The walls are particularly well worth studying, as there are to be found in them specimens of all kinds of building, beginning from prehistoric times. There is even plain evidence that the builders of the age of Pericles were not by any means the best wall builders; for the masonry of the wall called the Wall of Themistocles, which is well preserved in the lowest part of the course along the north slope, is by far the most beautifully finished work of the kind which can anywhere be seen: and it seems to correspond accurately to the lower strata of the foundations on which the Parthenon was built. The builders of Pericles’s time added a couple of layers of stone to raise the site of the temple, and their work contrasts curiously in its roughness with the older platform. Any one who will note the evident admiration of Thucydides for the walls built round the Peiræus by the men of an earlier generation will see good reason for this feeling when they examine these details.
The beautiful little temple of Athena Nike, though outside the Propylæa—thrust out as it were on a sort of great bastion high on the right as you enter—must still be called a part, and a very striking [pg 118]part, of the Acropolis. It is only of late years that the site has been cleared of rubbish and modern stonework, and the temple rebuilt from the original materials, thus destroying, no doubt, some precious traces of Turkish occupation which the fastidious historian may regret, but realizing to us a beautiful Greek temple of the Ionic Order in some completeness. The peculiarity of this building, which is perched upon a platform of stone and commands a splendid prospect, is, that its tiny peribolus, or sacred enclosure, was surrounded by a parapet of stone slabs covered with exquisite reliefs of winged Victories, in various attitudes. Some of these slabs are now in the Museum of the Acropolis, and are of great interest—apparently less severe than the school of Phidias, and therefore later in date, but still of the best epoch and of marvellous grace. The position of this temple also is not parallel with the Propylæa, but turned slightly outward, so that the light strikes it at moments when the other building is not illuminated. At the opposite side is a very well preserved chamber, and a fine colonnade at right angles with the gate, which looks like a guard-room. This is the chamber commonly called the Pinacotheca, where Pausanias saw pictures of frescoes by Polygnotus.
Of the two museums on the Acropolis, the principal one requires little comment and is very easily seen and appreciated. In an ante-room are the [pg 119]archaic figures of which I have already spoken, with the remains taken from about the Parthenon, together with casts of the Elgin marbles, and many small and beautiful reliefs, apparently belonging to votive monuments. There are also two figures of young men, with the heads and feet lost, which are of peculiarly beautiful Parian marble, and of very fine workmanship. But the visitor is very likely to pass by the little Turkish house, which is well worth a visit, for here are the cypress plugs from the pillars of the Parthenon or Propylæa; here are also splendid specimens of archaic vases, such as are very hard indeed to find in any other collection. The large jars from Melos which are here to be seen have the most striking resemblance in their decoration to the fragment of a similar vessel, with a row of armed figures round it, which was found at Mycenæ, and is now in the Ministry of Public Instruction. Lastly, there stands in the window a very delicately worked little Satyr, as the pointed ears and tail show, but of voluptuous form—rather of the hermaphrodite type: there is hardly a better preserved statuette than this anywhere at Athens. It seemed a pity that such a gem should be hidden away in so obscure a place; and I hope that by this time it has been brought into the larger and official museum.
I will venture to conclude this chapter with a curious comparison. It was my good fortune, a few [pg 120]months after I had seen the Acropolis, to visit a rock in Ireland, which, to my great surprise, bore many curious analogies to it—I mean the rock of Cashel. Both were strongholds of religion—honored and hallowed above all other places in their respective countries—both were covered with buildings of various dates, each representing peculiar ages and styles in art. And as the Greeks, I suppose for effect’s sake, have varied the posture of their temples, so that the sun illumines them at different moments, the old Irish have varied the orientation of their churches that the sun might rise directly over against the east window on the anniversary of the patron saint. There is at Cashel the great Cathedral—in loftiness and grandeur the Parthenon of the place; there is the smaller and more beautiful Cormac’s Chapel, the holiest of all, like the Erechtheum at Athens. Again, the great sanctuary upon the Rock of Cashel was surrounded by a cluster of abbeys about its base, which were founded there by pious men on account of the greatness and holiness of the archiepiscopal seat. Of these, one remains, like the Theseum at Athens, eclipsed by the splendor of the Acropolis.
The prospect from the Irish sanctuary has, indeed, endless contrasts to that from the pagan stronghold, but they are suggestive contrasts, and such as are not without a certain harmony. The plains around both are framed by mountains, of which the Irish [pg 121]are probably the more picturesque; and if the light upon the Greek hills is the fairest, the native color of the Irish is infinitely more rich. So, again, the soil of Attica is light and dusty, whereas the Golden Vale of Tipperary is among the richest and greenest in the world. Still, both places were the noblest homes, each in their own country, of religions which civilized, humanized, and exalted the human race; and if the Irish Acropolis is left in dim obscurity by the historical splendor of the Parthenon, on the other hand, the gods of the Athenian stronghold have faded out before the moral greatness of the faith preached from the Rock of Cashel.
CHAPTER V.
ATHENS—THE THEATRE OF DIONYSUS—THE AREOPAGUS.
There are few recent excavations about Athens which have been so productive as those along the south slope of the Acropolis. In the conflicts and the wear of ages a vast quantity of earth, and walls, and fragments of buildings has either been cast, or has rolled, down this steep descent, so that it was with a certainty of good results that the Archæological Society of Athens undertook to clear this side of the rock of all the accumulated rubbish. Several precious inscriptions were found, which had been thrown down from the rock; and in April, 1884, the whole plan of the temple of Æsculapius had been uncovered, and another step attained in fixing the much disputed topography of this part of Athens.