On entering the Peloponnesus from the Isthmus of Corinth, we see rising in front of us the mountain rampart of Oneium, which defended the entrance of the peninsula, and upon one of whose promontories was built the nearly impregnable citadel of Corinth. These mountains form part of the general mountain system of the whole island, and, sheltered by them, its inhabitants could live in security. The principal mountain mass, whence all other chains radiate towards the entrances of the peninsula, is situated in the interior of the country, about forty miles to the west of Corinth. There Mount Cyllene of the ancient Greeks, or Zyria, rises into the air, its flanks covered with dark pines; and farther away still, the Khelmos, or Aroanian Mountain, attains even a more considerable height, its snows descending into a valley on its northern slope, where they give rise to the river Styx, the cold waters of which prove fatal to perjurers, and disappear in a narrow chasm, one of the entrances to Hades. A range of wooded peaks, to the west of the Khelmos, connects that mountain with the Olonos (Mount Erymanthus), celebrated as the haunt of the savage boar destroyed by Hercules. All those mountains, from Corinth as far as Patras, form a rampart running parallel with the southern shore of the gulf, in the direction of which they throw off spurs enclosing steep valleys. In one of these—that of Buraikos—we meet with the grand caverns of Mega-Spileon, which are used as a monastery, and where the most curious structures may be seen built up on every vantage-ground offered by the rocks, suggesting a resemblance to the cells of a vast nest of hornets.
The table-land of the Peloponnesus is thus bounded towards the north by an elevated coast range. Another chain of the same kind bounds it on the east. It likewise starts from Mount Cyllene, and extends southward, its various portions being known as Gaurias, Malevo (Mount Artemisium), and Parthenion. It is then broken through by a vast depression, but again rises farther south as the range of Hagios Petros, or Parnon, to the east of Sparta. Getting lower by degrees, it terminates in the promontory of Malea, opposite to the island of Cerigo. It was this cape, tradition tells us, which formed the last refuge of the Centaurs; that is to say, of the barbarian ancestors of the modern Tsakonians. No promontory was more dreaded by Greek navigators than this Cape Malea, owing to sudden gusts of wind, and an ancient proverb says, “When thou hast doubled the cape forget the name of thy native land.”
The mountains of Western Morea do not present the regularity of the eastern chain. They are cut through by rivers, and to the south of the Aroanian Mountains and the Erymanthus they ramify into a multitude of minor chains, which now and then combine into mountain groups, and impart the most varied aspect to that portion of the plateau. Everywhere in the valleys we come unexpectedly upon landscapes to which an indescribable charm is imparted by a group of trees, a spring, a flock of sheep, or a shepherd sitting upon a heap of ruins. We are in beautiful Arcadia, sung by the poets. Though in great part deprived of its woods, it is still a beautiful country; but more charming still are the eastern slopes of the plateau, which descend towards the Ionian Sea. There luxuriant forests and {58} sparkling rivulets add an element of beauty to blue waves, distant islands, and a transparent sky, which is wanting in nearly every other part of maritime Greece.
Fig. 18.—MOUNT TAYGETUS.
The table-land of Arcadia is commanded on the west by pine-clad Mænalus, and bounded on the south by several mountain groups which give birth to separate mountain chains. One of these mountain masses—the Kotylion, or Palæocastro—thus gives rise to the mountains of Messenia, amongst which rises the famous Ithome, and to those of Ægaleus, which spread over the peninsula to the west of the Gulf of Coron, and reappear in the sea as the rocky islets of Sapienza, Cabrera, and Venetikon. Another mountain mass, the Lycæus, or Diaforti—the Arcadian Olympus, which the Pelasgians claim for their cradle—and which rises almost in the centre of the Peloponnesus, is continued westward of Laconia by an extended mountain chain, the most elevated and most characteristic of all the Morea. The highest crest of these mountains is the famous Taygetus, known also as Pentedactylum (five fingers), because of the five peaks which surmount it; or as St. Elias, in honour, no doubt, of Helios, the Dorian sun-god. A portion of the lower slopes of this mountain is clothed with forests of chestnuts and walnuts. {59} interspersed with cypresses and oaks; but its crest is bare, and snow remains upon it during three-fourths of the year. The snows of Taygetus direct the distant mariner to the shores of Greece. On approaching the coast, he sees rising above the blue waters the spurs and outlying ridges of the Kakavuni, or “bad mountain.” Soon afterwards he comes in sight of the promontory of Tainaron, with its two capes of Matapan and Grasso—immense blocks of white marble more than six hundred feet in height, upon which the quails settle in millions after their fatiguing journey across the sea. Into the caverns at its foot the waters rush with a dull noise which the ancients mistook for the barking of Cerberus. Cape Matapan, like Malea, is dreaded amongst mariners as a great “destroyer of men.”
The three southern extremities of the Peloponnesus are thus occupied by high mountains and rocky declivities. The peninsula of Argolis, in the east, is likewise traversed by mountain ranges, which start from Mount Cyllene, similarly to the Gaurias and the mountains of Arcadia. The whole of the Peloponnesus is thus a country of table-lands and mountain ranges. If we except the plains of Elis, which have been formed by the alluvial deposits carried down by the rivers of Arcadia, and the lake basins of the interior, which have been filled up in the course of ages, we meet with nothing but mountains.[16] The principal mountain masses—the Cyllene, the Taygetus, and Parnon—are composed of crystalline schists and metamorphic marbles, as in continental Greece. Strata of the Jurassic age and beds of cretaceous limestone are here and there met with at the foot of these more ancient rocks. Near the coast, in Argolis, and on the flanks of the Taygetus, eruptions of serpentines and porphyries have taken place, whilst on the north-eastern coast of Argolis, and especially on the small peninsula of Methone, there exist recent volcanoes—amongst others, the Kaimenipetra, which M. Fouqué identifies with the fire-vomiting mouths of Strabo, and which had its last eruption twenty-one centuries ago. These volcanoes are, no doubt, the vents of a submarine area of disturbance which extends through Milos, Santorin, and Nisyros, to the south of the Ægean Sea.
The sulphur springs which abound on the western coast of the Peloponnesus are, perhaps, likewise evidences of a reaction of the interior of the earth.
It is the opinion of several geologists that the coasts of Western Greece are being insensibly upheaved. In many places, and particularly at Corinth, we meet with ancient caverns and sea beaches at an elevation of several feet above the sea-level. It is this upheaval, and not merely the alluvial deposits brought down by rivers, which explains the encroachment of the land upon the sea at the mouth of the Achelous and on the coast of Elis, where four rocky islets have been joined to the land. Elsewhere a subsidence of the land has been noticed, as in the Gulf of {60} Marathonisi and on the eastern coast of Greece, where the ancient peninsula of Elaphonisi has been converted into an island. But even there the fluvial deposits have encroached upon the sea. The city of Calamata is twice as distant from the seashore now as in the days of Strabo, and the traces of the ancient haven of Helos, on the coast of Laconia, are now far inland.