adds evidence for the second, as it
shows that, to a person of this description, Ægina was the field for a
rich harvest, and we wonder how its reputation can have been greater in
this respect than that of Corinth.(171) But, a short time after, the rise
of the Athenian naval power crushed the greatness of Ægina, and it sank
into insignificance, and was absorbed into the Attic power.
Thus Sikyon and Argos remained, and it was precisely these two towns which
produced a special school of art, of which Polycletus was the most
distinguished representative. Dorian sculpture had originally started with
figures of athletes, which were dedicated at the temples, and were a sort
of collateral monument to the odes of poets—more durable, no doubt, in the
minds of the offerers, but, as time has shown, perishable and gone, while
the winged words of the poet have not lost even the first bloom of their
freshness. However, in contrast to the flowing robes and
delicately-chiselled features of the Ionic school, the Dorians reproduced
the naked human figure with great accuracy; while in the face they adhered
to a stiff simplicity, regardless of individual features, and still more
regardless of any expression save that of a vacant smile. This type, found
in its most perfect development in the Æginetan marbles, was what lay
before Polycletus, when he rose to greatness. He was the contemporary and
rival of Phidias, and is said to have defeated him in a competition for
the temple of Hera at Samos, where two or three of the greatest sculptors
modelled a wounded Amazon, and Polycletus was adjudged the first place.
There is some probability that one of the Amazons now in the Vatican is a
copy of this famous work; and, in spite of a clumsily-restored head and
arms, we can see in this figure the great simplicity and truth of the
artist in treating a rather ungrateful subject—that of a very powerful and
muscular woman.
The Argive school, owing to its traditions, affected single figures much
more than groups; and this, no doubt, was the main contrast between
Polycletus and Phidias—that, however superior the Argive might be in a
single figure, the genius of the Athenian was beyond all comparison in
using sculpture for groups and processions as an adjunct to architecture.
But there was also in the sitting statue of Zeus, at Olympia, a certain
majesty which seems not to have been equalled by any other known sculptor.
The Attic artist who appears, however, to have been much nearer to
Polycletus in style was Myron, whose _Discobolus_ has reached us in some
splendid copies, and who seems to have had all the Dorian taste for
representing single athletic figures with more life and more daring action
about them than was attempted by Polycletus.(172)
Herodotus notices somewhere that, at a certain period, the Argives were
the most renowned in Greece for music. It is most unfortunate that our
knowledge of this branch of Greek art is so fragmentary that we are wholly
unable to tell in what the Argive proficiency consisted. We are never told
that the Doric scale was there invented; but, very possibly, they may have
taken the lead among their brethren in this direction also, for it is well
known that the Spartans, though excellent judges, depended altogether upon
foreigners to make music for them, and thought it not gentlemanly to do
more than criticise.
The drive from Argos to Nauplia leads by Tiryns, then by a great marsh,
which is most luxuriously covered with green and with various flowers, and
then along a good road all the way into the important and stirring town of
Nauplia. This place, which was one of the oldest settlements, as is proved
by Pelasgic walls and tombs high up on the overhanging cliffs, was always
through history known as the port of Argos, and is so still, though it
rose under the Turks to the dignity of capital of the whole province of
Greece. The citadel has at all times been considered almost impregnable.
The situation of the town is exceptionally beautiful, even for a Greek
town; and the sunset behind the Arcadian mountains, seen from Nauplia,
with the gulf in the foreground, is a view which no man can ever forget.
A coasting steamer, which goes right round all the Peloponnesus, took us
up with a great company, which was hurrying to Athens for the elections,
and carried us round the coast of Argolis, stopping at the several ports
on the way. This method of seeing either Greece or Italy is highly to be
commended, and it is a great pity that so many people adhere strictly to
the quickest and most obvious route, so missing many of the really
characteristic features in the country which they desire to study. Thus
the Italian coasting steamers, which go up from Messina by Naples to
Genoa, touch at many not insignificant places (such as Gaeta), which no
ordinary tourist ever sees, and which are nevertheless among the most
beautiful in all the country. The same may be said of the sail from
Nauplia to Athens, which leads you to Spezza, Hydra, or Idra, as they now
call it, to Poros and to Ægina, all very curious and interesting places to
visit.
[Illustration: The Palamedi, Nauplia]
The island of Hydra was, in old days, a mere barren rock, scarcely
inhabited, and would probably never have changed its reputation but for a
pirate settlement in a very curious little harbor, with a very narrow
entrance, which faces the main shore of Argolis. As you sail along the
straight coast line, there seems no break or indentation, when suddenly,
as if by magic, the rocky shore opens for about twenty yards, at a spot
marked by several caves in the face of the cliff, and lets you see into a
circular harbor of very small dimensions, with an amphitheatre of rich and
well-built houses rising up all round the bay. Though the water is very
deep, there is actually no room for a large fleet, and there seems not a
yard of level ground, except where terraces have been artificially made.
High rocks on both sides of the narrow entrance hide all prospect of the
town, except from the point directly opposite the entrance.
The Hydriotes, who were rich merchants, and, I suppose, successful pirates
in the Turkish days, were never enslaved, but kept their liberty and their
wealth by paying a tribute to the Porte. They developed a trading power
which reminds one strongly of the old Greek cities; and so faithful were
they to one another that it was an ordinary habit for citizens to entrust
all their savings to a captain starting for a distant port, to be laid out
by him to the best advantage. It is said that they were never defrauded of
their profits. The Turks may, perhaps, have thought that by gentle
treatment they would secure the fidelity of the Hydriotes, whose wealth
and power depended much on Turkish protection; but they were greatly
mistaken. There was, indeed, some hesitation among the islanders, when the
War of Liberation broke out, what part they should take; for during the
great Napoleonic wars the Hydriotes, sailing under the neutral flag of
Turkey, had made enormous profits by carrying trade among the
belligerents. They lived in great luxury. With the peace of 1815, and the
reopening of the French and other ports to English ships, these profits
disappeared, and the extravagant hopes of the Hydriotes ended in
bankruptcy. This was probably a main cause of their patriotism. However,
by far the most brilliant feats in the war were those performed by the
Hydriote sailors, who remind one very much of the Zealanders in the wars
of Holland against the Spanish power. Whether their bravery has been
exaggerated is hard to say: this, at all events, is clear, that they
earned the respect and admiration of the whole nation, nor is there any
nobility so recognized in Greek society as descent from the Hydriote
chiefs who fought for the Liberation.
With the rise of the nation the wealth and importance of Hydra has
strangely decayed. Probably the Peiræus, with its vast advantages, has
naturally regained its former predominance, now that every part of the
coast and every port are equally free. Still, the general style and way of
living at Hydra reminds one of old times; and if the island itself be
sterile, the rich slopes of the opposite coast, covered with great groves
of lemon-trees, are owned by the wealthy descendants of the old merchants.
The neighboring island of Spezza, where the steamer waits, and a crowd of
picturesque people come out in quaint boats to give and take cargo, has a
history very parallel to that of Hydra. It is to be noted that the
population of both islands is rather Albanian than Greek. A few hours
brings the steamer past Poros and through narrow passages among islands to
Ægina, as they now call it. We have here an island whose history is
precisely the reverse of that of Hydra. The great days of Ægina (as I
mentioned above) were in very old times, from the age of Pheidon of Argos,
in the seventh century B. C., up to the rise of Athens’s democracy and
navy, when this splendid centre of literature, art, and commerce was
absorbed in the greater Athenian empire.
There is at present a considerable town on the coast, and some cultivation
on the hills; but the whole aspect of the island is very rocky and barren,
and as it can hardly ever have been otherwise, we feel at once that the
early greatness of Ægina was, like that of Hydra in the last century, a
purely commercial greatness. The people are very hospitable and
interesting. Nowhere in Greece did I see more apparent remains of the
purest Greek type. Our hostess, in particular, was worthy to take her
place in the Parthenon frieze, and among the children playing on the quay
there were faces of marvellous beauty.
With enterprise and diligence, a trading nation or city may readily become
great in a small island or barren coast, and no phenomenon in history
proves this more strongly than the vast empire of the Phœnicians, who seem
never to have owned more than a bare tract of a few miles about Tyre and
Sidon. They were, in fact, a great people without a country. The Venetians
similarly raised an empire on a salt marsh, and at one time owned many
important possessions on Greek coasts and islands, without “any visible
means of subsistence,” as they say in the police courts. In the same way,
Pericles thought nothing of the possession of Attica, provided the
Athenians could hold their city walls and their harbors. He knew that with
a maritime supremacy they must necessarily be lords of so vast a stretch
of coasts and islands that the barren hills of Attica might be completely
left out of account.
There is yet another and a very interesting way from Nauplia to Ægina,
which may be strongly recommended to the traveller who does not arrive in
due time to catch the weekly steamer. Horses can be hired at Nauplia,
which can perform, in about seven hours, the journey to the little village
of Epidauros (now pronounced _Epídavros_). Here a boat can be obtained,
which, with a fair wind, can reach Ægina in three, and the Peiræus in
about six hours. But, like all boating expeditions, this trip is
uncertain, and may be thwarted by either calm or storm.
[Illustration: Sculptured Lion, Nauplia]
We left Nauplia on a very fine morning, while the shepherds from the
country were going through the streets, shouting _γάλα_, and serving out
their milk from skins, of which they held the neck in one hand, and
loosened their hold slightly to pour it into the vessel brought to them by
the customer. These picturesque people—men, women, and children—seem to
drive an active trade, and yet are not, I believe, to be found in the
streets of any other Greek town.
The way through the Argolic country is rough and stony, not unlike in
character to the ride from Corinth to Mycenæ, but more barren, and for the
most part less picturesque. On some of the hilltops are old ruins, with
fine remains of masonry, apparently old Greek work. The last two or three
hours of the journey are, however, particularly beautiful, as the path
goes along the course of a rich glen, in which a tumbling river hurries
toward the sea. This glen is full of verdure and of trees. We saw it in
the richest moment of a southern spring, when all the trees were bursting
into leaf, or decked with varied bloom. It was the home, too, of thrushes,
and many other singing birds, which filled the air with music—as it were a
rich variation upon the monotonous sound of the murmuring river. There is
no sweeter concert than this in nature, no union of sight and sound which
fills the heart of the stranger in such a solitude with deeper gladness. I
know no fitter exodus from the beautiful Morea—a farewell journey which
will dwell upon the memory, and banish from the mind all thoughts of
discomfort and fatigue.
In the picturesque little land-locked bay of Epidavros there was a
good-sized fishing-boat riding at anchor, which we immediately chartered
to convey us to Athens. The skipper took some time to gather a crew, and
to obtain the necessary papers from the local authorities, but after some
pressure on our part we got under weigh with a fair wind, and ran out of
the harbor into the broad rock-studded sheet of water which separates
Argolis from Ægina, and from the more distant coast of Attica. There is no
more delightful or truly Greek mode of travelling than to run through
islands and under rocky coasts in these boats, which are roomy and
comfortable, and, being decked, afford fair shelter from shower or spray.
But presently the wind began to increase from the north-west, and our
skipper to hesitate whether it were safe to continue the journey. He
proposed to run into the harbor of Ægina for the night. We acquiesced
without demur, and went at a great pace to our new destination. But no
sooner had we come into the harbor, and cast anchor, so that the boat lay
steady with her head to the wind, than another somewhat larger boat which
came sailing in after us ran right into her amidships. The shock started
up all my companions, who were lying asleep in the bottom of the boat, and
the situation looked rather desperate, for we were in the middle of a
large harbor, a long way from land. It was night, and blowing hard, and
all our crew betook themselves to weeping and praying, while the other
boat did her best to sheer off and leave us to our fate. However, some of
us climbed into her by the bow-sprit, which lay across our deck, while
others got up the baggage, and proceeded to examine at what pace the water
was coming in. A boat from the shore came out in time to take us off
safely, but when we had landed our skipper gravely proposed that we should
pay for the boat, as she was injured in our service! Of course, we laughed
him to scorn, and having found at Ægina a steam-launch belonging to
Captain Miaoulis, then Minister of Marine, we went in search of him, and
besought him to take us next day to the Peiræus. The excellent man not
only granted our request, but entertained us on the way with the most
interesting anecdotes of his stay in England as a boy, when he came with
his father to seek assistance from our country during the War of
Liberation. Thus we came into the Peiræus, not as shipwrecked outcasts,
but under the protection of one of the most gallant and distinguished
officers of the Greek navy.
A great point of interest among newly-discovered sites is the great temple
and theatre of Epidaurus, which I did not visit, on account of an epidemic
of small-pox—_εὐφλογία_ they call it, euphemistically. The very journey to
this place is worth making, on account of its intensely characteristic
features. You start from Athens in a coasting steamer full of natives, who
carry with them their food and beds, and camp on deck where it pleases
them, regardless of class. You see all the homeliness of ordinary life
obtruded upon you without seeking it, instead of intruding upon others to
find it; and you can study not only the country, but the people, at great
leisure. But the ever-varying beauty of the scene leaves little time for
other studies. The boat passes along Ægina, and rounds the promontory of
Kalauria—the death-scene of Demosthenes—into the land-locked bay of Poros,
where lay the old Trœzen and Hermione along the fruitful shore, surrounded
by an amphitheatre of lofty mountains. The sea is like a fair inland lake,
studded with white sails, and framed with the rich green of vines and figs
and growing corn. Even the rows of tall solemn cypresses can suggest no
gloom in such a landscape. From here it is but a short ride to the famous
temple of Æsculapius, though most people go from Nauplia, as I once did in
former years, before the discoveries were made which now attract the
student.
The excavations of the Greek archæological society have laid bare at least
three principal buildings in connection with the famous spot; the old
temple of the god, the theatre, and the famous _tholos_, a circular
building, in which those who had been healed of diseases set up votive
tablets. The extraordinary size and splendor of the theatre—Pausanias says
it was far the finest in Greece—rather contrasts with the dimensions of
the temple, and suggests that most of the patients who came were able to
enjoy themselves, or else that many people came for pleasure, and not on
serious business. The remains discovered are particularly valuable for the
good preservation of the stage, but of this I can only speak at second
hand. So also the circular building, which was erected under the
supervision of the famous Polycletus, the great Argive sculptor, a rival
of Phidias, has many peculiar features, and shows in one more instance
that what earlier art critics assumed as modern was based on older
classical models. Circular buildings supported on pillars were thought
rather Græco-Roman than Greek, but here we see that, like the builders of
the Odeon of Pericles, of the later Philippeion at Olympia, so the
Epidaurians had this form before them from early days. Inside the outer
row of Doric pillars was a second circle of pillars, apparently Ionic as
to proportions and fluting, but the capitals were Corinthian, so that this
feature also in architecture has a venerable antiquity, and was not
Græco-Roman, as was once supposed. For a long time the so-called Lantern
of Demosthenes, built for Lysicrates at Athens in 335 B. C., when
Alexander was leading his army into Asia, was considered the oldest, and
perhaps the only pure Greek example of the Corinthian capital. People
began to hesitate when a solitary specimen was found in the famous temple
of Bassæ, where it could hardly have been imported in later days. Now the
evidence is completed, and in this respect the historians of art are
correcting the rash generalization of their predecessors.