On the track of Ulysses; Together with an excursion in quest of the so-called Venus of Melos / Two studies in archaeology, made during a cruise among the Greek islands

by William James Stillman

The city must have been very wealthy, if we may judge from that generally excellent indication, the tombs, which line the roads and the sea-shore beyond the city (looking from the point where the general view is taken), and by the enumeration of the booty taken by the Romans, which is given as follows: Two hundred golden crowns of ten Roman pounds each, eighty-three thousand pounds of silver, two hundred and forty-three pounds of gold, one hundred and eighteen pieces of Athenian money, two thousand four hundred and twenty-two of Macedonian, two hundred and eighty-three statues of bronze, two hundred and thirty of marble, besides the money distributed to the army.

I know of no place where the ruins of all epochs are so well indicated as at Samé. The large fragment of wall of the best Hellenic time which runs down the slope of the eastern hill is one of the finest, if not the finest, I have ever seen. Its stones are perfectly hewn, and some of them are twelve to fourteen feet long, and the highest portion still standing is not less than twenty feet high. At other points are various examples of the Pelasgic, similar to that of “Ulysses’ Castle,” but of better work. There are magnificent subterranean passages, one of which leads to the citadel on the easternmost hill, the more remote in the distant view, but the higher and probably the site of the greater citadel, being marked by the most imposing ruins and remains of works, and without doubt the locality of the original settlement. On the lower hill stand some interesting remains—a tower and remains of city wall of mixed Hellenic and Pelasgic, the tower being of the very latest Hellenic, showing the beginning of “rustication.” It was built upon in the middle ages, and the whole mass of buildings transformed into a fortress and afterward into a convent. Samé must very early have been a large and important city, as the whole of the space, including the two hills and the land between them, shows traces of Pelasgic construction, and one fragment on the brow of the hill near the tower is one of the most perfect examples of the best Pelasgic work one can find away from Mykenæ and Argos. The stones in the illustration range about five feet in length, and are faced with exquisite exactness. A wild fig-tree has taken root in the interstices of the stones, and the roots have pushed the masses of rock apart, but in several places it is difficult to see the junction when the light is flat against them. Of Roman work there is little; but some thermæ walls on the plains by the sea and some tombs show a considerable Roman occupation. Livy says that Marcus Tullius, the conqueror of Samé, went over to the Peloponnesus “after having placed a garrison in Samé.” This negatives the notion that the walls were razed to the foundations, as is asserted by La Croix; and it is also rendered improbable by the existing ruins, though it is not impossible that so much of the wall was destroyed as made the defense of it temporarily impracticable. There are, however, some slight traces of rubble-wall on the old ruins, which show a Roman (or possibly middle-age, though I incline to the former) construction, which negative any supposition that the enceinte was rendered useless for defense; for no one would repair a wall which was not tolerably complete in its circuit. The remains of the Roman time, however, are insignificant compared with those of the Pelasgic, either as to preservation or quality.

VIEW OF SAMÉ FROM THE WEST,—WITH PARTS OF PELASGIC AND HELLENIC WALLS.

At present Samé is an insignificant village, consisting of twenty or thirty small houses stretched along the beach, with a tiny port formed by a breakwater constructed from the stones of the city wall, the fairest and best cut that could be found. The people are a thievish clan, who set on any chance comer, like mosquitoes on a solitary and bewildered fisherman in a swampy land. They have coins and antiquities to sell, for which, as everywhere else in Greece, they demand the most absurd prices; and they beset one with offers of service as guides, etc., etc., etc., till they weary all human patience. This may be said of the Ionians in general, but less of the people of Cerigo, perhaps, than the others. We found, however, a grateful exception. We had wandered along the beach to the furthermost houses of the line, and on passing a very respectable-looking house, the owner, sitting in the coolness of the twilight at his gates, seeing two strangers, rose to salute us and invited us to enter; an invitation so amiable and earnest that we accepted, and were ushered into the guest-chamber, clean and furnished with divans in eastern fashion, where we were entertained with the usual sweetmeats and coffee, while the daughter of the house went into the garden and collected for each of us a bouquet of roses, the most fragrant I ever remember to have seen. Our host narrated many incidents of the English rule in Cephalonia, and when we rose to go urged us to take up our quarters in his house; and finally, as we stood before the gates, as a last favor, offered me two beautiful Greek stelæ, memorials of the ancient dead, possibly of the period of the heroic defense of Samé. He had found them in digging his house cellar, and they were the ornaments of his court-yard; but learning that we were in search of antiquities, he offered them freely as his contribution. I shall not soon forget him or his fragrant roses and the dark-eyed Saméan girl who offered them to us.

Of Crané scarcely a trace remains, even of the Pelasgic walls. It stood originally on the Lake of Argostoli (to which place we drove from Samé across the island), but at a point now far from the water’s edge. The lake is a singular geological phenomenon, formed by a number of springs bursting out from under the hills on which Crané lay, with a force sufficing to drive mills and form a strong current over the whole extent of the lake, which is a mile or more in diameter, though the surface of land to be drained by these subterranean outpours is, one would say, utterly inadequate to the quantity of water delivered.

I took a guide at Argostoli, a man of the usual type of Greek guide, who assured me that he knew the ancient city, and had often guided strangers there. On arriving at the head of the lake I found him taking useless détours to bring me to the mills, which were driven by the springs; and on asking him what he went there for, he replied that he supposed I wanted to see the mills—since that was what other people had come for. I gave him an energetic sample of modern Greek, and ordered him to show me the way to the ancient city—Palaiokastron. “Palaiokastron!” he ejaculated with surprise and bewilderment in his eyes, and turned to ask some shepherd boys or other vagabonds, who were sauntering near by and watching us, where the Palaiokastron was. They declined to give any information, probably regarding him as a poacher on their preserves. I had, therefore, to depend on my antiquarian instincts, and, taking the lead, climbed over the heights above until, guided by the nature of the ground, I found the traces of the old wall.

CRANÉ FROM THE SEA SHORE.

The position of the city was entirely characteristic of the sites of the Pelasgic epoch: a bold, double peak, almost inaccessible on the sea-side, and on the two flanks still very precipitous, but connected with higher land on the side opposite the water. On the side from which the view is taken none of the ancient walls remain. The movement of earthquakes, the gradual fall of the rock at the precipitous edge, or the leveling labor of man has carried away all the blocks that made this side of the enceinte; but many of the stones may be recognized at the foot of the slope, some worked into modern walls, and some in the débris of the hill. On the opposite side the traces are more distinct, and the wall may be traced a long way, and the site of the citadel determined, with a gate and the angles of some of the towers. From near the citadel a view is obtained which shows a long line of the débris with a distant view of the town of Argostoli and the lake, and far beyond the lines that form the western shore of the superb harbor of Argostoli, almost without a rival in the Adriatic. The mass of wall is hardly to be distinguished from mere decomposed rock; so much have time and frost, the great demolishers, split and crumbled the flinty, massive limestone, the preferred material of the Pelasgi. On the further shore shown in the view may be seen, when the air is clear, the houses which form a modern village on the site of the ancient Palé. Here were Jason and his fellow adventurers entertained on their search after the golden fleece,—an expedition which perhaps we may translate from myth into probability, as an expedition to obtain an improved breed of sheep, a finer-wooled stock, from one of the northern and inland countries.