identity of Lycabettus with the mountain of St. George, that so conspicuous a summit, and so near a neighbour of the city, could not but have had a name of some renown; that Lycabettus accordingly was one of the most celebrated of the Attic mountains 1; that it was not among those which surround the plain, but at an intermediate distance2; and that it had probably an acute summit, from its having served (or said to 1 Καὶ Παρνησῶν ἡμῖν μεγέθη, τοῦτ ̓ ἐστὶ τὸ χρηστὰ διδάσκειν ; Aristoph. Ran. v. 1088. The poet, doubtless, meant the Attic Parnesus, or Parnassus, commonly called Parnes. Παρνησὸς, ὄρος μεταξὺ Βοιωτίας καὶ τῆς 'ATTIKS. Timæi Lex. Plat. in v. Οἱ ῥ ̓ Ἰθάκην εἶχον καὶ Νήριτον (11. Β. 632) κυρίως μὲν γὰρ ακούων τις, τὴν πόλιν δέξαιτ ̓ ἂν, ὡς καὶ ̓Αθήνας καὶ Λυκαβηττὸν εἴ τις λέγοι, καὶ 'Ρόδον καὶ ̓Ατάβυριν, καὶ ἔτι Λακεδαίμονα καὶ Taûyerov. Strabo, p. 454. Anchesmus has more the sound of a foreign than of an Attic name in the Eolic form of Onchesmus, we find it attached to a town and harbour of Epirus. "Ayx, in allusion to the proximity of the hill to the city, has been suggested as an etymology of Anchesmus. 2 Ἐς τὴν Πάρνηθ ̓ ὁργισθεῖσαι, φροῦδαι κατὰ τὸν Λυκαβηττόν. Aristoph. ap. Phot. Lex. in Пáprns. The clouds, as they were returning to Parnes, vanished near Lycabettus. Photius refers this line to the Nepéλa, but it is not found in the extant edition of that comedy. If it means that the clouds were irritated with the reception which they had met with on the Athenian stage, it could not have been in the first edition of the comedy; and yet the extant play alludes to the rejection of a former (ver. 518 et seq.). This line, therefore, which is found only in Photius, may be added to other arguments, leading to the belief that the existing comedy is a third edition. See Petit. Miscel. 1, 3. Clinton, Fasti Hell. II. p. 71. have served) as an astronomical gnomon to Meton'. Other ancient allusions to Lycabettus equally tend to the same conclusion. Its dryness is contrasted by Socrates, in one of the dialogues of Xenophon, with the moisture of the Phaleric marsh 2, and its barrenness was such that its land was considered valueless 3. 1 "Εστι γὰρ αἰεί τινα λαβεῖν τοιοῦτον γνώμονα· καὶ ἔστι σαφέσω τατα σημεῖα τὰ ἀπὸ τούτων. Διὸ καὶ ἀγαθοὶ γεγένηνται κατὰ τόπους τινὰς ἀστρονόμοι ἔνιοι, οἷον Ματρικέτας ἐν Μεθύμνῃ ἀπὸ τοῦ Λεπετύμνου καὶ Κλείστρατος ἐν Τενέδῳ ἀπὸ τῆς Ἴδης· καὶ Φαεινὸς ̓Αθήνησιν ἀπὸ τοῦ Λυκαβηττοῦ τὰ περὶ τὰς τροπὰς συνεῖδε· παρ' οὗ Μέτων ἀκούσας, τὸν τοῦ ἑνὸς δέοντα εἴκοσιν ἐνιαυτῶν συνέταξεν. Ην δὲ ὁ μὲν Φαεινός μέτοικος ̓Αθήνησιν, ὁ δὲ Μέτων 'Αθηναῖος. Καὶ ἄλλοι δὲ τοῦτον τὸν τρόπον ἠστρολόγησαν. Theophrast. de Signis Pluviarum. Undoubtedly some point in Athens may be found (and it would not be far from the Pnyx) from whence the sun may have been observed to rise on the solstitial day, in coincidence with the highest point of the hill of St. George; and thus, by repeated observations, a first approximation to the length of the solar year may have been obtained: but it is difficult to conceive that by such a gnomon, Phaeinus or Meton could have calculated the length of the year with such correctness, that the year of Meton has been found to differ very slightly from modern observations. If we agree with Hesychius, who says (in v.) Λυκαβηττός· ὄρος τῆς ̓Αττικῆς· εἴρηται δὲ οὕτω διὰ τὸ λύκοις πληθύειν, the name is formed from λύκος and βῆσσα. But λύκη is the most probable etymon (Prisci Græcorum primam lucem quæ præcedit solis exortus λύκην appellaverunt. Macrob. Sat. 1, 17). The name, therefore, without any reference to astronomy, may have been derived from the simple fact, that in all seasons, except the middle of winter, the light of day makes its appearance behind that mountain, so that its summit is the first illumined point in the horizon of the city. 2 · Ξηρὰ μὲν γοῦν μοι δοκεῖ εἶναι ἡ περὶ τὸν Λυκαβηττὸν καὶ ἡ ταύτῃ ὅμοια· ὑγρὰ δὲ ἡ ἐν τῷ Φαληρικῷ ἕλει, καὶ ἡ ταύτῃ ὅμοια. Xenoph. Econ. 19. At the same time it was noted for its olive-plantations', a combination which appears contradictory, but is explained by the fact that the hill of St. George, although having a rocky and barren summit, is surrounded on every side, except that of the city, by plantations of olive-trees. In admitting Lycabettus and Anchesmus to have been the same mountain, it is not necessary to suppose the former name to have been obsolete in the time of Pausanias, but only that the latter was then more commonly used. We have seen that as late as the end of the fifth century the ancient name was familiar to the learned. In like manner, Brilessus had, in the same ages, become more generally known by the name of Pentelicum, in consequence of the fame of its marble. The period of both these sub. stitutions is marked by the fact, that while Pausanias names neither Lycabettus nor Brilessus, Strabo makes no mention of Anchesmus or Pentelicum, but, like Theophrastus, shows that the three great summits, which inclose the Tediov or plain of Athens, were Parnes, Brilessus, and Hymettus'. There is a similarity also in the kind of importance given by Pausanias to Anchesmus, and by Strabo and the earlier writers to Lycabettus; an importance derived not from the magnitude of the mountain, but from its conspicuous abruptness and proximity to the city. After all, however, there may possibly have been so 1 Dives et Ægaleos nemorum, Parnesque benignus Statii Theb. 12, v. 620. 'De signis tempestatum, p. 438, Heins. See Demi of Attica, p. 3 See above, p. 205, n. 1. 207, n. 1. 208, n. 1. 4. far a distinction between Anchesmus and Lycabettus, that while the latter name comprehended the whole of the low ridge to the north-eastward of Athens, which separates the vale of the Ilissus from the plain of the Cephissus, Anchesmus may never have been any thing more than the specific name of the summit of St. George. In this sense Lycabettus would perfectly deserve to be described as an olive-bearing mountain. læum of In the midst of the modern town of Athens a Propybuilding still subsists which belonged to the Athenian the New agora, and serves therefore to show the position of Agora. that important and central part of the Asty. It is situated opposite to the northern extremity of the rocks of the Acropolis at a distance of about 250 yards, and consists of four Doric columns four feet four inches in diameter at the base, and twenty-six feet high, including the capital; these columns support a pediment surmounted by a large acroterium in the centre, and by a much smaller at either end. Opposite to the exterior columns were antæ terminating the walls of a vestibule before a door eight feet and a half wide, which was distant twenty-five feet from the columns. Part of the jambs of this door still remain, and the southern anta of the vestibule'. That the structure was a propylæum, and not a pronaus, is proved by the facts, first, that the walls which terminate on either side in antæ, are not continued in a right line within the door, but on the contrary that the wall at right angles to them in which the door is pierced, preserves traces of its pro 1 See Stuart, Ant. of Ath. I. 1. longation on each side beyond the walls of the vestibule. Secondly, that the construction is that of a civil, and not of a sacred building; the columns being six diameters in height, a proportion more slender than is found in any Doric temple at Athens, but conformable to the distinction made by Vitruvius the middle intercolumniation, moreover, is ditriglyph, and bears a large proportion to those on either side (two and a half to one), resembling in these respects the Propylaa of the Acropolis, and other civil works requiring a wide entrance. The middle acroterium is between one-fifth and one-fourth of the whole length of the pediment, a proportion unexampled in a Greek temple, and which could scarcely have been intended for any thing but an equestrian statue or a chariot 2. These presumptions as to the intention of the building are confirmed by four inscriptions, 1. On the architrave; 2. On the central acroterium ; 3. On one of the jambs of the door; 4. On a pedestal, which Stuart found within the Propylæum. The first is a dedication to Minerva Archegetis 1 Aliam enim in deorum templis debent habere gravitatem, aliam in porticibus et cæteris operibus subtilitatem.-Vitruv. 5, 9. 2 On some of the Roman temples there may possibly have been Acroteria of these large proportions, though no extant examples of them are known; for we learn from Pliny, that on the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus there was a composition in earth representing the god in a quadriga, Plin. H. N. 28, 2 (4). 35, 12 (45). And on the Palatine temple of Apollo that Deity and Diana were mounted on a golden car, Propert. 2, 31, v. 11. Plin. 34, 3 (8). In the Propylæum of the Athenian Agora, the basis of the central acroterium has sufficient length to have supported a figure of the grandson of Augustus in a chariot. |