by Apollo'; Bacchus to have destroyed Eurytus with his thyrsus; Hermes to have prevailed over Hippolytus by virtue of the helmet of Orcus ("Aïdoç kuvén) which concealed him from view; Clytius to have been slain by Vulcan with irons from his forge; Polybotes by Neptune, who hurled at him the island Nisyrus, which he had wrenched off from Cos; Typhon by Jupiter, who buried him under Etna'. Some of the deities had probably been identified by means of these fables, or by the more usual attributes: but such is the present state of the monument, that nothing better than conjectures can now be offered in explanation.

The main action, however, may be divided into five monomachiæ. The pair of combatants nearest to Jupiter, consists of a warrior having a shield and a crested helmet, but otherwise naked, fighting against a giant who appears to be hurling a stone from his right hand, and who is the only one among the giants having any appearance of drapery. Next to him a naked warrior stands over a prostrate giant. The third pair of combatants, unlike the others, consists of a giant on the southern side of his adversary, of whom the bust only remains with the left arm, the shield, and a part of the chlamys. Next come the two warriors above mentioned, marching northward and passing behind the three seated deities; beyond whom is the fourth monomachia. Here we perceive a warrior larger, broader, and more muscular

born of a mortal mother, without whose assistance the Fates had declared that the Gods could not prevail. See also the Bacchæ of Euripides, 540. 1 Pindar Pyth. 8, 15. According to Apollodorus, by Hercules and

Jupiter.

2 V. Homer. II. E. 845.

3 Apollod. 1. 1. According to Strabo (p. 489), and Stephanus of Byzantium who follows Strabo, Neptune broke off Nisyrus from Cos with his trident, and overwhelmed the giant with this new island. A statue of Neptune, in the street leading from the Peiraic gate to the Cerameicus, represented him as hurling his trident at Polybotes. See above, p. 110. Neptune is seen in the same attitude on the coins of Posidonia and other places.

than the preceding, and in violent action. A long flowing chlamys trails behind him, leaving the whole figure naked in front. The giant opposed to him, hurls an immense rock with each hand; one of these masses his adversary pushes back with his left hand, while his right arm was stretched out so directly as to give the idea that the deadly blow, which he was about to inflict, was with a missile weapon of some kind. In the last combat, to the north, the bust and left thigh of the fighting deity only are preserved, and the left arm appears to grasp a rock. The bust is of the same muscular description as the preceding. He seems to have already destroyed a giant, who lies prostrate before him; and to be engaged with another, who throws a rock with each hand.

This may perhaps be Neptune fighting with another giant, after having slain Polybotes. The rock in his left hand may represent the island with which he covered the giant; and his right may have been armed with the trident'. In this case the fourth may be Vulcan hurling red-hot iron at Clytius (Kλúriov Badw'r púdpois); the third, Bacchus; the second, Apollo, whose superior power may be expressed by his having already slain Polytion; and the figure next to Jupiter may possibly be Hermes wearing the helmet of Pluto. But it will be asked, where was Hercules, one of whose actions this composition was particularly intended to commemorate. It was for him probably that the southern extremity of the composition was reserved, where five figures are seen between the southern end of the frieze, and the figure of Minerva seated on Olympus. The first figures at the former extremity are two young chlamydated warriors bearing shields, the first bareheaded, the second wearing a helmet without a crest, and both marching northward like the two near the lower deities. Next to them is the giant on his knees, before mentioned, behind whom a warrior, wearing a chlamys and crested helmet, ties the giant's

1 The action is thus represented on a Vulcian vase in my possession, but the trident is there directed not against a fresh adversary but against the prostrate Polybotes.

arms behind his back. Between him and Minerva there remains only a young naked warrior without helmet, but having a thong on his left arm, which indicates there was also a shield. He is represented stepping northward, but suddenly turning round to behold the action behind, and as stretching out his right arm, as if ready to assist the victor against his struggling adversary. The action here represented is, probably, Hercules binding Alcyoneus, whom he had overcome. The assistance which Minerva granted to Hercules in all his undertakings, and especially in his contest with this giant, may have been one reason why the artist placed the action near Minerva, although from other obvious considerations he was obliged to represent her as facing towards the main contest. There was a motive also for separating this action from the others: Hercules, whom we may suppose to have already wounded all the giants with his arrows, could not subdue Alcyoneus his particular adversary, until (by the advice of Minerva) he had driven the giant out of Pallene, in which peninsula, whenever the latter was thrown to the ground, he was revived by his mother Earth'. Hercules now secures him from any further resistance, by binding him as a captive in the usual manner.

At the northern end of the composition, behind the group of deities, and beyond the fourth and fifth pair of combatants, the extremity of the frieze is occupied by five figures, obviously intended to balance the same number which accompany the action of Hercules at the other end, and together with them to give importance to the centre of the composition. Among all these only one head and one leg are preserved. In their graceful attitudes, and unemployed or preparatory state of action, they resemble those of the western frieze of the Parthenon, and may have been intended perhaps for some of the inferiors of Olympus,

1 αὐτὸς δὲ (Alcyoneus) ἐπὶ τῆς Γῆς μᾶλλον ἀνεθάλπετο· ̓Αθηνᾶς δὲ ὑποθεμένης, ἔξω τῆς Παλλήνης εἵλκυσεν αὐτὸν, κἀκεῖνος μὲν οὕτως ἐτελεύτα. Apollod. 1, 6. § 1.

or possibly the followers of Bacchus not yet called into action. The southernmost, a naked young warrior with a shield, stands fronting the spectator: the second is a youth with a girded chlamys, who rests his left arm on the neck of an older figure, of which no more remains than the bust, the feet, and the chlamys hanging at the back. The fourth is clothed in a chlamys, which covers both the left arm and the right hand. The farthest to the north is a young warrior with a girded chlamys and a close helmet, leaning forward and stretching forth his right arm towards his left leg, which is placed upon an elevation. This figure, which Stuart supposed to be erecting a trophy, was probably adjusting a kvηuìç to his leg, an action often represented on gems and vases.

In the combat of Centaurs and Lapithæ, which forms the subject of the frieze of the posticum, we distinguish Theseus as the only one of the men who has slain his opponent. Micon had conferred the same distinction upon him in a painting which adorned one of the walls of the cella1. We also recognise Cæneus, who, having received from Neptune the gift of being invulnerable by weapons, was overwhelmed by the rocks and trees which the Centaurs heaped upon him. "Saxa trabesque super totosque involvite montes ; et erit pro vulnere pondus."

Ovid, Metam. 12, 507.

Cæneus is represented half-sunk into the earth, while an enormous mass of rock is suspended over his head, and is held up by a Centaur on each side 2.

All the sculptures of the Theseium, as well of the metopes as of the friezes, were painted, and still preserve some remains of the colours. Vestiges of brazen and goldencoloured arms, of a blue sky, and of blue, green, and red drapery, are still very apparent. A painted foliage and

See above, p. 125.

2 The same subject is seen upon the frieze of the Phigalian temple, now in the British Museum.

mæander is seen on the interior cornice of the peristyle, and painted stars in the lacunaria. Similar painted ornaments are seen in the Parthenon, in the Panhellenium of Ægina, and in several other temples.

The three pictures which adorned the three interior walls of the Theseium related to the actions of Theseus. The stucco upon which they were painted is still apparent, and shows that each painting covered the entire wall, from the roof to two feet nine inches short of the pavement. On one of the walls was represented the battle of the Athenians with the Amazons: on another the fight of the Centaurs and Lapithæ, in which Theseus alone was represented as having slain a Centaur, the rest being engaged in an equal combat. The picture on the third wall described an action of Theseus in Crete'. From the inferior importance of the latter subject, it is probable that this picture was on the western wall, which was the smallest of the three.

1 See above, p. 125.