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of that Emperor, but from the division of the seats into 13 compartments (kepkides), answering to the number of the tribes into which the Athenians were divided when his desire of identifying himself with the city which he boasted of having rebuilt induced him to add to the original 12 another bearing his own name.

The excavations in 1862, however, showed that this was not the last change or restoration which the Dionysiac theatre underwent. Within the limits of the orchestra proper, was disclosed the front of a stage built up in a very unworkmanlike style from marbles

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of Christianity by a restoration of the already doomed rites of paganism. The same excavations laid bare also a wall of the Roman period in front of the first row of seats, which served, in all probability, to fence in the orchestra when it had been degraded into an arena for those contests of men and beasts which replaced the intellectual enjoyments of the drama. There were also found many still later remains of the Frank and Turkish ages, showing that the orchestra was then used as a reservoir of water, and even for a lime-kiln, fed by the marble relics of art so profusely scattered around.

of the University of Athens, published in the Archæological Journal' of that city, in 1862.*

Every Greek theatre consisted of three chief parts: 1, the orchestra, where the chorus made its evolutions; 2, the body of the theatre (koîλov, cavea), occupied by the spectators; 3, the stage (σkny).

In the Athenian' theatre the orchestra is in the form of a semicircle, of which the circumference at each end of the diameter is produced in two straight lines into an apsidal form. In the centre of the semicircle we may see the spot where stood the altar of Dionysus (Ovuéλn) round which the chorus moved, but which in Roman times was superseded by a marble pillar. The middle of the floor of the orchestra is paved with small pieces of grey marble, arranged in the shape of a parallelogram and sloping slightly towards the Ovuéλn, so as to carry off the rain, and the blood which flowed from the sacrificial altar. The thick wall which fences in the front row of

But the traveller will gladly pass over all these vicissitudes to go back in imagination to better times. On these seats, under the canopy of an Athenian sky, looking over the plain towards the sea, embraced by the heights of Salamis, Ægina, and Hymettus, he will not fail to realize the powerful local influences whose effect on poet, actor, and spectator, combined to produce the unparalleled spec-seats from the orchestra, was probably tacle of an Athenian drama.

"Then what golden hours were for us
While we sate together there,

How the white vests of the chorus
Seem'd to wave up a live air!
How the cothorns trod majestic
Down the deep iambic lines,
And the rolling anapastic

Curled like vapour over shrines !
Oh, our Eschylus the thunderous,

How he drove the bolted breath
Through the cloud, to wedge it ponderous
In the gnarled oak beneath!
Oh, our Sophocles the royal,

Who was born to monarch's place,
And who made the whole world loyal,
Less by kingly power than grace!
Our Euripides, the human,

With his droppings of warm tears,
And his touches of things common
Till they rose to touch the spheres!"

E. B. Browning Wine of Cyprus.' Though the labours of 1862 have done much to discover the theatre, there is still great obscurity enveloping the many ruins around it. For the plan annexed, as well as for the general theory and explanations contained in this article, the reader is indebted to the papers which appeared from the learned pen of Professor Rousopoulos,

erected after the Greek chorus had been supplanted by the combatants of the arena. The whole stage of Phædrus (as marked in the plan) was found behind the proscenium which now remains within the orchestra, or, more properly speaking, within the area of its two open side-entrances (Tápodo) for the chorus and spectators, which were ornamented with statues of poets and other appropriate personages. The greater part of these encroachments has, however, been removed, and the front wall or proscenium of the stage of Phædrus alone remains as it was found, the other fragments behind being those of the stages of the earlier theatres.

2. The theatre proper, where the audience sat (konov, cavea), consists of concentric tiers of seats radiating in the shape of a fan from the diameter of the orchestra up to a road nearly parallel to the line of the pro

These have been embodied in this paper by Mr. Charles Cookson, to whom the thanks of the editor of this work are due.

scenium which shut them in on the N. nearly at the foot of the cavea, below the S. wall of the Acropolis. It is divided by 13 flights of steps cut in the rock into as many compartments, answering to the 13 tribes in the time of Hadrian, of the form of truncated cones (called Kеркides, from their resemblance to the web stretched in the loom), the lowest tier of these compartments being occupied by thrones of Pentelic marble (67 in all, five in front of each compartment except at the two extreme wings, where there are six to each), forming the places of honour (πpoedpía) for religious and other official dignitaries. In the centre of the middle compartment (assigned to the tribe of Hadrian) is the beautifully carved throne of the priest of Dionysus, the giver of freedom (Atovéσov Exevbepéws). Behind these are the seats of Peiraic marble for the rest of the people of Athens. The present arrangement of these compartments, as well as the inscriptions on the scats, belong, as has been observed before, to the period of the supposed restoration by Hadrian, whose statue is conjectured to have been placed in each compartment. Those skilled in such matters will have no difficulty in recognizing the difference in the character of the writing on the seats, on some of which the ancient inscriptions have been effaced to make way for others of the Roman period.

It was usual in great theatres for the compartments of the cavea to be divided laterally by semicircular zones (diaCauara); but if any such divisions existed in this theatre, the traces of them are not now visible.

| the stage constructed by Phædrus, and in front of the stage runs the proscenium, supporting the stage from which the actors spoke (Aoyeîov, okρißás, pulpitum). This proscenium is faced with 4 slabs of marble containing basreliefs, on the centre of which is a collossal figure of Silenus in the position of an Atlas supporting the stage, and remarkable for the excellence of the workmanship of the beard and hair which covers the breast and the lower limbs, as well as for the general power and effectiveness of its outlines. This figure, probably of the Macedonian period, appears to have been transferred to its present position by Phadrus, and part of the stage to have been cut away to admit it. The other figures on each side are probably of different ages, as they certainly are of different degrees of excellence. For the explanation of the other remains behind the proscenium the reader is referred to the plan.

On the E. and W. sides of the whole area of the theatre, from the extremities of the two side entrances, the exterior wall ran N. and S. up to the road which closed it in on the N. at the foot of the wall of the Acropolis. This wall may possibly have enclosed covered porticoes.

The dimensions of the theatre, as taken from the scale in the plan of Mr. Rousopoulos, are as follow:

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Breadth from E. to W. external wall at broadest ..

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3. Thus far the present condition of the remains leaves little doubt as to the general plan of the theatre. But when we come to the third division, of diameter of orchestra 11 Proscenium of Phædrus 11 the covered stage (σkný), it is imDo. of Lycurgus 13 possible with certainty to distinguish Height of stage of Phædrus 1 40the age and nature of the ruins in front of the orchestra: though the theory indicated in the plan of Mr. Rousopoulos has generally been accepted as correct. From the level of the orchestra there was an ascent to

The cave above the centre of the theatre is supposed to have been originally chiselled out in the Pelasgic ages. It was converted by Thrasyllus (B.c. 411) into an Ionic temple in com

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cant portions. It is built partly of brick and partly of magnesian limestone, the interior having been faced with marble. The statue at the western entrance is conjectured to be that of Herodes, the father of Herodes Atticus. Of this personage the story is told, that having informed the emperor that he had found treasure, he received in reply an injunction to use it, and that on his then writing to say that it exceeded the measure of his wants, the Emperor replied, "Then abuse it." Behind the Odeum, i. e. between it and the Acropolis, is the supposed site of the temple of Esculapius, which, according to Pausanias, contained statues of Dionysus and his children, and pictures worthy of inspection.

Leaving the Odeum and passing a little to westwards of the Acropolis, we come to

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Theatre of Dionysus, from a Coin now in the full of an interest not mainly derived 17. The Areopagus, a locality to us

British Museum.

Westwards of the theatre is a wall supported on arches of very late and irregular construction, the sub-basement, probably, of a covered stoa, connecting the theatre with

from the associations of ancient Athens. Not, however, that it is devoid of such interest. Pausanias thus describes it:-"Not far distant [from the cave of Apollo and Pan] is the Areopagus, so called because Mars was the first person here tried for the murder of Halirrhothius. Here is an altar of Minerva Areia dedicated by Orestes, on escaping punishment for the murder of his mother. Here also are 2 rude stones, upon one of which the accuser stands, and upon the other the defendant. Near this place is the sanctuary of the goddesses called Semnæ, but whom Hesiod in the Theogonia names Erinnyes. Eschylus was the first to represent them with snakes in their hair; but here the statues have nothing ferocious in their aspect, nor have those of the other subterranean deities here represented, namely, Pluto, Hermes, and the Earth."

16. The Odeum of Herodes or Regilla, situated beneath the southern wall of the Acropolis at the western extremity, which was built by Herodes Atticus in the time of the Antonines, in honour of his deceased wife Regilla. Pausanias, who did not mention it in his description of Athens, because it was not built at the time of his visit, subsequently remarks that it surpassed all other Odeia in Greece. The roofing of so large a building required great architectural skill, and excited the greater admiration as having been of cedar. The diameter within the walls was about 240 ft., and it seems to have been capable of holding 6000 persons. There are very Leake says, p. 165, "The identity considerable remains of the building; of the Areopagus with that rocky but as Mure remarks, it loses in ap- height which is separated only from pearance, owing to the rows of small the western end of the Acropolis by a and apparently useless arches which hollow, forming a communication bebreak up the masses into insignifi-tween the northern and southern divi

sions of the ancient city, is found in the words of Pausanias (above quoted), and in the remark of Herodotus that it was a height over against the Acropolis from whence the Persians assailed the western end of the Acropolis; and in the lines of Eschylus, describing the position of the camp of the Amazons (Eumenid. 689). Nor ought we to neglect the strong traditional evidence afforded by the church of Dionysius the Areopagite, of which the ruins were seen by Wheler and Spon at the foot of the height of the N.E. side."

Mars' hill is thus described by Wordsworth, p. 74 :-" Sixteen stone steps cut in the rock at its S.W. angle lead up to the hill of the Areopagus from the valley of the Agora. This angle seems to be the point of the hill on which the Council of the Areopagus sat. Immediately above the steps, on the level of the hill, is a bench of stone excavated in the limestone rock, forming 3 sides of a quadrangle, like a triclinium it faces the S.; on its E. and W. side is a raised block,-the former may, perhaps, have been the tribunal, the 2 latter the rude stones which Pausanias saw."

The great and solemn Areopagite Council (Bovλ) sat in the open air; but there was also a Court (SikaσThρiov), which was held, probably, in the building described by Vitruvius (2, 1) as roofed with tile.

from the tumult of public discussion to the place which was at once most convenient and appropriate. The place to which they took him was the summit of the Areopagus, where the most awful court of judicature had sat from time immemorial, to pass sentence on the greatest criminals, and to decide the most solemn questions connected with religion. The judges sat in the open air upon seats hewn out in the rock, on a platform, which was ascended by a flight of stone steps immediately from the Agora. On this spot a long series of awful causes connected with crime and religion had been determined, beginning with the legendary trial of Mars, which gave to the place the name of Mars' Hill. A temple of the god was, as we have scen, on the brow of the eminence [on the southern slope of the Areopagus]; and an additional solemnity was given to the place by the sanctuary of the Furies in a broken cleft of the rock, immediately below the judges' seats. Even in the political decay of Athens this spot and this court were regarded by the people with superstitious reverence. It was a scene with which the dread recollections of centuries were associated. It was a place of silent awe in the midst of the gay and frivolous city. Those who withdrew to the Areopagus from the Agora came, as it were, into the presence of a higher

Below the northern end of the east-power. ern extremity of the hill of Mars is a deep fissure, or wide long chasm, in the low precipices which border the height within these is a source of black water, esteemed by the peasants for its medicinal virtues. This gloomy recess was probably the auditum of the temple of the Semnæ or Erinnyes.

"There was everything in the place to incline the auditors, so far as they were seriously disposed at all, to a reverent and thoughtful attention. It is probable that Dionysius, with the other Areopagites, were on the judicial seats; and a vague tradition of the dread thoughts associated by poetry and tradition with the Hill of Mars may have solemnised the minds of some of those who crowded up the stone steps with the Apostle, and clustered round the summit of the hill to hear his announcement of the new divinities.

But the chief interest in the Arcopagus is connected with a far different worship-in the events described in the 17th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. The following commentary on those events is taken from Conybeare and Howson's 'Life There is no point in the annals of and Epistles of St. Paul,' a work the first planting of Christianity which abounding in valuable illustration. seizes so powerfully on the imagina"The Athenians took the Apostle | tion of those who are familiar with the

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