§ p5   PREFACE.
ALTHOUGH the Four Journeys in Northern Greece which form the subject of these Volumes, are not strictly consecutive, in order of time, to the two Journeys, which constituted my “Travels in the Morea,” the present Work is in all other respects a continuation of the former, on the same plan; and the Preface of those volumes will equally apply to these.
If the diurnal record of the traveller be not always the form of narrative most agreeable to the reader, it is, or ought to be, more faithful than any other, and consequently more useful to those who visit the countries described, especially when those countries have been little explored. That form, therefore, has been continued in these volumes, though the length of time which has elapsed since the Journeys were undertaken has justified the omission of many observations, which would now

§ p6   appear trifling, and may have given to those which are left no more interesting character than that of a memoir in aid of history, serving also to exemplify manners and language, in which little or no change has yet been effected by the new political state of a part of Greece.
Ancient history and geography having been the Author’s chief objects, their illustration occupies a large portion of the work; and, in consequence of its form, the remarks upon them are introduced, I must confess, with little observance of order or connexion. The only remedy for this inevitable defect was a copious Index. The opinions on those subjects were generally formed upon the spot, on a careful examination of the ancient testimonies, by means of portable editions of the works which more particularly treat of Greece, or by extracts from others, made previously to the several journeys. It has indeed happened occasionally, that a new light has been thrown upon such questions by authorities of less frequent occurrence, to which I had no access when in Greece; but in these cases I have not thought it necessary to refer to the circumstance when citing the author, as it has no effect upon the conclusion, and cannot be of any interest to the reader.

§ p7   The general map appended to these Volumes has been constructed like that which accompanied my “Travels in the Morea,” from the measurement of a great number of angles with the sextant or theodolite from every eligible station, which was accessible to me, no opportunity having been omitted of obtaining a complete triangle, when circumstances admitted of it. In applying these geometrical observations, I have had the benefit of some valuable information from John Hawkins, Esquire, of Bignor Park, in Sussex, who has had the kindness to communicate to me some important angles measured by him from the summits of the mountains Ossa and Pelium, and from two other stations in the eastern part of Thessaly. The coast-line has throughout been copied or corrected from the Admiralty surveys, executed under the direction of Captains Smyth and Copeland, of the Royal Navy, of which those made under the orders of the latter officer are still unpublished. For this assistance I am indebted to His Majesty’s Hydrographer, Captain Beaufort.

§ p8   In the interior country, the Journal will sufficiently distinguish the parts examined by me, from those in which the defects of distant or partial observations could be supplied only by such oral information as can be gathered from an ignorant and uneducated people. It is scarcely necessary to add, that in these parts the map is to be considered only as a first approximation.
Many circumstances of no public interest have retarded the appearance of these volumes, far beyond my wish and intention. The delay, however, has afforded me the means of marking on the map the boundary-line, which, for the present, forms the continental frontier of liberated Greece. LONDON, December, 1835.

§ 1.001   FIRST JOURNEY. CHAPTER I. EPIRUS.
DEC. 9, 1804.—Aulon, which preserves its ancient name in the usual Romaic form of Avlona, converted by the Italians into Valona, is about a mile and a half distant from the sea-beach, and has eight or ten minarets. On the sea side there is a tolerable wharf, with an apology for a fort, in the shape of a square inclosure of ruinous walls, with towers and a few cannon.

§ 1.002   The town occupies a hollow thickly grown with olive trees, among which are some gardens of herbs mixed with cypresses, poplars, and fruit trees. Beyond, are rugged hills entirely covered with olives, and to the northward a woody plain extending for a considerable distance, and forming a low shore except just at the northern entrance of the gulf, opposite to the island Sazona, where are some white cliffs of small elevation separated from the plain by a lagoon, containing salt works and a fishery.
Two miles southward of the town rises a steep hill, on the summit of which is the ruinous castle of Kanina, and on a ridge branching from it to the southward the scattered houses of a Turkish village of the same name overtopped by two small minarets. Kanina is a name which occurs in the Byzantine history. It was built upon a Hellenic site, as appears by some remains of masonry of that age among the walls. Not far to the southward of the height of Kanina, begins a range of steep mountains separated only by a narrow valley from the Acroceraunia, which mountain presents the same forbidding aspect on this side as towards the sea, and forms a narrow steep ridge, woody, rocky, and terminating in a sharp summit which closes the valley about ten miles from the extremity of the gulf. This valley is a part of the district of Khimara, and contains a large village named Dukai, in Greek Dukadhes, below which at the southern extremity of the gulf is the harbour named Pashaliman by the natives, and Porto Raguseo by the Italians, near the mouth of a river which flows from the peak of the Acroceraunia through the valley of Dukadhes.

§ 1.003   Eastward of the mouth of the river is a succession of lagoons, in the midst of which are the ruins of Oricum, on a desert site now called Erikho--the last syllable accented as in the ancient word, and E substituted for O, which was not an uncommon dialectic change among the ancients. The river of Dukadhes would seem from Ptolemy to have been the Celydnus, although its position does not exactly agree with his order of names, which places the Celydnus between Aulon and Oricum. Porto Raguseo I take to be the Panormus which Strabo describes as the port of Oricum.
The gulf of Avlona being surrounded, for the most part, by high mountains, is subject to sudden and violent squalls. When the wind blows strong from the westward, the road of Avlona is not considered safe, and the usual anchorage is under Sazona, the ancient Sason, notorious among the Romans as a station of pirates. This island is most conveniently placed to shelter this great bay just at the mouth of the Adriatic, and affords a safe entrance on either side into the bay; for the cliffs in front of the lagoons of Avlona, the island itself, and the cape which forms the extreme point of the Acroceraunian ridge, are all equally bold.

§ 1.004   The latter remarkable promontory is now called Glossa (perhaps its ancient name), and by the Italians Linguetta. The depth of the gulf between Sazona and Avlona is from 10 to 15 fathoms, and towards the southern extremity much greater, except near Oricum, where, as well as near Avlona, the depth is from 2 to 4 fathoms. Every where the bottom is a tough mud, deposited from the surrounding mountains.
Among a few ships now lying in the road of Avlona, is a Ragusan vessel loading fossil pitch from the mine mentioned by Strabo. The mountain, at the foot of which this mineral is found, is about three hours to the eastward of Avlona, and being conspicuous from off the coast, is marked in the Italian charts under the name of Montagna della Pegola. Its real name is Kudhesi. Another ship is from Constantinople, bound to Palermo with corn; a third, which has been three months from Venice, is of the species of Adriatic vessels called a Pielago, which differs not much from the Manzera and Trabaccolo. It has a main-mast of a single stick from Fiume, almost as large as the main-mast of our ships, and twice as long. These vessels make quick passages with a fair wind, but are very unfit to contend with the Etesian breezes of summer, and still less with the equally obstinate and much more violent southerly gales in the autumn and winter. In the month of October, 1802, I made a passage of ten days in one of these vessels, from Corfu to Trieste, through the Dalmatian islands, touching at several of them in the way. In the present season it is not uncommon for them to be four months in making the passage in the opposite direction between the two ports. During the Etesian winds in summer, instances often occur of these vessels putting into the Rhizonic Gulf, or Bocche di Cattaro, with a contrary wind, when the masters proceed to Venice by land, make an agreement for the disposal of their cargo, and return to the Bocche before the ship has sailed. In the winter the Bocchesi seldom pass their gulf, but leaving a man and boy aboard, join their families on shore, and there remain till the spring.

§ 1.005   Dec. 10.—Having sailed out of the gulf in the night with a light breeze at north, we speak a vessel from Alexandria bound direct to Tunis, with pilgrims returning from Mecca.
Dec. 11.—At noon at the foot of the Acroceraunian peak, on the slope below which stands the village Palasa, a name resembling that of the place where, according to Lucan, Caesar landed from Brundusium previously to his operations against Pompey in Illyria, but which Caesar names Pharsalus. There can be little doubt that, in this instance, the poet is more correct than the great captain, who was so negligent of geography, (in Greece at least), that he has not named the place in Thessaly, where he gained the greatest of all his victories: so that this is the only passage in the commentaries where the word Pharsalus occurs. Caesar’s chief consideration in selecting his place of debarkation on this coast, was to avoid the harbours likely to be in the hands of the enemy, and to make himself master of Oricum, Apollonia, and Dyrrhachium, before Pompey could arrive from Macedonia. Trusting, therefore, to his protecting fortune to carry him through the perils both of the enemy and the season, he embarked seven legions and six hundred cavalry at Brundusium, in ships of burthen, for want of any others, arrived on the day after his departure at the Ceraunia, where he found a quiet station for the ships in the midst of rocks and dangerous places; and having immediately landed his troops, sent back the ships to Italy the same night. By this promptitude, Pompey arrived from Candavia in time only to save Dyrrhachium. Appian, though he does not specify in what part of the Ceraunian mountains the landing was made, shows that it was very near to Oricum, for he agrees with Caesar in representing Oricum to have been taken within a day from the time of the landing: he adds that Caesar marched by night; that on account of the rugged and difficult country, he divided his forces into several bodies, which were reunited at daybreak, and that the Oricii having declared their unwillingness to resist the Roman Consul, the commander of the garrison delivered up the keys to Caesar.

§ 1.007   The distance of the site of Oricum from the shore below Palasa, seems perfectly to agree with these circumstances; and there is in fact a small harbour below Palasa, though it seems rather diminutive for the force which Caesar disembarked.
The Strada Bianca, so called in the Italian charts, and known to the Greeks by the synonym Aspri Ruga, is a broad torrent-bed very conspicuous at sea, which, originating in the summit of the mountain of Palasa, descends directly to the sea to the northward of that village. To the southward of Palasa is a succession of villages on the side of the mountain, as far as the entrance of the Channel of Corfu, all formerly belonging to the Khimariote league; but these, from Port Palerimo southward, are now in the hands of Aly Pasha. Khimara, which now gives name to the Acroceraunian range, is a town, a little to the northward of Port Palerimo, the ancient Panormus, described by Strabo as a harbour in the midst of the Ceraunian mountains.
The great summit at the northern end of Corfu, named Pandokratora, and by the Italians Salvator, is now a conspicuous object to the south by east, and a little to the eastward of it the northern Cape of Corfu, named St. Catherine. Maslera and Salmastraki are in a line off the north west Cape of Corfu, and farther eastward Όθωνούς (Ital. Fanu), forming an equilateral triangle with the two former. Othonus, or Othronus, is an ancient name, and appears from Procopius to have been applied in the plural number to all the three islands.

§ 1.008   DEC. 13th to 20th.—In quarantine at Corfu, in consequence of the fever at Gibraltar. The quarantine ground is a small level space on the shore below the gate of the city, which still bears the French inscription Porte d’Epire, but by the Greeks is called the gate of St. Nicolas, from a small church which, with an adjoining apartment, is the only building on the ground. St. Nicolas is the patron of sailors, and his churches are often found near the shore. His feast-day being on the 18th, the priest and his deacons were employed for two or three days previously in weaving garlands of myrtle to adorn the pictures, and in preparing branches of bay and myrtle to stick about the walls of the church.

§ 1.009   Dec. 20.—From the quarantine at eleven a.m. I cross over to the Forty Saints, a harbour on the Epirote coast, in an open boat, which carries a cargo of oranges and lemons; these fruits, with figs, rice, and oil, form the export trade of Corfu with the Skala of the Forty Saints, from whence are brought in return, grain, fish, botargo, cattle, and wood. We row over in six hours, against a light adverse air.
Kyr G. Z., to whom I have a letter of recommendation from our minister, is collector of the customs of the Forty Saints, which is the chief port of Delvino and its district. Having a share also in the fishery of Buthrotum, he sells fish, both fresh and salted, and retails wine and other commodities imported from Corfu. All these affairs are transacted in a small stone building: three-fourths of the space within the walls are destined to the shop and store which are on the bare ground, the remaining fourth, in which he dwells, is separated from the rest by a floor half way up the wall, and a wooden partition in front, having two windows looking down into the store. Around the apartment are ranged trunks and shelves containing the collector's property and domestic utensils. Among them are some boxes full of salted κεφαλοί, or grey mullets, making a powerful addition to the various odours, none of them very agreeable, which are diffused through the apartment. At one end is a hearth, but no chimney, the smoke serving, as it effects its escape through the tiles, to cure the botargo, or roes of the mullet, which, enclosed in the natural membrane as extracted from the fish, are suspended to the rafters, and after the smoking will be dipped in melted wax. The kefalos is produced in abundance in all the lagoons and lakes of Greece, which like that of Buthrotum have a communication with the sea; and the botargo is a great resource to the Greeks during the severer fasts, when only a bloodless fish diet is allowed.

§ 1.010   Dec. 21.—On the north-western side of the harbour of the Forty Saints are some extensive ruins, situated on a gentle slope by the sea side, at the foot of the bare rocky hills of which all this part of the Epirote coast consists. The ruins are those of a town of the better times of the Lower Empire. The walls forming an exact semicircle, the diameter of which is the sea beach, are flanked by about twenty towers; and contain within them the remains of churches, cisterns, and houses. At present the inclosure serves as a fold for the flocks of some Albanians, who have left their native mountains, now covered with snow, in search of pasture, and who are accompanied by their families; some living in tents, others in καλύβια or huts of light materials. This is the common practice of the mountaineers of northern Greece, the far larger proportion of whom are Christians, either of Albanian or Vlakhiote race, but the present party are Musulman Liape, from the mountains near Tepeleni.
Between the walls of the ancient town and the modern houses of the Limeni, Skala, or Skaloma are the remains of a suburb of the ruined town, and close to the houses of the Skala those of a large church, which has long been in ruins, but still retains the name of its saint, St. Basil. On its southern side are the ruins of a smaller church of the same date, sacred to St. Nicolas.

§ 1.011   The summit of the hill which rises at the back of the Skala is crowned by the ruins of the church of the Forty Saints; which gives to this place the name of στους Αγιους Σαράντα, A village on a height, separated only from that of the church by a hollow, through which leads the road to Delvino, bears the same name, as well as a small square white-washed fort to which there is a paved zig-zag path leading up the mountain from the Skala. The village was built three years ago by Aly Pasha, and is peopled by the cultivators and pastors of the neighbouring plain, from the former of whom, Aly having lately made the land his own, receives a third of its produce. The fortress was added this summer: it has two round towers at two of the opposite angles, and within the walls a dwelling for the bulu-bashi. The church of the Forty Saints is said to have been part of a monastery, but nothing more remains at present than the ruined church, of the annexed form, which was covered with three domes and seven semi-domes.
It was evidently coeval with the town below; though part of the materials of the church, particularly in the round arches of the windows, are Roman tiles, derived probably from some town of an earlier age, which stood on the site of the existing ruins on the shore of the harbour.

§ 1.012   At Kassopo in Corfu, nearly opposite to the Forty Saints, are similar ruins of a town not so large as that of the Forty Saints, with those of a castle, irregular in shape, and haying no ruined buildings within its inclosure, and which stands on the summit of a hill rising from the shore of the harbour of Kassopo.
The heights of the Forty Saints are rugged, sharp, honey-combed rocks of brown marble, with a little soil in the intervals, which bear squills and other plants usual on similar sites in Greece. At the Skala, a rough mole incloses a little cothon or basin sufficient for the use of the small boats which alone frequent the harbour, though it would be both secure and convenient for large vessels, were the commerce of this part of Epirus sufficient to require them, as the bay has good anchorage and is well protected both from south-easterly and northwesterly gales; in the latter direction, by a remarkable cape called Kefali. which with Cape St. Catherine, or the northern extremity of Corfu, forms the entrance of the channel from the northward; in the opposite direction the harbour is protected by the projecting coasts both of the continent and island. Today, though it blows a gale of wind from the southward, there is no sea in the port.

§ 1.013   As there is nothing between the Forty Saints and Port Palerimo deserving the name of a harbour, though there are creeks under the villages of Nivitza, Lukovo and Pikernes, where small vessels take shelter and are drawn up on the beach, the Forty Saints can alone correspond to the ancient Port Onchesmus, which was the next to the southward of Panormus, according to Ptolemy as well as Strabo. It would seem from Cicero that Onchesmus, in his time, was a place of some importance, and that it was the ordinary point of departure from Epirus to Italy, the south-easterly breeze which was favourable for making the passage, having been called an Onchesmites. Under the Constantinopolitan emperors the name Onchesmus assumed the form of Anchiasmus, which probably obtained the preference over Onchesmus in consequence of a tradition noticed by Dionysius of Halicarnassus, that the town was named after Anchises, father of Aeneias. Anchiasmus was a city of the government of Old Epirus, together with Phoenice and Buthrotum; the signature of the bishops of Anchiasmus is found to the acts of the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon in the fifth century. The other bishops of Epirus whose names are annexed to the acts are those of Dodona, Nicopolis, Eurhoea, Phoenice, Hadrianopolis and Corcyra.

§ 1.014   Dec. 22.—A Scirocco, which detained me yesterday, still continues, but though the gale has abated and the rain ceased, the Agoiates, (Italice vetturini,) are unwilling to go, and my host will not take upon himself to oblige them, until some person arrives from Delvino, who will report the rivers practicable. The consequence is, that I am not only detained this day, but the 23d Dec. likewise; for although some horsemen arrived yesterday, about 3 p.m., who had crossed the river, it was then too late to depart, and at night the rain set in again in torrents with thunder and lightning, penetrating the bare tiles of the collector’s roof, and pouring down all night a black stream from the smoky tiles. The tempest continues the greater part of the day, but the wind having come to the north promises a change of weather.
The feasts, the fasts, and the fears of the Greeks, are a great impediment to the traveller. During their feasts they will not work; the fasts, when prolonged and rigidly observed, render them unequal to any great exertion, while timidity is the necessary consequence of the Turkish yoke following long ages of the debasing tyranny and superstition of the Byzantine empire. But through this unamiable covering the ancient national character continually breaks forth; to which, in this mountainous part of the country, is added a considerable portion of the industry and activity of a northern race. Every traveller will occasionally be disgusted with the meanness, lying, and cowardice of the people, in the towns and in the parts of the country most frequented by travellers; but it should be remembered that their vices arise from their condition, that deceit is the only defence which their tyrants have left them, and that such defects are greater in proportion to that natural genius which is indisputably inherent in the race. They have a proverb, that the sweetest wine makes the sourest vinegar, which is well exemplified in their own character by means of a most corrupt despotic government acting upon a fine natural genius.

§ 1.015   Dec. 24.—At 10, a.m., we set out in the rain from the Limeni, cross the hollow between the monastery and the village of the Forty Saints, and at the end of three quarters of an hour ford a small stream descending from Nivitza into the Pavla, which is the principal river of the plain of Delvino. The passage of this tributary is so difficult in consequence of the rain, that there seems little chance of the main stream being passable. Our conductors, moreover, are ignorant of the πέραμα, or proper ford of the latter river; we are obliged therefore to follow its bank upwards, until immediately below Nivitza we meet a party of horsemen, who have been making an attempt to cross without success. We retire, therefore, for the night to Nivitza.
The mountain on the mid-slope of which this village stands, is separated on either side by a valley from the rest of the maritime range, and is fortified to the eastward as well by the steepness of the mountain as by the rapid river at the foot of it. So rugged is the ascent, and so bad our cattle, that we are two hours in reaching the village from the river, the mules having fallen several times under their loads.

§ 1.016   The Vezir’s Bulu-bashi, a rough Albanian Musulman, receives us kindly as the friends of his master, and we take up our lodging at the best Greek house in the place. Many of the soldiers and inhabitants speak Italian; one of them is son of a major in the Reali Cacciatori Albanesi of Naples, in which corps he himself served many years.
Nivitza was once a large and flourishing town, and the most important of the independent Christian communities, which then extended along the whole coast from Buthrotum to Avlon. By means of the strength of its position it resisted all the attempts of Aly Pasha to reduce it, until the year 1798, when he persuaded the French to connive at his conveying a body of Albanians in his own vessels through the Straits; an operation which had constantly been interdicted, by the Venetians on the strength of their treaties with the Porte, but which was conceded on this occasion by the French, as they were then anxious to conciliate Aly with a view to their designs upon Turkey, and little suspected perhaps the use which he intended to make of their permission. He landed his troops at the Skales of Nivitza and the Forty Saints; and the better to ensure success, made choice of the morning of Easter Sunday for the time of attack, when the inhabitants were all disarmed and engaged in prayers. He thus made an easy conquest, not only of Nivitza, but of two other villages to the northward, the possession of which has now given him all the coast as far as the town of Khimara. Nivitza and the two villages are now little better than ruins; their lands, divided into portions, are numbered among the Pasha's tjiftliks; and it is for the use of those who cultivate them that the Pasha has built the new village of the Forty Saints, while many of the inhabitants of Nivitza have been sent to labour on his farms near Trikkala in Thessaly.

§ 1.017   Dec. 25.—A mile to the northward of Nivitza, on the same mountain, stands Aio Vasili, one of the villages which shared the fate of Nivitza: a little below it a ridge which connects the mountain with the range to the northward, is occupied by a small square fortress, similar to that of the Forty Saints, and which was erected by the Pasha soon after he had obtained possession of Nivitza. About a mile below this castle is the Skala of Nivitza and St. Basil, called Spilia. The rugged hills below Nivitza, to the eastward, are planted with olives and vines: the plain produces Mesiri (maize), kalambokki (Guinea corn), fasulia (kidney-beans), rizi (rice), wheat, barley, and tobacco. Having descended the mountain, we cross the river at the extremity of the plain, near the opening where it issues from the mountains:

§ 1.018   it is not very deep, but extremely rapid, and the stony bed is such an insecure footing for the horses, that they tremble in crossing it. Both horse and rider must trust to the guide who walks on foot beside them, supports both, and repeats his recommendation to the rider to look at the bank, and not at the water, which causes giddiness. I did not experience that effect, but the illusion of appearing to remain stationary, while really moving, was perfect. The sources of this river are in the mountains eastward of Khimara, and its course, for the most part, is through a narrow valley, in which is situated Kaliasa. Half an hour beyond the river, we cross the torrent of Delvino, and at noon enter the pass of Delvino, from which the torrent flows. Kyr Khristo Kanaki, to whom I had letters, happens to be in the country, superintending his vineyards, but I am received in his house, and he returns home in the evening. Dhelvino, or Delvino, is situated in an opening of the lower ridges of a high range of mountains which have a S.S.E. direction. The town is chiefly inhabited by Musulman Albanians, who have eight or ten small mosques. Of Greeks who occupy only the eastern suburb called Laka, there are about thirty families, ten of which bear the same surname as Kyr Khristo. The Bishop and K. are the chief men; the former, who is now absent, styles himself Bishop of Khimara and Delvino, and is a suffragan of the Metropolitan of Ioannina. The Turkish houses occupy the sides of the hills on either side of the torrent, for a distance of two miles, being situated as usual in Albanian towns, at great distances from one another, with a view to the frequent quarrels and wars among the φαραις, or family alliances, into which all Albanian communities are divided. The effects of these, and of a war between the Pashas Aly and Mustafa, which lasted seven years, have left many of the houses in ruins. The war ended by putting Aly in possession of Delvino, and sending Mustafa to take shelter in Tjamuria, where he now resides at Vakalates, a small town two or three hours eastward of Buthrotum.
At the entrance of Delvino, on a conspicuous height, stands the deserted serai of Selim Bey Koka, a connection of Aly Pasha, but who, having taken part with Mustafa, has not thought himself safe here, and has retired to Konispoli, where, however, he still enjoys the revenue of his landed property in the district of Delvino. A little within the opening of the hills, a conical rock, projecting over the ravine, is crowned with a small castle in bad repair. The ground on either side of the ravine abounds in springs and streamlets falling down to the torrent, and although the most uneven imaginable, bears olives and other fruit trees. The Pasha’s palace is a heap of ruins, but there still remain in the same quarter, on the northern side of the town, some good houses, pleasantly situated among gardens, in which are orange-trees, cypresses, and poplars.

§ 1.020   The Christians of Delvino make wine, and comb and spin some imported hemp into yarn, from which they manufacture shoes. Swords too, such as the Albanians wear, are made here, and every part of their muskets except the barrels. Below the castle there is a miserable bazar.
On account of the difficulty of passing the river, I had no opportunity of examining a Paleo-kastro at Finiki (Φοινίκη), of which I received information. The name, however, is sufficient to show it to be the Phoenice of Strabo and Polybius, which the former describes as being near Buthrotum, and which the itineraries place exactly in this position between the Acroceraunia and Buthrotum: it stood on an insulated hill, in the middle of the plain between the river of Kaliasa, and another, named Vistritza, which flows from the northeast, and beyond Finiki pursues a course nearly parallel to the former river, as far as the lake, into which they separately fall.
My host complains to me, in the usual style, of the hardships which his nation suffers from the Turks, and asks why the great powers of Europe, but particularly the English, will not assist in liberating their fellow-Christians. It is not a very agreeable task to explain, that nations seldom act but from self-interest, that we have a cruel war on our hands, and that our present policy is to support the Turkish empire. The poor Greeks have not much more to hope for at present from any other nation. If either French or Russians, in their military occupation of the country, were obliged to derive their resources from it, the Greeks might find the necessities of a French or Russian general not less fatal to their liberty and property than those of Aly, whose officers are kept in the best possible order, however relentless his own extortion may be. The sentiments of the Greeks, as well in this as in other parts of Greece which I have visited, show that the conduct of the Russians in the Greek expeditions of Catherine, as well as in the administration of the Septinsular Republic, has left a very unfavorable impression: so far from desiring the presence of these brethren of their church, as might have been supposed, they much more commonly bestow upon them the appellations of Κλέφτες and Ζώα. On the other hand, they seem quite ready to hail the arrival of the French, though they are cautious of giving utterance to these sentiments, not so much from any fear of their own government, for at this moment they have perhaps more liberty of speech upon such subjects than any people on the continent of Europe; but from doubts lest they should give offence to European governments or their agents, whose influence with the Turks might be fatal to an offending individual. My host admits, that were any pretended deliverers to land, there would hardly be the Greek who would venture to furnish them provisions, much less to join them, so much do they dread the Turkish sabre, and so little energy have they to act in their own behalf.

§ 1.022   Dec. 26.—At half past eight this morning we begin to ascend the mountain at the back of Delvino. Its sides are covered with extensive vineyards, yielding a light pleasant wine, but which generally turns sour before the summer. The pass leads between rugged and barren hills, two of the highest summits of the range, until, at half past ten, we arrive at the little village of Kardhikaki, where are the sources of one of the streams which contribute to form the Vistritza. Here we fall in with some Musulman Albanians, hunting hares with greyhounds of a large breed. The peasants are ploughing the ground, with a light plough drawn by two oxen; they afterwards break the clods with a hoe. At 11.10 a hollow country is on our right, four or five miles in diameter, surrounded by an amphitheatre of mountains, and watered by several streams, which unite to form the Vistritza. The slopes, although intersected and broken by the torrents in the most rugged, and wildest manner, are well clothed with vineyards and olive-trees.
Having skirted the edge of this basin as far as the village of Morzena, we there join the road from Vutzindro, which is hardly passable at this time on account of the rivers. A little beyond Morzena is a Derveni, or guard-house, in a spot where the road begins to descend into the plain of Arghyrokastro through a narrow opening between two very steep and lofty summits.

§ 1.023   The descent is long and rugged; and it is not until 2 p.m. that we arrive in the plain at the Derveni of Garbitzi, or Grabitza, so called from a small neighbouring village. Here the opening is no more than a torrent-bed between lofty rocks. The wretched mules which we took from the Forty Saints move so slowly that the horizontal distance from Delvino to this place is probably not more than 9 geographical miles. Nothing can be less inviting or picturesque than the present appearance of the valley of Arghyrokastro, though undoubtedly it presents a very different appearance in spring, as its numerous villages and extensive cultivation show that it is one of the most flourishing districts in Albania. Those parts which are now little better than a marsh in consequence of the perfect level, are in summer richly covered with corn, maize, and tobacco. Opposite to Garbitzi the plain is about five miles broad, bounded by two parallel mountains of varied surface, woody, and studded with villages in the lower parts, and rising above to steep ridges of calcareous rock, the summits of which are now covered with snow, and the bare sides furrowed with white charadrae, or beds of winter torrents: along the middle of the valley flows a river in a direction from south to north. Our road on emerging from the pass, changes from an eastern to a north-western direction, along the foot of the mountain; and at the end of three miles we halt for the night, at the little village of Theriakhates. The Papas, in whose house I lodge, is a cultivator of land, holding it of the Musulman lord of the village, who supplies seed and cattle, and takes half the produce. He asserts that in summer, not only the plain is quite dry, but the river also, and that the air is not unhealthy. This perhaps is chiefly owing to the situation of the villages on the sides of the hills. They are for the most part surrounded with vineyards and a few olives. Opposite to Theriakhates is the town of Libokhovo, situated, like Delvino, in an opening through which appears a parallel range still higher than that which borders the plain, and with a greater quantity of snow upon it. This high ridge is called Nemertzika. The pass of Libokhovo leads to Permeti, or Premedi, which stands on the eastern foot of Mount Nemertzika, in the vale of the Viosa. In the hollow country between the two ranges behind Libokhovo, and extending from thence along the mountains towards Tepeleni, is the Albanian district of Lientjas, in Greek Λιουντζαριά, the country of the Λιούντζιδες. These people are noted for their skill in the irrigation of land, and the management of aqueducts, and in that capacity obtain employment at Constantinople, and in other distant parts of the Turkish empire. To the south of the Lmntzidhes is the district called Pogoniani, or Pogoyani, of which Dhelvinaki is the chief place; and to the north-east ward, that of Zagoria. The Zagoriani inhabit the banks of a stream, which joins the Viosa between Klisura and Tepeleni.

§ 1.025   Below Libokhovo, on the skirts of the plain, are seen some buildings where the snuff is made for which this valley is celebrated; and in the mid plain, which is here about four miles across, the Papas points out to me a mound near the left bank of the river, which by the description seems to be a small theatre. It is now inaccessible, the plain being a marsh quite up to the rocks of Theriakhates. The whole valley is called by the Greeks Deropoli, which the Albanians pronounce Deropugl: the river is named Dhryno, or Dryno, or Druno, or river of Deropoli. Arghyrokastro, the chief town, contains about 2000 Musulman families; Libokhovo half that number; in each are about 100 Christian houses.
The road to Ioannina from the derveni of Grabitza follows up the plain of Deropoli to the southward. At a quarter of an hour it crosses a branch of the Dryno, half an hour further another branch; and a quarter of an hour beyond, the main stream of the river. The road soon afterwards ascends the eastern hills, from which many torrents descend into the river, after having turned some more snuffmills. It then enters Pogoyani, leaves Dhelvinaki on the left, crosses again to the left bank of the Dryno, which originates in the mountains around Dhelvinaki, passes through the valleys of Xerovalto and Tzerovina, crosses the Kalama near its sources, and from thence proceeds into the plain of Ioannina.

§ 1.026   Dec. 27.—At half-past seven this morning we continue to skirt the foot of the mountain in a northerly direction, advancing very slowly through rocky ground, or along the edge of the marshy plain, and leaving several small villages on the heights above us, until ten, when we arrive at the point of a low projecting ridge, where the river, wide, deep, and rapid, approaches so near to the heights as to leave only a passage for the road. On the point stands the village of Kuloritza, and on a similar projection, two miles further, the town of Arghyrokastro.
Not thinking it right to visit this place, as Aly Pasha and the Kastrites, or rather a powerful party in the town, are at present in a state of mutual obversation, we leave it on the left, and crossing a high narrow bridge of four arches below the town, halt a little beyond it for twenty minutes at a fountain. The plain here is not more than a mile and a half in breadth, and is all in pasture. Arghyrokastro occupies a large space of ground, being divided into separate clusters of houses, which are defended from one another by deep ravines. The mountain on which it stands is bare and deficient in water, and it is difficult to imagine a more disadvantageous situation, except with a view to the interminable disputes among the Albanian fares, for here the hostile families, separated from each other by rocks and ravines, may cherish their quarrels for years together without any effectual result.
In the plain between Libokhovo and Arghyrokastro, the Dryno is joined by the Sukha, which rises in Mount Nemertzika, and after watering the fertile valley of the Liuntzidhes, to the eastward of Libokhovo, enters the plain through a narrow opening on the northern side of that town. Having reached a projection of the eastern hills, we coast them for two or three miles, strike again across a part of the plain, and at 1:15 arrive at a Khan called Valare, or in the Albanian pronunciation, Valiare, situated on the right bank of a torrent which descends obliquely from the mountain into the Dryno. The Khan is reckoned five hours from Tepeleni; the road thither lying along the foot of the mountain, and over some low heights which project from it. Finding it impossible, with such cattle as we have, to reach Tepeleni to-night, we follow the torrent at the foot of the eastern mountain, which here projects considerably into the valley, and forms a variety of lower heights.

§ 1.028   Instead of stopping at Gariani, which is at the entrance of these hills, we are induced, in search of better accommodation, to proceed to Labovo, which is asserted to be only half an hour higher on the mountain. We ascend accordingly by a winding path, which is not the better for being paved, as half the stones have been displaced by the torrents, but see nothing of Labovo for two hours, nor until we had entered the clouds, which have settled upon the hills with a southerly wind, and brought on rain.
Λάμποβος, vulgarly pronounced Liabovo, according to the guttural sound of the L in Albanian, is situated not far below one of the highest summits of the range, but in a situation where a more gradual slope than that which we ascended admits of space for the scattered houses of the village, and for some vineyards and fields of kalambokki. It is entirely Christian, and there are eight or ten churches, besides those in the detached quarters, for, like the larger Albanian villages in general, Labovo consists of several detached makhalas. They suffered last year from a deficient harvest, and derive no advantage from being near Tepeleni, as the Vezir Aly, when he visits his native place, calls upon Labovo among other neighbouring places to furnish him with provision for his household, particularly eggs, poultry, and wood. On the summit of the ridge above Labovo stands Tjaiube, in a situation so exposed to storms, that it is necessary to pile stones and earth upon the roofs to prevent them from being blown away, although composed of heavy masses of stone. From a peak of this ridge, called Strakavetzi, the monastery of Aghio Naum, near Bitolia, is said to be visible.

§ 1.029   Dec. 28.—Very soon after quitting Labovo, (at half-past eight,) the town of Kardhiki, or Gardhiki, appears over the northern extremity of the range of Arghyrokastro, on a height surrounded by a valley through which the Belitza river takes its course to join the Dryno. The junction of these two streams occurs a little below the Khan Valiare, between it and a bridge over the united river.
The slopes of the mountain of Labovo, as far as the river Viosa, are well cultivated, and contain many villages. One of the largest of these, named Khormovo, resisted for a long time the growing power of Aly Pasha, when at length, about nine years ago, he took it, murdered the male inhabitants, and burned alive the Prift, who commanded the village, in revenge for the ill-treatment which Aly’s mother and sister had suffered from this man and others, when they were made prisoners, by the allied forces of Khormovo and Gardhiki, soon after the death of Aly’s father.
In something less than two hours we arrive at the foot of the mountain, on the right bank of the Dryno, which, between the bridge of Arghyrokastro, where we crossed it, and this place, has received, besides the Belitza and torrent of Valare, a contribution much larger than either from a source at the foot of the mountain about midway between Arghyrokastro and the Belitza, so that here the river is almost twice as large as at the bridge of Arghyrokastro. The great source just mentioned is said to be the only portion of the river permanent in very dry seasons. The stream now enters a narrow vale between two mountains; that to the west is united with ridges which inclose on every side the valley of Gardhiki; the eastern, on which stands Khormovo, is a westerly projection of the mountain of Labovo. We cross the river by the bridge of the Subashi, so named; which has three arches resting upon piers, with arched openings in them. The middle arch, which is much the largest, is pointed at the top, and its height is equal to about two thirds of the span. The roadway is so narrow and roughly paved, and the structure so high, that it is scarcely ever passed but on foot. From the bridge to Tepeleni, the distance is about six miles—two thirds along the Dryno, and the remainder on the bank of the Viosa, after it has received the Dryno. The road has been paved, but as the mountain rises immediately above it, the torrent has carried away the pavement in many parts, and left a track just passable.
The fortress and serai of the Vezir, standing on a tabular projection, surrounded by cliffs towards the river, have an imposing appearance at a distance, and are quite in harmony with the sublime scenery around. The village of Tepeleni, indeed, which consists of not more than eighty or ninety Musulman families, with a small detached suburb of Christians, is no great embellishment to the scene; but upon the whole, the palace is one of the most romantic and delightful country-houses that can be imagined.

§ 1.031   The height is the termination of one of the counterforts of a snowy range of mountains, bordering the vale of the Viosa to the west, and is defended on the northern side by the ravine of a stream called Bantja. which, though sometimes dry in summer, now pours a large supply into the Viosa. The village is surrounded by vineyards which produce a poor red wine; beyond which, wheat and barley are the produce of the higher lands around; and kalambokki that of the low level on the banks of the river.
Immediately above Tepeleni, the piers of a ruined bridge stretch across the Viosa, the arches of which were carried away three years ago by an inundation, and are now supplied by a temporary wooden communication. From the opposite bank of the river rises a steep and lofty mountain, named Trebushin; on the side of which are a Tekieh, or convent of dervises, and a village named Petzisti.
Mount Trebushin is separated only from the similar mountain of Khormovo by the Viosa, which at two miles above Tepeleni emerges from a boghazi, or narrow gorge, between the two mountains, and joining the Dryno, spreads over a space of near half a mile; where the river is divided by sand-banks into several streams now deep and broad, but some of which have no existence in summer.

§ 1.032   Mount Trebushin sends forth a branch to the northward, which extends to the Illyrian plains, between Berat and Avlona, bounding the vale of the Viosa, below Tepeleni, on the eastern side, opposite to the parallel ridge before mentioned, of which the highest summit (not seen from Tepeleni), is named in Albanian Griva (grey), from its being constantly covered with snow, except for a short time in the middle of summer. The southerly and westerly winds, which have now prevailed for a fortnight, have melted the snow on the western side of all the mountains, but have left it in considerable quantity on the opposite face of them.
The narrow ravine between Trebushin and the mountain of Khormovo, from which the Viosa emerges, is called τά Στενά της Βιώσας, or the Straits of the Viosa. It extends four hours to the eastward, throughout which distance the river flows between two high mountains, every where steep, and in some places perpendicular. The Stena terminate at the village of Klisura, above which the valley widens, and from thence continues to be nearly of the same breadth for a considerable distance beyond Premedi. At Klisura Aly has built a fortress, in a lofty situation, above the right bank of the river, and is thus master of both ends of this important defile.
There can be little doubt that this pass is the celebrated Fauces Antigonenses, or Aoi Stena, near Antigoneia, in which Philip, son of Demetrius, attempted in vain to arrest the progress of the Roman consul, Titus Quinctius Flamininus, through Epirus.

§ 1.033   Dec. 31.—The road from Tepeleni to Nivitza leads along the river Bantza (in Albanian Benja), through a hollow in the range of Griva, from which that river descends. This pass conducts to Pregonati, situated at the head of the valley of the Sutzista, which descends to Nivitza, and joins the Viosa in the plain of Apollonia. Thus Tepeleni, in all the four quarters, is approached by a narrow valley; from the east and north by that of the Viosa, from the south by the valley of the Dryno, and from the west by that of the Bantza. On the left bank of the Bantza, three or four miles above Tepeleni, is a ruined castle, bearing the same name as the river. It occupies the summit of a height, and incloses about two acres. Nothing is left but the foundations, except at the upper end, where are some remains of a round tower, of very thick and regular courses of masonry, cemented with a great quantity of mortar. The shape and position of the castle, and its citadel at the round tower, incline me to think that the fortress is ancient, although no part of the masonry resembles the massy and beautiful constructions of the southern Greeks. On the opposite bank of the river, not a mile above the ruins, is the small village Bantza, which is said to have been built about thirty years ago by one of the fares, or family alliances of Pregonati, which, in consequence of the internal disputes of that town, and the superiority acquired by their opponents, had been obliged to leave it.

§ 1.034   Several other small villages were founded at that time in the country around Pregonati from the same cause. It may be thought, perhaps, that Bantza is a corruption of Amantia, and that it proves that ancient city to have stood either at Bantza or at Tepeleni, but Amantia was certainly much nearer to Aulon, and Bantza may, perhaps, be the ancient name, with scarcely any change. Below Tepeleni the Viosa continues to flow for twelve hours between the two ranges of mountains already mentioned, as far as Gradista, sometimes closely confined between rocky banks, at others leaving small plains, or cultivated open heights, on either side, and thus the country is divided by nature into districts, each of which contains several villages, generally small. The first of the plains below Tepeleni is that of Lopesi, pronounced Liopesi by the Albanians, of which the chief village is named Dukai, in Greek Dukadhes. Here is a ruin on the left bank of the river, similar to that of Bantza. Opposite to Lopesi, a quarter of an hour from the right bank of the river, stands Vasari, or Vashari, according to the usual Albanian and vulgar Greek pronunciation of the sigma. On the opposite side, one hour from Dukai, is Sarali, distant half an hour from the left bank of the river, from whence there is a road across Mount Griva to Nivitza, by a ravine called Grobate Pliakes, or the vale of the old woman, so called because a woman was once frozen to death in passing. Continuing from Sarali on the way to Avlona, occurs, at the end of an hour and a half, Dhumbliani, containing three hundred houses, and situated at the same distance from the Viosa as Sarali; three hours beyond it is Kudhesi, of five hundred houses, the chief town of a district containing several villages, and situated on the mountain, which commands the fork of the rivers Viosa and Sutzista.
On the river side, below Lopesi, is the district of Kalutzi, separated from that of Lopesi by a rocky shore, on which stands another ruined fortress, near the village of Lunji, which is about half way between Tepeleni and Gradista. Another rocky shore terminates Kalutzi on the left bank, beyond which the country begins to open towards the plain; then occurs Karvundri, a town of Kudhesi, then Gradista, on the right bank, and Selenitza on the left, where are the mines of fossil pitch described by Strabo; and then the junction of the Viosa with the Sutzista, or river of Nivitza.

§ 1.036   From all I can learn, the most considerable Hellenic cities in this part of the country were at Gradista and Nivitza. If the latter was Amantia, as I can hardly doubt from the strong testimony of the ancient authors, the former was probably Byllis, or Bullis, for Byllis, Amantia and Apollonia were the three principal cities in the vicinity of the Gulf of Aulon.
This evening the Dervises mount to the top of Mount Trebushin; and on their return declare the new moon visible, though the sky is so clouded that the sun could not have been seen, had it been above the horizon. Several guns are then fired at intervals of five minutes, and the rioting of the Bairam begins.
Knowing how little the Musulman Albanians care for the ceremonies or the doctrines of their religion, I was surprised to find them, on my arrival, keeping the Ramazan so correctly. Not a pipe was to be seen till the muezzin had called the evening prayer from the minaret of the Pasha’s mosque.

§ 1.137   But the Vezir, though he generally drinks wine openly at table, seems to think it right to set a good Musulman example to the wild Toskidhes and Liapidhes of his native mountains, whose ancestors probably adopted the fast the more readily from its resembling one of the observances of the church from which they apostatized, without being so severe a penance as the Christian Lent. In fact, the Ramazan is no mortification at all in winter, when the short days leave the Musulmans at liberty to feast as early as five in the evening.
Aly’s sons, Mukhtar and Vely, were born by a daughter of Kaplan Pasha, of Delvino. His third son, Salih, who is only three or four years old, was by a slave. It does not appear that the sons have been educated in such a manner as can adapt them for preserving the power which the father has founded, or that he himself looks much farther in this respect than other Turks. Indeed, a Turk, or Musulman Albanian, not short-sighted, avaricious, or intent upon momentary advantages, would be a rarissima avis. Aly is his own Kehaya and Hasnadar, trusts not even his own sons, and transacts every thing himself, except where writing is required, when he dictates to a Turkish or Greek secretary. His own writing is execrably bad, and his Greek orthography worse; the little that he learnt when a boy having been almost lost by that want of practice caused by the custom common in every part of the east among the great, of always employing a secretary.

§ 1.138   Turkish he can read, but never attempts to write, though it formed a part of his education: in fact it is not much wanted, except for some formal letters to the Porte, or to some of the Pashas of Rumili; his communications with the government being chiefly carried on in Greek by means of his Kapi-Tjokhadar, or acknowledged agent, residing at Constantinople. With the Albanians his written correspondence is in Greek, except perhaps in a few rare cases where he wishes his missive to be publicly read in Albanian, in which case it is written in that language with Greek characters.
The person of most importance under the Vezir is Suliman, the Seliktar Aga, now absent. It is said that his influence in southern Albania is such, that in the event of the Pasha’s death, he might place himself at the head of a party at least equal to those of Mukhtar or Vely, for little doubt seems to be entertained that the two brothers will be opposed to each other. Already the symptoms of this future civil war are apparent. Mukhtar, knowing that by money he can always command the affections of the Albanians, is a thesaurizer, while his brother, who is a mere sensualist, but with much more talent than Mukhtar, is much less provident.
Another person in whom the Vezir places great confidence, is Yusuf Aga Arapi, nominally His Highness's Hasnadar, in whose house, now occupied by his son, Bekir Aga, I am lodged. He has always been employed by the Vezir in the management of the Dervenia, and hence is thoroughly acquainted with the country, from the frontiers of Dalmatia to the isthmus of Corinth. He is described as a man of talent and activity, extremely attached to his master, brave, ferocious, active, and cruel. Two other officers, whom the Vezir generally keeps near him, are Tatza Bulubashi, a Musulman, and Athanasi Vaia, a Christian, the ready instruments of many an atrocious act of cruelty. All these persons, including the Pasha's sons, are usually dressed in the Albanian fashion, with a coat or jacket covered with gold lace, and a shirt falling down in folds over the drawers, resembling the drapery of the Roman statues. When new and clean it is a beautiful costume; but a clean shirt is not a weekly luxury even with all the higher classes; and among the soldiers it is sometimes worn out without ever being washed, though occasionally taken off, and held over the fire, that the animals contained in it, intoxicated by the smoke, may fall into the fire, when a crackling announces the success of the operation. Sometimes during the first two or three weeks of a new shirt or waistcoat, or when particularly desirous of making a favourable appearance, they wear a collar of cotton, impregnated with oxyde of mercury, which forms a barrier to the more aspiring natives, and keeps them out of sight. The same want of cleanliness pervades every class in proportion, in all their domestic arrangements.

§ 1.040   Aly himself has been so accustomed to the rudest Albanian life in his youth, that the dirtiness of his people gives him little disgust, and as policy obliges him to receive the lowest Albanian with familiarity and apparent confidence, to allow them to approach him, to kiss the hem of his garment, to touch his hand, and to stand near him while they converse with him, his dress is often covered with vermin, and there is no small danger of acquiring these companions by sitting on his sofa, where they are often seen crawling amidst embroidered velvet and cloth of gold.
A Divan Effendi and a Turkish Secretary, both πολίταις, or natives of Constantinople, form a part also of Aly’s court. They preserve the Turkish costume, and look upon the Albanians with that mixture of fear and contempt, which is the general feeling of the Turks towards this nation. Through the medium of the Constantinopolitans residing with him, and that of his own resident at the Porte, Aly manages the good understanding, which he has the policy to keep up with the supreme government. He makes frequent presents to the Valide Sultana, and her powerful Kehaya Yusuf. He has augmented his dominions as much by the intermarriages of his family with the chieftains around him, as by his military or political skill. Arghyrokastro and Libokhovo have been brought under his influence chiefly by the marriage of his sister, Khainitza, with Suliman, of Arghyrokastro, sometime Pasha of Trikkala, whose son, Adem Bey, now resides with his mother, as Governor of Libokhovo, under the orders of the Vezir, having succeeded in this post to his brother, Elmas Bey, who died not long since at Ioannina.

§ 1.041   Aly has no other relatives except his grandchildren. His sister, before she married Suliman of Arghyrokastro, was the wife of Suliman’s brother, Aly, by whom she had a daughter married to Vely, Bey of Klisura. It is said that Aly, of Arghyrokastro, was murdered by his brother, in concert with Aly of Tepeleni, and his sister: it is certain, at least, that Suliman, very soon after his brother's death, married the widow. Eight years ago Aly obtained possession of Klisura, by murdering his nephew-in-law, the Bey, together with his younger brother, whom he had enticed to Ioannina, to assist at the nuptials of his son Vely with the daughter of Ibrahim Pasha, by which alliance the peace between the two Vezirs was ratified. Aly pretended to have discovered that not only the Bey, but his brother, who had accompanied him, had been engaged in a plot against the Vezir. By this act Aly cleared away all the claimants to Klisura: a most important point, which secures Tepeleni and Premedi, and opens the road to Berat.
At Arghyrokastro, as in other independent towns of Albania, the power was formerly divided among several leagues, whose chieftains were continually at war. At present, Morteza Bey, brother of Suliman Pasha, chiefly by his alliance with Aly, is at the head of the strongest party.

§ 1.042   Mutja Hushuf (Albanian for Musa Yusuf, or Moses Joseph) was the name of Aly’s great grandfather, from whom the family are called in Greek οι Μουτζαχουσσάτες. My host, Bekir Aga, asserts, that Hushuf conquered all Albania with his sabre, which, though a mere amplification, shows that his power was considerable. His son, Mukhtar, accompanied the expedition of Kara Mustafa, the Seraskier of Sultan Hamid III., in union with the fleet of the Kapitan Pasha Djanum Khodja against Corfu, in the year 1716, when the island was defended by Marshal Schulemberg, whose statue still remains in the Citadel, erected by the Venetian republic, in gratitude for this defence of the island. Mukhtar was killed in the siege, having fallen in the assault of the fortress; and it is believed in Albania that his sword is still kept at Corfu, among the trophies of that expedition. Vely, the father of Aly, was the youngest of three brothers, or half-brothers, but having succeeded in destroying the two elder, became the head of the house. He died at an early, age, leaving Aly a child in the care of his mother Khanko, daughter of a Bey of Konitza, who was of the same family as Kurt Pasha of Berat, at that time the most powerful chieftain in Albania. Aly has now been a Vezir for about four years, and is not a little proud of the third tail, which the Porte has generally been very unwilling to confer upon Albanians. Having bestowed it upon Aly, they gave it also to the two Ibrahims, in order to keep the balance of power even.

§ 1.043   Aly disgusts all the Franks who come to seek their fortune in his service, by his parsimony. He scarcely ever gives them any fixed pay, whatever he may have promised, but confines himself to making them presents in clothes and money, when they perform any particular service. If they are not married, he is always anxious to provide them with wives, that he may have hostages to prevent their leaving the place. Those who have to provide for the different departments of his household, are said to be the only persons who enrich themselves in his service.
The Franks at present in the Vezir’s service are a Milanese, who had previously been employed by the Pashas of Berat and Skodra, and who has undertaken to complete a foundry at Ioannina: there are also a French engineer, a carpenter, who makes gun carriages, a Dalmatian watchmaker, and an Italian smith. These people, though really able men in their professions, will soon be forced to leave his service from the want of encouragement.
Plutarch informs us, that Pyrrhus was an assiduous courtier, and studious when young of acquiring the friendship of powerful persons. This is generally the Albanian character. They are anxious to secure the favour of their superiors, and faithful to them while regularly paid. Their revolts which so often occur, are generally caused by the ill-faith of the employers, who often begin an enterprize without sufficient pecuniary means, trusting to success for an augmentation of them.

§ 1.044   The Albanians, being generally poorer than the Turks, are more moderate in their expectations, more patient and persevering, more familiar with hardships from their infancy, but equally greedy of money, and much more saving. The Albanian soldier will either plunder or live on the hardest fare, as circumstances may require, to save his pay; his prime object being to return home with a well-filled girdle; for the zone, as among the Romans, is the treasury of the Albanian. Their military qualities are rather shown in the οδόν ελθέμεναι, than in the ανδρασιν ιφι μάχεσθαι, and their wars consist entirely in stratagem, rapine, and ambuscade, though few of them are deficient in personal courage, when the occasion calls for it. One of the advantages of the Albanians is their independence of other countries for the greater part of the manufactures of that rude kind with which they are content. Their arms are all made in Albania, with the exception of the gun-barrels, the greater part of which are from the north of Italy, though an inferior kind both of musquet and pistol-barrels are made at Skodra, Prisrend, Kalkandere, Pristina, and Grevena: gun locks are made both in Greece and Albania; some I have seen from Karpenisi, in Aetolia, which have a polish (if that be any merit) equal to those of England. The kind of musquet, however, which the Albanians use is very inconvenient, and is adapted only to their own irregular discipline, being long and heavy, without any balance of weight in the stock, which is particularly thin and light, and the piece is thus incapable of an aim without resting.

§ 1.045   The coarse woollen cloth used for the outer garments of the Albanians is chiefly made at Skodra. It is a thick white coarse cloth, which wears well, and when adorned with a broad lace, forms one of the handsomest national costumes in Europe. It is much superior in quality to that of the black kapa, or outer cloak, made in all the mountains of Northern Greece, and which is very generally worn by the shepherds, peasants, and lower orders both of Greece and Albania, as well as by the mariners of the Greek and Adriatic seas.
The Pasha asserts, that in the country, of which Tepeleni gives him the command, there are not less than 16000 men armed with musquets, who are considered among the best soldiers in Albania. However correct this numeration may be, it is certain, at least, that Albania is better peopled than any equal portion of European Turkey, that notwithstanding the great number of the soldiery employed abroad, it maintains its population, and that every male, from his infancy, is familiar with the use of arms. The Vezir describes Albania as 200 hours in length; in one half of which his own influence predominates, while the remainder is about equally divided between Ibrahim Pasha of Berat, and Ibrahim Pasha of Skodra. He admits, however, that there are still some chieftains who do not acknowledge the authority of the three. Nor is it likely that the country will ever quietly submit to a single hand, although this is evidently the object of all the Vezir’s actions. The quarrels of the chieftains are the delight of the inferior classes, and a constant source of profit to them. As the former are of every degree of power, the minor agree with the more powerful for the hire of their service, and that of their followers. When the hostile parties are persons of great authority, one of their first considerations is the employment of skilful agents to treat for the services of the inferior chieftains, or to make any other bargains useful to the cause.
It often happens in the course of a campaign, between two contending powers, that a village, a single house, a tabia, a meteris, or an occupied position, is bought from the possessors by the opposite party, and though the villages on the hostile frontier generally suffer, yet, as Albanian houses are quickly constructed, such injuries are often unworthy of consideration compared with the advantage which the inhabitants derive from their purchase by the contending parties. Sometimes the head of a family, who is known to be able to command a certain number of tufeks, privately meets the emissary of the chief who wishes to engage his services; he endeavours to raise the lufe, or daily pay, of each man as high as possible; next requires so many lufes for those whom he is to engage to take care of his house in his absence;

§ 1.047   then a farther acknowledgment, perhaps, to enable him to raise a meteris in some important spot for the defence of the house, or any other pretext of the same kind. When the bargain is finally made, he ties round his waist all the money paid in advance, makes the best provision he can for the care of his family, and comes into the field with half, or at most two thirds, of the men whom he is paid for, and remains, perhaps, only until he can make a new bargain with the opponents. Such treachery, however, although not uncommon among the poorest tribes of Albania, is not held in estimation, unless upon a very large scale, and for some great object. It may easily be conceived, that with such customs the Albanians have a particular objection to a muster. I have seen a Grand Vezir attempt it, when, instead of effecting his object, he had the upper part of his tent perforated in a hundred places with musquet-shot. The operations of Albanian warfare in the field being chiefly confined to dodging behind trees and firing at long distances from cover, and few but the chiefs being in earnest, their campaigns are tardy and expensive, and their wars seldom of any great duration, or productive of decisive results. Ultimate success, of course, is sure to attend the treasury which is the best provided.
The Albanians are fond of the chase, and almost every man of landed property keeps greyhounds for coursing the hare, which is their favourite sport. The Vezir has an establishment here, and a few days ago brought home six hares and a fox. He sent me his horses and dogs one day, with an order to Bekir Aga to accompany me, but the weather prevented us from going.

§ 1.048   There is no want of red-legged partridges on the hills, but netting is the only mode by which they are taken.
The greater number of Aly’s subjects being Christians, he is very watchful over the bishops, often employs them as instruments of extortion, and is careful that every act of theirs shall tend to the stability and extension of his own power. He often requires their attendance at Ioannina, or wherever he may happen to be, and shows them favour, so far as to support their authority over the Christians, and sometimes to assist them with a little military force if it should be necessary for the collection of their dues, which consist chiefly in a fixed contribution from every Christian house. They are not exempt, however, from those occasional calls upon their purses, from which no man within his reach is free whom he considers capable of paying. The most important of his ecclesiastical ministers is the metropolitan bishop of Ioannina, a Naxiote by birth, whose diocese comprehends the greater part of Epirus. I overtook him at the bridge of the Subashi, on his way to court.
His επαρχία, or province, contains four subordinate sees; namely, 1. Vela, Βελας; 2. Dhrynopoli, Δρύινοιόλεως; 3. Delvino and Khimara, Δελφίνον και Χίΐμάρας; 4. Vuthroto and Glyky, Βουθρωτοΰ και Γλυκίως. Of these, Delvino and Khimara only remain, the two others being traceable only by their ruins; of the first the residence is Konitza; of the second, Arghyrokastro; of the fourth, Paythia. The northern limit of the bishopric of Drynopolis, or Arghyrokastro, is the bridge of Tepeleni. To the eastward it comprehends Zagoria, and borders upon the province of Κορυτζα, a town situated a day’s journey from Premedi, to the north-eastward.
In the episcopal province of Ioannina the number of Musulmans bears a small proportion to that of the Christians, but in that of Korytza there are many villages entirely Mahometan; in some, Mahometans are married to Greek women, the sons are educated as Turks, and the daughters as Christians; and pork and mutton are eaten at the same table. The province of Beligrad, or Berat, borders on that of Korytza to the westward; its metropolitan is styled bishop of Velagrada, the form which the Greeks have given to the Sclavonic word Beligrad. In the provinces of Korytza and Velagrada, as well as further north, the Musulman faith is supposed by the bishop of Ioannina to be rapidly increasing. Instances have occurred of the apostasy of whole villages at a time. This happened in particular among the Karamuratates, who inhabit Mount Nemertzika, and the neighbouring valley of the Viosa.
Such examples, with the advantages, which a nation of mercenary soldiers cannot but find in belonging to the dominant religion, instead of one which renders them objects of contempt and ill treatment to those in power, are powerful motives to a rapid increase of apostasy. Meantime, the Christians who are employed in a larger proportion than the Musulmans, in pursuits of agriculture or trade, have a tendency to retreat from the oppression of their countrymen of the adverse faith, or to occupy lands in Greece or elsewhere, where labour is wanted;

§ 1.050   and thus there is every prospect of Albania, once a Christian country, becoming, at no distant period of time, almost entirely Mahometan. Apostasy has had similar effects among the Sclavonic nations of European Turkey, extending from Greece to the Danube, but by no means in the same proportion, unless it be in Bosnia.
The bishop relates to me that the Khormovites were notorious robbers before they were reduced by the Vezir. Their favourite place of action was the Pass of Tepeleni, where one of their priests used to enter a hollow tree which stands between Tepeleni and the bridge, while others lay in wait by the side of the road, and stopped the passengers until this Dodonaean Oracle was consulted. If the passenger was a Mahometan, the oracular voice generally ordered him to be stripped and hung upon the tree; if he was a Christian, belonging to a hostile village, he was perhaps dragged through the river. In other cases the Oracle was generally satisfied with sending the unlucky wight forward on foot, after his horse or ass had been taken from him.

§ 1.051   Jan. 2, 1805. —In consequence of a violent rain last night, the Bantza and Viosa have swelled to a great height, so that the former occupies the whole of its bed, which at the mouth is three or four hundred yards across, and the Viosa, which is nearly half a mile broad below the junction, pours even above it such a flood of water against the bridge of Tepeleni, that it has almost over-topped the old piers, and threatens with ruin some masses of masonry which the Pasha has erected on the piers to support the wooden planks, now serving instead of the four arches which were carried away. Passengers still continue to cross from either bank, but the Vezir, fearful not so much for their safety perhaps as for that of the bridge, sits all the afternoon in a kiosk at one corner of his harem, looking towards it with anxiety. A Dervish observing him, goes out and dances upon the bridge, harangues the trees brought down by the stream as they pass through it, and at last makes a kurban, or sacrifice, of a black lamb and two white ones, pouring the blood upon one of the piers. After this ceremony the populace seems satisfied that the safety of the bridge is insured, and in fact no accident occurs.
Both the ruined work and the temporary repair were erected by a Greek engineer who is building, with better success, a massy tower at the Serai. The piers have openings, with pointed arches and large spurs opposed to the current, but the whole work is obviously deficient in solidity, and the Aous will probably continue to be indignant of a bridge, until it has a master more liberal of expence, and who will employ an architect better acquainted with modern improvements in this branch of his art. The Albanians endeavour to supply the place of solidity by making the arches of their bridges of an excessive height, which method they allege is subject only to the inconvenience of obliging the traveller to dismount, while it admits of a great economy of materials, the breadth of a bridge being of little moment in a country where there are no wheel carriages.

§ 1.052   The Vezir expresses great disappointment at the failure of his attempts to establish a bridge at Tepeleni, as it causes a detour by that of the Dryno, and by another in the Stena, in order to reach the opposite bank when the river is not fordable; and, moreover, obliges his Highness on these occasions to enter the Pass of Klisura, where, if the stout Toskidhes of the neighbouring villages should prove rebellious, he might find himself in danger.
Adjoining to a mosque which he built near his palace some years since, is a garden, which was then laid out for him by a Frenchman. On the wall which bounds it towards the river three guns are mounted, and two small kiosks are built. The garden is now in a neglected state, serving only to include the poultry which the Pasha obliges the villages around to supply. There are now between five and six hundred fowls in the garden, forty or fifty of which die every day in consequence of exposure to the rain, and want of food; not because there is any deficiency of barley or kalambokki, but because the purveyor sells it, laying the fault upon the weather and want of shelter, and knowing that as fast as the fowls die, the deficiency will be supplied by the villages.
It is said, that Tepeleni once formed an alliance with two other villages; namely, Damesi, two hours to the north-east, on the direct road to Berat, over Mount Trebushin; and Dragoti, which stands a little within the Pass of the Viosa above its right bank, and that at the head of the league was a woman named Helen. May not Tepeleni be τάφος Ελένης? The Turks call it Tepedellen; the Albanians, Tebelen. There is a superstitious belief, that the houses in the village can never exceed one hundred. The Greek suburb, at the western extremity of the promontory on the edge of the hill over the Bantza, had lately so increased as to approach the Turkish quarter, and to give hopes that the spell would be broken; but last year a plague, which swept off whole families, put a stop to the increase of houses, and has left its marks in numerous recent graves, some of which have been opened by the late heavy rains.
Jan. 4.—Many Albanian chiefs have arrived here within these few days to pay their homage to Aly; among others Abdulla Pasha of Elbassan. They all come attended with followers armed to the teeth, in numbers proportioned to the power and rank of the chiefs. Their array in approaching, and their introduction to the Vezir, afford some fine pictures of feudal life, which carry one back in imagination to Europe in the tenth century; for the Turkish conquest of Albania has not merely prevented this country from partaking in the improvement of the rest of Europe, but has carried it in manners some centuries further back than it was at the time of the conquest, and, with the extension of the Mahometan religion, will render it every day more savage, and less capable of improvement.

§ 1.054   Among other persons who have arrived, is Mehmet Effendi, Aly’s secretary for foreign affairs. This Mehmet is a Roman, whose name was Marco Quirini. He was a member of the inquisition at Rome, lived six years at Aleppo as a missionary of the Society de Propaganda Fide, and would have succeeded, so he says, to the bishopric of Bombay, had he not, in a fit of ennui, left Aleppo a year before the term of his residence expired. Happening to be at Malta at the time of the arrival of the French expedition to Egypt, he was appointed by Buonaparte, in consequence of the knowledge of Arabic which he had acquired at Aleppo, his secretary-interpreter, but becoming tired of his situation at the end of three months, he sailed for Europe, was taken by a Dulciniote cruizer near Cape Stylo, and brought prisoner to Ioannina. Here, in despair of acquiring his liberty, and having persuaded himself that the Turkish religion would suit him, or at least recommend him to the Pasha, whose service he was tempted to enter, he renounced the errors of his youth, became a true believer, and now argues, with much Italian eloquence, that the Islam is the only reasonable faith existing. At Aleppo he acquired a little English, together with his Arabic. He is a man of acuteness, sense, and learning, and assuredly will most bitterly deplore the impatience of temper which has caused him to exchange such inconsiderable privations as he met with at Aleppo, or in Egypt, for the hard service of an Albanian master, among comrades with whom he can scarcely exchange an idea. The Pasha has, according to his usual policy, already persuaded him to take a wife, and now that he has him in his power, scarcely gives him the means of existence.

§ 1.056   CHAPTER II. EPIRUS.
JAN. 6.— This afternoon I return from Tepeleni, by the same road as far as the bridge of the Subashi. The village of Dragoti being only hid from Tepeleni by a projection of Mount Trebushin, soon becomes visible, and opposite to it Kotra, on a height above the junction of the Viosa and Dryno; then farther southward, on the western face of the same mountain, Lekhli; and then Khormovo. Opposite to Lekhli we pass under the village of Lizati, of two hundred houses, and meet Aidin Aga of Kaliasa with a long suite of palikaria on foot, on their way to court. A little short of the bridge of the Subashi is the hollow plane-tree where the robbers of Khormovo formerly lay in wait for travellers. Here, on both sides of the river, the space is very narrow at the foot of the mountain, and on both sides there is a road; that which proceeds from the bridge along the foot of the mountain of Khormovo and Lekhli enters the Stena, and follows the left bank of the Viosa as far as the vale of Kieperi, which is watered by a tributary of the river. The bridge over the Dryno was formerly below Khormovo, but having been swept away by the river, it was replaced higher up by that of the Subashi, which has now resisted the floods for several years.
Leaving the bridge to our left, we proceed in the direction of Arghyrokastro. On the face of its mountain, nearly opposite to Kariani, is seen Maskoluri, a large village, and above it the monastery of Trypi, just below the summit, which terminates the mountain at the opening of the valley of Kardhiki. A small village called Tzepo stands more to the northward in the middle region of this mountain, and below it is Khumelitza opposite to Stepezi, which latter stands on the northern side of the opening leading from the valley of Deropugl into that of Kardhiki. The Belitza, which waters the vale of Kardhiki, flows in a ravine through the opening, and joins the Dryno in the plain as already stated. At Stepezi we halt for the night. At first the people were not willing to receive us; and when the Bulu-bashi who accompanies me threatened them, “We are poor,” they replied, “and have nothing; we can but lose our lives;” but soon change their tone on learning, that contrary to the remonstrances of the Bulu-bashi, I had given directions to pay for every thing, and declare that if the King of England wants soldiers, the whole village, to the number of three hundred, is ready to enter into his service. “It would be easier,” observes one of them, “to maintain fifty Albanian soldiers than one English.” My konak is a hut which, like most of the houses in the Albanian villages, has no chimney, the fire being in the middle, and the smoke, after circulating for a while about the hut, finding its way out through the crevices of a roof covered with rude unformed tablets of calcareous stone, called πλάκες, anglice flakes. These being large and thick, are for the most part held in place by their own weight alone, but sometimes great stones are laid upon them. The rafters within are generally hung with the store of maize, here called mesiri, in the state in which it is brought from the field. Above Stepezi, near the top of the mountain, is seen the small village of Petzari; besides which, there are two or three others on the mountain not visible, so wretched as to be described in terms of compassion even by the Stepeziotes.
Below in the plain, about half-way between Stepezi and the Khan Valiare, I perceive the ruins called Dhrynopoli, written in Greek Δρνϊνούπολις, which appears to have been a fortress, or small fortified town of the time of the lower empire. It stands nearly opposite to the junction of the Belitza with the Dryno, and close by a ruined bridge over the torrent, which descends from the mountain of Labovo.

§ 1.059   Jan. 7.—I had intended to proceed from Stepezi by land to Palerimo, halting this evening at Kaliasa, but the weather obliges us to alter our route. Soon after setting out, at 8.40, a distant movement in the plain towards Libokhovo announces the approach of Vely Pasha, who is coming to visit his father at Tepeleni. We cross over the heights forming the lower part of the mountain of Stepezi: the land is little cultivated, but we pass some large flocks of sheep and goats, the shepherds bear staves headed with hooks of copper. Woods of oak diversify the scene, but there are no trees of any great size. At the end of three hours we arrive on the Belitza, in the valley of Kardhiki, which is inclosed on every side by steep and lofty mountains.
Kardhiki, or Gardhiki. is situated on the side and summit of a steep hill, on the right bank of the Belitza, at the junction of a torrent flowing from the south-west through a ravine which forms a precipice on that side of the town. The situation of the place is one of the wildest that can be conceived, and its appearance is rendered more so by the season of the year. We are no sooner arrived, than a heavy fall of snow puts an end to our day’s journey, and makes me well satisfied with a lodging in the house of Demir Aga till the morrow. Demir, commonly called Demir Dost, enjoys a degree of power such as few Albanian chiefs possess, and Kardhiki has the consequent advantage of internal tranquillity;

§ 1.060   for in general power is so nearly balanced between the leading parties in Albanian towns, that no one chief has sufficient influence to establish order. The unlimited power of Demir over the district of Kardhiki is at present chiefly owing to his good understanding with Aly Pasha. His government, he tells me, contains twenty villages, of which there are only three or four Greek. One of these is Khumelitza, famous for its tobacco, from which a snuff is made at Kardhiki, much esteemed by the Albanians, who, among other points in which they resemble the Highlanders of Scotland, are great snuff-takers. There are eight hundred Musulman families in Kardhiki, and twenty or thirty Greek houses on the opposite side of the ravine.
The mountains to the westward and northward of the district, as far as Khimara, Demir describes as inhabited by half-naked wretches living in villages, one of the hardiest and poorest races in existence: he calls them Gulimidhes, they form a subdivision of the great tribe named Liape, in Greek Liapidhes, a colony perhaps of the Lapithae of Thessaly. One of the villages of the Gulimidhes, called Poliona, and exactly resembling Petzari, is in sight from Kardhiki to the north-west, near the summit of the mountain.
The Musulmans of Kardhiki are not less anxious to serve the king of England, than the Christians of Stepezi; they observe that the use of the musket is their only art and their only property. The care of their fields and flocks they leave to the Christians.

§ 1.061   Demir gives me a very particular and undoubtedly accurate account of the general topography of Albania, and of the divisions of its tribes; of which the following is the substance: Rejecting the political chorography which has arisen since the Turkish conquest, the only important divisions of the Albanians are four: the Ngeghe, Toshke, Liape and Tjame, in Greek Γκεγκεδες, Τόσκιδες, Λάπιδες, or Λιάμπιδες, and Τζάμιδες: their respective countries are in Greek written Γκεγκεριά, Τοσκεριά, Λιαμπουριά, and Τζαμουριά. The Ngeghe possess the districts of Skodra, Kavaya, Kroya, Tyrana, Duras (in Italian Durazzo), Pekin, a part of the district of Elbasan, the two Dibras, and Djura on the Drin, Kurtzova, Kalkandere, and Pristina. There is a large proportion of Latin Christians of this tribe, called Merdhites, in the district of Skodra, who pay sixty paras a house to the Pasha of Skodra. They are considered as good soldiers as any of the Ngeghe. The Toshke extend northward from the frontier of Delvino to that of Pekin and Elbasan, bordering to the west upon the Liape, and possessing Gardhiki, Arghyrokastro, Libokhovo, Premedi, Dangli, Kolonia, Skrapari, Berat, Malakastra, Mizakia, Avlona. The Liape inhabit the entire maritime country to the southward and westward of the boundaries of the Toshke, and as far south as Delvino, where begin the Tjame, who occupy all the maritime country, as far as Suli inclusive, and inland to the Greek districts of Pogoniani and Ioannina. Thus it appears that Tepeleni is in Liaburia, and Aly Pasha a Liape; but as the whole of this tribe is in disrepute among the other Albanians for their poverty and predatory habits, he thinks proper to consider Tepeleni a part of Toskeria, and who dares dispute his geography?
Demir Aga has a khodja in his house, as preceptor to his family, who has learned Arabic at Cairo, Turkish at Constantinople, and Greek at Agrafa. Demir takes no pains to conceal his dislike and suspicions of Aly, though he has always been on good terms with the Pasha, made war in conjunction with him against Khormovo, and is still nominally his ally. By these means he maintains his authority at home, and hopes to save his country from falling entirely into the hands of the Vezir. Aly, he says, has a Jew now in prison at Ioannina, from whom he has already extracted one hundred and forty purses, by threatening him with the loss of his head. But this mode of refreshing a treasury is no novelty in any part of the east; and I well remember the noseless and one-eyed victims of Djezzar to be seen in the streets of Acre. The Pasha never loses an opportunity of gratifying his resentment against those who took part against him in the war of Khormovo. Only two days ago, on the representation of some person that a certain Labovite had been active against him on that occasion, he sent for the man and his son and put them both to death. The son received the order after the imprisonment of his father, and obeyed it, though he might easily have escaped, and was fully persuaded of the Vezir’s intention.

§ 1.063   At Kardhiki are some ruins of a castle, said to have been built by Sultan Bayazid, when he conquered this country, but which is probably more ancient. There can be little or no doubt of its having been an Hellenic site, though I cannot find any remains of those times. The heights around the town are, for the most part, clothed with vineyards, producing a pleasant light wine, almost colourless, and which the Musulmans of the place have no scruple in drinking. Some wheat and barley are grown on the lower heights; the bottom of the vale produces scarcely any thing but kalambokki, the soil being poor and stony, and subject to be overflowed by the river. Such situations are well adapted to that kind of grain which requires much moisture to feed its large succulent stems, and succeeds best therefore in levels which are either inundated by nature in the winter, or capable of artificial irrigation in summer; the abundant return of the grain also is very acceptable to a poor and numerous population like that of Albania. It is to the culture of maize and tobacco that some of the Albanians chiefly owe that skill in the conducting of water, for which they are noted in other parts of Turkey, and by means of which, as I have before remarked, the Liuntzidhes in particular obtain employment at Constantinople and other places.

§ 1.064   Jan. 8.—At 8.30 we move from Kardhiki in the direction of an opening in the mountains to the south-west, called the Pass of Skarfitza; and at 9.45 arrive on the bank of the Belitza, here flowing to the north, but which, after making the half tour of the hill of Kardhiki, has an eastern course through the opening of the valley between Khumelitza and Stepezi. Zulati, which stands on the left bank of the river, on the lowest heights of the mountain, is on the road from Kardhiki to Bordji, a castle and village on the sea-coast between Nivitza of Delvino and Khimara. In approaching the pass of Skarfitza, we have a summit on the left, which lies between Arghyrokastro and Delvino, and near which is the village of Sopoti. A torrent descends from thence through a woody valley called Skotini (dark), which is the resort of numerous flocks in summer. Having crossed two streams which join the Belitza to our right, we begin soon after ten, the snow falling very thick, to ascend the mountain called Pilo-vuni, which bounds to the east the vale of Kaliasa. The mountain is clothed with oaks, beeches, and planes, and many paths are seen, made by the shepherds and the cutters of timber and fire-wood: the oaks are not large.
The pass of Skarfitza separates the summit called Pilo-vuni from the mountain of Sopoti, the name Skarfitza is specifically applied to a Turkish fountain on the summit of the ridge, where the road begins to descend towards the plain of Delvino. At 10.45, not far from that fountain, we join the road from Khimara by Zulati to Delvino, and then descend by a very difficult passage over rocks covered with snow, and along torrents bor, until we arrive in sight of Nivitza, and soon afterwards of Kaliasa, in a vale to the right. The river Pavla, which enters the plain of Finiki below Nivitza, leaves Kaliasa on its right bank above the opening.

§ 1.065   At 1 p.m. we come suddenly upon Senitza, a Greek village on the side of the mountain of Sopoti, divided only by a ravine from the Turkish village Vergo, and looking down upon the plain of Delvino. The lower parts of the hills under these two places, though worn into the most rugged forms by the torrents, are richly covered with vineyards, mixed with poplars, olives, and cypresses. In the descent, Paleavli (old court), a Turkish village, remains to the left, and above it the ruins of Kamenitza, which has been in the same state beyond the memory of the present race. Then turning still more to the eastward we arrive, at 4.15, at Delvino, where I reoccupy my lodging in the Greek quarter, sending the Albanian soldiers and suridjis (postillions), with their horses, to find a konak, according to the tenor of the Vezir’s letter.
Jan. 9.—When preparing to set out this morning for the Forty Saints, the Bishop of Delvino comes to express his regret at my not having made his house my lodging, but was not sorry probably to escape the inconvenience attending the Turk and the horses. The bishop is of opinion, that in the district of Delvino, as in most other parts of Albania, the Musulmans are nearly equal in number to the Christians.

§ 1.066   Sending forward the baggage to the Forty Saints, I proceed to Finiki, which lies to the left of the direct road, about seven miles from Delvino, and do not arrive at the Skala until 4 in the afternoon. The entire hill of Finiki was surrounded by Hellenic walls. At the south-eastern extremity was the citadel, 200 yards in length, some of the walls of which are still extant, from twelve to twenty feet in height. The masonry is of the third kind, that is to say, it is laid in courses, but which are not very regular or equal, nor are the stones all quadrangular, although fitted to one another with the same nicety as in the second, or polygonal, and in the fourth, or most regular kind of Hellenic masonry. A stone in one of the fragments of wall is eight feet by six on the outside, and appears to be nearly as solid. In no part are there more than four or five courses remaining.
The modern village of Finiki, consisting of a few huts, lies directly under the citadel to the south-west. About the middle of the height is the emplacement of a very large theatre, the only remains of which are a small piece of rough wall, which encircled the back of the upper seats: at the bottom in the place of the scene is a small circular foundation, apparently that of a tower, of a later date. The theatre looked directly towards the village of the Forty Saints and Corfu. Between it and the north-western end of the citadel are the remains of a Roman construction, built in courses of tiles, alternating with a masonry formed of rough stones, mixed with a great quantity of mortar, and faced with square stones laid regularly in the mortar, but with the angles instead of the sides uppermost:

§ 1.067   this mode of building was not uncommon in the decline of the Roman empire, and the beginning of that of Constantinople. There are some ruins of houses also of a still more modern construction, showing that Phoenice continued to flourish to a late period, when the chief part of the town appears to have been towards the river Vistritza, which defended this height to the eastward, as the Pavla, or river of Kaliasa did to the west.
In agreement with these appearances we find Phoenice to have been one of the cities of the government of old Epirus, under the successors of Constantine. It was among the places of this province, repaired by Justinian, who, as it had suffered inconvenience from the lowness of the situation, placed the new constructions on a neighbouring height. On the hill of the acropolis I find accordingly some remains of columns in situ, of that polygonal, instead of circular shape, which exactly marks the taste of the age of Justinian.
About the time when the Romans first gained a footing in Greece, Phoenice was the strongest, most powerful, and richest city in Epirus; notwithstanding which, it was taken without a blow by the Illyrians, in the year B.C. 230. The ships of Agron having gained a victory over the Aetolians on the coast of Acarnania, and brought back a rich booty to Illyria, the king, in the height of his exultation, indulged to such an excess in pleasures of the table, that his death was the consequence. His widow, Teuta, who to the inheritance of his authority added a feminine disregard of consequences, ordered her officers to plunder all the ships which they should meet, and thus commissioned them to make war on all the world. Their first object was a descent on Elis and Messenia; but the fleet having previously anchored on the coast, near Phoenice, for the purpose of obtaining a supply of provisions, the commanders there entered into a conference with some Gallic mercenaries, who, to the number of 800, were employed by the Epirotes to garrison Phoenice, and by their assistance made themselves masters of the city.
The Epirotes seem to have been quite prepared to receive the Roman yoke; for their imprudence in trusting an important charge to a people notorious for perfidy, was not more remarkable than their defective discipline in some of the transactions which followed, though their first operation was well judged. Having collected their forces, and taken up a position on the bank of the river which flowed by Phoenice, they removed the planks of a bridge which communicated with the city, with the view of securing their camp against the Illyrians within the walls, and then sent a reinforcement to Antigoneia for the defence of the passes of the Aous against Scerdilaidas,

§ 1.069   a prince of the royal family of Illyria, of whose approach with 5000 men they had received information. Too well satisfied with these precautions, they neglected all further vigilance, and indulged without caution in the plenty which the rich district of Phoenice afforded. The Illyrians in the city soon took advantage of their fault: issuing at night from the town, they replaced the planks of the bridge, drove the Epirotes from their position, and the next morning beating them in the field, killed and captured many, and forced the remainder to retreat into Atintania. Soon afterwards Scerdilaidas arrived at Phoenice, apparently without having encountered the enemy’s forces at the pass of Antigoneia. The Epirotes meantime obtained succour from the Aetolians and Achaians, and again marched toward Phoenice. The opposing forces met at a place named Helicranum, but no action ensued, partly in consequence of the difficulty of the ground, and partly because Teuta, alarmed by a defection of a part of the Illyrians to the Dardani, had sent orders to recall her forces from Epirus. Scerdilaidas, therefore, retraced his steps through the pass of Antigoneia, after having made a treaty by which Phoenice, together with the free prisoners, were restored to the Epirotes, and the slaves and plunder were embarked in the Illyrian ships.

§ 1.070   So great was the booty, and such the encouragement which it gave to Teuta, that she thought of nothing but plunderiug the cities of Greece, while the ungrateful Epirotes soon afterwards joined the Acarnanes in an alliance with Illyria against their benefactors of Achaia and Aetolia. It is probable that the route of Scerdilaidas, both in coming and returning, was by the way of Gardhiki and the pass of Skarfitza, and that the Epirotes retreated as well as returned by the pass of Morzena or Delvino, that having been the route from Phoenice towards Atintania. Helicranum I take to have been the modern Delvino, for the castle hill at the entrance of a very important pass is such a position as could hardly have been left unoccupied by the ancients; and the rugged ground about it accords exactly with the words of the historian.
The ascertaining of the position of Phoenice is extremely useful in illustrating the topography of all the adjacent part of Chaonia, and greatly assists in forming an opinion on the difficult question of the site of Antigoneia. How it happened that Scerdilaidas met with no opposition at the Antigoneian passes, the historian has not stated, but he expressly asserts that the prince took this road both in going and in returning. As Scodra was the royal residence, we cannot doubt that, after crossing the open maritime country of Illyria, he entered the mountains of Epirus near Bullis, now Gradista, and followed the valley of the Aous to Tepeleni. The only other road he could have taken was by the modern Berat to Klisura, which was not only more circuitous, but more dangerous, since it would have obliged him to traverse the defile of the Viosa in its whole length, and afterwards that of its tributary the Dryno, above the junction, or in other words, the passes both of Klisura and of Tepeleni. In the other case he not only avoided the pass of Klisura, but followed a shorter road. It can hardly be questioned, therefore, that the Stena of Antigoneia intended by Polybius, was the pass to the southward of Tepeleni which leads from that town along the left bank of the Dryno towards Arghyrokastro.
But this could not have been the same pass where Philip, son of Demetrius, was defeated by the Romans under Quinctius, though Livy describes it as being at Antigoneia, and applies to it the same Greek word Stena, which Polybius employs on the former occasion; for Philip was not defending the approach to Illyria, but that which led from the western coast of Epirus through the interior of this province into Upper Macedonia and Upper Thessaly, whither the Romans proceeded in pursuit of the enemy after having forced the Stena.
It is evident, therefore, upon examining the places themselves, that there were two passes, or rather a pass with two branches, one of which communicated from the maritime parts of Epirus in a northerly direction to the maritime plains of Illyria, the other leading eastward from the same country towards Upper Macedonia and Thessaly.

§ 1.072   The first is that which I have called the pass of Tepeleni; the latter is the Stena itself, as the defile is still called, which conducts along the Viosa from Tepeleni by Dragoti and Klisura into the valley of Premedi. Antigoneia having given name to both passes, can only be sought for near their junction, where Tepeleni is the only place which has the appearance of an ancient site. We can arrive therefore at no other conclusion than that here stood Antigoneia. It may be admitted that in this case Antigoneia was too distant from the entrance of the Stena effectually to command that pass, but it entirely obstructs the other, and standing on a commanding height at the junction of a tributary, with the Aous, just at the point where the straits expand into a more open and fertile valley, it has all the requisites for the situation of a town of that importance which, from the ancient authorities, we may presume Antigoneia to have been.
The next question in the comparative geography of this part of Epirus is the situation of Phanote. In the winter of the year 170—169 B.C., Appius Claudius, anxious to repair the effects of his defeat in Illyria, marched from thence into Epirus, and laid siege to Phanote. But hearing soon afterwards that Perseus had entered Aetolia, and attacked Stratus, which was then defended by Popilius and his Aetolian allies, he raised the siege of Phanote, and began his retreat towards the plain of Elaeon.

§ 1.073   Clevas, the officer of Perseus, who with a strong garrison defended Phanote, followed the Romans, and, attacking them on a difficult road, by which they were obliged to pass along the foot of the mountains, killed 1000 and took 200 prisoners. Glevas, concerting operations with Philostratus, one of the Epirotes, who had endeavoured to betray Hostilius into the hands of Perseus in the preceding year, then crossed into the district of Antigoneia, and began to plunder the country, with a view to draw the garrison of Antigoneia into a valley, where Philostratus was placed in readiness to fall upon them. The stratagem completely succeeded, and the garrison of Antigoneia sustained a loss almost as great as that of Claudius. Clevas then moved towards the camp of Claudius in the plain of Elaeon; but the latter had no inclination to engage, and finding that nothing was to be gained in Epirus, he dismissed his Epirote allies, and returned with the Italians into Illyricum.
Every circumstance in these transactions tends to show that Gardhiki was the site of Phanote. The strength and remarkable situation of that town, in the midst of a valley surrounded by an amphitheatre of mountains, through which there are only two narrow passes, are a sufficient presumption that it was the site of one of the principal fortresses of Chaonia, and the position midway between the channel of Corcyra and the Antigoneian passes would render it particularly important to the Romans advancing from Illyria; and naturally the first object of Claudius, Antigoneia being already in the hands of the Romans or their allies.
The name of Phanote again occurs in a transaction which took place a few months earlier, and from which we learn that the most important military point on the Aous, in the line of communication between Macedonia and Epirus, was a bridge across that river, which, as Antigoneia is not mentioned on this occasion, would seem not to have been at that place or commanded by it. The consul, A. Hostilius Mancinus, proceeding to assume the command of the Roman armies in Thessaly, had arrived from Italy at Phanote, when the Epirote faction, adverse to the Romans, thought the time and place favorable to a design which they conceived of betraying Hostilius to Perseus, whom they urged by letters to hasten his march towards Epirus. But the Molossi, who were well disposed to the Romans, seized the bridge of the Aous, with the determination of preventing the Macedonians from crossing the river. Meantime the conspiracy was discovered, and revealed to Hostilius by his host, Nestor, of Oropus, upon which he returned to the sea-coast, embarked from thence for Anticyra, in the Corinthiac Gulf, and by that route proceeded into Thessaly.

§ 1.075   Applying this narrative to the country along the banks of the Viosa, and to the general geography of Northern Greece, there can scarcely be a doubt that the bridge alluded to by Livy was in the Stena, about midway between Klisura and Tepeleni, where the communication is now carried on by means of two bridges.
The route from Kardhiki towards Arghyrokastro, along the foot of the mountain, by Khumelitza, corresponds exactly to that in which Claudius was attacked by Clevas, if we suppose the plain Elaeon to have been that between Arghyrokastro and Libokhovo, and Claudius to have pitched his camp about midway between those two towns. The name of the plain Elaeon seems to show that a city Elaeus, which Ptolemy classes with Phoenice and Antigoneia among the interior cities of Chaonia, occupied a position in this valley; and the name is the more remarkable, as we may suppose it to have been originally derived from the abundance of olive-trees in the district, in which respect it is well adapted to this valley of the Dryno; for although surrounded by lofty mountains covered with snow during a great part of the year, and one of the coldest parts of Epirus, the valley itself is one of the few situations in Greece or Albania, distant from the sea, where olive-trees are now found. The town of Elaeus was probably situated on the heights, opposite to Arghyrokastro, where it is said that some remains of Hellenic walls still exist. The small theatre, and other ancient vestiges in the plain below Libokhovo, being of Roman construction, could not have existed at the time of the transactions related by Livy.

§ 1.076   They mark probably the position of a city which was founded by Hadrian and repaired by Justinian; and thence named first Hadrianopolis, and afterwards, but probably for a short time, Justinianopolis. Mention of Hadrianopolis occurs only in some authorities of the Byzantine empire of the sixth and seventh centuries, at which time it was one of the cities of the government of Old Epirus, as well as the see of a bishopric. The only authority which gives any indication of its exact situation is the Tabular Itinerary. In this document there are two roads from Apollonia to Nicopolis: one (noticed also in the Antonine) which led near the sea-coast by the Acroceraunia, Phoenice, and Buthrotum; the other by Amantia and Hadrianopolis, which last is placed about midway between the two extremities of the road. One route, therefore, passed through the plain of Delvino; the other, if Amantia was at Nivitza, ascended the vale of the Sutzista to that position, and from the head of the valley crossed by Pregonati, into the plain of Arghyrokastro, which it followed in its entire length. It would, therefore, have passed exactly by the theatre, which stands not very far from the middle distance between Apollonia and Nicopolis. No great accuracy is to be expected on this point, as several of the distances in both the Itineraries are obviously erroneous.

§ 1.077   The only objection to this position of Hadrianopolis is, that ten or twelve miles lower down the river are the ruins called Drynopolis, which name may easily be taken for a corruption of Hadrianopolis. These remains, however, and the theatre, are productions of two very different periods of time. The latter is a work of the Pagans during the Roman empire. Drynopolis was a fortress or small town of the Byzantine empire; the probability, therefore, is, that when Hadrianopolis fell to ruin, Drynopolis was built upon a different site, and became the see of the bishopric, first named from Hadrianopolis, then from Drynopolis, and which, after the ruin of the latter, was transferred to Arghyrokastro. Nor is Drynopolis a corruption of Hadrianopolis, but taken from the river on which it is situated, still called Dhryno, or Drino, or Druno, which may possibly be the ancient name still preserved of this branch of the Aous, and derived either from δρυς or from some native word which has given name also to another large river of Albania, the Drin, which flows from the lake of Akhridha into the Adriatic. As to Deropoli, or Deropugl, although this appellation is sometimes applied to the river, it belongs properly to the whole valley, and may perhaps be a corruption of Hadrianopolis, to which all this extensive plain probably belonged when the city was in its most flourishing condition.Although Arghyrokastro has no very marked appearance of an ancient site, the name may possibly be derived from that of the Argyrini, whom Lycophron, and two Greek authors cited by Stephanus, show to have been an Epirote people, and whom Lycophron leads us to look for in the northern part of Epirus, as he couples them with the Acro Ceraunii: in fact the word 'Αργυρινος is still sometimes applied to a native of Arghyrokastro.

§ 1.078   Jan. 10.—The scirocco has been constant at the Forty Saints since my departure, and the boat in which I crossed the channel was not able to return to Corfu till four days ago. Having prevailed upon the crew of another Corfiote boat, which had just arrived in the harbour with a lading of vallonea for Corfu, to defer their passage thither until they have taken me to Palerimo and back, we sail for that port at 9.30 a.m., and arrive there at 2. The distance is about eighteen miles; the wind was a gentle Onchesmite, like that which carried over Cicero to Brundusium.
Between the Limeni of the Forty Saints and Spilia, or the Skala of Nivitza, there are several small creeks where boats may find shelter. Spilia is a creek at the mouth of a glen, where stands the ruin of a magazine which was destroyed by Aly Pasha when at war with Nivitza. Beyond it is Lukovo, a small village on the side of the mountain, surrounded with terraces of vines and corn; two or three miles beyond which is Pikernes, somewhat larger; and two miles further Sopoto. Below Lukovo and Pikernes are sandy beaches, where boats anchor, and may be stranded in bad weather. Sopoto stands in a glen, and has a castle named Bordji, on the top of a steep rock commanded by Hadji Beddo Aga, a partizan of the Vezir. Here are the only Turkish families on this coast. Behind Sopoto a river descends in a very deep and rocky ravine. A little farther north is Kiepero, on the edge of a steep precipice, below which are a few fields, terminating in a beach which is separated from Port Palerimo only by the point which shelters that harbour to the southward and eastward. Palerimo, the ancient Panormus, which Strabo describes as a great harbour in the midst of the Ceraunian mountains, and thus clearly distinguishes from the Panormus of Oricum, is divided into two bays by a rocky peninsula, projecting into the middle of it, on the summit of which stands the kastro, or fortress. This castle is nothing more than a small square enclosure containing a house, a church, and two four-pounders. Having brought a letter to the Bulu-bashi, or commandant, I land as soon as we arrive, and take shelter from the rain in his small apartment, which is the only one in the place having a chimney. On the side of the hills bordering the southern division of the port are a few cornfields and vineyards, which, together with some sheep on the hills, are tended by the ten soldiers who garrison the fort. Five of these are Musulmans, including the Bulu-bashi and his son; the others are Greeks. At the extremity of the northern harbour the hills are well cultivated, but these form part of the territory of the town of Khimara, which possesses the exclusive right of fishery in that division of the bay.
A gale accompanied with rain, which comes on at night from the south-east, brings a ship of Dultjuni, in Italian, Dulcigno, into the harbour, bound to that place from Alexandria. As the Dulciniotes have the reputation of being inclined to piracy, the garrison is alarmed, and prepares for defence. Indeed they had already been put upon the alert by our arrival, for our boat being from Corfu, the governor suspected some Russian treachery, and before my cot was conveyed into the castle, it was searched, lest it should contain concealed arms.Last summer a French pirate boat, which was afterwards destroyed at Fanu by one of the British ships of war on this station, put into Palerimo, after having plundered some Maltese vessels under English colours; the Khimariotes formed a design of attacking it, on the plea of its being a pirate, but probably with a view of plunder; not agreeing however among themselves, the project failed.

§ 1.081   Jan. 11.—The wind shifts to the westward, and the weather clears up at noon. At 1, accompanied by a servant, and preceded by one of the Corfiote boatmen and a guard from the castle, I proceed on foot to Khimara, no beasts of burthen being procurable, and the road scarcely admitting of their being employed. The captain of the Dulciniote, a bearded Turk, about seventy years of age, had offered to land me in the Bay of Khimara, and thus to save the detour along the side of the mountain; but when we came alongside his ship, his authority proved insufficient to obtain a party to row the boat. It appears that they are afraid of the Khimariotes. After crossing the ridge at the extremity of the northern bay, and climbing along the side of the hills which overhang the sea beyond it, we arrive at the end of an hour’s walk from the castle, upon a little valley and beach where are some flocks. To the right, the sides of the mountains are grown with velanidhies, or oaks, which produce the vallonea; they still preserve their last year’s leaves, but can hardly be called evergreens. We meet some shepherds to whom the sailor, with a few words of greeting, presents his snuff-box, common compliment in Albania, and in these independent districts a necessary propitiation. In return the shepherds call off their dogs, which had made a general charge upon us.

§ 1.082   We soon arrive in sight of Khimara, situated on the top of a pointed hill, and enter upon the cultivated land which surrounds it, consisting of extensive vineyards, some fields of wheat just springing up, and others of barley, which the peasants are ploughing, and will sow as soon as they can catch a short interval of fair weather. On a high summit under the mountains on the right is a monastery of the Panaghia, on the left the port of Khimara, near the shore of which are some water-mills, turned by a rivulet from the mountain. The harbour is exposed to the west, but affords good shelter to small vessels from any other wind, and has a fine beach. There is another more open spiaggia, two miles farther to the north, immediately below the town, where boats are hauled up on the beach. Here is a small plain which, with the side of the hill between this plain and the village, is the best cultivated part of the territory of Khimara. Immediately below the village are some gardens, containing vines, olives, cypresses, and fruit-trees.

§ 1.083   At half-past three we arrive at the house of Capt. Zakharias, the son of George, vulgarly called Zakho-Ghiorghi, for whom I have a letter of introduction from Z. the collector, my host of the Forty Saints. Ther house is as humble a dwelling as any captain’s in Albania. In the inner room a fire in the middle of the floor, and a mattrass spread by the side of it, are the luxuries speedily arranged for me. Capt. George, who has attained the ordinary bounds of life, and has never been absent from his native village except three years passed in the Neapolitan service, expresses his delight at seeing an Englishman here for the first time. Two Germans some years ago, calling themselves Englishmen, left a certificate with Capt Constantine Andrutzi, which proves the imposture. Capt. Z.’s family consists of a son, the widow of another son killed in the service of the King of Naples, and two or three of his children. All are employed in preparing supper, but principally the widow. The dishes are baked, and a dingy towel spread close to the cinders, serves both for table and tablecloth. The Captain, and the sailor from the boat, who is honoured as a guest, are the only persons who join the table.
After supper all the heads of houses friendly to Zakho-Ghiorghi come in and seat themselves crosslegged around the fire. They relate their adventures in the Neapolitan or other services, for most of the Khimariotes seek a livelihood as soldiers abroad. One states that he was in the war of Italy with Buonaparte, who made many inquiries of him concerning this part of Albania, and told him at Trieste, that he meant to send 40,000 men to Corfu, and as many more to Avlona. They all speak with pride of their liberty, meaning their exemption from Turkish oppression, at the same time that they lament their own internal anarchy and dissensions, and agree that they should be happy to receive the blessing of good government from the hands of any sovereign in Europe except the Turk, whom they are always determined to resist.

§ 1.084   They neither pay the kharatj nor any other tax, except a contribution of thirty paras a head per annum to Ibrahim Pasha of Berat, for the liberty of trading to his ports. The right of pasturage on the lands of the town of Khimara, that of gathering velanidhi on the mountains, and that of fishing in the northern bay of Palerimo are enjoyed in common by all the inhabitants. Maize is grown in the plain adjacent to the northern beach, where the two torrents, which embrace the town, overflow in the winter, and prepare the land for receiving that grain. Wheat is produced within the territory, more than sufficient for the annual consumption of the place in favorable seasons; but for two or three years past they have hardly reaped enough for six months. Velanidhi, a small quantity of wheat in good years, and sometimes a little wine, which is of a dry kind and without flavour, are the only exports. The mountain behind Khimara is said to abound in firs suited for masts, which might be brought down at a small expense, and would be a profitable undertaking, if poverty and dissension admitted of it.

§ 1.085   The village, or city as the natives are pleased to qualify it, of Khimara, more commonly pronounced according to the Italian κακοφωνίa Tjimara, contains 300 families: divided into five principal alliances called parentie in Italian, and in Greek φρατρίαις, a classical word which I hardly expected to find in Albania. With one or other of these, all the inferior families are in alliance. The fratries are, 1. The Lyganates, consisting of sixty or seventy houses, at the head of which is Alexodhemo, son of Alexi; 2. The Tzakanates, of which my host Zakho-Ghiorghi is the πρώτος: it has upwards of eighty houses; 3. The Koykadhes, of which Zakharias Andrutzu is the chief: of these there are about forty-five houses; 4. The Mazates, of whom John Tragynus is the chief; and, 5. the Κοκουρτάδες, of whom Andrew Polus is the head. The first and second are the only families, at present, who are not on speaking terms, but last August there was a scuffle with sabres between Constantine, the brother of the chief of the third family, and Alexodhemo, the head of the first, in which some wounds were received before the quarrel was adjusted, and the contending parties restored to an exchange of words. Another brother of the Andrutzi is now lieutenant-colonel of one of the regiments of Cacciatori Albanesi in the Neapolitan service. His major is a native of the town of Vuno. Constantine Andrutzi informs me that he was twenty-eight years in the Neapolitan service, that he deserted to the French when they took Naples, but that not obtaining any employment or encouragement from them, he returned to his native country. When General Villettes was raising a corps of Albanians for the British service, C. Andrutzi was sent for to Corfu to agree upon the terms on the part of the Khimariotes. He speaks and reads Italian and French, is tolerably informed on the history and antiquities of this country, wishes much to enter the English service, and asserts that we may easily raise a body of 800 Khimariotes from the free villages of Khimara, and, with the permission of the Turks, twice that number in the neighbouring districts.
There are about 100 pensioners of the King of Naples in the town, officers included, who are paid by Capt. Zakho, for which purpose he visits Corfu every year to receive the pay from the Neapolitan consul, whose agent he is. He receives a pension of twelve ducats a month for his own military services, four more for the consolato or agency, and eight ducats for the widow of a son who fell in the service. So handsome a provision after a short personal service can only be considered as intended to secure an influential agent in the place, for Zakho-Ghiorghi is looked up to as the chief man in Khimara by all except those who side with the Lyganates, and who, of course, consider Alexodhemo the chief. The feud between the two parties is of long standing; the most remarkable contest occurred ten or twelve years ago, when many lives are said to have been lost. The heads of the fratries are those who possess the largest proportion of vineyards, cornfields, and flocks; and they form the council of the family league. Between friendly fratries disputes are easily made up, though even among them the foundation and last resource of the law is the lex talionis.

§ 1.087   As in Arabia, a murder may be acquitted for money. At Khimara 2000 Turkish piastres are the usual price of blood; at the next village of Vuno it is 1000. Until this be paid the retaliation goes on. The power of the heads of families, Capt. Zakho observes, is merely the influence of property and character, and is neither asserted nor acknowledged. “That man,” pointing to an attendant, “though he receives his pay from me, will do nothing I order unless he pleases.” He shows, however, at the same time, that he can desire the man to bring his kapa and lay it on his shoulders. There are several soldiers here on leave of absence, during which they receive their pay. One has a twelvemonth’s leave. The pay of a private is 28 grani per diem; that of a serjeant-major 34; of a captain 80 ducats a month; of a lieutenant-colonel 110; but they find their own arms and clothes. A Neapolitan soldier has not half as much. There are three or four Khimariote captains now recruiting here for their corps at Naples.
The Khimariotes often intermarry with the people of Vuno, the territory of which is separated only from that of Khimara by the crest of the ridge to the north-westward, which looks down upon Vuno. But notwithstanding these alliances, the two towns are generally on terms of suspicion, and often in open hostility. This, indeed, is the ordinary condition of two neighbouring towns in Albania, and, by a natural consequence, those which are separated from one another by a third territory are generally in alliance, which in fact is not uncommon on a larger scale in other parts of the world.

§ 1.088   The name of Khimara is generally applied to the whole of the ancient Acroceraunian ridge, from Cape Kefali to Cape Glossa, including the valley of Oricum. The towns are in the following order from south to north: Nivitza, Lukovo, Pikernes, Sopoto, Kiepero, Khimara, Vuuo, Dhrymadhes, Palasa, and Dukadhes. All these places stand on the western slope, of the Acroceraunia, except Dukadhes, which looks to the Gulf of Aulon. There are also a few smaller villages in Khimara, one of which, named Piliuri, is in sight from the town of Khimara to the eastward, towards the summit of the mountain, in a pass leading to the Turkish village of Kutzi. At Corfu I met a certain Count Gika, of Dhrymadhes, who described that place as very picturesque, with a river running through it; and added, that near Dukadhes are forests of fine oaks and pines, furnishing timber which might easily be brought down the hills into the lagoon of Erikho. All the towns have nearly the same semi-barbarous manners and customs. The Greek language is spoken by almost all the men, and the Italian by those who have lived abroad; but the women in general know little of any language but the Albanian.
Khimara being situated on a steep rocky height, protected on either side by the ravine of a torrent, and having all its exterior houses prepared for defence, has by its strength hitherto served as a barrier to all the northern part of the district against the arms of Aly Pasha. Three or four years ago, the Khimariotes fought with his troops on the hill above Palerimo. More recently, on visiting the latter place, he proposed to purchase a piece of land from the Khimariotes, for the purpose of building a castle, which they wisely refused. He has often recommended this harbour to the use of British ships; his principal object in which, as he confessed to me, is that by this appearance of support from us, he may find it more easy to bring the Khimariotes under his yoke. It was in a manner somewhat similar that he obtained Nivitza and Aio Vasili; and thus it is that he always endeavours, in his transactions with the powers of Europe, to convert them into instruments of his own aggrandizement. From Khimara to Tepeleni is reckoned a four days’ journey in this season, though the direct distance is not more than 20 G. miles: the first day is to Kutzi, the third to Nivitza on the Sutzista, which, like the other streams of this country, is difficult to pass in seasons of rain. Nivitza is inhabited by Musulman Liape, and is described as situated on a peaked rock, surrounded by deep ravines and torrents, where considerable remains of ancient walls are preserved, and in the castle particularly an entire door. It is agreed by all who have seen these walls, that they exactly resemble some pieces of Hellenic work, which now serve as foundations to several of the modern houses of Khimara. The masonry approaches to a regular kind not any of the blocks of stone having more than five sides. These relics, together with the name, leave no question that Khimara stands upon the exact site of the ancient Chimara, which I believe is noticed only by Pliny. I was informed of an inscription in a private house, but as it belonged to one of the adverse faction, I could not obtain permission to see it.

§ 1.090   Jan. 12.—As neither the season, nor the engagements of the boat in which I came to Palerimo, nor the doubtful politics and civilization of the Ceraunians, will admit of my exploring Khimara any farther, still less of being able by this route to examine the topography of Amantia, Oricum, Bullis, or Apollonia, I am under the necessity of returning to Palerimo and Corfu. The people of Dukadhes, who possess the valley above Oricum, are the principal difficulty, having a reputation something like that of the Kakovuliotes of Mani.
Though the wind is favorable this morning for returning by sea to the Forty Saints, and the weather delightful, Captain Zakharias, pushing the laws of hospitality to a semi-barbarous extent, will not allow me to walk back to Palerimo, until a lamb, which he sends for from the hills, has been baked and served up on the floor.
After this Homeric breakfast we descend to Palerimo, accompanied for two miles by Captain Constantine Andrutzi: two guards, formerly Neapolitan soldiers, armed with musquets, walk with us as far as the boundary of the territory, between the northern Bay of Palerimo and the isthmus of the castle. Here, having received a present, they fire off their musquets and return.

§ 1.091   We embark at 2 p.m. with a light northerly breeze, which soon' falls to a calm; and, rowing all the way, arrive at half-past nine at the Forty Saints by a fine moonlight.
In all this part of Albania it is a prevailing idea, not uncommon also in many parts of Greece, that the country formerly belonged to the Spaniards, and that all the ruins are the work of that people; those at the Forty Saints, the castle of Delvino, the ruins in the plain of Deropugl, the remains of an old Turkish castle at Tepeleni, and even the Hellenic walls of Phoenice are supposed to be of Spanish construction. It is difficult to understand how this opinion originated, for the Catalans, the only Spaniards who made any permanent settlements in Greece, were not in this quarter, nor can any one of the ruins in Epirus with any probability be ascribed to them.
I had made an agreement with the Corfiotes to proceed to Vutzindro, and Parga, and from thence to Corfu, but this being the Greek new year’s day, and feast of St. Basil, the sailors get drunk and insolent, and the bargain breaks off.

§ 1.092   Jan. 14.—Having found another vessel, we sail along the coast to the Bay of Buthrotum, passing between the two rocks off Kassopo, which are such a dangerous impediment to the safe navigation of this channel. They lie midway between the castle of Kassopo and a wide bay on the shore of Epirus, which is separated only from the lake of Vutzindro by a long ridge of land, not broader in some parts than a mile. The bay is called Examili, in allusion to the isthmus, that name being often attached by the modern Greeks to an isthmus, whatever may be its breadth. It is thus applied to the Isthmus of Corinth, and to that of the Thracian Chersonese, near Cardia. The Bay of Examili is open and exposed to the west, but the southern part is well sheltered by four islets, which have given to the anchorage within them the name of Tetranisa. Beyond this there is a rugged coast, parallel to the eastern extremity of Corfu, and forming with it the narrowest part of the channel. The most projecting point on the continent is probably the Cape Posidium of Ptolemy and Strabo. Between Onchesmus and Posidium, Ptolemy places a Cassiope, which he clearly distinguishes from the Cassiope of Corcyra, by describing the former as a harbour, the latter as a town and promontory. Cassiope of Epirus, therefore, if Ptolemy is correct, would seem to have stood in the harbour of Tetranisa. It is on the strength of this evidence of Ptolemy, that Strabo has been supposed to allude to a Cassiope on the coast of Epirus, in stating that the distance from port Cassiope to Brundusium was 1700 stades. I have little doubt, however, that he intended the harbour of Cassiope in Corcyra, from whence it is more probable that vessels should begin their passage to Italy, than from any port on the Epirote coast to the southward of Onchesmus. If Strabo did not intend a place in Corcyra, why should he have described Phalacrum, (which we know from Ptolemy and Stephanus to have been a promontory of that island), as lying to the southward of Cassiope; or why should he have returned to Onchesmus before he described the ports of Posidium and Buthrotum? This seems clearly to show that all which occurs between his first mention of Onchesmus, and his return to it, relates to Corcyra only; that his Cassiope was the modern Kassapo, and his Phalacrum the north-western point of Corfu. It is true that this cape is nearly due west of Kassopo, instead of being to the south; but errors of bearing are among the most common of ancient inaccuracies. Strabo’s distance of 1700 stades cannot assist in deciding the question, because the difference of distance from Brindisi to Kassopo in Corfu, or from Brindisi to any point on the Epirote coast, is too small on so long a line to lead to any certainty, especially in reference to so incorrect an authority or text as those of Strabo.

§ 1.094   His imperfect knowledge of the general form of these coasts is shown, not only by his mistaken bearing of Phalacrum from Cassiope, but by his statement also that the distance from Phalacrum to Tarentum is equal to that from Cassiope to Brundusium, there being a great excess in the former line whether the latter be measured from the coast of Corcyra, or from that of Epirus. As to the mention supposed to have been made by other authors beside Ptolemy, of a Cassiope in Epirus, it is clear that they all, without exception, intended the Cassope, of which the territory bordered on the Ambracic Gulf.
If Phalacrum was the north-western cape of Corfu, the southern extremity, or Cavo Bianco, was probably the Amphipagus of Ptolemy; for although the words Leucimne and Bianco have a similar import, the modern name Alefkimo is a much stronger proof of the identity of the ancient Leucimne with the low cape advancing into the channel of Corfu, eight miles to the northward of Cape Bianco. The name Amphipagus corresponds to such an abrupt and rocky height as Cavo Bianco, and with the more propriety, as it is a contrast to the low sandy promontory of Alefkimo. It is observable also, that the placing of Amphipagus at Cavo Bianco agrees with the order of names in Ptolemy, which is as follows:

§ 1.095  Cassiope (Kassopo); Ptychia (Vido); Corcyra (Corfu); Leucimne (Alefkimo); Amphipagus (Cavo Bianco); Phalacrum (Cape Drasti, or the N.W. Cape). The only remarkable promontory in Corcyra, which seems here omitted, is that at the southern entrance of the Channel of Kassopo.
As we approach Vutzindro, the water becomes muddy, and in the bay is almost fresh. This bay is very shallow on the northern side, and the bar at the mouth of the river will even now, when the water is at the highest, but just admit of the entrance of καΐκια or small coasting vessels. We row three or four miles up the river, through a plain once perhaps the property of Atticus, the friend of Cicero, and now peopled with horses from the neighbouring villages. We then arrive at the Vivari, or more vulgarly Livari; that is to say, the principal fishery, which is on the left side of the river, at its exit from the lake, nearly opposite to the peninsula which was anciently occupied by Buthrotum. The only buildings at the Livari are a ruined house of Venetian construction, and near it an old triangular castle, occupied by a dirty bilibash of the Vezir, and fifteen or twenty soldiers. The place is called Βουτζιντρόν, vulgarly pronounced Vutjindro: the territory comprehends all the lake, and a part of the surrounding hills. In the house live the superintendent of the fishery and fourteen Greeks, who are employed by him. The fish are caught by means of a strong permanent dam, made of large beams, crowned with a palisading of reeds. At intervals are small chambers in the dam, where the fish are taken in passing out of the lake. A man who is on the watch, gives a signal for shutting the door as soon as the chamber is full. There is a second dam above the first, for the purpose of breaking the force of the water, but the late violent rains have carried away great part of it, and injured the fishery for the remainder of the season, which usually lasts from September to March. The yearly average quantity of fish caught is 350,000 litres, or Greek pounds, which are the same as the Venetian. This year, though the season is only half over, they have caught 400,000. The fishery is farmed from the Vezir for fifty-five purses by N. Y. of Kalarytes, the bishop of Ioannina, and G. Z. of the Forty Saints. In the same farm is included the fishery of a smaller lake named Riza, to the south-eastward of the great lake; that of a lagoon called Armyro on the northern side of the mouth of the river, the pasturage of the marshy land near the river and lake, and the privilege of cutting wood (but not construction timber) in the forests and marshes of the territory of Vutzindro, as it was defined by treaty between Venice and the Turks. Beyond that line the wood-cutters pay for the privilege to Konispoli, which possesses all the south-eastern part of the fine plain, extending from the southern extremity of the lake to the foot of the hills which border the Channel of Corfu in face of the city.
The right of fishing with nets in the lakes, lagoons, and river, is underlet by the farmers to Corfiotes, who employ many boats in this manner.

§ 1.097   The fish are salted on the spot, and the greater part sent to Corfu, which depends upon Vutzindro and the Gulf of Arta for its supply of fish during the long fasts of the Greek church; the rest are sold in the villages around for a great distance. From hence also Corfu is chiefly furnished with firewood, and with staves to make casks for its oil and wine. These circumstances explain the importance which Venice always attached to the possession of Bucintro. The wood is chiefly procured on a mountain rising steeply from the eastern side of the lake and plain, and called Milia-vuni, from a little village near the summit, which is in sight from Corfu. The French are said to have formerly procured from thence some good timber for shipbuilding. Under its south-eastern extremity, between it and another mountain, is the lake Riza, which is three or four miles long, and sends forth a stream which enters the lake of Vutzindro, nearly opposite to the ruins of Buthrotum. Along the eastern side of the lake Riza passes the direct road from Delvino to Mursia, a village at the southern extremity of the plain, from whence it continues to Konispoli and Filiates. The road from the Livari to Delvino follows the western side of the same lake, and joins the former road at the upper or northern extremity of the lake, near a source of salt water. On some low eminences rising from the southern bank of the lake Riza are the villages Zara and Zaropulo, which are comprehended in the district of Vutzindro. The fishery of this lake, as I before remarked, forms a part of the farm of the great livari, but is subject to the payment of one hundred and eighty okes of fish to Selim Bey Koka, who owns the neighbouring land.

§ 1.098   Konispoli is a scattered town of four or five hundred Albanian families, conspicuous from Corfu by its situation on the summit of the maritime ridge, which stretches from the plain at the mouth of the Kalama, as far as the bay of Vutzindro. Inland the plain extends southward from Vutzindro behind this ridge, for a distance of about five miles, and a river flows through it into the lake. The southern part of the plain belonged to a Hellenic city, of which remains are found on the edge of the plain, to the northward of Konispoli; the other end was obviously a part of the territory of Buthrotum.
About twenty days ago there was a battle at Konispoli, between the two parties which divide the town; at the head of one is Mahmud Daliani, whose niece was married to Mukhtar Pasha some time ago, but divorced by him and then married to Selim Bey, of Delvino, who now resides at Konispoli. The other chief is Ismail Aga, a friend of the Vezir, whose assistance he demanded; but before it could arrive Ismail had made up matters with his adversary. The Vezir’s party at Konispoli and Filiates are called Jacobins by their opponents, in imitation of the party appellations of the Corfiotes. Aly was displeased with Ismail for not allowing time for his interference; but still hopes, by his means, to obtain possession of Konispoli, which would be a great step towards his object of subjugating the whole of Tzamuria.

§ 1.099   Wild swine are very numerous among the thickets along the edge of the lake, particularly in the peninsula of Buthrotum; and the place is infested with jackals, which at night make as hideous a noise as those in the plains of Palestine. Woodcocks are very numerous, and the lake is now covered with ducks.
A Greek of Ioannina, who is employed at the Livari, had established, at the expence of six hundred piastres, a small shop and wine-store, which was totally carried away by the late inundations. Of the two years he has dwelt here, he has been ill the greater part of the last. In summer the air is extremely unhealthy; and there is no drinking water, but that of the river, which in winter is extremely turbid.
As one of the states of Epirus, Buthrotum has not received any more notice from history than the cities of this province in general. It was occupied by Caesar soon after he had taken Oricum, and before the time of Strabo had become a Roman colony. Virgil had a most imperfect idea of the place, when he applied to it the epithet of lofty; and its resemblance to Troy is very like that of Monmouth to Macedon. It would be difficult even to find the dry torrent to which the followers of Helenus had given the name of Xanthus.

§ 1.100   The words which the Latin poet applies to the Phaeacian citadel are better chosen, and exactly describe the two rocky summits or κορυφαί, which have given its modern name to Corcyra.
Strabo was so far acquainted with the site of Buthrotum, as to know that it stood on a chersonese; but in placing it at the mouth of the harbour Pelodes, he was either greatly misinformed, or the word λιμένος has been improperly substituted in his text for λίμνης, and the name Pelodes belonged to the lake as well as the harbour; for Ptolemy, Plutarch, and the word itself, sufficiently identify Pelodes with the muddy bay of Vutzindro. Ptolemy, indeed, distinguishes between the Bουθρωτοΰ κόλπος and the Πηλωδης λιμην; placing the former next to Cape Posidium: possibly port Pelodes was the modern Armyro, which may have been converted in process of time by the deposit of the river, from a well-sheltered harbour into a lagoon on the northern side of the river’s mouth.

§ 1.101   The ruins of Buthrotum occupy a peninsula which is bounded on the western side by a small bay in the lake, and is surrounded from the north to the south-east by the windings of the river just above its issue. The walls of the Roman colony still exist in the whole circumference, which is about a mile, and are mixed with remains both of later and of Hellenic work, showing that the city always occupied the same site. Within the inclosure are the ruins of a large church, of two or three small ones, and of some cisterns, baths, and houses. There are also some fragments of granite columns and of other marbles. The towers which flank the walls were built with a salient angle, and some of them were of this form. The citadel was towards the bay of the lake, where the side of the peninsula is the highest and steepest. Of the Hellenic remains there is a very perfect piece of wall on the south-eastern side, which, as it consists of regular courses, is probably not much older than the time of Pyrrhus. There is also a fine remnant on the western side, of which the courses are nearly equal and parallel, and appear entirely so at a distance; but on a nearer inspection, few of the stones are found to be quadrangular, nor the courses regular. Immediately opposite to the house of the fishery are some other ruins which appear to be Venetian; among them is a tower resembling those on the coast of Malta. There is a similar one in the pass behind the Limeni of the Forty Saints.

§ 1.102   Jan. 15.—A rocky summit on the western side of the ruins commands a fine view of the Epirote coast, from the cape near Palasa to the islands of Syvota, as well as of all the eastern side of Corfu. The plain of Delvino is seen beyond the lake, together with the surrounding mountains. On the narrow ridge which separates the lake from the bay of Examili, stands the monastery of St. George, surrounded with gardens, olive-grounds, and vineyards; it is now occupied by Aly as a military post. A little beyond the southern point of the bay of Vutzindro is a small port called Glyfa, a little within Cape Stilo: then occurs the harbour of Ftelia, or Aftelia, which is well sheltered, and though small is a good anchorage for ships of commerce; then Kataito, a little open port, then Bagania, a good harbour for merchant ships. Beyond Bagania, the villages, Konispoli, Liopesi, and Saiadha, crown the hills which border the coast. Under Saiadha is a sandy shallow bay, exposed to the north-west, in which is a skala called Kerasia, which is the ordinary landing-place from Corfu on the way to Filiates and Ioannina, and from whence the island is usually supplied with cattle, sheep, hogs, and other provision.

§ 1.103   At the mouth of the river Kalama, the ancient Thyamis, there is an island or peninsula affording good shelter, immediately beyond which is the bay of Gomenitza, a fine harbour for ships of any size and number; the entrance is narrowed by the shoals formed by the Kalama, which extend from Kerasia all the way round to the bay of Gomenitza. Close to the mouth of the river, on the north, is the insulated mountain called Mavronoro, which seems once to have been an island, as all around it are low sandy points. It seems to be the projection which Ptolemy entitules the promontory or promontories of Thyamis; the low promontories around it would justify the plural number. Five or six miles to the southward of Gomenitza are the islands Sybota, which still bear the ancient name. They shelter a small bay, where on the shore of the main land stands a village of Musulman Albanians named Vrakhana or Murto. Strabo has not noticed any place between Buthrotum and Sybota: an unfortunate omission, as there must have been anciently some important towns in the rich districts near the mouth of the Thyamis, concerning which no author has left us any precise information. Torone would seem from Ptolemy to have stood in one of the bays between the mouth of the Kalama and Syvota.

§ 1.104   The country which lies to the southward of the districts of Vutzindro and Delvino, as far as the Kalama, is called Parakalamo. Φιλάτες, pronounced Filiates by the Albanians, is the principal town of Parakalamo. With the exception of a few Christian artisans and shopkeepers, it is entirely inhabited by Musulman Albanians, contains several handsome mosques, and about 2000 houses, which, as in the generality of Albanian towns, are dispersed over a great space; the ground is hilly, and the place is situated at a distance of some miles from the plain of the Kalama. Ibrahim Demis and Ibrahim Stambulis are the two principal chieftains, and can bring two or three thousand armed Musulmans into the field.
Plessaritza is a large Greek village on a rocky hill to the northward of Filiates, and situated above the western side of a valley which forms the natural communication between the vale of the Kalama and that of Delvino. Beyond Plessaritza, towards Delvino, are Kotzika and Verva, in the narrowest part of the valley abovementioned: this pass, and that of Neokhori, in the mountains which separate the valley of the lower Kalama from the districts of Paramythia and Margariti, are the only two entrances into that valley on the land side, except the difficult route which leads into it along the river from the north-eastward. Hence Parakalamo, Daghi, to the south of the Kalama, Magariti, and Paramythia, have hitherto remained independent of Aly Pasha.

§ 1.105   Jan. 16.—Return this morning to Corfu, in a boat of that island with a gentle scirocco. At two thirds of the distance down the river stands a house built by a Corfiote, who owns also part of the plain; but his speculation having failed, the house is now in ruins. Aly Pasha having already made so much progress in gaining possession of the Ex-Venetian places, is desirous of purchasing this property from the Corfiote.

§ 1.106   CHAPTER III SECOND JOURNEY. AETOLIA.
June 12, 1805.—At 11 p.m. I embarked with two servants and a Tatar courier in a boat of Kefalonia from the Skala of Patra for the opposite coast; but a light breeze, blowing directly against us from the lagoon of Mesolonghi, and our boat being furnished only with two oars, it was not until the morning of June 13, at 8.30, that I landed at the ruin of a tower of Venetian, or lower Greek construction, at the foot of Mount Varassova, as that immense pile of rock is here called which closes the plain of the Evenus to the eastward,

§ 1.107   but which is more commonly known at Patra by the name of Mount Galata, from a village of that name. The other steep mountain or promontory towards Epakto, which at Patra is generally called Paleo-vuni, is here better known by the name of Kaki-skala. The landing-place of Varassova is in an angle, where the level coast at the mouth of the Evenus terminates, under the cliffs of the mountain, which rise almost perpendicularly to the summit. Several copious streams of the purest water issue from the foot of the mountain, and form a pond and marsh near the beach, from which a stream flows into the sea. Most of these fountains are within fifty yards of the beach; and there is one which rises in the sea itself ten or twelve feet from the shore, forcing its way to the surface, and making the water all around it fresh. From these sources the place receives the name of Krio-nero.
Some return mules, which have brought hither plank from the interior mountains to be transported to Zakytho, afford the means of forwarding my baggage to Galata. At noon I leave the sea-beach on foot, but soon meet some horses, sent from the village by order of Osman Bey, a Turk of 'Epakto, who owns Galata. The plain is very marshy near the sea, but farther inland is fertile; and near Galata and Bokhori produces maize, corn, oil, wine, silk, and rice. Of the latter grain a great quantity might be grown, as there are large uncultivated tracts in the plain well adapted to it.

§ 1.108   Two or three miles to the northward of Galata and Bokhori, the valley of the Evenus, now called Fidhari, branches from the maritime plain. It is inclosed by hills clothed with oaks, and has a rich and beautiful appearance.
Galata is a Turkish village of thirty houses, distant 2 ½ miles north, 60 west, from Krio-nero; it is situated in the midst of olive plantations and cornfields, and though surrounded also by rice marshes, is said to be not unhealthy. The peasants are now employed in reaping barley. The Turk who brought the horses conducts me to his cottage, provides a dinner, and accompanies me in the afternoon to Mesolonghi. We are prevented from setting out till 4.53, by a heavy rain, accompanied with thunder, an occurrence almost daily in the mountainous parts of Greece in the early summer. The clouds begin to collect on, the mountains about 9 o’clock, and the storm is generally over by 3 or 4 p.m., but sometimes it is later. Though it happened every day during the fortnight I remained at Patra, the rain never reached that place. While travelling in the Morea, I remarked that these meridian storms were more constant in the mountains of Rumili than in the Peninsula. At 5.15 we cross the Fidhari about the same place where the centaur Nessus, of old, transported passengers across the river in his arms, and where he suffered from the arrows of Hercules for his rudeness to Deianira, for hereabouts is naturally the most convenient passage. Nessus would seem to have been no more than a mortal horseman, who gained a few pence by his employment.

§ 1.109   The river well illustrates the story, as it requires a guide for the ford even in this season, the water reaching to the stirrups. The water is clear and rapid, running over a wide gravelly bed, which in winter is often entirely covered. The river separates the district of Epakto from that of Zygos.
Having reached the right bank, we pass through Bokhori, a Greek village situated amidst plane trees, cornfields, fruit-gardens, and plantations of the same productions which grow near Galata. Derivations from the Evenus here turn several mills. At the hamlet of Kurt-aga, near the point where the last slope of the mountain on the north-western side of the vale of the Evenus advances into the plain of Bokhori, are foundations of the walls of a large Hellenic polis, not far from the right bank of the river. The position corresponds so exactly to that of Calydon, as indicated by Pliny, that one can hardly doubt of the identity. Without this testimony, there might have been some doubts on the question. Strabo, by his citation of two conflicting authorities, without deciding between them, clearly shows that he never was here; but though his text, as it now stands, is unintelligible, it requires only the transposition of two of the paragraphs,

§ 1.110   and the addition of the single word ουκ (not), to be made perfectly applicable. The passage occurs in a description of the maritime places in their proper order from Leucas to Antirrhium. With the proposed alteration his remarks will be as follows: “Next to the lake Cynia, which has a communication with the sea, is Pleuron, then the town Licyrna, above which, thirty stades inland is Calydon, and near it the temple of Apollo Laphraeus; then the Evenus, to which, from Actium, there is a distance of 670 stades, and beyond it the mountain Chalcis, which Artemidorus calls Chalcia; then the mountain Taphiassus; then the city Macynia; then Molycreia, and near it Antirrhium, the boundary of Aetolia and Locris, to which, from the Evenus, there is a distance of 120 stades. Artemidorus, however, differs respecting the mountain Chalcis, or Chalcia, placing it between the Achelous and Pleuron. Apollodorus, on the other hand, places both Chalcis and Taphiassus, as I before stated, above Molycreia, and Calydon between Pleuron and Chalcis, unless, indeed, we suppose that Mount Chalcia near Pleuron was different from Chalcis near Molycreia.”

§ 1.111   As it cannot be doubted that the Chalcis and Taphiassus here named were the two great mountains situated between the river Fidhari and the Castle of Rumili, or ancient Antirrhium, it follows that Chalcis was Varassova, or the western mountain, and Taphiassus the eastern, now called Kaki-skala. And as there is no appearance of an ancient site between the river and Mount Varassova, we may infer that Chalcis or Hypochalcis, the Χαλκις αγχίαλος of Homer, and the Chalceia of Polybius, stood in the valley between the two mountains, where is now a harbour called Gavrolimni. It would seem also, that the site of Macynia was between Taphiassus and Molycreia, which last, as I have already remarked, was on the first rise of the hills behind the castle of Rumili. I was informed at Patra, from whence the whole of this coast is well seen, that there are still some remains of a Hellenic fortress, now called Ovrio-kastro, between the mountains, and some vestiges also on the eastern side of Kaki-skala both of them confirming the preceding conjecture, the former being the remains of Chalcis, the latter of Macynia. Ptolemy places Molycreia in Locris, but Strabo makes Antirrhium the boundary, and ascribes Molycreia to Aetolia.

§ 1.112   The modern name Μποχώρι is obviously a corruption of Υποχώριον in allusion to its position, that is to say, an outlying quarter of Calydon below the city. In some vineyards near Kurtaga a sepulchral stele has lately been found and brought to Bokhori. It has that common form which is an imitation of the end of a sarcophagus, and is inscribed with the names Philumena, Antimachus, where the precedence of the lady’s name without anything to indicate the relationship between the two is uncommon.
The evening is unfortunately too near its close to allow me to examine the ruins of Calydon. Proceeding therefore from Bokhori we pass through fields of oats, barley, grinia [wheat of a middle hardness and generaly with a black beard and fine full grain; in the Morea it is chiefly produced on the banks of the Alpheius], guinea corn, and maize,

§ 1.113   and at 6.20 leave on the left a village which has recently been built in the level near the sea, on the edge of the eastern extremity of the Lagoon of Mesolonghi, and hence called Neokhori. The mountains on the right are well cultivated at the foot, and above are covered with trees. Having descended upon the lowest level at something more than a mile from the edge of the lagoon, we proceed over a desert space inundated by the late rains; at 7.10 enter a suburb of Mesolonghi consisting of thatched huts, and at 7.25 arrive at the house of a merchant on the seaside.
Mesolonghi was evidently so named from its situation in the midst of the λόγγος, or wilderness of woods and marshes, which, under the Romans, gradually enveloped all the ruined cities of maritime Aetolia, until the position, like that of Venice, was chosen for its security during the middle ages, to which period of Greek literature the name belongs. The town contains about 1000 families, residing in houses which indicate a great variety of conditions, and occupy a large space, as well along the shore of the lagoon as in the adjacent marshy level. The lagoon is separated from the sea by a narrow ράμμα, as it is called, or thread of low land, and is divided into two nearly equal parts by, a projection from the marshy level, which advances to within a short distance of the ramma. In the eastern division of the lagoon, and in the middle of a bay at its northern extremity, is the town of Anatoliko, entirely covering a small island.

§ 1.114   The entrance from the roadsted of Mesolonghi into the lagoon is at a distance of four miles from the town, where is a small island called Vasiladhi, and upon it a fort and custom-house. Large boats cannot approach within a mile of the houses, nor can they advance so far unless when empty: all the remaining navigation of the lagoon, therefore, is carried on by shallow monoxyla, or canoes, which are made of hollow trunks of oaks from the neighbouring mountains. In the town, salt water rises every where on digging to the depth of three or four feet; but so near as the gardens which surround the town, wells of a greater depth furnish an abundance of fresh water which maintains the gardens in perpetual verdure. The water for drinking is brought by an aqueduct from Mount Zygos between the foot of which and the gardens there is a plain covered with currant plantations, vineyards, and fields of corn, but which do not supply the place with more than a four months’ consumption of bread.
I was surprised to hear that the air of Mesolonghi is not considered unhealthy, and to observe that the appearance of the people, who are a handsome race, corresponds to this opinion. It is admitted, however, that the back part of the town is not so healthy as the seaside, where the best houses are situated. The fishery of the lagoon, and the commerce of this the only emporium in Aetolia, are the productive labors of the Mesolonghites.

§ 1.115   The fish are taken in a variety of modes, but in the greatest numbers by means of a palisading near the stomata or mouths of the lagoon, of which there are several communicating with the sea. Here, after breeding in the shallows, they are intercepted on their return to the sea, in passages or in chambers into which the passages conduct. Each kind of fish has a different season during the summer and autumn for going out. Besides the quantity consumed in the town, or in the villages around, either fresh, half salted, or thoroughly salted, 200,000 litres are exported every year. The other exports of Mesolonghi are 5000 barrels of oil every two years, 1500 barrels of wine, 300,000 litres of currants, 1000 okes of silk, and all the surplus corn of the southern parts of Karlili. The merchant, in whose house I am lodged, carried last year a cargo of maize to Tunis. The currants, shipped here, are partly produced in the plain of Vrakhori [Agrinio], and as they form part of the cargoes of the British ships trading to Patra, a consul or agent has been appointed at Mesolonghi, who is the son of a Kefalonite merchant residing here, and who acts also for the Septinsular Republic.
June 14.—A ride of a little more than one hour from Mesolonghi conducts me to some ruins in a lofty situation on Mount Zygos, just as the usual postmeridian storm of rain and thunder is coming on. Fortunately it lasts only half an hour. The remains which are now known by the name of TO Καστpov της Κυρίας Ειρηνης, ΟΓ the Castle of Lady Irene, are those of the entire circuit of the ruined walls of a small polis, about a mile in circumference, enclosing the western face of a very steep and rugged height, the summit of which formed an acropolis.

§ 1.116   The masonry is generally of the third order. The lower courses of the principal gate exist, on one side of which is a stone measuring seven feet by four. It seems to have been a common practice among the Greeks to place the largest masses near the principal entrance, to excite respect in a stranger for the fortifications. In the centre of the wall, which defended the lower side of the town, is a square tower, and at one extremity of the same wall another tower, having very long flanks. The most remarkable remains within the enclosure are a theatre about 100 feet in diameter, and above it, on the side of the hill, a cistern, 100 feet long, 70 broad, and 14 deep, excavated on three sides in the rock, and on the fourth constructed of masonry. The excavation is on a slope, and between the excavated side at the upper end, and a wall which closes the lower, there are four other parallel, though not equidistant walls reaching from the one side of the excavation to the other, and consisting of courses of regular masonry, of a single stone in thickness, and which have openings at the bottom in the form of a triangle, very acute at the upper angle. The intention of these walls and openings in such an excavation it is not very easy to explain. Close to a small side-gate on the north are the foundations of a building, and to the eastward the remains of two parallel walls, enclosing a terrace twenty-four yards long and eleven wide; near the great gate are those of a small quadrangular building, like the cell of a temple, the stones square and accurately cut, but without any appearance of a peristyle or any fragments of columns.

§ 1.117   In the acropolis are some remains of Doric shafts of white marble, about three feet in diameter; they belonged, perhaps, to the identical temple of Minerva at Pleuron, noticed by Dicaearchus, for I have little doubt that these are the ruins of Pleuron. Strabo remarks, that the more ancient Pleuron was destroyed by Demetrius II. son of Antigonus Gonatas; that it stood in the plain towards Calydon, and that the Pleuronii afterwards built a new town on Mount Aracynthus. From his description also of the Evenus, though he was mistaken in supposing the course of that river above Calydon to have been easterly, it is evident that the territory of Pleuron bordered upon the Calydonias.

§ 1.118   Dicaearchus, in naming Pleuron between the Achelous and Calydon, agrees with Apollodorus, who places Calydon between Pleuron and Chalcis. If the situations therefore which I have assigned to Calydon and Chalcis be correct, there can be no question that Pleuron was near Mesolonghi. In farther admitting the transposition which I have proposed in the text of Strabo, we may add to the preceding testimonies that of Artemidorus. Nor is the concurrence of Thucydides wanting, who, in describing the march of Eurylochus the Spartan from Locris into Aetolia, in the sixth autumn of the Peloponnesian war, relates, that he moved from Molycrium to Calydon, Pleuron, and Proschium, in which places he remained until he proceeded against Amphilochia .
There is every reason to believe that Mount Zygos, upon a part of which the castle of Irene stands, is the ancient Aracynthus, and the ruins accord with those of the later Pleuron, inasmuch as they have no appearance of remote antiquity, and are exactly those of such a small town as we may suppose New Pleuron to have been from the circumstances of the people at the time of its foundation. I remarked, moreover, some pieces of Hellenic wall at the foot of the mountain on the edge of the plain of Mesolonghi, as well as on a small height in that plain now called Ghyfto-kastro, situated precisely where the words of Strabo would lead one to look for Old Pleuron. The name Ghyfto-kastro allows the conjecture, that greater remains once existed there, and that the materials have been removed for the use of modern constructions at Mesolonghi.

§ 1.119  Proschium, from a comparison of Strabo with Thucydides, in the places just referred to, seems to have occupied the western part of the ridge of Zygos. and to have possessed the plain, at its foot, now belonging to Anatoliko. The high situation in which Proschium was founded when the low position of the Homeric Pylene was abandoned seems to accord with that of the monastery of St. George in Mount Zygos, between Anatoliko and Anghelokastro, where considerable remains of a Hellenic city are said to exist. Pylene may have received its name from the remarkable cleft called the Klisura, which extends through the whole breadth of Mount Zygos, and which was exactly such a place as the ancient Greeks called a πύλη or gate. In this case it is probable that Pylene was situated at the maritime end of the Klisura, over against Anatoliko.
Apokuro, a sub-district of the Turkish kaza of Karpenisi, to the north-eastward of Zygos, seems evidently to have derived its name from Mount Curium and the Curetes; for it comprehends nearly the same country in which Homer places that people, as well as Strabo, who says that Pleuron was situated below the mountain Curium, whence it seems that Curium and Aracynthus were the same, or different parts of the same, mountain.

§ 1.120   Having descended the hill of Kyria Irini on foot, through the rocks and shrubs with which it is entirely covered, we regain, in half an hour, the direct road from Mesolonghi to Khierasovo, at a distance of three quarters of an hour from the former; and soon after having entered the mountain, and lost sight of the maritime country, leave on the right, at 5.20, a tumulus, covered with stones, situated in a little valley, along which a torrent flows; on its opposite bank is a Hellenic foundation. These are possibly the sepulchre and shrine of one of the ancient heroes of Aetolia. After ascending for an hour over a rugged road, we arrive on the side of a stream shaded by large plane-trees: follow a path still worse than before along the side of the same torrent through a forest of planes, oaks, and pirnaria, as far as a hollow between two summits of Mount Zygos; and at the end of another hour reach a height which commands a view of the lakes of Vrakhori, and of the great mountain to the north-east of that town, called Kyria Evghenia (Lady Eugenia), or vulgarly Mount Viena. Descending from hence, through a forest for three quarters of an hour, we arrive, at 8.30, at the village of Khierasovo, beautifully dispersed among vineyards and gardens on the slope of the mountain, in the midst of a forest of chestnuts. The gathering of the nuts and the carrying of them to Anatoliko and Mesolonghi, from whence most of them are transported to Zakytho or the other islands, together with the tending of their sheep and goats on the mountain, form the principal employments of the people of Khierasovo.

§ 1.121   June 15.—A descent of fifty minutes from Khierasovo through the forest of chestnuts, conducts us, at 7.5, nearly to the base of the mountain, where a torrent shaded by planes turns some mills, and flows down a valley opening into the plain of Vrakhori. At 7.40, just at the entrance of the plain, we pass a zevgalati. or hamlet, dependent on Khierasovo, and called Ston Gambo, or “at the plain” but which is sufficiently high to command a view over a great part of the extensive plains and lakes around Vrakhori, with the opposite mountains. This prospect is alone sufficient to identify Mount Zygos with Aracynthus; since, according to Dionysius the geographer, Mount Aracynthus bounded to the southward the great plain of the Aetolians. There are three lakes in this plain, one to the right of the river Aspro, or Achelous, the two others to the left of it; but the latter are separated only by a marshy and often inundated tract, full of large trees and underwood, through which is a causeway of stone, forming the only road from Vrakhori to Anatoliko, Mesolonghi, Bokhori, and the adjacent coast, whether by Khierasovo or by Klisura.

§ 1.122   The latter route, after having crossed the causeway, turns to the right of the former, and passes by Papadhates, which stands on an extremity of Mount Zygos, not far from the borders of the middle lake; it then enters the pass of Klisura, which natural opening by avoiding the ascent and descent of the mountain, is often preferred as the road from Vrakhori to Mesolonghi, although circuitous. Above Papadhates are considerable remains of a Hellenic city, probably Lysimachia. Leaving Papadhates a few miles on the left, we enter on the causeway at 8.10, and ride through a most agreeable shade of oaks, wild olives, and planes, festooned with wild vines, and intermixed in the more marshy parts with large reeds. The causeway, which rests on a great number of arches, is said to be two hundred years old, and to have been built by a certain bey of Vrakhori, who probably took advantage of the foundations of a more ancient work. A gentle stream flows through the arches from right to left. We arrive at the end of the causeway at 8.30, cross the remainder of the plain, and, ascending the last slope of the heights which border it on the north, arrive at 9.45 at Vrakhori [Agrinio].
This town occupies a large space of ground, and contains about 500 Turkish, 100 Greek, and 40 Jewish families. It was entirely Turkish not many years ago, but the present Aga has encouraged the Greeks to reside. The Turkish houses have large gardens attached to them, with high stone walls to hide the windows of the harem, and they are built in a more antique Turkish taste than is commonly seen in Greece.

§ 1.123   The Greek houses are small, and situated in the lower part of the town. In the afternoon I visit Yusuf Aga, the Musellim of Karlili, of which district Vrakhori is the chief town. Yusuf, who has resided here during the last seven years, with the exception of one, owes his promotion to his cousin of the same name, who is the powerful Valide Kiayassy, and, like his relative, a native of Khania in Crete. In consequence of the Musellim’s interest at court, Aly Pasha finds it necessary to treat him with respect; received him lately with great distinction at Nicopolis, and affects to place his Derveni troops under Yusuf’s orders, which is believed by many to be nothing less than a trap laid by the crafty Albanian to bring Yusuf into disgrace; for not long ago, a hasne, which the latter had forwarded from Kravari with 40 soldiers, in its way to Constantinople was attacked by the robbers at Makrinoro, which is not very likely to have happened without the Pasha’s connivance. ['Hasne' is applied to any portion, however small, of the imperial revenue. To rob the hasne by open violence is one of the most heinous of offenses in the eyes of the Turkish government; to do so by any other means, is the object and practice of every official man in Turkey.]
The royal farms of the revenue in this part of Greece are divided as follows: Karlili, Mesolonghi, 'Epacto, Kravari, Badrajik, (Neopatra), and Karpenisi.

§ 1.124   Aly Pasha has Mesolonghi, to which is attached Magula, a village of 50 houses, and Neokhori of 150; chorographically these form part of Karlili, as well as Vonitza at its opposite extremity, which is separated from it politically, as being one of the ex-Venetian places. As the inferior branches of revenue in Turkey are often farmed separately from the miri, Yusuf has that of the kharatj in Badrajik, Karpenisi, Kravari, and Epakto.
Karlili, besides the towns of Vrakhori, Mesolonghi, Anatoliko, and Vonitza, contains 140 villages of various sizes; many of these, situated in the plain of Vrakhori, are mere tjiftliks belonging to the Turks of this town. The kaza, which contains all Acarnania, and a great part of Aetolia, is divided into four parts: Vlokhos, and Zygos, to the left of the Aspro Valto and Xeromero, to the right. The two first are separated from one another by the northern bank of the middle lake, which is all included in Zygos, as the eastern lake is entirely in Apokuro, which district is bordered to the eastward by Kravari, as Zygos is by Venetiko, or the district of Epakto. Apokuro is included in the Turkish kaza of Karpenisi; but Kravari is considered a separate district, of which the chief town is Lumbotina. Vlokho borders, northward, on Agrafa, and Valto on the Arta kazasi; the latter includes the Makrinoro, and follows the course of the Aspro as far as a line drawn from the south-eastern extremity of the Gulf of Arta, until it meets the Aspro, about Anghelo-kastro.

§ 1.125   All the country westward of that line between the Aspro and the Gulf of Arta, constitutes Xeromero, which thus corresponds nearly with the ancient Acarnania. Βάλτος, though the ordinary meaning of the word is marsh, is said to be so called, as being for the most part a woody desert. Xeromero seems to have derived its name from its deficiency in water, when compared with Zygos, Valto, aud Apokuro, and Zygos from the ridge of Aracynthus, though it contains also the level and lake at the foot of this mountain on either side. Apokuro, as I before hinted, appears to be an ancient name corrupted.
The whole of Karlili, with the exception of the principal town, has suffered excessively from the wars carried on between the kleftes and the Dervent Aga, so that at present it does not contain, exclusively of the towns which I have named, a population of 20,000 souls.
Anghelo-kastro, which is a conspicuous object from Vrakhori, is a ruined castle on the summit of a low peak at the north-western extremity of Mount Zygos, not far from the Aspro. At the foot of the height, towards the river, is a small village of the same name. There are said to be some Hellenic foundations on the hill, as well as in the plain below it, marking probably the site of Conope, afterwards called Arsinoe.

§ 1.126   June 16.—A beautiful little bronze figure of Hercules, wanting an arm, which I observed yesterday in my lodging, and which my host stated to have been brought from Vlokho, a monastery on a lofty hill to the eastward of Vrakhori, where he described some extensive ruins, at once points out the probability of that place being the site of Thermus; which, at the time when Greek art was in perfection, was noted for its numerous statues. Setting out this morning, therefore, at 5.5, and riding through currant grounds and vineyards, among which, on the left, are a kiosk and gardens of Yusuf Aga, I cross, at 5.50, the river Ermitza, which issues from a ravine among the hills between Vrakhori and Vlokho; in winter it covers a wide gravelly bed, and even now is a respectable stream. The name is encouraging to a search for Thermus, as it seems to be a corruption of that word. Instead of ascending to Vlokho by the nearest way, we leave it on the left, and follow the plain towards the shore of the eastern lake, or lake of Apokuro, for the purpose of visiting another Paleo-kastro which has been described to me: pass through some fields of maize and corn, and numerous plane trees, and at 7.5 arrive at the remains of a Hellenic fortress, situated on a height one third of a mile distant from the edge of the lake, between which and the ruins stands a tjiftlik, or zevgalatia, called Kuvelo.
The entire circuit of the ancient fortifications still subsists, surrounding a height which forms the last slope of Mount Viena. The circumference is about a mile.

§ 1.127   On the summit are the ruins of an oval acropolis, ninety-five yards in length, flanked with towers on the exterior side, and towards the town defended by a double wall without towers. At the southern extremity of the oval, a semi-circular tower, twenty-three feet in diameter, looks down upon and enfilades the whole line of the southern walls, of which a great part of the towers and curtains are still standing. This semi-circular tower is nearly complete, and has three windows in the middle of the curve. At the northern end of the acropolis are two towers formed of small stones and mortar, raised upon the ruins of the ancient walls, (a repair probably of the time of the lower Greeks or Franks,) and adjacent to them, on the northern town-wall, three or four of the ancient towers, with the intermediate curtains: of the rest of that front, which follows in a curve line the crest of the height towards a narrow vale grown with corn, there is very little left, and still less of the western side towards Kuvelo and the lake. This fortress, standing on the foot of the mountain a little above the lake, was well placed to command the passage along the shore to the eastward or southward, or in other words, the ancient route from Thermus and every part of the great Aetolian plain, in the direction of the vale of the Evenus and Naupactus. Beyond the fortress, at the southeastern end of the lake, the mountains descend quite to the water, and leave only a difficult road along the margin.
This is far the largest of all the lakes of Acarnania and Aetolia, and is so deep towards the extremity that it has the reputation of being unfathomable: it abounds in fish, but they are caught only in the shallows towards the causeway, by means of monoxyla, one of which is now lying near the shore at Kuvelo.

§ 1.128   On the opposite shore of the lake, the slope of Mount Aracynthus is more gradual than it is on the shore of the western lake, or lake of Zygos, where, especially beyond Papadhates, the woody mountains extend to the water side. At the foot of the mountain, south-eastward of Ston Gambo, and opposite to Kuvelo, there is a cultivated tract containing the village of Gavala, or Kavala, and several tjiftliks. It is probably the territory of Trichonium, from which the lake took its ancient name.
From Kuvelo, after returning for half an hour by the same road, we turn out of it to the right, and begin to ascend the mountain of Vlokho, which is very steep, and covered with a thick wood of oak, ilex, and holly-oak. The ilex affords the best timber; its stem resembles that of the holly-oak; the leaves are larger, (and not so prickly) smooth, small, and dark-coloured, oblong, pointed, and serrated, with serratures very long and close. Besides these trees, there are many ordinary shrubs, among which are wild olives, brambles, and wild vines, making the ride cool and agreeable, though the path is so bad that Philip and his army could hardly have taken more time to reach the summit than I do with a couple of Albanian soldiers.

§ 1.129   At length we arrive at a small grassy level surrounded by woody heights, and crossed by a brook shaded with planes, which descends from the summit of the hill. From hence upwards to the village of Vlokho the path is still steeper than before, and is traced in a zigzag among corn-fields, olive plantations, and pear trees, bearing a small well-flavoured fruit now ripe: the wild pear also abounds. At the distance of an hour and a half from the kastro of Kuvelo we pass through Vlokho, where are the sources which supply the rivulet, and about ten inhabited houses, with a large one in ruins, dispersed among some large walnut-trees. Two or three hundred yards higher up the hill, is another collection of cottages, with a little garden ground. These villages and cultivated ground occupy a hollow under the summit of the mountain on the southern side, and stand about the centre of the site of the ancient city.
At the upper village we find a monk belonging to the monastery which stands on the summit of the hill, and invite ourselves to dine there. He speedily procures a lamb, places it on the shoulders of one of the villagers, and thus accompanied we proceed to the monastery. From the upper huts of Vlokho the ascent is very steep. Half-way to the summit we arrive at a part of the ancient wall, which followed the crest of a, ridge descending from the citadel to the south-west. The wall was constructed of great masses of various shapes, accurately fitted to one another; higher up, near the foot of the acropolis, the stones are still larger.

§ 1.130   One of them, a trapezium, measures ten feet by the largest diagonal, and is six feet four inches broad; another on the surface is equal to a square of seven feet and a half. Few are less than three or four feet. The acropolis and its rocks are still towering above our heads, but we reach at length, by a zigzag road, a narrow passage between two parallel walls, which was evidently the approach to the gate of the acropolis, and arrive at the monastery at the end of half an hour's ride from the upper Vlokho.
This building, dedicated to the Virgin and called the Panaghia of Vlokhos, stands on an oval tabular level, bordered on all sides by steep rocks, but rather less difficult of approach on the western side, where we ascended. To the north-eastward the mountain slopes rapidly to a deep ravine between slopes cultivated with corn, on the opposite side of which rises the great mountain of Viena, or Kyria Evghenia; an appellation which, according to the kaloyeri of the convent, was derived from a βασιλοπούλα, or princess Eugenia, who concealed herself, when pursued by her enemies, in a cavern which the monks point out to me just under the highest summit of the mountain, and there died. Who these ladies, Eugenia and Irene, were, whose names remain attached to two of the mountains of Aetolia, it would be vain to conjecture with our scanty knowledge of the history of Aetolia under the Byzantine empire, for to that time the names are evidently to be referred.

§ 1.131   The other summits of Mount Viena, which from its magnitude and central situation I conceive to be the Panaetolium of Pliny, are distinguished by the names of the nearest villages, the whole being called Viena, which is probably nothing more than a Bulgarian corruption of Ευγένεια. The range terminates to the north in a peaked summit above the village of Arakhova, in the district of Karpenisi. Half way down from the retreat of the unfortunate princess, and immediately opposite to Vlokho, stood a village of fifteen houses, named Lykokhori, which about eight years ago fell down the side of the mountain, and disappeared with all the adjoining soil; the inhabitants fortunately had retired, having taken warning from the previous trembling and cracking of the earth. Aware of what was likely to happen, the monks watched the place, but it slipped off in the night, and they heard only the awful crash.
While our dinner is preparing, one of the monks guides and assists me in climbing up the rocks of an upper summit, by a path known only to themselves. This height, which is named Ogla, is 200 yards long and 30 broad, similar in shape to the entire summit of which it constitutes about a fourth part; and thus forming a sort of keep to this natural castle; its precipices on the further side from the monastery are a continuation with an increased height of those on the eastern side of the entire hill.

§ 1.132   The summit of Ogla is level and carpeted, like the larger summit, with a delicate herbage. This fine geographical station comprehends in its view to the southward Mount Khelmos beyond Kalavryta, and to the northward the vast serrated rock of Djumerka beyond Arta, points distant from each other more than 100 miles in a straight line. The mountains of Agrafa are seen to the right of the latter, and other points more distant to the east, which are probably a part of Othrys. Oeta and Parnassus are hid by Mount Viena. The summits near the head of the Gulf of Arta are visible to the left of Djumerka, then the mountain of Suli, the Acarnanian heights near V0nitza, Varnaka and Tragamesti, and then the range of Zygos, above which appear the great mountain of Kefalonia, and the rocks of Oxia and Kurtzolari. Above the lofty hills at the end of the lake of Apokuro appear the mountains Varassova and Kaki-skala, and that of Rigani, above Epakto, beyond which are the great Peloponnesian hills Olono, Voidhia, and Khelmos. The plain of Vrakhori is extended in front of the prospect, with its three lakes, and the broad white bed of the Achelous, from which the modern name, Aspro, was evidently derived. The nearer country, at the back of the hills of Vlokho and Vrakhori, is very rugged and mountainous as far as can be seen, nor do I perceive any cultivation, or a single village. Deep ravines surround the hill of Vlokho on every side excepting to the south. On the west a stream shaded with planes follows the foot of the hill, traverses half-way down a little cultivation round a metokhi of the monastery, and joins one of the lakes, near the causeway.

§ 1.133   Farther westward is a narrow valley watered by the Ermitza, the sources of which are at a considerable distance to the north. The springs at Vlokho form a branch of the rivulet flowing along the ravine which separates the hill of Vlokho from the mountain of Kyria Evghenia. Their junction and subsequent discharge into the lake of Apokuro are not far westward of Kuvelo.
It is curious that Vlokho, though of so little importance at present, not only stands on the site of the ancient capital, but still gives name to a great part of Aetolia, of which it is in fact the natural citadel. The modern name is Sclavonic, and seems to indicate, that when the barbarians of that race conquered this part of Greece, in the decline of the Byzantine empire, the advantages of the site caused it to be their principal fortress, and the chief place of a large district. When the French were at Prevyza, and an invasion was expected, the Turks of Vrakhori prepared to retire for security to Vlokho.
The form and position of Thermus were such as the Greeks seem generally to have considered the most advantageous; namely, a triangle on the slope of a pyramidal hill, bordered on either side by a torrent flowing in a deep ravine, and having a summit convenient for an acropolis. The citadel was generally the apex of the triangle, and often itself, therefore, of a triangular form, but when the summit of the hill was level, the citadel was sometimes oval, such as I have already described at Kuvelo, and at the ruins of Phigaleia and Theisoa in the Morea.

§ 1.134   But this was probably a very ancient manner of fortifying, which was seldom followed in the meridian ages of Greece, when square towers and straight curtains were the general method. In the instance of Vlokho the ground was formed by nature for an oval acropolis.
The entire circumference of the city was about two miles and a half; the walls are in best preservation on the western side. Here the foundations, with some of the lower courses of masonry, are to be seen, following the entire crest of the ridge; in some places there are considerable pieces of the wall, all of polygonal masonry, though generally of smaller stones than those which I described below the acropolis.
There were no towers, but only short flanks at intervals of 60 or 100 yards: on the eastern side I could not trace any remains of the wall between the citadel and a small level about half-way down the hill, which was not far from the south-eastern angle of the city. But the fall on this side being much steeper, there was not so much necessity for defence as on the other side, where the easier declivity not only required a stronger fortification, but has been the means of preserving it better than on the eastern side, where the materials as they have fallen may have rolled down the hill. To the south, the walls crossed some transverse ridges, on the borders of the hollow in which the two villages are situated, but considerably below the lower village. Little more than foundations are traceable on this side.

§ 1.135   The only remains of a public edifice within the walls of this capital of one of the most influential people in Greece, and which, when it was taken by Philip, was noted for its riches, is a square pyramidal shapeless mass of stones, on a line with the cottages of upper Vlokho, near the western wall. I inquired in vain for medals, or other remains of antiquity.
At a little before 5 we begin to descend from the monastery, which is soon afterwards occupied by some guests less welcome; namely, a body of armatoli, ranging the country, and living at the public expense. Turning at the upper huts of Vlokho, to the right of the road, by which we mounted the hill, we cross the western wall, and descend the ridge along the outside of it as far as the southwestern angle, where the southern wall of the town began to cross the valley. In the latter, a little beyond the angle, is a semi-circular retiring of the wall, about ten yards in diameter, with a plain unornamented opening in it which was evidently one of the principal gates of the city. The gate is not in the middle of the semi-circle, but a little to the left, and the whole construction furnishes an example of one of the many ingenious modes devised by the Greeks for strengthening their gates and the approaches to them. The semi-circle had the same intention as the square court which is sometimes found before the gates of Hellenic cities; in the present instance it not only admitted of a concentration of missiles, particularly on the right or unshielded side of the enemy, but exposed him, when he had reached the gate, to the reverse of the western wall.

§ 1.136   [sketch of gate] Leaving this spot at 5.45, we descend by zigzag paths, among the hills, to the ravine on the western side of the city, and having crossed the stream which flows along it, enter soon afterwards the plain of Vrakhori; we then ride over a fine soil quite uncultivated, in a direction parallel to the foot of the mountain, enter the currant grounds and vineyards of Vrakhori, and at 7 cross the Ermitza at the mills where we passed it in the morning, following the same road from thence as before, and at halfpast 7 re-entering Vrakhori.
June 17.—This morning, at a few minutes before 6, I proceed northward along the plain, in a direction parallel to the foot of the hills, and at 6.25 arrive at Zapandi, a village of 120 houses, two thirds of which are Turkish. After waiting a quarter of an hour for a guide, to ford the river, we begin to cross it at 7.20. In winter the passage is seldom attempted, the waters often filling the entire bed, which is not less than three quarters of a mile in width; but at present the river is divided into five or six rapid streams, two of which only are large, and require a guide: not so much on account of their depth as because the bottom is a loose gravel and sand, with many holes and quick-sands;

§ 1.137   and the peramata or safe places for passing, shifting frequently, are well known only to those who reside on the spot. In the present season the afternoon’s storms in the mountains sometimes produce sudden floods which are dangerous, but in the forenoon the river is generally passable. The water is now not higher than a Turkish stirrup, and we find no inconvenience except from the round stones at the bottom, which make the horse stumble occasionally. But the guide who walks alongside on foot, and leads the horse, quickly raises him when he makes a false step, encouraging him by his voice, and recommending to the rider to look at the bank, that the current may not make him giddy. A little below the ford the bed is wider than where we cross it, and takes a turn to the westward. The dry part is covered with trunks of trees, the wintry spoils of the woods of Pindus.
After a halt of half an hour on the right bank, we reach at 8.24 the ruins of a large Hellenic town, undoubtedly Stratus; for Stratus, according to the ancient authorities, stood on the right bank of the Achelous, in the same plain which contained the lake Trichonis, and at a distance of 200 stades from the sea, by the course of the river: all which accords perfectly with this place.

§ 1.138   The eastern wall of the city followed the bank of the river, just at the point where it touches the last falls of the hills of Valto, which are here low, but rise gradually to the north-north-west, and extend to the head of the Gulf of Arta, where they terminate abruptly in the pass of Makrinoro: a parallel ridge rises gradually from the plain not far to the southwestward of Stratus, and ends at the Gulf of Arta in the hill called Sparto-vuni. Between these two ridges lies a long valley commencing at the ruins of Stratus, and at a village opposite to it called Lepenu, and terminating to the north-west in an easy pass, through which is a descent into the plain of Xerokambo, near the south-eastern corner of the Gulf of Arta. It is evident from this construction of the country, that Stratus was a military position of importance. Being situated at the point where the valley of Lepenu meets that of the Achelous, and where they both open into the great Aetolian plain, it commanded two of the principal approaches to that plain from the northward, at the same time that it was not far removed from a third, which I shall presently have occasion to mention.
The first object in the ruins of Stratus that strikes the traveller after crossing the river, is a small door in the south-eastern angle of the town wall. Thirty yards below it, on the water side, are some foundations, whether those of the peribolus of a temple, or belonging to a wharf, it is impossible to say. The door has a semicircular top, not constructed on the principles of the arch, by hollowing the horizontal courses of stone into a semicircular form,, in the same manner as is seen in many places, both in Greece and Egypt.

§ 1.139   The door is 10 feet high, and 5 feet 6 inches wide; the stones very large, and, as commonly occurs in Greek fortresses, larger than in the other parts of the wall. This door leads into an uneven space about a mile in circumference, surrounded on all sides by remains, more or less traceable, of the town walls, which are of the third kind of masonry, in some parts nearly approaching to the most regular species. Half way from the door, towards the highest part of the inclosure which is diagonally opposite to the gate, are the remains of a theatre, situated in a hollow, having its right side near the western wall of the above-mentioned enclosure, and fronting the south. Its interior diameter below is 105 feet, and there seem to have been about thirty rows of seats, all of which might probably be brought to light by excavation. But this inclosure towards the river, which contained the theatre, was not much more than a third of the whole city. The remainder stood on lower and more even ground, and the circuit of its walls, which are every where traceable, occupied the summits of several heights which border the valley of Lepenu, or follow the contour of the ridges uniting those heights. The wall which parted the two portions of the city terminates at the north-western summit before mentioned. Here seems to have been a small citadel, but it was scarcely higher than the adjoining part of the same ridge on the outside of the walls, and at the distance of two or three hundred yards was commanded, together with almost the entire site, by the external heights.

§ 1.140   A gate remains in the partition wall, near the summit, a little beyond which, to the westward, are some ruined huts, and some fruit-trees, once belonging to the village of Sorovigli. In the northern wall of the greater or western inclosure, a little below the summit, are some towers and intervening curtains, which are almost perfect. The circumference of the western inclosure appears to be between two and three thousand yards, and the entire circuit of the city about two miles and a half. The arm of the Achelous (for the river is here divided into several streams), which flows at the foot of the eastern wall, although narrow, is rapid, deep, and difficult to pass, even at this season, so that the river was a considerable protection to the place. As a fortress, however, Stratus could not have been considered very strong when poliorcetics were in the state of improvement which they reached after the time of Alexander.
The external ridge commanding the citadel illustrates one of the circumstances of the attempt made by Perseus to occupy Stratus, in the winter of the year B.C. 170—169. The king, who having undertaken the expedition at the request of the Epirotes, had marched through their country, was met on the frontiers of Aetolia by Archidamus, the strategus of Aetolia, who accompanied him to Stratus, then belonging to the Aetolian confederacy. But as usual in the states of Greece, there were two factions in Aetolia,

§ 1.141   and while Archidamus was proceeding to meet Perseus, the opposite party had sent for Popillius, who was at Ambracia, and who entered the city with a thousand men, on the very night that Perseus encamped upon the Achelous, near Stratus. Dinarchus also, commander of the cavalry of Aetolia, who had come ostensibly to meet Perseus, joined the adverse side, and entered the city. The king, nevertheless, having with him an army of 10,000 men, and the chief magistrate of Aetolia, still hoped that the Aetolians in the town would come out and join him, and with this view presented himself on the heights above the city; but finding that instead of any advances to a communication he was threatened with missiles, he retired five miles to the river Petitarus, and from thence to Aperantia.
The summit of the ruins commands a fine view of the Aspropotamo upwards, and of the hilly country near its banks, terminated by the mountains of Agrafa in the distance; the quantity of snow on which seems to show that the highest summits are nearly equal in height to Olono and Khelmos. At less than two hours above Surovigli, the river is joined, on the same side, by a tributary which originates to the eastward of Mount Makrinoro, and at an equal distance beyond the river are the ruins of another Hellenic city, at a village near the right bank, named Preventza. The river I take to be the Petitarus, if this name be correct in the text of Livy, and the ruins those of the town of Aperantia, of which Preventza may be a corruption.

§ 1.142   Livy indeed seems to allude to Aperantia only as a district; but Stephanus, in reference to the corresponding passage of Polybius, which is lost, shows the city also to have been named Απεράντεια. The general situation of the place accords with a transaction relating to Aperantia, which occurred twenty years before the expedition of Perseus, and which is recorded by Polybius and by Livy in nearly the same terms. When Amynander had recovered his kingdom of Athamania from Philip, the Aetolians who had assisted him thought the opportunity favourable for recovering Aperantia and Amphilochia for themselves. Nicandrus, the strategus, therefore, proceeding first into Amphilochia, probably because it was the more important of the two, although more distant from Aetolia, found the greater part of the people ready to receive him, and met with easy success; he then moved into Aperantia with the same result, and from thence proceeded into Dolopia, where the people, having never belonged to Aetolia, hesitated at first to receive him, but on learning the state of affairs, and that Philip had no farther hopes from their neighbours, the Athamanes, they joined the Aetolians.
While I was seated in the theatre, a drove of 300 Wallachian oxen, every one of which was white, passed through the ruins to Tragamesti to be shipped for the Islands. Besides these, which are on their passage from Wallachia, large herds and flocks are brought to feed in the winter and spring in the plains of Acarnania and Aetolia from Agrafa, and the other mountainous districts around Thessaly. The oxen of the latter countries are generally dark coloured.

§ 1.143   Leaving the ruins of Stratus at 10.15, we ascend the valley which branches from the plain to the north-westward, and arrive at 11 at Lepenu, or Lepenio village of forty families, on the side of the valley opposite to Surovigli. In the vale just below it, are some copious sources of water. Lepenu is one of the principal villages of Valto, but has much diminished in population, from the same causes which have annihilated Surovigli. Being quickly driven out of the house of the Proestos by the fleas, I remove to the gate of the court-yard, which having, as usual in this part of the country, a large tiled roof, affords sufficient shelter in this season.
The Proestos confirms several Hellenic positions which I have heard of, but not yet seen. In Aetolia those of Anghelokastro, Papadhates, and St. George, seem to be the most remarkable; the last is reckoned three hours from Anghelokastro. Some monks of St. George, who came here lately, affirmed that the kastro at Surovigli is not to be compared to theirs, by which perhaps they meant only that the walls of the latter are in better preservation. A peasant, whom I encountered in the ruins at Surovigli, remarked that the city was the capital of the surrounding country. He judged merely from their extent; for probably not an individual in Acarnania or Aetolia has ever heard of the name or history of Stratus.

§ 1.144   It is chiefly from the narrative given by Polybius of the capture of Thermus by Philip, son of Demetrius, that we obtain a knowledge of the ancient geography of the central part of Aetolia, or great inland plain now occupied by Vrakhori, from which the chief strength and opulence of this province of Greece has in all ages been derived. In the second year of the Social War B.C. 218, Philip, taking advantage of the absence of Dorimachus with half the Aetolian forces in Thessaly, raised the siege of Palaea in Cephallenia, and sailed to Leucas, from whence, after having caused his ships to be dragged across the Dioryctus, or sandy isthmus of Leucas, he entered the Ambracic Gulf, and reached Limnaea on the morning after his arrival at Leucas. Having been joined by all the forces of Acarnania, he moved from Limnaea towards the evening without baggage. At the end of sixty stades, he halted to allow his troops to repose and take their supper; and then, continuing his route all night, arrived at the break of day on the river Achelous, between Stratus and Conope. His treacherous counsellor, Leontius, wished to give time to the Aetolians to defend themselves; but the better advice of Aratus having prevailed, Philip gave orders for an immediate advance to Thermus, the Aetolian capital.

§ 1.145   Crossing the river, therefore, and marching with all speed towards that city, he passed, on his left, Stratus, Agrinium, and Thestia, and, on his right, Conope, Lysimachia, Trichonium, and Phytaion and thus arrived at Metapa, situated sixty stades from Thermus, in the defile of the lake Trichoma, the passage along which was rendered very narrow and dangerous by the rugged woody mountains on its margin. The Aetolians having abandoned Metapa, he occupied it with five hundred men, to serve as a protection to him, as well in advancing as in returning through the straits. He then conducted his army in column, protecting his right by some light troops thrown out on that flank, while his left was defended by the lake for a distance of thirty stades. At the end of this distance from Metapa, he arrived at a town named Pamphium, and leaving a guard there, then ascended to Thermus by a road which was thirty stades in length, very steep, bordered by dangerous precipices on either side, and in some places very narrow.

§ 1.146   Having arrived at Thermus considerably before the close of day, he gave permission to his army to plunder all the surrounding villages, to overrun the plain of the Thermii,. and to sack the city itself, which was well furnished with corn and other provisions, and abounded with riches of every kind, having long been the place of meeting of the national assemblies, the centre of the civil and religious as well as commercial affairs of Aetolia; and, from the strength of its situation, considered as the place of refuge and acropolis of all Aetolia. The temple of Apollo in particular, with its surrounding buildings, was full of valuable furniture and offerings. On the morning after their arrival, the Macedonians separated the part of the plunder which they intended to carry away, and burnt the remainder in heaps before their tents; in which manner they destroyed, among other things, an immense quantity of armour. They burnt, or razed to the ground, the temple, with its stoae, and threw down all the statues, breaking those which were not figures of the gods or inscribed with their names. The number of images thus demolished or subverted, was not less than two thousand.

§ 1.147   Such an act of destruction and impiety was very repugnant to the manners of Greece, and is severely censured by Polybius, notwithstanding the provocation which Philip had recently received in the similar conduct of the Aetolians at Dium and Dodona; against the former of which places their vengeance had been particularly directed, as being a Macedonian city. But the young monarch was not sufficiently gifted with magnanimity to abstain from retaliation on so fair an opportunity; indeed, it seems to have been the great object of his expedition, and accordingly he inscribed upon the ruined wall of the temple, a senarian iambic, composed by a young poet who accompanied him, for the purpose of reminding the Aetolians that the shaft of vengeance came from Dium. Philip then began his retreat by the same road by which he came. Three thousand Aetolians, under Alexander of Trichonium, who were lying in wait for the purpose, attacked the rear, consisting of mercenaries and Acarnanians, as they began to move from the city, and had put them to flight, when a body of Illyrians, whom Philip, with a view to such a contingency, had placed behind a certain height, met them in the pursuit, and killed or made prisoners between two and three hundred of them. The rear then set fire to Pamphium, passed the defiles, and joined the Macedonians, who had already arrived at Metapa.

§ 1.148   The next day the invaders, having destroyed Metapa, marched to Acrae, and on the following day to Conope, where they remained one day; they then followed the left bank of the river, as far as Stratus, crossed it near that city, and halted just without the reach of missiles from the walls, thereby offering battle to a body of three thousand Aetolians, who with some cavalry and Cretans had recently entered the place. But it was not until the Macedonians resumed their march that the enemy came forth. The rear then turned, drove back the Aetolians to the gates of the city, and killed one hundred of them; after which, Philip, prosecuting his march without further impediment, rejoined his vessels at Limnaea, and returned to Leucas.
The preceding narrative, when compared with Strabo, will enable us with some confidence to affix the ancient names to the principal existing remains of the cities of the interior of Aetolia, notwithstanding that there is one part of it which I have found impossible to reconcile with an actual view of the country. From the south-eastern extremity of the Gulf of Arta, where it is evident that Limnaea was situated, there is a route for the most part level of about twenty-five miles, as far as the Achelous below Stratus, so that it was not very difficult for Philip, by performing about a third of the distance on the evening of his departure from Limnaea, to effect the other two thirds in the course of the night. The remaining distance of about fifteen miles to Thermus seems equally conformable to the proceedings of the army on the second day,

§ 1.149   when we may easily conceive that the march to Metapa, which was not so rapid as to prevent Philip from burning and destroying the country, added to the preparations for the passage along the lake to Pamphium, and the usual loss of time in the course of such a march, may have consumed, together with the long and painful ascent to Thermus, all the forenoon and two hours of the afternoon, about which time the Macedonians seem to have arrived at the city. The difficulty in the narrative is, that Philip, in advancing from Metapa to Pamphium, should have marched with his left upon a lake; since, according to the present state of the country, there is no apparent reason why he should have approached either of the lakes, the route from the Aspro by Vrakhori to Vlokho, not passing within three miles of them. Or if we suppose that the woods noticed by Polybius then occupied so much of the plain below Vrakhori, as to force him to follow the margin of the lake, and that Metapa stood about the junction of the river Ermitza with the lake, the distance of that point from Vlokho being nearly equal to the sixty stades, which the historian assigns as that between Metapa and Thermus: still it is obvious that an army moving from thence to the foot of the mountain of Vlokho would have had its right and not its left towards the marshes. In order to have approached Vlokho with his left on one of the lakes, Philip must either have made the circuit of them both, along the foot of Mount Zygos, and then, after rounding the extremity of the lake of Apokuro,

§ 1.150   and passing by the foot of Mount Viena along the steep and woody mountains which overhang the lake, have emerged into the plain again near Kuvelo, or he must have crossed between the lakes by the line of the modern causeway, and entered the plain between Vrakhori and Kuvelo. On the former supposition Metapa would have been near the eastern extremity of the lake of Apokuro.
It was impossible, however, for the Macedonians, immediately after a forced march from Limnaea to the Achelous, to have performed even the shorter of these routes, which would have tripled the direct distance from the Achelous to Thermus; or certainly, if such a march were practicable, they could not have arrived at Thermus at the hour which the subsequent transactions of that day render necessary. Possibly it may be thought that the ruins at Kuvelο, although very short of 60 stades from Thermus, are those of Metapa, and that Philip, after having conducted his army directly from the Achelous across the plain of Vrakhori, occupied the fortress at Kuvelo, not with the view of retreating through the passes commanded by it, which lead along the lake in an easterly direction, but merely to protect his operation from any interruption on that side. The purpose seems useful, and the post well suited to it, and we might suppose that in consequence of his possession of it, the Aetolians were induced to attack his rear in a different place, just as it began to retire from Thermus. The deviation to Kuvelo would only have added another hour to his march, and in moving from Kuvelo to Vlokho the Macedonians might for a short distance have had their left on the lake.

§ 1.151   But it is impossible to be satisfied with this explanation. The historian gives positive testimony that the στενα, or passes on the borders of the lake, were between Pamphium and Metapa, from the latter of which on his return he proceeded by Acrae to Conope: it seems inevitably to follow, therefore, that Metapa was at the western entrance of the passes, about eight miles to the south-westward of Thermus. The only conclusion seems to be, that the words right and left have, by some negligence either of the historian or his copyers, been substituted for each other in the text. Experience proves that such an error, notwithstanding its importance, is one of the most common that occurs. With this change every thing is clear, Metapa having stood near the lake immediately below Vrakhori, around which site there were probably woods making the passage difficult. As to Trichonis having been the eastern lake, whereas I suppose Philip to have marched chiefly along the western, that is easily reconciled by the fact that they are only divisions of the same lake, which communicate at the causeway, whence in common parlance the larger division may often have given name to the whole.
I have not entertained the supposition that Thermus could have occupied any other site than that of Vlokho, the description of Polybius, but still more the magnitude of the ruins leaving scarcely a reasonable doubt on this head in the same manner as the extent of those at Surovigli are a strong confirmation of their being the remains of Stratus.

§ 1.152   If we were to suppose Thermus to have stood on the southern side, or at the eastern end of the lake of Apokuro, in which case Philip might certainly have approached it, with his left defended by the lakes, it would in that case have been situated on Mount Aracynthus, or on the mountain which separates that lake from the valley of the Evenus, and would have been at no great distance from Calydon and the sea-coast, instead of having been far in the interior towards the great mountains of Aetolia and the centre of the province, as every evidence respecting Thermus seems clearly to indicate.
Of the places which the Macedonian army left on either hand in their march towards Thermus, after having crossed the Achelous, namely, Conope, Lysimachia, Trichonium, and Phytaion on the right, and Agrinium and Thestia on the left, there can be little doubt that Conope stood at Anghelokastro; for, besides the testimony derived from Polybius in his narrative of the capture of Thermus, from which we learn that it was on the eastern side of the river at a considerable distance below Stratus, the same author in relating some movements of Philip in Acarnania, in the year preceding that of the capture of Thermus, indicates it as standing at about twenty stades from the Achelous, which perfectly agrees with the distance of Anghelokastro from the Aspro. Strabo, moreover, as well as Polybius, intimates that it was near one of the ordinary passages of the Achelous, which is now the case as to Anghelokastro, and arises in fact from permanent geographical causes.

§ 1.153  Conope having received considerable augmentation from Arsinoe, sister and wife of Ptolemy Philadelphus, assumed her name instead of that of Conope. Polybius, however, in relating transactions which occurred thirty years after the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, still names it Conope. The neighbouring city which stood at Papadhates, near the lake of Zygos, seems clearly to have been Lysimachia, for Strabo describes the ruins of that city to have been between Pleuron and Arsinoe, on a lake then called Lysimachia, but more anciently Hyria, which agrees perfectly with the position of Papadhates, supposing Pleuron to have been at Kyria Irini, and Arsinoe at Anghelokastro. This position of Lysimachia accords also with the march of Antiochus from the Maliac Gulf in the year B.C. 191, when, having appointed Stratus,as the place for meeting the Aetolians, he marched thither by Naupactus, Calydon, and Lysimachia. We may infer from the name of this city, that it was founded by Lysimachus, when, as King of Macedonia, his dominion extended over the greater part of Greece. If the site was occupied more anciently, the name of the town may possibly have been Hyrie, in like manner as in later times both town and lake were named Lysimachia.

§ 1.154   As Antoninus Liberalis, in relating the fable of the conversion of Cycnus into a swan, gives to the lake in which Cycnus destroyed himself the name of Conope. it is evident that the ancients considered the lake of Zygos as the scene of this fable, and it becomes probable, therefore, that Ovid, who in describing the same metamorphosis, couples the Cycneia Tempe with Hyrie, alluded by the former name to the Klisura of Zygos, which is precisely such a place as the Greeks denominated a Tempe.
The river Cyathus, which, according to Polybius, as quoted by Athenaeus, flowed near Arsinoe, corresponds to the stream which, issuing from the lake of Zygos, joins the Achelous, not far from Anghelokastro. The principal sources which form both the lakes are at the foot of the steep mountain overhanging the eastern, or lake of Apokuro; a current flows from east to west through the two lakes: and the river of Anghelokastro, or Cyathus, is nothing more than a continuation of the same stream. Acre stood perhaps at the place where the river emerges from the lake, this being about midway between the positions which I have assigned to Metapa and Conope.
Notwithstanding the opinion of the antiquaries of Strabo's time, who pointed out some ruins at the foot of Mount Aracynthus, near Pleuron, as those of the Homeric Olenus, there is difficulty in believing that Olenus and Pleuron were so near to each other. It seems more probable that Olenus occupied some advantageous site in the dominions of the Calydonian dynasty, such as that of Gavala, where Trichonium afterwards stood.

§ 1.155   The notice taken of Trichonium by several ancient authors, as well as the circumstance of its having given name to the largest of the Aetolian lakes, shows it to have been the principal town of the plains, which, according to Strabo, extended from Trichonium to Stratus. The occurrence of its name after that of Lysimachia, among the cities on the right of Philip in his progress towards Thermus, places it beyond a doubt towards the south-eastern extremity of the plains, where Gavala, in a fertile district on the southern side of the Lake of Apokuro, seems perfectly to correspond to the data. Phytaion, having been the last town on the right of Philip’s line of march, answers to the ruined polis at Kuvelo, that being moreover the only place, besides Gavala, where any open country is left between the woody mountains and the shore of the lake.
Agrinium and Thestia received their names from Agrius and Thestius, two Aetolian chiefs of the royal race of Calydon and Pleuron, who, in process of time, obtained possessions farther in the interior; for the Aetolians, who went with Thoas to the Trojan war, were all from the districts of Zygos and Apokuro.

§ 1.156   It is evident that Agrinium was not far from the Achelous, as well from the march of Philip as from an occurrence of the year B.C. 314, related by Diodorus, when Agrinium was in alliance with Acarnania against the Aetolians, and when Cassander marched from Macedonia into Aetolia to assist the Acarnanes. By his advice the Acarnanes concentrated their forces, by withdrawing from their smaller fortresses into Stratus, Agrinium, and Ithoria. As soon as Cassander departed, after leaving a garrison in Agrinium, the Aetolians besieged it; and when the inhabitants marched out upon capitulation, treacherously fell upon them in the route, and massacred the greater part of them. It may be inferred from the two testimonies, that Agrinium was not far from Zapandi. Thestia was probably on the heights above Vrakhori, towards the sources of the Ermitza. The river Campylus, upon which the historian states that Cassander encamped, and held a council with the Acarnanes on his arrival in Aetolia, seems, from all the circumstances mentioned by the historian, to have been that great branch of the Achelous, which joins it between Tetarna and Surovigli, not far below the former.

§ 1.157   CHAPTER IV ACARNANIA, EPIRUS.
JUNE 18.—The direct route from Lepenu to Amvrakia passes along the foot of the hill of Lepenu, and leaving on the left the lake of Lygovitzi, which discharges its superfluous waters into the right side of the Achelous, enters a pass between the ridges of Makhala and Lepenu, and then follows the eastern bank of the lake of Valto to Amvrakia, which village by this road is seven hours distant. Wishing to explore a little more of the district of Valto than the direct road affords, I send the baggage that way; and taking with me two of the Albanian escort, which Yusuf Aga provided for me, follow up the valley of Lepenui. It soon becomes narrow and quite uncultivated. As we advance, the hills on either side become higher, and the bushes below thicker, until at 5.45 we enter a wood of small oaks, mixed with ilex and prinus, ascending gently by a pleasant shady path,

§ 1.158   until having arrived at the summit of the pass we begin at 7 to descend, and at 7.15 arrive at the ruins of some Hellenic walls. One of them crosses the road; others are with difficulty traced among the trees. They are the outworks of a fortress which occupied a height to the left of the road, and was naturally strengthened on two sides by a deep ravine and torrent; thus placed, it commanded the access by this valley from Amphilochia to the great plain of the Achelous. Within the inclosure, a little to the left of the road, a circular excavation in the ground, thirty-four feet in diameter, is lined with regular masonry of nearly equal courses, one of the stones of which measures four feet six inches in length, and two feet eight inches in height. On one side of the circle there remain eight courses overgrown with trees and bushes, on the other the slope of the bank covers the masonry. Near the walls of the fortress, on the outside, there is an ordinary ancient sepulchre, which has never been opened. The ruins are called the Paleokastro of Kekhreniatza. The latter name is applied to the pass, and to a brook to which I descend in five minutes, after a halt of fifty minutes.
The wall which crosses the road follows it afterwards for three minutes towards the brook. It has in some places six courses of masonry of the third kind, nearly approaching to the fourth, and very accurately joined, except where trees growing on the top have displaced the stones, with their roots. The brook of Kekhreniatza winds through a little uneven vale, ending in a small plain on the shore of the Ambracian Gulf, which is called Xerokambo, from its want of water;

§ 1.159   for the brook is lost before it arrives there. It produces, however, corn and Kalambokki, and belongs to the village of Kekhrenia, situated on the side of the steep rocky mountain which borders the ravine of Kekhreniatza to our left, and which separates it from the valley and lake of Valto or Amvrakia. We now quit the road to Xerokambo, and turning to the left cross the ridge of Kekhrenia, passing about the middle of the ascent through that village, which contains thirty Greek families, some dwelling in good pyrghi. We left the brook at 8.18, halt ten minutes at Kekhrenia, and then, proceeding to climb its steep rocky ridge, arrive, at 9.40, at a church of St. Elias, on the summit which commands an extensive view of Xeromero and Valto. These districts are little cultivated or inhabited, but particularly the latter, which consists of woody mountains to the northward, and to the southward of steep ridges inclosing a valley, the greatest part of which is lake or marsh, according to the season. It is this valley which gives name to the sub-district.
Having descended the western side of the ridge, on foot, through a wood of oaks not growing very thickly nor of large size, we arrive, at 10.50, five minutes beyond the foot of the mountain on the edge of the lake; then turning the northern end of it ascend to Amvrakia, which is one-third of the way up a ridge parallel to the one we have passed, and equally steep and rocky. We arrive at 11.30. Sparto is another village on the same mountain, one hour northward of Amvrakia towards the sea.

§ 1.160   Stanu is a third, of the same size as Amvrakia, and situated at the same height above the lake, three quarters of an hour to the southward. The part of the Valto, or lake, below Amvrakia, is a narrow shallow creek, about three miles long, branching out of the deeper part of it which is under Papalates and the monastery of Agrilio.
Amvrakia, or more vulgarly Amvrakia, contains about forty houses, and as many more in ruins. The Amvrakiotes, to avoid further decay, are about to move their situation higher up the mountain, where they will be less exposed to Turkish passengers, to thieves, and to the hostilities of some of their neighbours, which have caused a part of the vale, on the side of the lake, to be at length quite uncultivated. Their new village is to be called Plato, the position being level, though lofty, and already, my host the Proestos, has spent, he tells me, twenty purses in building a house there.
In the evening I descend the mountain of Amvrakia, in 40 minutes, to its Skala, from whence are exported planks, velanidhi, grain, and cattle. It is called Kervasara l, and is situated in a valley at the head of a long bay which forms the southeastern extremity of the gulf of Arta. To the eastward of the valley rises the mountain named Spartovuni, a lower continuation of which extends to the entrance of the bay, and falls on the eastern side to Xerokambo.

§ 1.161   The latter valley terminates at Armyro, where is a skala and shallow harbour, separated from the sea on the west by a low coast, which appears from Kervasara projecting to the left of the cape of Spartovuni. To the westward of the bay of Kervasara rises the continuation of the ridge of Amvrakia, on which stands the village of Sparto, once perhaps situated on the opposite mountain which now bears that name, for, as we have seen in the instance of Amvrakia, villages have a locomotive faculty in this country.
At the inner point of the bay, south-east of the magazines of Kervasara, are the walls of a large Hellenic town, occupying a height which rises from the right bank of a torrent, and reaches to the sea side. The place was fortified like Stratus, that is to say, there is no appearance of an acropolis of the usual kind, but the inclosed space was divided by a transverse wall into two parts, which are here more equal than at Stratus: many towers remain on the land-fronts. The masonry is of various ages; some parts are entirely polygonal, others consist of regular and equal courses. But the greater part of the work is of the third order, or of a kind between the two former. There are remains also of repairs with mortar, of a much later period. Doubtless the post has always been one of importance, as commanding the most easy and natural access into Acarnania from Epirus, both by sea and land. The inclosed space is overgrown with the kharub, oak, wild olive, and a great variety of shrubs, which often give shelter to deer, and other wild animals abounding in the adjacent woods.

§ 1.162   Beyond Xero-kambo is the plain of Vlikha, where at the foot of the mountains are the remains of a Hellenic city, described as being of larger compass than those at Kervasara, but not so well preserved. It is probably the ancient Argos of Amphilochia. Beyond the plain of Vlikha begins the Makrinoro, a mountain covered with a forest of oaks, and falling steeply to the shore of the gulf. The road along its declivity, which is reckoned three hours in length, forms a pass resembling that of the Gates of Syria, at the head of the gulf of Skanderun. Returning to Amvrakia, some παλαιά μνήματα occur on the road-side. They are ancient sepulchres of the most ordinary kind, or formed of four slabs set edgewise in the ground, and covered with other slabs.
The existence of the name Άμβρακία attached to a modern village in this part of the country has a great tendency to confuse the ancient geography, as leading to the belief that the ruins at Kervasara are those of the ancient Ambracia. But Ambracia was certainly on the northern side of the gulf, at some distance from the sea. The fact is, that Amvrakia is a village of recent construction, to which the founders gave that name in consequence of a prevalent opinion, that the ruins at Kervasara are those of Ambracia. That the error is of long standing, we learn from Meletius, who himself fell into it, and who, having been Bishop of Arta, was probably the false luminary which led the founders of Amvrakia to give their village that name. I have little doubt that the ruins at Kervasara are those of Limnaea, from whence Philip began his march to Thermus.

§ 1.163   June 19.—At 5 we begin to climb the steep rugged mountain at the back of Amvrakia. At 5.40, arrive at the summit which forms the separation between Xeromero and Valto, and begin to descend. It is observable that this mountain, as well as the two parallel ranges, and the same may be said of many others in this part of Greece, are bare on the eastern side, and well clothed with trees on the western. As we descend, Katuna, a village of Xeromero, pleasantly situated on a hill, with a cultivated valley below it, is on the left, and rather behind us: beyond it towards the sea, distant 10 or 12 miles, rises a high ridge, on which stands Zavitza, not in sight. To the right of Katuna appears the bold round mountain called Bumisto, and more in front of us a lofty ridge with a peaked summit, named Varnaka, from a village on it towards the sea. On this side of it there is a fine vale, which extends to Katuna, and is well cultivated with com. Towards the Gulf of Arta appears a valley and a green marsh, overgrown with shrubs and timber trees. The mountain beyond it is covered with a thick forest. Having descended on foot through the wood, and arrived in the vale at 6.20, we leave, after a halt of ten minutes, the marsh to the left, and pass through a wood on the side of it. Cattle are feeding round it, and towards the southern end there are a few fields of wheat now falling under the sickle. At 7.20, near the head of the Bay of Lutraki, leaving to the right the road to the monastery of Kendromata, and to Vlikha, Makrinoro, and Arta, we ascend a height,

§ 1.164   and at 7.25 look down to the right, on the head of the Bay of Lutraki. The beach is covered with firewood, piled in stacks for embarkation; and farther on are some magazines, near which a polacca brig is at anchor, loading the wood. At 7.53 the road crosses a bridge over a torrent, which is shaded with planes, and bordered by slopes clothed with oaks and planes, festooned with wild vines, and where the kharub and the paliuri, covered with a profusion of blossoms, are mixed with the aromatic shrubs with which Greece so eminently abounds, and peopled with nightingales singing in the deep shade. After a halt of 12 minutes we pursue our route along the side of the forest of oak, which covers the mountain, with the gulf at a short distance on the right, and then pass through a narrow tract between the sea and the forest, where are a few fields of maize, watered by rivulets from the mountain.
At 8.35 occurs a tjiftlik belonging to Aly Pasha, named Balim Bey, situated half a mile from the sea. Here the French consul, Lasalle, about the year 1788, embarked the greatest part of the timber which he cut down in the neighbouring mountain, for the use of the naval yard at Toulon. There still remain however some very large trees, the finest I have yet seen in Greece. Soon afterwards we enter the thickest part of the forest, leaving the village of Nisi half an hour to the right. The road to Lefkadha turns off to the left about three quarters of an hour beyond Balim Bey.

§ 1.165   We lose our way in the wood, and are 40 minutes in recovering it. At 10.15 having gained the summit of a ridge, which terminates in a cape called Gheladha, on the eastern side of the Bay of Vonitza, this town opens to view, and to the left of it the lake called Vulkaria, with a woody and marshy tract on this side of it, around which is a little cultivation. Here the oaks are generally small, but there is an abundance of fine trees towards Lefkadha, in which direction the mountain of Plaghia intercepts the view to the Strait of Leucas, but admits a sight of the highest part of the island over it. The ridge to our left is continued as far as the western coast near Zaverdha, and rises in that interval to a lofty summit named Pergandi. Exactly in the spot where this view opens are some Hellenic foundations by the roadside, and some others in a neighbouring corn-field.
From hence to Vonitza the land is well cultivated with com. Leaving on our right a monastery, beautifully situated below a grove of oaks on the side of the mountain, we descend into the plain, and crossing it diagonally, arrive at Vonitza at 12.10. In the entrance of the town are the remains of a square redoubt and detached ravelin, which are recent works of the French.

§ 1.166   The district of Vonitza extends 4 or 5 miles round the town, including the slopes of the mountains on the eastern and western sides of the valley, and the valley itself in the direction of the Lake Vulkaria, nearly as far as Konidhari; a tjiftlik belonging to Aly Pasha, whose property now extends as far as the channel of Lefkadha, though in consequence of its exposure to the robbers, who take refuge in the islands, he derives little profit from it. Konidhari stands on a low ridge which connects the heights on the west of Vonitza with Mount Pergandi, and thus separates the plain of Vonitza from the Lake Vulkaria, as well as from another plain which reaches to the Bay of Zaverdha. Beyond the ridge, at the eastern extremity of the Vulkaria, are some thick woods, the abode of deer and wild hogs, and often the retreat of the robbers in those expeditions from the islands which have almost depopulated Acarnania.
The house in which I am lodged at Vonitza, that of the Greek primate Khalikiopulo, commonly called Logotheti, from his ecclesiastical office, stands on the shore, on the side of a strait about 200 yards in width, which communicates from the Bay of Vonitza to the Limni, a shallow harbour which widens to half a mile, and is about two miles long.
Vonitza contains 450 houses, divided into three separate quarters: namely, Recinto, which lies on the south-west, and is so called as being inclosed within two walls which descend to the shore of the shallow harbour from the summit of a conical hill, crowned with a ruinous and ill-constructed Venetian castle; secondly, Borgo, which is a suburb on the western side of the hill;

§ 1.167   and thirdly, Boccale, which is divided from Borgo by gardens, and stretches eastward along the shore of the Bay. The greater part of the houses of Vonitza are wretched cottages, constructed of mud and thatched. In Recinto are the ruins of a large church, having a Latin inscription over the door, placed there by the Venetians. A marshy tract extending towards the head of the limeni is occupied by gardens, and several private houses in an unhealthy situation. Immediately opposite to M. Logotheti’s house, on the opposite or northern point of the harbour’s mouth, is a small suburb consisting of a few houses upon the extreme point, together with a monastery prettily situated among olive trees. Both the monastery and suburb are known by the name of Myrtari.
Beyond Myrtari lies the great peninsula, formed by the Bay of Vonitza, the limeni of Vonitza, and the Gulf of Prevyza, and which terminates to the north-east in a high rocky point, separated from a similar cape by the strait which forms the entrance from the small ante-gulf of Prevyza into the main Gulf of Arta. The Bay of Vonitza is a very large semi-circular basin, opening into the gulf between the eastern side of the peninsula above-mentioned, and Cape Gheladha to the eastward. It is indented with several beautiful harbours, and has considerable depth quite to the shore of Vonitza. The commerce of this place consists chiefly in the exchange of grain, cattle, and firewood, for the articles of furniture and domestic use for which Greece is indebted to Europe, or Constantinople.

§ 1.168   As to government, it is in the same condition with Prevyza and Parga. The treaty of 1800, which formed the Septinsular republic, assigned these Venetian dependencies to the Porte, on the condition that they were to be governed by their own municipal laws, and to be exempt from the kharatj, but to pay the land tax and customs to an officer appointed by the Porte to receive them. The Aga charged with this office has a guard of five or six men. He complains much of his solitary situation, without a single Turk to speak to, even the soldiers of the garrison being Christians. “But I serve,” he says, “for the glory of my sovereign, and with the hopes of promotion.” In the meantime, he is in great dread of offending Aly Pasha, whose design of obtaining complete possession of the Ex-Venetian places is sufficiently evident. The poor Aga has recently been much alarmed at the conduct of his principal at Prevyza, who has openly shown his suspicions of the Pasha by not waiting upon him when he was lately at Mytika, on the borders of the district of Prevyza. Nor is he free from apprehensions from the chief Greeks at this place, whom he suspects of having been gained over by Αly to solicit his protection. Whatever may be the Pasha’s designs, the Turk is totally unable to prevent them, and will find it very difficult, therefore, to avoid falling into disgrace with his own superiors. “If the Greeks of Vonitza,” he observes, “abandon me, and I am left alone to oppose Aly’s wishes, I am certainly a lost man.” There seems to be too much reason for these fears,

§ 1.169   for already those among the Greeks, who were inclined to support him and his cause against Aly, have thought it prudent to quit the place; and the opposite party, convinced of the inutility of resistance, have joined the Vezir in some mercantile speculations, by which all the advantage they are likely to gain, is that of being the last devoured. His Highness derives great assistance in his designs from the robbers, who furnish him with a constant pretext for having a body of troops in the Ex-Venetian territories. Soon after the Turkish resident's visit, he sends me a present of a lamb and some lemons, —
June 20, and this morning accompanies me to the castle which commands a fine view of the western part of the Ambracic Gulf, bounded by the hills of Suli and Ioannina. The castle has a double inclosure, a ruined church on the summit, a good cistern, and a house built by Aly Pasha for the Albanian garrison, which he placed here after he had taken Vonitza from the French, and when he probably expected to have been left in quiet possession of it by the Porte. It is armed only with three small cannon on the southern side. The ruinous condition of the churches here, and in the Recinto, is said to have been caused by the Venetians having destroyed them to sell the materials when they evacuated the place.
The advantages of Vonitza are its fine bay for ships, its harbour at Myrtari for small vessels, its forests abounding in excellent timber and pasture for cattle; a fertile valley, an easy communication with Lefkadha,

§ 1.170   and a fortress in a position which commands the access into Acarnania and Aetolia from Epirus by the way of Prevyza, and which would be of the greatest importance if the strong Pass of Makrinoro, the only entrance by land, were closed, and the water communication in the hands of the defenders of Acarnania. On the other hand, Vonitza, in common with the other places in the gulf, partakes of the inconvenience of the shallowness of the Strait of Prevyza, and which is the more sensibly felt as the exterior coast, for a great distance both to the north and south of the entrance, affords no secure anchorage. Dhemata, at the northern extremity of the Strait of Leucas, is the best; but the entrance is commanded by the Castle of Santa Maura. Another disadvantage of Vonitza is its deficiency of fresh water, which is supplied by a canal derived from a stream at some distance in the valley; nor is the place exempt from malaria in the summer and autumn, caused by the stagnant waters at the head of the harbour, as well as by the land breezes which blow from the marshes near the Lake of Vulkaria.
The land of Vonitza belongs chiefly to nobles of Zante, Cefalonia, and Corfu, who became possessed of it under the Venetian government, and whose cultivators send the proprietors a fourth of the produce, being themselves subject to all the expences, including the land tax paid to the Porte. The Greeks of Vonitza have lately cleared tracts of land on the hills, which they are sowing on their own account. In the woods around, they are allowed to cut firewood and plank, but not for exportation, the woods being the property of the Sultan, and no persons being allowed to fell large timber without permission from the Porte.

§ 1.171   In the plain, a mile and a half S.E. of the town, and three quarters of a mile from the sea, rises a small conical height, called Magula, and behind it a similar one, but larger; both overgrown with bushes. On the summit of the smaller, a space of about three acres, now grown with corn, is surrounded by the remains of a Hellenic wall. On the northern side, the masonry is of the third order; and on the east there is a beautiful specimen of the fourth, or most regular kind. There is said to be another small castle of the same kind at Ruga, an inlet of the coast a little on this side of Nisi. The latter was probably a maritime dependency of a larger place, of which there are remains at Aio Vasili, on the side of the mountain above it, three hours from Vonitza. I have searched in vain for any vestiges of antiquity in the Castle of Vonitza, or on any part of the hill, though the situation could hardly have been, neglected by the ancients. In fact, ancient sepulchres are often found in the suburb of Boccale, and fragments in other places, sufficient to show that it was an ancient site.
June 21.—This morning, at 5.10, having sent my baggage off at midnight in a boat, I proceed by land from Vonitza to Prevyza, follow the southv era shore of the shallow harbour until 5.30, then leaving the direct road, which continues along the harbour at the foot of the mountain, turn to the left, and in eighteen minutes gain a summit which commands a fine view of the great Acarnanian peninsula, lying to the westward of the bays of Vonitza and Zaverdha.

§ 1.172   To the eastward of the isthmus, which, with the exception of the small ridge of Konidhari, is a level from the one bay to the other, rises the parallel mountain, of which the summit is named Pergandi. The middle of the peninsula is composed of low land, surrounding the lagoon of Vulkaria, and extending to Prevyza, and to the coast between it and Aia Mavra. All the southern part of the peninsula consists of a lofty mountain, on the slope of which, opposite to Lefkadha, stands the village Plaghia, and at its southern extremity another named Bogonia. Opposite to the latter, at the foot of the ridge of Pergandi, is Zaverdha. Both these places are at no great distance from the bay, which is usually named after the latter. The intermediate plain, and indeed the whole isthmus, is fertile, but little cultivated. The peninsula is for the most part a forest, which, especially on the southern and eastern side of the lagoon, and on the mountain of Plaghia, abounds in large oaks well adapted to naval construction. The lagoon, including the marshes on its edge, is four or five miles long, and as much broad. It communicates by a narrow stream with the head of Port Dhemata, on the southern side of which is the entrance of the canal of Lefkadha and the Castle of Aia Mavra.

§ 1.173   At the south-eastern end of Vulkaria, on a height rising amidst thick woods, is the Paleo-kastro of Kekhropula, so called from a small village no longer inhabited. To the left of Kekhropula the view comprehends Meganisi, 'Atoko, and a part of Kalamo, the remainder of which is hid by the Acarnanian coast. To the northward are seen Paxii and the coast from Parga to Salaghora, with all the northern side of the Gulf of Arta. Though it is difficult with confidence to adapt the names to the ancient positions in this part of Acarnania, there can be little doubt that the Vulkaria is the ancient Myrtuntium, being precisely as Strabo describes Myrtuntium. “a λιμνοθάλαττα, (or salt-water lagoon,) situated between Leucas and the Ambracic Gulf.”
At 7.15, descending from the mountain, and leaving the extremity of the limeni of Vonitza on the right, as well as a road to Aghios Petros, a harbour on the shore of the Gulf of Prevyza, where are some vestiges of a Hellenic polis, probably Anactorium, we proceed through woods and bushes, and arrive, at 7.50, on the margin of a beautiful little fresh-water lake, named Linovrokhi, on one side of which is a hanging forest of oaks. A peasant here describes to me a subterraneous stream which emerges from a cavity in the forest, near the Lake of Vulkaria.

§ 1.174   The road continues through an uncultivated country over grown with thorns and shrubs, and at 8.40 emerges on the beach of the Gulf of Prevyza, where lies some ship timber, principally knees, ready cut and prepared for an armed vessel which Aly Pasha is about to build at Salaghora. The builder calculates that it will pass the bar of Prevyza with the guns in, and have half a foot water to spare.
After following the beach for half a mile, we cross a low point for the most part covered with myrtle, at the northern extremity of the Strait of Prevyza, and at 9.10 arrive at the Tjiftlik of Punta. Here are a few fields of maize surrounding a quadrangular building, with towers at the angles, which contains the dwellings of the peasants who cultivate the fields and tend the flocks on this farm of Aly. Here also is a kula, or modern tower, and several remains of ancient buildings of Roman construction. At a projection to the southward of the tjiftlik, where the Strait is narrowest, and immediately opposite to the castle of Prevyza, the Vezir has constructed a serai and small fortress. There is every probability that the Roman ruins are remains of some of the buildings of Actium, established by Augustus, for the breadth of the Strait answers perfectly to the “less than 5 stades” of Polybius, or the “something more than four” of Strabo, or the “four” of Scylax, or the “500 Roman paces” of Pliny.

§ 1.175   Punta, it is to be observed, is the Italian translation of Ακρη, or Άκρον, which is the Greek name of this promontory, though in consequence of Prevyza having so long been a Venetian dependency, the word Punta is very commonly used by the Greeks themselves. But Akri, as well as Punta, is nothing more than the modern representative of Άκτη, a word descriptive, like Akri, of such a peninsula as that opposite to Prevyza, and from which the Apollo here worshipped was surnamed Actius, and his temple Actium. Besides the authors who have just been cited, we may refer to Thucydides and to Dio, in proof of Akri being the site of Actium. Strabo alone has left an expression which is not easily reconciled with actual appearances, in saying that the temple stood on a height.
June 22.—Prevyza, or Prevesa, for it is now written in both ways in Greek, though the latter form is probably Italian, contained 2,000 families, when the French arrived in 1798, but has now not more than 1200. When the Venetians took it in 1684, there are said to have been only 70; the rapid increase after that time is easily accounted for, by the commercial advantages of the position, and by the importance of this place, as well as of Parga and Vutzintro, to the safety of Corfu and its canal, which induced the Venetian government not only to protect the people against their Musulman neighbours, but to be vigilant in preventing their own proveditori and other officers from indulging in their accustomed rapacity.

§ 1.176   The houses are dispersed over a large space, each having a garden or small plot of ground attached to it, containing fig, walnut, and apricot trees, with a few culinary herbs. But the greater part of the dwellings are wretched huts, made of wattled branches plastered with mud. All the best houses, some of which, built in the Venetian style, show the former opulence of the place, are now in ruins. Prevyza is still, however, one of the best towns in Greece, and has an agreeable appearance, from the abundance of gardens, and from the olive plantations which cover the peninsula beyond them. The low point on which the town stands enjoys the sea-breeze in summer in perfection, but the gulf wind at night, and early in the morning, is reckoned unwholesome; that the situation, however, is not so, generally speaking, the robust constitution of the men, and the good complexion of the women sufficiently indicate, notwithstanding, that the latter, besides performing all the household drudgery, labour in the fields during the harvest of corn and olives, while the men are employed in the fisheries of the gulf, or in the trade and coasting navigation of Epirus, Acarnania, and the islands, or in smoking their pipes in idleness at home. One of the severest labours of the women is that of carrying large jars of water on their heads from the fountains, which being at the extremity of a very straggling town, are a mile distant from some parts of it.

§ 1.177   The water, which is excellent, rushes plentifully from the foot of a rocky cliff on the edge of the sea beach. Wherever a channel is made in this place, a stream immediately issues, and it can hardly be doubted, that if the Prevyzans were to dig wells, they would find water every where. The principal source is fitted up in the Turkish style.
Another employment of the women, but which is at once profitable and easy, is that of raising silkworms; they are now winding off the silk. The place produces annually 1500 pounds of raw silk, now sold at 10 piastres the pound. The grain of the territory, consisting of maize, wheat, barley, and oats, is about equal to the consumption of the place, sometimes insufficient, but sometimes so productive as to admit of the exchange of a portion of it for the wine of Lefkadha, or Thiaki. Of oil, which is of the best quality, superior even, according to the Prevyzans, to that of Corfu, or any other island, there is an annual average exportation of 10,000 tzukalia, or jars, of seven litres each, besides the consumption of the place: the present price is two dollars the jar.
The Turkish Bey, or resident of the Sultan, receives the tithe on land, which is let every year to the Greeks in lots, and the maritime customs, which are four per cent, on exports, and two per cent, on imports, as under the Venetians. The Bey commands a garrison of thirty-six soldiers, but takes all his directions for the management of the police from the Greek magistrates, who still preserve the Maggior Consiglio and other Venetian courts.

§ 1.178   The Consiglio consists of nobles, some of whom, as in the Seven Islands, may be found digging in their olive grounds. A body of forty of these elect the magistrates. Culprits are imprisoned on the requisition of the Proestos, and are tried by the proper tribunal, which, as under the Venetians, admits of an appeal to the primary court, at either of the two other ex-Venetian towns, Parga and Vonitza. The Prevyzans express themselves very grateful to Russia, whose consul takes care that no encroachments are made on these privileges, either by Aly Pasha or by the Bey. Hence, Prevyza at present is one of the happiest towns in Rumili, though with such a neighbour as Aly there is no saying how long this condition may last. The territory extends only an hour’s distance inland. Mytika. and the further part of the ruins of Nicopolis, are in Aly Pasha’s dominions: the nearer ruins, and the lagoon called Mazoma, belong to Prevyza. The situation in the entrance of this noble Gulf, surrounded by some of the most productive lands in Greece, at a point of ready communication with the islands and with Italy, would ensure to it some of those advantages which the same causes gave to its predecessor Nicopolis, if Greece were again to become a civilized country; though perhaps not to the same degree, in consequence of the shallow channel, less suited to modern than it was to ancient navigation. Nevertheless, it is probable that in every age Patrae and Nicopolis will prove the wisdom of Augustus in selecting these two places for the Roman colonies of the western coast of Greece.

§ 1.179   The soil of the peninsula is excellent. Barley is sown in November, wheat in December, and oats in January. Maize, as requiring plentiful irrigation, which is not to be obtained here, sometimes fails when the spring rains are not sufficiently abundant. It is generally grown among the plantations of young olives, is sown in April and reaped in August. The best oil is made from olives gathered by hand, though these do not yield half so much in quantity as the fruit which falls from the tree. It is not customary to sow under the full-grown olive-trees, which is common in many parts of Greece, oil being the most valuable production of Prevyza, and the opinion prevailing that the corn exhausts the soil and injures the crop of olives. Vines are supposed not to have the same effect, and are sometimes planted among the trees. Where no tillage occurs the grass is fed short, and the ground about the roots is opened. In many parts of the peninsula the land is covered with fern, which grows here rather too luxuriantly. It is cut down and put into holes at the roots of the trees, where some think it beneficial as manure, and the ground is then ploughed. One of the reasons for this treatment is to obviate accidents from fire in the summer, when the least spark among the dried vegetables, then abounding in uncultivated lands, creates a conflagration. Prevyza is said to have once lost one-third of its trees in this manner; and a similar accident, though not so destructive, occurred when the Vezir’s Albanians were here.

§ 1.180   These troops, when en bivouac, are in the habit of lighting fires, for the purpose, among others, να ψήσουν ταις φθείραις, that operation which is the Albanian substitute for washing the shirt.
The hill of Mikhalitzi, at the foot of which are the ruins of Nicopolis, although now uncultivated on this side, bears the marks in its artificial terraces of a different state when it belonged to the monastery of Zalongo; the Vezir, having appropriated it to himself, has built a house and some labourers cottages on the summit of the hill. His farmers furnish seed, cattle, labour, and farming utensils, and deliver to him the tenth of the gross produce as miri, and a third of the remainder. In new tjiftliks, or those which are of uncertain tenure, such as many of his were during the Suliote war, he was generally contented with a fourth of the produce. When to this obligation is added the kharatj, and the demands of Albanian troops, there seldom remains more for the peasant than is necessary to support life upon maize, salt fish, cheese, and garlic.
The channel between Prevyza and Akri is not only shallow and narrow, but the entrance is rendered dangerous by a long sandy shoal, which projects southward from the cape of Prevyza, and leaves only a narrow passage of twelve feet in depth between it and another shoal on the Acarnanian shore. Towards the northern, or interior extremity of the strait, and immediately opposite to the town, the strait widens, and forms the harbour of Prevyza.

§ 1.181   Half a mile beyond the springs, at the northern extremity of the town, is Vathy, a small bay, where the water is as deep as in the harbour of Prevyza, and where an armed brig of the Vezir, formerly an English sloop, is now lying. A creek branches from Vathy, which has a double termination; the western branch touches a part of the site of Nicopolis, and the eastern approaches the coast of the Gulf of Arta. On the shore of Vathy are ruins of the magazines of Lasalle, which formed a quadrangle and had two stories; the upper intended for grain, the lower for timber. In the inclosed court Lasalle built vessels on his own account, besides which he had a contract to deliver at the arsenal of Toulon, for five franks the cubic foot, oak timber, to be marked in the woods by persons appointed by the French government. He bargained with the Greeks οχ Albanians to bring the trees down to the waterside: the ambassador at the Porte procured permission from the Sultan, and Aly was paid forty or fifty purses yearly to cover his own claims as Dervent Aga, or for the Spahilik, where it existed. One year he extorted seventy purses from the French, on the pretence that he had received an order from the Porte to prevent the embarkation. Lasalle had the contract for five years, when it was renewed for five more; but at the end of two the French Revolution put an end to the contract, and an assassin to his life. The Suliotes brought a considerable quantity for him down the river of Luro.

§ 1.182   In the forest of Manina, in Acarnania, the oaks are chiefly of the veloni kind, which is seldom so large as the common oak, nor is the timber so good. Those of Makrinoro, Suli, and Vonitza, are the best in this part of Greece. Djumerka produces some fine firs.
It is reckoned that near four hundred Prevyzan families gain a subsistence by the fisheries of their own town, or by those of Arta and Acarnania, which are now farmed from the Porte by Aly Pasha. In the territory of Prevyza, shell-fish, eels, and grey mullet, are caught—the two latter in the Mazoma, or lagoon of Nicopolis. Of shellfish there is an inexhaustible supply in the shallows around the strait and near the town; a great quantity of these is sent to the islands in the time of Lent. Occasionally also an immense number of eels from the lagoons of Arta, suddenly make their appearance in the harbour of Prevyza. This happens always in tempestuous weather, and probably occurs only when in migrating to the sea from their breeding-places in the rivers and lagoons of the Gulf, they meet with a storm in passing out of the strait, which drives them back upon Prevyfca. The fisheries of Arta and Acarnania are conducted by the more opulent Prevyzans, who form societies, each of which hires a share of the fishery, and employs Prevyzan labourers, for whom they find nets and other necessaries. While the sale of fish is going forward, the money is laid by in a common purse, which, when the mukitesi has been paid, is equally divided between the merchants and the fishermen. This, and other modes of giving an interest in profits to all the individuals employed in any speculation, are common in the mercantile and even in the agricultural undertakings of the Greeks.

§ 1.183   The greater part of the maritime commerce and carrying trade is managed upon the same principle; and it often happens that every sailor is in part owner of the ship as well as of the cargo.
Such customs are at once an effect and a support of the republican spirit which it is curious to find pervading a people subject to such a despot as the Sultan. In its origin it is to be attributed to the geographical construction of the country, naturally dividing the people into communities, which have little dependence upon one another; its preservation since the conquest may be attributed, in great measure, to the bigotry, and exclusiveness of the Turkish system, which, neither admits the Christians to the rights of the governing people, nor interferes with the internal arrangements of the communities, unless by the effects of its universal oppression. It cannot be denied, that the Greek method of conducting affairs stimulates mental and bodily exertion, but it promotes also that undisciplined, intractable, envious, and contentious spirit, which is sure to break out whenever this people has sufficient liberty to display it.
Greek customs prevail at Prevyza in all their force, as in other places where by any accident the people enjoy a considerable degree of independence; among others, they observe strictly the forbidden degrees in regard to marriage ;—cannot take a wife more than three times ;—the priests more than once.

§ 1.184   Cousins cannot marry nearer than the seventh degree, nor can the god-son be united to the daughter of his god-father. This is a part of the custom of Κουμπαρια, which gives an alliance equal to relationship by blood to two men of different families who have been sponsors to the same child at the baptismal font. The Greek word formed from the Italian compare, and originally from the Latin compater, shows the origin of the custom. It may be doubted whether it gives the Greeks any advantages against their great enemy the Turk, and rather seems to be a proof only of barbarism and insecurity, and both cause and effect of their spirit of hostility and rivalship.
Mr. North, afterwards Earl of Guildford, gave five hundred piastres towards the establishment of a school, by means of which and other donations a small house was built at the gate of the principal church. It has since been converted into a court of justice; but there is a school in which writing is taught, with a sufficiency of ancient Greek to read the Testament.
Many of the women of Suli have taken refuge at Prevyza, since the capture of their mountain by Aly, and are employed as servants. A Σουλιώησσα, or Suliote girl, ten years of age, in the Vice-Consul’s family, has hired herself for twenty years, at the end of which she is to have one hundred and fifty piastres for a marriage portion.
Of the three other ex-Venetian places given up to the Porte, under conditions, by the treaty of 1800, we have seen the state to which Vonitza is now reduced.

§ 1.185   Parga is protected from Aly at present by a resident agent of the Porte, under whom the people enjoy their old municipal government unchanged. Vutzintro is entirely in the hands of Aly. At the instigation of the Russians, the Porte has sent the Pasha repeated orders for its evacuation; but he avoids them, affecting to believe that the Russians mean to make use of the place for the purpose of their designs against himself and the empire. He moreover alleges that he has purchased the farm of the fisheries from the Sultan for three years, and that he has not yet been paid his expenses in expelling the French.
June 24.—Strabo, who wrote soon after the foundation of Nicopolis, has thus described it: “Beyond port Glycys are two other harbours; the first and smaller is Comarus, which at Nicopolis the city founded by Augustus Caesar is separated by an isthmus of sixty stades from the Ambracic Gulf: the farther, and larger, and better port, is near the mouth of the gulf, about twelve stades distant from Nicopolis.

§ 1.186   Augustus founded this place because he saw that the neighbouring cities were much depopulated; and he gave it the name of Nicopolis in honour of the naval victory which he gained before the mouth of the gulf over Antony and Cleopatra, who was herself present. A sacred inclosure for the use of the quinquennial contest has been constructed in the suburb in a grove containing a gymnasium and stadium; there is another sanctuary on the sacred hill of Apollo, which rises above the grove. The Lacedaemonians have the superintendence of the games which are named Actia, as being sacred to Apollo Actius, and which have been declared Olympian. All the surrounding towns are now subordinate to Nicopolis.”
The ruins of Nicopolis are now called Paleoprevyza. The road thither leads for two miles through the olive plantations and vineyards, which occupy all the south-western part of the peninsula of Prevyza, and for another mile over a shrubby uncultivated plain. The first ruins that occur are some small arched buildings of brick, probably sepulchral; a little beyond which are the remains of a strong wall following the crest of a height which falls to the lagoon called Mazoma. The situation and direction of this wall, and the position of the sepulchres on the outside of it, seem to show that it was a part of the southern inclosure of the city.

§ 1.187   The Mazoma, which occupies about half the breadth of the isthmus, is separated only from the Gulf of Arta by a narrow ράμμα, or thread of land, which is a mile long and one hundred yards wide, and has two openings, where the fish are caught in great numbers as they enter the lagoon in the winter, and quit it in the summer. At the southern extremity of the narrow bank stands a tower, from whence, following the southern shore of the Mazoma, we arrive at a church of the Άνάληψις, or Ascension; two or three hundred yards beyond which are the ruins called the Paleokastro.
[map of Nicopolis]

§ 1.188   This is an extensive inclosure of irregular form, flanked with towers, and composed in great part of the materials of former ruins: courses of large squared blocks of stone, which seem to have belonged to Hellenic walls, alternate with thick strata of Roman tiles cemented with an abundance of mortar. The western side of the inclosure is the most perfect, and here was the principal gate, situated near the south-western angle between two semi-circular towers. The other towers are quadrangular. All of them internally have flights of steps supported upon arches, for the purpose of ascending to battlements on the summit of the walls.
Although these works are lofty and solid, they do not resemble those of the Augustan age; indeed the variety of marble fragments, and even remains of inscriptions, of the time of the Roman empire, inserted in the masonry, prove the whole to have been a repair, though upon the exact site perhaps of the original citadel, and restored so as to form an inclosure sufficiently large for the diminished population of the place. It may not improbably be the work of Justinian, who, we know from Procopius, repaired Nicopolis. A cross over a small gate called η πόρτα Άράβη seems contemporary with the rest of the work.

§ 1.189   In the middle of the Paleokastro is a pool of fresh water now called Vaieni, which appears to have been covered with a large arched building. A rivulet issues from it, and is consumed in some adjacent gardens. Not far from the spring to the north-west, a ruined building, called the Metropolis, is supposed to have been the episcopal church of the extinct see of Nicopolis. If so, it may be the oldest church in Greece, for the intention of St. Paul to winter here, expressed in his letter to Titus, would seem to indicate that he had a congregation at Nicopolis. Leaving the Paleokastro by the great gate, and proceeding in the direction of Mytika, where stands upon a cape of the western coast a small village of that name and a serai of the Vezir, the first remarkable object that occurs is a theatre, so overgrown with vegetation in the lower part that it is not easily examined. It appears to be about 200 feet in diameter: 15 or 20 rows of seats and the proscenium still remain. Being built on level ground, the back or highest part is entirely supported upon an arched corridor, 18 feet high, and 8 feet 6 inches wide, lighted by openings in the wall which slope outwards, and supporting the entire superstructure, which contains the seats, formed of tiles and mortar. The building is now called the Skotini, from its dark passages. The next ruins towards Mytika is named Bughis, and seems to have been a palace, as it has numerous apartments with many niches in the walls for statues, and some remains of a stone pavement.

§ 1.190   It stands just within an aqueduct supported upon arches, which enters the valley of Nicopolis on the western side of the hill of Mikhalitzi, and may be traced beyond the Skotini: in most parts the piers alone remain. Between the aqueduct and Mytika are remains of a building similar to that within the aqueduct, but of a more regular plan, and of smaller dimensions.
On the side of the last falls of the hill of Mikhalitzi stands the greater theatre, sufficiently elevated above the other remains of Nicopolis to be a very conspicuous object. In approaching it from Bughi, the remains of a solid wall occur, resembling that above the Analipsis, and which seems, when complete, to have stretched across the isthmus from the north-western angle of the fortress. Beyond it is a second source of water, which, with that in the Paleokastro, would seem to have been sufficient, by the aid of wells, for the supply of the city; but here, as at Corinth, another Roman colony, where local springs are still more abundant, the colonists were not satisfied with the water, either because it lay too low, or did not suit their taste, and constructed an aqueduct thirty miles in length. Near the fountain are the ruins of a building called Kalpetzaki, of the annexed form, and probably a bath. It stands on the lowest and narrowest part of the isthmus. A little above it are some other remains on the foot of Mount Mikhalitzi, from whence the stones of a pavement, and a statue of white marble, are said to have been transported lately to Prevyza.

§ 1.191   Both these and the baths belonged perhaps to the gymnasium; for the gymnasium, according to Strabo, was near the stadium, and the remains of the stadium occur immediately above the last-mentioned ruin, in a north-eastern direction, having its eastern extremity situated just below the south-western angle of the great theatre.
The stadium, by the peasants called το Καράβι, (the ship) is circular at both ends, unlike all the other stadia of Greece, but similar to several in Asia Minor, which have been constructed or repaired by the Romans. The length of the course, however, seems to have been the same as in the other stadia of Greece, namely, 600 Greek feet; for I measured 670 feet in the clear between the two curved extremities of the seats, which are now mere ruins overgrown with bushes. In winter the inclosed space is a pool of water. The ruins of the seats occupy a breadth of about 75 feet, but the total length of the construction was probably not more than 750 feet; underneath the seats are a range of arched chambers, intended apparently for no other purpose than to diminish the mass of masonry.
The great theatre was partly excavated in the side of the hill; but all the superstructure, with the appurtenances of the scene, and a vomitory on either side of the stage, was constructed of large flat Roman bricks, united with a great quantity of mortar, and was faced with stone. Although the corridor above the cavea has fallen in, and the stone seats have been removed, it is still one of the best preserved Roman theatres in existence, and well deserves to be accurately measured and delineated by an architect.

§ 1.192   The total diameter is about 300 feet, but the earth, which has been washed from the superincumbent hill during the fourteen centuries which have elapsed since the decease of Pagan civilization, renders an exact measurement unattainable without excavation; in the present season a dense vegetation is a farther impediment, and, in particular, a forest of gigantic thistles, now in the full strength of their growth, mixed with other plants, which are equally troublesome from being already pulverized by the heat, especially the Sfaka, or Verbascum, which at the least touch throws out a cloud of acrid dust. The scene had three doors and a large square apartment at either end, but the stone door-cases not having been spared any more than the seats of the cavea, the building is deprived of all its external decoration, and the inferiority of the Roman brick and mortar to the beauty and solidity of Greek masonry is shown in all its nakedness. The scene is 120 feet long, and 30 in depth. It was decorated with a range of statues of deities facing the cavea, as appears by some blocks below, on which are remains of the names of Venus and Minerva: ΑΦΡΩ, —ΘΗΝΑΙ. From the back of the theatre, the hill of Mikhalitzi rises steeply to the summit, which is about 500 feet above the theatre.
As Strabo describes the sacred grove, stadium and gymnasium, to have been in the προαστειον, or suburb, it is probable that the wall to the south-ward of Kalpetzaki was a part of the inclosure of the city on the northern side.

§ 1.193   Of the two τεμένη, or sanctuaries, the άλσος, or sacred grove, in which the Actia were celebrated, is sufficiently identified by the theatre and stadium, the former for the use of the music, the latter for that of the gymnastic contests. The second temenus, which was above the former, on the mountain of Apollo, is shown by Dio to have been exactly on the summit of the hill, where Mikhalitzi now stands. The historian relates that Octavianus, on arriving, previously to the battle of Actium, at the place where Nicopolis afterwards stood, encamped upon a height, from whence he could see both the Ambracic Gulf and the outer sea towards Paxi, as well as the ports before Nicopolis; he not only fortified the camp, but built walls from it to the outer port, Comarus; and after the battle, having surrounded the place where his tent was pitched with squared stones, he adorned it with the beaks of the captured ships, and built within the inclosure a sanctuary of Apollo, open to the sky. Such a view as Dio here describes, Augustus could not have obtained from the isthmus of Nicopolis, or from any spot in the immediate vicinity, except Mikhalitzi, from whence all the objects stated may be seen.

§ 1.194   The tent of Augustus therefore was placed on the summit of the mountain, his camp occupying the slope and the foot of the hill, from whence the communication with the port Comarus was probably secured from interruption by μακρά τείχη, or parallel walls, which comprehended the harbour between their extremities.
Although the words of Strabo, combined with the extant stadium, show that it was at Nicopolis, and not at Actium, that the games called Actia were held during the long period of their celebration, there is reason to believe from Dio, that until the city was completed, and the buildings for the use of the games constructed, the meeting took place at Actium, where a στεψανίτης αγών, or contest for a crown, had long been instituted by the surrounding cities. This ancient celebration was converted by Augustus, immediately after the victory, and at the same time that he enlarged the Temple of Apollo Actius, into an exhibition of music and gymnastic rivalship, accompanied with horse-races, and was declared a sacred contest; by which it was made equal in dignity to the four great games of Greece, and was accompanied by a sacrifice and festival, at which the hieronicse were entertained at the public expence. Dio expressly adds, that it was not until some time afterward that Nicopolis was colonized and completed, and that the hypaethrium was constructed on the site of the tent of Augustus.

§ 1.195   Here, besides other dedications, were placed the brazen statues of an ass and his driver, in commemoration of a favourable omen, which had probably been prepared for the occasion on the morning of the battle. On the foundation of Constantinople these statues were removed to the hippodrome of that city, where in 1204 they fell into the hands of the barbarous Latins, who melted them with many other monuments of Grecian art still more valuable .
It is remarkable that the wide bay lying between Mytika and Kastroskia is now called Gomaro; Comarus, however, which Dio agrees with Strabo in showing to be the harbour of Nicopolis in the exterior sea, was certainly not such a gulf as that to which the modern name is attached, but a port such as the ancients used, whence it was probably that of Mytika.

§ 1.196   The port which Strabo describes as the greater, would seem by the order of his text, to have been between Comarus and the strait of Prevyza, and consequently on the outside of the gulf; but the nature of the western coast of the Peninsula shows that he cannot have expressed himself accurately. It is evident from Dio, who distinguishes Comarus as the outer port of Nicopolis, that the second harbour intended by Strabo was within the gulf. Here, in fact, his distance of 12 stades corresponds perfectly to Vathy, where some Roman ruins a little within and on the eastern shore of the creek, seem to indicate the exact situation of the λιμην. These ruins consist of two square masses from 20 to 30 feet the side, with a third ruin, 48 feet in length, having a curved extremity. The walls are formed of strata of Roman tiles between masses of rough stones and mortar, and in some places subsist to the height of 12 or 15 feet.
The breadth of 60 stades, which Strabo ascribes to the isthmus of Nicopolis, is obviously incorrect; the broadest part of the site from the tower of the Mazoma to Mytika not being more than three miles. An opinion prevails at Prevyza, founded I believe on a supposed measurement by the French, when they entrenched the isthmus, that the shortest line from the Mazoma to the Gulf of Gomaro is no more than 800 οργυιαις, or 4000 Greek feet. I cannot conceive, however, that it is less than 2000 yards in the narrowest part.

§ 1.197   After having measured the stadium, which is not exactly on the isthmus, it appeared to me, from a rising ground, that there is a distance equal to two stadia between the end of that monument and the Mazoma, four between the other end of the stadium and the aqueduct, and three more to the sea.
The great quantity of fish taken by the Prevyzans in the Mazoma, and neighbouring sea, illustrates the remark of an anonymous geographer of the fourth century, who says that fish was so plentiful at Nicopolis as to be almost disgusting. Most of the other towns near the gulf having been abandoned, the Nicopolites probably had all the fisheries in their hands.
Nicopolis was considered the capital of Southern Epirus and Acarnania during the three first centuries of the Roman Empire; but before the close of this period, it had so far declined as to cease to strike its own money, of which there exist great numbers in copper, either autonomous or of the emperors prior to Galerian. The coins of this prince and his wife Salonina are the latest. The ruin of paganism, by depriving the Actian games of their importance, was the first great blow inflicted upon the prosperity of Nicopolis. Julian restored both its edifices and its games; but the effect was momentary, and the decline of the imperial authority at sea having been followed by piracy, the inevitable consequence in the Grecian seas of the want of a controlling naval power, Nicopolis lost the maritime commerce which had been its main support.

§ 1.198   At the beginning of the fifth century, the Goths of Alaric retreating before Stilico in the Peloponnesus, spread desolation over Epirus, and soon afterwards the Huns of Totila ravaged this coast, on which occasion Nicopolis particularly suffered. It was chiefly perhaps on these occasions that its buildings sustained the injuries which called for the repairs bestowed upon the city by Justinian. It continued to be the capital of southern Epirus, either as the chief town of a ducal province, according to the arrangement of the earlier ages of the Byzantine Empire, or as that of a Theme in the tenth century. Cedrenus relates, that in the eleventh century all the Theme of Nicopolis, except Naupactus, joined a revolt of the Bulgarians against the Emperor Michael the Paphlagonian, which had been caused by the extortion of his lieutenant, John Cutzomytes (wrynose). The name of Nicopolis occurs also in the history of Venice, in reference to the transactions following the capture of Constantinople by the Franks in 1204: and from Nicetas we learn that the territory of Nicopolis was a part of the dominions which then became the Despotate of the West, under Michael Angelus Comnenus.

§ 1.199   But the town had long been reduced to misery, if we may trust to ecclesiastical history, which, during the Byzantine empire, furnishes the best indication of the relative importance of places. Although Nicopolis was still a bishop’s see at the end of the ninth century, and had then been recently transferred from the patriarchy of Rome to that of Constantinople, the ravages of the Bulgarians, fifty years afterwards, put an end to the bishopric, the last prelate having then been removed to Ancyra in Asia. Ioannina, which was already a bishopric under the metropolitan of Naupactus then succeeded to Nicopolis as the seat of ecclesiastical, authority in the south of Epirus, and was raised to the dignity of a metropolis in the thirteenth century; about a century before which Arta became a bishopric of Naupactus. When the imperial name was no longer a protection to the distant subjects of the empire, it was natural that Ambracia and other ancient sites near the Gulf, which Nicopolis had depopulated under the first emperors of Rome, should again become preferable from the same motives of security which had caused them to be occupied by the early Greeks. The new town of Prevyza, built nearer to the Nicopolitan harbours than the ancient city, in a more defensible position, in a more fertile part of the plain, and where water was equally plentiful, then absorbed probably all the remaining inhabitants of the old city.

§ 1.200   June 25.—A north-westerly breeze carries me this afternoon, in an hour and a half, to Salaghora, the port of Arta. Just beyond the strait which separates the Gulf of Prevyza from that of Arta, are two small islands: that to the left named Gaidharonisi, that to the right Kefalo. These, and the other islands in the Gulf, like all the desert grounds in Greece, are clothed with a luxuriant vegetation in the spring, when they furnish pasture for cattle. Between Gaidharonisi and the neighbouring cape of the peninsula of Skafidhaki, we found one of Aly Pasha’s gun-boats lying, a small vessel with two little guns in the bow. He has two or three of these in the Gulf, and at Salaghora a new brig corvette. When he lately visited Salaghora he ordered the shrubs to be cleared away, and a town to be laid out; but only five or six magazines have been built, with a chamber for the collector of the customs at the foot of a rocky height which here projects from the northern shore of the Gulf. The hill seems formerly to have been an island, being almost surrounded by the sea to the south, where the depth of water is more than sufficient for any ship capable of crossing the bar of Prevyza,

§ 1.201   and by shallow lagoons to the north, the connexion with the main land being by means of three narrow low banks branching from it to the east, the west, and the north: the two former of these are mere threads of land, such as generally separate lagoons from the sea; the last is wider, but so low as often to be inundated; a causeway, which even in this season is washed by the water of the lagoon, forms the only road into the plain of Arta. The summit of the hill of Salaghora commands an excellent view of the Gulf. In the rammata, which separate the lagoons from the sea, are seen the openings where the fish are caught, as at the Mazoma of Prevyza, and where are houses for the use of the fishery. The thread to the east joins at the end of three miles a woody peninsula projecting into the Gulf, on which is a metokhi of the Panaghia, and off it three or four small islands connected together by mud-banks, and called the Korakonisia: midway to the Acarnanian shore, is Vuvala, the largest island in the Gulf. Beyond the peninsula of Panaghia the ramma is continued two or three miles farther eastward, to Palea-Bukka: so called from the belief that here was anciently the mouth of the river of Arta, now three miles to the eastward, which is not devoid of probability, as in almost every instance of an increase of land at the mouth of rivers, their lower course has assumed a new direction. Near the eastern side of the muddy and shallow bay of Palea-Bukka, is an island in the lagoon, covered with the ruins of a castle called Fidhokastro (Serpent-castle), built of small stones and mortar, mixed with Hellenic work towards the foundations. The lagoon on the western side of Salaghora, which extends to the river of Luro, is named Tzukalia, that to the eastward Logani.

§ 1.202   June 26. — Quitting Salaghora for Arta this morning at 5.45, we pass round the western end of the hill, and follow the causeway for half a mile across the lagoon; then enter upon the plain which, though now dry, is so marshy during the greater part of the year, as to be left uncultivated. But we soon arrive upon a somewhat higher level, where are a few fields of corn among desert tracts covered with camomile; pass through Anazi and Postikius, both villages belonging to Mukhtar Pasha, the latter at 7.35, and from thence pass through a continuance of tillage as far as Arta. At 8.15 we cross the river of Arta, which is here about 200 yards wide—deep, winding, and rapid— by a handsome bridge, said to have been built by one of the Palaeologi. From thence, having traversed gardens and scattered houses, we pass close to the left of the ruined church of Parioritza, properly Parigoritissa, at 8.20, leave the castle of Arta on the right at 8.28, and at 8.30 arrive at the Metropolis. The baggage was three hours and three quarters on the road.

§ 1.203   The bishop Ignatius receives me with great politeness; he is a prelate of a most prepossessing person and address, well informed and sensible in his conversation, but spoiled by his situation, which, instead of allowing him to cultivate his mind, or to enjoy that civilized society of which he is naturally formed to be an ornament, places him in a perpetual state of fear for his own safety, and reduces him, against his inclination and conscience, to execute the cruel orders of a selfish unprincipled tyrant. While another Greek is the Pasha’s agent for the management of the police and finances of the town and district of Arta, the bishop superintends the more important political concerns of all the surrounding country; and when the Pasha has occasion to send a mission to the Septinsular republic or elsewhere, Ignatius is the person generally employed. At Salaghora his signature was affixed to the tariff of imports in the custom-house. At home he assumes a considerable degree of oriental grandeur, more perhaps than any Musulman can venture upon in the Vezir's dominions. Were it not for the absence of all arms, of which the Turks delight in making a display, and the plain monastic habit which is in contrast to the showy dresses of the Ottomans, the Metropolitan palace might be mistaken for the house of a rich Aga.
The Vezir encourages these appearances of authority in the Greek prelates, as it assists them in the exactions and political objects of which they are the instruments, without saving them from the occasional demands which none of his subjects, but especially the more opulent, ever escape.

§ 1.204   Thus circumstanced, it is not very surprising that bishop Ignatius should be better acquainted with modern politics than with the ancient history and geography of Greece; upon which subjects he is satisfied with the opinions, often erroneous, received among his countrymen, who seldom give themselves the trouble of referring to the original sources of information. Meletius, one of the predecessors of Ignatius in the see of Arta, whose judgment was not equal to his diligence and learning, has been a great cause of the prevalence and permanence of these errors, as the Greeks seldom or ever venture to dispute his authority.
In the evening the άγιος Αρτενός, or Artinian Holy (such is the most polite mode of naming a bishop), accompanies me in a ride round the town. We proceed first to the church of Parigoritissa, a lofty building constructed chiefly of brick, nearly cubical on the outside, but within surrounded with vestibules and galleries, so as to leave in the middle a katholiko, which is more than twice as high as it is square at bottom, and is surmounted by a dome around which are six smaller domes over the aisles. The following is an inscription in two lines round the semi-circular arch of the great door of the church in the inside:—Κομνηνο Δουκας Δεσποτης ...

§ 1.205   The bishop states, that the church was built by the Comnenus Ducas here recorded, that his name was Michael, and that in two MSS., one of which is preserved in Lefkadha, the other in the convent of Myrtari at Vonitza, he is entituled Despot of Arta, Count of Leucas, and Duke of Cephalonia and Zacynthus. He was probably the same Michael Angelus Comnenus who, under the title of Despot of Aetolia, or of Epirus, governed all Western Greece at the time of the Frank conquest of Constantinople in 1204, and who appears to have been the most powerful of the despots of the West. This would make the date of the building not long posterior to the time when Arta became a bishopric of the province of Naupactus. In the sixteenth century it was made a metropolis, and the see of Naupactus having been transferred hither, the prelate received the title of Bishop of Naupactus and Arta, which he still retains.
From Parigoritissa we ascended the height which commands Arta to the eastward, and returned to the Metropolis by the modern castle, visiting several remains of Hellenic antiquity in the way. Though not considerable, they are sufficient to show that Arta was the site of a very large Greek city. Towards the north and west it was half encompassed by the river which issues from an opening at no great distance to the north-eastward between Mount Gelberini, a high rocky summit, which rises in face of the town to the northward, and the hill of Peta, a village standing on the last falls of a range of mountains, which follows the left bank of the river of Arta almost to its sources.

§ 1.206   Beyond Peta, southward, the hills border the plain of Arta as far as Makrinoro, which is a continuation of them terminating abruptly in the gulf. [map of Arta]
The height on the eastern side of the town is the extremity of a long rocky hill, which is embraced by the river on its northern and western sides, and falls to the plain on the two others.

§ 1.207   Some foundations of an acropolis are traceable on the summit, from whence the town wall descended in a northerly direction, so as to exclude a monastery dedicated to ‘the Virgin brought to light,’ and from thence to a projection of the height which here overhangs the river. It then followed a direction parallel to the river towards the modern castle, where in one place the Hellenic wall forms part of some cottages, otherwise of the slightest and rudest construction, and which remind me of the Egyptian huts standing on the ruins of Luxor or Edfu. Beyond these the ancient wall is again seen in the lower part of the structure of the castle towards the river, and here it is most remarkable, consisting of courses nearly regular, and not less remarkable for the close and finished junction of the stones, than for their magnitude. These are in general quadrangular, but some are sloping at one end; the two or three lowest courses which are narrower than the others, and project beyond the rest of the wall, as often occurs in Hellenic masonry of the best times, are founded on the excavated rock. One of the stones, which rest on the uppermost narrow course, is 16 feet long and 4 high; another is 12 feet by 6. A little beyond the castle occurs the excavated foundation of another enormous wall parallel to the former, and indicating apparently, that the modern fortress occupies the site of a second ancient citadel. The town wall may again be seen supporting the terrace of the bishop’s garden overhanging the river, beyond which some smaller vestiges may be traced as far as the church of Parigoritissa,

§ 1.208   beyond which, at the foot of the hill behind the church of Odhighitria, the foundations are again visible ascending the hill directly to the acropolis. Squared blocks formerly belonging to the walls or public buildings of the city, are to be seen in every part of the modern town, where they are often used as benches, steps, or mounting blocks at the doors of the houses.
The traces of power and opulence evident in these remains, seem scarcely to leave a question that Arta stands on the site of Ambracia, though neither bishop Ignatius assents to this opinion, nor his physician, Dr. M., of Katuna, a learned and well informed man. But the presumption derived from the existing vestiges, from the fertile and extensive plain, and from the strong and central situation of Arta, which have made it the chief town of the surrounding parts of Western Greece, causing it to give name to the Gulf, like Ambracia of old, is fully confirmed by other coincidences derived from the ancient authors. From a comparison of their testimony, we learn that Ambracia was situated eighty stades from the sea, in the middle of the northern side of the Gulf, on the eastern bank of the Arethus, otherwise called Arachthus or Arethon, which rose in Athamania, and in the same mountains which give rise to the Peneius. There is no other river, nor any other position near the Ambracic Gulf, that will correspond to these requisites.

§ 1.209   Livy, in the narrative which he has borrowed from Polybius, of the siege of Ambracia by the Romans under the consul Fulvius, in the summer of the year B.C. 189, informs us that the city of Ambracia was more than three miles in circumference; that it stood on the western side of a rugged hill called Perrhanthe, one of the summits of which was occupied by the citadel; and that it was well protected by the river and heights, and by the wall which surrounded it. These particulars are exactly justified by the existing remains.
As the siege by Fulvius is the most remarkable event concerning Ambracia which occurs in history, and as it refers both to the topography of the place itself and to the geography of the surrounding country, I shall subjoin the principal circumstances of it.

§ 1.210   From the reign of Pyrrhus, Ambracia bad been the capital of Epirus and the royal residence; but at the time of the siege it was in the hands of the Italians, and had been a main cause of the extent of the Aetolian power at that period of Grecian history, by giving them either a direct authority or a strong influence over the neighbouring states of Amphilochia, Aperantia, Athamania, and Dolopia, which last confined on other acquisitions of the Aetolians in Phthiotis and the country of the Aenianes. As soon as they found themselves unable to save Ambracia, they submitted to the Roman power, and never recovered their former importance. Fulvius, who had landed at Apollonia, and had marched through Epirus, first established two fortified camps at a moderate distance from each other in the plain, and built a castle on a height near the citadel. His Epirote allies were encamped in the plain on the opposite side of the river. Before the consul could unite his three works together by means of an entrenchment, Eupolemus, with one thousand Aetolians, made his way into the city. As soon as the circumvallation was complete, and the machines prepared for assailing the walls, the Romans began to batter them in five places: three of these, at two equal intervals, were in the plain overagainst the Pyrrheium; a fourth was near the temple of Aesculapius, and the fifth was at the citadel. The walls were so strong as to resist even beyond the expectation of the besieged;

§ 1.211   giving them time to make sorties by night and day, and enabling them to counteract the effects of the battering machines of the enemy, either by means of engines or of fire.
While these operations were in progress, a second body of Aetolians, amounting to five hundred, partly by force and partly under cover of a tempestuous night, entered the place, and immediately joined Eupolemus in assaulting the Roman lines, in which attempt it had been concerted that they were to be assisted by a simultaneous attack from without by Nicander, the praetor of Aetolia. Nicander, however, found a cause or an apology for inaction in the arrival of Perseus in Amphilochia, who had been sent by his father Philip to recover that country and Dolopia from the Aetolians. The double consequence was, that the sortie from Ambracia failed, and that Perseus retired from his attack of Argos on the approach of Nicander, and returned into Macedonia, contenting himself with the spoliation of Amphilochia and Dolopia. No sooner had this obstacle been removed, than a new diversion occurred to prevent the praetor from attempting to raise the siege of Ambracia. Pleuratus, king of Illyria, having arrived with sixty ships in the Corinthiac Gulf, made from thence desultory incursions on the Aetolian coast, which required the attention of Nicander and his army. Meantime the siege proceeded vigorously on both sides. The wall was breached and retrenched; a mine was formed and countermined, and the parties fought in the subterraneous passages, until the besiegers were driven out by the missiles of their adversaries, or by the smoke of burnt feathers.

§ 1.212   Affairs were in this state when deputies arrived to solicit peace on the part of the Aetolian council, who were urged to this measure by the defeat of Antiochus in Asia, by their conscious inability of resisting three such enemies as Philip, Pleuratus, and the Romans, and probably by the conviction that the Ambraciotae and their friend Amynander, king of Athamania, were only waiting for an opportunity to withdraw from their forced alliance with Aetolia. The principal conditions were, that the Aetolians should pay five hundred Euboic talents to Rome, and should cease to claim any authority over the cities which had been taken by or allied with the Romans since the arrival of T. Quinctius in Greece. The people of Ambracia presented Fulvius with a golden crown of one hundred and fifty pounds weight; but this present did not save the city from being despoiled of all the statues of brass and marble, with which, as having been the royal residence of Epirus, it was adorned beyond all the cities of Western Greece. In the triumph of Fulvius two years afterwards, on his return from his proconsulship, two hundred and eighty-five statues of brass, and two hundred and thirty of marble, were exhibited in the procession, the greater part of which had been brought from Ambracia, Aetolia, and Cephallenia.
The triple assault of the walls seems evidently to have been from the side of the modern gardens, that being the only part of the circuit where the walls were contiguous to the plain.

§ 1.213   The Pyrrheium, consequently, which I take to have been a fortified palace built by Pyrrhus, was in the adjacent part of the modern town, and probably near the river, comprehending the beautiful terrace now occupied by the metropolis. The situation of the monastery of Fanaromeni seems to have been an advantageous point for one of the battering machines of the Consul, and may therefore be the site of the temple of Aesculapius. The castle which Fulvius built on a height over against the citadel we can hardly doubt to have been on the hill of St. Elias, which is separated only by a hollow from that of the acropolis; for the occupation of that height was obviously necessary to the safety of his line of circumvallation. The position of his work for battering the acropolis was of course immediately opposite to the hill of St. Elias, on the crest of that of the citadel, and close to the wall.
Dicaearchus informs us that Ambracia was noted for a temple dedicated to Minerva, which may have been converted into one of the ancient churches now existing, such having, often been the use made of the pagan temples.
The other situations in the Ambracian territory which history has noticed are: 1. Ambracus, which was captured by Philip, son of Demetrius, in the year B.C. 219, after a siege of forty days,undertaken at the instigation of the Epirotes, who hoped that it would lead to the recovery of Ambracia from the Aetolians. 2. The port of Ambracia, near which there was a fortressl.

§ 1.214   3. Craneia, which a comparison of Pliny and Stephanus shows to have been a subordinate place of the Ambracia, on a mountain of the same name .
Ambracus is described by Polybius as a place, in the territory of Ambracia, well fortified with ramparts and outworks, and as surrounded by marshes, through which there was only one narrow causeway leading to it. This description accords so well with Fidhokastro, that little doubt can remain of the identity. If Ambracus was the same as the τεΐχος, or fortress near the port of Ambracia, mentioned by Scylax,of which the probability is very great, we may conclude that the harbour, which, according to the same author and Dicaearchus, was a κλειστός λιμήν, or port closed with moles, leaving a narrow entrance which might be shut with a chain, was an artificial basin, excavated near the fortress, and opening towards the mouth of the river, which appears anciently to have discharged itself very near to Fidhokastro.

§ 1.215   Craneia I conceive to have been the high mountain now called Kelberini, which rises from the right bank of the river of Arta, immediately opposite to the town, and which is exactly of the rugged nature described by the ancient name. Whether this was the same as the Sacred Mountain mentioned by Dicaearchus, or whether the ridge on which Ambracia stood, and which Livy calls Perrhanthe, bore that name, cannot be asserted; but these being the only heights near Ambracia, the words of Dicaearchus seem applicable only to the one or other of them.
The poetical topographer just named differs from Scylax in interposing the Oreitae between the Ambracian coast and that of the Amphilochi, and thus identifies the country of the Oreitae with Makrinoro;

§ 1.216   for as Polybius and Livy agree in placing Argos Amphilochicum at 22 miles from Ambracia, it is evident that the country at the head of the gulf, immediately beyond Makrinoro, was the Amphilochia. The Oreitae therefore seem to have been the inhabitants of that remarkable mountain, and probably of its northerly continuation also, as far as it bordered on the Ambracian territory.
As the foundation of Nicopolis was the term of the existence of Ambracia, it was to be expected that the site of Arta should be deficient, as we find it in those remains of the time of the Roman empire, which so constantly meet and sometimes disappoint the traveller when in search of earlier monuments in Asia, Africa, and many of the cities of Greece. Whatever may be found at Arta will probably be of the best times of Greece, as Ambracia, after having been plundered by Fulvius, shared the fate of the other cities of Epirus, 22 years afterwards, when the Senate of Rome, to gratify their army, which had been disappointed of the plunder of Macedonia, gave directions for that atrocious act of deliberate cruelty and perfidy, too well attested by the cotemporary historian, which consigned 70 cities of Epirus to plunder and destruction, and 150,000 Epirotes to be sold as slaves.

§ 1.217   Hence the wretched state into which Ambracia fell, in common with the other cities occupying the naturally favoured districts around this beautiful inland sea, and which reduced them all to so small a population, that they sufficed only, even with the aid of a Roman colony, to furnish inhabitants for the single town of Nicopolis. To the abandonment of the site of Ambracia we may attribute, as in the instance of Sparta and a few other leading cities, the loss of the ancient name; for it has rarely happened where the positions have been continually inhabited, that the name has not been preserved. When strength of situation became again an important requisite, Ambracia was re-occupied, as well as two other Hellenic sites at Vonitza and Rogus, while such as Sparta, Megalopolis, and other places little defended by nature, have remained desolate. The new name seems to have been taken from that of the river 'Άραιθος, or Άραχθος, which was the more easily contracted into two syllables as the accent was on the first. The monasteries and churches, Vlakherina, Fanaromeni, Parigoritissa, Saint Theodhora, and Pandokratora, show the importance of the renewed city under the Byzantine emperors.

§ 1.218   CHAPTER V EPIRUS.
JUNE 27.—This afternoon, at 6, having re-crossed the bridge of Arta, we follow the right bank of the river to Marati, a suburb standing just opposite to the metropolis of Arta, and consisting of a Turkish mosque with some houses and gardens. The Turk who built the mosque adorned it with several columns from the church of Parigoritissa, where the loss has been very clumsily repaired. The gardens of Marati abound in filbert trees, the fruit of which forms one of the exports of Arta. Among the gardens is a ruin with walls and towers, apparently of the early times of Arta, forming a square of 36 yards; it is now called Καστέλι. Beyond Marati we cross the plain, leaving a marsh on the left hand, and having arrived at the foot of Mount Kelbermi, bend to the left along its foot, following a paved road which overhangs the edge of the marsh.

§ 1.219   In the midst of this pass at 7.7 are some copious springs issuing from under the mountain, and forming a large stream; it is supposed to be the subterraneous discharge of the Lake of Ioannina, and flows to the lagoon of Logaru. The marsh now becomes more deep and impracticable, and the mountain steep and rocky, the exhalations are offensive, and numerous serpents are seen on the water’s edge. At 7.40 the pass ends, and the marsh retires to the left, leaving a cultivated plain which extends to Strivina in front, but narrows to the right, where it terminates in an ascending valley, the direct route and natural opening of communication from the Gulf of Arta to the plain of Ioannina. At a khan called Khanopulo we leave that road to the right, and proceed for the night to Strivina, where by order of the bishop a cottage had been prepared for me. This village contains 30 or 40 families, who are chiefly employed in the culture of tobacco on the banks of a stream, of which the sources are in the village. After flowing through a marshy plain, it forms one of the tributaries of the river of Luro.

§ 1.220   June 28.—Setting out this morning at 4.30, we rejoin the road to Ioannina at the entrance of the valley above-mentioned at 5, then ascend the dry bed of a torrent, and at 5.30 leave the village of Kometzades a quarter of a mile to the right, situated on uneven ground on the side of the torrent, which here issues from between two high summits of Mount Kelberini. To our left, at the same time, are the remains of a small triangular Hellenic fortress, standing on the summit of a hill, which commanded the entrance of this important pass. The walls are in some parts still standing to a considerable height.
From hence we continue to ascend, passing a little to the right of Koliadhes; and at 6.38, arriving at the summit of the pass, descend into a small valley included between steep rocky mountains. At 7.10 the village of Muliana is half a mile on the right, on the mountain’s side, situated at the entrance of a lateral pass which leads to the vale of the Arachthus, over Mount Kelberini, or rather which separates that summit from Xerovuni, a ridge following the same northerly direction as the former. The Vezir has lately built a serai at Muliana, and has constructed a good paved road by which we cross a counterfort of the mountain to Pende Pigadhia, where are a few cottages, and a little beyond them the five wells which give name to the place. It is situated just at the opening of the pass where it begins to descend into an elevated plain, similar to that below Muliana, but much more extensive, and equally bordered on either side by a steep rocky mountain.

§ 1.221   We arrive at the khan of the Five Wells at 8.38, and make a long halt, for at this season of the year it is necessary to divide the day’s journey, and to rest during the meridian hours, which, especially in the villages, are by far more quiet than the night, when asses, hogs, dogs, fowls, rats, bugs, fleas, gnats, are all in a state of activity. Of the three latter plagues, which by adding want of sleep to the effects of fatigue and climate often contribute powerfully to destroy a traveller’s health, the flea is the only one from which he may not be protected by a well constructed mosquito netting. This torment and the excessive heat are the chief impediments to the traveller’s repose in the day, for as to the incessant chirping of the woodcricket, he soon becomes accustomed to it, though he will hardly bring himself to consider its note musical, as the ancients seem to have thought.
At 3.15 p.m. we descend from the khan into, the valley, with the village of Varlam on the left, and beyond it the mountain Olytzika, as the highest point of the range to the left of our road, and the most remarkable peak in all the surrounding country is now called. I know not where we are to look for its ancient name. Below Varlam are some fields of tobacco, but the chief produce of this valley, as well as of that below Muliana, is kalambokki.
At 4.45, after having crossed the plain, there is a further descent, with the village of Pesta on the right, to a fine source of water on the road side.

§ 1.222   Here, to the left, on the opposite side of the valley, rises a sloping cultivated hill, on the summit of which are the ruins of a triangular Hellenic fortress, naturally fortified at the back by a precipice, which overhangs the ravine lying between it and Mount Olytzika. Twenty minutes farther there is another paleo-kastro, at about an equal distance to the left of our road, of the same kind as the former, and similarly situated, but the hill is steeper, higher, and more uneven, and die in closed space is larger. We now begin to descend towards the great plain of Ioannina, and at 5.52 arrive at the khan and small village of St. Demetrius, situated in a little bay of the plain, half an hour beyond which, Bartzi is on the side of the hills on the left; hereabouts are several round ponds in the plain, some of which are covered with water lilies. We hasten forward, and at eight arrive at Ioannina. The distance from Arta is about forty-two miles by the road. In time, it is thus generally reckoned: from Arta to Khanopulo 1.30; to Kometzadhes, 1.30; to a ruined khan under Muliana, 1.30; to Pendepigadhia, 1.30; to Ai Dhimitri, 3; to Ioannina, 3. Total, 12 hours, or 14 with baggage.
June 29.—Since my visit to the Vezir at Tepeleni, he has built a foundery at Bunila, in the plain of Ioannina, where he had before established a colony of Bulgarians, whom he brought here in 1802, on his return from the Danube, and lodged in cottages built in a quadrangle, like their own native palankas. When I asked His Highness how he procured copper to make his gun-metal, “I collect it,” he says, “from my subjects; one furnishes an old pot, and another a kettle.”

§ 1.223   A magnificent room, which he has just finished in his new serai in the Kastro, is probably not surpassed by those of the Sultan himself. It is covered with a Gobelin carpet, which has the cypher of the King of France on it, and was purchased by the Pasha's agent at Corfu. His Highness has lately taken Dr. Frank, formerly one of the physicians of the French army of Egypt, into his service, at 10,000 piastres a year. In the evening he has some mortar practice at Bunila, with an old five or six inch mortar, which has been considerably damaged by its employment in the siege of Suli. They fire loaded shells, one of which explodes close to a party of Greeks standing upon a height, but fortunately without hurting any of them. The Pasha laughs very heartily at the joke. We then visit the foundery, the roof of which seems likely to fall.
July 1.—This afternoon I set out on a tour to Suli, accompanied by the Italian renegade Mehmet Effendi, together with one of the Vezir’s trusty Albanian bolu-baahis, and his chief architect named Peter of Korytza. who constructed the bridge and serai at Tepeleni, and has built many others of the Pasha's palaces and castles. His Highness furnishes me with an excellent mule, for the mountain paths, from his own stable. We proceed no farther this evening than Rapeista, a village distant 1.30 hour from the city, in the middle of the plain on the right hand side of the road to Ai Dhimitri.. On the hills above Rapsista are two or three convents prettily situated among woods of pirnaria.

§ 1.224   July 2.—At 4.10 this morning we quit Rapsista, leaving the baggage to follow; at 5.40 leave the khan of Ai Dhimitri half a mile on the left, then ascending the lowest part of the mountain which borders the western side of the plain of Ioannina, we arrive at six in a small level on the summit where the village Ferekisi is at a short distance on the left, from thence descend into the valley of the Varia, and at 6.23 arrive at that stream near the beginning of its course. On our left, as we proceed, is the ridge which separates this valley from that of Pesta and Varlam, and on two points of which are the two Hellenic castles mentioned on the 28th of June. We now cross another ridge, in the middle ascent of which are some ancient sepulchres and remains of Hellenic walls in and beside the road, and then descend to Variadhes, where we arrive at 8. This is a small village, with a kula or pyrgo belonging to the Vezir, situated at the eastern foot of the southern summit of Mount Olytzika, where the heights overlook the narrow vale of the Varia.
From Variadhes, at 3.30 p.m., we proceed to cross the lowest part of the southern summit of Mount Olytzika, and arrive at 5.3 at a church of St. Elias, standing on the crest of the ridge which separates the valley of the Varia from that of a branch of the river of Suli, and commands a view of both. We descend the slope obliquely to the left, and at 6.45 arrive at Dervidjana, properly Tervitziana, situated amidst fountains, large walnut trees, vineyards and gardens,—on the middle descent of the ridge, and enjoying a prospect of the valley below it, which is beautifully diversified with broken ground, streams, woods, and cultivated fields. At seven we arrive at the farther end of the village, at the kula of the Bolu-bashi, an Albanian of unusually polished manners.

§ 1.225   July 3.—At four this morning we descend into the valley, and after passing a tributary of the river of Suli, cross at 5.30 the principal branch, which, taking its rise near the village of Lakia, is called the Lakiotiko. The hills at the foot of Mount Nasheri, which is a peaked summit, separated only by a hollow from Olytzika, are covered with oaks, some of which are large. All the villages in this beautiful valley formed a part of the Suliote league in the time of its greatest power, when Variadhes, the vale of Varia, and all as far as the summit, overlooking the plain of Ioannina, were included in it. The village of Paleokastro, which is a mile and a half on the left after crossing the river, belonged to the Botzari family. Three minutes farther we begin to ascend the great mountain of Suli at the kula and tjiftlik of Romanates, where are some ruins of another tower, which was surprised and blown up by the Suliotes during the war. Aly’s Albanians having, as they thought, secured the place, went to forage, leaving a few of their youngest soldiers in it, and on their return remained at night on the outside.

§ 1.226   During the night the Suliotes, approaching silently, set fire to a mine which they had left at the foot of the tower, and, as soon as it exploded, attacked and slew, or dispersed, the Albanians. After the war, the Vezir destroyed the church of Romanates, and converted the village into a tjiftlik. From hence the ascent of the mountain is in a steep zigzag; the road has been well made, but in some places the borders are giving way. At 6.40 we pass a copious βρύσις or source of water, in a hollow grown with pirnaria; and continuing from thence to ascend, arrive at 7.28 on the crest of the ridge, about a mile to the southward of the highest summit of the mountain. Lefkadha is in sight to the southward; Paxu and Andipaxo to the west, with the hills behind Parga and the coast near Port Fanari: but Suli and its vicinity are hidden by a lower summit of the mountain, immediately overhanging them.
After a halt of six minutes we begin to descend; pass many remains of the konaks, or temporary huts of loose stone constructed by the contending parties during the siege; and having descended the steep mountain on foot, arrive at 8.45 at the village of Suli. On the side of the mountain grows a great quantity of a small fragrant species of abrotonum, not very common in Greece, and here named απιστία.
Suli, called Kakosuli from its fame and strength, like the Κακοΐλιον of Homer, or Megalo-Suli, to distinguish it from another Suli on the Kalama below Zitza, contains 150 scattered houses, all of which are in ruins, except five or six, tenanted by Musulman Albanians, to whom the Vezir means to add a colony of Christians from the neighbourhood of Tepeleni.

§ 1.227   The ruins of the principal church he is now converting into a mosque. The houses, which seem all to have been built on a similar plan, were small square buildings, with a pitched roof and two stories, of which the lower was a store or stable, and the upper contained two apartments. They were dispersed among terraces, artificially formed on the side of the hill, and now uncultivated, but which formerly bore potherbs, and corn, among fruit-trees. In the height of their prosperity, the Suliotes possessed all the adjacent part of the plain of Glyky, containing rice grounds and maize fields,in the culture of which they employed the Greek peasants of that district, thinking such employments beneath them, and delighting only in robbery, war, and idleness. The instances of their activity, of their swiftness in walking over the mountains and through roads and passages, to us impassable, of their expertness in the use of the musket, of their keenness of sight, in which they excelled all other Albanians, who themselves are exceeded only by the Arabs of the desert; their vigilance and sagacity, their ability in planning, and activity in executing, the most refined stratagems of their desultory warfare, would, in some instances, exceed belief, if they were not so universally attested by their enemies. Their power of vision in the night is particularly mentioned in terms of astonishment by the troops of Aly Pasha, who opposed them.

§ 1.228   From Suli we proceeded south-westward to the hill of Kughni, an Albanian word, which the Greeks interpret λόφος, a summit: the fort of Kukia occupies the southern point of the hill, and is distant from Suli 35 minutes. Kukia was the last point which resisted the arms of Aly. He is now erecting a new fortress on the spot, after having levelled all the walls, huts, and meteris of the Suliotes, as well as their church: 4 or 500 yards to the northward of Kukia, and not much lower than that point, is a peak called Ai Dhonato (St. Donatus), from a church which formerly stood there, and which the Pasha converted into a kula, and made the headquarters of the siege.
Having descended by the same road to the foot of the hill of Kughni, we fall into that from Suli to Kiafa, near the ruined village of Samoniva, and in half an hour arrive at the ruins of Kiafa, or Gkiafa, situated amidst a few terraces and fruit-trees, and from thence, ascending the hill of Trypa, in Albanian Bira, arrive at a new fortress, not yet completed, situated on the summit of this narrow ridge, and midway between its two extremities. The south-eastern end of the height is the Bira, properly so called, which gives name to the whole ridge; the north-western is specifically named Breke Vetetimis, in Greek η Ράχη της Αστραπής, or the Hill of Lightning, because in stormy weather the lightning often strikes the summit, so often indeed that the Suliotes were obliged to give up building upon it. A kula which the Pasha erected there last year has already had one of its angles beaten down by a thunderbolt.

§ 1.229   This point, in fact, being lofty and precipitous, and surrounded by an amphitheatre of much higher mountains, cannot fail often to attract the electric fluid. Northward it looks down upon Kughni, at the distance of 1000 or 1200 yards, and is separated from that hill by a narrow vale, in which the Lakiotiko, or main branch of the river of Suli is joined by the Tzingariotiko, so called as rising near the village of Tzingari, on the mountain which rises to the northward of the hill of Kughni. The fortress in the middle of Mount Trypa, which the Vezir began to build as soon as he obtained possession of Suli, is now nearly finished: my companion Kyr Petros, of Korytza, is the architect. The crest of the ridge is so narrow, that there is just room for a path, and Kyr Petros was obliged to level the hill before he began the castle. Towards the mountain of Tzikurates, which is separated from the hill of Trypa by the river, and commands it on the southern side, as the mountain of Suli does on the eastern, he has built bomb-proof magazines, casemates, and cisterns. He has also completed a house for the officer in command, and is now building a large serai for the Vezir in the middle of the fort. The only guns at present here are two short pieces of brass, carrying a 12 1b. ball. These and two five or six inch mortars were all the artillery used in the siege. The hill of Trypa towards the river is a rapid descent, covered with loose stones, and interrupted in many places with precipices and pointed rocks;

§ 1.230   although the slope forms an angle of about 30° with the horizon, the women of Trypa were in the habit of mounting it, with large jars of water from the river, upon their heads. The southeastern end of the ridge of Trypa terminates in three pointed summits, the two northern of which are surmounted by kulas, lately erected by the Pasha to contain a guard of Albanians; one of these buildings has already been damaged by the lightning, but not so much as the tower at the opposite extremity of the mountain. The hollow between the two northern summits of the southeastern end is properly the Trypa or cavity from which the whole mountain takes its name, but the posts of the Suliotes extended over all this extremity of the hill, and their meteris may still be traced as far as the place where the southern gate of the fortress now stands; 100 yards to the south of which, is a small Suliote church still subsisting. As it was necessary for the Pasha, when he had expelled the Suliotes, to build a fortress for his Albanian garrison, he could not have chosen a better site. Suli, however, although it would be troublesome to him in the hands of an enemy, is of no importance as a pass or point of communication between the several parts of Aly’s dominions, nor can it be of much use to him as a place of refuge in case of disaster, for the mountains on both sides command it within a moderate range of cannon-shot; and although they are very difficult of access on all sides, an active enemy, if superior in the field, would soon find the means of transporting artillery over them.

§ 1.231   Upon all the summits around Suli are still seen the remains of the Meteris and Konaks which were erected by the Pasha’s troops during the siege. The former are upon all the most advanced and commanding points of the mountains, and are nothing more than little breastworks of stone, from behind which the besieger fired his long heavy musquet, resting it on the top of the wall. The konaks, or lodgings, were in the most unexposed situations, and were just large enough to afford shelter during their hours of repose, to the men who were stationed at that point of the investment. As the siege proceeded, the meteris were drawn nearer, serving the purpose of approaches in a regular siege, and blockading the posts of the Suliotes until they were reduced to starvation. In like manner the konaks of the Suliotes are to be seen on all the rocky points and precipices of the hills of Trypa and Kughni.
The river, after the junction of the two branches, flows through the Klisura, or narrow opening between the mountains of Tzikurates and Zavrukho, into the plain of Glyky, where it is generally known by the name of the Suliotiko, or river of Suli. Along the rocky sides and precipices of the Klisura, above the left bank of the river, the Vezir has lately made a good paved horse road from Suli to Glyky, so that now there is a road, though in some parts rather dangerous, through the entire pass, communicating from the plain of Luro, or of Ioannina, into that of Glyky.

§ 1.232   The view from the Hill of Lightning comprehends all the adjacent part of the plain of Glyky with its numerous villages, and I perceive at once that the river is the ancient Acheron; for after winding through the plain it traverses a lake, or marsh, or rather combination of both, which is evidently the ancient Palus Acherusia, and then falls into the harbour called Porto Fanari, or Splantza, which (it is equally manifest) is the Glycys Limen: so great is the quantity of water poured into it from the lake and river, that the water of the harbour is observed to be generally fresh, as the ancient name implies. The harbour and a great part of the Acherusia are hidden from Trypa by a part of the mountain of Tzikurates. At the foot of the hills of Margariti which rise from the western side of the plain of the Acheron, is a marsh called Vuvo, through which passes a river of the same name, flowing from the vicinity of Paramythia. Its subsequent course is traceable through the plain to a high stone bridge near Kastri, a name generally indicative of an ancient site, and in this instance derived fropi the conspicuous ruins of a large Hellenic city on a height above the village. The Vuvo, as I am informed, afterwards winds to the left in a direction nearly parallel to the Acheron, and joins that river near the sea. It is probably the ancient Cocytus.

§ 1.233   In the lower part of the plain the Suliotiko or Acheron is more commonly called Fanaritiko, or the river of Fanari; this name (in Albanian, Frai) being generally applied to the plain around and below the Acherusia, as Glyky is to the portion above it towards Suli. Formerly there was a village and church of Glyky near the right bank of the river, a little below the spot where it emerges from the gorges of Suli into the plain. But this church was destroyed by the Vezir two months ago, and there now remain only two or three of the buttresses which sustained the walls, and which may be remarked from the Trypa. During the war this was an important military post of the Suliotes, and sometimes was equally useful to their besiegers. The name Glyky, by a process of change not uncommon in all countries, seems to have spread from the harbour to the plain, and afterwards to have been applied specifically to a place, where, though nothing but a ruined church is now to be seen, there was probably a town of the Lower Empire; for Glyky still gives title in conjunction with Buthrotum to one of the bishops of the province of Ioannina, whose residence is Paramythia, and the church at Glyky is acknowledged to have been the cathedral of that diocese.
At Glyky the plain is about five miles wide, and extends to the right in a northerly direction four hours to Paramythia. This large town, which is inaccessible to me at present on account of the hostility of its chief family to Aly Pasha, is situated at the extremity of the valley of the Vuvo, and has a castle behind it on a steep and lofty hill, near the foot of the range which terminates to the southward in the mountain of Zavrukho and the Klisura of Suli. The entire range, like most of the moun tains around Suli, is bare and rocky in the middle, but is covered at the summit with pine-trees.

§ 1.234   The official name of Paramythia, by which it is always designated in the firmahns of the Porte, is Aidonat Kalesi, or the Castle of Aidonat, which doubtless is a corruption of 'Άγιος Δονάτος, or St. Donatus, who was the patron of this part of the country: the church of Glyky was dedicated to him, as well as another on the ridge of Kughni, and a third in the village of Suli. It is curious that his name should so nearly resemble, especially in modern Greek pronunciation, that of Άϊδωνεύς, the ancient monarch of this country; for though the Greek mythology confounded Aidoneus with the lord of the infernal regions, he appears to have been in reality the mortal possessor of the valuable district watered by the Acheron, at the time when Theseus, prince of Athens, was on his travels.
The Suliotes, having no written memorials nor any clear traditions older than a century, it can only be offered as a conjecture, founded on strong probability, that Suli was occupied in the thirteenth or beginning of the fourteenth century, by a colony of those Albanians, who, at the latter period, overran the Despotate of the West, avoiding Ioannina the capital, which was in the hands of Greek, Servian, or Frank princes; but settling at Arta and on the banks of the Achelous, and extending themselves, as their present settlements and the use of their language indicate, throughout maritime Epirus, from Illyria nearly to the Ambracic Gulf.

§ 1.235   The Turks, when they penetrated into Epirus, were satisfied with the conquest of Arta and Ioannina, and had little temptation to enter the poorer and more mountainous parts of the country, which neither the Greeks, Vlakhiotes, nor Albanians, who possessed them, were disposed to yield without a struggle. The Albanians soon discovered that the Ottoman empire was an excellent mart for their services as mercenary infantry; but that, in order to obtain all the advantages in view, it was necessary to profess the dominant religion. The consequence has been, that more than half the nation has become Musulman, that Mahometan Albanians are to be found in the service of every chieftain or governor of that faith, from the Straits of Gibraltar, to Arabia, Persia, and the Danube; and that at home they have either brought the Christians under their yoke, or have forced them to take refuge under a milder despotism in Southern Greece or Asia Minor. To the former country the stream of Albanian migration had been setting, even before the Turkish conquest; those countries having already been depopulated by wars, or by the bad. government of the Franks and the Byzantine Greeks. Such is now the military preponderancy of the Musulman faith in Albania, that with the exception of a tribe belonging to the Roman church, in the district of Skodra, the Khimariotes are the only Christian Albanians who preserve their independence. The Suliotes were the last who fell under the Mahometan yoke.

§ 1.236   During the past century, as well in the early part of it, when Ioannina was governed by a Musellim dependent on the Pasha of Arta, as after the year 1740, when it became the head of a Pashalik, the Suliotes were constantly engaged in war, with the neighbouring beys of Margariti, Paramythia, or Ioannina; for it was not until Aly succeeded to the government of Ioannina, in the year 1788, that a factious oligarchy, similar to that of the Albanian towns, and which had left very little authority to the Sultan’s officer, was rendered powerless, and has at length been stripped by Aly of the greater part of their property. The Suliotes soon found that they had an opponent in Aly far more formidable than they had yet known; and that to resist such a bold and crafty enemy would require all their energy. Nor was the Pasha less prompt in arriving at the conviction that he could have little hope of extending his power in the degree which his ambition contemplated, until he had reduced the Suliotes, who were a constant rallying point to the Christians, were capable of strengthening by their alliance every Mahometan chieftain disposed to resist him, and even threatened his capital whenever he might be engaged in any distant undertaking. By his usual artifices, he succeeded first in turning against them one or two of their Musulman neighbours, and then the Christian armatoli of Acarnania and Aetolia; which so provoked the Suliotes, that their predatory excursions, hitherto confined to hostile and neighbouring places, were extended to Makrinoro, or to the passes leading from Arta to Ioannina, and even into the plain of Ioannina, where they plundered travellers without distinction, and never spared the life of a Mahometan unless with the prospect of a heavy ransom.

§ 1.237   The war between Aly and the Suliotes was actively carried on during the years 1790 and 1791. In 1792 the Pasha made that formidable attack upon the mountain itself which has been related by Eton on the authority of a Greek interpreter in the service of the French consulate at Saloniki, who happened to be at Ioannina at the time. His army approached Suli from the plain of Glyky, forced the Klisura with difficulty, met with a still more resolute opposition in the pass of Paraskevi, which leads between the hills of Kughni and Bira to Megalo-Suli; but succeeded by the effect of superior numbers in obtaining a momentary possession of the town, when both women and men rushing forth against them, and an attack being made at the same instant on their rear, by a party which for this purpose waited only to receive a signal from Bira, the Mahometans were totally defeated with an immense slaughter, and with very little loss to the Suliotes. Mukhtar escaped with difficulty, and Aly fled with precipitation to Ioannina, fearing to be intercepted.
This victory saved the Suliotes from any serious danger for the next six years, during which they were aided by a tacit, but not less real alliance with the Venetian towns of Prevyza and Parga; and through them with the adjacent islands, the Septinsular government having always been sensible of the necessity of maintaining good terms with the tribes of the opposite continent,

§ 1.238   and of preventing any single chieftain from acquiring too large a portion of the Epirote coast, upon which the islands depend for the supply of several objects of prime necessity. Ultimately, however, this connection of Suli with the Venetian places was destined to contribute to its ruin; for when the designs of the French Republic against Turkey became apparent, Suli was involved in the denunciations of the Porte against all those who were suspected of being friendly to the French in this quarter; and when Aly had taken Prevyza, it gave him great influence over all the neighbouring Musulmans, and left them no plea for declining to join him against the Suliotes, as abettors of enemies who threatened the Turkish empire with destruction.
Before the Suliote war, which began in 1798, the increase of Aly’s power and his unceasing activity had curtailed the Suliotes of some of their dependencies, and had diminished the number of their combatants. The history of this last and longest of the Suliote wars, which continued to 1803 without any intermission except in the year 1802, when Aly Pasha, as Rumili Valesi, was employed against the adherents of Pasvent Oglu near Adrianople, has been written by a native of Parga, a part of whose narrative has been printed. As he seems to be a man of some education, who treated the subject with great minuteness and apparent accuracy, and was anxiously watching the progress of events in a neighbouring and: allied town, it would be in vain to attempt to collect a more correct account from the illiterate actors in the contest, now dispersed over every part of the Vezir’s dominions, or in the Seven Islands.

§ 1.239   The greatest misfortune, or rather the certain ruin of Suli, was the defection of its own citizens. The arch-traitor was George Botzari, who received a bribe from the Vezir to desert with his fara before the war began, and who, in the course of it, tempted others to follow his example. Bira was lost in this manner, by the desertion of the Zervates, about two months after the loss of the town of Suli, and Avariko in consequence of a similar treachery on the part of Polios Gusi. After the fall of Bira, the Vezir’s troops began to invest the hill of Kughni, where 300 families were collected. The four pieces of ordnance before-mentioned were placed at Ai Dhonato, and on the side of the Hill of Lightning, in situations which are on a lower level than the summit of Kughni. The Pasha was totally in want of artillery-men; and although his shells destroyed the houses of Kughni, not more than three of the garrison were killed by them. The Suliotes made bomb-proofs by digging holes in the ground, and covering them with a slanting roof of timber, spread with boughs and earth. The women took refuge in a cavern, or in little konaks of loose stones, constructed for the occasion on the western side of the hill, where they were covered from the enemy’s fire.

§ 1.240   On the summit there was nothing but a slight wall, comprehending a small church to the eastward, of which the foundations now remain. The rest of the fortress consisted only of the walls of the exterior houses, united and loopholed. The Vezir’s Mahometan Albanians showed as much perseverance in the attack as their Christian opponents in the defence: the former climbed up the sides of the hill, particularly on the west, and made some small meteris of stone at the distance of a few yards only from the enemy’s konaks. The Suliote women exposed themselves to the fire of the enemy, supplied the men with water, ammunition and provisions, and when not otherwise employed, discharged vollies of verbal abuse against the assailants. When resistance began to be hopeless, a part of the garrison made their escape by forcing their way over the enemy’s meteris, like the Plataeans in the Peloponnesian war. The defence was chiefly prolonged by the exhortations and example of a priest named Samuel, a native of one of the Aegaean islands, who had the care of the ammunition and provisions, and who, after the capitulation, was blown up in the magazine, which stood at the northern end of the hill, within the present fortress. One of the Pasha’s officers, who had been sent to receive the fortress and its stores, suffered with him and two or three other persons, which seems to prove that the explosion was either accidental, or premeditated by the priest, and not as some persons imagine, the result of a scheme of Aly Pasha, to get rid in this manner of his most formidable opponent; but who, in fact, was already in his power.

§ 1.241   The Vezir’s Albanians assert that it was an accident; but the Suliotes maintain that it was the deed of Samuel, which is very probable, as he could not expect any mercy if taken, and as it accords with his determined character, and with that of the Greeks in general, who often exhibit similar examples of desperation. The remaining families had permission to retire unmolested in whatever direction they thought fit; but the Vezir, in violation of his promises, intercepted many of them in their retreat, and brought them to Ioannina. Of those who escaped, the greater part are now in the Greek corps, formed by the Russians in the islands, and many of the women and children are in the domestic service of the Christians of Epirus. There are now about seventy men prisoners at Ioannina, and as many women and children. These the Vezir gradually disperses among his tjiftliks as labourers, and generally sends them to the most disagreeable and unhealthy situations.
July 4.—This afternoon, having descended on foot from the castle to the ruins of the village of Kiafa, we proceed at 3.45 eastward, along the hollow between the mountain of Suli and the hill of Trypa. At the end of this pass, just under the Trypa, stands the ruined village of Avariko, from whence there is a descent into a deep ravine, formed by the meeting of the two great mountains of Suli and Tzikurates; one of the darkest and deepest of the glens of Greece:

§ 1.242   on either side rise perpendicular rocks, in the midst of which are little intervals of scanty soil, bearing holly-oaks, ilices, and other shrubs, and which admit occasionally a view of the higher summits of the two mountains covered with oaks, and at the summit of all with pines. Here the road is passable only on foot, by a perilous ledge along the side of the mountain of Suli; terminating at a narrow opening, where the Acheron enters the defile from the vale of Tervitziana. The river in the pass is deep and rapid, and is seen at the bottom falling in many places in cascades over the rocks, though at too great a distance to be heard, and in most places inaccessible to any but the foot of a goat or a Suliote. On the side of the road, at intervals, planks are collected, which have been sawn out of the oaks on the spot, and left in readiness to be removed.
At 5.45 we arrive at the end of the defile, and descend into a valley, where the river, coming from the north in a direction almost at right angles to its course through the Suliote glens, previously makes many turns and meanders, as if unwilling to enter such a gloomy passage. At 6, leaving Seritziana close to the right, where only five or six houses now remain, and to the left Gorina, standing on the side of the range of Tzikurates, we cross the river at 6.15, and immediately ascend into a vale, or opening between the ridge of Tzikurates and Mount Nasseri, which latter here changes its direction, and turns eastward towards Luro and the Gulf of Arta. From hence riding over a beautiful undulated valley, naturally fertile, but little cultivated, we arrive at 7 at Zerml, where the Vezir has lately built a tjiftlik of five or six cottages, inclosed by a square wall. My konak is an open gallery on the outside of one of the huts. In the evening the whole atmosphere glitters with fire flies.

§ 1.243   July 5.—At 4.20, a.m. we begin to follow the same valley, descending towards the south-east: the sides of the hills and the valley become more woody as we advance. At 5 the monastery of Arasso is a little on the right at the foot of the mountain, and Zerlia a small village is on the heights to the left. Near the monastery there are said to be many ancient sepulchres, few of which have ever been opened; they show that the monastery occupies a Hellenic site. As the name appears to be ancient, Arassus may very possibly have been one of those numerous cities of Epirus unnoticed by history, but of which the former existence is well attested by their remains. At 5.30 a tumulus occurs on the road side, and at 5.45 the village Kutzanopulo on the hill to the left. We soon afterwards arrive on the bank of a dry torrent, shaded with fine planes, where the valley opens towards the Gulf of Arta, and a rich level is covered with plantations of maize. Leaving the castle and village of Luro a quarter of an hour on the left, we proceed to skirt the foot of the mountain of Zalongo which is united by a lower ridge with the hills on the right side of the vale which we have passed. After having made the semi-tour of the mountain, through a wood of small oaks, Libokhovo remains three quarters of a mile to the left, at 8;

§ 1.244   soon after which we begin to ascend the southern face of the mountain, and at 8.20 arrive at Kamarina, a village of 30 or 40 Greek families, situated among fruit gardens at the copious sources of a little stream which flows to the plain of Lamari, and there unites with a river which falls into the sea a little to the southward of a small harbour called Agriapidhia.
My lodging is a chamber and open gallery in the serai, as it is called, of a Christian captain of Armatoli, named Ianaki, who is entrusted by the Vezir with the government of the surrounding district. The village commands a beautiful view of the gulf and plain of Arta, with the mountains around them, including the Makrinoro, the hills of Valto and Xeromero, and to the southward, the town, channel, and whole island of Lefkadha, ending in Cape Ducato, to the right of which is seen the Point of Viscardo, in Kefalonia. Within this magnificent amphitheatre appear the town of Prevyza, the peninsulas of Actium and Nicopolis, and immediately below us an undulated country and plain, consisting of pasture, corn-fields, and olives, forming the district of Lamari. A line of tall detached masses is seen stretching across the plain, formed of a mixture of stone and Roman tile. These are the piers of the ruined aqueduct of Nicopolis.

§ 1.245   The summit of the mountain of Zalongo, which is a mile to the north-eastward of Kamarina, is famed for having twice been the scene of a gallant resistance of the Suliotes. [map of Zalongo and Cassope]

§ 1.246   On the first occasion, 100 families, who had retired hither by capitulation from Suli and Kiafa, and who had lived on the hill unmolested until the reduction of Kughni, were suddenly attacked by order of the Vezir, on the pretence that the natural strength of the position had tempted them to commit acts of hostility against him. When affairs became desperate, Kitzo Botzari and a party with him escaped. Of the rest, 150 persons were made slaves, 25 heads were brought to the Albanian Bolu-bashi at Kamarina, who commanded the attack, and 6 men and 22 women threw themselves from the rocks, at the place where the precipice is highest, in preference to falling alive into the hands of their enemies. Several of the women who had infants, were seen to throw them over before they took the fatal leap. Last year again, in the month of July, a party of 400 Suliotes, under Botzari, sent over by the Russians to assist the Beys of Tzamuria in their war with Aly, stood a siege here, in conjunction with as many Tzamidhes, for six weeks, against a large force sent against them by the Vezir; they capitulated, on condition being permitted to return with their arms into Tzami.
The meteris of the Suliotes are still seen on the weak points of the cliffs, which surround the hill on all sides, and particularly near a winding road which ascends through the cliffs, from the deserted monastery of Zalongo to its metokhi of Άγιος Ταξιάρχη or St. Michael, which is situated in the middle of the summit, and is still occupied by two or three monks.

§ 1.247   The monastery stands just under the cliffs at the western extremity of the hill; from which point the tabular, though sloping summit, which is of an oval form, rises gradually to the opposite extremity, where it terminates in a natural citadel, 200 yards long from north to south, and 35 broad. All the summit around the metokhi is covered with low oaks. No remains of Hellenic architecture are to be seen on this height, though it commands, at a distance not greater than the length of the hill itself, the eastern extremity of the acropolis of an ancient city of great extent.
This acropolis occupies a level about 1000 yards long, and one-fourth at the utmost of that breadth, and which is surrounded by low cliffs on every side, except to the north, where it is still better fortified by high rocky summits, connected with the height of Zalongo by a lower crest or ridge; on the farther extremity of which stands the monastery. The ruined walls of the acropolis may be traced in their entire circuit, but are best preserved at the western end, and towards the upper cliffs. There were very few towers, and the masonry is so completely of the second order, that I do not observe one regular course, or rectangular stone. In the highest part of the inclosure at the foot of the cliffs, towards the western end, is a theatre in good preservation, of which the interior diameter is 50 feet; the rows of seats, which are 37 in number, are divided into two compartments by a precinctio, or διάζωμα, the lower containing 24 rows, the upper 13. The cavea is greater than a semi-circle, and is divided into cunei, separated by steps.

§ 1.248   The outer circular wall of the cavea, and those which support the two extremities, are built of polygonal masonry, without any squared stones, and are well preserved. The scene or structure in front of the cavea was divided into two compartments, of which the inner was equal in length to the inner diameter of the theatre, and the outer half that length; both were about 24 feet in breadth. Two immense fragments of rock, which have fallen from the cliffs above, are lying on the cavea; this accident is said to have happened not many years ago.
On the descent from hence to the western extremity of the acropolis, near where it terminates in an angle, is a subterraneous building, which the peasants call the Vasilospito, or King’s House. Its plan resembles, on a small scale, that of the tombs of the kings at Egyptian Thebes, and it was intended probably for a similar purpose; but instead of being hewn out of the rock, it is constructed of masonry. A passage, nineteen feet in length and five feet in breadth, with a curved roof one foot and a half high, leads to a chamber nine feet nine inches square, and having a similar roof five feet seven inches in height. The arches are not constructed on the principles of the Roman arch, but are hollowed out of horizontal courses of stone: the interior of the arch is plastered, and is adorned with a small cornice in the same material at the bottom of the curve.

§ 1.249   The architrave of the outer entrance is formed of a single stone seven feet long. The passage and chamber, but particularly the latter, are obstructed with stones and rubbish; so that in no place the surface of the ground is more than six feet below the bottom of the arch. There is an excavation of earth before the door; and the upper surface of the roof, which was probably in former times entirely covered with earth, is now partly visible on the outside. These seem to be the effects of a search which has been made for treasure. Upon the roof lie several stones in the form of segments of a circle, belonging apparently to some circular building of about ten feet in diameter. Not far from this subterraneous building there is a vaulted postern gate in the wall, the arch of which is formed by concave stones, as in the Vasilospito; but in this instance the concave parts of the two upper stones do not meet, and the top is completed by a flat stone. The wall is here entirely of the second order.
The principal gate of this fortress, which is still in good preservation, is in the western front, between the theatre and Vasilospito. It is flanked on either side by a square tower, in one of which stands a sorus, formed of a single stone with an operculum, which has been removed just enough to admit of an examination of the contents of the tomb and of an abstraction of them.

§ 1.250   Below the theatre are many rectangular foundations, all of polygonal masonry, and apparently belonging to very large buildings. In some places the ancient streets may be traced, crossing one another at right angles. The circuit of the fortress is upwards of a mile, and that of the city could not have been less than three miles; for though I cannot exactly trace the inclosure of the exterior town towards the south, a piece of wall, which crosses the slope of the mountain ten minutes below Kamarina, serves to mark the extent in that direction. Along the foot of the wall, between the great gate and Kamarina, and particularly in a spot immediately behind the village, are many tombs of an ordinary kind, seven to nine feet long, and three or four wide. They were either hewn in the rock, and covered with three massy pieces of stone, or where the soil was earthy, had sides constructed of four fragments of stone set edgeways, with a covering of similar slabs. Having caused four of these tombs to be opened, I found in the first a great number of broken vases and bones, three or four small lachrymatories, as they are commonly called, and several long rectangular pieces of iron, one-tenth of an inch thick, and covered with gold leaf. The second tomb, though it had no appearance of having ever been opened, produced nothing, not even bones: a part of its cover and all the body of the tomb was cut out of the rock.

§ 1.251   The third, which was also hewn out of the solid rock, produced fragments, but not many, of skulls and bones, with coarse vases of the usual forms, together with fragments of utensils made of lead, and a circular mirror of copper or mixed metal, six inches in diameter, placed within a covering of thinner metal; the lustre is still perfect on the side which has been protected by the covering. The opposite side has a rim three-eighths of an inch high, and the handle has an ornamented border. The same tomb contained also a leaden box two inches and one-eighth high, and one inch and three-eighths in diameter, shaped like the frustum of a cone, and having a button serving for a handle in the centre of the lid. As the labourers believed that the box contained jewels, and were afraid perhaps of an avania, I opened it in their presence: nothing remained in it but some earth, amidst which were two or three shells of a minute kind of snail. The mirror, and the box which once contained probably some ointment or perfume, show the tomb to have been that of a female. In the fourth sepulchre were found two or three vases, and some more of the ornaments of iron and gold above-mentioned. The speculum was placed vertically at the feet of the deceased: the vases were found in every part of the tombs, and are all of the most ordinary kind of Greek pottery. The annexed was the only form among them that is not very commonly found in Greece. [sketch]

§ 1.252   This great city I take to have been Cassope, or the city of the Cassopaei, who occupied the maritime country between Thesprotia and the Ambracic Gulf, and bordered on the territory of Nicopolis; for although in the time of Scylax the Cassopaei dwelt κωμηδον, or in small towns, it is very probable that the most advantageously situated of those towns became subsequently the head of the nation, when the Cassopaei arose to such power as to obtain Pandosia and some other places in the ancient Thesprotia. The acropolis, therefore, of which the masonry indicates so remote an antiquity, may have been the Κωμη, older than the time of Scylax, and the lower city may have been added at that later period to which the coins of the Cassopaei have the appearance of belonging. That this people had a capital city, is shown by Diodorus, who, in relating an expedition of Lyciscus, commander of the forces of Cassander, against Alcetas, king of Epirus, in the year B.C. 312, states that Lyciscus, marching from Acarnania into Epirus, pitched his camp near the city Cassopia. Alcetas, after having sent his two sons, Alexander and Teucer, to collect forces, advanced to meet Lyciscus; but his Epirotes having passed over to the enemy before the reinforcements arrived, he fled to Eurymenae, where he was joined by his sons.

§ 1.253   He then fought two battles with the enemy, and in the former had the advantage; but the Macedonians having prevailed in the latter, he took refuge with his two sons in another place of strength, leaving Eurymenae to be taken and destroyed by Lyciscus; soon after which Cassander, arriving in Epirus, made peace with Alcetas, and entered into an alliance with him. It seems not improbable from these circumstances, that Eurymenae stood in the vale of the Upper Acheron, towards Lakia, Variadhes, or Tervitziana; for the valley of the Acheron, below Suli, together with the country extending from thence to Zalongo, appears to have been occupied by the cities of Elaea, Buchaetium, Cichyrus, Pandosia, Batiae, and Elateia. Agriapidhia was probably the λιμην, or harbour of the Cassopaei.
Captain Ianaki has an annual income of about 1000 piastres, now equivalent to 65L sterling. He is authorized to deduct 300 piastres for himself, and 50 for each of his men, from the Vezir’s revenue, which he collects; the remainder of his income is derived from fees on his arbitration of the disputes which arise in the district under his charge. My travelling companion, Kyr Petros, of Korytza, considers Captain Ianaki an object of envy; and with reason,—for although Peter is the Vezir’s chief architect and engineer, he has served in his present capacity for five years without receiving a para, although constantly employed in superintending the building of some castle or serai for the Vezir or his sons.

§ 1.254   His property and family are at Korytza, where by special favour he is now and then allowed to stay a few days. He relates that when he was excavating the ground for the new serai in the castle of Ioannina, a stone was found inscribed in honour of Thomas Ήγούμεvoc,. benefactor of Ioannina. Having reported his discovery to the Vezir, his highness said, “Go read all the old histories, and come to-morrow morning and let me know whose monument it is.” This same benefactor of Ioannina is said to have been a much worse tyrant than Aly himself; and one among several examples which show that many of the Christian chieftains of Albanian and Servian race, with their military followers, exercised a dominion over the subject population of Greece not less oppressive than the Turkish. Kyr Petros states that his native town and the neighbouring one of Moskhopoli formerly contained five or six thousand houses, but that the emigrations which have followed the tyranny of the Pashas have reduced them to less than eight hundred. The distress of the Christian population throughout the diocese of Ioannina, he ascribes in great measure to the extravagance of the bishop, who has loaded the see with debts to such a degree, that at his death the mansup will hardly find a purchaser; while, meantime, his flock is fleeced to pay the immoderate interest, without which money cannot be raised in this country.

§ 1.255   July 8.—This morning, having set my watch to Turkish time to accommodate my companions, we begin the descent from Kamarina at 10, and in ten minutes arrive at some remains of the exterior walls of the ancient city, near a mill turned by the stream, which has its rise in the village. At a quarter of an hour short of Luro, we cross the mouth of the valley of Kutzanopulo, and at twelve arrive at the house of the Proestos of Luro, which village is situated in a low unhealthy situation, near a square castle of the Vezir, now in a ruinous state. All the hills around are clothed with oaks. Coarse but good blankets are made here, and in some of the neighbouring villages: a piece of seven feet by four feet and a half costs ten piastres. In the afternoon, at 8.53, we proceed over a desolate plain overgrown with brambles and bushes, and at 9.12 arrive at the foot of a rocky mountain, from which issue some copious streams of water, forming a large pond: it is very deep and pellucid, abounds in fish, and is closely shaded around the margin with trees and shrubs. To the right are marshes extending for a great distance towards the sea; and near the sources a kula for the protection of the pass, with the remains of a Hellenic tower, which doubtless served the same purpose.

§ 1.256   A paved road here passes over the foot of the mountain, descends beyond the lake again into the plain, and then turns to the left through an opening between two mountains, in which stands the village of Kanja. The aqueduct of Nicopolis was conducted through this opening, as appears by some remains of it visible on the slope of the hill to the left, as we pass through Kanza at 9.33: we then enter a small plain surrounded by mountains, and continue to ascend through it until turning a point of hill we open the view of an extensive valley, included between two parallel ridges of hills, of which those on the east are richly clothed with trees. To our left a woody height is surrounded with remains of the inclosure of the Hellenic city which possessed this beautiful vale, consisting only of the foundations of town walls, chiefly of the third order. The site is now called Kastri.
At a distance of one hour and a half from Kanza is Lelovo, situated on the rocky foot of the western hills. Around the village are plantations of olives, and below it fruit trees and gardens, extending into the valley, which stretches four or five miles farther, terminating inland in heights which separate it from the valleys watered by the upper tributaries of the Acheron, and of the eastern branch of the river of Luro.

§ 1.257   Lelovo contains 150 or 200 houses, much dispersed. Papa Nikola is both priest and proestos, and has a large house with yard and outhouses, erected with considerable expense, but utterly in want of the most vulgar comforts. He has the reputation of being a tyrant, and a complaint has lately been preferred against him by the village, but the Pasha seldom listens to such representations, unless to impose a fine upon the person complained of. The principal church, which was built about six years ago, is adorned within with costly gilding and painting. This is a vanity which Aly readily allows the Greeks to indulge in, and though he exacts something in permitting them to rebuild or repair their churches, he is very moderate on these occasions, and desirous of encouraging the practice. Lelovo contains the ruined serai of a Turkish Bey who once possessed a considerable property here in land, but was stripped of it by the Vezir, and now lives in misery at Ioannina. All the better houses have spacious yards, in which the people delight to sit at this season, on a rude sofa raised upon sticks, and covered with fern leaves. These, when the leaves are fresh, are cool and agreeable, but they soon become dry and swarming with fleas, like every place in this country in summer where man inhabits.

§ 1.258   July 9.—At 9.40, Turkish time, we begin to cross the valley in a south-eastern direction, and having traversed it, as well as the range of hills which border it on the east, we arrive at 10.45 at the issue of a large stream which flows to the river of St. George.
We then ascend an uncultivated valley overgrown with bushes, and having passed through a wood of large oaks, fall a little beyond the summit of a low ridge, into the road from Kanza to Pendepigadhia, which here pursues the side of a woody and rocky height, about 100 yards above the river of St. George. The ruined channel of the aqueduct of Nicopolis follows the side of our road. Steep rocky heights covered with wood rise from the opposite bank of the stream. This is the main branch of the river, which joins the Gulf two or three miles to the northward of Nicopolis, and is usually called the river of Luro, perhaps from being collected into one body in the marshes of Luro. The river of St. George, although considerably smaller than the Arcadian Ladon, in volume of water, is broader and very rapid, falling with a great noise in a continued cataract over the rocks. This peculiarity leads me to believe that it was anciently named Charadrus; for although no author mentions any river besides the Arachthus in this part of Epirus, Charadrus was a natural name for such a rapid stream; and as Polybius twice alludes to a town of Charadra l, which in one passage he clearly shows to have been on the road from Ambracus to the Strait of Actium, there is every reason to believe that it was situated on this stream towards the gulf, and that it took its name from the river. Some ruins on its bank, at Rogus to the eastward of Kanza, mark probably the site of Charadra, as some remains of Hellenic walls are reported to be there mixed with the ruins of a town of the Byzantine empire.

§ 1.259   At 11.40 we descend upon the right bank of the river, which is here overshadowed by very large plane trees, and after following it for a few minutes, arrive at a spot where the larger portion of the river issues from a rocky opening, under the foot of the opposite hill, and joins the direct branch, which falls into it, over a ledge of rocks in a wide cascade. The subterranean river is said to be the discharge of a katavothra. A little higher up is a conjunction of several small streams which sink under the rocks. We continue to follow the right bank of the ravine, amidst plane trees, and soon arrive at a natural bridge formed by the rocks in the river’s bed, under which the water is concealed for the distance of 100 yards. Towards the upper end, a part of the subterraneous current may be perceived through a lateral opening in the rocks, and several small tributaries tumble over them, flowing in numerous rills among the planes, until just above the natural bridge they unite and disappear in a great whirlpool. Two hundred yards above this spot occurs the junction of two other principal branches; that to the right, which is the larger though not so broad as the other, rises near Potamia, and flows through the plain of Khierasovo and Koliadhes, the other comes from Ferekisi, where we crossed it near its sources in the road from Ioannina to Varia. A little above the junction is the ruined aqueduct of Nicopolis, built across the ravine of the Ferekisi stream, which rushes through the arches of the aqueduct over a stony bed.

§ 1.260   The beautiful effect of this ruin, fringed with shrubs, and which in the middle of the ravine is 70 feet high, with a double tier of arches, 18 feet wide, standing between two rocky, extremely abrupt, and woody mountains, and stretching over a rapid torrent shaded with enormous plane trees, it is easier to imagine than describe. The ruin is commonly known by no other name than that of σταίς καμάραις, or the arches. [sketch plan of aqueduct]
Besides the principal ruin there are remains on either bank of another row of arches, which crossed the ravine obliquely a little higher up the stream, and met the former in an acute angle, from whence began the conduit which was constructed along the side of the hills nearly as far as Luro. Across the valley of Luro it was probably again necessary to raise the aqueduct upon arches, though I did not perceive any vestiges of them. In the plain of Lamari, which the aqueduct crossed, long rows of the piers, as I have already mentioned, still remain, and the aqueduct may be traced, from thence to the western end of the hill of Mikhalitzi, and from thence to Nicopolis. The length was about thirty miles. Not a vestige remains in the bed of the river of the piers of the aqueduct B C nor can I discover from what sources it was supplied.

§ 1.261   The aqueduct A-C was filled by a stream which issues from the side of the mountain, at a church of St. George. In order to reach that place we are obliged to return down the right bank to cross the united river at the natural bridge, then the branch from Potamia, and lastly the stream from the church, which falls over the side of the mountain with the utmost rapidity, and supplies derivations for turning some mills. The source is in the mountain behind the mills, and issues in the church itself. When the aqueduct was in use, the water was of course conducted into it by an artificial channel; it now falls the whole height of the source above the bed of the river in less than half a mile. From the church we ascend in five minutes to the village of St. George. where we had intended to rest during the meridian hours, but find that it has been abandoned by the inhabitants on the news of our approach. Recrossing therefore the Potamia branch, and passing for half an hour over some heights, we enter the valley of Potamia, at the end of which, on the right, but not in view, is the village of Sfeliniki; and directly in front of us the summit of the Xeroviini, or Kelberini range, which is just above Kometzadhes. Having passed some copious sources which join the river, we follow the foot of the hill from whence they issue, and reach the bank of the river, which is here a deep and muddy stream flowing along a marshy valley covered with rice fields.

§ 1.262   In an hour from St. George, we arrive at Koliadhes, a village of fifteen houses, now abandoned by its inhabitants on account of the bad air and gnats.
All the villages in the valley have summer residences on the surrounding hills, a common practice both in Greece and Asia Minor. The summer village of Koliadhes I have already noticed as being in sight, to the left of the high road from Arta to Ioannina, between Kometzadhes and Pendepigadhia. Khierasovo is situated in the valley of the river of Potamia, at the foot of the mountain immediately over against Koliadhes; between these and Potamia, near which the river rises, there are six or eight other small villages inhabited in the season by cultivators of the rice-grounds, but which are all now empty. At a pyrgo at Koliadhes, where we halt, a Papas visits me, the only person left in the place, and who is losing his sight by a disease of the eyes exactly resembling the ophthalmia of Egypt. At 9 we set out again, continue to follow the left bank of the river, and the foot of the hills, from whence issue several sources, and at 10 quit the valley, which stretches considerably higher up, and turn to the right up an opening of the mountain, following a torrent which in some places is thickly shaded with stunted plane trees, until at 11.20 we arrive at the head of it at Pende Pigadhia. Pursuing from hence the ordinary road from Arta to Ioannina, we arrive at the Khan of St. Dhimitri at 2.35, lighted for the last two hours by the moon.

§ 1.263   Chapter VI EPIRUS, MACEDONIA.
JULY 14.—Having received intimation of some remarkable ruins at the foot of Mount Olytzika, I proceed thither this afternoon. The road, leaving Rapsista a quarter of a mile on the left, enters an opening in the ridge which borders the plain of Ioannina on the west, passes to the left of Kosmira, a village situate in the midst of vineyards; and after having crossed the ridge, descends into a narrow valley at the foot of Olytzika, on the side of which mountain are situated the four villages of Milyngus, Alepukhori, Tjerkovista, Drametjus, or Dhramisius: in that order from southeast to north-west, and consisting of dispersed houses prettily situated among gardens on the mountain side.

§ 1.264   The summit of Mount Olytzika, like most of the high mountains of this country, is a bare white limestone rock, deeply furrowed by torrents. Below this naked region there is a belt of firs, and then a cultivable slope.
The ruins, called as usual the Paleokastro, are in the valley immediately below Alepukhori, but nearer to Dhramisius. Here are the walls of a Hellenic fortress, crowning the summit of a small rocky height, which rises from the lowest part of the vale. The form is an irregular quadrangle, and the inclosed space is not more than equal to a square of 550 feet. Within the enclosure is a small subterraneous building, supported by rude pilasters, and formerly covered with a roof formed of flat beams of stone, which have now fallen in. The walls of the fortress, flanked with towers, are extant in some places to the height of 15 or 20 feet, and are from 10 to 15 feet in thickness, according as the ground required a greater or less defence. The towers are not uniform in size or shape, nor are the intervals between them equal: the faces of those at the angles are from 25 to 35 feet long; in the intermediate towers they are not so long. The flanks in general are about 15 feet. The irregularity of the fortress, although caused in some measure by the nature of the ground, seems to have been partly adopted for the sake of obtaining a convenient site for an immense theatre, facing the south, and separated only, at the back, from one of the angles of the fortress by a passage 27 1/2 feet in width. Like the theatre of Sparta, and many others in Greece, the middle part was excavated in the hill, and the two ends supported by two great masses of masonry, faced with rectangular stones, nicely fitted without cement.

§ 1.265   There were 65 or 66 rows of seats, of which the two lowest were cut in the rock. As usual in Greek theatres, the seats were divided into horizontal portions by precinctions or corridors, and vertically by cunei, separated from each other by radiating scalae or flights of steps, each step being half the height of a seat. There were two precinctions, dividing the seats into three divisions, besides a third corridor of the same kind at the top of the theatre: in the upper division were 22 seats, and there were perhaps an equal number in each of the two lower; but there is some difficulty in ascertaining this fact, for though the seats all exist, their component blocks are very much displaced by the effects of vegetation or other causes, and are lying in confusion. In the upper division of the seats there were twice as many scalae as in the two lower divisions, as may generally be observed in Greek theatres. Two broad flights of steps conducted from the exterior level, on either side of the proscenium, to the middle diazoma. The interior diameter or length of the orchestra is about 80 feet, and each wing being about 190 feet, the total diameter is 460 feet nearly: dimensions which place this theatre among the largest in Greece, such as those of Athens, Megalopolis, Sparta, and Argos. It differs, however, from all I have seen, either in Greece or Asia sufficiently preserved to afford a comparison, in having a cavea which, very little, if at all, exceeds the semicircle.

§ 1.266   In proportion to its diameter, therefore, it was incapable of containing so many spectators as some of those above mentioned. There are some foundations of the constructions belonging to the scene, which it would be interesting to excavate. [plan]

§ 1.267   On the north-eastern side of the theatre, and below the adjacent wall of the fortress, an enclosure, about two-thirds as large as the fortress itself, was surrounded on the other sides by a wall not more than half as thick as that of the fortress. It appears to have had an entrance by the side of a tower at its north-eastern extremity, and to have been separated by a narrow passage from the eastern side of the theatre. The slightness of the wall, and the remains of two temples in the enclosed space, evidently show that it was a sacred temenus, of which the theatre may have formed a part. Of one temple, which stood on higher ground than the other, and not far from the theatre, one or two columns only remain in situ; but of the lower temple, which is near the north-eastern end of the peribolus, or wall of the temenus, the lower parts of most of the columns are extant amidst the ruins. It was a tetrastyle, with at least 10 columns in the sides, about 70 feet long, and 25 broad, built of a coarse limestone, which is much injured by time. At one end of the temple, among the ruins, lies a piece of the frieze, ornamented with small capita bovis, connected by garlands formed of an intermixture of the vine with oakleaves, acorns, and ears of corn: the relief is very low, and roughly executed.
Below the temenus was a third enclosure, smaller than the former, in the shape of an irregular quadrangle, and enclosed to the southward by a wall still slighter than that of the peribolus. Nevertheless, a part of it still stands to a considerable height; and at its termination to the south-east was a large tower, with the remains of a gate

§ 1.268   on one side of it, and on the other a long narrow space in the lowest part of the valley, enclosed with the remains of a slight wall. But neither here, nor in any other direction, can I find any traces of town walls, such as were universally employed in the cities of Greece. Nor was this narrow valley, deficient in water, and closely surrounded by hills, such a situation as the ancients usually chose for their towns. As well from these circumstances therefore, as from the nature of the buildings, I conceive them to have composed a ιερόν, and place of public assembly, protected by a fortress, the dimensions of the latter not being even those of a κωμη, or small town. The position is so nearly central in the country of the Molossi, that it was probably a place of common sacrifice and political union for the use of all the towns of that division of Epirus. The valley is now chiefly cultivated with maize. The waters flow to the Kalama. Variadhes is about three hours to the southward, over the roots of Mount Olytzika.
Aug. 4.—The afternoon thunder-showers, which fell at Ioannina two days out of three during the months of June and July, and still oftener on the neighbouring mountains, have ceased for the last ten days. The heat reflected from the hill of St. George, on which the upper part of the town stands, as well as from Mount Mitzikέli, which has the effect of an immense wall on the opposite side of the lake, is unmitigated, except by the maestrale, which the former hill in great measure intercepts.

§ 1.269   The thermometer, about 3 p.m., ranges from 90° to 98° in the coolest places. The want of rain to carry off the accumulation of filth, which nothing else ever removes from a Turkish town, begins to infect the air; and the muddy edges of the lake send forth exhalations which render that quarter unhealthy.
This evening at sunset I set out for Kalarytes, one of the Vlakhiote towns of Mount Pindus, to the south-east of Ioannina; and in less than three quarters of an hour arrive at a khan, near the small village of Katzika, which is situated near the south-western angle of the Lake of Ioannina, not far from the foot of the hill of Kastritza. From hence, after reposing for a few hours in a dirty cabin, adjacent to the shop of the Khan, we proceed at half-past three, tempo Francese, as the Italians and Levantines call the mode of reckoning used by French and English: follow the hill of Kastritza, which rises from the southern extremity of the lake; and leaving it on the left, then pass through a narrow opening between it and some heights which are connected with the range of Xeroviini, into the valley of Barkumadhiwhich surrounds Kastritza, and to the eastward of that height touches the lake. Crossing the southern end of this valley, and leaving Ardhomista and two other small villages to the left, we ascend the ridge of Dhrysko, or Drysko, which separates this plain from the vale of the river Arta. All the land in the plain of Barkumadhi still belongs to

§ 1.270   Turkish beys of Ioannina, no part of it having yet become a tjiftlik of the Pasha. On the ascent of Drysko, we pass, at 5.15, a large monastery surrounded with oaks, named Eleokali, which the monks have abandoned on account of the frequent passage of late of Albanian soldiers by this road. At 6.50 we arrive at a chapel on the summit of the ridge; descend by a steep and very bad road, and at 8 ford the river Arta at the junction of a torrent on the left bank, where amidst barren mountains are a khan, some mills, and a few fields of maize.
A high narrow bridge crosses the river and another the torrent, but little use is made of them in this season. The river flows from hence through a very narrow vale to our right, and soon enters a deep ravine. To the left the snow-capped mountains, which stretch from Konitza to Metzovo, are seen above Mount Mitzikeli. We now climb for an hour one of the steepest ridges of Pindus, as far as another khan under one of the highest peaks, which is never entirely free from snow, and on the other side falls to Syrako. Having remained at this khan from 9.5 till 4.40, we begin to make the tour of the summit, passing round its southern extremity, and leaving on the right a succession of cultivated slopes, with rocky intervals between them, which reach to the Arta. In these slopes are several mills, turned by torrents from the mountain. The heights, which rise abruptly from the opposite bank of the Arta, and connect Dhrysko with Mount Xerovuni, are well cultivated by the natives of twelve villages called the Katzano,

§ 1.271   or Tomaro khoria. At half an hour beyond the khan, the side of the mountain is covered with immense fragments of rock, and innumerable smaller pieces —the effects of the fall of a part of the mountain which occurred about twelve years ago. My companion, a Kalarytiote, states, that the previous fall of a portion, and the appearance of the rest, gave sufficient warning; so that no damage ensued, except the destruction of the road. The ruin is half a mile in length, and the path through it winding and difficult. The immense rock of Djumerka now presents itself in face of us to the southward, the opening between which and the parallel range of Xerovuni displays a fine view of the Gulf of Arta, with its shores and the mountains of Xeromero beyond it. On the nearest part of Tzumerka is seen the village of Pramanda, and a cultivated tract, sloping northward to a large branch of the Arta, which before its junction with the main stream passes through a narrow gorge between two very high precipices. This branch of the river is formed of three streams, one of which flows from Matzuki, the middle from Viliza, the third and largest from Kalarytes and Syrako. We now cross over the ridge, of which we had been following the side, and at 7.15 arrive at a small church of St. George, situated on a narrow summit, three or four miles to the southward of the peak which is above Syrako. The church commands a view of Syrako and Kalarytes, both covering slopes of

§ 1.272   excessive steepness; the former just under the peak, the latter upon an insulated mountain, occupying a space between the ridge of Syrako and the still higher summits to the north and east, which form the central chain of Pindus. The third of the three streams above-mentioned passes between the two towns, which, although only two or three miles apart in a direct line, require as many hours to walk from the one to the other. Kalaryrtes, standing on the eastern side of its mountain below the summit, is hid by that summit from Syrako. Nothing can be more surprising than the sudden view of these two large towns on arriving at St. George, after travelling the whole day amidst precipices, arid rocks, and desolation. It is particularly in the present season that the contrast is most remarkable; for while the little patches of cultivation within view, show nothing but a dry stubble, the gardens among which the houses of the two towns are dispersed, are maintained in the brightest verdure by numerous rivulets originating in the towns, or a little above them, and which undoubtedly guided the first settlers in their choice of the two positions. All the surrounding scenery consists of bare rocks or parched elopes, except to the southward, where a peak rising to the left of the fork of the Kalarytes and Arta rivers, is covered from a little below the summit to the base with a thick forest of firs, mixed in the lower region of the mountain with other trees, and thus forming a most beautiful object in front of Kalarytes. Several of the lower slopes in the ravines of the rivers

§ 1.273   of Kalarytes and Syrako, are clothed with woods: but they form no decoration to the picture in the higher positions, being hidden by the depth and narrowness of the ravines; so that in descending from St. George to the river of Syrako, I was surprised to find myself suddenly in a thick forest of linden, maple, cherry, horse-chestnut, oak, elm, ash, beech, sycamore, and hornbeam, mixed with cornel, holly, elder, hazel, and a variety of plants of lower growth. The hill is so steep that the descent occupies half an hour by a continued zigzag. At the bottom the stream bounds over the rocks with a loud noise, and in some places forms deep pools which abound in trout; as all the neighbouring rivers are of a similar description, the Kalarytiotes are thus plentifully supplied with these fish in summer. They are most commonly taken by means of quick lime thrown into the head of the pool, which soon brings the intoxicated fish to the surface. In seasons of rain, nothing can resist the fury of the river: not long since, my Kalarytiote companion thus lost, in an instant, some mills and buildings which had given him a yearly rent of 1000 piastres. At the bridge, the road to Syrako branches to the left up the right bank of the river, until it arrives at a point immediately below that town, from whence there is an ascent similar to that which we follow from the bridge to Kalarytes. The latter resembles exactly the descent from St. George, excepting that it is not so woody.

§ 1.274   Like the descent, it occupies half an hour. At 8.30 we arrive in the upper part of the town.
Kalarytes or Akalarrytes, and Syrako or Serraku, are two of the largest of the Vlakhiote villages, which in number about 500, and none very small, are dispersed throughout the mountains of Epirus, Thessaly, and Macedonia. Vlakholivadho, near Olosona, is reckoned the largest, and then Metzovo. We learn from the Byzantine history, that the Wlakhs, in Greek Βλάχοι or Bλαχιώταις, occupied so large a portion of Thessaly about the twelfth century, that the whole country was commonly known by the name of Μεγάλη Βλαχία, or Great Wallachia. But it is the tradition of Kalarytes, that the Vlakhiotes have not been settled in this part of Pindus more than 250 years, which is very credible, as it is not likely that they quitted the more fertile parts of Thessaly until they felt the oppression of the Turkish conquerors, and their inability to resist it. The removal has not been unfortunate, for their descendants have thereby enjoyed a degree of repose, and have obtained advantages which their former situation could hardly have admitted. They began by carrying to Italy the woolen cloaks, called Cappe, which are made in these mountains, and much used in Italy and Spain, as well as by the Greeks themselves. This opened the route to a more extended commerce: they now share with the Greeks in the valuable trade of

§ 1.275   colonial produce between Spain or Malta and Turkey, and many are owners of both ship and cargo. The wealthier inhabitants are merchants, who have resided abroad many years in Italy, Spain, or the dominions of Austria or Russia, and who, after a long absence, return with the fruits of their industry to their native towns, which they thus enrich, and, in some degree, civilize. But they seldom return for permanent residence till late in life, being satisfied in the interval with two or three short visits. The middle classes pursue a similar course; but as their traffic seldom carries them so far from home as the higher order of merchants, they return more frequently, and many of them spend a part of every summer in their native place. These are chiefly shopkeepers in the towns of Turkey, or artisans, of whom the most numerous are tailors, and workers in gold, silver, and copper. They excel in mounting pistols and musquets in the Albanian taste, in making flisans or silver coffee cups, and in embroidering Albanian dresses. The poorer householders are chiefly carriers or shepherds. At Syrako are a few goldsmiths, who work chiefly at Prevyza and Lefkadha; but there the great body of the people are owners of sheep, shepherds, or carriers. The gardens, and the small quantity of arable land which surrounds these towns, are chiefly cultivated by the women, who reap the harvest as well as perform all the household work, and spin. Heraclides Ponticus remarks, that in Athamania the men tend the flocks, and the women till the

§ 1.276   ground; and we are here, if not in Athamania, at least very near it, and in a country altogether similar.
As some of the retired merchants have houses at Ioannina, and the shepherds drive their flocks in that season to the plains and maritime districts, Kalarytes in that season is chiefly inhabited by women, children, and priests; and as the snow lies sometimes five months in the town, or at no great distance from it, there is little communication with the surrounding country, and it is customary for every family to lay in a winter provision of rice, flour, oil, saltfish, and firewood.
Kalarytes and Syrako contain between five and six thousand souls, besides those who are abroad, amounting to about a tenth of the population. Each town has its iatros, or medical attendant, receiving a fixed salary from the public, and its dhaskalo, or master of literal Greek; but the latter teaches scarcely any thing more than the rudiments of the language, the illiterate parents taking little interest in a proficiency, which seems to them unnecessary, unless their children are destined to the priesthood; in fact, it adds little to their prospect of success in life.
The lower classes of Kalarytes (and the same is said to occur in all the villages of these mountains) preserve, in a remarkable manner, the ancient spirit of independence for which the Greeks were

§ 1.277   so remarkable. They will not easily submit to be household servants: and heads of families, who have not been abroad, are generally served by their wives and daughters; those who have been accustomed to different fashions abroad generally take servants from Ioannina or Trikkala. A Corfiote, who came to establish himself here as physician, could not for a long time procure any one to wait upon him, because he made use of a bell, which they said was fit only for sheep and goats. On the other hand their wives are perfect slaves.
As a community, their peaceable pursuits have been adverse to their retention of that independence which their ancestors conquered and long enjoyed in Northern Greece, and to which their almost inaccessible retreat in this part of Mount Pindus would have been extremely favourable, had they been as martial a people as many of the Greek and Albanian mountaineers. But they have made little or no resistance to Aly Pasha, who has been inclined to treat them with lenity, as well from that circumstance, as because the revenue of Kalarytes, and of some of the other principal towns, is an appanage of the Valide Sultan, who with her kiaya still enjoys great power at the supreme court. Aly regularly accounts, therefore, for the dues to the imperial treasury, and has hitherto endeavoured to avoid all flagrant cause of complaint from the rayahs of these places. The conquest of Suli, however, has of late rendered him bolder, and the people now complain of the angaria, or gratuitous labour of men and horses, for which they have often been called upon

§ 1.278   since the Pasha began to build the castle of Kiafa. The 14,000 piastres, which was formerly the amount of the contributions of Kalaryrtes, have gradually been raised to 45,000, and the town has been lately obliged to increase its public debt by 100 purses, which they have borrowed from Turks of Ioannina at an interest of 15 per cent. My host informs me that he pays 170 piastres a year, equal to 12L. or 13L sterling, in direct contributions.
The corn-fields of Kalarytes, which are chiefly on the northern and eastern sides of the town, and on the face of the opposite mountain in that direction, produce a sufficiency of wheat in favourable years for about four months’ consumption. In the present year the harvest has been very bad, and has scarcely returned double the seed. It is a bearded wheat, with short straw, and makes excellent bread. They are supplied with maize, wine, and oil, from Arta, wheaten flour from Trikkala, and a few articles, chiefly European, from Ioannina. Some of the narrowest terraces and most stony soils are grown with vines: grapes, apples, and pot-herbs are the principal produce of the gardens. For these and a few ordinary commodities and manufactures from Ioannina, they have a market on Thursdays and Saturdays, which is attended from some of the nearest villages. The surrounding mountains furnish an excellent pasture for sheep in summer, and large flocks are here tended by Vlakhiote shepherds during that season.

§ 1.279   Such is the steepness of the hill of Kalarytes, that the topmost houses are at least 500 feet higher than the lowest, and the vertical streets of the town are mere zigzag paths formed into steps. On the southern side, by which we approached the town, the position terminates in a tremendous precipice, the summit of which is so near to the church of St. George, on the opposite ridge, that words may be heard from the one place to the other; and the first intelligence is constantly communicated in this manner, on the arrival of passengers or caravans from Ioannina, which in winter are sometimes arrested there by a sudden fall of snow for several days. It is curious to remark with how much ease this τηλολαλία or distant conversation is carried on. It is an art which, as well as that of τηλοσκοπία, or of distinguishing distant objects, is possessed by the Albanians and mountaineers of Greece in a degree which seems wonderful to those who have never been required to exercise their ears, eyes, and voices to the same extent. The same qualities were among the accomplishments of the heroic ages of Greece, the manners and peculiarities of which have never been extinct in the mountainous and more independent districts of this country.
The houses of Kalarytes are all on a small plan, but generally neat, well arranged, and well furnished, according to Greek ideas of convenience. The hanging gardens which separate them are watered by streams from numerous fountains, supplying every part of the town with a cold and pure water, of which the Kalarytiotes are justly

§ 1.280   proud. The roofs of the houses are covered like those of Greek mountain-villages in general, with πλάκαις, or large slabs of a limestone, which readily splits into this form. These are squared more or less accurately according to the opulence of the owner, and in addition to other fastenings, generally require large masses of stone to be laid upon them, in order to obtain increased resistance to the furious winds which prevail in this elevated situation, and which in the winter often unroof the houses in spite of all precautions. Every dwelling of the better kind has a χειμονικόν, or winter apartment, in the lower story; above which is the principal chamber of reception, generally fitted with windows of coarse Venetian glass, but otherwise constructed and fitted up in that Turkish style which is so little adapted to the climate of these mountains.
The language of the Vlakhiote towns of Pindus differs very slightly from that of Wallachia, and contains consequently many Latin words, derived from the Roman colonists of Dacia. At Kalarytes all the men speak Greek, and many of the women; but the Wlakh is the common language both in the towns and among the shepherds. The Latin words are not so numerous as in Italian or Spanish, but the flexions and the auxiliary verbs, in some of their forms, are less changed than in any of the daughters of the Latin.

§ 1.281   The Greeks give the following expression as an example of the vocality of the Wlakh, a characteristic in which the Greek itself is not deficient: oao, aue, oi, aua αυγα, σταφύλια, πρόβατα, εδω. With the aid of these words, a party of Albanian or Greek palikaria may order their dinners on arriving at a Vlakhiote village.
On the north-eastern side of Kalarytes, a long declivity, which contains the greater part of the cultivable land belonging to the town, falls to a torrent, the middle one of the three tributaries already described, as forming one of the branches of the Arta. On the lowest part of the slope, on the bank of the river, stood the Hellenic town which possessed this secluded district. The ruins are in no part extant to any great height, though almost the entire circuit is traceable, consisting of a loose ill-constructed kind of masonry, of the third kind, but containing a few large masses of stone. The site is covered with vineyards in terraces, at the back of which some high rocks were the upper limit of the town; from the opposite bank of the torrent rises abruptly a rocky height, on the other side of which is Matzuki. A little below the ruins are some mills; the view from the ancient site is extremely confined on every side, except down the river, where the opening shows woody slopes folding over one another, with the mountains near Arta in the distance. The place is called Viliza, or Vigliza, a modification of the Romaic vigla, and like the Latin vigilo, from which

§ 1.282   it is immediately derived, may be traced to the same root as the Hellenic synonym Phyle.
The former state of the district of Kalarytes is preserved in the following proverb: κάστρον Βηλιζά, χωρίον Ματζύκι, Άκαλαρρύταις μαχαλά, και Συράκω πεντεσπητια, meaning that formerly Viliza was the fortress, Matzuki the town, Akalarrytes an outlying quarter of the town, and Syrako a little detached hamlet. But such is the change, that there are now 500 houses in each of the two last places, and in Matzuki only 25. Some years ago (it was before Aly Pasha gained Ioannina) there were 40 Turkish families at Kalarytes, but such was the influence of the Christians at that time with the Valide, that the Turks were removed to Vendista, on the opposite side of the Aspro.
It may be remarked in every part of Greece, that whenever circumstances, which are often occurring, though they are seldom very permanent, favour the industry and security of the Greeks in any particular place, and enable them to acquire some degree of comfort and opulence, they are never slow in tempting their tyrants to plunder them, by their imprudence and vanity, or by their envious and contentious disposition. The Vlakhiotes, who with less native acuteness than the Greeks, are endowed with more steadiness, prudence, and perseverance, are nevertheless like all republicans, (for such they may be styled, as well as the Greeks of the Eleftherokhoria, notwithstanding the despotism of the supreme government) seldom free from intestine intrigues and divisions.

§ 1.283   The Pasha takes care to be well informed of the local politics, and allows no good opportunity to escape of turning these, or any other accidental circumstances to his own purposes: Not long since, on discovering that G. T., one of the leading citizens, had lent a large sum to the town and was in great want of a repayment, which the town could not conveniently make; the Pasha offered T. his interference, on condition of his having a large share. Not many years ago, the Kalarytiotes were moved with the desire of having bells to some of their churches, one of the attributes of the temples of the Oriental Christians, of which, because forbidden by the Turks, they are particularly proud. Aly, though generally very indulgent on the subject of building and repairing churches, did not omit so good an opportunity of making the Kalarytiotes pay for their vanity, and exacted 15,000 piastres from them for the permission to have bells.

§ 1.284   Aug. 12.—At 4.30 this afternoon, I set out, in company with Messrs. John and David Morier, with the intention of climbing to the summit of the peak of Mount Pindus, called Kakardhitza, or Kakardhista, which bears S.E. from Kalarytes, and has the appearance of being the highest point in the whole range. Descending into the ravine of the torrent of Viliza, we cross it at some mills a little below the Palea Khora, or ruins before described. One of these mills is for corn, and another for fulling the skuti, or cloth for making the cloaks called Κάπαις, the chief manufacture of the Vlakhiotes. The torrent, bridge, and buildings, overhung by precipices, form a beautiful piece of mountain scenery. We cross the ridge which lies between the river of Viliza and Matzuki by a tedious zigzag ascent and descent, and arrive, in 1.45 from Kalarytes, at Matzuki, which is situated in a hollow immediately at the foot of Kakardhista, where a torrent collected from the great summits around, rattles along the ravine, and proceeds to join the streams from Viliza, Kalarytes, and Syrako. At the back of the village, towards the north-east, rises the steep ridge which connects Kakardhista with the summits towards Metzovo, called Peristeri and Tzikurela: like all the others, it is a white bare mass of limestone. The houses of Matzuki belong chiefly to persons, who keep shops for the sale of capots and a few of the other productions of Greece, in the islands of the Adriatic and Ionian seas, or in the maritime towns of Italy. The two most opulent of their traders are settled at Corfu. Very few of the men are now in the village. Those who reside are employed in the manufacture of capots, or as carriers with their mules, or in cultivating a few χωραφια, or fields of corn and maize, on the mountain side, or in the care of sheep and goats.

§ 1.285   The person of whom I have hired a mule for the expedition, who brought it to Kalarytes, and accompanied me on foot, kept a shop for capots, and other commodities, during seven years at Cadiz, and for another three years at Leghorn. He was at Rome when the French entered it the first time. Most of these people, as may be supposed, speak Italian. They ascribe the ruin of their town to the quartering of Albanian soldiers; the place being more accessible to this pestilence, than Kalarytes and Syrako. The annual contributions of the village amount to 9000 piastres, of which 6000 are paid to Aly Pasha, 500 to the Turkish Subashi for staying away, and the rest for the interest of money borrowed by the village, and other local charges. The burthen to each house increases with the diminution of the population: so that one of the proprietors of our mules has paid this year, as the head of a family, 110 Spanish dollars, or more than twice as much as some of the larger householders at Kalarytes, and has been obliged to borrow the money at Ioannina, at twenty per cent, interest. Beldani, who was made tutor to the Emperor Alexander, and his brother Constantine, by the Empress Catharine, was a native of Matzuki. He was a poor merchant at Leghorn when Alexis Orloff took him into his service, and carried him to St. Petersburg. Our hosts of the poor cottage in which we lodge, priding themselves on being μεσοφράγκοι, or half Franks in their manners, endeavour to prove it by giving us a covered table at supper, with plates, knives and forks. At 2 in the morning we set out to scale the mountain.

§ 1.286   August 13.—The ascent being very rugged, our progress is slow; the route crosses many small torrents, which flow to the right into a ravine, lying between this mountain and the pine-covered peak conspicuous from Kalarytes, which connects at its southern extremity Kakardhista with Tzumerka. At 4.30 the road being no longer practicable for mules, we mount on foot, during another hour, by a very steep ascent, where loose stones and earth, or grass dripping with dew, carry the feet half way back at every step. Towards the summit are some deep patches of snow, and a hoar frost on the grass. At a few minutes after sunrise we reach the highest point.
To the east the view is rendered indistinct by the sun being in that direction, and by an atmosphere not perfectly clear. There is a haze likewise over the sea on the opposite side; but this is the ordinary state of the atmosphere of Greece in the middle of summer, and a clear day in winter is much more favourable for obtaining a sight of distant objects. Nevertheless we distinguish Corfu, Cefalonia, and Mount Voidhia in the Morea. To the north, Mount Tomor, and the summits between it and Bitolia, are seen, particularly a peak between Kastoria and Filurina, to the right of which are those more eastward, towards Vodhena and Verria. The horizontal arch between N.E. and S. is bounded by Olympus, Ossa, Pelion, Othrys, and the mountains of Aetolia, of which latter the peaks called Velukhi and Viena are the most conspicuous.

§ 1.287   The remotest point which I can recognize is Voidhia, or Panachaicum, in the Morea; the direct distance of which is about 100 geographical miles. The ridges along the western coast from Xeromero to Khimara, are naturally much more distinct. To the north-west the geography of the valleys of the Upper Aous, in which Arghyrokastro, Tepeleni, Premedi and Konitza are situated, is well defined, though none of those places are distinguishable. Immediately below us, to the east, are the mountains of Aspropotamo, a confused mass, resembling the waves of a stormy sea; and to the right, those of Agrafa, of the same description: the highest summit of the former is nearly in a line with Pelium. Olympus has the appearance of being the highest point in sight. Of those in the Pindian ridge, none seems to rival Kakardhista, unless it be a summit near Samarina. Its height above the sea is probably about 7000 feet.
A great part of the course of the Aspro or Achelous is traceable from Kakardhista, though the river cannot be distinguished in consequence of the depth of the valleys in which it is encased, or the haziness of the atmosphere hanging over them. Its reputed sources are at Khaliki, a Vlakhiote village of 200 houses, situated midway between Kalarytes and Metzovo, on the south-eastern side of Mount Tzikurela, but not in sight from hence. As the name Khaliki, which is not uncommon in Greece, is generally a corruption of the Hellenic Χαλκίς, indicating the former existence of a Chalcis in the same place, it serves, in the present instance, to illustrate an hitherto unexplained passage of

§ 1.288   Dionysius the geographer, in which he evidently intended to remark that the Achelous rose at Chalcis. After receiving several streams from the mountains around Khaliki, the river follows the narrow ravines included between the summits in the district of Aspropotamo, and those of Kakarhista, Tzumerka, and Radhovisi. On the slope of one of the mountains in the last-mentioned sub-district of Arta, are seen the lands of Vrestenitza above the right bank of the river, near the bridge of Koraki, which is in the road from Arta to Trikkala, through Agrafa. From thence the Aspro flows for about 20.miles through a country, in which the great summits are more distant on either side, after which it again skirts the foot of a lofty rock of the Tzumerka chain, which is named Kalana, and is a conspicuous object from Prevyza. Here the river is again crossed by a bridge, called that of Tetarna, from a monastery on the left, and a few miles lower is joined by its principal tributary. The united stream then passes between perpendicular rocks into a country of woody heights, of secondary elevation, until it emerges near the ruins of Stratus into the great Aetolian plain. In almost every direction the mountains hide the valleys; Kakardhista being in the centre of the most mountainous part of Greece. The only plain in sight is that of Ioannina, with a small portion of that of Trikkala: Ioannina is the only town.

§ 1.289   The immense precipices of Tzumerka appear considerably below us: they hide Arta and all the Gulf, except a small part of its eastern extremity near Makrinoro, which makes its appearance between Tzumerka and Sakaretzi, as the mountain of Radhovisi is named.
Kakardhista is quite bare of trees or shrubs, but furnishes a fine short herbage to the very summit. A sharp rocky ridge, which connects it with the peak of Peristeri, separates the course of the waters flowing respectively to the Arta and to the Aspro, and divides the district of Malakassi in the kaza of Ioannina from that of Aspropotamo in Trikkala. The latter sub-district extends fifty miles down the river from its sources, comprehending the sides of the adjacent mountain on either side, and separating first Ioannina and then Arta from Agrafa. The right of pasturage is so accurately defined between Ioannina and Aspropotamo, that the flocks of one district are not allowed to enter the other. Kakardhista itself falls steeply into a deep ravine which lies between it and another lower but abrupt and rocky crest, which slopes to the Aspro.
We descend to a mandra, or sheep-fold, supported on each side by one of the palikaria, who have accompanied us from Kalarytes; and who, though with daggers and pistols at their girdles, and a musket slung over their shoulders, never make a false step, though bearing the weight of another person. Some goat’s milk, with bread which we brought with us, furnishes our breakfast. The annual profit of a yew in these mountains is reckoned as follows: two piastres for the cheese

§ 1.290   and milk, four piastres for the lamb, and half a piastre for the wool; out of which there is a clear gain of five piastres. From the mandra we reach Matzuki in two hours, leave it at 5 p.m., and in two hours and a half return to Kalarytes. So steep is the northern side of the hill of Matzuki, that it takes longer to descend than it had required yesterday to mount it.
The shepherds of these mountains, as well as those who tend their flocks around Ioannina, play on a pipe (in Greek φλογέρα, in Albanian fuol), which resembles that described by Theocritus, inasmuch as it has nine holes on the side, and is partly closed at either end with wax. But some of the modern pipes of Epirus have a singularity which has not been noticed by any author, being made of the thigh of the vulture, or of the eagle, which are bones of extreme hardness, and of a size well adapted to a shepherd’s pipe. These materials may be more common now than anciently, because gunpowder has given the moderns the power of bringing down such birds more easily than could formerly have been done by means of arrows. In the mountain pastures in every part of Greece, the shepherds may be heard, as the same poet has described, pouring forth a wild melodious strain from their pipes, amidst the murmuring of the waters, and the whispering of the wind through the trees. Theocritus has particularly referred to the pine as producing this sound. And the pine is doubtless the most psithyristic of trees. It is surprising that he has not noticed also the aromatic odour which emanates from it in summer.

§ 1.291   Aug. 31.—Leaving Ioannina this forenoon for Grevena, I follow the causeway between the lake and the foot of the hill of Kastritza, and having crossed the plain of Barkumadhi, arrive in two hours at the khan of Ardhomista, near the foot of Mount Dhrysko. The plain is covered with maize and melons, of both which the harvest is near at hand. After resting an hour and a half, we quit the khan, ascend in three quarters of an hour the ridge of Dhrysko, and in another quarter arrive at the khan of that name on the eastern face of the mountain, which is a continuation of Mount Mitzikέli, and derived, undoubtedly, its name from the oaks still growing here, and which anciently may have been larger and more numerous than they are now. The khan seems to have been placed here for the sake of a copious source of water, which the tatar, who accompanies me, and who has had long experience, declares to be the best between Ioannina and Constantinople. One of his corps brought letters a few days ago from

§ 1.292   Constantinople in four days and a half: thus performing two hundred computed hours, or six hundred miles of road distance, in one hundred and eight hours, including stoppages. To be appointed to such a journey as mine, is to be well paid for a comparative state of repose, and is considered, therefore, as a favour conferred upon the tatar by the Pasha.
After a twenty minutes’ halt we continue our descent, and in another twenty minutes arrive at the junction of the two great branches of the Arta: one flowing from Zagori, the other from Metzovo. The place and neighbouring valley are hence named Dhipotamo. A bridge of three arches, called the Lady’s Bridge, crosses the Zagori branch, which is the larger of the two, and is composed of a great number of streams collected in the hollow between Mount Mitzikeli and the parallel higher range, or central ridge of Pindus. On the side of the mountain of Syrako, above Dhipotamo, stands the village of Gotzista, divided into two makhalas, and surrounded with cultivated slopes. A point above it, which is separated by a ravine from the great mountain, is the site of a Hellenic fortress or fortified come, the walls of which inclose the summit and face of the hill.
In winter the road, after crossing the bridge, follows the right bank of the river of Metzovo. Instead of crossing the bridge, we ford the united stream, and then ride along the bed of the Metzovo branch, which, though consisting

§ 1.293   entirely of loose stones, is a saving in time, the line being shorter than along the ακραις, or rugged banks. Occasionally, however, we cross some of the akres. Like all the roots of the mountains bordering these valleys, they are covered with small oak, ilex, piraari, and a variety of shrubs, among which the lentisk is the most common. At 6 we arrive at a half-built kula of the Pasha, on the right bank of the river, where are a few fields of kalambokki. In winter, the road reaches this point from the bridge of the Lady, by crossing and recrossing two other intermediate bridges. On the heights to the left stands Khrysovitza, beautifully situated among the woods, and noted for its monastery of the Panaghia, whose festival on the 23d of August is resorted to by all the neighbourhood, particularly from Ioannina. At 6.35 we halt for the night at the Three Khans. situated on a height overlooking the right bank of the river, in a part of the valley where its direction and that of the river change from about E.S.E. to E. by N. The three khans may possibly be the successors of three Roman taverns; for Tres Tabernae is a name repeatedly occurring in the Roman itineraries; and although this road is not found in any of them, the general structure of the country is a sufficient proof that the pass of Metzovo was in all ages one of the chief thoroughfares of Northern Greece.

§ 1.294   The summit named Tzikurela, or Tzukurela, was immediately above us on the right, about half way up the valley. To the north-eastward is the other peak, called Peristeri; beyond which is the summit above Khaliki, of the same height nearly as that of Syrako, and situated midway between Peristeri and the southern end of the Zygos of Metzovo. The hills around the Three Khans are covered with vineyards and wood. At less than a mile beyond them, at the head of a slope of vineyards reaching to the river, is the village of Yutinos, and on a height on one side of the vineyards some remains of ancient walls called Lakhanokastro. The masons of Metzovo resort to it for the sake of the tiles which they find there. It was perhaps a Roman military station, for the defence of the pass, which is here more open than in any other part.
Sept. 1.—Our route continues along the river’s bed, crosses it several times, and at intervals passes over its woody and rocky banks by an execrable road. The village of Grevendista is situated among some cultivated slopes on the side of the mountain to the right. In seventy minutes we cross to the right bank by a bridge, a little above which is the junction of two branches of the river, one coming from Metzovo, the other from a valley to the right, in the direction of the mountain of Khaliki, which thus gives rise both to the Arachthus and Achelous. We ascend along the side of the mountain which overhangs the right bank of the Metzovo branch of the river, and at 8 a.m., in two hours from the khans, arrive at the northern and larger of the two makhalas, into which Metzovo is divided by the ravine. The northern is

§ 1.295   called Prosilio, as being exposed to the sun, while the southern being shaded by the mountain on which it stands, is named Anilio. The road to Trikkala passes through the latter, and then ascends the Zygos, or ridge, as a long woody mountain is named which has a north and south direction, and which separates the sources of the Arachthus from those of the Peneius, connecting Kakardhista and the ridge of Syrako with the Zagori summits and those near Konitza and Samarina. The streams descending from the western slope of the Zygos, are the principal feeders of the torrent which separates the two makhaladhes, of Metzovo, and which we followed from the bridge. There are about seven hundred houses in the two divisions of the town, which, together with Malakassi, a village on the eastern side of the Zygos, and two others is an appanage of the Valide Sultan. Formerly, in consideration of the expenses to which the Metzovites were subject from the passage of soldiers and travellers, they were liable only to the Kharadj, and to the payment of five thousand piastres a year to the Valide’s agent, for which advantage they were bound to ensure the safety of the Pass, and to maintain a body of armatoli under a captain. The Vezir, by paying a larger sum to the Valide than she before received, has obtained the Mukata, and exacts from the Metzovites fifty-five purses, besides obliging them to maintain an Albanian guard, nominated

§ 1.296   by himself. The adjoining slopes produce wheat, barley, and rye; but the wheat is not more than enough for the consumption of a month or two, and the barley still more insufficient, on account of the demand of passengers for their cattle. They have some large flocks of sheep and goats; but the greater part of the men, as in the other mountain villages on the borders of Epirus and Thessaly, seek their fortunes as labourers, artizans, and shopkeepers, in other parts of Turkey, or as merchants in Germany, Hungary, Russia, or the Mediterranean. Those who are not too distant, visit their families for a short time in the summer. The climate, in winter, is described as more severe even than that of Kalarytes.
At 2.25 we quit Prosilio, and mounting the hill for half an hour, arrive in a plain called Politzia, inclosed between the heights of Metzovo and Mavro-vuni, which is a long mountain covered with pines, lying in a north and south direction, and forming a northerly continuation of the Zygos. On its slope near the plain is a place called by the Vlakhi Beratori, a name supposed to be a corruption of Imperatoria. Wrought stones, coins, and similar remains of antiquity, are found there, as well as appearances indicative of some process of metallurgy having been carried on in the place. These vestiges, combined with the name, seem to show that a Roman settlement existed here earlier than that of the Dacian or Vlakhiote colonists, whose descendants now occupy these mountains.

§ 1.297   On the opposite side of the plain to Beratori stands a beech-tree, called in the Vlakhiote tongue Fago scripto, from some appearance of inscriptions on it. The plain produces in summer some rye, and a great abundance of excellent grass, all which is consumed by the cattle of Metzovo or those of passengers. During the remainder of the year the plain is either covered with snow or is in a state of marsh. There are no sheep or cattle upon it, though it is now dry; the soil apparently is good. The small streams which water it flow to the north, through the district of Zagori, towards Konitza, and are therefore the extreme tributaries of the Aous.
Having traversed the plain for an hour, we ascend a ridge connected with the northern end of Mavro-vuni, and covered towards the summit with pines, and at 4.30 arrive at the guard of the Tjankurtara derveni, after having passed a large khan of that name a little below the summit of the pass. At the derveni there is nothing but a temporary shed. Here the mountains Mitzikeli and Olytzika are seen in one direction, and in the other Mount Bimno, with the mountain of Siatista to the left of it, and nearer the lower hills about Grevena. After a halt of fifteen minutes we descend from the derveni through a dense forest of large pines, remarkable for the straightness of their stems. On the ascent where the trees are not so close, some of them are fifteen feet in circumference, and sixty or eighty feet high: several of them have been struck with lightning, and are burnt at the top.

§ 1.298   There is reason to believe from Livy, following Polybius, that this part of Mount Pindus bore the appellation of Citium, probably from a town of that name which stood in some part of the pass leading from Grevena to Ioannina. Mount Citium is mentioned by the historian in his relation of the expedition of Perseus, when he led an army of ten thousand infantry and three hundred horse to Stratus, in the winter of the year 170—169 B.C. On the third day from Elimeia, he reached Mount Citium, where he was much impeded by the deep snow, and with difficulty found sufficient space for encamping. The fourth day, in which his beasts of burthen particularly suffered, terminated at a temple of Jupiter Nicaeus; and the fifth, which was a very long march, at the Arachthus, where he was detained by the swollen state of the river until he had constructed a bridge. At the end of one day’s march from thence he was met by Archidamus, the strategus of the Aetolians, halted on the borders of Aetolia, and on the following day encamped on the Achelous, near Stratus. Perseus appears to have marched through Epirus because the Molossi had invited him, and because the Athamanes, who were on the more direct route, were in alliance with the Romans. As it is evident

§ 1.299   that he descended upon the right bank of the Arachthus, since otherwise there would have been no necessity for crossing it; and as he made only two marches from his bridge to Stratus, there can be little doubt that he crossed the river not far above Arta, and that his route from Mount Citium was either through Zagori into the plain of Ioannina, or through the same district in a more southern direction to Mount Dhrysko, the site perhaps of Nicaion, and from thence by the Tomarokhoria. In either case it follows, from the geographical construction of the country, that during the long march terminating on the right bank of the Arachthus, he pursued the course of that river, and during all that day perhaps was seeking for a passage. He then, probably, passed through the modern Rhadhovisi to the Achelous, or by the valley of Komboti into that of the Petitarus, but avoiding Ambracia, which was in the hands of the Romans.
After following for half an hour a small river, we arrive, at 5.40, at Milia, a Vlakhiote village of forty families, situated in the midst of the forest, on the bank of the stream. A few corn and maize fields dispersed on the hills around, and several mills on the river side, are all the property of the village, except the cattle, which they employ as carriers. We halt ten minutes, and then follow a good horse-path along the banks of the same stream, in a ravine bordered by a continued forest of pines; and at 7.20 quit the river, which here turns to the left of our route in a northerly direction along the foot of a ridge, which is thickly

§ 1.300   covered with pines, mixed occasionally with beeches and a few horse chestnuts. The numerous small caravans which we meet, show that this is one of the great lines of traffic between Epirus and Macedonia. At 7.30 we arrive at Krania, a Vlakhiote village of fifty neat cottages, pleasantly situated in an opening of the forest, amidst fields of maize and other corn, fenced with a well-made palisading. The scene has an appearance of comfort and successful industry seldom seen in Greek or Turkish villages: but, unhappily for these poor Vlakhiotes, their village has lately become one of Aly Pasha’s tjiftliks. The corn, after deducting the Vezir's portion, suffices only for a small part of the consumption of the inhabitants, whose means of subsistence are chiefly derived from the cheese of their sheep and goats; from the wood which they cut in the forest and transport to Ioannina and other towns; and from the profit of their horses and mules, which are let to traders and travellers. The master of the house in which I lodge, who possesses two horses and two oxen, formerly kept a shop at Smyrna, Constantinople, and Salonika; and now employs himself in transporting wood to Ioannina, Grevena, Larissa, and Trikkala, by which he is just able to pay the twenty per cent, interest on the money he has been obliged to borrow.

§ 1.301   Sept. 2.—This morning we arrive in half an hour at the summit of a ridge facing Krania to the eastward, just as the sun is rising behind the broad Olympus, as Homer so properly describes that mountain. The range which unites it with Pindus, and at the foot of which are the towns of Siatista and Kastoria, is seen stretching from Olympus to the north-westward. Our road is well beaten, and winds agreeably through a forest of pines and oaks, gradually descending until at the end of one hour and fifty minutes from Krania we pass, at 7.30, through Kiepero, one of the small Vlakhiote villages, of which we have seen several on either side of our road. At Kiepero men and women are employed in threshing rye, by driving a sledge with one man standing upon it, round the threshing-floor. The huts of the Vlakhiotes are well built, and neatly plastered with earth: and to the traveller afford better shelter than the cottages of a similar class among the Greeks and Albanians, the inner apartment being well protected against cold and rain in winter, and most of the cottages having a gallery in front, closed at either end; which is not too cool for a lodging in the fine season, when the inner part of every house, not excepting those of the Vlakhi, swarms with vermin.
From Kiepero, having descended rapidly the roots of the mountain where fields of corn and vines, fenced with pallisades, are intermixed with woods consisting of oaks of various kinds, and where the soil, like this side of Mount Pindus in general, seems capable of a productive cultivation, we arrive at 8.40 at the junction of two rivers.

§ 1.302   The larger is that which we followed down the vale of Milia, and left at Krania, taking there a turn to the left of our route; the other proceeds from the woody sides of Pindus on our right to the southward. A little below the junction a bridge crosses the united stream, which then flows eastward over a rocky bed of limestone, composed of thin flakes lying vertical to the horizon, along a valley closely bounded by undulated downs, like those which border the Orontes near Hama, but with banks not so high. Though now shallow, the river is wide, and in winter impetuous. It is called Venetiko. We follow the right bank for a short distance under a woody hill, then pass below a height of bare rock washed by the river, and afterwards along a narrow vale which is grown with stunted oaks and wild pears, and is bounded by woody hills, or irregular downs of fine corn land, a description of country which continues to a considerable distance below Grevena. At 9 we halt at the Khan of Venetiko, which has lately been built at the expense of a Tutunji, or smoke-master, of the Vezir, and stands on the river-side at a fountain of excellent water, issuing out of the side of the hill. The charge for eggs, butter, melons, water-melons, bread, salt, red pepper, and brandy, is about sixpence a head, which I have some difficulty in persuading my tatar is not unreasonable.
Departing at 10.15, we cross the river, and having followed its left bank for a quarter of an hour, traverse some downs to a much smaller stream, which, having also crossed, we immediately ascend, at 11.30, to the Metropolis of the bishopric of Grevena, where stand the cathedral

§ 1.303   church and palace of the bishop, surrounded by twenty Greek houses. The bishop I left at Ioannina. The Turkish Makhala of Grevena is a mile distant to the north-eastward, and though it contains only eighty families, is the chief place of Grevena which in the plural number comprehends a great number of small Turkish villages and tjiftliks. The country resembles Northern Europe more than Epirus or the other parts of Greece, consisting of an undulated surface, well supplied with sources of water, intersected by numerous streams, and diversified with beautiful groves of oak and other timber trees. Nor is the soil inferior to the aspect, but would produce corn in great abundance, if population and security were here in any moderate proportion to natural advantages. The many πράγματα φορτωμένα, or loaded horses and mules, which we have met on the road from Metzovo, and the far greater part of which were charged with flour, show that even now it supplies Epirus and the islands with bread.
The Venetiko and river of Grevena join the Vistritza, separately, to the eastward near the foot of Mount Burino; after which the united river winds round the southern extremity of that mountain to Servia, and having passed that town, flows northward through narrow valleys and deep chasms in the great Olympian range, until it emerges near Berrhoea, which town still preserves its ancient name. There can be no doubt that this great river, which the Turks call Injekara-su, is the ancient Haliacmon.

§ 1.304   The largest villages in the district of Grevena are Avdhela and Perivolio, inhabited by Vlakhiotes, and each consisting of about 300 houses. They stand near each other on the eastern side of the great ridge to the W.S.W. of Grevena, whence proceeds one of the branches of the Venetiko, which is joined before it enters the plains by those from Spilio and Krania. The Turks of Grevena occupy, as usual, the lower and richer lands. The largest of their villages are Tjurkli and Kryftissa, not far from the river which separates the district of Grevena from that of Anaselitza. To the southward, towards Stagus, Grevena extends six hours over unproductive hills, where the villages are neither large nor numerous.
Sept. 4.—From Grevena to Siatista. At 6.35 we descend in a quarter of an hour from the Metropolis to the Musulman quarter, which has a ruinous and wretched appearance, like all the Turkish villages of Greece. After following the left bank of the river for a quarter of an hour, we turn to the left across an undulated country, intersected by narrow valleys, where the cultivated land is mixed with woods of oaks. Neither the olive nor the mulberry for the silkworm, are grown in this country, which produces scarcely any thing but grain and cattle, with a little wine; but carts, which are not to be met with in the great plains of Arta, Ioannina, or Arghyrokastro, are used in agriculture; they are drawn by two oxen, run upon four solid trucks, and have a square space for the load, inclosed within wattled sides.

§ 1.305   At 7.45 we pass to the left of the small Turkish village of Kubla, and at 8.30, opposite to another similar hamlet called Dovrado, we cross a small branch of the Vistritza. From thence the road traverses a rich and pleasant country of the same description as before, but little cultivated, until at 9.30 we arrive at a khan, and a high narrow bridge of six arches called Pasha Kiupri, which crosses the Vistritza just at the point where, after having pursued an easterly course, it turns to the south along the foot of Mount Burino.
At 10.15 we quit the khan, and ford the river a quarter of a mile above the bridge, then immediately leaving to the right the road to Venja and Servia, we ascend the slope of the mountain of Siatista, having the Turkish village Iankovo a little on the left. An opening between the mountain of Siatista and Mount Burino shows the mountain of Verria, the ancient Bermius. Soon afterwards we enter the vineyards of Siatista, and mounting a rocky hill, arrive at the principal makhala called η χώρα at 11.45. After some delay we are sent to the lower quarter, named γιεράνη, from whence I am conducted back again to the Khora, to the house of Kyr N., one of the archons, and nephew of the bishop of Siatista, whose ordinary residence is here, but who happens at present to be at Selitza. His title is bishop of Sisanium and Satista, the vulgar pronunciation of which is Shatsta. His superior is the archbishop of Akhridha.

§ 1.306   The town, which contains about 500 houses, is situated upon a narrow level, between the upper and lower heights of a high rocky mountain, at the foot of which extends a large tract of vineyards. From this fruit the Siatistans make some of the best wine in Rumili, and which has an extensive sale in Macedonia and Thessaly, but is seldom sent into Epirus, on account of the difficulty of transport over the Pindus. The wine is of four sorts:—1. The ηλιουμένον, or sun-dried, which is a mixture of white and red grapes, left for eight days in the sun, or for six weeks in a covered building, after which the produce is a white sweet wine, of strong body and high flavour. 2. A dry, white wine. 3. A dry, red wine. 4. The αψιθινον, or wine of Absinthium, which is made also in other parts of Greece, and is flavoured with a species of Artemisia, laid among the grapes when placed in the press. This wine is sweet and high flavoured, but not the better for the wormwood. The Siatistans keep their wines three, four, five years, and sometimes more. Each considerable proprietor has a wine-press, and there are cellars under all the larger houses, exhibiting the agreeable spectacle of butts arranged in order, as in civilized Europe. The most stony soils are held to produce the best wine. The grapes this year have not attained their full growth, in consequence of the want of rain, and the vintage, it is expected, will be small in quantity, though good in quality.

§ 1.307   I was not a little surprised to observe the proofs of drought in the appearance of the vineyards, the weather having been very different in Epirus. It shows the great atmospheric difference between the two sides of Mount Pindus. Besides their wine, the Siatistans have to boast of the excellence of their mutton, fed on the delicate herbage of their limestone mountain; and of an abundance of game. The hares are even troublesome, being so numerous, that when the snow lies upon the vineyards, as it often does in the winter for many days together, it is a common custom to go in pursuit of them without dogs, and to kill them with sticks, half famished as they then are, and unable to run. A little earlier in the season they afford good sport, and coursing is a common amusement of the Siatistans. Our mode of killing partridges on the wing they are not accustomed to, nor have I seen it in any part of Greece. The birds, indeed, which are all of the red-legged species, are larger, longer in their flight, and wilder than ours; and it is not very easy to shoot them. To catch them in nets is the common practice in Greece, but they are seldom seen for sale in the markets. They are more abundant however in Macedonia and Epirus than in Southern Greece.
Almost every family in Siatista has one member of it residing as a merchant in Italy, Hungary, Austria, or other parts of Germany, and there are few of the elders who have not spent ten or twelve years of their lives in one of those countries. German is of course very generally spoken, and Italian almost as much.

§ 1.308   The houses are convenient, clean, and well furnished, and the people more curious in their tables than any I have met with in Greece. This, as the stipendiary physician of the place observes to me, is almost the only source of disease, so healthy is the air and situation. But they drink, he remarks, rather too much of their own good wine, of which one of his patients is an example, who is now dying of the effects of a fall from his horse, after an indulgence of that kind. This physician’s name is Paul Renaud, son of a Frenchman, who was attached to the English Consulate at Zante. His brother is now French Commissaire in that island, and there was a third brother in the English East India service, who rose to be agent at Busra. All this, which I happened to know, was news to M. Paul, who, having written to his brothers some years ago and received no answer, had long been ignorant of the fate of them both.
The Siatistans complain bitterly of the oppressions of Aly Pasha. They say, that not contented with robbing those who have, he puts in prison those who have not, and thus succeeds sometimes in extracting money from their relatives.
The ordinary annual payments, regular and irregular, amount to five hundred purses, besides which the bishop makes the Vezir an annual offering of 4000 piastres, 2000 each half year. Such has been the practice for the last twelve years. Like the Kalarytiotes, the Siatistans have lately been obliged to supply workmen and horses for the castle of Suli.

§ 1.309   When Aly makes a tour round this part of his territory, he never fails to visit this place. The Archons generally meet him in the plain, and offer perhaps twenty purses, begging him not to come into the town. He receives the present with smiles, promises that he will not put his friends to inconvenience, afterwards comes a little nearer, informs them that no provisions are to be had in the plain, and after being supplied upon the promise of not entering the town, quarters on them, in the course of a day or two more, with his whole suite, perhaps for several days, nor retires until he has received a fresh donation. In these progresses he expects something from every village, and will accept the smallest offerings from individuals. His sons in travelling fail not to follow so good an example. As he dares not exercise this kind of oppression in Albania, the districts on the eastern side of Pindus are the great sufferers; and neither pestilence nor famine are more dreaded by the poor natives than the arrival of those little scraps of coarse paper scrawled with a few Greek characters, and stamped with the well-known little seal which makes Epirus, Thessaly, and Macedonia tremble. Sometimes these papers contain a request, that in consequence of a momentary want of money, they will supply him with a few purses, and place them to his account, though he has never been known to admit of any deduction in consequence of these loans from the annual contributions. It is admitted, that sometimes the Pasha is supplied with a pretext for his extortions by the Greeks themselves, who have the folly to refer their quarrels to him. In these cases, after extorting something from both

§ 1.310   parties, he commonly ends by sending his decision by some faithful servant, with an order that he shall receive 500 or 1000 piastres for his trouble in carrying the letter. This is generally some favourite Albanian, who, having been for several years employed in executing the Vezir’s orders without reward, is at length recompensed in this manner at other people’s expence. Not long ago the riches of a certain great cattle-feeder, brother-in-law of Kyr N., having excited the Pasha’s avarice, was kept in prison until he had paid thirty purses, and was then obliged to feed his cattle in certain pastures of the Vezir’s not far from Siatista, where His Highness hired thieves to carry off 2000 sheep. The usual mode of squeezing a rich man, is to send for him to Ioannina, and put him in prison upon some pretended accusation. There are no means of avoiding the summons but by flight, which with a family is extremely difficult, as the Pasha generally takes care to keep a strict watch upon the motions of all the relatives of those who are known to possess property. Numerous emigrations have, nevertheless, taken place, in consequence of the late Extension of Aly’s power; and many of the merchants of Moskhopoli, Korytza, Kastoria, Selitza, Kozani, and Servia, instead of carrying on commerce as formerly with correspondents or relatives in Germany, or other parts of Europe, have withdrawn into those countries, while some have migrated to other parts of Turkey. The Osmanlis of Thessaly and Macedonia entertain as great a dread of Aly as the Greeks themselves, and perhaps a more keen hatred; because it is inflamed

§ 1.311   by a consciousness of military inferiority. On the other hand, the Greeks of these countries are ready to admit that they are much more secure now from the lawless depredations and highway robberies of the Albanians than they were before the extension of Aly’s power over these districts, when there was little safety in the roads; and when Siatista among other places had often to resist the organized attacks of Albanian freebooters made in great force. Hence the houses of the town have all been built with a view to defence as well as comfort. Each has its small garden, but which, from the deficiency of water, serves only to supply a few vegetables in the spring and early summer.
Sept. 5.—This forenoon, in company with Kyr N. and M. Renaud, I visit the Boghaz, or Klisura of Siatista, a remarkable pass, leading from the champaign country of the Injekara, or Vistritza, into the plain of Sarighioli. The latter name is a Turkish word, meaning yellow lake; the common use of which by the Greeks in preference to their synonym λίμνη κίτρινη, shows that we here approach the limit of the general use of the Greek language. Sarighioli comprehends a large extent of level country, subject to inundations, one of which is in part permanent. We were twenty

§ 1.312   minutes in descending from Siatista through vineyards to the beginning of the pass, from whence in one hour and twenty minutes more we arrived at the end, where it opens into a plain which branches off to the left behind the mountain of Siatista, and from thence conducts into the district of Kariani, or Karaianni, which, like Sarighioli and another named Djuma, to the eastward of the former and southward of the latter, is inhabited chiefly by Turks dispersed in many small villages. The whole of this champaign country is bounded eastward by a lofty range of mountains, branching northward from Olympus, and at the eastern foot of which stand the Greek towns of Verria, Niausta, and Vodhena, on the edge of the great plain of Lower Macedonia, which extends to Saloniki. Karaianni is separated from Sarighioli by a ridge of inferior heights, and from the district of Kozani, which town is situated three or four hours eastward of the Klisura, by other hills of greater elevation which branch from Mount Burino.
The Klisura of Siatista is a valley about a quarter of a mile in width, included between the mountain of Siatista, which is a high white naked rock, and another mountain to the south equally steep and lofty, but green with shrubs. The latter is called Tjervena and is connected to the southward with Burino: it is noted among the sportsmen of Siatista for its abundance of partridges. The vale of Klisura consists of open corn land, interspersed with wild pear-trees, which, though one of the

§ 1.313   most common natives of Greece, are not indigenous here, but are planted by the peasants, to whom they are recommended by the toughness of the wood serving many useful purposes in agricultural machinery, and by the dense shade of the tree, which never grows to such a height or expansion as to injure the corn. The lands of Karaianni and Siatista meet in the middle of the pass: near this spot stands the tomb of Selim Bey, of Monastir, who, after having been kept in prison at Ioannina seven years by the Vezir, was at last dismissed with an appearance of friendship; but on his way home was strangled in his bed at Siatista by one of his own attendants. Having returned from the Klisura to Siatista, I set out from thence at 4.15, with the same two gentlemen as companions, for Selitza, which lies in the opposite direction to the Klisura.
There are two Hellenic ruins near Siatista, one on the face of Mount Tjervena, three quarters of an hour distant from the lower makhala of Siatista, at a village which receives the name of Paleokastro from the ruins. The other bears the common Bulgaric name of Gradish, or Graditza, and stands on the highest point of the lower ridge of the Siatista mountain, in front of the upper town. Neither of them being of large dimensions, they may both, perhaps, have been fortresses, dependent upon a city which occupied the site of Siatista itself. By the learned of this place, Graditza is supposed to be the ancient Tyrissa, a Macedonian city noticed by Pliny and Ptolemy, but as the latter places

§ 1.314   its name next to that of Europus in Emathia, there is reason to believe that Tyrissa was very far from hence to the north-eastward. Whatever the name may have been, the situation was of great importance, as commanding the principal entrance into Macedonia from the plains of the Haliacmon, which river was here the boundary between Upper Thessaly and Upper Macedonia. It seems to have been near Siatista that Domitius Calvinus was encamped when opposed to Scipio, while Caesar was employed against Pompey in Illyria. We learn from the Commentaries that Scipio occupied some heights on the right bank of the river, at a distance of about six miles from the camp of Domitius. Scipio leaving twelve cohorts under Favonius, with orders to fortify his position, attempted to surprise Longinus, who commanded a legion of Caesarians in Thessaly, but was speedily recalled by Favonius, and returned just in time to prevent an attack upon him from the superior forces of Domitius. Soon after his return, Scipio crossed the river, but no action ensued; and on the second night he found it prudent to resume his station on the right bank. In a subsequent attempt to surprise the enemy's foragers, eighty of his cavalry were slain, and soon afterwards he was tempted to quit his strong position by a stratagem of Domitius, who pretended to retire for the sake of obtaining supplies, but withdrew only three miles into a pass, which concealed his whole force.

§ 1.315   The cavalry and light-armed in advance of Scipio, on entering the pass, discovered the ambuscade, but too late to prevent the loss of two turmae and a prefect. The Klisura of Siatista seems perfectly adapted to this transaction from its nature and its situation relatively to the Haliacmon, but still more as being the Gate which led from the extensive open country watered by that river through Sarighioli, which was probably the ancient Eordaea into Lyncestis; for we learn from Caesar, that Domitius afterwards really retired to Heraclia (of Lyncestis), where he narrowly escaped from falling into the hands of the enemy, marching into Macedonia after his victory over Caesar at Dyrrhachium. A position in front of a pass, which secured the entrance into a large extent of fertile country, was exactly such as we may suppose to have been chosen by Domitius for his camp.

§ 1.316   CHAPTER VII MACEDONIA
SEPT. 5, (continued).—Leaving the peak of Graditza on the left, we descend the mountain from Siatista by a rocky road, and at 5 enter again the plain of the Vistritza; where near the foot of the mountain, to the left, the river Pramoritza joins the Vistritza below the village of Tzenisia. We continue our route along the foot of the ridge of Siatista, and at 6.20 arrive at Selitza, which is situated in the hollow of a ravine descending from the summit of the same mountain, and at the head of a slope which towards the Vistritza is covered with vineyards. Numerous springs water the gardens of Selitza, and render the situation preferable to that of Siatista in every respect except those of its healthy elevation and coolness in summer. Selitza is two or three miles distant from the river which here pursues a course

§ 1.317   parallel to the foot of the mountains, and receives from them several small streams. The summit above Selitza, which is higher than either of the other points of the same chain, namely, Burino, and the mountain of Siatista, is named Σινιατζικον, vulgarly pronounced Sinatjko. On the other side of it are the villages Platissa and Pepelista, below which lies the plain of Sarighioli.
In front of Selitza, beyond the great valley of the Haliacmon, the entire range of Pindus is presented to view, from the summits near Metzovo to a point beyond Korytza, called Xerovuni. Mount Smolika, or Zmolska, above the Vlakhiote town of Samarina, is the most remarkable peak, beyond which, above the centre of the range, and to the left of Mount Smolika, is seen the great ser rated rock called Lazari, which is near the village of Papingo in Zagori, and not far to the southward of Konitza. The undulated low country, which borders the Vistritza and its western branches, constitutes the district of Anaselitza, of which the Turkish Kassaba or capital, named Lapsista, is visible at the distance of a few miles to the westward. Selitza formerly contained many Greek merchants trading to Germany, but having fallen into the hands of the Vezir Aly, it has been abandoned by them. The houses are tolerably built, and have good gardens; the vineyards yield a wine not much inferior to that of Siatista; the other cultivated lands produce wheat, barley, maize, and millet; but none of the richer productions of lower Macedonia or Southern Greece are found in

§ 1.318   these cold regions; neither silk nor cotton, rice nor oil. An olive tree planted by the bishop in his garden at Siatista did not thrive after the second year. On my inquiring of the bishop for remains of antiquity, he sends for an inscription which he has partly traced in charcoal, and partly copied, but without attending to the lines of the original, from a marble still existing in a monastery near Sisani, which, though now only a small village, is one of the places from which his bishopric takes its title. The monument shows that at Sisani, or near it, stood a city of some importance, but not named in the inscription,—an unfortunate omission, as the ancient authors have left no description of this part of the country sufficiently precise to supply the deficiency. Elimeia I should conceive to have been nearer to Grevena. The inscription is complete at the beginning, but imperfect at the end; it contains a list of Ephebi, with the names of the gymnasiarch and ephebarch, and a notice that the city supplied the oil for the gymnastic exercises. It is dated in the year 135, which, taken from the battle of Actium, corresponds to 105 from the birth of Christ, or the eighth year of the reign of Trajan.

§ 1.319   Sept. 6.—After treating the bishop with an English breakfast, which seems not much to his taste, I proceed on horseback with my two companions to the monastery of St. Athanasius, situated in a wood on the side of Mount Siniatziko, and afterwards to one of the nearer summits on foot, a laborious walk, and scarcely worth the fatigue, as the height commands no very important points that are not seen from below, with the exception of Olympus, which rises above the ridge of Siniatziko in all its breadth and majesty, and shows its superiority to this range still more strikingly than from the plain. A little to the left of Olympus appears the mountain of Livadhi, or Vlakholivadho, a large Vlakhiote town, four hours beyond Servia, in the direction of Olympus. On a little elevated plain between us and the summit which rises above Siatista stands Konasko, a small village formerly noted for the skill of its inhabitants in the use of the musquet, their activity in climbing the mountains, and those other qualities of the independent mountaineers of Greece and Albania, one of which was generally a disposition to robbery. They have been subdued, and are now kept in quiet by the strong arm of Aly Pasha.
The monastery contains at present no more than three monks, all the others being absent on their usual tours of begging, which sometimes carry them as far as Germany. The house is supported by these means, and by the produce of a few corn-fields and sheep pastures in the bosom of the mountain, assisted by the presents made to the church by the neighbouring

§ 1.320   inhabitants, who often come in the summer to pass a day or two in this pleasant retreat, and on the festival of the saint, frequent it in considerable numbers. The monks are building a new konak for the accommodation of their profitable visitors, while a painter, who has the reputation of being one of the best in Greece, is employed in the church in retouching, new silvering, and gilding the pictures of the saints. In the minutiae of drapery, in the expression of muscles and features, his effect and finishing are remarkable, while the figures themselves are in the usual Greek taste, intolerably stiff and unnatural. But they resemble in many respects the early productions of the Italians, among whom the revived art of painting had its beginning in the pictures of the Greek church. The same painter is the most celebrated performer on the violin in this part of the country, and fails not to be in attendance whenever there is an assembly at the monastery.
At 3.20, taking leave of my two companions and the bishop, I proceed through the vineyards at the foot of the mountain, and cross at 3.50 a small branch of the Haliacmon, coming from the mountain on the right. Sisani stands on the right bank of this stream, at the distance of two hours from this spot. The hills seen up the glen are well wooded, and are not so high as the bare white summits above Selitza and Siatista.

§ 1.321   We proceed over the barren roots of the mountain by a rugged road, having the river on our left, very near the foot of the hills. At 5.25 we cross another tributary of the Vistritza, where it emerges from an opening between steep banks, which leaves only a small level on either side of the stream, where are some mills and cultivated lands. Beyond the river we pass through a pleasant grove of oaks and elms, again cross the roots of the mountain, and arrive at 6 at Boghatziko, a large village situated at the head of a slope covered with vineyards, and immediately at the foot of the mountain, in a situation very similar to that of Selitza, except that here is no ravine at the back. The roads about the village are made practicable for wheel carriages, and the cars, instead of running on trucks, have wheels with spokes. It is the only place in Greece where I have seen agricultural mechanics in so advanced a state. Boghatziko is a Kefalo-khori, producing little grain, but a considerable quantity of wine. The principal inhabitants are masons and carpenters, who find work at Constantinople, and in the other principal towns of Turkey, and after residing there for several years return home with their gains. The village belongs to the ecclesiastical province of Sisanium and Satista, but like several others in this part of Macedonia, accounts for its taxes at Olossona.
The district of Anaselitza, which extends in front of us, along the opposite side of the river, contains upwards of 100 villages, the greater part of which are small; about one half of the number are Turkish. In the opposite chain of mountains, a rocky summit, towering above the others, and bearing W.S.W., is called Rushotari. On this side of it stands the Greek village of Tzoban, on the other Burbutziko. Between them is a derveni, which leads from Anaselitza into the Albanian district of Kolonia, and the valleys of the upper Viosa, or Aous.

§ 1.322   Sept. 7.—Sending forward my baggage by the direct road to Kastoria, I begin to descend at 6 through the vineyards of Boghatziko, pass over a fine plain, quite uncultivated, and at 6.45 cross the Injekara, for the purpose of visiting Bobushti, a small Turkish village situated on the summit of a steep bank above the river, where, agreeably to the information which I received at Boghatziko, I find an ancient statue. It is of white marble, draped, and of the human size; the head is wanting, and the legs and feet are buried in the ground, in which manner it serves to support a stone trough, made to convey water to the village fountain. The right hand is folded in the mantle over the breast with the fist clenched, the left hand hangs down by the side. The drapery is heavy, and the whole performance indifferent. Near it are several wrought stones, which belonged to some ancient building; but there is no appearance of any walls or other indications of the site of an ancient town. After a loss of three quarters of an hour at Bobushti, I follow the heights near the river, over a rich but uncultivated soil, and then descending from them, re-cross the Injekara at 8 by the bridge of Smighes, probably so called because the river just below it is joined by another stream which issues from the Lake of Kastoria.

§ 1.323   This point is less than an hour from Boghatziko by the direct road. At the bridge the slope of the mountain reaches to the left bank of the river. We now cross a plain higher than the level of the river; at its extremity to the right is the Lake of Kastoria, on the margin of which we arrive at 9.30. The waters are stagnant, putrescent at the edge, and entirely covered with a green pellicle. The town appears on the opposite side, built on an isthmus, which connects a high rocky peninsula with the north-western shore. The peninsula extends into the middle of the lake, and a large monastery is seen at its extremity on the water side. Having skirted the western shore of the lake, we enter some gardens abounding in walnut trees, and halt among them at 10.10, near the gate of the town, waiting for the return of the tatar, whom I had sent forward to provide a lodging, with a letter of recommendation from Siatista, to Kyr T. Κ., one of the primati. After some delay we are conducted to the house of a papas, where I am soon afterwards visited by Kyr Κ., who is now very pressing that I should remove to his house, which, under, the circumstances, I decline, though my konak is humble enough, compared with the handsome houses of some of the Greek merchants, particularly that of Kyr K. himself. It would seem that the merchants of these Macedonian towns have lost something of the barbarous virtue of hospitality by a residence in civilized Europe, though at Kastoria something may perhaps be ascribed to an anxiety to resist every infringement of an ancient privilege which exempts the Greeks of this place from the burthen

§ 1.324   of lodging passengers. A traveller is the more sensible to this difference of reception, as the Greeks in general are eminently of a social character, and practise hospitality to a degree which could hardly be expected in their poor and oppressed condition. But without this advantage, travelling in the Levant would hardly be tolerable; for although the traveller may, by the power of his firmahn and of Turkish attendants, force his way into the Christian houses, he would be disappointed in his objects of inquiry if he were not generally met by a disposition to hospitality. This indeed is the most agreeable characteristic of Oriental travelling, as it gives the traveller a better view of manners than can possibly be obtained in civilized Europe, in moving from one inn to another, and thus more than compensates for the inconveniences arising from the want of public accommodation. In point of expense, there is no saving, or rather, notwithstanding the greater value of money in Turkey, the Oriental mode is the more expensive of the two, the traveller’s attendants being more numerous than are necessary in civilized Europe, and the presents which he makes at departing to the lower class of householders with whom he lodges, or to the servants of the rich, amounting generally to as much as would pay the bill at the most expensive inn in Christendom. I met with a similar delay at Metzovo as at Kastoria in obtaining a lodging, and at Siatista should probably have found still greater than that which occurred, had not Kyr N., being a nephew of a bishop, been particularly fearful of offending the Vezir’s musafir, or stranger guest.

§ 1.325   Kastoria, or, according to the vulgar transposition of the accent in this termination, Kastoria, contains about 600 families, of whom the Jews form a tenth, and the remainder is divided equally between Turks and Greeks. All the population of the villages is Greek, with the exception of a subashi, or agent, in some of the Turkish tjiftliks. The present Turkish commandant is Demir Bey, who pays the Porte 25 purses a year for the mukata, or farm of the revenue of the district, which includes fifty villages. His family is of long standing at Kastoria; Mehmet, the head of the house, is now at 'Akhridha with his troops, on the public service; for these Beys, being Timariots, hold their lands on condition of personal service, and are bound to the maintenance of a certain number of men, who receive provisions from the government when called into the field. A third brother resides at Ioannina by command of Aly Pasha, who generally takes care to keep one member of every principal family near him. Their father was beheaded by the Porte.
The Lake of Kastoria is reckoned a six hours ride in circumference, but does not appear to me to be above six miles long and four broad. The peninsula is near four miles in circumference, and the outer point is not far from the centre of the lake. In the evening I make the tour of the peninsula in a canoe, in company with Kyr K. The monoxyla of this lake are longer and better made

§ 1.326   than those of the Lake of Ioannina; that in which I embark is 15 feet in length, so deep that a man sitting down at the bottom is quite concealed, and is capable of holding thirty persons. [sketch]
The two ends, which are exactly alike, are raised above the gunwhale, and hollowed within, so as to furnish a very comfortable seat with a back, while by their form they improve the outward appearance of the boat. Towards the stern, two outriggers, with an upright at the extremity of them, furnish a pivot for the oars, which thus placed have great power, and are capable of turning the boat round upon the head, as a centre, with remarkable quickness and ease. The annual value of the fish caught in this lake amounts to 100 purses. Besides the quantity consumed fresh in the town and surrounding villages, which are supplied from hence in winter, as far as Korytza, a

§ 1.327   large proportion is salted and meets a ready market in every part of Macedonia and Thessaly. Though the lake is now entirely covered with a green surface, and the water is hot, turbid, and by no means tasteless, it is preferred for drinking to the water of the wells, and of some fine springs at the foot of the hills beyond the gardens, which are all considered as βαρυά vtpa, or heavy waters. In fact, when cooled in jars, the lake water is not disagreeable, though I should never have thought of preferring it to the clear and sparkling produce of the springs; but the Greeks are extremely curious upon the subject of the quality of water, and attentive to its possible effects upon their health; in which they are prudent, as they drink an immense quantity of it in summer, especially in those fasts when they live chiefly on salted provisions. The fish of the lake are carp, tench, eels, and the γουλιανός; carp are taken, weighing 15 okes, eels 4 okes, and Kyr K. has seen a gulianos weighed of 64 okes, or 176 lbs., but they are sometimes much larger. The fishery of the lake, which forms part of the Mukata, is let by Demir Bey for 12 purses to Hassan Effendi, who exacts from the fishermen of the town one third of the produce of the sale, and grants the privilege to those of Topiakos, a village on the side of the lake, for 10 piastres a year to each person. All modes of fishing are allowed; the Topiakiotes chiefly employ traps, and the Kastorites round spreading nets, or seines, which are sometimes 200 οργυιαίς in length.

§ 1.328   The lake is frozen over occasionally when the north winds are constant in winter; seven or eight years ago carts passed across upon the ice.
The Lake of Okhri, in Greek 'Akhridha, and sometimes Okhridha, differs essentially from that of Kastoria. Its waters are extremely bright and clear, though perfectly sweet and fresh. It never freezes, and abounds in trout, which are not found in the Lake of Kastoria.
The present fortification of Kastoria consists only of a wall across the western extremity of the isthmus, which was built in the time of the Byzantine Empire, and has a wet ditch, making the peninsula an island. The wall has been slightly renewed by the Turks, who keep it well whitewashed, which among them often serves instead of a repair. In the middle of the wall stands a square tower, through which is the only entrance into the town. A parallel wall, flanked with round towers, which in Byzantine times crossed the peninsula from shore to shore, and excluded all the eastern part of it, although now in ruins, still divides the Kassaba, or quarter of the Turks, from that of the Greeks, whose town occupies the middle of the peninsula, and extends down to the water on either side of it.
The remainder of the peninsula eastward of the Greek quarter is a high rock, bare and uncultivable, and which intercepts from the town the view of all the southern and of great part of the eastern side of the lake. There are many small churches of ancient date in different parts of the peninsula,

§ 1.329   which are said to have been built by persons banished from the capital, and confined here by the Greek emperors. The accurate description of Castoria by Anna Comnena, shows that no great change has occurred since the twelfth century.
At the eastern extremity of the lake is a large village named Mavrovo. Here begins a long and well-cultivated plain, bounded to the south by the hills, the opposite side of which we followed from Selitza, and to the north by the ridge of Siniatziko, which, taking a more northerly direction than towards Siatista, embraces the plain, and joins the mountains which bound the lake on the northern side.
The hills at the eastern end of the plain of Mavrovo separate it from that of Sarighioli. Northeastward of Kastoria is the lofty summit called Vitsh, written in Greek Βίτζη. It is the same which I saw bearing N. 22 E. from Mount Kakardhista, and is a very remarkable bare abrupt peak, having a region of pines below it. The road from Mavrovo to Kaliari leaves it on the left in passing the ridge which separates the plains. Midway in this route is situated Vlakho-klisura, the name of which explains both the origin of the inhabitants and the situation of the place.
The scenery around Kastoria is extremely beautiful. Trees and verdure adorn the higher parts of the mountain, and below are small villages and cultivation mixed with woods. To the N.W. and W. the lowest slopes are green with vineyards; and below them a narrow plain stretches along the margin of the lake, which on either side of the gardens,

§ 1.330   near the entrance of the town, is covered with walnut-trees and poplars, mixed with cornfields. To the south a plain of corn land extends to the hills of Boghatziko and to the Injekara. In every other direction except at the eastern extremity, the slopes of the hills reach to the margin: from the southern extremity of the lake issues the stream which joins the Injekara at Smighes. At the point of its exit from the lake the Topiakiotes catch an abundance of crayfish.
The ecclesiastical province of Kastoria is very extensive, but the bishop, although metropolitan, is, together with those of Grevena, Pelagonia, Vodhena, Korytza, Berat, and Strumnitza, considered subject to the archbishop of 'Akhridha. To the north the province is synorous with that of Pelagonia or Bitolia; and extends to the west into Albania, where it includes Kolonia, which has a suffragan bishop.
Of the Hellenic name of this remarkable position we should have been left in ignorance, but for a single passage in Livy, which leaves no room for a doubt that it is the site of Celetrum, and thus affords a most useful point for the adjustment of the comparative geography of the surrounding part of Macedonia, which, although still sufficiently obscure, would, without this aid, have been much more uncertain. In the first Macedonian campaign of the Romans, B.C. 200, the consul Sulpicius marched from the banks of the Apsus through the country of the Dassaretii into Lyncestis, and from thence, after an engagement with Philip at Octolophus, forced the passes which separate the valley of the river Erigon from Eordaea.

§ 1.331   From the latter province he moved into Elimaea, and from thence into Orestis: here he invested Celetrum, “a town situated on a peninsula which is surrounded by the waters of a lake, and has only a single entrance over a narrow isthmus which connects it with the continent. Having received the submission of Celetrum, the consul returned into Dassaretia, and from thence regained Apollonia, the place from whence he had departed on this expedition.”
The travelled men of Kastoria seem not more anxious about education than their fellow-countrymen in general: nothing more being taught in the school, which they support here, than the mere rudiments of the ancient language. So powerful is the effect of the Turkish system, that all those who dwell long in the country seem inevitably to feel the effects of this moral atmosphere by a want of energy and an indifference to every thing but the vulgar pursuits of life, or to their personal safety, which, being always in some danger, affords therefore some excuse for their conduct. Even those who return after a long residence in civilized Europe, are seldom tardy in resuming the general feeling, and among other indications of it, make none but the feeblest exertions for the improvement of the rising generation. It is almost entirely to the Greeks permanently settled in foreign countries, and to some of their countrymen at Constantinople, that Greece is indebted for the progress she has made of late years in education, and that progress, therefore, although constant, is slow on the continent of Greece.

§ 1.332   Few men are to be found here who have any curiosity as to the ancient geography or history of their country; and even the young men who have had the benefit of an European education, soon lose their literary taste and acquirements, when they are settled in their native land, where, straightened, perhaps, for the means of existence, living under a constant necessity of deceiving their oppressors, and deprived of all instructive conversation, they soon become entirely occupied with the only objects which a government such as the Turkish leaves open to them. Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged, that in these matters the continent of Greece has been exemplary, compared with the islands of the western coast, where the vicious government of Venice seems to have been more effectual even than the Turkish in repressing the natural disposition of the Greeks for mental improvement. The Greeks of Kastoria are somewhat less exposed than those of Kozani, Siatista, Selitza, and Korytza, to the exactions of Aly Pasha, which have driven away so many from those places. Enough, however, has been done to thin Kastoria of its inhabitants; and several of the large houses, both of the Greeks and Jews, are falling to ruin, or standing empty.

§ 1.333   Sept. 8.—This afternoon we cross in half an hour the hills to the westward of Kastoria, and descend into the plain of the Injekara, where the junction of its two principal branches is half a mile to the left. In another hour we cross that which comes from Tzelova, a village in the mountains towards Filurina, and enters the plain through a narrow opening just above the place where we cross it. The village of Sligani is in the glen half a mile to the right. The other, or western branch of the river, which originates in the great mountains on that side, after winding through gorges in the lower hills of that range, enters at a point bearing about N. 60 W. from Kastoria the open champaign country ten or twelve miles in breadth, which separates those mountains from the heights near Kastoria. On a ridge along the right bank of the river are situated several Turkish villages, of which the principal are Zelogosh and Krupista. The latter was not far to our left at 4.30, and Zelogosh was at five miles in direct distance in the same direction at 5.10 as we mounted some heights which close the plain to the northward, and which are the barren roots of a range of mountains running north-westward from Kastoria. Near Zelogosh, which stands on a rising ground, the river flows from the west, and receives several small branches from the mountains. After having crossed the heights we arrive at 8.10 at Kapesnitza, and there descend into a valley, the direction of which is parallel to that of the Pindian range.
The waters which collect in this valley from the surrounding mountains, form a stream flowing to the north-westward, and thus the low ridge which we crossed separates the waters running to the Haliacmon and the Aegaean sea from those which flow to the Adriatic. The valley, with its including mountains, as well as the country to the northward, to within a short distance of the Lake of Akhridha, is called Devol. The river bears the same name. At its sources, in the western ridge, are the villages Nikholitza and Bushigrad; to the southward of which, in the same great range, is the town and district of Gramista.

§ 1.334   After following for a short distance the foot of hills on our right, we arrive at 8.40 at a khan situated on the road side below Biklista, a Mahometan village with two large serais belonging to Aly Bey, who owns the neighbouring lands. Biklista may be considered the frontier village of Albania, as the inhabitants speak that language. The valley, like most of those in Albania, is chiefly cultivated with maize. Near the town are a few gardens of melons and pumpkins. The vale is three or four miles in width, bounded to the westward by hills of no great height, but connected with the high range.
Sept. 9.—At 6 this morning I proceed from the khan to the Boghaz or pass of Tjangon, situated at the extremity of the vale of Biklista, to the N.N.W. of that town. In three quarters of an hour a narrow glen opens on our right, from which issues a small river, said to originate in a lake in the district of Prespa, called Ventrok. At the mouth of the glen is a narrow level, on which stands the village of Tren. A high mountain is seen through the opening, having a direction of north and south. The plain is now three miles in breadth. Leaving several small villages to the right at the foot of the mountain, we cross at 7 the river Devol, which, not having yet received that of Tren, is still very small.

§ 1.335   At 7.40 Tjangon, a small Moslem village, is on the left, on the foot of the heights, which form the pass on the southern side. Here we halt eighteen minutes, then proceeding, arrive at 8.15 at the narrowest part of the pass, where the river, now greatly increased in size, occupies all the space. Here they are building a new bridge.
The Pass of Tjangon, or Klisura of Devol, as it may be called, and probably would be if the Greeks were more numerous in this part of the country, is a remarkable feature in the geography of Upper Macedonia. Like the Klisura of Siatista, it is a natural gate of communication from the champaign country of the Haliacmon into other extensive plains, and it is moreover the only break in the great central range of Pindus, from its southern commencement in the mountains of Aetolia, to where it is blended to the northward with the summits of Haemus and Rhodope. The pass is not as strong as it is narrow, the hills which immediately border it on either side being not very abrupt. But they soon become steep and lofty, and the great rocky summit to the north called Kururdagh, Grace Xerovuni, is a suitable link to the chain, formed by the great summits Ghrammos, Russotari, and Smolika. Beyond the bridge we turn immediately to the south, enter the great plain of Korytza, and pass along the foot of some hills connected at the back with the central ridge. On our right in the plain are several Albanian villages, situated between Xerovuni and the Devol.

§ 1.336   The largest is Poyani, on the right bank of that river, which flows from thence to the north-west, enters a large lake towards that extremity of the plain, and on emerging from it, begins to wind through a succession of narrow valleys among the great range of mountains which border the plain of Korytza on the west In its progress through them, the Devol receives several large tributaries, and finally joins the Beratinos, or ancient Apsus, two hours below Berat, in the great maritime plain of Illyria.
At 8.55 we pass through Pliassa, a small village at the foot of the mountain, remarkable for a very large serai, which was built here not long ago by one Mehmet Pasha, an Albanian of large possessions in the neighbouring plain, whose family is connected by marriage with that of Aly of Tepeleni. Mehmet died suddenly last winter at Ioannina, where his son Vely is still detained by the Vezir Aly: the other sons are here. Continuing along the foot of the hills, we arrive at 10.20 at Korytza, which is situated entirely in the plain, though separated only by some vineyards from a projection of the mountain, which is crowned by a ruined castle. It is a structure probably of the Bulgarians, though vulgar report attributes it to the Spaniards.
As there are some doubts whether the plague, which broke out here about eight months ago, has entirely ceased, I pitch my tent on the outside of the town, but on receiving, after the delay of an hour, an assurance from the Bey that the Greek quarter is entirely free from suspicion, remove to the metropolis.

§ 1.337   The bishop returns to town in the evening from the village of Bobushtitza, on hearing of my arrival, but not before I had taken possession of his apartment, the only comfortable one in the metropolitan palace; the others, which are inhabited by the archdeacon and deacons, being all ruinous, exposed to the weather, and covered with smoke and dirt. The bishop’s closet, which measures ten feet by six, has two small glazed windows, a sofa on two sides, a shelf in one corner piled with ecclesiastical books, and other shelves on which are ranged plates made of pewter, or of German earthenware. Affixed to one wall, as customary in Greek houses, is a deal case, containing a picture of the Virgin, with a lamp perpetually burning before it. A German clock, the pastoral staff, and a Ξύστρi, or scratching machine made of hard wood scored with furrows, complete the list of furniture.
Sept. 10.—Korytza, vulgarly pronounced Gortja, or Gkiortja, and by the Albanians Ghiorghia, contains about 450 houses, of which more than a half are Christian. The filthy streets and comfortless habitations proclaim the Albanian town. Its artizans manufacture most of the articles of Albanian dress and furniture; and the snuff of Korytza, which is made chiefly from the tobacco of Arta, is in good repute.

§ 1.338   One of the most ordinary causes of delay to the traveller in Turkey, which I experience to-day, is the want of horses, generally caused by the insufficient capital of the farmer of the post, so that whenever there is an uncommon influx of tatars, or a Pasha passes through, the traveller who follows has no alternative but to wait for the return of the horses. Abdullah Pasha passed through Korytza two days ago on his way to Okhri. He is a pretender to the Pashalik of Elbassan, and is supported in his pretensions by Aly Pasha, but he has no less than three rivals, two of whom are from the northern part of Albania, where the Skodrian has the chief power: the third Ibrahim is in actual possession of the place, and is supported there by the troops of the Vezir of Berat, after a war between Berat and Skodra, which has ceased now that the Beratinos has gained his object. But as Aly has an interest in reviving the contest, it will not be long, probably, before hostilities recommence.
At dinner, the bishop not being able to resist the Frank cookery of my servant, breaks the fast, but sets the archdeacon at the door to prevent intruders. He has a plate of octapodhi, or salted starfish, set before him, and takes care neither to change his plate, nor to allow more than one excavation to appear in the pudding and pilaf. He produces from his cellar a light dry wine, which is made from the vineyards on the hills near the town, and is not inferior to the wine of Siatista. His all-holiness, or high priestship, as a metropolitan bishop is styled, was a deacon for many years at Kastoria, and purchased his present dignity from the Porte in the usual manner.

§ 1.339   On appointing a Bishop, or rather on approving the recommendation of the Patriarch, the Porte gives a seal, in the centre of which is written the name, in Turkish, of the mansup, or office, and round its edge the Greek Title. The bishop found his see burthened with a debt of 50 purses, bearing an interest of 12 per cent., which, on account of the growing poverty and depopulation of the country, his province will scarcely ever be able to pay. The metropolitan bishopric of Korytza and Selasforo comprehends the country to the westward of Korytza half way to Berat, includes Premedi and Tepeleni to the southward and westward, and in the opposite direction Devol. Selasforo is now a village by the Turks called Svesde, situated at the foot of Mount Xerovurni, 3 hours north of Korytza. There is a remark in the Notitiae Episcopatuum Graecorum, of the date of the 13th century, that Selasforo was then better known as Deabolis; Devol is the modern form, or rather, perhaps, Devol was always the local name, and Deabolis the Greek version of it. In the eleventh century, Anna Comnena described Deabolis as a town situated at the foot of a mountain, (thus agreeing with Selasforo,) and informs us that Alexius frequently occupied it in his campaigns against the Normans, when the latter first obtained a footing in Illyria.

§ 1.340   It is evident from Anna’s narrative, that Achris and Deabolis were then the two places of chief importance to the eastward of the Candavian range, but though many other names, still existing, or slightly corrupted, occur also in that part of her history, there is no trace of that of Korytza. A bishop of Deabolis was instrumental in having first invited the Normans into this country from Italy.
There are 80 villages and 2800 Greek houses in the episcopal province of Korytza; as the bishop receives 8 paras from each house, his regular income is between five and six hundred piastres, or about 36L sterling. His other emoluments consist in customary presents of provisions, and in fees which are chiefly for the arrangement of disputes among the laity. In the larger sees, such as Larissa and Ioannina, where the clergy are more numerous, and there are Greek families of opulence, the bishop demands a portion of the profits derived by the former from the confessions, domestic services, and the εφημερίαις, or daily prayers, which are read in many families by a priest. But Korytza produces very little to its bishop in this way.
In common with many of the Greek clergy, my host is desirous of an union of the Greek and Latin churches, entertains a very indifferent opinion of his own countrymen, but ascribes the ruin of the country principally to the Musulman Albanians, whose power and tyranny have arrived at such a height, that Turks and Christians agree in wishing for the arrival of a Frank conqueror.

§ 1.341   Hence he has always considered Bonaparte deficient in policy, in having gone to Egypt instead of coming here, where the consequences would have been much more important, and from whence he could not have been driven out. The bishop admits, however, that the three Vezirs of Ioannina, Berat, and Skodra, could collect 50,000 men in a short time, and that an army landing at Avlona, and advancing as far as Berat, would be unable to proceed from a want of provisions, Albania producing nothing but men, and this fine looking plain returning very little to the cultivator. It is said that the fig, which so near as Premedi ripens at the usual time, here seldom comes to perfection; from the present appearance of the vines, indeed, it is evident that the climate is that of a much more northern latitude, and the soil may be less fertile, than that of Anaselitza and Kastoria; but a want of security, industry, and good agriculture, are probably the chief causes of the scanty harvests; for we learn from Livy, that these plains furnished an abundance of forage to the Roman army, under the consul Sulpicius, in the campaign of the year 200 B.C.
The bishop's geography and history ascend no higher than the Bulgarian conquest of this country, which he considers as a part of Παλαιά Βουλγαρία, or Old Bulgaria, subdued and in part peopled by Albanian freebooters. As a proof of this fact, he instances some Bulgarian names, such as Belovoda (white water), a village and river in the neighbouring mountain,—Bushigrad and several others.

§ 1.342   But names of Illyric origin are found in every part of Greece. A stronger proof is the use of the Bulgarian language, which is still spoken in some of the villages of this district. The plain of Korytza is about 20 miles long, and from 6 to 10 wide, terminated at either end by hills of no great height, of which those to the northward furnish an easy passage into the great valley of Akhridha, which is occupied in great part by the lake anciently named Lychnidus. The town of Akhridha lies nearly due north from hence, distant twelve hours near the northern extremity of the lake. Southward of the plain of Korytza are hills forming a district called Kiari, beyond which is Kolonia, and the sources of the branch of the Apsus, which flows by Viskuki and Skrepari to Berat. The district of Kolonia begins on the other side of Mount Pepelas, which branches from the mountain of Gramista in a south-western direction, and falls to the southern end of the plain of Korytza. From the western and north-western side of the plain rises a range of very lofty mountains, on the sides of which are seen villages, and cultivation on the middle and lower slopes, and behind them towering summits, known by the names of Lenia and Opari. Farther south other lofty ridges are in sight, as far as the great serrated mountain near Premedi, named Nemertzika, which bears from hence S. 49 W. by compass. The hills are lowest to the northward beyond Selasforo, where appear some very high and distant mountains beyond 'Akhridha, between which and Mount Lenia is seen the mountain of Elbassan, which I take to be, the proper Candavia; it bears N. 23 W. by compass. The boghaz, or gorge through which the river Devol enters the mountains, after emerging from the lake, bears N. 11 W.

§ 1.343   Sept. 11—This morning at 7.35 I set out for Berat in the rain, with a wretched set of horses, procured from the menzil, and crossing the plain directly in its breadth, and nearly in a due westerly direction, arrive at 8.45 at Votskop, which name is now applied to two small villages on the last root of the mountains. They are the remains of an old Wallachian colony, which at the time of the Turkish conquest possessed the circumjacent district, and was very populous, but in consequence of that event was dispersed. A part of them retired to a situation in the neighbouring mountain, where they founded the town of Voskopoli; the security of the situation attracted thither numerous settlers from Greece and other parts of European Turkey, who having traded to Germany and rendered the place opulent, became ashamed at length of inhabiting the city of the Shepherds, and changed the name therefore to Moskopoli, or Moskhopoli, which, meaning the city of Calves, seems no great improvement. I have frequently heard the assertion, that the town once contained eight or ten thousand houses, but have great difficulty in believing even the smaller of these numbers. Its greatest prosperity was about a century ago; for seventy years it has been declining, and for the last ten so rapidly, that at present there are only two or three hundred inhabited houses in the place.

§ 1.344   After ascending the hills for three quarters of an hour from Votskop, we enter open cultivable hills and downs, which, compared with the steep ascent from Votskop, and the abruptness of the mountains around, may be almost termed a plain. At the end of it, at 10.45, we arrive at Moskopoli, situated at the foot of a very lofty summit. Whatever it may once have been, Moskopoli now presents only the appearance of a large village surrounded with gardens, in which the Lombardy poplar is very frequent,—a tree common in these mountains, but apparently not indigenous, as it is found only near the villages.
For a considerable distance round the town are seen the ruins of houses, most of which were of small dimensions, and altogether cannot have amounted to more than a thousand. It is very possible, however, that these ruins are much posterior to the great decline of the place. Among them are several small tents and temporary coverings, tenanted by families which have been obliged to retire out of the village, under suspicion of being infected with the same contagious disease which raged at Korytza. The disorder, however, is not the proper plague, or it has been unusually mild in its effects, for not more than forty have died at Korytza in eight months, and here about fifty in the last two months, at the beginning of which time the disease first made its appearance.

§ 1.345   Having lost a quarter of an hour by a circuit, to avoid passing through the village, we regain the direct road, cross some barren heights grown with brushwood and wild strawberries, and at about 12.30, having gained the highest part of the ridge, descend to a stream flowing from the left towards the west, over a tfide stony bed between steep mountains, whose sides are well peopled with small villages. We descend by a zigzag path, and cross the river at 1.25; then, ascending the mountain of Opari, at 2.30 arrive at Lavdhari, a small village of Greeks, or rather Christian Albanians, and the ordinary residence of Shemseddin Bey, son of Mehmet Pasha, of Frashari, which place is under the authority of Aly Pasha. After a long delay, caused by the conduct of the tatar, who, instead of searching for a lodging for me, demanded a contribution of money for himself, I obtain admission into a long apartment, open to the roof, and belonging to the Papas, who is likewise Proestos of the Greek community. At one end of the room is a ladder descending to the ground floor, which is a stable, and at the other end a fire-place. The dispute between the tatar and Proestos continues after our arrival; the former asserting that the Papas has a better house, the latter swearing that he has not, by the Christ, by the Cross, by the Bread, by the Virgin, which is the orthodox ascending climax of Greek asseveration.

§ 1.346   The summit rising immediately above Lavdhari is here known by the name of Ostrovitza: from Korytza it bore N. 86 W. by compass. The river which we crossed is called the Khelidhoni; a Greek name and probably ancient. It joins the Devol at the foot of Mount Lenia, which appears before us to the north-west, afid is not much inferior to the great Tomor in its height and imposing appearance; the latter mountain is hid from us by the range of Opari, or Khopari, nor was it visible from Korytza. Mount Khopari is a westerly continuation of Mount Ostrovitza, and closes the hollow watered by the Khelidhoni. Both these summits, as well as Lenia, are thickly studded on their lower slopes with villages surrounded by cultivation, so that the mountains seem to be inhabited beyond their powers of production, while the plains are deserted,—a circumstance to be ascribed to the bad government of the Turks, and to the difference between their military character and that of the Albanians. Inferior as horsemen, the latter are unable to maintain themselves in the plains, while their hardiness, activity, and greater skill in the use of the musquet are well adapted to the defence of their mountains.
The villages on either side of the hollow which we have crossed, form the district of Khopari; with the exception of Lavdhari, they are principally inhabited by savage Musulman Albanians, of the Toshke tribe, the Christian houses not amounting to more than 230 in thirty villages. In these, though the ordinary language is Albanian, many of the men speak Greek, because the Papadhes are in general from Greece, and because many of the male inhabitants find that language necessary in their employment, as carriers, or keepers of flocks in the neighbouring parts of Greece.

§ 1.347   Like the Greeks of Asia Minor, and of other parts of Turkey where they are greatly in the minority, they seclude their women. The Wallachian language is partially used also in these mountains, being spoken by some remains of the Wallachian immigration which preceded the rise of the Albanian power; and thus within a short distance the traveller may hear five tongues, Turkish, Albanian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, and Greek all radically different, though from the long mixture of the people they have many words in common. The Turkish is much the most rare. It is a melancholy reflection that all the Mahometans of these mountains, and who now form the majority of the population, have become apostates from Christianity since the reign of Mahomet II., in which they have been imitated by many of Vlakhiote or Bulgarian race.
My host the Papas complains of having to pay 300 piastres a year in contributions. The great staff of life, maize, is produced in the Mizakia, of which the market is Berat.
Sept. 12.—At 6.40 we leave Lavdhari, pursue the side of the mountain, and, in the neighbourhood of two or three small villages, pass through several gardens, where the cornel and walnut are mixed with pear, apple, and some other fruit trees, which, being the growth of colder climates, are either not found or rarely found in Southern Greece and the Morea.

§ 1.348   Having then descended, we cross at 7.45 a branch of the Khelidhoni, coming from the south, and from thence ascend to Protopapas, which, notwithstanding its name, is now entirely Musulman, and has a mosque with a minaret, a distinction proper to be mentioned, as this picturesque adjunct of the mosque is by no means general in Albania. The road in many places is destroyed by the late rains, and in all parts is so extremely bad that our pace is very slow. The tediousness, however, is in great measure compensated by the beauty and sublimity of the prospect. Though the sky still lowers, the weather is less threatening, and admits a view of the great summits at intervals. Occasionally they are illuminated by the sun, while fleecy vapours are seen settling on the ravines and vallies. Sometimes we find ourselves in the midst of these vapours unable to see more than a few feet before us, until suddenly the mist clearing away, shows the highest mountains in that partial manner which never fails to augment their apparent height and magnitude. Continuing to ascend over rugged hills, we halt for 15 minutes at 10.45 at Durshari, situated under a woody peak called Bofnia, the continuation of the Khopari range: half an hour before Durshari we crossed a stream from the south, which unites with the Khelidhoni near its junction with the Devol, of which the previous course was frofti the north-eastward, but which, after the junction, flows along the south-eastern side of Mount Lenia.

§ 1.349   At 12.45, after a continual ascent from Dύshari, we arrive at the Kommeno Lithari, or Cut Rock, in Albanian Guri Prei. This is a small rock rising from the crest of a ridge which ranges with Mount Lenia, and divides the hollow of the river Khelidhoni from that of another principal branch of the Devol, which flows along the eastern side of Mount Tomor. The ridge being exactly at this point lower and more accessible than in any other part, the “Cut Rock” is the natural point of communication from the one valley to the other, and for that reason has been occupied by a castle which surrounds the rock. Kommeno Lithari was taken from the Pasha of Berat, about seven years ago, by Aly, who now holds it with a garrison of a dozen dirty half-starved Albanians. The fort is nothing but a thin wall, surrounding a quadrangular space, in the centre of which rises a kula, or small keep, standing upon the lithari or rock itself: this tower was formerly the only fortress. The poor soldiers have a few chambers with fire-places in the tower, but so dirty and miserable that I prefer remaining on the flat roof of the tower in the midst of fog, rain, and wind; doubly chilling after the late sultry weather in the plains. The soldiers complain of the cold in winter, when the snow lies on the ground for several months; but still more of the wind, which rushes through this lofty opening in the ridge, in concentrated blasts from whatever quarter it may come. Mutton they contrive to obtain occasionally, as even in winter some sheep remain in the sheltered vallies, and sometimes a little kalambokki, but neither wine nor spirits, their tarn consisting only of koromana, or black bread: and having never yet received any pay, they must rob, starve, or desert, but for the contributions of passengers.

§ 1.350   After dining on the roof of the tower we quit Guri Prei at 8.15, and soon exchange its fogs and cold for the sunshine of a sheltered valley; in descending to the bottom of which, we pass at 2.45 through Dombreni, a Mahometan village with mosque and minaret, pleasantly situated among gardens and fields of maize, but bearing marks of the late war between the two vezirs in a ruined kula belonging to the Bey, who resides in the village. All this valley, with the including slopes from Guri Prei to the crest of Tomor, is called Tomoritza. From Dombreni there is a descent of another half hour to the branch of the Devol last-mentioned, which we cross at 3.15; then, after riding for a short distance along the bed, begin to ascend from its left bank the lower declivity of Mount Tomor. In the ascent, one of the horses, mounted by a postillion, falls to rise no more. Continuing through a very uneven and woody region, we arrive at length at the foot of the stupendous cliffs and forests of the great summit, from which many fragments loosened by the rains have recently fallen into the road. At the end of two hours from the river we have made the tour of the northern end of the summit, and are beginning to proceed along its western face just under the highest cliffs, which are entirely hid from view by the vapours.

§ 1.351   As we advance along the western side of the mountain, the sun becomes visible at short intervals, and lights up portions of the great plain of the Mizakia with the sea beyond it, but these views are soon shut out again by interposing clouds and rain. Just as it becomes dark we obtain a sight of the village of Tomor or Domor in the highest habitable part of the mountain, and perceive on our right, at the extremity of the long rugged slope of the mountain, the Castle of Berat, and the valley of the river Uzurmi. At 7 we arrive at the village, and as the rain is falling heavily, I am not sorry to obtain speedy admittance into a tower belonging to the family of a Papas recently deceased, who was the Proestos of Tomor. The village which is situated immediately under the immense cliffs, which surround the summit of the mountain, is built amidst a great number of walnut trees of native growth: in other parts of the mountain beeches and pines are the most common trees. The village is inhabited entirely by pastors of the Mizakia, who remain here during the months of June, July, August, and September, old style, and then return to their pastures and winter villages in the plain. Some of these persons possess several thousand head of cattle and sheep, from which butter and cheese are made, and labouring oxen reared for the supply of Rumili, Albania, and Greece. The butcher has scarcely any demand for the oxen, as beef is not much eaten by Turks or Christians either in these or any other parts of Turkey, and is seldom to be seen but in the Frank or Jewish houses of the great towns.

§ 1.352   The Illyrian plains are subject to inundations, which sometimes deprive the cattle of wholesome pasture in the spring, and generally cause a mortality, as happened this year, and rendered necessary a large importation of beasts from the Ultra-Danubian provinces. The pastors of the Mizakia are chiefly of Vlakhiote descent, and speak both Wallachian and Albanian. A Bolu-bashi, appointed by the Pasha of Berat, resides at Tomor, but has no power independent of the primates, the chief of whom, now present, is one Demetrius, who has a tolerable house as compared with the generality of the miserable huts. He is one of the few persons in the community who can speak Greek, which he has learned by having travelled in the prosecution of his trade into several parts of Greece, particularly Acarnania and Aetolia, great feeding countries. I find him a well-informed man for his station, and anxious to supply me with every thing which the village can afford, nor can I prevail on him to accept payment for the provisions consumed by us. In truth, it is by no means uncommon to find not only more hospitality, but more information among the simple shepherds and husbandmen of Greece, than among the inhabitants of the towns.
Demetrius describes to me a Hellenic fortification on the summit of a height rising from a steep slope, which half an hour to the southward of the village of Tomor is surrounded at the back with precipitous cliffs, separating it from the upper heights of the mountain.

§ 1.353   Sept. 13.—The mountain of Kurdhesi, to the south-eastward of Avlona, is conspicuous from Tomor, and to the left of it, more distant, is seen that of Dukai, Romaice Dukadhes, in Khimara.
At 7 a.m. we begin to descend the mountain to Berat. Its immense declivity is interrupted by very uneven ground and numerous ravines. Sometimes the road leads over eloping strata of bare limestone rock, rendered slippery by the rain, which still continues to fall, and in some places is so narrow and muddy that it could not be more difficult in the middle of winter. Several small villages appear on the right and left, chiefly Mahometan. Little cultivation is seen, but there are many large flocks of sheep and goats in the open pasture. In other parts the hills are covered with small trees, principally oaks, mixed with brushwood, consisting chiefly of pirnari, ilex, and lentisk. At 8.40, passing along the side of a precipice where the narrow path has been rendered still narrower by the late rains, two of the loaded horses fall over, roll down for about fifty feet, and would have been precipitated to the bottom of the ravine, but for the trees and bushes which arrested their fall; neither baggage nor horses were hurt. This causes a delay until 9.
At 11 we arrive in a narrow valley, where the river Uzumi flows from the south, inclosed on the other side by a long mountain of no great height. Here the road turns to the westward with the castle of Berat in front, joins the Ioannina road at the river side, and follows the right bank. As we approach Berat the valley widens, and then again becomes narrow, until, at the Castle Hill, there is space only for the river between the precipices of that hill and the point of the opposite range.

§ 1.354   The Kassaba, or town, is divided into two parts by the gorge at the Castle Hill. Goritza, on the opposite side of the river, inhabited solely by Greeks, forms a third makhala; and the castle itself, which is occupied only by the Pasha’s palace and some houses of Christian Toshke, is a fourth. I enter the Kassaba at 12, and in half an hour more, in passing the castle gate, to the Greek quarter, observe in the wall adjacent to the outer and inner gates, particularly at the latter, some small remains of a massy Hellenic wall. After some difficulties, produced by the folly or roguery of the tatar, whom I discharge immediately, I obtain a lodging in the house of the principal Greek merchant, which by no means resembles the houses of the same class in Greece. Even in the best apartment there are neither glass windows, nor a ceiling, nor furniture to the divan, and the light appears through the shutters, floor, and tiles. It is rather a bad omen to find three physicians residing here. Two are Corfiotes, living wretchedly; the third is Dr. G. Sakellarios, of Kozani, who was happily settled at Ambelakia, on Mount Ossa, when, at the request of Ibrahim, he was obliged by Aly to change his situation from a place which enjoys the comforts of civilized Europe more than any other in Greece, for the centre of Albanian barbarism. Dr. S. is well acquainted with German, Italian, French, Latin, and ancient Greek, has translated (in company with some others) the four first volumes of the Voyage d’Anacharsis into modern Greek, and has printed the first and fourth; but has given up the work, lest suspicions should attach to him, because a part of the translation was made by Riga, and because the first volume was printed by another of the conspirators of Vienna, who were betrayed by the Austrian government to the Porte. Dr. S., anxious to benefit his countrymen, and sincerely attached to letters, is now engaged in translating into his native language the general history of Greece, by Cousin Despreaux, and is already advanced as far as the seventh volume.

§ 1.355   The character given of Ibrahim Pasha, even by those not attached to his service, is favourable. He is said to be a humane and lenient governor, and in many respects a favourable contrast to the Tepeleniote. He is desirous of peace, but his two enterprizing neighbours will not permit him, particularly Aly, who will probably be satisfied with nothing short of his destruction. Ibrahim, however, is himself an usurper: he was son-in-law of his predecessor Ismail, at whose death he seized the castle, battered the palace, where Mehmet Pasha, the son of Ismail, had taken refuge, and drove him out. Mehmet is now living in poverty at Liisnia. Ibrahim has lately finished, or rather has not quite finished, a lofty building at one corner of the castle, consisting of three or four stories, to which a palace in the usual Turkish taste is attached. Here he constantly resides, scarcely ever moving from his divan but once in two or three months to some neighbouring village, and very seldom entering even his harem, unless it be that part where his treasures are deposited; he has only one wife, the mother of a son, who, though only six or eight years old, is already styled pasha, and has an establishment of officers.

§ 1.356   Sept. 14.—This forenoon I visit His Highness, for being a vezir he is styled by the Greeks υψηλοτης, like Aly. Nothing is here to be seen of the crowd, and noise, and multitude of dirty Albanian soldiers, which give such an air of business or confusion to the palace of Aly Pasha; only a few tatars, or other persons silently seated, in attendance in some long passages which lead to the Pasha’s apartments. After passing through an anti-chamber, in which several handsome youths with pallid countenances are reading the Koran aloud, I find the Pasha stretched out at full length in one corner of his sofa in a small apartment, neat, but quite deficient in the magnificence which is often overdone in Aly's palaces. The latter, on a first visit, is generally found walking about the room; after a few words of salutation, he immediately asks his guest to be seated, more polite in this than Russians in authority, whose interviews with persons of inferior rank are on foot. Aly seems to have adopted his method as a compromise between the ordinary European custom and that of the Turks on these occasions. But Ibrahim has made no such advances in civilization: he does not move from his posture when I enter, but merely makes a motion for me to be seated. No pipes or coffee are handed: he speaks very little, and shows nothing of the curiosity, shrewdness, or engaging manners of his brother of Ioannina, as the latter styled him in the letter of introduction which I brought.

§ 1.357   In manner and conversation, however, he is neither rude nor haughty. He invites me to visit any part of his territories I may wish, and has no recollection of having seen an English traveller here before, though captains of English ships have not unfrequently visited him, both here and at Avlona; and not long since, on the occasion of a shipwreck near Apollonia, he clothed and fed a part of the crew and sent them to Constantinople. Some attempts to raise the ship are now in progress.
The dominions of this Vezir extend to a distance only of four hours to the south, having been reduced to that limit by Aly Pasha, who had before conquered the country as far as Paleo Pogoghiani inclusive, from Kurt Pasha, the predecessor of Ismail. To the north Ibrahim commands as far as Lusnia, distant six hours on the road to Duras. He has lately acquired the district of Elbassan, and in that direction his dominion extends farthest into the mountains. Tirana and Kavaya are an appanage of the Sultan Mother, and are his boundaries in the maritime plains. At Lesh, inclusive, begins the government of the Vezir of Skodra. Ibrahim's brother was Pasha of Avlona; since his death the government has been filled up with Ibrahim’s name in the yearly nomination of the Porte; and last year that of his young son Suliman was inserted, the Porte having been willing to augment his power as a counterpoise to that of Aly.

§ 1.358   The Beratinos, to use the familiar Greek expression, is at present greatly in want of money, and having gained his ends at Elbassan,has been glad to put an end to the war with him of Skodra. Ibrahim’s necessities obliged him last year to oppress some of the villages. but he was checked by the Turkish beys of Berat, who own many of them, and whom he has not mastered so completely as has been done at Ioannina by Aly. He possesses a considerable landed property, having, when he succeeded to the Pashalik purchased the malikhiane. or farm, for life, of all the Beyliks, which had been held by Ismail Pasha. As the annual payment to the Porte was calculated by the relative value of corn and money, when he obtained the grant, he has been a great gainer by the debasement of the Turkish coinage; and although the Porte will probably make a demand upon him in consequence; such demands are not very quickly complied with in Albania, when the persons upon whom they are made have the means of avoiding them.
Corn-lands in the adjacent plains generally pay half the produce to the owner: farther north, in the proportion of three to the cultivator and two to the owner; but in the latter case the farmer bears a greater share of the expences. Corn is measured here by the Bara of eight Kiase, each of which is 100 λίτραις, or Greek pounds, which are the same as Venetian. The crop of the rice grounds, watered by the river in the plain of Berat, is divided into three parts; one of which goes to the Pasha for miri, and the expence of keeping the channels in order, the other two to the owner and the cultivator.

§ 1.359   Wheat in the plain of Berat and in the Mizakia is sown at two seasons, October or November, and February. The latter bears a small hard grain, and makes excellent flour: it is called Kutzeli. Barley is also sown in February. The last harvest was very bad from the same cause which produced mortality among the cattle,—the excess of rain during the winter and spring. Flax is sown at the present season. Kalambokki (which is chiefly arabositi or maize) in May: it is not watered, except near the river or near the canals derived from it. No Christian has any landed property in the Mizakia, but the pastures are open to the public on paying a moderate κεφαλιάτικο, or tax on each head of cattle.
Berat, in vulgar Greek Το Μπεράτι, is named by the writers of the Lower Empire Βελάγριτα, or Βελέγραδα, which latter is still the title of the bishopric. It is nothing more than the Greek form of the same Sclavonic word, Beligrad (white fortress), of which Berat is the Albanian corruption. The name shows that the place was a part of the Bulgarian conquests, and long in possession of that people.
The castle is defended by a strong battlement in the Turkish style, raised on a wall which is flanked by square towers, but armed with only two or three small pieces of ordnance. The greater part of the inclosed space slopes in such a manner as to be entirely exposed to another height now covered with vineyards to the north-east, where the Pasha has lately constructed a small square castle.

§ 1.360   At the foot of this hill is the principal Turkish quarter, which extends from thence up to the cliffs of the castle-hill, and is pervaded by a long bazar from one end to the other. The extremity near the castle is the only part of it inhabited by Greeks. In Goritza, or the quarter on the left bank of the river, there are about sixty houses, which, added to those in the castle, make the Christian families amount altogether to four hundred. In the Kassaba there are about six hundred Mahometan houses. Just below Goritza the river is crossed by a handsome bridge which was built by Kurt Pasha. From the left bank of the river rises a long and lofty ridge named Spiragri, beautifully clothed with wood on the slope. At the foot of it stands a palace which was built by Ismail Pasha, and which, having been much injured by the shot from the castle in the war which followed that Pasha's death, has since been neglected. Below Berat the Uzumi winds to the N.N.W. through a valley called Topalti, which expands to a breadth of three miles between the parallel ranges of Tomor and Spiragr, and at the end of eight or nine miles opens into the great maritime plains or champaign country which anciently belonged to Bullis, Apollonia, Dimallum, Dyrrachium, and some other cities of minor note. The Uzumi, soon after entering the plain, makes a turn to the left, and then receives the Devol, not far from the place where the latter emerges out of a narrow gorge in the mountains to the eastward.

§ 1.361   The castle of Berat, although a lofty point, is situated too far in the valley to command an extensive view: the sea is not visible. To the north the mountains near Kroia and Tirana are pointed out to me; and in the opposite direction in a line with the Uzumi, the hills near Skrepari and Dusnitza, above which rises the great serrated crest of Nemertzika. The range of Tomor shuts out all view to the eastward, and the parallel range almost equally in the opposite direction.
The Hellenic remains in the castle wall, and their situation on a precipitous height overhanging the river, at the entrance of a valley leading from the plains of Illyria into the strongest parts of Epirus, afford indubitable proofs that Berat stands on the site of an ancient city of some importance. But there is no evidence in history sufficiently precise to afford any certainty as to its name. The probabilities are in favour of Antipatria, which was certainly hereabout, and is described by the historian as a great city strongly fortified, and situated in a narrow pass. It was taken in the year B.C. 200, by L. Apustius, who was detached by the consul Sulpicius from his camp in the neighbouring plain, with directions to lay waste the Macedonian frontier. In strictness, indeed, this country was a part, not of Macedonia, but of Atintania, Dassaretia, or Illyria; but nothing is more likely than that the kings of Macedonia had added it to their dominions when their power was at its height, in the ages preceding the Roman wars, and when a new name may have been given to this place in honour of Antipater.

§ 1.363   CHAPTER VIII ILLYRIA, EPIRUS.
SEPT. 21.—The route from Berat to Avlona after descending into the plain follows the course of the Beratino, or Uzumi, at a small distance from the river, and sometimes passes along the bank itself. The road is wide and rendered very dusty by cars, which we meet, drawn by buffalos. These beasts are entirely covered with dried mud, a consequence of the habit which they have in the summer, of rolling or immerging themselves up to their necks, and even to their nostrils, in the mud and shallow water of the rivers, lakes, or ponds. There they remain enjoying the coolness, free from the torment of insects, many hours at a time, and when they emerge, obtain in the dried mud an armour against the flies.

§ 1.364   The carts are loaded with wood, hay, and other commodities for the use of the town. The wheels have spokes and very broad fellies, narrowed at the edge, but are so loosely and clumsily fixed to the axle as to sway about at every step with an incessant creaking. At the end of 1 hour and 50 minutes we cross the river at 5 p.m. by a handsome bridge, which was built by Kurt Pasha. Near it we meet the metropolitan bishop of Velegrada, or Berat, coming into town from his residence at Kolkondasi, and accompanied by two priests with yataghans in their girdles and pistols in their holsters. The bishop’s house in the castle of Berat is occupied by the Pasha’s Grammatikos, a Greek who manages all the money concerns of the lazy Ibrahim, making good use of the favour he enjoys for his own advantage, and affecting such pride in his official station as to be above visiting the Pasha’s physician, the learned Sakellario. Half an hour beyond the bridge the road ascends the hills which bound the plain of Topalti on the west, and at 6 we arrive at Vakopoli, a village of 25 Greek houses in a retired situation among the hills, surrounded with gardens, and an extensive tract of vineyards. There are two papadhes in the village, with one of whom I lodge in a ruinous cottage, but the best in the place. He informs me that at Pakhtos, a village among the hills, an hour and a half to the left of Luari, which is on the road from hence to Avlona, there is a fountain of ασφαλτον, which rises like water out of the ground.

§ 1.365   Strabo describes a fountain of warm water mixed with asphaltum at the Nymphaion of Apollonia. where a bituminous substance was extracted also in a solid form. But the latter mine, which is still wrought, is at Selenitza, near the Viosa, much nearer to Aulon and Apollonia. The fountain of pitch at Pakhtos, therefore, is different from that of Strabo, and shows the great extent of the subterraneous riches of this quarter of Greece.
The same papas describes a place near a village called Ekali, where are two Palea Kastra, one on a peak above the other, and the latter immediately above the river Viosa, or Vuisa, as he pronounces the name; they are in a hilly district on the right bank of that river, not far from its entrance into the plains. He measured one of the stones in the castle wall, and found it 14 σπιθαμαΐς, or spans long, and 4 high. Here also, he adds, is a great rock, inscribed with Φραγκικά γράμματα, or Frank words, which nobody can read; perhaps they are Latin, though I have often heard the same description given to Hellenic inscriptions by half educated Greeks. The ruins are the same as those which were described to me at Tepeleni. There is a small village on the site named Gradista, a Slavonic name analogous to the Greek Kastri. The two castles probably belonged to the same Greek city, the upper having been the acropolis. Ekali is reckoned 7 hours from Vakopoli, 6 from Avlona, and 5 from Apollonia; but being inhabited by wild Toskidhes, not in the government of Ibrahim nor controlled by Αly, whose authority does not extend along the Viosa, below Liopesi, it will, I fear, be inaccessible to me. The Greeks of Vakopoli, in common with those of all the villages which lie on the great routes, suffer extremely from the Albanian soldiers who quarter upon them.

§ 1.366   Sept. 22.—At 7 this morning we begin to cross a ridge which separates Vakopoli from a southerly branch of the great plain of Mizakie, by the Greeks called Mizakia, or Mizakia. At 8.30 we arrive at Donafros, a small Musulman village with a mosque, situated in a retired valley among heights, which are the last falls of Spiragri, and the hills of Dusnitza. This is the frontier of Mizakia and Malakastra, which last district begins from the western side of the plain of Topalti, and, skirting the roots of these hills, extends to near Avlona. Leaving Donafros, we have a large opening of the plain of Mizakia on the right, and one hour and a half distant in that direction, the large village of Dronovitza, inhabited by a mixed population of Mahometans and Christians. At 9.30 Kervel is on our left, a scattered village occupying two summits, between which is a cultivated hollow. One of the summits is crowned with a church, the other with a mosque. At 10.20, crossing an extremity of one of the heights, we pass through the skirts of Luari, a small village; the hills towards Pakhtos are chalky or gypsous. At Luari, one of my servants being seized with a violent fit of the intermittent fever, we are obliged to remain at a khan, a quarter of an hour beyond the village, till 4 p.m.

§ 1.367   We then cross a large branch of the plain, to the projection of a low root of the mountain which bounds it to the westward, and having turned the extremity, arrive at 5.35 at Stafiri, where a large church and a bazar show that it is a Christian village of relative importance, though the houses are mere huts of wicker and mud, without chimneys, and the bazar a row of miserable shops. The cultivation of this noble plain, capable of supplying grain to all Illyria and Epirus, with an abundance of other productions, is confined to a few patches of maize near the villages. Nevertheless the Mizakia is as well peopled as most of the great plains, either of Asiatic or European Turkey, and better than many of them. This part of it is well wooded; the hedges and great trees are festooned with wild vines, which produce a small grape of excellent flavour: and the villages in general are embosomed in clusters of trees, the huts standing far apart, each with its piece of garden ground. At Stafiri we cross a stone bridge over a lazy rivulet, named Lenitza, flowing from the heights on our left towards the Apsus, and here inclosed between high banks.
At 6.50, after having traversed another bay of the plain to another point of the hills, we arrive at the large scattered Turkish village of Radostin, agreeably situated at the foot of low woody hills above a grove of fine oaks. Some of the inhabitants show an inclination to insult us as we pass, until they espy a negro tatar, a favourite servant of the Vezir Ibrahim, who accompanies me, and who is well known throughout his dominions.

§ 1.368   The burying-ground of Radostin is full of pieces of fluted columns, and other fragments of the good times of antiquity. Having crossed a height beyond it, and descended a little of its western slope, we arrive at a quarter past 7 at a monastery, of which I take the correct name to be η παναγία της Απολλωνίας, as standing upon a part of the site of Apollonia, but which the ignorant monks have been pleased to convert into the ridiculous title of ή παναγία του Άπόλλωνος: the vulgar name of the place is Pollina, or Pollona. A small village named Poyani lies at the foot of the hill to the north; and nearer ta the monastery, in the opposite direction, a few labourers’ huts called τα Καλύβια, in a narrow vale lying between the hill of the monastery and a parallel low ridge, clothed with small beeches. Behind the monastery, towards the summit of the hill, are some gardens and vineyards in a ruined and neglected state, (like the greater part of the extensive lands of the monastery,) the cause of which is the exposed situation of the place on a route much frequented by the Albanian soldiery, and so convenient as a halting place that parties of them often remain here for two or three days for the sake of the free quarters, and in the course of these unwelcome visits have ruined all the cells and other apartments of the building. The best lodging I can find is the cell of the Igumenos, a little chamber perfectly Albanian as to dirtiness, and of which the thick stone walls are gaping open at one corner. Only two monks now reside here.

§ 1.369   The church has been built and repaired at different periods, but is chiefly composed of Roman tiles, and of ancient squared stones of a large size taken from the ruins of Apollonia; some of these have been carved into monstrous ornaments of the lower ages. There remain the sepulchral monuments of two Ηγούμενοι of the ninth century. The monastery contains some fine pieces of sculpture, which having been found, for the most part, in ploughing the fields on the ancient site, have been fixed into the walls in the room of other stones displaced for their reception.. It is to this custom of adorning their convents and churches, which still generally prevails among the Greeks, that we are indebted for the preservation of the greater part of existing inscriptions and remains of art. Of those in the walls of the monastery of Apollonia the most remarkable are as follows:—1. The bust of a matron with the veil thrown over the hair, and then passing under the breast. This bust the monks say was quite perfect, until some soldiers of Berat thought proper to amuse themselves by firing their musquets at it, which has destroyed the nose and chin. 2. The bust of a young man, with curled hair, and a short thick beard covering all the lower part of his face; the breast and right shoulder are bare, and a loose garment hangs over the left shoulder and under the breast. Both these busts are of the human size, and of white marble, apparently Italian. The nose of this last bust was destroyed by the plough when it was discovered.

§ 1.370   3. A small mnema or monumental stone, representing in relief two young persons in loose garments with the right hands joined, and the left hand of the female upon the left shoulder of the man. The face of the man is perfect, that of the female is destroyed. Her name was Prima, as appears by the letters ΠΡΙΜΑΧΑΙΡΕ over her head. 4. A very spirited Paniscus or Satyr seated on a rock, with his goat's legs crossed, grinning and blowing on the pan-pipe, which he holds with both hands. 5. A fragment of a frize, representing the lower part of the drapery, and part of the wing of a female figure flying, together with a man’s front face upon a shield; around the face are locks of hair, twisted upon the forehead. 6. Another similar fragment representing in low relief a man setting one foot on the hip of a woman, and dragging her by her arms, which are passed over her head. Behind him is a warrior with a shield and flying robe, in the attitude of combat: the very common subject probably of the Greeks and Amazons. Underneath the figures is an Ionic border, which is continued round one of the other sides of the stone: there are some other figures hid in the wall. This fragment and the preceding appear to have been parts of the frize of the same building. 7. A sepulchral stone, with a man on horseback: very good. 8. Another mnema, bearing the figure of a bearded old man with a long staff in one hand; below is the head of a greyhound looking up at the man. This is roughly wrought, but in good design. 9. A dog seizing an ass, both animals on full stretch: an Ionic border below shows that it was part of a frize.

§ 1.371   10. Another piece of frize too high in the wall to be seen; it seems to be a man on horseback opposed to a lion, while behind him another wild beast seizes an ox. 11. Two front faces with locks of hair hanging down on either side; part of a frize. 12. The head of a lion, which anciently served for a spout.
There are only three inscriptions, and all merely sepulchral, but curious as all containing Roman names, and thus according with the known fact of Apollonia having been much resorted to by the Romans, who sent hither their youth to study the literature and philosophy of Greece. Augustus had thus passed six months when the death of Caesar called him to Rome. One of the inscriptions is in memory of Lucius Licinius Tere(ntius), who died at the age of 65; another was in honour of Titus Julius Clemens, who died at 45, and whose wife’s name, Claudia Therine, was only half Roman. The third is the monument in honour of Prima.
It was at the end of the seventh century before the Christian aera, that this fertile part of Illyria first received the laws and customs of Greece. Dyrrhachium and Apollonia were then colonized by the Corcyraei, who, according to ancient custom, placed at the head of each colony a leader from Corinth, as being the metropolis of Corcyra itself.

§ 1.372   The northern colony was named Epidamnus, the southern Gylacia, from Gylax, the Corinthian leader, but neither appellation continued long in use, those of Dyrrhachium and Apollonia having prevailed. Apollonia is described by the ancient authors as situated at a distance of ten stades from the right bank of the Aous, fifty or sixty stades, or four miles, from the sea, two days’ journey to the south of Dyrrhachium, twenty-five Roman miles from Aulon, and three hundred and twenty stades, or thirty Roman miles, from Amantia. There are some traces of walls close to the monastery on the north, extending from thence upwards to the summit of the hill, and along that summit in a northerly direction. Below the monastery they followed the crest of the ridge to the plain, where their traces are lost. There is also part of a transverse wall which, a little below the monastery, branches from the main wall to the northward. To the southward of the hill of the monastery are the remains of two temples, one in the valley at the Kalyvia, the other beyond that valley, at the extremity of the heights which rise from that side of it. The former temple appears from some fragments to have been Ionic.

§ 1.373   The low situation and deep loam of this valley seemed to promise, that some considerable remains of the temple might still be concealed below the surface; but on inquiring of the monks, I was informed that no less than seventy cart loads of materials had been taken from thence to build the new serai at Berat. Similar spoliations have been committed at the western temple, and so recently that the excavation made to carry away the foundations, of which not a single stone is left, affords a very tolerable measurement of the length and breadth of the building. One column standing in solitary grandeur is the only part of it which has been spared by the Pasha’s masons. The length of the temple was about 135 feet, the breadth 55; the column, which has 20 Doric flutings, with a capital more spreading than in the Parthenon, and probably more ancient, is 14 feet in circumference at its base, and consequently 4 1/2 feet in diameter, which, compared with the dimensions of the ground plan, and supposing an intercolumniation of 5 1/2 feet, would lead to the belief that the temple was a hexastyle with 14 columns on the side. The extant column is composed of 12 pieces of stone, and the height is about 22 feet, including the capital and plinth, which are of a single stone, and together about 2 feet 9 inches high. The material is a dull white limestone, hard, but nevertheless much injured by time and the effect of the sea air. At Kalyvia there is a fountain, perhaps the ancient Cephissus which was near the gymnasium. These are the only vestiges I can find of the great Apollonia.

§ 1.374   The existing line of walls meeting in an angle at the summit of the hill behind the monastery, and diverging from thence to the north, tends to show that the city faced the north-west, and that the two temples and gymnasium were without the walls, which would have been very far from a singularity. It is possible, at the same time, that the present remains of walls may not be of Hellenic times, as there are no certain marks of such antiquity in them. If the woody height to the southward were explored, some other vestiges might perhaps be found, which would give a clue to the dimensions and general plan of the city.
The hill of Apollonia is not of sufficient height to command a very extensive prospect, or to afford a very advantageous geographical station, though by no means useless in this respect. To the southwestward is seen the island of Sazona, twenty degrees to the right of the northern end of which is the mouth of the Viosa, and seventy-two farther to the right that of the river of Berat, forming a long promontory. The farthest part of the shore to the north is the hill of Kavaya, appearing as an island. A little to the left of Sazona is seen Cape Glossa, or the Acroceraunian extremity, between which and the island is the southern entrance into the Gulf of Avlona. That town is not visible, being hidden by some heights on the eastern side of the lagoon, which extends along the shore at the northern entrance of the gulf. To the left of Glossa occurs the Acroceraunian ridge, separated by the valley of Nivitza from the range of Griva, which bounds the valley of the Viosa to the westward.

§ 1.375   At the northern extremity of this range is the district of Kudhesi, containing twenty villages and a lofty summit, forming a conspicuous termination to the range of Griva. To the left of the mountain of Ktidhesi appears that of Skrepari, to the south-east of Mount Tomor, then the gigantic Tomοr itself, occupying eight degrees of the horizon. The hill of Spiragr, which bounds the plain of Berat, extends several degrees to the northward of Mount Tomor, and in the midst of the plain watered by the Apsus, or river of Berat, is seen the height of Ardhenitza, so called from a monastery on the summit.
The valleys of Dukadhes and Nivitza formed anciently the territory of the Amantini, or Amantienses, or Amantes, the last of which forms was preferred by the people, and was employed by them on their money, in memory of their origin from the Abantes of Euboea, who settled near the Ceraunian mountains after the war of Troy, and possessed Oricus and Thronium. That the district of Amantia lay in that direction from Apollonia and Oricus is confirmed by Caesar, while the distances afforded by Scylax and the Tabular Itinerary, added to the evidence of Hellenic walls at Nivitza, show that place to have been the site of the town of Amantia.

§ 1.376   The only objection which can be made to this conclusion is, that according to Ptolemy both Bullis and Amantia were on the sea-coast between Aulon and the mouth of the Celydnus, in which he seems to agree with Caesar, who just before he quitted this quarter for the siege of Dyrrhachium, left a detachment of his fleet under Laelius to prevent supplies from being thrown into Oricus from Amantia and Bullis. The only mode of reconciling the apparent inconsistency is to suppose that Amantia, Bullis, and Apollonia, possessing all the country adjacent to the Gulf of Aulon, and being all situated at some distance from the coast, had each of them a port or maritime dependency on the gulf. It was probably to these mantime places that Ptolemy alluded, and towards them that the vigilance of Laelius was chiefly directed, in order to intercept supplies intended for Oricus.

§ 1.377   The branch of the Aous, which irrigated the valley of Amantia, would seem from Lycophron to have been named Polyanthes. As to Thronium, it appears to have stood at the northern extremity of the Amantine territory, on the borders of that of Apollonia, for it was reduced by the Apolloniatae and added to their district in an early age, as appears by an epigram annexed to a group of statuary at Olympia, which the Apolloniatae had dedicated on that occasion from the tenth of the spoil.
It is remarkable that the Roman road from Apollonia to Nicopolis by Hadrianopolis, in the valley of Arghyrokastro, ascended the Amantine valley, and not that of the Aous, although the latter is at least as direct, and there was a continuity of plain or valley from Apollonia to Hadrianopolis without any intervening mountain; whereas, oh the former route, some high ridges are interposed between the head of the valley of Amantia and the plain of Hadrianopolis. Possibly there were some rocky projections on the banks of the Aous, which it would have required great labour to render passable, or frequent ferries or bridges, which it was desirable to avoid.

§ 1.378   Selenitza, where the mines of pitch mentioned by Strabo are found, is about four hours to north-eastward of Avlona, near the left bank of the Viosa, not far above the junction of the river of Nivitza, and a little below Gradista, which is on the opposite side of the river. The asphaltum is dug out of the earth in large masses, mixed with a considerable quantity of earth. Ibrahim Pasha farms the mine from the Porte, and is said to receive from those to whom he underlets it 120,000 piastres a year. It is a hard black resin, and when mixed with vegetable pitch is much used in the Adriatic in the careening of boats. Strabo, or rather Posidonius, whom he cites, had an idea that earth thrown into the mine was converted into pitch: the fact, perhaps, is, that the asphaltum, liquified by subterraneous heat, flows in that state into the cavities of the earth, whether natural or formed by the excavations from which asphaltum had been already extracted, and that it there hardens, whence the mineral may appear to be continually renewed in the same cavity. Near the mine a gaseous effluvia on the surface of the ground sometimes takes fire, and maintains a flame for several days. This is evidently the celebrated Nymphaeum of Apollonia, which is recorded on the coins of that city by the type of three nymphs dancing round a flame .

§ 1.379   Sept. 27, 28, 29, 30.—Instead of exploring Illyria and Chaonia any farther, I was obliged to employ these four days in returning to Berat, in consequence of a violent fever which assumed an intermittent form. Being unable to sit upon a horse for more than half an hour at a time, I was under the necessity of performing the greater part of the journey in the arabas of the Mizakia. The first day I halted at Kalkondasi, and lodged in the house of the Bishop of Velegrada (Berat). In the walls of the church are several fragments (brought probably from Apollonia) of sculptures in low relief, and of architectural ornaments, and there is a tombstone with an inscription of lower times, but not Christian. The next day I crossed over the hill of Ardhenitza, which stands in the middle of the Mizakia, and in a great monastery on the summit found the Bishop, whose house I had quitted in the morning, together with his aged predecessor, who had resigned in his favour, and the venerable Igumenos of the convent, all of whom were extremely kind to me.

§ 1.380   Our progress was the slower, as I found it impossible to hire a car for the whole journey, and was obliged to change it frequently. On the third day we crossed the point of the hill of Spiragr into the plain of Topalti, and at night I lodged in a store-house among casks, baskets, and bags of corn. Here the fever, not having been improved by the jolting of an Illyrian cart for three days, with intervals of riding in the sun, assumed a form which is not uncommon in Italy and Greece, and is called by the Italian practitioners a doppia terzana, because the fever returns daily, but with increased violence on the alternate days. These alternate fits were accompanied by delirium, and on the second occurrence by complete insensibility.
Oct. 14.—Having been restored by the good care and judicious treatment of my friend Sakellario, to a state just equal to travelling, I quit Berat this day for Ioannina, being, in consequence of the delay that has occurred, under the necessity of giving up the intention of visiting Dyrrhachium, and tracing the operations of Pompey, Caesar, and Brutus. This has been doubly unfortunate, because having intended after visiting the maritime Illyria, to follow the entire Egnatian way to Saloniki, I had preferred the direct road from Korytza to Berat across Mount Tomor to the circuitous but much more interesting route by Akhridha and Elbassan, which was a part of that Roman road.

§ 1.381   At 1 p.m. we cross the bridge of Berat, pass through the small Greek quarter called Goritza, at the foot of the opposite hill, then skirt the river for a quarter of an hour, and enter a valley which branches to the right of the main vale of the Uzumi. Here the road in many parts passes along the bed of a torrent, and at other times over branches of rugged barren hills, which exclude the prospect on both sides, except that sometimes the rocks of Tomor appear on the left. The Uzumi is at no great distance in the same direction; one of the roads leading from Berat to the southward passes along its banks, but that which we travel is the most frequented. After an hour’s riding the rain begins to fall, and continues, with short intermissions, until at 5.30 we arrive at the Khan of Totjer, so called from a village of that name, half a mile distant, in the steep hills to the right, and consisting only of a mosque and three or four large Mahometan houses. The latter part of our road was over a very steep branch of the hills, and was, for the most part, paved. These heights are cultivated only near several dispersed hamlets of three or four houses, situated generally on steep summits. The vegetation bears all the marks of an advanced autumn. The Khan of Totjer, which stands in a narrow bottom between rugged hills, has been lately improved by Ibrahim Pasha. Though the doors and windows have no security to prevent their being blown open by the wind, which perhaps might be too much to expect in an Albanian khan, the floor at least is much more compact than that of the Πρωτο-Πραγματιστης, or first merchant of Berat, and the roof a better defence against the rain—a fortunate circumstance, as in consequence of a deluge which falls all night,

§ 1.382   Oct 15.—The torrents are reported impassable, until the afternoon, when it is too late to reach Klisura, the nearest place where any provender for the horses can be obtained.
Oct. 16.—At 7.45, continuing our course along the ravine, bordered as before by rugged hills, we arrive, in less than three quarters of an hour, at a stream which flows to the left through a gorge into the Uzumi, and from thence, for near half an hour, we ascend the bed of this torrent, which is now but just safe for the baggage horses. We then turn into the channel of a branch of the same river, and at 10, crossing a height, descend, in half an hour, into a vale watered by a stream which flows to join the Viosa near Klisura. The hills are of the same description as those mentioned on the 14th, but the cultivation and the hamlets are more thinly dispersed. One small village only with a mosque was in sight, in a lofty situation on the right As we advance, the great ridge of Trebusin, which appears higher on this side than from Τβρβίέηί, stretches in a direction parallel to the valley we are following, which becomes a little broader as we descend it, and is covered with fields of araboeiti, not yet gathered in. From 11.30 until I we halt at the khan of Venakos, so called from a village of that name situated a mile on the right, amid rugged hills at the foot of Mount Trebusin.

§ 1.383   On proceeding, our road, every where extremely bad, often crosses the river, and then pursues, for a short distance, the course of its stony bed: the valley is still narrow and grown with maize. On the left are hills more rugged, but in other respects of the same description as before. Behind them rises a lofty range, but not so high as Trebusin.
Thus we continue our route till 3.46, when we find ourselves opposite the village and castle of Klisura, at the entrance of a valley which is here about a mile in width. Instead of following the direct road, which ascends the Viosa to Premedi, we turn to the right, and in eight minutes begin to mount a steep slope at the foot of the eastern extremity of Mount Trebusin, which rises bare and precipitous above it, and soon arrive in the scattered village of Klisura, containing about one hundred and fifty houses of Musulmans, who for the most part speak only Albanian. A little beyond the village an immense edge of rock descends from the summit of the mountain to the river, and forms, together with the opposite mountain, which is separated from it only by the river Viosa, the eastern entrance of the celebrated pass anciently called the Fauces Antigonenses, or Stena of the Aous, and now the Stena of the Viosa. Klisura has obviously received its name, which is analogous to the Latin Clusium, and other similar appellations, from its situation. It is mentioned by Cantacuzenus in the fourteenth century, together with other places which are still to be recognised as having been the chief strong-holds in this part of Greece.

§ 1.384   The river, after having followed a north-western direction from its sources, here suddenly turns a little to the southward of west; and having pursued this course for twelve miles, between two high mountains of extreme steepness, then recovers its north-western direction, which it preserves to the sea. Above the village of Klisura, at an elevation of about one-third of the summit of the mountain, the Vezir Aly has constructed a castle, consisting only of a square white-washed inclosure of a single wall, with a tower at each angle, but perfectly commanding the only road into the pass which leads along a cornice over the right bank of the Viosa. The castle occupies the site of an ancient fortress, as appears from some remains of a Hellenic wall near the entrance. Half way between the castle and the river stands a serai lately built by Aly Pasha.
The mountain on the opposite or left bank of the river, is the northern extremity of the great ridge of Nemertzika, much lower than that summit, but nearly equal to Trebusin in height. At the top it is a bare perpendicular precipice, but the steep lower slope, unlike that of its opposite neighbour, is clothed with trees quite to the river. Through the opening between them is seen a magnificent variety of naked precipices and hanging woods, inclosing the broad and rapid stream of the insinuating river .

§ 1.385   It was on this singular field, in the year B.C. 198, that the Romans obtained the first and therefore the most important of a series of victories, which extinguished for ever the independence of Greece. The young consul, T. Quinctius Flamininus, being resolved to avoid the fault of his two predecessors, Sulpicius and Villius, who had allowed the greater part of their consulships to expire before they entered Macedonia, lost no time after his election at Rome in crossing the Adriatic, from Brundusium to Corcyra, with a reinforcement of near 9000 men; and from thence, with equal celerity, proceeded into Epirus, where he assumed the command of the Roman army. Their camp was at a distance of five miles from the enemy: who was intrenched in the pass of the Aous, called the Stena, and on the steep mountains on either side of it, and who had fortified all the weaker points with ditches, ramparts, and military engines. Philip had occupied this position ever since the beginning of the spring. His main body was encamped on Mount Aeropus, on a conspicuous summit of which his own tent was placed. Athenagoras with the light troops was stationed on Mount Asnaus, on the opposite side of the river.
Flamininus, after due consideration, adopted the intention of his predecessor Villius, and determined to force his way through the passes, in stead of entering Macedonia by a circuitous route, through Dassaretia, as Sulpicius had done. But the undertaking was of extreme difficulty,

§ 1.386   and 40 days were passed in inactivity, with the exception only of a fruitless attempt to make peace by means of a conference which was held between Quinctius and Philip, in the narrowest part of the pass, and which was abruptly broken off by the king, on hearing the unreasonable propositions of the Consul. On the following day there was an action first in a plain just large enough to admit of it, and then in the pass into which the Macedonians retired; and where the superior discipline and skill of the Romans were fully compensated by the strength of position and the catapeltic engines of the Macedonians. The loss on both sides was great, and night alone put an end to the combat. Soon after this event, Charops of Megara, in Molossis, to whom the Romans had already been indebted for information and assistance, sent to the Consul a shepherd who undertook to guide a detachment of the Roman army in three days, by a circuitous route, to the summit of the mountain which was above and in the rear of the camp of Philip. Four thousand infantry and three hundred horsemen were sent upon this service, and were ordered to march only in the night, the moon being then at the full.
During the two days of their circuitous route, the Consul disposed his army for a general attack, and at the same time occupied the enemy’s attention by frequent assaults. On the third day, when he saw the concerted signal made by his troops with smoke on the summit of the mountain, he moved forward with his whole army, marching himself in the centre at the bottom of the valley, and sending forward his wings on either side.

§ 1.387   The Macedonians advanced out of their intrenchments, but found the enemy so superior to them, as well in valour and science as in armour, that they retreated again behind their defences. The Romans then became the assailants, and would have suffered for their rashness, in proceeding over very difficult ground against a well-fortified position, had not their detachment on the summit of the hill at the same moment advanced to the attack of the enemy’s rear; when a shout in that direction having revealed the truth to the Macedonians, threw them instantly into a disorderly flight, and their whole army would have been destroyed, had it been possible for horsemen or heavy armed infantry to pursue with effect over such rugged ground.
The king retreated 5 miles to a height, from whence, suspecting that the Romans would be unable to follow him, he sent out parties of the troops who accompanied him, to collect the remainder of his dispersed forces from the mountains and ravines, and to protect their retreat. By these means there were not more than 2000 of his men missing, when the army began a disorderly retreat towards Thessaly. The next day the Romans, who had passed the night in Philip’s camp, emerged from the straits, and pursued the enemy. On the first day Philip reached a place named Castra Pyrrhi, in Melotis; on the following day. he encamped on Mount Lingon, and from thence, after deliberating for some days whether he should take the route to Macedonia, he proceeded at length to Tricca, in Thessaly.

§ 1.388   Although it is not expressly stated either by Livy or Plutarch, that the camp of Philip was on the right side of the river, and that of Athenagoras on the left, it could hardly have been otherwise, as the road is continuous only on the right bank through the whole pass, and as that side alone affords such an extent of open space as seems absolutely necessary for the encounter which took place on the day of Philip’s defeat. The height to which the king then retreated seems, from the distance mentioned by the historian, to have been that of Klisura, which furnished a good defensive position, and was well adapted to the king’s design, of collecting his scattered forces. Valerius Antias, a Latin historian, asserted that Villius, while in command of the Roman army, had entered the pass, thrown a bridge over the river, and attacked the enemy; but Livy opposes to his testimony that of all the other Greek and Latin writers, who were agreed that Villius had done nothing worthy of mention. Hence it is credible that Philip was in possession of the entire pass until he was attacked by Quinctius, and consequently, that until that day the Roman camp was 5 miles from the western end of the pass, probably in the valley of the Dryno, above its junction with the Viosa.

§ 1.389   The plain, therefore, near the western entrance of the pass, between Kotra and Tepeleni, would seem to have been the scene of the combat which occurred on the day after the conference between the two commanders. If Philip’s camp was on the right bank of the Aous, it follows of course that Mount Trebusin is the ancient Aeropus, and the opposite mountain, or northern termination of Mount Nemrtzika, the ancient Asnaus. Whether the latter name belonged to the whole of that great mountain, it is impossible to say, no ancient author having distinctly alluded to it, although it is one of the most remarkable in Greece.
Plutarch has added nothing to the narrative of the Latin historian worthy of notice, except his description of the pass, in which, if he is more than usually clear and accurate, it is probably because he has borrowed freely from the same Greek historian from whom Livy chiefly derived his information. Plutarch describes the Straits of the Aous as not less strong than the similar defile of the Peneius at Tempe: “It is deficient,” he adds, “in the beautiful groves, the verdant forests, the pleasant retreats, and the meadows which border the Peneius; but in the lofty and precipitous mountains, in the profundity of the narrow fissure between them, in the rapidity and magnitude of the river, in the single narrow path along the bank, the two places exactly resemble. Hence it is difficult for an army to pass under any circumstances, and impossible when the place is defended by an enemy.”

§ 1.390   In all the editions of Plutarch there is an error in the name of the river, which by the substitution of a ψ for an ω has been made Apsus instead of Aous. That it really is an error cannot admit of a doubt, for no position on the Apsus can be reconciled with the circumstances of the battle, or with those which occurred before and after it. Nor does the Apsus, or indeed any other river in Greece, flow through a defile which so nearly resembles that of the Peneius as these Straits of the Viosa, although they are not to be compared to the Thessalian Tempe in beauty and grandeur, as well in consequence of the deficiencies remarked by Plutarch, as from the smaller dimensions of the river, and including mountains which constitute the main features of both these defiles.
Oct. 17.—Having descended to the point of the road from Berat to Premedi, from whence we turned to Klisura, we proceed from thence at 7.10 to follow up the valley, until having reached, in about three quarters of an hour, a spot where a low branch of the hills on the left touches the Viosa, we pass close along its right bank. The river is deep and rapid, but not so much swollen as might have been expected after the late rains. In a quarter of an hour the valley becomes wider again; the chief produce continues to be maize; the upper part of the plant has been cut off for the cattle, the pods alone remaining on the stem to ripen in the sun. Musulman tombs are frequent on the road side, and the same was observable in every part of the district of Berat.

§ 1.391   The ridge of Nemertzika follows the same south-easterly direction as before, and so continues as far as Paleo Pogoghiani: the highest summit is a little to the southward of Premedi. On our left are some secondary heights which unite Tomar and the mountain of Skrepari with the central range of Pindus, and which have a general direction parallel to Nemertzika; they are very uneven in their forme, but are cultivated in many parts.
At a turning of the hills, an hour from Premedi, we come in sight of its castle, situated on a low acclivity overhanging the Viosa, at the foot of the steep slope of Mount Nemertzika. The town lies to the eastward of the castle, in a narrow bottom on the side of the river, which for a considerable distance below the town, flows rapid, full, and turbid, between banks composed of a rock which is a congregate of small pebbles united by a white cement. Where this substance prevails as it does immediately opposite to the town, and for some distance below it, the valley is quite barren, while in higher situations, especially on the eastern hills, the land is fertile and well cultivated. At 10.30 we cross the Viosa by a bridge, and enter the town.
Premedi, sometimes called Permedi, or Permeti, contains about 300 Musulman and 100 Christian families. The houses are built of loose stones put together without cement—a kind of masonry not uncommon in Albania; and few of them have walls which are quite perpendicular. That which is assigned me for a lodging, belonging to a tailor now absent, is tolerably comfortable within, and far better than any I saw at Berat.

§ 1.392   One of the most remarkable objects is a high rock on the northern side of the town, towards the river, the summit of which is surrounded by a ruined wall, containing within it a pool of water supposed to possess medicinal virtues. According to the local tradition, Premedi belonged once to the Spaniards. Above the town the Vezir Aly has lately built a new fortress, in the form of an oblong quadrangle, flanked with towers at the angles, and at intervals also on the sides. It stands like many such constructions in Turkey, on a slope, and one angle is commanded at a very short distance. The castle was prolonged on the descent in great measure for the purpose of including an old ruinous Serai, which Aly’s avarice not allowing him to pull down, he has thus, as he now admits, injured his castle, without escaping from the necessity of constructing a new Serai near the upper wall. An Italian renegade calling himself Suliman Aga, who has been employed as engineer on this occasion, informs me that he did not find any traces of antiquity when he cleared and dug the ground for the foundations, though it is the spot where the acropolis is likely to have been, if Premedi was an ancient site, which is highly probable. The great ridge of Nemertzika rises with extraordinary abruptness behind the castle. Beyond it is the valley of Zagoria, watered by the stream which continues through that of Kieperia, and joins the Viosa in the pass of Klisura. Zagoria consists of several villages, inhabited chiefly by Christian artisans and travelling tradesmen; some of whom proceed as far as Germany. Between Zagoria and Libokhovo is the district of Liuntja.

§ 1.393   Mukhtar Pasha, who is stationed here by his father, in consequence of some suspicions of war with the Pasha of Skodra; and because the place is centrical, and convenient for collecting the Toshke, returns this afternoon from a hunting party at Eleusa, a village in the mountains, four hours distant. This name is remarkable for its Greek form, amidst so many others of indigenous or Sclavonic derivation, and tends to the belief that Elaeus, which Ptolemy enumerates among the inland cities of Chaonia, was situated at Eleusa. But in this case Elaeus was a different place from the plain Elaeon mentioned by Livy, which was evidently that of Arghyrokastro. It will be necessary also to suppose that Ptolemy is in error in regard to the province to which he attributes Elaeus —namely, Chaonia: for the valley of Premedi was certainly not a part of Chaonia, but lay between the Atintanes and the tribes of Upper Macedonia, and probably belonged to the Paravaei, who received that name as dwelling on the banks of the Aua, which appears to have been one of the ancient names of the Viosa. I am inclined to believe, therefore, that although Eleusa may be an ancient name preserved, it has nothing in common with the Elaeus of Chaonia.

§ 1.394   Oct. 19.—At 10.30, proceeding from Premedi, we continue to follow the route by which Philip fled before the victorious legions of Rome. At 11.20 we cross to the right bank of the river by a somewhat dangerous ford, at a spot where the stream is compressed between rocks of the same kind as those near Premedi. It is a position in which Philip’s rear-guard might easily have checked a pursuing enemy; but as Quinctius did not complete his march through the Straits until the day after the battle, and Philip seems not to have lost a moment in commencing his retreat, there was little chance of his being overtaken.
Beyond the ford of the Viosa the valley is in no part more than a quarter of a mile in breadth, being bounded to the right by the last falls of the abrupt Nemertzika, and on the other side by a continuation of the parallel range of rugged hills which I before described. In some places there is no valley, and the road crosses over the hills. At 2.40 we turn out of the main route to the left, and ascend the rugged heights in order to gain the village of Tjersova for our konak; the steep acclivities are clothed with shrubs; of which the most common are the arbutus and andrachne, both covered with a mixture of blossoms and ripe fruit. The first has a smooth red stem, large leaves like a laurel, and a small tasteless fruit, growing in a racemus; the andrachne a rough brown stem, small serrated dark-coloured leaves, and a larger fruit growing singly. Both plants are called κουμαριά, which is the ancient κόμαρος, little changed. Tzersova, which we reach in fifty minutes from the yalley, stands on the eastern side of the ridge, just below the summit, and contains forty-five houses, surrounded by vineyards, below which are a few corn-fields on the slope.

§ 1.395   All the mountains around are much broken and intersected by ravines: the summits near Konitza are conspicuous to the eastward, with the branches of the same range towards Mount Russotari. On the opposite side of the valley of the Aous, and almost immediately above the point from which we began to mount the hills, are the most precipitous of those great cliffs of Nemertzika which are so remarkable from Ioannina and other distant places: the summits of these rocks are hid in the clouds, while their bases are but a little above the level of the valley and river. They are probably between two and three thousand feet in height.
Oct. 20.—At 7 we descend by a rugged path, and in three quarters of an hour re-enter the main road in the valley of the Viosa, at a spot which is about thirty-five minutes from where we left it. The valley is narrow and grown with maize: the lower slope of Mount Nemertzika, though still exceedingly steep, is more practicable than before, and there is a monastery upon it, as well as one or two small villages, which, like those on the hills to our left, are inhabited by Musulman Albanians. At 9.5 we ford a large branch of the Viosa, of which the sources are in the mountains on the left, near Khierasovo. At the junction, the Viosa, by means of a derivation perhaps artificial, forms a large island, at the upper point of which is a mill, turned by a part of the water of a cascade which falls over the bank of the Viosa; behind these objects an old deserted monastery completes a most picturesque scene.

§ 1.396   At 9.20 we cross the main river by a bridge high and narrow, and with scarcely any defences on the sides. Here again the stream, being compressed between the rocks, is narrow, and too deep to be forded, though below at the mill it was so shallow as to be forded by asses. Immediately after crossing the river we begin to ascend a lofty root of Nemertzika, and at 9.40, near the summit of the ridge, pass Ostanitza, once a place of importance, but now small: the people have built a khan on the road, which, affording better accommodation than any of their own huts, relieves them from the lodging of travellers. Ostanitza, being about thirty-two miles by the road from Klisura, and lying in the direction which Philip was pursuing towards the modern districts of Zagori and Metzovo, is probably the position of the Castra Pyrrhi, at which the king arrived in his retreat on the afternoon of the first day after the battle. The position was exactly suited to his circumstances, being a strong height, well defended in the direction of the enemy by the narrow gorge through which the river passes immediately below Ostanitza. No remains of antiquity, however, are to be observed here.
At the summit of the ridge of Ostanitza we arrive in sight of Konitza, a large town, situated on the right bank of the Viosa, at the foot of an abrupt termination of the central range of Pindus, but considerably elevated above the valley. It appears to contain 800 or 1000 houses.

§ 1.397   The adjacent mountain is rugged, broken by torrents, and covered with wood: behind it rise the bare precipices of Mount Lazari, one of the highest points of the central range, often called the mountain of Papingo, from a village at its foot belonging to the sub-district of Ioannina, named Zagori. The heights of Konitza are separated from those of Ostanitza by a plain about six miles in diameter, through which the Viosa winds along a broad stony bed, and then, entering the hills, pursues a serpentine course for two miles through them in approaching Ostanitza, beyond which it passes through the narrow glen, a little above the island to which I before alluded. In the plain the Viosa is joined by another great component branch of the Aous called the Voidhomati, (ox eye, or fountain,) which issues from a deep ravine of the mountains of Zagori, a few miles to the south-east of Konitza: the Viosa itself enters the plain immediately below Konitza, through a narrow opening between two precipices higher and more abrupt even than those of Klisura.
Our road now leads through a wood of oaks of small size and of various kinds. At 10.20 we halt twenty minutes at a fountain in the middle of the wood to dine; then descend the hill into a narrow valley, where at 12.30 Mavrovuni, a Zagorite village, is near us on the left, and two miles on the right Pogoghiani, which, though small, gives name to a district extending northward from thence to the sources of the Sukha, or branch of the Dryno, which enters the plain of Deropoli at Libokhovo. Delvinaki is now the chief town.

§ 1.398   The great cliffs of Nemertzika terminate above Ostanitza, where they suddenly fall to a lower woody branch which connects that mountain with a high rocky peak to the northward of Delvinaki. Between the latter and an inferior range, which has a northerly direction, stretches a long slope, on which appear some of the villages of Pogoghiani: through an opening at its northern extremity I recognize the summit near Labovo, called Strakavetzi, and to the left of it one side of the Klisura of Libokhovo. At the end of the valley we ascend a steep hill, and a little beyond the summit arrive, at 1.15, at Raveni, containing eighty poor houses, and included among the villages of Zagori.
It is probable that our road from Ostanitza to this place has no longer coincided with the route of Philip, and that in his second day’s march he followed a more eastern line, crossing the plain to the westward of Konitza, and making as direct a course as possible to the highlands of Zagori, which he may have conveniently entered about Artzista. Livy’s description of Mount Lingon is so exactly applicable to Zagori, that we cannot doubt the identity, nor that he adopted that description from Polybius, who was well acquainted with the country. The Latin historian remarks that Lingon (in Greek Λίγγος, or Λίγγον) was a mountainous district of Epirus, bordering on Macedonia northward, and on Thessaly eastward, covered with woods, but in the higher parts containing open plains and perennial waters.

§ 1.399   Although it might be more correct to say fertile valleys,” than “open plains,” in reference to Zagori, the only plain properly so called being that of Imperatoria, the description leaves at least no question that the line of Philip’s retreat was through Zagori to Imperatoria, where he was probably encamped while undecided whether he should retreat into Macedonia or Thessaly; for at one end of that plain the road to Grevena, in Upper Macedonia, begins to cross the great ridge of Pindus; and from the other end branches that which leads over the Zygos of Metzovo into Upper Thessaly. The name Lingon I should conceive to have been particularly attached to those summits in the middle of Zagori, which are embraced on the north and east by the extreme branches of the Aous, and on the west and south by those of the Arachthus. It is remarkable that one of the villages of Zagori is named Linghiadhes. It is situated on the eastern side of Mitzikeli, which mountain is separated only by the valley of the northern branch of the Arachthus from the mountain which I imagine to have been the proper Lingon. As soon as Philip had arrived on the second day of his retreat within the recesses of this mountainous district, he might encamp wherever he found it convenient; but even if he advanced no farther than the valleys eastward of Sudhena and Dovra, his horizontal distance was more than equal to that of the preceding day, besides which there was a considerable increase of elevation, so that the “ingens iter agminis” of Livy seems perfectly justified.

§ 1.400   Oct. 21.—A violent fall of rain last night, which continues all this day, with a strong gale from the south, detains me in the cottage of the papas of Raveni, in a wretched chamber pervious to the weather on all sides.
Oct. 22.—At 7.15 we descend into a small cultivated plain to the south of Raveni, from whence the road winds through low barren hills till 8, when it enters a plain which is included between the last falls of the mountains of Zagori and a steep ridge on the western aide. This plain, which contains the sources of the Kalama and a small lake, is nearly as broad as long, and is ten or twelve miles in circumference. We skirt it at the foot of the hills which border it on the east, and at 8.20 arrive at the khan of Kalbaki, lately built by the Vezir on the edge of the plain. We then enter a narrow vale, in few places cultivated, between two ranges of low barren hills. Those on the right increase in height to the westward, and upon one of the highest points of them is situated a village called Zagoria. We continue to pursue the tedious course of this uninteresting vale till 10.40, when we find ourselves at the foot of Mount Mitzikeli, above the northern end of the Lake of Lapsista, where the village of Petjali is half a mile on the right, not far from the bank. The abundance of rain has maintained the lake at its highest all this year.

§ 1.401   A farther descent of half an hour brings us, at 11.50, to the Khan of Lykostomo, situated at the eastern end of a causeway, or long bridge, here crossing the narrowest part of the marsh, which unites the Lake of Ioannina with that of Lapsista. The causeway of Lykostomo is the only direct communication between Zagori and the plain of Ioannina. Having remained at the khan till 1.40, we cross the causeway and the plain, and arrive at the entrance of the city at 3.3. Here I am lodged for a few days at the house of the Bishop of Arta, and then remove to that of S. B., a young man who inherited from his father 800 purses, all which, with the assistance of the Vezir, he has long since got rid of. He was a frequenter, like other young men of fashion, of the house of the celebrated Frosyni. But he was not always so refined in his female society, and the Vezir, who is very rigorous on these subjects when it suits his purpose, and who had an eye to a share of Kyr S.’s fortune, set the police to watch and arrest him on the spot, and by threatening a public example, extracted 400 purses from him.
As to the famous πνίξιμον, that atrocious act which seems first to have shown Aly’s subjects to what an extent his pitiless disposition could carry him in a single act of cruelty, I have received the following particulars from Kyr N. G. of Kalarytes, whose wife was one of the sufferers.

§ 1.402   The Vezir invited himself to supper at the Kalarytiote’s house, an expensive favour, which he is wont to confer occasionally on his confidential servants, of whom Kyr G. is one. Here he collected his intended victims, either by sending the bolu-bashi of the police for them, or proceeding himself on horseback to their respective residences. From the house of G. he went on foot to that of Frosyni, which he entered at the back by climbing over a part of the neighbouring house. He thus appeared suddenly before Frosyni, and without saying a word, made a motion to the bolu-bashi, signifying that she was to be conveyed with the others to prison. The relations of G.’s wife say that her husband was privy to the Vezir’s intentions, and that when she was preparing to appear before the Pasha, in obedience to his summons, her husband, in order to save her trinkets and best clothes, told her that the Pasha wished to make her some present, and might be indisposed from doing so if she made too great a display of dress. The Kalarytiote himself, however, denies all knowledge of his master's intentions, which seems much more probable; and although his suspicions could hardly have been short of conviction, when the women were collected at his house, it would have been in vain for him then to attempt any interference. He asserts, that when the design became manifest, he made every effort to move the Vezir’s compassion for his own wife, without effect. The women were all conveyed to the church of St. Nicolas at the northern extremity of the lake: so much time however had been consumed in assembling them,

§ 1.403   that the morning returned before boats could be obtained from the island, the fishermen, moreover, refusing to assist without a written order; so that as Turkish custom requires darkness to be added to the other horrors of this mode of punishment, it was not until the following midnight, in the midst of one of those furious thunder-storms so common in Ioannina, that the women were collected in five or six boats, and not being inclosed in sacks according to the practice of Constantinople, the Albanians were under the necessity of using force when they clung to the sides of the monoxyla.
During the intervening day, such was the state of the Vezir’s mind and appearance, that no one dared to approach him; and it unfortunately happened that Bishop Ignatius, who would certainly have made some attempt to save the wretched victims, arrived only at Ioannina a day or two after the event. The Pasha has since observed to more than one person, with a pointed allusion to this event, that he has no good counsellors; thus showing the probability that he would at least have spared some of the women for a good ransom. Frosyni was niece of the bishop of Grevena, and was about 28 years of age; she is said to have been witty and accomplished, and seems to have revived exactly the ancient Greek character of an εταιρα. The Ioannites speak with pride and affection of her, and seem to consider the existence of such a person at Ioannina as proving their superiority to the rest of Greece in civilization, not less than a bookshop in the Bazar and their two colleges for education.

§ 1.404   Frosyni’s coterie, however, was better suited to France or Italy than to Greece in its present state, and was attended with extreme danger in a Turkish town, where the example of a person of good family had a pernicious effect among the Greek women, while it was viewed with abhorrence or envy by the Turkish. The jealous complaints of Mukhtar’s wife to her father-in-law were chiefly directed against Frosyni: those of her sister, the wife of Vely, against two or three married women; and these accusations were undoubtedly the immediate cause of the horrible result. The whole number who suffered were 17, of whom five or six only were of the higher class. The bodies were not all collected for several days, during which time the Satrap remained inclosed in his harem to avoid witnessing the indignation of the Greeks of Ioannina, which for a moment got the better of their prudence, and showed itself by their attending the funerals in great numbers, particularly that of Frosyni.

§ 1.405   Nov. 1.—A sharp frost in the morning: the lake is now peopled with astonishing numbers of the duck tribe, which often furnish good sport to the Ioannites. The Vezir and his sons often have a battue, which lasts the greater part of the day. As the Pasha permits any body to accompany him, every boat in Ioannina is in requisition on such occasions. They proceed in a long line through the narrow channels which pervade the papyria, and thus surround the cover where the birds are collected, when a sudden shout being given, they rise and are brought down by scores. They are generally very fat at this time of the year, but in general coarse and ill-flavoured.
Aly’s intentions are at present directed towards Margariti and Paramythia, and his Albanians have lately taken Koranopulo in Fanari, a village belonging to Hassan Tjapari, of Margariti. His Highness declares his intention of building a new fortress and palace at Litharitza, an important point to the security of Ioannina, being a commanding height not far from the lake, at a distance of 600 yards from the south-eastern tower of the citadel. It commands every approach to the town from the southward, and enfilades the whole length of it in a northern direction, and will thus give the Vezir a command over his capital which can never be obtained from the castle, while the latter is an excellent citadel, and would furnish a secure retreat if the post of Litharitza were lost.
The Pasha’s avaricious disposition carries him to such a length, that he never allows any wornout piece of furniture, or arms or utensils to be thrown away, but lays them in places well known to him, and would discover the loss of the smallest article. In the dirty passages and antichambers leading to some of the grandest apartments of his palace, and which have cost some thousands to fit up, the worn out stock of a pistol, or a rusty sword, or a scabbard, or some ragged articles of dress, may be seen hanging up, which his numerous domestics never venture to remove, well knowing that it would be remarked by him.

§ 1.406   This mixture of magnificence and meanness is very striking in every part of the palace. His great apartment covered with a Gobelin carpet, surrounded with the most costly sofas, musical clocks, and mirrors, is defended by cross iron bars, rougher than would be considered tolerable in the streets of London. They are intended to prevent his servants from passing through the windows when the chamber is locked.
Having had occasion when I was at Corfu to transmit a small sum of money to the Vezir, I sent it purposely through the hands of Mehmet, the Roman, in the hope that when he presented it, his highness would make him a present of it. In a fit of generosity he did so; but not long afterwards changed his mind, and sent his treasurer for it. One year he gave the superintendence of the collection of his revenues and rents to the bishop of Arta, with the injunction that it should be done καλά, which word the bishop well knew did not convey any intention of forbearance. The new system failed not in producing a greater amount than usual, but numerous complaints having followed, the Vezir informed the complainants that they might apply to the bishop for a remission in their next contributions, amounting altogether to 80 purses. For these 80 purses, however, he never allowed the bishop any credit in the account between them, thus pocketing the increase, and leaving the bishop to settle it as he best might with the villages.

§ 1.407   Though the Greek prelates suffer in this manner occasionally, he is too well aware of their importance in the government of the Christian population, and as instruments of extortion, to treat them with extreme harshness. Indeed, he generally favours the Dhespotes, as he qualifies them, much more than the Turkish Beys, and seldom denies the bishops a little military assistance in obtaining their personal dues. Not long ago, however, he almost frightened to death the Bishop of Grevena, a mild and timid man, by a proceeding which was meant to increase the bishop’s authority. Being about to visit Grevena, he ordered the bishop to prepare the episcopal palace for his reception, but instead of proceeding there went to another konak, pretending to believe that the bishop had so ordered it. Having sent for the unfortunate Άγιος Γρεβενών, or Holy of Grevena, he assumed an air of extreme anger, ordered the bishop to prison, and issued a proclamation that all persons having complaints against him should make a statement of them. Nobody having appeared, the Vezir sent for him the next day, and congratulated him on the proof that he had no enemies, and that he governed his flock with kindness and justice.

§ 1.408   Nov. 11.—Visiting the Pasha this afternoon, previously to my departure, I find him sitting in his state apartment, in close conference with a Bektashli Sheikh, whose sect he affects to favour. During our conference he employs himself in selecting some large pearls for a chaplet of beads, which two Greek jewellers have brought. I was afterwards informed that he purchased twenty-four of these pearls for fifty purses: though of course uncommonly large, they are not round or regular. He added some which he before possessed, and two emeralds of the same size, to make up thirty-three, one of the legitimate numbers of a chaplet. This he afterwards wore, for the first time, at a supper, to which he invited himself, at the house of Mehmet the Roman, and who was thus put to an expence of two or three hundred piastres.

§ 1.409   Chapter IX EPIRUS, THESSALIA.
Nov. 12.—After six or seven clear calm days, with a light north-east wind, the appearance of the weather alters this morning, just as I am about to leave Ioannina for Larissa and Athens, and threatens a difficult passage over the Pindus.
The water of the lake, which in the months of July and August reached to the paved road at the foot of the rocks of Kastritza, is now near a mile distant from thence; and all that extremity of the lake is dry, with the exception of a few marshy spots. The reeds are either cut down or withered, and some large spaces, which in the summer were covered with water, have since that time produced a crop of coarse grass, which has lately been mown

§ 1.410   with the scythe. Through this desiccated termination of the lake, a small stream flows to the extremity, and there enters some cavities at the foot of the rocks along which the road passes. These openings are called the khoneftres, or katavothra, the latter being the common Greek word for such channels, and the former the term more peculiar to Ioannina. The place, according to Meletius, is named Voinikovo. In three hours we arrive at the khan of Dhrysko. Although spacious and recently built, it is already out of repair, and in the best room half the ceiling is wanting, and a shutter to one of the windows. In an instant, however, an immense pile of fuel from the brushwood which covers the hill is brought in, and a blazing fire soon appears upon the hearth. The shop attached to the khan supplies raki, eggs, and new wine.
Nov. 13.—Setting out from Dhrysko at 8.30 we arrive, in a little more than three hours, at the Triakhania, travelling, as in September last, chiefly along the bed of the river, which in winter is sometimes entirely filled: in that case, if the bridges were broken down, the road would be quite impracticable; it seldom happens, however, even in winter, for many days together, that it is necessary to follow the Akres all the way. Having crossed the river beyond Triakhania, we follow the left bank to the point of junction of the branches from Metzovo and the mountain of Khaliki; and fording the latter, proceed, for upwards of half an hour, along a road overhanging the ravine of the

§ 1.411   Metzovo branch, when at the end of two hours and five minutes from Triakhania, we arrive at Anilio, where I am lodged in a neat Vlakhiote cottage, which has a plastered floor and walls, and an air of comfort unknown in the houses of the Greek peasants. The town is half buried in sntw, and long icicles hang from the eaves of the houses. We lost a short time towards the end of our journey by meeting a great number of asses and mules coming from Thessaly, laden chiefly with flour. These caravans were moving heaps of snow, and had passed the Zygos, or ridge of Metzovo, with difficulty, on account of the violence of the wind. Those who attempted it latest were obliged to leave their φορτώματα, or burthens, on the top of the mountain. The Papa-Proestos of Anilio informs me that they have had similar weather, with little variation, these fifteen days, during a great part of which it was clear and calm at Ioannina.
Nov. 14.—Although much snow has fallen in the night, and the weather still continues squally, the Metzovites report the mountain passable; we set out therefore at 8.30, and follow the left side of the glen of Metzovo for a quarter of an hour, and afterwards the bed of a torrent which joins that from the plain of Imperatoria a mile above the town. We soon enter the clouds, and lose sight of all objects at more than a few yards’ distance; and quitting the torrent, begin to mount the Zygos by a zigzag road. In ascending, the snow becomes deeper, lying in drifted heaps, and forming hillocks, under which the shrubs are buried.

§ 1.412   Box and pine are the most common trees, and become more plentiful as we ascend. The east wind comes over the ridge in squalls with a piercing keenness. Where the snow has been blown away, and the rocky surface left bare, the narrow slippery path on the side of the steep slope is not a little hazardous. The road on the lee side of the mountain is generally in this state in winter, because the wind, coming over the ridge in squalls, drives away the snow from the rocky parts, and hence the lee side is considered the more difficult, unless the quantity of snow on the weather side be such as to render it quite impassable. I hired three conductors from Metzovo, whose business it is to trace the road wherever it is entirely covered, to support the horses where it is bare and slippery, and if the horse cannot be saved from falling over the side of the hill, to drag off the rider. As it is impossible to save baggage and merchandize with the same celerity, the loads are often left on the top of the mountain till the weather improves, but this seldom happens when they come from the westward, because the Metzovites are well acquainted with the disposition of their mountain, and will not venture without a certainty of passing. We are accompanied by the mules sent to resume their loads, which we find just at the foot of the highest ridge on the western side. Here we dismount, in order to make the last ascent of about fifty paces on foot. This little interval, however, is so steep and slippery that, not having yet recovered from the effects of my Apollonian fever, I should have been some time in reaching the summit, had not two of my guides, each taking an arm, hauled me up, and

§ 1.413   then running down the steep on the opposite side, saved me the trouble of making a step. The road on the sharp summit passes between two rocks, on one of which is a konisma [εικόνισμα, a little pillar of stone, in which there is a niche to hold a small picture of the saint] of St. Nicolas, whom they invoke as they pass, and hence the place is called Aio Nikola.
The proper Zygos terminates at no great distance to our right, beyond which rises the summit called Dhokimi, connected by means of the heights behind Anilio with the summit above Khaliki. Beyond St. Nicolas we immediately enter a forest of beeches loaded with snow, which lies upon the ground four or five feet deep, or more than double its average depth on the other side of the ridge. This is said to be generally the case, whether the wind be from Thessaly or Epirus, for though the snow generally falls in much greater quantity in the latter case, sometimes covering the ground to the depth of several feet in the course of a night, it seldom remains long unmelted on that side. The easterly winds, on the contrary, being frosty, the snow is more permanent, falling commonly in a fine powder; whereas from the southward or westward it descends in large flakes. The two winds most noted at Metzovo for foul weather are called Patrinos and Avlonitis, names indicating the directions of south and north-west, but comprehending under the one or the other denomination many of the intermediate points. It is remarkable

§ 1.414   that the snow lies at present upon the ground as far down the valley to the westward as Triakhania, while upon the highest points to the northward, and on Tzikurela, and the neighbouring heights in the opposite direction, which are many hundred feet higher than the Zygos, there is only a slight sprinkling on the summits. Mounts Tzumerka and Kakardhista are more deeply covered. This peculiarity of the Zygos is probably caused by its position between much higher mountains to the north and south, at the same time that it is the ridge of separation between two long narrow valleys which lie in a transverse direction to the chain. The wind is thus drawn up the one or the other of the twο valleys, and is confined to those two opposite directions, while the Zygos in either case intercepts the vapours.
The forests which cover this part of the Pindus consist chiefly of firs and beeches. On the Zygos, beeches are only found near the summit, lower down are firs, and still lower, small oaks. In the latter end of February and beginning of March, at which time the snow generally collects on the ridge in the greatest quantity, the beeches, although lofty trees, have their stems sometimes buried, and the ridge is impassable for many days, except to foot passengers: nor would it be practicable at all during strong winds, but for the shelter afforded by the trees. Hence they are carefully preserved. The firs on the western side, on the contrary, are used for fuel, and are diminishing.

§ 1.415   The Zygos of Metzovo is geographically the most remarkable mountain in Greece. Situated in the heart of Pindus as to its breadth, and centrally also in the longitudinal chain which pervades the continent from north to south, it gives rise to five principal rivers, in fact to all the great streams of Northern Greece except the Spercheius: north-eastward to the Haliacmon, south-eastward to the Peneius, southward to the Achelous, south-westward to the Arachthus, and north-westward to the Aous.
Remounting our horses a few hundred yards below St. Nicholas, we proceed in half an hour to a fountain, where our guides leave us, and where the beech wood ends. The zigzag road continues with a diminishing depth of snow for another hour, when we arrive, at 11.30, upon a part of the slope of the mountain, where in the bottom of a deep ravine to the right, flows the Salamvria, or Salambria, composed chiefly of the streams collected from the eastern face of Mount Dhokimi. At 12 this river is joined by a branch from the northward, which rises at the γαλακτίτης λίθος, or milkstone, a rock so called because there is a calcareous deposit at the fountain which has the reputation at Metzovo and other neighbouring villages of having the effect, when pounded and mixed with water, of promoting a woman's milk. Although this is not so distant a source as that of the southern branch, it was very probably the reputed origin of the Peneius, from being the most remarkable of its fountains.

§ 1.416   The road from Metzovo, by the milk-stone, passes not far from the site of Imperatoria, and descends to the Salamvria by the monastery of Libokhovo [Λιμπώχοβος]. At the junction of the two branches stands a khan named that of Malakash [One of the four sub-districts into which the rural district of Ioannina is divided bears the same name, but is separated from the territory of this village by the whole of Metzovo.] from a village situated half an hour above it on the mountain to the left. Here we remain until 2 p.m., then immediately crossing the northern river by a bridge, continue for a short time along the left bank of the united stream, which is not large, but very winding, with a general course of S. S. E, The mountains on either side have a more gradual slope than those which border the river Arta below Metzovo, and the passage of this valley would be easier to an army than that of the Arachthus. The woody summits rising above the akres or extreme points, clothed with oak, which overhang the river, present, as they fold over one another, a continuation of beautiful scenery. As we advance, the snow, which at Khan Malakassi was lying on the ground, retires to a higher limit on the hills. We follow generally the gravelly bed of the river, but sometimes cross the akres for a considerable distance, especially towards the end of the day’s journey, which terminates at 4.15, on the right bank, at the Khan of Kotovazdhi, so called as having been built by the inhabitants of a village of that name in the neighbouring mountain, who are

§ 1.417   bound to keep the building in repair, and to see that it is furnished with provisions and a khanji to sell them.
Aly Pasha has caused khans to be established in the same manner, at intervals of about an hour along the whole route from Ioannina to Trikkala, but only those of Dhrysko, Tria Khania, Malakassi, and Kotovazdhi, have chambers for travellers of the higher classes. From Kotovazdhi there is a route of six hours to Kalarytes, leaving Khaliki at no great distance to the right. The river of Kotovazdhi receives streams from Vendista and Kastania, two large villages situated among woods of chestnut. Between the khans of Malakassi and Kotovazdhi a tributary joins the Salamvria from the northward, having its origin in the ridges towards Milies, from the opposite face of which the waters flow to the Venetiko of Grevena. To the right of our road were the villages of Labovo, Kokkino-lithari, and Gletjadhes: to the left that of Struniza, nearly opposite to Labovo. All these places stand at the head of sloping vineyards and corn-fields.
Nov. 15.—At 8 we continue to follow the bed of the river from the Khan of Kotovazdhi, but sometimes passing through narrow meadows on its bank, or among plane trees which began to border the stream a little above the khan. The vale widens gradually. At 8.30 we cross a branch of the river flowing from the mountains on the right, and at

§ 1.418   9.20 a larger from Klinovo. Here the main valley is about a mile in breadth. The opening of the river of Klinovo admits a view of a great branch of Pindus which follows a direction nearly parallel to the course of the Peneius. This mountain is known by the name of Aspropotamitiko, as being contained in the district of Aspropotamo, and as falling on the opposite side to the river so called: it is now deeply covered with snow. At 9.40, being near the foot of the right-hand hills, we have, at the distance of half a mile on the left, the junction of the Salamvria, with a stream of almost equal magnitude flowing from the northward, and from the Trikkaline sub-district of Kratzova. Soon afterwards we cross a tributary from the right. From the left bank of the Kratzova branch rises a range of hills of a secondary altitude, which terminate towards the valley of the Peneius, in the perpendicular rocks named the Meteora, upon which are built the monasteries called τα μοναστήρια του Πίνδου. At 10.10, after having turned a root of the mountain to the right where the valley changes its direction to the south, a part of the plain of Trikkala becomes visible: the plane trees still continue. At 10.20, the principal monastery or Meteora, individually so called, is on a high rock to the left, distant two or three miles, and another midway on a point half as high as the former. After having passed over a root of the mountain, we cross to the left bank of the river and arrive in sight of the Castle of Trikkala, then

§ 1.419   turning to the left of the direct road leading to that place, arrive in ten minutes more, at 11 a.m., at Kalabaka, where I am lodged in the house of a Kalarytiote silversmith.
Kalabaka, by the Greeks called Stagus, in the nominative Staghi [Σταγοι], is situated on the south-eastern side, and immediately at the foot of a perpendicular precipice, which is five or six hundred feet high, and of an uniform surface from top to bottom, but is divided into two parts by a deep vertical fissure, affording a narrow passage from the town to the village of Kastraki, and the monasteries of the Meteora. The cleft widens towards the top, and gives the rock of Kalabaka a bicipital appearance at a distance. There is a third precipitous summit to the eastward, called the mountain of Aio Stefano, from a convent of Saint Stephen which stands on the summit. The town is spread over the upper part of a long slope covered with mulberry trees, which declines very gently to the river Salamvria, and commands a fine view of the plain of Trikkala, beyond which appear the heights of Agrafa, and behind them the summits of Mount Oeta, entirely covered with snow. To the left of the plain rise the heights behind Trikkala, over which another snowy mountain is seen, probably Othrys. At 2 miles below Kalabaka, the Salamvria, after having encircled the slope which descends from the town, makes a sudden turn to the south, towards the foot of the mountain of Kotjaka, which borders the plain to the westward,

§ 1.420   and after a course of six or eight miles in that direction, sweeps again in a graceful curve towards Trikkala. A wide gravelly uncultivable space on either side the river, caused by its inundations, is characteristic of the ποταμόκλυστος θετταλία. but it is common to the rivers in general of the plains of Greece, and may be said to be injurious both to agriculture and to picturesque effect. Although Kalabaka belongs to the Liva or government of Trikkala, its public revenue is at present a separate mukata in the hands of Vely Pasha, whose agent is the only Turk residing in the place. The Pasha receives 30 purses a year; the other contributions, including the local expences of the district, such as konaks, support of Albanian troops, ac. amount to 20 more. This is paid almost entirely by about 120 houses, the rest, to the number of 30 or 40, being wretched cottages. The house of Kyr Ianaki, the Hodja-bashi, is large, and there are some others which indicate former opulence, but the place has been much injured of late by robbers, or by the Albanians sent in pursuit of them. The mulberry plantations still produce 12 or 15 fortomata of silk per annum, each fortoma being 100 okes. The territory of Trikkala produces about 60 fortomata. Stagi was formerly a metropolitan see, but is now only a poor bishopric of the province of Larissa.

§ 1.421   The cathedral, which is not large, was built about the year 1300 by the Emperor Andronicus Palaeologus, as appears by an inscription on one of the walls of the church. It has a large pulpit of stone in the centre, and is supported by columns of a coarse white marble. Below the altar is a small column of verd-antique. All these columns are held to be θαυματούργαις, and distil water on the feast of the saint to whom the church is dedicated. Adjoining to the church is the humble palace of the bishop των Σταγών, who is now at Constantinople.
That Stagus stands on the site of an ancient city, appears from many indications. On the slope below the town are some massy foundations of Hellenic walls, and ancient sepulchres are found occasionally in the vineyards in the same direction. In the town several wrought blocks are observable in the walls of the churches and private houses. There is an inscribed marble in the outer wall of the episcopal church, and two others at a fountain at the church of St. Prodromus. The first of these monuments (No. 7) records the liberation of some slaves, and contains, together with their names, those of the purveyor, and some other officer, under whom the manumission took place. But one of the inscriptions at the fountain (No. 6) is of more importance, and comes most opportunely in aid of the ancient authors, to resolve many historic and geographic uncertainties. It is cut in large but much-worn letters on a plain squared stone, and attests that the city of the Aeginienses had honoured the emperors Severus and Antoninus (Caracalla).

§ 1.422   Stagus therefore stands on the site of Aeginium, a fact in perfect conformity with Strabo, from whom we learn that Aeginium was in the country of the Tymphaei, and that it confined on Tricca. for Mount Tymphe is sufficiently identified with the summits near Metzovo, by its having contained the sources of the Arachthus; and Stagus lies exactly between the Zygos of Metzovo and Trikkala. The singular situation of the place, fortified on two sides by perpendicular precipices, accords also with the mention of Aeginium by Livy, who relates, that when the consul Quinctius entered Thessaly after the battle at the Aoi Stena, he first took Phaloria, and then advanced against Aeginium, but that finding it next to impregnable, he was deterred from even attempting to besiege it, and turned towards Gomphi.
The importance of Aeginium is shown on other occasions in ancient history. Notwithstanding its strength, it was taken by the Athamanes, when they were in alliance with Antiochus against the Romans, but was soon afterwards recovered by the united forces of Baebius and Philip. It was given up to plunder by L. Aemilius Paullus for having refused to open its gates after the battle of Pydna.

§ 1.423   But perhaps the most interesting illustration which the inscription of Kalabaka affords, is that of the march of Julius Caesar, in his way from Illyria to Pharsalia. Aeginium, which he describes as objectum oppositumque Thessaliae, was the place where he was met by the forces under Domitius, coming from Heraclia of Lyncestis It was from Apollonia that Caesar had begun his march into Thessaly; his route therefore probably followed the Aous and its branch, the modern Dryno, traversing from thence the plain of Ioannina, and crossing the Pindus by the pass of Metzovo, while Domitius, moving from Heraclia, which was near the modern Bitolia, returned to the vale of the Vistritza, or Haliacmon, where he had been opposed to Scipio previously to his movement upon Heraclia, and following that valley to Grevena, from thence crossed the heights which separate it from the Upper Thessalian plain, in which Kalabaka and Trikkala are situated. Scipio about the same time marched from the Haliacmon to Larissa, probably by the modern Servia and Elassona, in order to effect a junction with Pompey, who from Dyrrhachium had crossed Mount Candavia to Lyncestis, from whence, we may suppose his route to have been through Perrhaebia and the Larissaea.
It is proper to observe, that besides Caesar’s error as to Heraclia, to which I have before adverted, the text is manifestly wrong in describing his march as being through Epirus and Acarnania; for the latter province lay very wide of his route to the

§ 1.424   right. The latter name ought evidently, therefore, to be Athamania; for though in strictness Caesar’s line of march only passed along the northern borders of Athamania, it is easy to conceive that the importance which the latter district had assumed about the time of the earlier wars of the Romans in this country, may have caused the name to be applied, especially among the Romans themselves, to a larger portion of the mountains adjacent to the south-eastern part of Thessaly, than it had originally included. As the inscription of Stagus gives to the emperors the titles Parthici, Arabici, Adiabenici, its date was subsequent to A.D. 201, the year of the expedition of Severus into the East.
Nov. 16.—This morning at 8.30, descending through the mulberry plantations, we rejoin, in less than twenty minutes, the direct road from Ioannina to Trikkala. On looking back toward Kalabaka, the rock of Aio Stefano appears higher than the double summit immediately behind the town. To our left, as we proceed, low hills skirt the plain, and thus continue all the way to Trikkala, beyond which they trend more easterly; and the mountains on the opposite side having also a direction more southerly than before, the plain becomes suddenly much wider. Our road is seldom more than half a mile distant from the hills on the left. In a little κόλπος, or retired plain, at about a quarter of the distance to Trikkala, stands Koveltzi, and in another, at half way, Voivoda, both villages of the district of Trikkala.

§ 1.425   The land is a light and light-coloured mould, now under the plough, after having produced a crop of kalambokki. Cars are used like those of the plain of Grevena, but the trucks, or solid wheels upon which they turn, are higher. These trucks are thicker in the centre than at the edge, which is shod with iron: the car is drawn by two oxen, and moves, without creaking and bending, from one side to another, like those of Berat and the Mizakia. The plough-share is a flat triangular piece of iron, like the head of a spear. As we approach Trikkala, many large elms and planes are observable towards the river, which is two or three miles to the right. We crossed a torrent issuing from the mountains at Voidova; and another half an hour short of Trikkala, which passes through the town, and contains only pools of water in the deepest parts, with little or no current, though in the rainy season it would seem to be of a different character, as the road crosses it by a large stone bridge. It is probably the ancient Lethaeus.
At the entrance of the town stands a new serai of Aly Pasha. Here we overtake a caravan of horses, mules, and asses, in number about two hundred, laden with the women, children, and household gear of Gramista on their road to Armyro. Gramista, like several other towns on the ridge of Pindus, consists chiefly of αγωγιάταις and βοσκοί, or in the Turko-Greek dialect of Thessaly,

§ 1.426   κερατζίδες and τζουμπάνιδες; that is to say, carriers and shepherds, very few of whom remain in the mountain in the winter. The carriers, from the nature of their employment, are frequently absent from home at all times of the year, the shepherds proceed constantly in the winter to their pastures in the plains: so that in that season the villages in the mountains are almost deserted. Each village has its particular place of resort, where the Mukatesi levies a capitation upon the cattle for the right of pasture.
The castle of Trikkala occupies a hill projecting from the last falls of the mountain of Khassia, and is commanded by one of those heights at no great distance. It is a structure apparently of the middle ages, which has been frequently repaired. It is of considerable extent, and has a small keep at the summit which commands a noble view of the great plain of Upper Thessaly, from Stagus to Maskoluri, backed by the mountains of Kotjaka and Agrafa. These two great ridges are separated only from each other by a klisura, or pass, called the Gates of Trikkala, where are two villages named Portes, standing in the pass. To the left of this remarkable feature of the view, the mountains of Agrafa occupy near ninety degrees of the horizon. A low projection of them immediately opposite to Trikkala, and nearly due south of it, is crowned with a village and ruined castle named Fanari.

§ 1.427   The town of Trikkala covers the slope and plain on the southern and eastern sides of the castle, and is said to contain between twelve and fifteen hundred families, a great part of whom live in miserable cottages. The houses are all built of sun-baked bricks, and have a poor appearance compared with those of Ioannina, where in all the larger the lower half of the wall is of stone. Though Trikkala has rapidly declined since it has been governed by Aly Pasha, it is still one of the largest towns in Greece, has seven or eight mosques, more than as many churches, two synagogues, a well furnished bazar, and a market on Sundays, much frequented from the surrounding country.
A large proportion of the houses, although built. by and belonging to Turks, are hired and inhabited by Greeks; so that the Christian population exceeds the Turkish. This has arisen from the conduct of Aly Pasha towards the Turks, whose lands he has obtained from some by purchase at a cheap rate, because their extravagance and debts had reduced them to that necessity, and from others by his accustomed modes of fraud or tyranny; others having been unable to bear their share of the expences caused by the wars of the Vezir, the visits of himself and his sons, the passage of Albanian troops, and those arbitrary demands which he makes at intervals, have either sold their property to live elsewhere, or have removed into some village and let their town-houses in apartments.

§ 1.428   The post is another heavy tax on such a thoroughfare as Trikkala, and the Menzilji, or postmaster, is one of the leading men in the place. He contracts to keep one hundred and fifty horses for two hundred purses a year. An old inhabitant tells me, that he remembers when it was done for six purses.
In one of his late visits to this place, Aly carried away with him a Trikkaline Greek, whom he imagined rich, and put him in prison at Ioannina, signifying to him that the price of his liberation was two hundred purses. After two years’ confinement, the man escaped and went to Adrianople, whence he immediately wrote to his son at Trikkala to join him. But the Vezir had been beforehand with him, and had already caused the son to occupy the father’s place in the prison. After a long bargaining, fifty purses was agreed to by the Vezir as the lowest price of the son’s liberty. The father had not so much; but after selling his house, two or three small farms, and some vineyards, in short, the whole property of the family, he collected thirty-six purses, which were paid to the Vezir, who, however, still kept his prisoner confined, until fully convinced that he had not the means of completing the fifty purses. The father, meantime, died at Adrianople, and the son is now in poverty at Trikkala. Aly refused to accept the property in house and lands from the son in full of his demand, but obliged the young man to sell them himself; purchased them secretly, and then received back the purchase-money from his victim.

§ 1.429   The bishop of Trikkala, a man of some curiosity and information, supposes Stagus to be the site of the Ithome of Homer, judging so with great appearance of reason, from the poet’s epithet κλωμακόεσσα; but Ithome still retained its name in the time of Strabo; and his description of the site will not agree with that of Stagus. The bishop was of course ignorant of the decisive inscription containing the words Πόλις Αίγινιέων. He informs me, that there are some remains of a Hellenic town or fortress at Ardham, a village two hours from Trikkala to the north-west, in the Khassia hills, where also are the sources of the lazy stream, which flows through Trikkala. He is rather scandalized at my having passed without visiting the Meteora, which he qualifies as royal and heaven-built works.
The only traces I can find of the ancient Tricca are some small remains of Hellenic masonry, forming part of the wall of the castle, and some squared blocks of stone of the same ages dispersed in different parts of the town. On the summit of the hill behind the castle stands part of the shaft of a column one foot eight inches in diameter, tapering like the Doric, but not fluted. It is fixed with the smaller end in the ground, and is not, therefore, in its original position. There is another similar column in an adjoining Turkish cemetery. They seem too small to have belonged to the Asclepium of Tricca; for Aesculapius having been an object of peculiar veneration as a native deity, whose sons conducted the Triccaei to Troy: his temple was probably one of the chief ornaments of the city. Some remains of it may, perhaps, be enveloped in the buildings of the modern town, or buried under the accumulated ruins and rubbish of ages. Strabo describes it as the most ancient and illustrious of all the temples of Aesculapius, and as the constant resort of invalids, whose cures were there recorded as in his temples of Cos and Epidaurus.

§ 1.430   Nov. 18.—At 10 a.m. we proceed from Trikkala on the road to Larissa, and at the eastern extremity of the town pass by the serai of Vely Pasha, which, although built only a very few years ago, is already in such a dilapidated state, that the window-shutters are dropping off their hinges into the street. The road is dry and even dusty; the hills of Khassia are at no great distance on the left: to the right the plain extends for twelve or fifteen miles to the foot of the lower heights of Agrafa, behind which the central ridges which connect Pindus with Oeta, exhibit their majestic summits covered deeply with snow. At 11.40 we halt to dine at the little village of Kurbali: the men are all absent with their flocks, but we are received by the women without fear — one of the favourable traits of Aly’s government. A quarter of an hour beyond Kurbali, a hill, one mile and a half to the

§ 1.431   left, which is one of the extreme points of the mountains of Khassia, and is connected with the heights behind Trikkala, is surrounded by Hellenic walls of considerable extent. A church crowns the summit, and there is another in ruins at the foot of the hill. The place is called Kardhiki, and still gives title to one of the suffragan bishoprics of the province of Larissa. In the interval between our road and the ruins is a small lake, which yields an abundance of fish.
An opening in the hills, not seen from Trikkala, now discovers itself, through which the Salamvria flows, and the northern part of Mount Pelium makes its appearance. Our road, on turning towards the opening, approaches the hills on the left, and at 2 brings us to Kolokoto, a small village at the foot of a rocky insulated height not far from the hills, and about half an hour distant from the left bank of the Peneius. Immediately above the village are some remains of a Hellenic wall of rude and antique construction, which inclosed only the summit of the hill, together with a small space down the side. On the top of all is a modern tower in ruins. A little before Kolokoto our road touched the bank of the small stream which flows through Trikkala: it is narrow, in most parts deep, and moves so slowly that the current is visible only in particular places. From Kolokoto we pass over a paved road, between the rocky height of the Paleokastro and a marsh on the right, which is fed by some springs issuing from under the rocks, and then cross a bay or recess of the plain between the hill of Kolokoto and those of the district

§ 1.432   of Khassia. At 3.10 Great and Little Tjigoto, or Tjighioti, or Tjaioti, are on the left; and to the northward of the latter Grisano, or Gritziano, above which are a large church, and the ruined walls of a considerable town, apparently of the time of the Byzantine empire. To the right, at the same time, a round insulated hill, situated at about the same distance from the right bank of the Salamvria as Tzighioti is from the left, is rendered very conspicuous by the ruined walls of a large Hellenic city inclosing its summit and face.
We now come in sight of Zarko, situated, like Tzighioti, just within a projection of the heights which here form with other hills on the opposite side of the Salamvria a strait through which the river makes its way towards Larissa. Having crossed the plain which extends to the left to Grisano and the hills of Khassia, we arrive at 3.45 at Zarko, a town of 350 houses, built of a coarse granite from the adjacent hills, and which forms with Tjighioti an agalik of Mukhtar Pasha, who, besides the royal revenue of the two villages, receives an annual contribution as an exemption from the quartering of Albanian soldiers. For the accommodation of Tatars, or persons travelling with imperial firmahns, or with buyurdis of Aly or Mukhtar, the proestos has built two apartments adjoining his house, in one of which I take up my abode for the night. The proestos himself is now in prison at Ioannina, whither he was carried by Aly when

§ 1.433   this primate had allowed the thieves to infest the country around Zarko, and had been on good terms with them. Zarko is chiefly noted for its cotton, which in good years produces 1000 fortomata of picked cotton, in a state fit for spinning. Each fortoma is of twenty okes, and requires ninetythree okes of cotton from the field. Notwithstanding the fertility of these plains, cultivation is confined to the vicinity of the villages; the remainder supplies only winter pasture to sheep and cattle. Cotton is almost the only agricultural production of this place, and a bad cotton-year is starvation to Zarko. It is the ordinary residence of the Bishop of Kardhiki, who is now at Constantinople.
Nov. 19.—At 8.30 we begin to turn the point of the mountain of Zarko, and entering the boghaz or strait already mentioned, through which the Salamvria flows, arrive in twenty minutes upon the bank of the river. The water being now low, and fordable in many places, we leave on the right the πόρος, where at other times the river is passed by a boat, and continue to follow the left bank. At 9.45 there is an interval of only a mile and a half between the hills on either side. Here a rocky advanced height on the right bank preserves the ruins of a Hellenic wall, which incloses the summit together with the slope towards the river, and contains within the ancient inclosure some remains of a smaller and more modern castle. Ten minutes farther, we ford the Salamvria, which flows with a slow current over a bed formed of a mixture of mould and fine sand, resembling the deposit of the Nile; the

§ 1.434   depth in the deepest part is about four feet. But the dry autumn has made the river lower and less rapid than usual. In proceeding, the village of Alifaka is a mile on the right, not far from the foot of the height of the Paleokastro, from whence the hills on that side take a southerly direction. We now cross the plain to Larissa, along the chord of a large arch formed by the Salamvria: the river however does not, throughout this distance, flow through the great plain, but first passes in a northerly direction through a valley included between a continuation of the Zarko range of hills, and a rocky ridge on the opposite bank, which forms the boundary of the plain of Larissa to the westward. The river then emerges into the plain two hours to the westward of Larissa, at a narrow opening between the northern extremity of the last-mentioned ridge and the southern end of a root of Mount Olympus, at the foot of which stands Turnovo, two hours to the north-eastward of the opening. After passing the city, the river makes a remarkable turn to the northward before it arrives at Tempe. As soon as we had passed the opening of Alifaka, Olympus, Ossa, and Pelium, were displayed before us in all their magnificence. Ossa, with its woody slopes and its conical peak now deeply covered with snow, is one of the most beautiful mountains in Greece, and is well contrasted in character with the broad majesty of its neighbour. The lower sides of Olympus are well wooded, but the summit presents a wide extent of a bare light-coloured rock, which has very little snow on this side, though it is evidently the highest of the mountains

§ 1.435   which surround Thessaly, and probably the highest in Greece.
From the ford of Alifaka, as far as Thumai, we cross an uncultivated plain, with a soil resembling that of Egypt. Thumfo’ is on the rise of a low ridge which projects into the plain from the hills on the right. It consists of twenty or thirty families, with one Turkish house. Having halted here from 10.50 to 12.40, we cross a slight elevation, upon which are two or three other small tjiftlik villages, and descend again into the lowest level where the town of Larissa, surmounted by more than twenty minarets, displays itself in front. Having traversed some gardens and vineyards, where the Salamvria flows at a small distance on the left, we enter the town at 2.45, and at 3 arrive at the serai or παλάτι of the metropolitan bishop, situated on the right bank of the Peneius. The palace, together with the adjoining cathedral, which is remarkable neither for its size or decorations, is inclosed by a wall, serving in some measure as a protection from Turkish insult. The upper story commands a noble view of the Larissae campus opimae, surrounded by Ossa, Olympus, and the Perrhabian hills. Immediately above the metropolis, the river is crossed by a bridge of nine arches, 300 feet in length, faced with large squared stones, and having a road-way

§ 1.436   which, very unlike that of the narrow Albanian bridges, is wide enough for two carriages: the piers which terminate below in spurs, are pierced with Saracenic arches, curved and pointed.
Larissa, though standing in the lowest part of the plain, and subject to excessive heat in summer, is not considered unhealthy, which is ascribed to its being unconfined by neighbouring mountains, and therefore always well ventilated; nevertheless, as in the generality of Greek towns, the autumn is seldom unattended with some degree of sickness and mortality. Although the plain immediately around is as dry and dusty in the summer months as Egypt in June, there is a marshy space to the north-east, caused by an inundation from the river in winter, where the water is never quite absorbed by the sun. The exhalations from thence, and the cold air which descends at night from the mountains, can hardly fail to produce some degree of disease, when after the termination of the Etesian breezes, that stagnation of the atmosphere prevails, which throughout Greece is prevalent from the beginning of September to the autumnal rains.
Since we have crossed the Pindus the weather has been perfectly serene, with a slight breeze from the north or north-east, and a sharp frost every night, yielding at an early hour to the power of the sun. While deluges were falling on the western side of that chain of mountains, Thessaly was suffering from drought, and the land is now so parched that the peasants cannot sow: it is admitted, however, that this is an unusual occurrence, and that in

§ 1.437   general there is a sufficiency of moisture to make the light rich mould of Thessaly the most productive soil in Greece. A beautiful autumnal season generally follows the equinoctial rains, and continues with short intermissions to the end of the year, while in Epirus the same kind of weather occurs only at intervals, which after the beginning of November are both short and rare. The softness of the Thessalian climate, compared with that of Epirus, seems to have had its effect upon the character of the inhabitants, who are more cheerful and civil than those to the west of the Pindus, although living in the midst of poverty and the most grinding oppression.
Finding the Mitropoli too much like a Turkish kiosk for the present season, and that the inmates, although bearing the sounding titles of πρωτοσύνκελλος, οικονόμος, and ιεροδιάκονος, are too ignorant of every thing beyond their walls to afford much assistance to my inquiries, I procure, not without some difficulty, an apartment at the house of Kyr P., a medical practitioner. But I have reason to regret the change of lodging. Though a native of the place, my host knows very little about it, and thinks only of turning my occupation of his apartment to his own benefit. He proceeds in this manner: according to custom, the town undertakes to entertain the Vezir's musafir, and to supply him with a taim of meat, bread, wood, oil, and candles. The iatros having taken this duty upon himself, soon begins to complain of the extreme difficulty of obtaining such commodities (in Larissa of all places in Greece), and gives various ingenious reasons

§ 1.438   for it, until at length, to avoid starvation, we are obliged to make our own purchases, and to entertain our entertainer and his whole family, who will make his own charges as soon as I am gone, when there will no longer be any possibility of a reference for the truth of them. Among the great number of petty inconveniences, which put the traveller’s patience to trial in these countries, the unavoidable necessity of contributing occasionally to the misery of the lower classes, and of abetting the oppression and roguery of the higher, is that which is most mortifying. Last winter Kyr A., the hodja-bashi of Ioannina, after starving my friend M. and his suite for several days, charged the town at the rate of sixty piastres a day for their maintenance.
Mr. P. asserts, that there are 8000 Turkish families in Larissa, instead of which probably they do not much exceed half that number. There are 300 or 400 Jewish houses, some of which are said to be among the richest of European Turkey, and about 400 Greek. Formerly, there were many Armenian families, but the greater part have had the wisdom to withdraw to places where the Christians can pursue their trades in greater security. The Armenians are the most prudent, crafty, and knowing, of all the Ghiaurs of the Levant, and are generally to be found in the beet situations. They are industrious, always intent on gain, and far more profound knaves than the Greeks, whose flighty and inconstant tempers render it difficult for them to attend to any fixed plans, and who, amidst all their roguery and deceit, are capable of liberal and disinterested actions, and have a curiosity and thirst for mental improvement, which is very rarely found among the Armenians of Turkey.

§ 1.439   Nov. 20.—Larissa, like the generality of the sites of Greece, which have been continually inhabited, preserves few remains of Hellenic times. The circumference is less than three miles, one fourth of which is contiguous to the river, on the opposite bank of which there is a grove of elms and white poplars. The remainder of the town is surrounded by hillocks, and at intervals by large spaces covered with Turkish tombstones. Among these cemeteries is found almost all that now remains above ground of the ancient Larissa, consisting of plain quadrangular stones, fragments of columns mostly fluted, and a great number of ancient cippi and sepulchral stelae, all now serving for Turkish tombstones. In many instances a sepulchral stone with a Greek inscription has been placed at the head of a Turkish grave, without any Turkish inscription now apparent, so that many a Mehmet or Mustafa is reposing under the name of an Aristomachus or Cassander. It would be tedious to examine thoroughly all the burying grounds, but a person who had the patience, and the good fortune to do so without insult, for the Turks of Larissa are very insolent, might possibly find something interesting among the inscriptions. Almost all those I saw were simple μνήματα. In the wall of the metropolitan church is a register of the names of certain freed men and women, who had each paid a stater to the city upon the occasion of their liberation.

§ 1.440   The marble is incomplete, and contains only the names of seven persons who had been the slaves of one Marcus Afrius. Larissa is the most Ottoman town in Greece to the southward of Saloniki, having been the chief settlement of the Turks ever since the conquest of this part of the country previously to that of Constantinople. It then received the name of Yenisheher, which is still the official appellation. When Mahomet IV. was engaged in the siege of Candia, he made this place his residence, and here Dr. Brown, an English traveller, found him in the year 1669. The doctor relates, that the Sultan encamped during a part of that summer upon Mount Olympus, in order to avoid the heat and malaria of Larissa, but that the cold of the mountain was fatal to many of his followers. As an instance of the daring character of Mahomet, Brown states, that he killed one of his finest horses in an attempt to ride up the peak of Kissavo, (the summit of Ossa. [The doctor seems to have mistaken Kissavo for a part of Olympus; it is possible, therefore, that Mahomet’s camp may have been upon Ossa.]) Although Yenisheher, in civil and military arrangement, is subordinate to Tirhala (Trikkala), which gives name to a liva or district of the eyalet or province of Rumili, it has like many other places in Turkey, a jurisdiction separate from its district, the judicial and ecclesiastical affairs being in the hands of a Molla, who is

§ 1.441   appointed like the pashas every year at the Kurban Bairam, and whose maintenance being assigned upon a certain portion of the liva of Trikkala, has given to that portion the name of the Mollalik. The civil power at Larissa is divided among several rich Beys styled the Ayans: the chief is Abdim, who possessing a large portion of the Pelasgic plain, has no reason to envy the precarious fortune of any vezir in the empire. There are several other Turks here with good landed properties, but in general their expences in arms, horses, furniture, and women, oblige them in a few years to cheat the Christian or Jewish trader, or to oppress the farmer so much by forced contributions of produce, that he is obliged to migrate elsewhere, and to leave the estate unproductive, for want of cultivation. In the tjiftliks of the surrounding plains the peasant generally receives half the crop for his labour, he supplying the seed, but the farming-stock belonging to the landlord. In any other country this would leave enough for the farmer; but such is the conduct of the Turks, that the Greeks are continually migrating, chiefly to the districts of Ionia, governed by the family of Karaosman-oglu; in return, Turkish peasants from Asia Minor have settled on some of the Larissaean farms, and have been able to live better than the Greeks, because they are exempt from the kharatj, and some impositions to which the Greeks alone are liable. Some of the grievances to which both the townsmen and peasants are subject are owing to the Vezir Aly, who, as Pasha of Trikkala and Superintendant of the Dervents, considers himself privileged

§ 1.442   frequently to visit Larissa, when it is well understood that he expects a large gratuity, and will not depart without it. He generally finds some excuse also for carrying away with him some Jew or Greek, to be kept in prison until he has extorted a sum of money from him. The Greeks afford him little plunder, being generally poor. The most flourishing trade seems to be that of physician, of whom there are several at Larissa; at Trikkala, the favourite abode of Aesculapius, there was not one. The expression εκαλάσθηκε ο κόσμος, (the world is ruined), so common all over Greece, is repeated here loudly, not less by the Turks than by the Greeks. They allude to the increasing poverty, and to the excessive rise in the price of provision, and every necessary of life within the last few years, which has been the ruin of many families. Its causes are the necessities of the Porte, the progressive debasement of the currency, the extortion of local governors, and particularly in this part of the country the destruction of industry consequent upon the oppressive government of Aly Pasha, his wars, his progresses, his arbitrary demands, and the forced maintenance of his Albanian soldiers.
The Greeks being in that small proportion at Larissa which I have stated, are ill-treated whenever any affair in which a Turk is concerned is brought before the kadi. Not many days ago, a Greek entering the town with an ass-load of charcoal, from one of the mountains which supply Larissa, was killed by a Turk, for no other reason than because the latter wished to have the charcoal,

§ 1.443   while the Greek insisted upon carrying it to the market, where he was more sure of being paid for it. As the poor Greek had no friends ready with the proper compliment for the kadi, and none of the persons who were present at the murder, and who were chiefly Turks, were able or willing to swear that he saw the Turk point the pistol or pull the trigger, the kadi declared there was a want of evidence, and discharged the prisoner. As three Christian witnesses are only considered equal to one Turk, there is little chance of justice for the Christian at the Turkish tribunal. Where Christians only are concerned, the Turkish law seldom interferes, except in criminal cases, leaving the affair to the bishop or hodjabashi. The Greeks nevertheless not unfrequently carry their disputes to the mekheme, though they generally have reason to repent it.
Here, as in other parts of Turkey, the Jews are less oppressed, unless perhaps when by some imprudence they allow it to be suspected that they are wealthy, and thus excite extortion. The preference of the Turks for the Jews does not arise from any respect for this people, whom they hold in extreme contempt, but because they have no fears from the Jews, while they consider the Christians as the natural allies of their European enemies, by whom the Ottoman Empire is destined to be overthrown, and the Musulman faith to be destroyed. The Jews moreover recommend themselves to the Turks as being ardent haters of the Greeks. At Larissa they speak Spanish, in common with those of the rest of Greece, whose ancestors

§ 1.444   migrated to this country in great numbers, when expelled from Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella. Benjamin of Tudela, in his journey through Greece, three centuries earlier, did not pass through Larissa, so that we remain uninformed whether any Jews then inhabited this city.
The greater part of the rich plain which lies between Larissa and Mount Olympus is inhabited by a race of Turks cultivating their own lands and employed almost entirely in agriculture. They are descendants of the earliest Turkish settlers, and by the Greeks are called Koniaridhes, a name as old probably as the eleventh century, when Iconium was the seat of Turkish power, and when Turkish auxiliaries were employed by Alexius Comnenus in Thessaly against the Normans: though their permanent settlement in this country cannot be attributed to an earlier period than the 14th century, after their conquest of Adrianople. Some of the Koniaric villages, which are about twenty in number, are situated towards Mount Ossa, and others to the southward of Larissa. The larger are divided into several makhalas, and the whole Koniaric population is not less than ten or twelve thousand.
Nov. 22.—From Larissa to Fersala.—The great plain of Lower Thessaly, or Pelasgiotis, of which Larissa is still the chief city, extends from the mountains Titarus and Ossa to Pelium, and the branches of Othrys, interrupted only by a mountain of no great height now called Karadagh, or in Greek Mavrovuni, which, by means of an inferior

§ 1.445   ridge not far north of Fersala, is united with the heights on the right bank of the Salamvria, which separate the Pelasgic plains from the equally extensive levels of Upper Thessaly, which constituted the ancient divisions named Thessaliotis and Histiaeotis. The ridge to the north of Fersala, although the lowest of all the heights around these plains, is sufficiently high to be seen from Larissa at a distance of fifteen miles; and one point in it, which lies nearly in a line between Larissa and Fersala, is rendered conspicuous by several tall cypresses round the tomb of a Turkish sheikh or saint. The road begins to rise very gradually to this ridge, from a point not far from Larissa; so that between Zarko and Larissa the lowest level is narrow on the right bank of the river, though very extensive on the left. Below Larissa the lowest level widens on the right bank towards the foot of Mount Ossa, and here is the inundation which I have already mentioned: it is called Karatjair, and corresponds exactly to the ancient Nessonis which Strabo has described as “a lake in the Larissaea, formed by the overflowing of the river.” In fact, there is no other lake in the Thessalian plains, except that of Karla, which seems from its position to accord equally well with the ancient Boebeis.

§ 1.446   From the point where the road begins to rise, as far as the summit of the ridge of the Sheikh, the whole country has a gently undulated surface, and consists of a fertile soil, which, though well cultivated around several small villages, has far the largest portion, particularly on the right side of the road, in a state of nature, and covered with thorns. The cultivated land is ploughed but not yet sown. The other parts furnish an excellent pasture to the sheep, which are driven here in great numbers in winter from the mountains around Thessaly. All the southern part of the country just mentioned I take to have been the territory of the Crannonii, more anciently named Ephyraei, the extent of whose pastures may be inferred from the allusion made by Theocritus to the numerous flocks and herds possessed by the Scopadae, one of the leading families of Crannon.
At the end of two hours and a half we halt for dinner at a fountain; and proceeding at 12.40, arrive at the summit of the ridge of the Sheikh at a little after 2.

§ 1.447   The only trees I have seen on the route are wild pears and dwarf oaks, the latter of which cover a large tract of the uncultivated downs, and are not more than a foot high, though exactly resembling the common oak, and still bearing both leaves and acorns. The road crosses the ridge at a mile to the right of the Sheikh, and at the summit opens upon an extensive prospect, but which is not seen to-day to advantage on account of the cloudiness of the atmosphere. On a clear day it commands the greatest part of Thessaly, included within the renowned barriers of Olympus, Ossa, Pelium, Othrys, and Pindus. Pelium, however, particularly its southern part, is considerably hidden by Mount Karadagh. We look down immediately upon the valley of the Enipeus, and the scene of the great victory which gave the world to Caesar. It is bounded on the other side by a range of mountains branching from Othrys, the summit of which is seen above them to the south-eastward. The town of Fersala lies at the foot of the hills, immediately opposite to us. To the right, the extensive plain, watered by the Enipeus, Apidanus, and Peneius, is spread at the foot of the Agrafiotiko, or great snowy range of Agrafa. The ridge of the Sheikh, which has a rise almost imperceptible on the north, slopes rapidly into the Pliarsalian valley, leaving on the descent the village of Tataris a little to the right. Several other Turkish villages occupy the valley as well as the hills on either side. At 2.23 we enter the level, and at 2.55 ford the Fersaliti, as the Greeks now call the Enipeus, just below a handsome bridge of seven arches, which shows that

§ 1.448   the river is sometimes formidable, though now narrow, clear, and about two feet deep, flowing with a slow current; from thence, crossing some open corn-land we enter Fersala at 3.30.
Fersala, called Tjataltje by the Turks, and often by the Greeks, covers the foot of a height, somewhat detached from the rest of the range, which bounds the valley of the Enipeus to the southward, and having a natural citadel formed by a tabular summit which is encircled by a low precipice of rock. The town contains between six and seven hundred inhabited houses, and many others empty: there are five or six mosques, and the population is entirely Turkish, except at the two extremities of the town to the east and west, which are inhabited by Greek artisans, and keepers of shops in the bazar, or by zevghites, who cultivate the Turkish lands in the immediate neighbourhood of the town. Our konak is at a shopkeeper's at the eastern end of the town,—a neat cottage with a plastered floor, well furnished with mats and other stromata, and having a yard which contains a stable and a good provision of fire-wood.

§ 1.449   Fersala is one of the most important military positions in Greece, as standing at the entrance of the most direct and central of the passes which lead from the plains of Thessaly to the vale of the Spercheius and Thermopylae, With a view to ancient warfare, the place had all the best attributes of a Hellenic polis or fortified town: a hill rising gradually to the height of six or seven hundred feet above the adjacent plain, defended on three sides by precipices, crowned with a small level for an acropolis, watered in every part of the declivity by subterraneous springs, and still more abundantly at the foot by sources so copious as to form a perennial stream. With these local advantages, and one of the most fertile plains in Greece for its territory, Pharsalus inevitably attained to the highest rank among the states of Thessaly, and became one of the largest cities of Greece, as its ruined walls still attest.
The height which was occupied by the acropolis, consists of two rocky tabular summits, united by a lower ridge. The western summit is lower than the eastern, and is not above a third of it in length. The entire acropolis was about five hundred yards long, and from one hundred to fifty broad, but still narrower in the connecting ridge, where are the remains of two gates nearly opposite to each other, one of which led down a

§ 1.450   steep descent at the back of the acropolis, the other into the city. On one side of the northern gateway, the ancient masonry consists of irregular masses of rock, having smaller stones in the intervals, as at Tiryns; but the masses are not so large as some of those in the latter ruin: one measures 6 feet 7 inches, by 3.10 by 2.4. Another piece of wall toward the eastern summit seems to be of an antiquity not less remote. All the other remains, both of the town and citadel, are of the kind of masonry which was employed about the time when history gives reason to believe that Pharsalus was very populous and powerful. There is a monument, however, of very early times in the middle of the acropolis, which taken together with the remnants of Cyclopian walls, may favor the opinion that this city was the capital of Phthia in the time of the Trojan war. It is a subterraneous construction, built in the same manner as the treasury of Atreus at Mycenae. Below an oval opening, level with the present surface of the ground, eight feet two inches long, and six feet ten inches broad, eight courses of stone, in all about ten feet high, nearly cubical,

§ 1.451   and laid together as usual without cement, are visible above the rubbish which fills up all the lower part of the monument. In the three or four upper courses, each course projects a little beyond the one below it; but those below, as far as they are visible, have the spheroidal curve of the interior of the treasury of Atreus.
The acropolis of Pharsalus was replaced by a castle of Roman, or Imperial Greek times, which is now itself a complete ruin. It included not only the level occupied by the acropolis, but the upper part of the adjacent slope to the north, inclosing about a sixth part of the ancient city. At the top of the hill the walls of this castle were raised on the remains of the Hellenic inclosure, but on the slope they were constructed, from the foundation, of rough materials mixed with mortar, though cased in some parts with squared blocks taken from the more ancient ruins: in this part they are thicker even than the Hellenic walls, being not less than eleven feet. In the acropolis are two or three cisterns of the same kind of masonry as the modern castle; one of these is fifty-five feet long and twenty-five broad. The summit of the hill commands a most extensive view, bounded to the north by Olympus, and comprehending to the westward all the great plains of Upper Thessaly as far as Trikkala and the rocks of Meteora. Due south is seen a high summit near Zituni, between which and the ridges near Fersala is an elevated valley, containing the villages Kaklidji and Tjeutma.

§ 1.452   The ancient city was near four miles in circuit, and of the very common form of an irregular triangle; the walls are traceable on the two descending sides in their entire extent. On the eastern slope of the mountain, which is very steep, and naturally defended by a torrent, there are no towers, nor even any of those short flanks which were common among the Greeks when towers were not employed. Near the north-eastern angle a piece of the ancient wall, having eight regular courses of masonry, now forms part of the wall of the episcopal church of Fersala. In few other parts of the ancient inclosure so many courses remain.
On the western side, the walls, towards the upper part, made a wide sweep, for the purpose of following the crest of two detached heights, and that of a ridge which unites them. Between the citadel and the nearest of these two summits, which is rocky, and rises almost to a level with the citadel, the ground is hollow, with a gradual declivity, and is consequently weaker than in other parts; hence the hollow was fortified with a second wall, distant fifty yards from the outer, and having an obtuse re-entering angle in the middle. The ridge which unites the two heights just mentioned being almost at right angles with the double wall, formed an additional security to this weak point. The northern, or lower wall of the city, on the edge of the plain, was a mile in length; it is traceable only in a few places, chiefly where excavations have been made by modern masons, to take away the foundations, and which thus sufficiently

§ 1.453   show to what we are to attribute the disappearance of this wall. There are still, however, some remains of it above ground at the western extremity of the modern town, particularly at the foot of a rock above a pool and some sources of water, uniting in a permanent stream, which, after a winding course through the plain, joins the Enipeus, near Vashli. Near the pool are two courses of a tower, 20 feet square, from which it may be judged that all this northern front of the town, on account of its being naturally the weakest, was fortified by a chain of towers, although there were very few on the western, and none on the eastern face of the city. A few stones remaining in their places to the westward of the springs, show that the northern wall joined the western, exactly at the spot where the road from the west enters the modern town.
Besides the fountains which issue from the rocks below the town, in many pellucid streams, and which were obviously one of the recommendations of the site to the founders of the city, the Pharsalii were supplied from sources on the height by an aqueduct, excavated in the form of a deep trough in the rock, and covered with large stones reaching from side to side. At one place I observed a descent into the conduit of several steps, and a piece of wall of a later date, formed of tiles which crossed the opening. The modern Pharsalians supply the fountains of their town in the same manner; the lower sources serving only for washing, or to gratify the Turks in summer by the coolness, the agreeable sound of the running water, and the shade of the plane trees.

§ 1.454   In order to enjoy these favorite luxuries the better, they have constructed several kiosks, in some of which the water issues from the ground in the building. The margins of the springs are bordered by squared blocks, some of which were probably placed there by the ancients; others have been transferred from the ruined walls to their actual positions by the Turks. Many wrought stones are to be seen in the houses, steps, and pavements of the town, but I can find no relics of sculpture, and only one inscription (No. 14), which is inserted in the wall of the Greek church. It was the monument of Aurelia Phila who denounces a penalty against any one who shall open her tomb, or place another body in it, and is curious only for its bad spelling. παραγγέλλει is written παρανγελλι--τεθήναι, τεθηνε --εις, ις,ανοίξαι, ανυξε.
Nov. 23.—Having moved from Fersala at 1.25, p.m. in a westerly direction, we pass through an opening which separates the ridges adjoining to the ancient site from a north-western projection of the same range, and at 2.15 re-enter the great plain. The hills now take a direction to the south-west, as far as Ghynekokastro, from whence to the head of the plain under Dhomoko they trend more to the south. At a distance of about 10 miles to the westward are the lower heights of Agrafa and behind them the steep snowy mountains of that district. In re-entering the plain, Vrysia (Turcice Bey Bunar) is a mile on the left, at the foot of the hills; the village takes its name from some very copious springs which issue from

§ 1.455   under the rocks a little below it, and form a considerable stream which we cross by a bridge at 2.30. From hence the road leads directly to the point of Ghyneko-kastro, where we arrive at 2.55. All this corner of the plain, and as far as can be seen on the right, consists of a fine turf, now covered with sheep and cattle, with the exception of a few patches of arable land, surrounding some small Turkish villages. The soil seems equally adapted to cultivation or pasture, and as the adjacent hills furnish food to the cattle in summer when the plains are parched, the country well deserves the double character conveyed by the epithets which Homer attached to Phthia.
Ghyneko-kastro is the modern name of a Hellenic ruin [Proerna], standing upon an extremity of the Phthiotic ridges; remains of walls of the third order of masonry inclose the north-western face of the hill, which slopes in that direction, and surround also a long narrow tabular summit, which was the ancient acropolis. At the back the descent is more rapid, and on that side the wall and towers of the citadel remain perfect to one third of their original height. Although small compared with Pharsalus, this seems to have been a place of some importance. After having remained here a quarter of an hour, we proceed, and soon arrive in sight of Dhomoko, situated on the summit of the ridge which here closes the plain.

§ 1.456   Half an hour beyond Ghyneko-kastro we pass some sources on the right side of the road; and on the left a ruined mosque standing on a height. Here is an extensive Turkish burying-ground, in which one of the tombstones is an ancient Greek statue of a female, wanting the head. From the mosque we cross direct towards Dhomoko, which does not lie exactly above the extremity of the plain, but rather towards the Agrafa side, and in one hour and 25 minutes from the mosque reach the foot of the hills, on which the town is situated, when leaving on the left the direct road to Zituni, we arrive at the town at 5.15, after a tedious ascent of 40 minutes, rendered disagreeable by the rain, and difficult by the slippery path, and the weakness of our wretched cattle. Dhomoko contains about 300 families and several large houses: half the inhabitants are Greek and half Turks. The situation resembles that of Dhimitzana in the Morea, standing upon the two sides and crest of a ridge in a very lofty situation. In the menzil road, which we quitted at the foot of the mountain, is a large khan, on one side of which a copious spring and pool of water supplies canals, which after turning several mills on the side of the hill, are collected into a small stream flowing to join the others of similar origin, which we have this day passed. The house in which I lodge belongs to four partners in trade, all of whom have their families in the house.

§ 1.457   Nov. 24.—This being Sunday, the usual market day in Greece, a concourse of people crowd the village, buying and selling corn, maize, and other agricultural commodities. There is no want of evidence to show that Dhomoko stands exactly on the site of the ancient Thaumaci. The bishop, who is one of the suffragans of Larissa, is styled ο θαυμακου και Ζητουνίου; and two inscribed marbles are still preserved, in which the words πόλις θαυμακων occur several times.

§ 1.458   Many Hellenic foundations are to be seen around the town, though too disjointed to indicate the exact plan or extent of the place. The inscriptions are grants of proxenia, to foreign benefactors, with the accompanying privileges: two of the favoured persons were citizens of Heracleia and of Callium, both which towns were in or near the valley of the Spercheius. At the southern end of the town a rocky point overtopping the other heights, commands a magnificent prospect of the immense plain watered by the Peneius, and its branches, which extends from Pharsalus to Aeginium; behind the latter rise the rocks of the Meteora, distant at least 50 miles in a direct line. This is the view which Livy describes, following probably the words of Polybius, in relating an attempt made upon Thaumaci by Philip son of Demetrius, at the close of the year (B.C. 199) which preceded that of his defeat at the Aoi Stena. The historian remarks that Thaumaci was situated in the pass called Coela, in a lofty position defended by precipices, where the traveller entering Thessaly from Thermopylae and Lamia, after having passed over rugged mountains and intricate valleys, suddenly came in sight of a plain resembling an immense sea, and so extensive that its extremity was scarcely visible. A reinforcement of Aetolians having penetrated through the guards of Philip into the city, he abandoned the siege, and retired into winter quarters in Macedonia.

§ 1.459   The situations of Pharsalus and Thaumaci being determined with certainty, there remains the greatest probability that Ghyneko-kastro is the ancient Proerna which Strabo names among the towns of Phthiotis, together with Thaumaci and Pharsalus, and which in the war with Antiochus, eight years after the transaction just alluded to, was taken by the Consul Acilius, in his way from Larissa to Hypata. On this occasion his first march was from Larissa to Crannon. As he advanced, he received the submission of Pharsalus, Scotussa, and Pherae, took Proerna and some castles near it, but was attacked as he approached Thaumaci from the woods and mountains overhanging the pass; he penetrated however to the town, which had been deserted, and the next day, arriving upon the banks of the Spercheius, ravaged the lands of the Hypataei.
On quitting Dhomoko we make a circuit of the hill, and proceed by a short descent into an elevated plain, which extends south-eastward to the foot of the mountain of Gura, the proper Othrys, and to the northward rises by a gentle slope to the summit behind Fersala. Having traversed this plain, we descend over an uncultivated tract into the lower plain of Taukli, leaving a mile to the right the nearest part of the lake of Taukli, which

§ 1.460   occupies all the lowest part of the plain, and is six miles in circumference. The greatest dimension of the plain is from east to west; the soil seems fertile, but is little cultivated. We cross it obliquely by a road which the rain of yesterday has rendered very bad, and having reached the hills on the southern side, leave Taukli on the right, and beyond it a promontory or peninsula in the lake, distant two or three miles from us, on which are some remains of ruined edifices. It is probably the ancient Xynia, for that place gave name to a lake on the southern borders of Thessaly, not far from the country of the Aenianes, who inhabited the valley of the Spercheius. Beyond the lake the ground rises to the hills of Agrafa.
In the plain of Taukli we joined the main road from Fersala to Zituni, which crosses the mountain at the back of the former town, leaving the summit on the right. The heights of Taukli are part of a ridge which branching from the mountain of Gura, borders the plain of the Spercheius on the north, and is connected with the mountains of Agrafa to the west. Our passage over it is in the lowest part; but there is another pass to the westward called the derveni of Karya, which leads from Taukli directly to Neopatra. These are the two natural entrances into Thessaly from the southward; and the plain of Taukli with Zituni, Dhomoko, and Fersala, are therefore the most

§ 1.461   important military positions of the frontier. Having ascended the ridge along the side of a gorge formed by a small torrent, we arrive in two hours and three quarters from Dhomoko at a derveni, where a guard is stationed for the protection of the pass. The rain falls heavily as we proceed, and the road is very bad, winding among woody mountains, but without much ascent. This is the δρυμός Μαλεαίος, or Maliac forest, which, not long ago, was as dangerous as it seems to have been in ancient times, but which now, thanks to the strong arm of Aly Pasha, is acknowledged to be free even from suspicion, like the greater part of the country over which his guardianship as Dervent Aga extends. Anciently in some part of this forest stood the sepulchral monument of a young man named Derxias, who had been murdered by robbers, and whose epitaph is still preserved in the Anthologia. At the end of seventy-five minutes from the first derveni we pass a second, which, as well as the whole defile, is known by the name of Furka. The road then begins to descend towards Zituni, and soon brings us in sight of the plain of the Spercheius. From the Furka to Zituni is a distance of one hour, in a direction more easterly than before. After some delay at the entrance of Zituni [Lamia] I obtain a lodging

§ 1.462   in the house of one of the principal Greeks, who is absent, but whose family is at home. The house is built on the same plan as the generality of the better sort of Greek houses in this part of the country: a lower story serves chiefly as a stable and storehouse, the upper consists of a row of four chambers opening into a wide gallery, almost as large as 'all the other apartments together; none of these has any door or window but into the gallery, and within they are black with smoke and dirt. The walls of the lower story are formed of loose stones cemented with mud, those of the upper of sun-baked bricks, plastered and whitewashed. In few of the houses are the walls upright, or the floors level, owing to the green timber and loose masonry, which settle into a distorted form. My konak is an extreme example, and seems to require only a slight earthquake, or a strong euroclydon, to crumble it into a heap of ruins. It has, nevertheless, stood these forty years, and is said to have settled into its present shape soon after it was built.

§ 2.001   CHAPTER 10 MELIS, AENIANES
Nov. 25.—Ζητούνιον is a name remarkable from its resemblance to the Arabic Zeitun, which means a place of olive trees, and is repeatedly found in countries where that language is spoken, but as none of the names of Greece are derived from the Arabic unless through the Turkish, as the Turks have corrupted Zeitun into Isdun, and as Ζητόνιον is found among the bishoprics of the province of

§ 2.002  Larissa in the ninth century, there can be little doubt that the name came into use with others still existing, which are found in the Notitiae Episcopatuum, and is not to be traced to an Oriental origin. There are about 3000 Turks in the town, and 2000 Greeks, who are poor, or at least afraid of not appearing so. The district confines eastward on that of Armyro, and is bordered in the other directions by Neopatra [Hypata], Agrafa, and Fersala. It contains near 60 villages, of which the population is almost entirely Greek.
The strength of the castle hill of Zituni, the secure and convenient distance of the place from the sea, and its abundant sources of water, point it out at once as the position of an important Hellenic city, which an inscription copied at Zituni, by Paul Lucas, shows to have been Lamia. And this is amply confirmed by Livy and Strabo. The latter places Lamia above the plain, which lies at the head of the Maliac Gulf, at a distance of 30 stades from the Spercheius. Livy describes it as situated on a height distant seven miles from Heracleia, of which it commanded the prospect, and as lying

§ 2.003   on the route which led from Thermopylae through the passes of Phthiotis to Thaumaci.
The only remains I can find of the ancient city are some pieces of the walls of the acropolis, forming a part of those of the modern castle; and some small remains of the town walls constructed of masonry of the third species, at the foot of the hill beyond the extreme modern houses to the eastward. On the opposite side of the town, a brisk little river turns fourteen mills, situated one above the other, on the slope of the hill. The same method is practised at Dhomoko, but there with only four mills.
The ancient importance of Lamia is shown by its silver coins, and by the occurrence of its name in ancient history, on some important occasions, particularly in the year B.C. 323, when the Athenians, on the death of Alexander, were excited by the “sibi mortifera facundia” of Demosthenes to renew their struggle with Macedonia. Antipater was at first unsuccessful, and retired into Lamia, where he was besieged by the Athenians, but their commander Leosthenes, having been slain, and Antipater having received a reinforcement from Asia under Craterus, the Macedonians were again enabled to meet the enemy in the field, and terminated the war by a victory near Crannon. In the year B.C. 191, Lamia was besieged by Philip, son of Demetrius; Livy, in relating this

§ 2.004   transaction, takes notice of the rocky soil of Lamia, which prevented the Macedonians from making so rapid a progress in this siege as their comrades, who were similarly employed at Heracleia on the opposite side of the plain. In the following year Lamia was taken by the Romans under Manius Acilius Glabrio.
The castle of Zituni commands a most beautiful and interesting prospect; and being itself a remarkable point, is an excellent geographical station. There is no other of equal altitude which comprehends so complete a view of the country adjacent to the head of the Maliac Gulf, or at least that affords so much assistance in understanding the history of the celebrated events which have occurred on this scene. Having the advantage today of a most diaphanous atmosphere, I easily recognize the places with which I was familiar in 1802.
The most striking part of the prospect is the vast Oetaean range of mountains extending from Callidromus above Thermopylae, as far westward as the summit near Karpenisi named Velukhi, not far to the left of which is seen Patratziki or Neopatra, below one of the highest summits of the range; to the left of that town rise the stupendous precipices called Katavothra, which fall in a northeastern direction to the plain of Zituni. In the opposite quarter, towards the entrance of the gulf, is seen Stylidha, the port of Zituni; and in a line

§ 2.005   with it the most westerly inlet of the sea, which here advances to within three miles of the town. Near the shore, on this side of Stylidha, appears the village Aghia Marina; and beyond Stylidha the slope of Mount Othrys, as far as the entrance of the Euboic Straits. The promontory of Lithadha in Euboea forms a lofty peninsula in the center of the gulf, to the right of which the view comprehends a long reach in the Euboic channel; and at its entrance the islands anciently called Lichades, to the right of which is Mount Cnemis, with the village of Mola at its foot. From hence, to the beginning of the pass of Thermopylae, a narrow plain abounding with wood extends along the shore, behind which are the hills below Pundonitza, which connect the mountains Cnemis and Callidromus, and at their foot a remarkable rock, upon which I observed, on my former visit to this country, some remains of ancient monuments. It is nearly in a line with the castle of Pundonitza, seven degrees to the left of which appears the peak of Khlomo above Talanda. Considerably to the right of Pundonitza begins the precipitous termination of Mount Callidromus above the salt springs, which gave name to Thermopylae.
This alone is the proper pass, for to the eastward of it the hills, though now difficult to penetrate on account of the woods, form a very regular slope from the summit of Callidromus to the paralian plain, about Mola; the above-mentioned rock

§ 2.006   with the ancient remains, being at the foot of a part of this slope, is not very near the pass, and cannot therefore be the site of any of the places in the pass mentioned by Herodotus; it may indicate perhaps the position of Nicaea. Thereabout it must have been that Hydarnes descended to the rear of Leonidas. The eastern extremity of the pass was a little to the left or east of the derveni, or guard-house, from whence to the upper or western salt-springs, precipices overhang the pass, gradually increasing in height from the former position to the latter, immediately over which they are highest. Above these precipices there is still an elevated country of varied surface, gradually rising to the foot of the snowy and fir-clad summit of the mountain; and in this place, just under the highest peak, stands the village of Dhrakospilia .
Below the district of Dhrakospilia, to the westward, extends a regular and cultivated declivity, which belongs to another village named Dhamasta, and reaches to the Asopus, and Thermopylae, terminating at the latter in a long stony slope corresponding to the plain of Anthele of Herodotus, which lies between the upper salt source of Thermopylae proper, and another pass to the westward where the road is confined between cliffs and a marsh, and where are also some sources of hot salt water.

§ 2.007   But this latter pass, lying between the plain of Anthele and the Asopian plain, may be turned through the slope of Dhamasta. So that supposing the sea and marshes to have occupied all that which now forms a plain in front of Thermopylae, the real pass will be reduced to the space between the derveni and the old or upper sources, or in other words to the space eastward of the plain of Anthele, which is now occupied by the course of the eastern salt springs and their deposit. Dhamasta is situated at the head of some cultivated declivities at the foot of a precipice under the upper heights of the mountain, and around it there is a considerable tract of vineyards. The cultivated slope immediately below the village is separated by some shrubby steeps from the Asopian or Trachinian plain. To the right of Dhamasta is seen a little table land on the mountain, upon which, among the woods, stands a monastery of the Panaghia, and near it to the right, is an acclivity reaching to the crest of the Zygos, or connecting ridge, which unites Mount Callidromus with the great Oetaean summits, and over which passes the modern road from Zituni to Salona. This Zygos is cultivated in patches quite to the top. The summit of Parnassus makes its appearance above a shrubby height; one of the lowest of those bordering the plain, and which to the westward is bounded by the precipitous ravine of the Asopus, which river here traverses the mountain nearly in the same oblique direction in which it crosses the plain.

§ 2.008   To the right of the Asopus for two miles are seen the great precipices from which the city Trachis derived its name, and which about the middle advance considerably into the plain. Above them are seen some small villages, situated on cultivated slopes, extending as far as the great summit which is called Patriotiko, or Patratzikiotiko, from its being immediately above Neopatra, or Patratzik. This summit is covered with firs and other trees. Between the cliffs of Trachis or Heracleia, to the westward, and the still higher precipices called Katavothra, where the valley is narrowest, a cultivated declivity advances into the Trachinian plain. Here on the edge of the plain are the villages Vardhates, Alpospata, and Franzi. A remarkable chasm separates the south easternmost summit of the Patriotiko from the Katavothra, and terminates to the left of the heights of Franzi in a ravine which descends into the plain near Alpospata, half way between the end of the Trachinian Rocks and the point of Franzi. Here and at the foot of the gorge of the Asopus, the land of Trachis is highest, and from these two points it subsides gradually to the Spercheius. This river is now known by the name of Elladha; Mount Callidromus is called Saromata, —the Asopus, Karvunaria.
A pezodhromo well acquainted with all this country, informs me that there is a road of not above two hours along the upper region of the mountain from Dhrakospilia to Pundonitza, which he has often traversed. It is undoubtedly by the same route that Hydarnes crossed the mountain, and the pezo may possibly be a descendant of his

§ 2.009   guide; for neither the barbarians of the east nor of the north seem to have colonized much in Melis, if we may judge by the names of places, which are chiefly of Greek derivation.
Livy thus describes the Oetaean barrier: “These mountains which divide Greece in the middle, as Italy is divided by the ridge of the Apennine, extend in a continued line from Leucas and the western sea to that on the eastern side of Greece; they are so uneven and rocky, that not only armies, but even ordinary pedestrians find a difficulty in crossing them by the few paths which they afford. At the eastern extremity they are named Oeta, and their highest summit Callidromon, at the foot of which, towards the Maliac Gulf, there is a pass only sixty paces in breadth. This is the only military road which affords the means of transit to an army, when it meets with no impediment from an opponent. Hence the place is denominated Pylae, and sometimes Thermopylae, the latter name being derived from some hot waters, which have their sources in the pass itself.”
Strabo agrees with Livy in considering the proper Oeta to have been the eastern portion of the ridge which stretches across the continent from the Ambracic Gulf, as well as in describing the summit nearest to Thermopylae as the highest point of Oeta; in which latter opinion, however, they were both mistaken, Mount Patriotiko being

§ 2.010   considerably higher. Strabo further remarks, that Oeta was 200 stades in length, that it terminated towards the sea in precipices which left only a narrow passage for the road from Thessaly into Locris, and that the pass was called Pylae, or Stena, or Thermopylae, which last appellation was derived from some hot waters, sacred to Hercules. He adds that the mountain which rises above the pass bore the name of Callidromum, though some gave this denomination to the whole range, extending through Aetolia and Acarnania to the Ambracic Gulf; and that near Thermopylae, within the Straits, were several fortresses, namely, Nicaea on the sea shore of Locris, —higher up Teichius, and Heracleia, which was founded by the Lacedaemonians in a position six stades distant from the ancient Trachis, and Rhoduntia, in a strong situation. The geographer then subjoins some remarks borrowed from Herodotus, who, as his object was that of tracing the progress of Xerxes and his host through the eastern part of Greece, confined himself to a description of the eastern extremity of that belt of country which is referred to by Livy and Strabo. After having described the march of the Persian army through Thessaly and the Achaian Phthiotis, Herodotus states that Xerxes then entered Melis, near a gulf where the sea ebbs and flows. “Here,” he continues, “is a plain, large in one part, and in another very narrow. High and inaccessible mountains, called the Trachinian rocks, surround the land of Melis.

§ 2.011   The first city in the gulf, proceeding from Achaia, is Anticyra, near which the river Spercheius, flowing from the Aenianes, falls into the sea. About 20 stades from it is another river, named Dyras, which is reported to have first made its appearance to relieve Hercules when he was burning. Twenty stades farther is a third river called Melas, five stades distant from which is the city Trachis. Between the mountains where Trachis stands and the sea, the plain is widest; its whole surface contains 22,000 plethra. In the mountain which encircles the Trachinian land, there is an opening to the southward of Trachis, from which the river Asopus issues, and then flows along the foot of the mountains. To the south of the Asopus is a small river, named Phoenix, from whence to Thermopylae the distance is 15 stades.”
A comparison of this passage with the topographical sketches at the end of this volume, will, it is hoped, carry with it the conviction, that the names mentioned by Herodotus are there correctly placed, notwithstanding the surprising change which appears to have taken place in consequence of the accumulation of soil brought down from the upper country by the rivers, especially the Spercheius. The Asopus is recognized by its διασφάξ, or rocky gorge, through which it issues into the plain: between it and the Spercheius are found the two streams corresponding to the Melas and Dyras, which now, instead of falling separately into the sea, unite, and then discharge their waters, as does the Asopus itself, into the Spercheius.

§ 2.012   The latter, instead of meeting the coast nearly opposite to Lamia, as it appears to have done in the time of the Persian war, not only receives the Dyras, Melas, and Asopus, as tributary streams, but continues its course on a line parallel to the pass of Thermopylae, at a distance of a mile from the hot sources. It then forms a delta in that new plain which has been created beyond the pass, and which has thus caused the head of the gulf to be removed three or four miles from its ancient position. The consequence is, that all the lower plain, although intersected with marshes at all seasons, and scarcely passable in the winter, affords in summer a road through it from Zituni to Mola, which leaves Thermopylae two or three miles on the right, and renders it of little or no importance as a pass in that season. This I had particularly occasion to remark on my former visit to Thermopylae and Zituni, which was in the month of July.
The inclination of the new course of the Spercheius, in the direction of Thermopylae, and towards the south-western corner of the head of the gulf seems connected with the form of the high land on either side of the plain. As the Oetaean chain rises much more abruptly than the ridge on which Lamia stood, it is probable that when the gulf extended as far westward as the meridian of Lamia, the deepest water was towards the southern shore, whence the new plain formed itself more speedily on the northern than on the southern

§ 2.013   side, and the new stream had therefore a tendency towards Thermopylae. So copious, however, is the deposit from the salt springs, and so rapid the formation of new soil below them, that this cause has been sufficient, together with the alluvion of Mount Callidromus, aided perhaps by the Asopus, to prevent the Spercheius from approaching nearer than a mile from the foot of the mountain. The increase of land at the head of the gulf is still rapidly continuing; for I remember to have observed, on my former journey, some of those basins for making salt which are common on the coast of Greece, so far removed from the shore that they had been abandoned, and new salt-pans had been constructed nearer the sea.
Nov. 26.—This day, at 12.45, leaving Zituni for Neopatra, we traverse the plain to a bridge near Franzi, crossing some rice-grounds, which, though they have not been cultivated for some years, impede us by the little mounds of earth which serve to divide the ground into small squares for irrigation: we afterwards follow the bed of a canal (αυλάκι) made for the same purpose, and at 1.23 cross the Spercheius. The bridge consists of planks strewn with earth and resting upon trunks of trees supported by the piers of a stone bridge, which was carried away by an inundation. From hence we resume a winding course among corn-fields, and at 1.55, at the foot of the hills below the village of Franzi, join the route from Salona to Neopatra. Here is a mill turned by a very considerable stream of water, which descends to the Elladha. Mount Callidromus is well seen from hence in

§ 2.014   profile, giving a perfect idea of the track pursued by the Persians after they had attained the part of the mountain near Dhrakospilia; for this practicable ground, which comparatively may be called a plain, occupies the entire face of the mountain between the summit and the precipices, overhanging Thermopylae, and beyond this elevated region there seems no longer any great difficulty in descending to the positions of Nicaea and Alpeni. We now follow the foot of the magnificent precipices named Katavothra, and at 2.17 leave the small village of Kostalexi, a little above us on the left. At 2.35 pass along the edge of another named Komoladhes, below which there is a small wood of plane-trees. Here the Turk, proprietor of the village, advances from his pyrgo, and invites us to lodge with him. The river is at a small distance on the right, but leaves a broad plain on the opposite side; the valley is narrowest opposite to Franzi. Our road now continues, as far as Neopatra, along a stony slope formed by the torrents descending from the gorges of Mount Katavothra, which rises like an immense wall, shading the road from the afternoon sun for several hours, like the similar precipices at Mistra. But the Katavothra are much higher than the abrupt terminations of Mount Taygetum in the Spartan valley. We arrive in the town at 4.
Neopatra, by the Turks called Badrajik, stands partly at the head of a long stony slope, similar to that below Mount Katavothra, and partly upon a ridge which rises at the back of the slope, terminating above in a steep detached summit of a peaked form.

§ 2.015   On this height are the ruins of a small castle of Lower Greek construction, or perhaps a work of the Franks in the fourteenth century, when Neopatra was conquered from the Greek despot of Western Greece by the Catalans, and became a part of the duchy of Athens under the Spanish sovereigns of Sicily until Thessaly was overrun by the Turks. The ridge is protected on either side by a ravine, in which flows a torrent, (ρεύμα); that on the west has a wide gravelly bed; the eastern is shaded by plane trees, and waters numerous gardens around a suburb which stands below the ridge on that side. These streams do not fail in summer, but after turning many mills, irrigate plantations of tobacco in the plain. The Spercheius, or Elladha, is diverted from the general course in which it descends to the sea from the westward by the long projection of the hill of Neopatra, which forms a diminishing ridge almost as far as the river’s bank.
The town is inhabited by about 500 Turkish and 150 Greek families. Their proportion accounts for the prevalence of the Turco-Greek name, Πατρατζήκι, in preference to that of Neopatra. The latter however is well known to be the right appellation, and the bishop is styled των Νεών Πατρών. Almost all the power is in the hands of an Albanian Bey, placed here by Aly Pasha. The district contains between 30 and 40 villages, all Greek; not long ago there were 70, so great have been the emigrations of late from this part of the country. The major part of these villages are in the subjacent plain.

§ 2.016   The town contains one church besides the metropolitan, and a third unfinished, which the Greeks have lately been permitted by Aly Pasha to rebuild. The streams and gardens of the town, and its lofty position are very agreeable, but the air is said to be unwholesome in the summer and autumn, which the natives ascribe to the exhalations of the tobacco plant, though undoubtedly the rice-grounds, as at Zituni, equally contribute, and probably the overhanging mountains, as well as the want of a good Imbat in the Maliac Gulf, which is too narrow and too much excluded from the open sea by surrounding mountains to receive in perfection that great corrector of the air in the maritime parts of Greece.
There is no direct road over the mountains from Neopatra to Salona: the usual route falls into that from Zituni to Salona at the ascent of the Oetaen pass. That from Neopatra into Thessaly passes the Elladha nearly opposite to the village of Ghenokladha, and crosses the opposite hill at the derveni of Karya, so called from a small village of that name to the left of the road: it then descends upon Taukli, near which it joins the road from Zituni to Dhomoko. The hills which bound the valley of Neopatra to the north are included in its district, but immediately beyond them begins that of Agrafa. Not far above Neopatra the plain widens to the breadth of five miles, and here the Elladha is joined by the Vistritza, a large branch which descends with great rapidity through a gorge dividing the Patriotiko from a peaked mountain lying between the former and

§ 2.017   Mount Velukhi. The Vistritza crosses the plain obliquely in a wide gravelly bed, and joins the Elladha immediately opposite to Neopatra, at a distance of three or four miles. Its waters, like those of the Elladha, serve to irrigate some rice-fields in the lowest part of the valley.
About ten miles above Neopatra, the valley of the Spercheius is reduced to narrow limits by the approximation of the two ranges of hills. Karpenisi is reckoned nine hours from hence, its position lying to the left of the summit of Velukhi, near the sources of a branch of the Aspropotamo which joins the main stream near the monastery of Tetarna. The sources of the Elladha are on the northern and eastern sides of the same mountain, which seems clearly therefore to be the ancient Tymphrestus; for Strabo states that the Spercheius had its origin in Tymphrestus, and that Mount Othrys extended from the Maliac Gulf to Tymphrestus and Dolopia. The two most distant tributaries of this river flow from Neokhorio of Kostriava in Agrafa, and from Mavrilo in the district of Neopatra. These streams are joined by other branches from the summit, intermediate between Oeta and Tymphrestus, but by none of any magnitude from the Othryan range of mountains.

§ 2.018   The Vistritza, which is almost as large as the Elladha itself, originates in a ridge which stretches in a south-easterly direction, uniting Velukhi with Vardhusi, and which, from its forests of beech, is known by the name of Oxies.
There are many large quadrangular blocks of stone, and foundations of ancient walls, on the heights of Neopatra, as well as in the buildings of the town, particularly about the mosques and fountains: several of these remains are of white marble, of a species different from the Attic, and which was probably quarried in the adjacent mountains. I observed some shafts of columns of this material, but could not find a capital. In the metropolitan church, which is a wretched old building with a falling roof, there is a handsome shaft of white marble, and on the outside of the wall an inscription in small characters of the best times: of which I was unable to decipher any more than the three last words— απο Υπαταιων πάντων. Another stone, inscribed in a similar character, is sufficiently legible to show that it recorded grants of proxenia to foreign benefactors. As in one of these records the Hypataei, and in another the council, or magistrates of the Aenianes, conferred the favour, we may infer not

§ 2.019   only that Neopatra is the site of Hypata, but that Hypata was in the country of the Aenianes, and probably their chief town: the grant in one case was perhaps confined to Hypata, and in the other extended to the whole district. The latter inscription is on a broken block of white marble, lying under a plane-tree near a fountain in the Jewish burying-ground, and not far above the western torrent; on the opposite side of which an ancient sepulchre was lately excavated. It produced nothing but bones; but it serves to confirm the very natural supposition that the city was bounded by the two torrents. If Hypata was the chief town of the Aenianes, we have an obvious reason for the non-existence of any coins of Hypata; the money coined here having probably all had the inscription Aινιάνων.
The length of 200 stades which Strabo assigns to the proper Oeta, seems to leave little doubt that the Mount Patriotiko, which is the highest point in this part of the country, is the proper summit of Oeta; and it is not improbable that the name Hypata may have been originally Hypoeta, as having been situated immediately under Oeta. But there was also a city Oeta, said to have been founded by Amphissus, son of Apollo and Dryope, where it is to be supposed that the beautiful coins with the legend Οιταιων were struck. As Herodotus and Thucydides distinguish the Oetaei from the Trachinii, and as Stephanus describes Oeta to have been a city of the Melienses, we have good reason for

§ 2.020   believing that it stood at the foot of Mount Patriotiko, towards the Trachinian plain. It was the same place, perhaps, as the ιερόν αστυ, to which, according to Callimachus, the Hyperborean offerings were sent from Dodona in their way to Delos, and which gave name apparently to the Hierenses, one of the three tribes of the Malienses. Oeta may have been called the sacred city, from the worship of Hercules, and because near it, on the mountain, was Pyra, where Hercules was said to have died on the burning pile,—a place of such sacred celebrity, that the Roman Consul, Acilius, ascended thither from Heracleia to offer sacrifice, continuing his route from thence across Oeta and Corax to Naupactus.
The two other tribes of the Malienses were the Paralii and Trachinii, the former of whom evidently occupied the maritime towns of Anticyra, Phalara, and Echinus, the latter the opposite mountains, with the adjacent part of the plain round Heracleia. As to Lamia, although once a city of the Paralii, it would seem afterwards to have been altogether separated from Melis; for we find coins both of the Μαλιέων and Λαμιέων. Echinus preserves its name, slightly corrupted into Akhino, Phalara was probably the modern Stylidha, and Anticyra, which stood at the mouth of the Spercheius, should now be

§ 2.021   sought for towards the middle of the plain below Zituni. There were some other towns of the Malienses, the names of which only are preserved, without any indication of exact locality, such as Colaceia, Aegoneia, and Irus, or Ira.
With these particulars as to the position of the Malienses and Aenianes, there is little difficulty in adjusting the local distribution of the other small districts, which were surrounded by Doris, Locris, Thessaly, and Aetolia. Their exact boundaries cannot easily be defined, but their relative situation may be inferred from that of their cities. Included between the south-eastern extremity of the Thessalian plains and Melis were the Phthiotae, whose towns have not been named by Homer. Their capital at that time was probably Pharsalus; in latter ages, when Phthiotis extended to the Pagasaean Gulf, and maritime commerce was in its meridian, Thebae Phthioticae rivalled Pharsalus.
Westward of the Pharsalia was Dolopia, a mountainous country, which, falling to the great Thessalian plain, extended westward to Athamania, and bordered southward on Aetolia and the Aenianes. It corresponded to the northern and eastern part of the modern Agrafa; its principal town is not specified in ancient history. The situation of Dryopis is exactly indicated by a passage of Strabo already referred to, which shows it to have been adjacent to Mount Tymphrestus,

§ 2.022   now Velukhi; whence, on comparing this fact with other geographical data which have been mentioned, the general inference may be drawn, that the Dryopes occupied the upper valleys of the Spercheius, and the Aenianes the lower, as far as the entrance into the plains of Melts, near the modern Franzi. The Aenianes derived their name perhaps from Anias, which, as it often occurs simply, or in composition as a river’s name, both in Greece and Italy, would seem to have been a generic word for river in the Pelasgic tongue. There is some reason to believe, from a story related by Plutarch, that the great branch of the Elladha, called Vistritza, was anciently named Inachus. He states, that in the last migration of the Mnianes, they removed from Crissa to the country on a river Inachus, which was partly occupied by Inachii and Achaei, and that the Aenianes acquired this portion when Hyperochus, king of the Inachii, had been slain by Phemius, king of the Aenianes.

§ 2.023   Nov. 27.—At 1.30 p.m., setting out from Neopatra we descend by a path which conducts along the side of the mountain above the lower suburb, where on the skirts of the upper town, the remains of a very massive Hellenic wall are observable on the brow of the slope, showing that Hypata occupied exactly the site of the present town. On a rock close by a piece of ancient wall, on the side of the eastern torrent, are two niches; one of these is in the form of a cockle-shell, the other, which is perpendicularly above it, is quadrilateral. On the descent of the hills, beyond the gardens of the lower Makhala, is a handsome wood of elms, chestnuts, and other trees, and many sources of water by the road side. We enter the valley through a wood of plane trees, at 2 join the road by which we came, and retrace it as far as the point near Franzi, where we arrive at 4. From thence an ascent of a quarter of an hour brings us to the village. On the edge of the plain a labourer was sowing barley, and another behind him, ploughing it in. In the lower level very little besides maize and rice is grown. The cottage in which I am lodged is neat and comfortable. The owner of it asks my servant secretly whether it is true, as reported in the village, that all the plain belongs to me, and that I am come to look at the state of it; but, adds he, “When will he come with his palikaria and take possession?”

§ 2.024   Nov. 28.—Departing from Franzi this morning at 7.52, we descend the hill obliquely, and cross at 8.4, on the edge of the plain, a wide avlaki, or artificial channel, which conducts a deep and rapid stream towards the mill on our left, which I mentioned on the 26th. From the mill the stream descends directly to the Elladha, but the water is for the most part consumed in watering plantations of cotton and maize. It is a derivation from the Gurgo-potamo, a torrent which descends from the great chasm of Mount Oeta, between the Katavothra and Mount Patriotiko, described on the 25th.
We now enter the plain which below Franzi expands to a breadth of six or eight miles, and proceed in the direction of the rocks of Trachis, by which I mean those near the site of that city, for as Herodotus states, that all the lofty mountains which surrounded this plain were called the Trachinian rocks, it would seem that he meant to include among them the precipices of Mount Katavothra, which were four or five miles from the site of Trachis. At 8.15 we cross the Gurgopotamo, a clear, rapid, perennial stream, which, after passing through Moskokhori, joins the Elladha two miles below that village. The Trachinian plain is little cultivated, and much overgrown with agnuscastus and oleander. At 8.25 Alpospata, a small village of fifteen or twenty houses, is a quarter of a mile on the right. We here cross a small rivulet running down into the plain. At 8.32 we are at the low point of hill which appears from Zituni to project into the plain to the right of the rocks of Trachis. It is commanded at the back by a round hill, behind which a gentle slope ascends to the foot of some great precipices, which are a continuation of the Katavothra.

§ 2.025   On the slope stands the village of Dhyo-vunia (two hills). The round height has much the appearance of the site of an ancient acropolis, but a man of Alpospata, of whom I inquire, knows of no remains of ancient walls there, nor can I perceive any, though we make the semi-tour of the hill at no great distance. It may, nevertheless, be the site of the city Oeta, or ιερόν άστυ of Callimachus, for it lies immediately at the foot of the great summit of Oeta, and is also very near the borders of the plain of Melis. Alpospata occupies the lowest declivity of the hill on the north-eastern side. Proceeding in the same direction, at 8.41 we have the small village of Vardhates half a mile on the right, at the foot of the hill, and at a few paces on the left of the road an ancient tumulus, near the angle where the rocks of Trachis begin to overhang the plain. At 8.46 cross a streamlet running from right to left in the direction of those precipices, and at 8.52 arrive at the foot of the rocks, which rise to the height of four or five hundred feet with great magnificence and beauty, the bareness of the rock being relieved at intervals by patches of green shrubs hanging over it. Continuing along the foot of the precipices, we arrived at 8.59 at their most projecting point, as observed from Zituni, on either side of which are several sources, issuing from below the rocks, and collecting into two streams which meet below the projection. The united river flows from thence across the plain in the direction of Moskokhori, a little above which village it joins the Gurgo-potamo. The sources and river are called the Mavra-neria; the streamlet, which we

§ 2.026   crossed at 8.46, is a branch of it. It seems clear that the Gurgo is the Dyras, and the Mavra-neria the Melas, of which word the modern name is a synonym. In the time of Herodotus these two streams, which now unite and fall into the Spercheius, discharged themselves separately into the sea. A little before arriving at the projecting point, the road, in order to avoid the rivers and springs, ascends a steep rocky slope, which at this place forms the base of the rocks. It continues thus passing just above the springs till 9.3, when it again enters the level at the foot of the rocks. From hence for half a mile onwards, towards the gorge of the Asopus, there are many catacombs excavated in the side of the perpendicular rocks. Some of these have narrow entrances, others are square and open, and one has a curved roof. Within they are (at least all those I entered) plain sepulchral chambers, small and low. These catacombs and their distance from the sources of the Mavra-neria, agreeing with that of five stades, which Herodotus places between the river Melas and Trachis, determine the position of this city; the direction which the rocks take from the projecting point to the Asopus, equally justifies his remark, that the Asopus was to the south of Trachis.
Fifty-four years after the events described by Herodotus, or in the year B.C. 426, which was the sixth of the Peloponnesian war, Trachis received a colony of Lacedaemonians, in consequence of a complaint made by the Trachinii in conjunction with their neighbours of Doris, from whom the

§ 2.027   Lacedaemonians were supposed to derive their origin, that they were harassed by the surrounding Oetaei, and no longer able to defend themselves. Thucydides, from whom we learn this fact, asserts that Heracleia was situated at a distance of forty stades from Thermopylae, and of twenty from the sea, which latter number, if it be not below the truth, shows that the sea still reached at that time to the western extremity of the heights of Thermopylae. After the defeat of Antiochus at Thermopylae, B.C. 191, Heracleia was besieged and taken from the Aetolians by the Romans under Acilius, and the circumstances of this conquest, as extracted from Polybius by Livy, are well illustrated by the topography. The consul having divided his army into four bodies, placed one of them on the Asopus, near the gymnasium, another near the citadel, a third at the temple of Diana, on the banks of the Melas, and the fourth towards the Maliac gulf. The approach was most difficult in the last direction, which is accounted for by another remark of the historian, namely, that the plain of Heracleia was marshy, and abounded in lofty trees. These, however, were very useful to the Romans, who, finding moreover every other kind of building materials necessary for their works in the deserted houses of the suburbs, speedily constructed towers, battering-rams, and other implements used by the ancients in the attack of fortified places. The

§ 2.028   Aetolians, nevertheless successfully maintained their positions in all the four quarters of attack for twenty-four days, when the consul, finding that the enemy’s numbers and efforts were diminishing, resolved upon a general attack of the lower town, first deceiving the enemy by a feigned relaxation on his part, and then making a general assault in the fourth watch of the night. The Aetolians were surprised, and retired into the citadel. The next day the consul, after allowing his troops to plunder the town for some hours, divided them into two bodies; one of these he led by a circuitous route round the foot of the mountain to a rocky summit, which was equal to the citadel in height, and was separated from it only by a chasm so narrow, that the two summits were within the range of a missile. The

§ 2.029   occupation of this height was to be the signal to the Romans in the town to ascend against the citadel, but the Aetolians were now disheartened, and the citadel being crowded with women and children, and without any preparation for a further defence, they did not wait for the assault, but surrendered at the consul’s discretion.
It seems quite clear from this account that the city occupied the low ground between the rivers Karvunaria and Mavra-neria, extending from the one to the other, as well as a considerable distance into the plain in a north-eastern direction. The citadel stood on the summit of the same precipice in the lower part of which are the catacombs. Its distance above the town justifies the words extra muros, which the historian applies to it, and may explain also the assertion of Strabo, that Heracleia was six stades distant from the ancient Trachis; for although the town of Heracleia seems to have occupied the same position as the Trachis of Herodotus, the citadel, which according to Livy was better inhabited in the Aetolian war than the city, may very possibly have been the only inhabited part of Heracleia two centuries later. The Latin historian has not left us the means of judging of the route taken by the Roman division which seized upon the summit near the citadel,—whether

§ 2.030   by the ravine of the Asopus, or round the western end of the rocks near Vardhates. I am informed that some vestiges of the citadel of Heracleia still remain, but they are not visible from below; and as it would require a long detour on foot to reach them, I was under the necessity of giving up the attempt.
The marshy plain, which in the consulship of Acilius, occupied the space between the northern wall of Heracleia and the shore of the Maliae Gulf, we may suppose to have been narrower and more difficult at an earlier period, when Heracleia consequently more completely commanded the passes from Thessaly into Southern Greece, as well along the shore by Thermopylae into Locris, as over Mount Oeta into Doris; and this consideration illustrates a passage in Xenophon, who informs us that when Jason of Pherae returned from Boeotia into Thessaly after the battle of Leuctra, (B.C. 371,) he destroyed the walls of Heracleia, in order that they might not be an impediment to his own free passage into Greece. At a later period its possession by the Aetolians was a main cause of the power of that people which balanced that of Macedonia under the successors of Alexander, especially when after the termination of the Epirote monarchy they obtained Ambracia, and thus extended their wings to either shore of continental Greece. Had they been a virtuous and prudent people, or had they been

§ 2.031   guided at the right time by such counsellors as their praetor Agelas of Naupactus, they might have cemented such an alliance as would have saved Greece from the Romans; but all hope of successful resistance was lost when Heracleia fell, and two years afterwards Ambracia.
Having quitted the catacombs, after a delay of five minutes we ride in a direction a little to the right of the point at which the pass of Thermopylae begins. This part of the plain is quite uncultivated, and overgrown with shrubs. At 9.22 we cross the Karvunaria or Asopus, half a mile below the rocky opening from which it issues into the plain, and opposite to the ruins of the village of Mustafa Bey. Within the gorge there are perpendicular precipices on either side, as far up the stream as the view admits: those on the left bank are intermixed with wood. The ravine after some distance winds to the eastward, or exactly in the direction which Hydarnes wished to follow in his march over the mountain. At 9.40 the part of the Oetaean ridge, on which stands Nevropoli, and which I crossed in 1802 on the way from Zituni and the bridge of Alemana to Gravia, and Salona is on our right. A little farther a torrent issues from a small ravine and passes into the plain in several rills, over a slope a quarter of a mile in breadth, which has been formed in process of time by the deposition of the torrent: a part of the stream terminates in a marshy spot at the foot of the slope; another part serves to fill an avlaki used for irrigating some cotton-grounds on the left.

§ 2.032   As generally found at the issue of torrents from the mountains, the surface of the ground is gravelly, and shaded with planes and other trees.
At 9.48, half a mile to our right, the road to Dhamasta begins to ascend the mountain: we halt three minutes, and then proceed through cotton-fields watered by another small rill from the hills on the right. At 10.4 arrive at the point where begins the western pass, or false Thermopylae, as it may be called. At 10.8 cross the first stream of mineral water, which runs with rapidity towards the Spercheius, leaving a great quantity of red deposit. This I take to be the Phoenix, so called, probably, from the colour of its sediment. Strabo, indeed, derives the name from a hero Phoenicius; but the Greeks were fond of an heroic etymology for their names, and as Herodotus clearly describes the Phoenix to have been in a narrow pass westward of Anthele, and fifteen stades from the real Thermopylae, which is found exactly to be true as applied to this red rivulet, there can be little or no doubt of the identity. The junction of the Asopus and Spercheius is on our left, a little below the khan of Alemana. The ground being still white and hard with frost under the shade of the point, and the air very cold, the stream of the Phoenix is covered with vapour, though it is much cooler than that of Thermopylae. Nor is it so much impregnated with salt. The red deposit also, which may indicate the presence of iron, shows that the water differs from that of Thermopylae, which leaves only a white crust.

§ 2.033   The plain between this place and the Spercheius, which is now covered with a fine grass, furnishing pasture to sheep and goats, appears to have been formed by the deposit of the springs in the course of ages. The soil, however, has not accumulated so rapidly here as below the springs of Thermopylae. At 10.11 we arrive at a second salt spring or source of the Phoenix, issuing at an angle of the steep bank or cliff, and flowing to the former rivulet: here we join the road from Zituni, which now passes over the foot of the heights. Below on the left are cotton-fields, and in one place some appearance of the marsh, which in former ages was impassable in every part, and reached nearly to the foot of the cliffs.
At the entrance of the road over the heights there is a fountain of fresh water constructed in the usual manner with a low wall, a small basin, and a spout supplied by a pipe. These Turkish fountains, as they are usually called, are probably nothing more than the Greek κρηναι continued to the present day, with such changes only in the decorations as the Turkish religion and manners have required, arabesques with sentences from the Koran, or the name of the builder, being substituted for the elegant ornaments of architecture, or the sculptures allusive to their mythology, which the Greeks employed.
At 10.20 the heights terminate, and in one minute more we cross a stream of cold salt water, frozen at the edges, and then enter upon that which Herodotus calls the plain of Anthele. This is a long triangular slope, formed of a hard gravelly soil and covered with shrubs.

§ 2.034   It is bounded above by a rocky ravine which separates the cliffs of the false from those of the real Thermopylae; and it appears to have been formed in the process of time by the alluvial matter brought from the mountain through the gorge. The plain is broadest where the road crosses it, narrowing from thence to a point towards the Spercheius, where it terminates. The precipices at the head of the plain of Anthele prevent all approach on that side except through the gorge; but this affords an easy though very defensible access from the plain of the Asopus by passing above the cliffs of the Phoenix or false Thermopylae. In the middle of the plain of Anthele, at 10.30, we cross the deep bed of a torrent now dry, but flowing copiously in times of rain. On my former visit I searched in vain, when passing the greatest part of two days at Thermopylae, for any remains of Anthele, or of the buildings mentioned by Herodotus which formed the place of meeting of the Amphictyonic council. At 10.40 we arrive at the end of the plain, and enter upon the white elevated soil formed by the deposit of the salt-springs of the proper Thermopylae. The upper source is in a corner retired within the line of termination of the plain of Anthele, immediately at the foot of the highest part of the great cliffs. The soil appears to have been very much raised in the course of ages by the deposit. The water is inclosed within a receptacle of masonry, about two feet in depth, and is seen springing from the earth below. Some small superfluities from this basin run down the white slope, but the main stream formerly serving to turn a mill which is now in ruins, issues from the

§ 2.035   foot of the slope, its previous course from the spring to the issue being below the calcareous crust or deposit. Some of the veins of water which contribute to it are visible through apertures in the crust at a depth of a foot and a half below the present surface. From the upper or western to the lower or eastern hot spring, the distance is two hundred yards. Between them a path conducts to some vineyards on the table summit of a precipice which is advanced in front of the great cliffs, but ascends no farther; the ordinary path from the pass to Drakospilia leading by a church which is situated on the heights above the western cliffs, to which there is an ascent by the bed of the torrent of Anthele. The sides of the mountain immediately over the pass (for the great precipices are some distance farther back) are covered with a thick wood of wild olive, holly-oak, lentisk, and other common shrubs.
From the lower source there is a distance of 400 yards to a mill which is still in use, the road leading along the avlaki or artificial canal, which conducts the water to the mill. The water in the avlaki is deep, and runs with rapidity, emitting a vapour which has a strong sulphureous smell. The sides of the canal, both within and without, are clothed with a thick white fetid deposit, which consists chiefly of carbonate of lime, but seems to retain a considerable portion of sulphur. The deposition of this substance is so rapid that the twigs of the plants which hang into the water, and even the green leaves, are partly covered with it; a fact which easily accounts for some of the changes that

§ 2.036   have occurred in the elevation of the surface and the strength of the pass in the course of twenty-three centuries. The water throws out a great volume of smoke as it issues from the mill. It appears that there was formerly another mill below, for the avlaki is continued, though in a ruinous state, beyond the existing mill, along the foot of the two conical heights marked in the plan, the easternmost of which is crowned with the guard house of the derveni. Beyond this height the canal ceases, and the water is suffered to flow in a natural course down to the river. A lake of the same water as the springs, but not hot, occupies all the space between the mill and the western conical height, a distance of 150 yards; the avlaki is there carried along the edge of the lake. There is another smaller pond behind the derveni, or eastern conical height, towards its western side. The water of these pools, like that of the principal hot source, is very bright, and of a deep blue colour, thus illustrating in some measure the remark of Pausanias, that the bluest water he ever saw was in one of the baths at Thermopylae. The coolness of the water of the two lakes may be ascribed to the slowness with which they are supplied by the subterraneous veins, for the water being of the same composition as that of the hot springs, is probably hot also at its issue from the ground. The difference in quality between the water of the Phoenix and

§ 2.037   that of Thermopylae, is practically shown by the cultivators of the cotton plantations, who carefully exclude the water of Thermopylae from the cotton, whereas they use that of the Phoenix to irrigate it. Neither of the two heights just mentioned, though very regular in form, has the smallest appearance of being artificial, and in fact each of them is united by means of a small ridge with the mountain: from the western to the eastern there is a distance of 250 yards, and 400 more to the point where the road, leaving the white soil formed by the deposit of the thermal waters, begins to ascend through the wood. This is the eastern extremity of the real pass of Thermopylae, as the plain of Anthele is the western.
At a few minutes within the wood stands a mill turned by a small torrent of fresh water from the mountain, and belonging to a monastery of St. George, above Mola: three men of Dhrakospilia had just arrived to take possession of the mill, having hired it of the convent, on condition of paying thirty-five kuvelia of flour of eighteen okes each, to the convent yearly. They inform me, that though there are thirty houses at Dhrakospilia, there are no more than four families now residing there, but that they have little reason to regret the reduction of their numbers, as they are now less tormented by Turkish visitations, particularly that of the Dervent Aga, a deputy of Vely Pasha, who has four or five hundred men under his command, and travels continually in the neighbourhood of these passes, quartering and living upon the villages.

§ 2.038   We met some of his palikaria in the pass; the Aga himself was at Neopatra. There was a sharp frost under the shade of the mountain in the pass, and the edges of the salt streams were frozen. Here in the sun, at the mill, it is warmer than is agreeable. Not far from this spot was probably situated Alpeni, or Alponus, the frontier town of Locris.
At 12.40 we continue to ascend through the wood, in which, among other shrubs, there is an abundance of large myrtles; at 1.35 cross the foundations of a Hellenic wall, traceable for a considerable distance in an oblique direction towards the cliffs, which are a continuation of those overhanging and forming the pass of Thermopylae, and which are here about half a mile on our right. Similar remains are observable between the upper and lower cliffs immediately above Thermopylae, the remains of works by which the pass has at various times been fortified. The foundations of the wall which we cross in the road are nearly opposite to the height on the left; where, as I mentioned on the 25th, I found on my former visit a tumulus, and the foundations of a circular monument, just above a deep marsh near the right bank of the Spercheius. It is very probable that the Hellenic wall was carried from the cliffs to this point as an advanced defence to the pass on the eastern side, and that there stood the town of Nicaea. Thus far I can see no place where the Persians could have descended. To our left on the declivity are some small Kalyvia, and fields of kalambokki. At 1.50 we arrive at a fountain immediately below a rocky ravine, between two of

§ 2.039   the lower heights of Callidromus. This ravine is stony and narrow, but is said to afford a route, though difficult, to Dhrakospilia and the summit of the mountain, passing by the monastery of Ai Ianni, which is situated an hour above the fountain. With the telescope I perceive some foundations of ancient masonry on the round summit of the lower, which is the smaller and westernmost of the two heights bordering the ravine. These summits which are nearly a mile distant from the fountain, are themselves very steep, but below them, as well as around the fountain, there is a level pasture and an easy descent in every direction, both to the maritime plain and to the pass. Leaving the fountain at 2, we cross half an hour afterwards a deep ravine in which the torrents, descending from the summit of Callidromus, are collected into one bed. It is the easiest and most direct passage to the summit of the mountain: no more than two hours being required to reach Dhrakospilia by this route, though an equal time is employed in proceeding to the same place from Ai Ianni, which is only half the distance. It is probably, therefore, the route by which the Persians under Hydarnes descended from the summit of the mountain; for Herodotus remarks, that their descent was much shorter and less circuitous than the route by which they ascended, which may be partly accounted for by the facility of route afforded by the ravine, and partly by the summit being nearer to this end of the ridge than to the Asopian plain, from whence Hydarnes began his march.

§ 2.040   At 3 we enter the town of Pundonitza.
In referring the ancient descriptions of Thermopylae, or the allusions to it contained in history, to the real topography, we are immediately sensible of the great change which the place has undergone from natural causes in the intermediate time. The strength of Thermopylae as a pass now depends upon the season of the year, for as the sea, instead of bordering the defile, is now at a distance of three or four miles from it, the difficulty of passing Thermopylae depends on the dry or marshy state of the plain. At the Phoenix, or Western Pass, there is still in winter only a narrow road at the foot of the hill, bordered by marshes; but as these in summer afford intervals for cultivation, they would likewise admit of the passage of troops into the plain of Anthele. In the Eastern Pass, or proper Thermopylae, there is in like manner a plain, more than half a mile in breadth, between the pass and the Spercheius, and this plain also, although marshy and sometimes impassable in winter, is partly cultivated in summer, and presents no difficulties of passage. Between this level and the cliffs, moreover, there is a slope formed of the calcareous depositions of the springs, dry at all seasons, and in some places four or five hundred yards in breadth.
To show how different this state of the place is from that which it presented at the time of the Persian invasion, it will be sufficient to extract the description of the pass by Herodotus, together with his narrative of the circumstances which accompanied the death of Leonidas and his three hundred heroes. “From the river Phoenix,” he says,

§ 2.041   “to Thermopylae, there is a distance of fifteen stades. Between them stands the town named Anthele, near which the Asopus falls into the sea. Here the country is open, and contains the temple of Ceres Amphictyonis, and the seats of the Amphictyones, and the temple of Amphictyon. Xerxes the king stationed his army in Trachinia of Melis, and the Greeks in the pass called by the natives Pylae,but Thermopylae by the Greeks in general.” The following passage is more particular: “The entrance into Greece through Trachis is half a plethrum in breadth where it is most confined. The narrowest part of all the country, however, is not there, but before and behind Thermopylae behind, near Alpeni, where the road admits only of one chariot; and before, at the river Phoenix, near the city Anthele, where also the space is no more than sufficient for a single carriage. To the west of Thermopylae a mountain inaccessible, precipitous, and lofty, extends to Oeta. On the eastern side of the defile, are the sea and marshes. In the Strait are the hot-baths called by the natives Chytri, where stands an altar of Hercules. Anciently there was a wall with a gate in the pass, which had been erected by the Phocenses, when fearful of being invaded by the Thessali, who had come from Thesprotia to inhabit the Aeolic land which they now possess.

§ 2.042   The Phocenses used every contrivance to shut the entrance of their land against the Thessali, and among other things let loose the hot water upon the pass to form a torrent. As the greater part of the wall lay in ruins, the Greeks thought right, upon the present occasion, to repair it, and make use of it as a defence against the barbarians. They resolved also, as the town Alpeni was very near, that the Greeks in the Strait should be supplied from thence with provisions. In this pass the Greeks, having examined the places and found them convenient, resolved to await the attack, judging that here the barbarians could neither derive advantage from their immense numbers, nor make use of their cavalry. Having departed therefore from the Isthmus as soon as they heard of the arrival of the enemy in Pieria, some went in ships to Artemisium, and others by land to Thermopylae.” Of the road over the upper part of Mount Callidromus the historian thus speaks:—“This path was discovered by the inhabitants of Melis, who made use of it to conduct the Thessalians against the Phocenses, when the latter shut the pass of Thermopylae with a wall; from that time the path had been of no use to the people of Melis. It began from the rocky opening of the Asopus, and was named, as well as the mountain over which it leads, Anopaea. It passes over the crest of the mountain, and terminates towards Alpeni, the frontier town of Locris, and towards the rock called Melampygus, and the seats of the Cercopes, where the road is narrowest. By this path the Persians marched,” etc.

§ 2.043   Three accidents concurred to frustrate the endeavours of the Panhellenic council at the isthmus to defend Thermopylae. They were ignorant of the path over Mount Anopaea, by which the position might be taken in reverse, Leonidas himself having only been informed of it by the Trachinii on his arrival, when he sent 1000 Phocenses to defend that route. Secondly, there was no expectation when Leonidas marched from the isthmus that the troops at Thermopylae would be soon attacked, the consequence of which was, that none of the allied states dispatched more than a small force in the first instance. And lastly, a religious ceremony, as had happened in the former Persian invasion, contributed to interpose a delay in the movements of the main body of the Spartans, while the Olympic games produced a similar effect in the rest of Greece. It appears, indeed, that the Spartans would not have sent any of their forces so soon, had it not been with a view to set an example to the allies, and thereby prevent them from embracing the interests of Persia .
The allies had only time to reach Thermopylae and repair the Phocian wall, when the Persians made their appearance before the pass. On the part of all the Peloponnesians, except the Spartans, there was a wish to reserve their efforts for the defence of the isthmus of Corinth; but as this gave great offence to the men of Phocis and Locris, who were supported by Leonidas, it was at last resolved to remain at Thermopylae, and to

§ 2.044   dispatch messengers to hasten the march of the remainder of the allied forces. Xerxes, meantime, had been informed that a small body of men, headed by the Lacedaemonians and their king Leonidas, occupied the pass; but he could not believe that they really meant to defend it against his multitude, though such was the positive assurance of Demaratus king of Sparta, who, in the same manner as Hippias the king of Athens had guided Datis in the invasion of Attica, accompanied the Persian monarch in the present expedition. Xerxes seems to have been ignorant of the real numbers of the Greeks; for the single horseman whom he sent for information, and who was allowed to approach unmolested, found only the three hundred Spartans on the outside of the wall, which concealed the remainder of the Greek forces. The Spartans were engaged, some in their gymnastic exercises, and others in combing their hair, which being their custom when they were on the point of exposing their lives to imminent danger, proved to Demaratus that they were resolved upon defending the position to the last extremity. Xerxes, however, was still incredulous, and wasted four days in expectation of their retreat. On the fifth he sent a detachment of Medes and Cissi against them. These, and others who succeeded them, having fought the whole day without making any impression upon the Greeks, Xerxes was at length convinced that though he had many men he had few soldiers.

§ 2.045   On the sixth day from that on which the Persian horseman reconnoitred the Greeks, they were attacked by the Immortals; but these also soon found that their numbers were of no advantage in such narrow ground, against the long spears and large shields of the Greeks. The Lacedaemonians, who were the men chiefly engaged in this day’s action, retired several times as if defeated, and then suddenly facing about, overthrew great numbers of their opponents .
On the following day the Greeks were not less successful in maintaining their post. All the allies were present except the Phocians, who were guarding the passage over the mountain. Xerxes, convinced at length of the infinite superiority of the Greek soldier, was reduced to such a state of embarrassment, as might have made Mount Oeta the term of his expedition, had the allied forces of the Greeks arrived in time to defend the upper passage of Mount Anopaea as well as Thermopylae had already been defended. It seems to have been on the eighth day of the operations that the Persian king obtained from a Trachinian named Ephialtes, whose countrymen had joined the Persian army, a knowledge of the path over the

§ 2.046   mountain, by which he might send a body of men into the rear of the Greeks, and thus attack their position on both sides. In the evening, Hydarnes with the Immortals began his passage over the mountain, by a circuitous path which at first ascended the ravine of the Asopus. He marched all night, with the mountains of the Oetaei on the right, and those of the Trachinii on the left, and arrived at daybreak near the place where the Phocians were posted. As the enemy advanced, unseen, through a forest of oaks which covered the upper parts of the mountain, the Phocians would have been surprised had not the rustling of the dead leaves under the feet of the enemy, which the calmness of the morning rendered audible, advertized them of the approach of a large body of men. They had only time to arm, when a shower of Persian arrows obliged them to retreat to a more defensible position upon the summit of the mountain, where imagining that the enemy had come expressly to attack them, they prepared to resist to the last. This movement being precisely what the Persians wished, they took no further notice of the Phocians, but descended the mountain. Meantime, the Greeks at Thermopylae had heard of the movement of Hydarnes, and the whole camp was informed of it before daylight.

§ 2.047   A council was immediately held; the result of which was, that all the Greeks should retire to their respective cities, except the Lacedaemonians, Thespienses, and Thebans. Ephialtes, having calculated that he should arrive at the eastern end of Thermopylae about the middle of the forenoon, had recommended to Xerxes to attack the Greeks in front about that time. The Persians advanced accordingly, and Leonidas met them in the widest part of the pass, having advanced in front of the wall. Great numbers of the Persians were slain, many fell into the sea, and many were trodden to death under the feet of their own comrades. The Greeks, knowing that they could not avoid their fate when the Persians should arrive in the rear, fought with all the energy of despair, and having broken their spears, came to action with their swords alone. Here fell Leonidas, and two of the half brothers of Xerxes. The chief contest was now for the body of the Spartan king, which the Greeks at length gained possession of, after having four times obliged the enemy to retreat. Thus each side had alternately the advantage, until the arrival of Hydarnes, when the Greeks, retreating to the narrowest ground, retired behind the wall, and from thence gained the hill in the pass, upon which a stone lion was afterwards erected in honour of Leonidas. Here, assailed on every side, they were all buried under the missile weapons of the enemy, with the exception of the Thebans, who had been retained by Leonidas solely because their city was already suspected of medizing; and who, when the Greeks retreated to the hill, advanced to meet the Persians, when some were slain as they approached; the rest had quarter,

§ 2.048   but were afterwards branded with the royal mark of Xerxes .
Diodorus, Plutarch, and Justin, give a very different account of the death of the Spartans, representing that they penetrated in the night into the camp of Xerxes, and there fell, after slaughtering the Persians for several hours. This improbable tale deserves not a moment's confidence, when opposed to the historian who was a cotemporary of the heroes of Thermopylae.
According to an epitaph on the polyandrium at Thermopylae, cited by Herodotus, “4000 Peloponnesians fought there against 300 myriads.” His enumeration, however, amounts only to 3100. There is reason to believe, therefore, that Isocrates and Diodorus were right in supposing the 300 Spartans to have been exclusive of the Lacedaemonians. From the cities of Greece northward of

§ 2.049   the Isthmus there were about 3000, and as all the 7000 were hoplitae, and were undoubtedly attended by a proportion of light-armed, it is probable that about 10,000 Greeks were assembled, when the impossibility of defending the pass having been proved, the Spartans and Thespienses alone under Leonidas and Demophilus, devoted themselves, by remaining, to certain destruction.
The Persian land forces assembled in Melis amounted, according to Herodotus, to 80,000 Asiatic cavalry, and two millions of infantry, among whom, were included 300,000 Europeans from Thrace, Macedonia, Thessaly, and other states of Greece, and the followers of the camp were even more numerous than the combatants. The only proof which the historian has left to corroborate this statement is the mural measurement of the Asiatic infantry in the plain of Doriscus in Thrace, where 10,000 men having been set apart and made to stand close together, a wall was built round them, and the inclosure was successively filled until the whole army was thus counted, and found to amount to 1,700,000.
Such a process, if carefully and fairly executed, could scarcely have failed to produce an approximation to the truth within 10,000.

§ 2.050   It is obvious, however, that there may have been many persons interested in producing a false muster. We may readily credit that the host of Xerxes was one of the largest which ever entered an enemy’s country. Asiatic armies have always been greater in proportion than those of other countries, in consequence of the peculiar structure of society, which pervades almost the whole of that continent. And in this instance we know the numbers assembled to have been the result of a four-years’ preparation, to have been collected from the whole Persian empire, which then included Egypt as well as all Western Asia, and to have been augmented by the forces of Europe, from the extremity of Thrace to the foot of Mount Oeta. But some of the same causes, which facilitate the collection of large armies in the east, render it difficult to arrive at any certainty as to their exact numbers; and the impossibility of finding subsistence in an enemy’s country for such a multitude, although attended as they were by all the naval forces of the states which supplied the troops, is alone sufficient to justify a disbelief in the numbers of Herodotus.
The silence of Persian history on the invasion of Greece has been supposed to invalidate the truth of the whole transaction, or at least to show that it was nothing more than an expedition of some provincial satrap, magnified by Grecian vanity, and which being unsuccessful, the Persians took no great pains to record. But no person who has reflected on the history of Greece, or has read Herodotus with attention, will easily entertain such an opinion.

§ 2.051   With the sole exception of the amount of the enemy’s land forces, there is no reason to question the statements of Herodotus, who in his narrative of the Persian invasion has left us one of the most cautious and accurate narratives that ever was written, not even excepting those of Thucydides and Polybius. The conquest of Egypt is no more recorded in Persian history than the failure of the expedition to Greece. The oblivion of both these events we may attribute to the same cause: namely, the total loss of the literature and history of ancient Persia, of which the arrow-headed character was the element. A few names only of the ancient monarchs seem to have escaped that literary wreck.
The following are a few reflexions occurring on a view of the scene of this celebrated event. Thermopylae appears to have been the name generally applied to the whole road or passage at the foot of Mount Callidromus, from the plain of the Asopus to the woody slopes which commence a little beyond the modern derveni. But it is distinctly divisible into three parts, the pass of the Phoenix, the plain of Anthele, and Thermopylae proper. The latter was the only part very defensible against a great disparity of numbers; for, as I have already remarked, it is not difficult to turn the pass of the Phoenix from the westward, and to descend upon the plain of Anthele, which being more than half a mile in breadth, leaves only for the real Stena or pass, the part where are the hot springs, anciently called Chytri, and now Therma,

§ 2.052   together with the two ponds of the same kind of water, and the two conical heights. Above all these rise immediately steep woody slopes mixed with rocky precipices, behind which are other precipices still higher, which impede all communication but along the foot of the hill by the hot sources, ponds, and conical heights. Herodotus gives reason to believe that the wall of the Phocians was built a little eastward of the western salt spring, which issues on the eastern edge of the upper extremity of the plain of Anthele, so that the current from this spring may have flowed along the exterior side of the wall. The κολωνός εν τρ εσόδω, or hill in the pass, which was the last retreat of the Spartans, and where the stone lion was erected in honour of Leonidas, I take to have been the western of the two small heights, this being nearest to the position of the Phocian wall, and the narrowest part of the pass, which begins to widen near the hill of the Derveni. The latter moreover being rocky, whereas the former is smooth and even, will better correspond to the rock Melampygus, upon which were the Kερκωπων εδραι, or seats of the Cercopes. A little beyond this hill eastward, the pass terminates: the woody heights, which rise steeply

§ 2.053   from the saline sources and ponds, diminish in height, and at the same time recede to the southward, leaving at their feet a long practicable slope covered with wood, which reaches to the marshes near the mouth of the Spercheius, and which I traversed on quitting Thermopylae for Pundonitza.
In regard to the route of Hydarnes from the plain of Trachis, over Mount Callidromus, otherwise named Anopaea, to Alpeni, there can be little doubt from the words of Herodotus, that it began by ascending the ravine of the Asopus, which, having (as before remarked) a direction from the eastward, and being perfectly concealed, was thus well adapted to the object of the movement of Hydarnes. After following the ravine for some distance, a rugged and circuitous ascent would conduct him to Dhamasta, from whence the route was comparatively easy to Dhrakospilia, a little beyond which probably was the position of the Phocians. After engaging with them until they retreated to the neighbouring summit of the mountain now called Saromata, he descended by the torrent, which I crossed at 2.30, and turning westward on arriving at the modern route from Pundonitza to Thermopylae, reached, without any further difficulty, the position of Alpeni and the eastern end of the pass. As he quitted the camp of Xerxes in the dusk of the evening, and arrived

§ 2.054   at the Phocian position at day-break, he was about eight hours on his march, the transaction having taken place in the beginning of August. Even if the road had been as good as the ground could possibly admit, the distance could not have been less than twelve miles: on considering, therefore, the steepness of the ascent from the vale of the Asopus, the varied surface of the mountain in the upper region, the necessary halts and other delays incidental to the march of 10,000 men by such a path as the historian has described, partly through a thick forest, and in the night, the time does not seem too much in proportion to the distance to be performed. The descent was not much less than the ascent in actual distance but was very different in other respects, being little encumbered with rugged ground or forests; and the march was performed by day. These causes combined would produce a great diminution in time; so that Hydarnes probably was not more than five hours in the descent, including the delay occasioned by the skirmish with the Phocians, and may have arrived at Alpeni about nine o’clock in the forenoon. The only difficulty in the historian’s narrative is, that he states Hydarnes, in commencing his march, to have left the mountains of the Oetaei on his right hand, and those of the Trachinii on his left, which tends to the belief that he began his ascent from the plain to the westward of the Trachinian rocks, about the modern Vardhates. But as this would have doubled the distance, and the words of Herodotus decisively indicate the ravine of the Karvunaria as

§ 2.055   the beginning of his route, we are to conclude that all the summits above the city of Trachis and the Trachinian rocks, on one of which the citadel of Heracleia was afterwards built, then belonged to the Oetaei. The Trachinia, it is easy to conceive, comprehended all the mountain Callidromus, as far as the boundaries of Locris; and thus, notwithstanding the city Trachis was on the right of Hydarnes, the Oetaean mountains, during a great part of his march, may have been on the right, while the Trachinian were on his left. The stillness of the dawn, which saved the Phocians from being surprised, is very characteristic of the climate of Greece in the season when the occurrence took place, and like many other trifling circumstances occurring in the history of the Persian invasion, is an interesting proof of the accuracy and veracity of the historian.
A little more than two centuries after the Persian invasion, in the year B.C. 279, the Gauls, whose appetite for plunder had been more excited than satisfied by that of Italy, Illyria, Pannonia, and Thrace, turned their steps towards Greece, which then offered a more tempting field for the plunderer than any country in the world. They first made their appearance in Macedonia, where in two successive years they defeated Ptolemy Ceraunus and Sosthenes.

§ 2.056   Elated with this success, they now advanced towards the southern provinces of Greece, having principally in view the pillage of the temples of Greece, and particularly that of Delphi. They were met at Thermopylae by an allied army of Greeks, amounting to about 23,000 infantry and 2000 cavalry, together with all the Athenian triremes which could be collected. The chief management of the war was entrusted to the Athenians, who were led by Callippus, son of Moerocles.
The Greeks, having destroyed the bridges of the Spercheius, and stationed a body of troops to oppose the Gauls in crossing at the same point, Brennus effected a passage with 10,000 men nearer to the sea, where the river spreading over the low grounds formed a lake and marshes instead of the single and steady stream which it presented higher up.

§ 2.057   Loftiness of stature, says Pausanias, being a general characteristic of the Celtic race, some of their tallest men waded over the marshes, while some employed their shields as rafts, and others passed over by swimming. The Greeks then withdrew their forces from the river, and retired within the pass of Thermopylae. The next measure of Brennus was that of obliging the people of Melis to construct bridges over the Spercheius, and he then crossed with his whole army, which had consisted, when he first entered Greece, of upwards of 200,000 men. After having laid waste the country, and murdered the inhabitants around Heracleia, which was then in the possession of the Aetolians, he proceeded against the Greeks in Thermopylae. Being informed of their amount by some fugitives, and despising the smallness of their numbers, he attacked them at sunrise on the day after his arrival at the entrance of the pass. But neither the military skill nor the armour of the Gallic infantry, qualified them to contend with Greeks. Their shields were a very insufficient covering, and their swords were made to cut only, having no point. The cavalry, in consequence of the narrowness of the ground and of the rocks and torrents was of no use on either side. The Gauls attacked with their accustomed impetuosity, and fought with the utmost perseverance

§ 2.058   notwithstanding the wounds inflicted by the battleaxes and swords of the hoplitae, as well as by the javelins and arrows of the light-armed. Many even drew out the missiles of the Greeks from their own bodies, to hurl them back upon the enemy. Unable, therefore, with all their efforts to obtain any advantage, they regained their camp, after considerable loss, by a retreat as tumultuous and confused as their attack had been, and in which those who were trodden to death by their own comrades or who were lost in the marshes, were not less numerous than those who fell in the engagement. The success of the day was in great measure due to the Athenian galleys, which were conducted with great difficulty and danger through the marshes, until their missiles were brought to bear upon the enemy.
On the seventh day after the battle, a body of Gauls ascended Mount Oeta by a narrow path near the ruins of Trachis, not with a view of crossing the mountain into the rear of the Greek position, but for the purpose of plundering a temple of Minerva, situated above the ruins of Trachis. They were met and beaten by the Aetolians from Heracleia, whose commander, Telesarchus, fell in the action. Brennus now attempted to detach the Aetolians from the confederate army, by undertaking an expedition into their country with the view of thus obliging them to march to its defence: 40,000 Gallic infantry and 8000 horse having crossed the Spercheius, as if marching into Thessaly, suddenly entered Aetolia and attacked Callium, which they took and treated with the most

§ 2.059   merciless cruelty; but having been encountered on their return by the Italians from Thermopylae reinforced from various parts of Aetolia, they were completely defeated, and not half their number returned to the camp of Brennus.
An example of that selfishness and disunion which has been the bane of Greece in every age was now destined to favour the invader. The Heracleotae and Aenianes, tired of the protracted stay of the enemy in their territory, and thinking only of the readiest means of ridding themselves of the evil, undertook to guide the Gauls across Mount Callidromus by the same path which the Persians had followed. Brennus resolved upon conducting the expedition in person. Leaving Acichorius, therefore, in charge of the main army, with orders to attack the Greeks in front, as soon as those who crossed the mountain should arrive in their rear, he ascended Callidromus at the head of 40,000 men.
A body of Phocians, for the defence of the road, had been stationed on the mountain, as in the time of Xerxes, and to as little purpose. A dense vapour covering the summit, the Phocians were not apprized of the approach of the Gauls until they were attacked, when, after a short resistance, they retreated with all expedition to their comrades at Thermopylae. The whole army then embarked in the Athenian galleys, and thus effected its retreat without further loss.

§ 2.060   Brennus, upon learning that Thermopylae was evacuated by the enemy, without waiting for Acichorius marched forward to Delphi, where he suffered a variety of disasters which the Greeks believed to have been caused by an immediate interposition of Apollo in defence of his sanctuary. If Pausanias was truly informed, the Greeks were assisted on this occasion both by an earthquake which detached some of the rocks of Parnassus and rolled them upon the enemy, and by a thunder-storm which was succeeded by snow and a supernatural degree of cold. The next day they were attacked in the rear by the Phocians, when Brennus with difficulty escaped, and effected a junction with Acichorius. A panic terror caused the Gauls to kill one another; and the Greeks, assembling from all sides, harassed them to such a degree that with difficulty they regained the Spercheius, when they were again so vigorously assailed by the Thessalians, that, if Pausanias is to be believed, not one returned from Greece.
Although there may be some superstitious exaggeration in the accounts which obtained credit in Greece of this defeat of the Gauls, none of the circumstances are incredible in a country so subject to earthquakes, and thunder-storms, and to sudden changes of temperature in the mountains. No place in Greece is more likely than Delphi to be the scene of such a conflict of the elements, or is better suited, by its local peculiarities to produce the effect upon ignorant strangers which Pausanias has described. When terror had once overpowered the minds of the invaders their destruction easily followed, exposed as they were to

§ 2.061   an enemy well acquainted with all the natural resources of the country, and ready to harass them in their retreat through some of the most difficult passes in Greece.
In the year 207 B.C., when Eastern Greece was the seat of war between Philip, king of Macedonia, son of Demetrius, and the Aetolians, who were then in alliance with the Romans, and with Attalus, king of Pergamus, the pass of Thermopylae was fortified by the Aetolians with a foss and dyke, which was soon afterwards taken by Philip. Sixteen years afterwards, Thermopylae was occupied by Antiochus, king of Syria, when at war with the Romans, who were then in alliance with Philip. Antiochus brought with him 10,000 infantry, 500 horse, and six elephants. The Aetolians were also opposed to the Romans, but afforded little assistance to Antiochus. The consul Acilius, commander of the Roman army, after laying waste the districts of Hypata and Heracleia, both which cities were then in the hands of the Aetolians, encamped in the pass near the fountains of hot water, over against the king, who had fortified his position with a wall, and a double ditch and rampart, and who, mindful of what had happened to the Lacedaemonians in former time as well as recently to Philip, had prevailed upon the

§ 2.062   Aetolians to occupy with 2000 men three castles upon the mountain named Tichius, Rhoduntia, and Callidromum; upon learning which the consul detached Flaccus his legate against Tichius and Rhoduntia, and Cato against Callidromum.
On the morning after the arrival of the Romans at Thermopylae, both parties drew out their forces. Those of Antiochus were in two lines in front of the rampart, a part of his light-armed occupying the heights above the hot sources. The Macedonian Sarissophori was in the centre: on the right, as far as the marshes, were the elephants with their guards, and behind them the cavalry. The remainder of the army formed a second line. The position, though we may suppose it to have been somewhat increased in breadth since the time of the Persian, and even of the Gallic invasion, by the gradual effect of the same causes which have at length left a considerable plain between the pass and the Spercheius, was too narrow for such an order of battle as that of Antiochus, against infantry which had now established its superiority over the phalanx. His line, therefore, was obliged to retreat behind the first rampart, and was defending the second with some advantage, when the troops of Cato, who had surprised the Aetolians in Callidromum, appeared on the summit of the heights above the pass, threatening the rear of the king’s position,

§ 2.063   and the destruction of his whole army. A precipitate retreat was the immediate consequence, which would have been still more disastrous to the Greeks than it proved, had not the narrowness of the pass rendered the advance of the Roman infantry difficult, and that of the cavalry impossible, in face of the elephants, which the Romans at length found it more easy to kill than to capture. The pursuit, however, was continued as far as Scarpheia; scarcely any more than 500, who formed the bodyguard of Antiochus, escaped to Chalcis, and the loss of the battle obliged Antiochus to retire into Asia.
There are still the remains of three Hellenic fortresses on the side of Mount Callidromus above Thermopylae: one of these is on the westernmost of the two rocky heights which include the ravine of the torrent of Anthele; the second is above it, near Dhamasta; the third occupies the summit described by me at 1.50, as lying on the right of the road, about half way from Thermopylae to Pundonitza. As the consul sent a single body of troops against Tichius and Rhoduntia, and another against Callidromum, it is natural to suppose that the two former were those not far distant from one another on the western side of the mountain, and I am disposed to believe that Tichius was the higher, as Appian gives the names of Tichius and Callidromum to two summits of the mountain. It will follow that Callidromum was the third fortress, the position of which accords with the circumstance of Cato, soon after he had taken Callidromum, having made his appearance on the hills

§ 2.064   threatening the rear of the king’s position, and consequently towards the eastern end of the pass. Had these fortresses existed at the time of the Persian or Gallic invasions, or even when Philip occupied Thermopylae against the Romans and Aetolians, they would probably have been brought into notice on those occasions. They would seem, therefore, to have been constructed during the sixteen years which elapsed between the last-mentioned period and the Antiochian campaign; probably by the Aetolians, who had then extended their dominion from the borders of Aetolia proper, to those of Locris. The want of such an addition to the natural defences of this entrance into the southern provinces of Greece, had then been repeatedly proved, and the road over the mountain had thrice frustrated the hopes of the defenders of Thermopylae, founded on the strength of the pass itself. The three fortresses were well placed for the object in view. Tichius defended the ascent of the mountain on the road by which Hydarnes crossed it. Rhoduntia protected the route by which the pass of the Phoenix may be turned through the ravine of Anthele, and Callidromum was equally well placed as a defence of the upper pass on the eastern side.
We are told by Procopius, that among other works which Justinian constructed for the defence of the empire, he restored the fortifications of Thermopylae, and of some neighbouring towns. Scarcely any illustration of topography, however, is to be

§ 2.065   obtained from the Byzantine historian, who had evidently no personal knowledge of the place, and whose inflated account exaggerates the power and performances of Justinian in the same degree as in his Secret History he studies to vilify his imperial master. The buildings of Justinian were probably of a very different composition from the solid constructions of the ancient Greeks, for while remains still exist, more or less considerable, of all the principal Hellenic cities round the Maliac Gulf, not a trace is to be found, as far as I can learn, either of the works which Justinian is said to have constructed at Thermopylae, Heracleia, and Hypata, or of the towns of Saccus, Unnus, Coracion, Baleae, or Leontarium, all which Procopius states to have been situated near Thermopylae.

§ 2.066   CHAPTER 11: LOCRIS, PHOCIS, DORIS.
Pundonitza, or Bundonitza, according to the vulgar enunciation of the initial P, is a bishopric of the province of Athens, under the name of Medhinitza, and the chief place of a Turkish district comprehending 30 villages. The town, which contains 115 Greek families and 50 Turkish, stands at the foot of a steep rock, occupied by a castle of the middle ages, in the walls of which are some portions of Hellenic masonry, showing that it was the acropolis of one of the towns of the Epicnemidii. The hill rises from an elevated plain, stretching along the foot of a ridge which connects the summits anciently named Callidromus and Cnemis.

§ 2.067   The latter mountain, which commences at the end of this plain and extends to that of Talanda, is woody and uncultivated, and is here generally known by the name of Karya, from the nearest village. Half-way towards it from Pundonitza the pass of Fondana leads over the ridge to Turkokhorio, or Essed, in the plain of the Cephissus, By this road I came to Pundonitza on my former visit.
The castle commands a fine view of the Maliac Golf, and of the Straits on either side of Euboea, together with a large portion of the northern part of that great island, particularly the peninsula Centeum, now called Lithadha. Beyond the straits, the gulf, and the plain of Zituni, is seen the whole range of Mount Othrys. A little to the right of the southern mouth of the Spercheius, that of a large torrent is a conspicuous object. It is formed from the ravines mentioned at 1.50 and 2.30, added to the water-courses round Pundonitza. Its ancient name is not, I believe, to be found in history. The Boagrius, which is a similar but much larger torrent, enters the sea two or three miles farther to the east. It collects all the waters from the elevated plain and adjacent mountains to the eastward of Pundonitza. If the relative situations of the two divisions of Eastern Locris were not perfectly clear, the modern name Pundonitza might mislead the geographer, and induce him to suppose that Opus was here situated, Pundonitza being formed apparently from one of the oblique cases of 'Οπους, by the omission of the

§ 2.068   initial o, which is a common Romaic corruption, and by the addition of the Greco-Illyric diminutive ιτζα. But the Epicnemidii were certainly interposed between Thermopylae and the Opontii; Pundonitza, therefore, can only be regarded as an instance among many in Greece of the preservation of an ancient name in a different site, arising probably from one of those colonizations or movements of the inhabitants, which appear in all ages to have been common in this country. Neopatra, or New Patra, is a neighbouring example, greatly resembling that of Little Opus, at Pundonitza.
The upper Epicnemedian plain, as that of Pundonitza may be called, in contradistinction to the maritime level which contained some other towns of the Epicnemidii, may be considered as a continuation of the upper region of Mount Callidromus, already so often mentioned, in which Dhamasta and Dhrakospilia are situated. All this elevated country, although unproductive compared with the rich Spercheian plain, is a most useful neighbour to it, by supplying the timber and fuel, in which the plains are deficient, and by affording a salubrious retreat from their pernicious exhalations in the summer. Callidromus in particular, which is well described by its name, consists entirely in its middle region, of a most agreeably diversified scene of pasture and corn land, intermixed with forests, rocks, and streams; and commanding by its elevation a variety of prospects of the most sublime and interesting character. The whole district of Melis, in short, is a complete example of the great variety and resources of the climate and soil of Greece.

§ 2.069   Nov. 29.—At a mile to the south of Pundonitza, we leave to the right a road to Dhrakospilia, which follows the foot of the steep ridge, connecting Callidromus with Cnemis, and enter a narrow rocky opening in it, between two summits, of which that on the left is very lofty, and clothed with large fir-trees. The pass is a mile in length. In eight minutes beyond its extremity, mounting a rising ground, we suddenly open a magnificent view of the great mountains of Phocis, Boeotia, and Attica, from the western end of Parnassus as far as Mount Parnes, together with a great part of the lower country within these barriers. Below us extends the great valley of Doris and Phocis, contained between the Oetaean and the Parnassian ranges; and immediately opposite is the town of Dhadhi, or Dhadhia, on the side of Parnassus, considerably increased since I was there between three and four years ago. I recognize also the other places on the opposite side of the valley, which I then visited, namely, the villages of Velitza and Suvala, on the side of Mount Parnassus,—higher in that mountain Aguriani, in the road which leads across it to Delphi,— at its foot the sources of the Cephissus, called Kefalovryses,—the ruins at Paleokastro, and the pass and khan of Gravia, by which we proceeded to Salona. The plain to the westward surrounded by Callidromus, Oeta, and Parnassus, and watered by several streams, which unite and fall into the Cephissus, is well seen also from these hills.

§ 2.070   The position of the several objects, particularly that of the mountains, perfectly illustrates Strabo, and proves that the farther part of this great valley towards the west is a part of the ancient Doris; the ruins, therefore, which we then saw near Mandates and at Gravia, are those of two of the Dorian towns named by the geographer. It may be remarked also from hence, that the territory of Dhadhi forms a natural separation between the Dorian and the Phocian valley of the Cephissus; for here the hills on either side approaching, leave only a narrow passage for the river. The root of Parnassus, which forms the north-western point of the strait, meets the Cephissus about two miles to the north-west of Dhadhi, where the road from Zituni passes the river by a bridge near some mills.
To the westward of this point are some copious springs at the foot of the hills, which form a marshy space for a quarter of a mile, and then join the river. These springs are usually called the μεγάλαις βρύσεις, or great sources; but though they bear this name from their forming a large marsh or inundation around them in winter, they are not so permanent or so considerable in summer as the other great sources three miles farther to the south-west at the foot of Parnassus, and which show by their name, κιφαλοβρύσίις, that they are now considered the fountain-head of the Cephissus. Near the Megales Vryses, to the south-west, begins a long slope, similar to that of Dhadhi, at the head of which is Suvala, where in my former tour I remarked ancient foundations, which probably mark the site of Charadra.

§ 2.071   The foot of the mountain afterwards takes a turn, for a short distance, to the northward to the Kefalo-vryses, which issue from under a platform supported by the remains of an ancient wall near a large ruined church. The course of the Cephisus is north-easterly from the sources to the extremity of the slope of Dhadhi, which it surrounds; it then gradually assumes the south-easterly course, which it follows to the Stena, leading into the plain of Chaeroneia. A little to the right of the Kefalo-vryses is seen the ravine of a torrent generally dry, which descends from Aguriani. On its left bank, on the edge of the plain, are the ruins called Paleokastro, one of the best preserved of Hellenic fortresses, and which a variety of authorities from Homer to Pausanias show to have been Lilaea, by their testimony that the sources of the Cephissus were at that town; the nearest point of these remains is in fact less than half a mile from the Kefalovryses.

§ 2.072   To the right of Paleokastro occur the lower heights of Parnassus, much intersected with torrents running into the branch of the Cephissus, called the Kaienitza, or river of Gravia. In a recess at the foot of Parnassus, from which one of these tributaries of the Kaenitza proceeds, and about midway between Paleokastro and Gravia are the ruins of an ancient town at the village of Mariolates. The Kaienitza, which had no water in it when I passed along its bank in the month of July, but is now a stream of some magnitude, flows parallel to and at a small distance from the foot of Parnassus, until near the Megales Vryses it unites with another and larger stream called Apostolia, and then joins the Cephissus. The Apostolia rises in Mount Oeta, enters the plain towards its north-western corner, and crosses it obliquely. On, or not far from its left bank, is Kardhiki, situated on the right of the road from Zituni to Salona, in a forest of oaks, which not only covers that side of Mount Callidromus, but extends over all the neighbouring part of the plain. Below the forest the plain is well cultivated.
On the Apostolia, above Kardhiki, is Pavliani, and on this side of the road from Zituni to Salona, on the slope of the mountain, are Bralos, Paleo-khori,

§ 2.073   Kamares, Glunista, and then Ternitza, to which latter village I descend in forty minutes, and then proceed to the ruins of a Hellenic fortress, situated about midway between Kamares and Glunista, which I observed from Dhadhi on my former visit. It is distant forty minutes from Ternitza, and occupied a rocky point of the mountain on the edge of the plain. Some of the towers remain nearly entire. The masonry is generally of the third order, but contains some pieces of the polygonal kind; the space enclosed is a triangle, of which none of the sides is more than 250 yards. At the summit is a circular acropolis of about two acres, preserving the remains of an opening into the town. These are probably the ruins of Drymus or Drymaea, where Pausanias noticed an ancient temple of Ceres, containing an upright statue of the goddess in stone, and in whose honour a festival was celebrated named the Thesmophoria.
From the Paleokastro, I proceed, in thirty-five minutes, directly across the plain to the bridge near the mills already mentioned. This space is one continued corn-field, with an excellent soil. It is not yet ploughed for sowing. From the bridge we ascend, in forty minutes, to Dhadhi. At a third of the distance is the Kalyvia of Dhadhi, consisting of upwards of one hundred huts for the use of the labourers and cattle of the Dhadhiotes. The space between Dhadhi and the river is a triangular slope, of which the village forms the vertex: at the river side or base the triangle is about three miles long; to the eastward it is bounded by a ridge which descends from Parnassus and forms a projection at the river;

§ 2.074   and on the third side the triangle terminates in the point near the mills. Dhadhi, which is in the district of Livadhia, now contains five hundred families, having been much increased by emigrants flying from Turkish extortions in districts less protected at Constantinople than Livadhia has the good fortune to be, from its being a Vakuf of Mecca. It will probably not be long, however, before Dhadhi and Livadhia itself will suffer from the encroachment of Aly Pasha. Two handsome churches and a school have lately been built, and there is a large monastery of the Panaghia on the side of the mountain above the town. The houses are generally upon the same plan, consisting of two small rooms and a gallery in front of them. The galleries, for the most part, face the south-east, so that the gable ends of the houses, in which there is generally one small window, look down the elope. The people appear industrious and civil. The lands on the declivity below the village, although stony, yield a tolerable return in wheat and barley. In the valley below, where the soil is excellent, the return is eight to one, and would undoubtedly be much greater with a better mode of agriculture. The cotton-grounds which are below the narrow part of the valley, consume all the water of the Cephissus in summer, and leave it dry as far as the junction of the Mavronero in the plain below Daulis.

§ 2.075   A height which rises from the western side of the village of Dhadhi and is named the Paleokastro, from some remains of Hellenic walls encircling the summit, was evidently the acropolis of a town which occupied the side of the same rocky height, as far as the edge of the cultivated slope of Dhadhi. An inscription in a church on the summit of the hill shows this city to have been Amphicleia: a fact very useful in arranging the τοποθεσία of the Phocian towns Amphicleia, indeed, is not named in the inscription; but as the monument was erected in the sacred inclosure of Bacchus, in honour of one of his high-priests, and as Amphicleia was noted for the worship and orgies of that deity, there can be little doubt of the identity; especially as Pausanias has not described any other town of this valley as having contained a temple of Bacchus. The orgies were celebrated in a secret cell, into which Pausanias was not permitted to enter. The inscription appears to be nearly of his time, for the titles of the priest are exactly referrible to the political state in which he found Greece. Marcus Ulpius Damasippus, therefore, in whose honour the monument was raised, was one of those priests who enounced the oracles of Bacchus when under the influence of the Great God, as he is termed in the inscription, and who interpreted the dreams of suppliants for the cure of their diseases. The monument was erected by Quintilia Plutarcha, the wife of Damasippus, by authority of the council and people.

§ 2.076   A papas of Dhadhi, who has succeeded to the influence of the high-priest of Bacchus in this place, and who has lately purchased a part of the fertile valley on the banks of the Cephissus, near the bridge, points out to me from the church in the Paleokastro the remains of another Hellenic ruin on the left bank of a deeply incased rema, at a tjiftlik called Mulki, immediately below the ruined mosque and village of Verzana, which is said to have been formerly the chief town of this district.

§ 2.077   Nov. 30.—Quitting Dhadhi at 9.30 for Velitza, we continue to follow the foot of the great summits of Parnassus nearly on the same level with Dhadhi; the Cephissus remaining at a distance of two or three miles to the left. Having arrived at 9.52 at an opening between the acclivities of Parnassus, where the ridge of Dhadhi terminates to the eastward, we begin to descend, though still having the steep sides of the upper heights of Parnassus close on the right. At 10.15 a road to the left conducts to Turkokhorio and Talanda, and on the opposite side of the Cephissus is seen the village of Modhi, on the side of Mount Fondana, which, except around that village, is uncultivated and covered with shrubs. Towards Velitza, where we arrive at 11.15, the Parnassian slope also becomes very stony and uncultivated: this village, which contains sixty or seventy families, is situated exactly at the foot of the great heights of the mountain, where a torrent, issuing from them, flows in a broad gravelly bed at the foot of precipices which defend the eastern side of Velitza. A gentle slope about four miles in length falls from the village to the Cephissus. The higher lands produce wheat and barley, the lower cotton and maize, which are watered by derivations from the torrent.
Velitza occupies the exact site of an ancient polis, the ruined walls of which inclose the modern houses to the west and south, and are continued on the former side so as to include also a triangular space of nearly the same superficial extent as the village, on the face of a rocky peak which overhangs it, and immediately above which rises one of the highest of the snowy summits of Parnassus. On some parts of the height the walls occupy situations to which it would be difficult to climb. Along the edge of the cliffs on the eastern side of the acropolis and modern village no walls are traceable.

§ 2.078   Some of the towers are extant to more than half their original height, with masonry in regular courses about eighteen inches high. The material is the same as that of the rocky peak behind the village, giving, together with that peak, a white appearance to the place at a distance, which probably suggested the modern name. The church of Velitza is large and ancient, in the form of a Greek cross, with a dome in the middle; among many spoils of Hellenic buildings in the walls and pavement, is an inscribed stone of a concave form, inserted in the usual semi-circular recess behind the altar, from which we learn that the ruins are those of Tithorea. The torrent was named Cachales, according to Pausanias, whose remark, that the inhabitants descended to it for the purpose of obtaining water, accords with the height of the village above the torrent. The town had declined for a generation before the time of the Greek traveller, who noticed, however, a theatre, the inclosure of an ancient agora, an alsos and temple of Minerva containing a statue of the goddess, and a monument in memory of Phocus and his wife Antiope.

§ 2.079   In the time of Herodotus, Tithorea was known by the name of Neon; it was one of the towns occupied by the Persians in their progress through Phocis, after they had forced the defile of Thermopylae, when many of the Phocians took refuge in Amphissa, and others in the highest parts of Parnassus, particularly on Mount Tithorea, near Neon, because it was spacious, and capable of containing great numbers of them. As this description is scarcely applicable to the peak immediately above Velitza, which is not very spacious, was included within the walls of Tithorea, and could hardly have been excluded from those of Neon, unless that city occupied a much lower site, it might be supposed that the Mount Tithorea of Herodotus was the great summit of Parnassus above the peak of Velitza, which seems the more likely, as Pausanias affirms that Tithorea was the name anciently applied to the district, and that it was not until the population of the neighbouring villages was collected within the city which subsisted until his time that the name of Tithorea was given to it. Plutarch, however, in the life of Sylla, favours the opposite opinion. He relates, that when Hortensius marched from Thessaly to effect a junction with Sylla on the frontiers of Phocis and Boeotia, Caphis a Phocian led him round through

§ 2.080  Parnassus for the purpose of avoiding Thermopylae, which was in the hands of the army of Mithradates, and that on this occasion the circuitous route issued below Tithorea :—“a place,” adds Plutarch, “not such as the present city, but only a fortress upon a precipitous rock, where the Phocians of old took refuge from Xerxes.” Whence it is evident that he supposed the peak of Velitza to have been the Mount Tithorea of Herodotus. However this may have been, we learn at least from the same passage of the biographer, that the city destroyed by the Persians was not yet revived in the Mithradatic war, and as Greece was in the lowest state of misery between that time and the beginning of the Roman Empire, it was not probably until the latter period that the Tithorea was built, which Plutarch, Pausanias, and the inscription of Velitza, demonstrate to have existed in the time of Nerva and the Antonines. The extant walls, by the regularity of their masonry, exactly accord with that degree of antiquity.
If the numbers of Pausanias are correct, the district of Tithore was extensive, for he describes a sacred adytum of Isis belonging to it distant forty stades, and a temple of Aesculapius Archagetes at a distance of seventy stades. At the former there was a festival twice a year, and a fair for the sale of slaves and cattle. Some of the sacred rites were borrowed from the Egyptians. At the Asclepieium there were habitations for the servants and suppliants of Aesculapius, and a temple which contained a bearded statue of the god in stone. Pausanias has not left us any means of judging of the direction of either of these places from the city of Tithorea.

§ 2.081   The district in his time was celebrated for the excellence of its olive oil.
Tithorea is one of those situations abounding in Greece, which were so well adapted to influence the manners and character of the people, and to produce the picturesque and poetical in every thing relating to them. The distant prospect in the northern and eastern quarters of the horizon is no less beautiful than the nearer view of the great summits of Parnassus appearing through the rocky ravine of the Cachales, and which being now covered with snow, add a brilliant contrast to the woody precipices of the mountain. The modern houses interspersed with gardens, and the ruined walls of the ancient city, complete the embellishments of this interesting scene. There is no road in common use from Velitza across the mountain, either to Arakhova or Kastri, and the inhabitants penetrate no farther than a woody slope at a small distance, where they cut fire wood. In the time of Pausanias there were two roads from Tithorea across the mountain to Delphi, one direct, the other longer, but practicable to wheel carriages. The two routes probably coincided as far as the extremity of the ravine of the Cachales, after which the carriage road may have crossed the plain anciently belonging to Lycoreia, and now to Arakhova, and below the latter may have joined the road to Delphi from the Schiste, thus diverging to the left of the direct

§ 2.082   route from Tithorea, which probably joined that from Lilaea, just above the Delphic cliffs, where remains of the ancient way still exist. It is not impossible that the carriage road might still be traced by the marks of the wheels in the rocks.
The Proestos of Velitza, an old man whom I find winding cotton in his gallery, shows me, on the opposite side of the Cephissian valley, the small village of Lefta, which he has often visited, and out of respect to its Hellenic remains calls Leftopoli. It lies a little to the right of the pass of Fondana, on the modern route from Pundonitza to Turkokhorio, the position of which may be recognized at a great distance by a remarkable rocky peak, near one of the highest summits of the ridges of Cnemis.
Meletius reports the following inscription as existing at Lefta in his time: Αυτοκράτορα Καισαρα Μάρκον Αυρήλιον Ευσεβή Σεβαστόν Mεyιστόν, η Βουλή και ο Δήμος Έλατέων.
This inscription, therefore, as well as the modern name, leave not a doubt of Lefta having been the site of Elateia, and the fact is confirmed by every mention of it in ancient history. Lefta, like Velitza, stands at the head of a long slope reaching to the river, from which it is a mile more distant than Velitza. Placed about the middle of the great fertile basin which extends near twenty miles from the narrows of the Cephissus below Amphicleia, to those which are at the entrance into Boeotia, it was admirably situated for commanding the passes leading into Southern Greece from the Transoetaean provinces.

§ 2.083   Hence it may have been, that Elateia, which was unknown to Homer, became, under a different state of society and general politics, the greatest city in Phocis, and about the time when Greece was threatened with subjection to Macedonia, was more important than Delphi itself. Elateia was then the key of Southern Greece, as Demosthenes and Machines show, as well as the consternation of the Athenians, when Philip seized the place, not long before the battle of Chaeroneia.
A little below Lefta stands the large village of Dhragomano, or Tragomano, to the left of which is seen Essed, or Turkokhorio, not far from the river side. Near the road from Velitza to Turkokhorio, on the right bank of the Cephissus, are the vestiges of a Hellenic town.

§ 2.084   The ruins are now called Palea Fiva. Meletius writes the name Παλαιαι θηβαι, but Φήβα is the vulgar pronunciation in this part of the country.
Having now visited either in this or my former journey, the principal ancient positions in the valleys of the Upper Cephissus and its branches, and having ascertained the situation of some which I have not visited, I shall endeavour to apply the ancient names to the several sites which still bear evidences of antiquity, taking for granted from what has already been stated, that those of Amphicleia, Tithorea, and Elateia, are indisputably determined. It seems almost equally certain, that the Paleokastro or Hellenic ruins, half a mile westward of the Kefalovrises, or sources of the Cephissus, which I visited on my former journey, having crossed thither from Delphi by Aguriani, are the remains of Lilaea; that route being the most direct and easy passage across the mountain, could not have been any other than the road alluded to by Pausanias, when he says that the distance from Delphi to Lilaea was 180 stades, with which our time distance of six hours and a half sufficiently accorded. As to the remark of Pausanias, that the source of the Cephissus very often issues from the earth, especially towards noon, with a noise resembling the roaring of a bull, I was not surprised to find that the present natives had never made any such observation at Kefalovrises, though they admit that the water

§ 2.085   often rises suddenly from the ground in larger quantities than usual, which cannot but be accompanied with some noise. The Megales Vrises, on the other hand, do not intermit, and are surrounded with marshy ground.
I am thus particular in showing that the ruins at Paleokastro are those of Lilaea, because the description which Pausanias has given of Charadra, as situated on a lofty rock, agrees in this particular with the ruins. But there are some insurmountable objections to the site being that of Charadra. Upon an examination of them, it is found that all the principal part of the city stood in the plain at the foot of the rocks, that the precipitous part was the citadel only, that the whole was a much larger place than one can imagine Charadra to have been; and that exactly at the Kefalovrises, where we should in that case be inclined to look for Lilaea, there are no remains except those of a single building, probably a temple, which may have been sacred to the river-god himself, as Pausanias states, that sacred rites in honour of Cephissus were celebrated at the sources of the river. When to these considerations is

§ 2.086   added the testimony of the same ancient traveller that the Charadraei suffered from a want of water, whereas there are some abundant springs close to the ancient walls at Paleokastro, with the Kefalovrises at a very short distance; and when it is further remarked that Pausanias describes the torrent of Charadra as being three stades distant from the town, whereas that of Paleokastro is close to the ruined walls, we can have no hesitation in rejecting the opinion that Paleokastro was Charadra, and cannot but conclude that it was Lilaea.
It then becomes a question whether Charadra, which Pausanias places at twenty stades beyond Lilaea, coming from Delphi, stood at Suvala to the eastward, or at Mariolates to the westward of Paleokastro, at both which places there are remains of a small fortified town. Two reasons support the former opinion: 1. The distance of twenty stades is nearly that of Suvala from Paleokastro, whereas Mariolates is more distant; and 2. The torrent at the latter does not join the Cephissus, but is a branch of the river of Gravia, which itself joins the Apostolia before the latter is united with the Cephissus.
Placing Amphicleia at Dhadhi, there can hardly remain a doubt that the ruins opposite to it at Mulki, below Verzana, where a torrent unites with

§ 2.087   the Cephissus, are those of Tithronium; for Pausanias describes that place as being in the plain, (meaning the valley,) fifteen stades beyond Amphicleia—that is to say beyond Amphicleia, according to the direction which he had been pursuing from Delphi by Lilaea; and the distance of those ruins from Dhadhi, although I think underrated at fifteen stades, is not far from the truth. The ruins near Klunista, which I visited from Ternitza, accord equally with those of Drymaea, those ruins being about twenty stades from the former, which is the distance stated by the ancient traveller between Tithronium and Drymaea, though in this instance also the interval assigned by Pausanias appears to me to be below the reality. The three places were so situated that we may easily

§ 2.088   imagine Pausanias to have been correct in his subsequent remark, that the road from Amphicleia to Drymaea joined that from Tithronium to Drymaea near the Cephissus; since it might be more convenient to follow the river from Tithronium to Drymaea, than to make a more direct course over the heights. As Pausanias adds that, at the junction of the roads, there was a grove containing altars and a temple of Apollo without a statue, within the limits of the Tithronenses; and that the turning to the left led to Drymaea, it seems evident that the grove of Apollo stood on the left bank of the Cephissus, and that the direct road from Amphicleia crossed the Cephissus near the temple, where a turning to the right led to Tithronium and on the left to Drymaea.
The words of Pausanias, therefore, so perfectly accord, in their general purport, with the three positions of Dhadhi, and the two ancient sites below Verzana and Ternitza, that we may be assured of the identity of the two latter with Tithronium and Drymaea respectively, although the number of stades stated in the text of the ancient traveller may not be correct. The error, indeed, in the word eighty, which he assigns as the number of stades between Amphicleia and Drymaea, is self-evident, if the two other distances, which amount only to thirty-five stades, are correct.
As Pausanias has not noticed any of the places, of which remains are still found in or around the valley lying westward of the sites of Drymaea and Lilaea, it may be inferred that no part of that valley

§ 2.089   belonged, at least in his time, to the Phocic community, but was all included in Doris, the position of which district on this frontier of Phocis is clearly shown by Lilaea, Drymaea and Tithronium having been sometimes attributed to Doris. Herodotus describes Doris as lying between Trachinia and Phocis, and as occupying a breadth of only thirty stades. The Persians marched through it from Trachinia, but spared it because the Dorians had joined them, after which “following the Cephissus, they destroyed everything; and burnt the cities Drymus, Charadra, Erochus, Tethronium, Amphicaea, Neon, the cities of the Pedieis, and Tritaeeis, Elateia, Hyampolis, Parapotamii, and Abae.” Erochus and Tritaea not being even named by Pausanias, their site was perhaps unknown in his time, and it is a mere conjecture, deduced from the order of the enumeration of Herodotus, and the general distribution of the other ancient sites, that I have placed those names on the map. The city of the Pedienses we might presume, from the same indication added to that of the name, to have stood near the Cephissus, in some part of the plain between Tithorea and Elateia. It is precisely in this situation, that the ruins at Palea Fiva are found. As Herodotus has not named Ledon, it is not improbable that the city of the Pedienses may be the same place as Ledon, which, in the time of Pausanias

§ 2.090   had been abandoned, and the name transferred to a few habitations on the river’s bank, forty stades below the former position.
Lilaea not being comprehended by Herodotus among the towns which were destroyed by the Persians, would seem at that time to have belonged to the Dorienses, who, having medized, were spared by the invaders. Whence, probably, some later authors have ascribed it to Doris, though in general it was considered a Phocic city. But it was evidently, therefore, on the frontier, and the ruins, consequently, at Mariolates and Gravia are certainly those of two of the Dorian towns. The breadth of thirty stades, which Herodotus assigns to Doris, agrees nearly with the extent of the valley of the Apostolia from the foot of Mount Parnassus, where Mariolates and Gravia are situated, to that of Mount Oeta, where the road from Zituni to Salona, after crossing that mountain by the pass of Nevropoli, enters the valley of the Apostolia. It cannot be doubted, therefore, that all this valley was a part of Doris. From Strabo, likewise, notwithstanding the imperfection of his text, the extent and position of Doris may be understood, and even some details of its topography. He observes that the Western Locris was separated from the Eastern by Mount Parnassus, which extended northward from the neighbourhood of Delphi to the junction of the Oetaean with the Aetolian mountains, and to the Dorians which lay between them;—that Phocis was

§ 2.091   thus conterminous with both divisions of Locris,— that on the western side of Parnassus dwelt the Locri Ozolae, some of the Dorians and the Aetolians of Mount Corax, and on the eastern side of the same mountain the Phocians and the Dorians of Tetrapolis, who formed the larger portion of that nation, and who extended from Parnassus towards the east. The latter passage of the Geographer explains those authorities which ascribe to Doris a greater number of towns than four, and shows exactly the position both of the Tetrapolis and of the remaining portion of Doris. The latter, which lay between the Locri Ozolae and Mount Corax, comprehended the mountains on the right, or western side, of the pass leading from Gravia to Salona. The towns of this portion of Doris would seem to have been Amphanae and Metropolis, for Stephanus describes these as places in Doris. According to Strabo, the four towns of the Tetrapolis, were Erineus, Boeum, Pindus and Cytinium, some of which names are confirmed by several other authors.

§ 2.092   He adds, that Pindus stood above Erineus, that it was sometimes called Acyphas, and that a river of the same name as the town, flowed by the walls, and joined the Cephissus near Lilaea. It is evident, upon comparing this passage with my former remark, as to the junction of the river now called Apostolia with the Cephissus, not far below the sources of the latter, that the Apostolia was the ancient Acyphas or Pindus, and consequently, that upon its banks we should search for Erineus and Pindus. Of these the latter, as well from its name, which is a word belonging to a lofty situation, as from a remark of Strabo, that the town of Acyphas was considered to belong to the Oetaean cantons, was probably towards the sources of the river in the mountain, which is connected northward with the Patriotiko or Oeta proper; and which to the south gives rise to the river Mornos, which joins the sea near 'Epakto. The other two towns of the Tetrapolis were in the situations already noticed, at Mariolates and at Gravia.
Of these, there can be little doubt that Gravia was the ancient Cytinium, Thucydides having described the position of Cytinium in a manner not to be mistaken, in his account of the expedition of Demosthenes from Naupactus, in the sixth year of the Peloponnesian war; when Demosthenes intended, if he had been successful over the Aetolians, to have then passed through the Locri Ozolae, leaving Parnassus on his right, to Cytinium of Doris, and from thence to descend into Phocis,

§ 2.093   the people of which were to have assisted him against Boeotia.
Gravia stands exactly at the northern entrance of the pass leading from the valley of Doris to the plain of Amphissa, in the middle of the isthmus included between the Maliac and Crissaean gulfs. The defile is formed by the ravines of two torrents flowing in opposite directions; namely, that of Gravia, which, as I have already remarked, joins the Apostolia near the union of the latter with the Cephissus, and that of another stream which crosses the plain of Amphissa into the Crissaean Bay: the two ravines form a complete separation of the highlands of this part of Greece, dividing Parnassus from the mountains which are connected with the Aetolian and Oetaean summits, and which thus exactly correspond to the country of the άνα μέσον Δωραίς, or intermediate Dorians of Strabo.
It is obvious that a fortified town at the entrance of such a defile, was of great military importance, and of this we find two examples in history, besides that which has already been alluded to. Soon after that unsuccessful expedition of Demosthenes against Aetolia, Eurylochus, at the head of 2500 Spartans and 500 Heracliotae, prepared to march from Delphi through the western Locris to assist the Aetolians against Naupactus, and made choice on this occasion of Cytinium, as the place in which he secured the hostages whom he had received from the Locrians. But the most remarkable instance is, the occupation of Cytinium by Philip of Macedonia, when he took possession also of Elateia, not long before the battle of Chaeroneia.

§ 2.094   It was on hearing that the Athenians had decreed to support the resistance of the Amphissienses to the Amphictyonic council, that Philip took this step, of which the object and consequence were, the capture of Amphissa, the approach to that place from the northward having been completely commanded by Cytinium. If Cytinium was at Gravia, it will follow that the ruins near Mariolates are those of Boeum.
Herodotus relates that Doris was anciently named Dryopis, but in later times they were distinguished, and Dryopis like Doris was a tetrapolis. In the time of Strabo it was comprehended as well as the Parasopias, and a town named Oiniadae, in the Oetaea, which even included Acyphas of Doris to the S.W., and Anticyra of Melis to the N.E. It is evident, from these testimonies regarding Dryopis, together with another fact stated by Strabo, namely, that Tymphrestus, at the sources of the Spercheius, now Velukhi, was a Dryopic mountain, that Dryopis occupied the mountainous country extending from the head of the valley of the Apostolia towards Mount Velukhi and Karpenisi.
At 12.55 we quit Velitza, and continue to follow the foot of the great steeps of Parnassus at the head of a long slope, stony and quite uncultivated, which descends from our road to the river,

§ 2.095   until at 1.32, having a monastery of the Panaghia half an hour on the right, on the side of the mountain, we turn to the left of the upper road leading to the Zimeno pass, and descend towards the Stena (τα Στενα), as the narrow valley is now called, through which the Cephissus enters the Boeotian plains. Having passed the Dhrakoplymata, as two large natural basins in the ground are called, one of which is 150 yards in diameter, forming a perfect circle with a very regular hollow within, we leave, a quarter of an hour farther, the village of Aghia Marina a little on the right, and descend exactly in the direction of the peaked summit of Mount Khlomo, seen between the lower heights of Parnassus, and an insulated rocky hill which here terminates the upper or Phocian valley of the Cephissus. This hill, which stands exactly on the foot of the great slope of Parnassus, is very steep on every side except the south-east, where it throws out a low termination, between which and another low height quite insulated, there is a narrow plain. At the foot of the latter height, to the south, stands a village called Krevasara, and along its eastern side flows the Cephissus, beyond which is another small insulated height near the foot of a rocky mountain, which rises from thence and takes a north-eastern direction towards Talanda. The approaches, therefore, to the straits leading into Boeotia from the plain of Elateia, are on either side of the hill of Krevasara.

§ 2.096   To the left of the Cephissus are the small villages of Sfaka, Merali, Khubavo, and Belissi vulgarly called Belish. Sfaka and Khubavo are on opposite sides of the extremity of the mountain just mentioned; Merali stands on a small insulated height between them, and Belissi is opposite to Khubavo, at the foot of a mountain similar and parallel to the former, and separated from it by a valley a mile in width. Between Merali and Khubavo, the river Kineta issues from a small lake which extends northward round the extreme point of the mountain as far as Sfaka, and having received a torrent which rises in Mount Khlomo, joins the Cephissus, near the khan of the Kady which I visited in my former journey, and which stands on the right bank of the latter river, two miles below Krevasara, where is a bridge over the river in the narrowest part of the Stena or Straits. Though the lake which feeds the Kineta is supplied from subterraneous springs, these are not always sufficient to afford a running stream in summer. At 2.23 we arrive at Bissikeni, vulgarly Bishken, which stands in a narrow plain between the heights of Parnassus and the larger and more western of the two insulated rocky heights before mentioned. The proestos and inhabitants know of no ancient remains in this vicinity, except at a height on the left bank of the Kineta, and a tower at the southeastern extremity of the heights in proceeding from Bissikeni to the bridge near the Kadi’s Khan.

§ 2.097   The latter is described by the proestos as a μαστορικόν πραγμα, meaning such as modern masons construct, but the remains near Belissi, he states to be of large wrought masses of stone. Their position in the Stena seems to correspond exactly with that of Parapotamii as indicated by Theopompus, who, in a passage preserved by Strabo, states that Parapotamii stood at a distance of forty stades from Chaeroneia in the entrance from Boeotia into Phocis on a height of moderate elevation, situated between Parnassus and Mount Edylium,—that these two mountains were separated from each other by an interval of five stades, through which the Cephissus flowed; and that Mount Edylium extended from thence sixty stades as far as Hyphanteium, on which Orchomenus was built.

§ 2.098   Having remained half an hour at Bissikeni, we proceed, in one hour precisely, to Dhavlia. The road follows an opening which separates the higher Parnassian ridges from the advanced mountain which forms the western side of the Stena of the Cephissus. The pass is a narrow valley, cultivated only in the parts towards Dhavlia. The road is much shorter than by the Stena, and in winter has the further advantage of avoiding the marshy or muddy valley near that river. It is probably the route by which Hortensius eluded the enemy in the Elatic Plain, and effected a junction with Sylla at Patronis. The issue of the pass is at the upper extremity of a vale branching from the plain of Chaeroneia, and terminating at the foot of the great summits of Parnassus. Many streams water this valley, turn several mills, and then uniting take a northerly course, close to the foot of the heights by the village Khasnesi, below which the stream enters the plain and joins the Mavronero or Mavroneri, a copious perennial stream, which issues from the foot of the same mountain a mile beyond Khasnesi. On the southern face of the height which bounds the vale to the south, stands the village of Dhavlia, separated by a hollow from another height, on which are some remains of the acropolis of the ancient Daulis. The name had assumed the form Δαυλεία as early as the time of Strabo, but is now by the vulgar more commonly accented on the last syllable, Dhavlia. The modern village belongs to Hassan Bey of Livadhia, now residing in Egripo, and whose father was pasha of the latter place. It contains forty houses. The inhabitants cultivate vineyards in the upper valleys and on the sides of the hills, and corn in the plain below, and exercise the trade of agoyates with their mules.

§ 2.099   Dec. 1.—The vale between Dhavlia and the site of the ancient Daulis is covered with vineyards, and refreshed by many springs and rivulets, which, in the plain below, join a branch of the Cephissus called Platania, which receives all the torrents from the adjacent slopes of Parnassus, Cirphis and Helicon, and has its extreme sources at Dhistomo, but is nevertheless dry in summer. The Platania unites with the Mavroneri very near the junction of the latter with the Cephissus. It is to the Mavroneri that the Cephissus owes its water in summer, for I found it dry in July above the junction of the Mavroneri, even as high up as a little below Dhadhi, where its waters were consumed by the plantations of cotton and kalambokki, whereas it contained water below the junction of the Mavroneri, and even as far as Skripu. Hence, below the junction, the Cephissus is now called Mavroneri or Mavronero, and above it the river of Dhadhi, or simply το ποτάμι. Below the Kineta, which it receives in the narrowest part of the Stena, it turns to the eastward, and continues, all the way to Orchomenus, to flow at a small distance from the foot of the mountain which extends from the Stena to Skripu in a high stony ridge, subdivided into two nearly equal parts by a small branch of the river. This mountain, the same which I before described as parallel to that of Khubavo, and which Theopompus so clearly indicates under the name of Edylium, was sometimes called Acontium in its whole extent, for Strabo remarks that Mount Acontium extended from Orchomenus to Parapotamii, and attributes to it the same length as Theopompus. Properly, however, it would seem that Hyphanteium was the eastern extremity of the ridge, Acontium its highest point, and Edylium the division of it westward of the small branch of the Cephissus above mentioned; for Plutarch mentions a place called Assia as situated between Edylium and Acontium.

§ 2.100   The entire circuit of the walls of the acropolis of Daulis, which seems to have been nearly circular, and formed of masonry almost regular, may be traced on the summit of the height which rises opposite to the modern village to the south. Within the inclosure, is an old church of St. Theodore, containing a marble inscribed with small and very ancient characters, so nearly obliterated that I have not attempted to copy them; there is also an inscription of names on a block of variegated marble. Three or four years ago, in the vineyards at the foot of the height on the north, a more interesting monument was found, which having been conveyed to Dhavlia, now stands before the door of the church. It is a quadrangular stele, four feet six inches long, one foot three inches broad, and ten inches thick, adorned only with a simple moulding at the top.

§ 2.101   One of the broad sides is inscribed with forty-seven lines, and one of the narrow sides with forty-nine lines. The monument records an arbitration concerning the property and boundaries of certain lands in the district of Daulis, made at Chaeroneia on the 24th of October, in the year of our era 118. The following is a translation of the inscription on the broad dimension of the stone.
“With good fortune to the consuls, the emperor Trajan Adrian Caesar Augustus, the second time, and Cneius Pedanius Fuscus Salinator, on the 9th of the Calends of November, in Chaeroneia. Zopyrus, son of Aristion, and Parmenon, son of Zopyrus, acting on behalf of the city of Daulis, have witnessed the following as a faithful copy of the underwritten decision of Titus Flavius Eubulus: I, T. F. Eubulus, having been appointed judge and arbiter by the proconsul Caesius Maximus, and having acted under the inspection of the proconsul Valerius Severus, between Zopyrus son of Aristion and Parmenon son of Zopyrus and Memmius Antiochus, concerning the land in dispute, have, after hearing each side as long as they wished, and after an actual inspection of the place, and upon receiving an order from the excellent proconsul Clodius Granianus to declare my decision, adjudge as is underwritten.

§ 2.102   Four hundred and thirty-five Phocic plethra of the land called Dryppius, which appear from the writings exhibited to me to have been purchased by Memmius Antiochus from the heirs of Cleon, belong to Antiochus; whatever exceeds this quantity (in Dryppius) is the property of the city of the Daulienses. In like manner, in the land Euxyleia four hundred and thirty plethra I judge to belong to Antiochus, and the remainder to the city. The beginning of the measurements in the lands Dryppius and Euxyleia shall be commenced wherever Antiochus may think proper; but in Platanus and Moschotomeae the measure for both parties shall begin in the same place, and from thence the remainder of the measurement shall proceed; and in all these measurements no account shall be taken of torrents or rugged places, or such as cannot be cultivated if they exceed the dimensions of ten sphyrae. The following persons were present: I, Titus Flavius Eubulus, have declared my determination and affixed my seal. Lucius Mestrius Soclarus; Cleomenes, son of Cleomenes; Neicon, son of Symphorus; Lamprias, son of Neicon; Zopyrus, son of Antipatrus; Sosibius, son of Dracon; Neicon, son of Alexandras; Leon, son of Theodotus; Callon, son of Phylax; Cassius, son of Martianus. By a decree of the city.”

§ 2.103   On the narrow side of the stele is the following: “The road to the Archagetes shall be two calami in breadth. They shall jointly engrave the landmarks and boundaries of the measurements within the twentieth day of the twelfth month, we examining them when they shall be engraved. Concerning the land Dryppius, we adjudge, from a view of the writing exhibited by Serapias, son of Zopyrus the agent, and by the Archons Philon, son of Sosicrates, and Damon, son of Zopyrus, that if any thing should be wanting to the four hundred and thirty-five plethra assigned by the decision of Eubulus, Serapias shall have a right to demand it from the city of the Daulienses. These were present: I, Curius Autobulus, adjudged, and sealed the first seal. I, Nicephorus, son of Lycomedes, adjudged; 1, Agasias, son of Timon, adjudged; 1, Publius Aelius Damoxenus, sealed the fourth seal; Eisid(otus) the fifth; Metrodorus, son of Apollodotus of Anticyra; Neicaretus, son of Pistus of Tithorea; I, Tyrannus, son of Tyrannus, sealed; Acindynus, son of Callicrates of Tithorea; Sextus Cornelius Axiochus; Eunus, son of Epaphras; 1, Callinicus, son of Cleonicus of Tithorea, sealed.” [The κάλαμος was a linear measure; if it was nearly equal to the modern Italian canna, the road was about fifteen feet in breadth.

§ 2.104   Pausanias, who visited Daulis about fifty years after the date of this inscription, remarks, that there was a place in the Daulia named Tronis, where stood the heroic monument of a hero called the Archagetes, whom some supposed to be Xanthippus, a warrior; others Phocus, son of Omytion. It is evidently to this place that the beginning of the second inscription refers, where it is said that “the road to the Archagetes shall have a breadth of two calami.” It is not impossible that Tronis is an erroneous reading for Patronis, the name, according to Plutarch, of the place where Sylla was encamped before he was joined by Hortensius, who, as I have already remarked, probably arrived through the same pass which I traversed from Bissikeni into the valley northward of Dhavlia. The biographer, indeed, describes Patronis as being in the plain of Chaeroneia, but the whole plain, as far as the pass of the Cephissus, was undoubtedly often designated as the plain of Chaeroneia. In Platanus, the name of one of the portions of land mentioned in the award of Eubulus, we have the origin apparently of the modern appellation of the river Platania.

§ 2.105   While I was copying the inscription, which was my first employment this morning, a funeral took place. The corpse was carried into the church, the service read over with wonderful haste, and at a certain point a howling was set up by three women, relations of the deceased, after which the corpse was put into the ground, and small loaves of wheaten bread, boiled maize, and wine, were distributed to the company, who assembled after the service in great numbers, and seated themselves round the wall of the church-yard.
Pausanias remarks of Daulis, that the inhabitants were few in number, but the tallest and stoutest of all the Phocians. The name of the place he supposed to be derived from δαυλος, because the position had formerly been a forest. The only building described by him is a temple of Minerva, containing an ancient statue, and another still more ancient made of wood, said to have been dedicated by Procne, for Daulis was supposed to have been the scene of the well-known story of Tereus, Procne, and Philomele.
Immediately above Dhavlia, on the site of Mount Liakura, stands the monastery of Aghia Arsali, and below it a metokhi, where the monks retire when the snow covers their upper habitation. About five miles to the south-west of Dhavlia is the entrance of the Zimeno Derveni, or opening between the mountains Cirphis and Parnassus, which leads to Delphi. It is the σχίστη οδός, or τριπλή κελευθος, the cleft or triple way celebrated among the ancients for being the place where Laius fell by the hands of his son Oidipus. I searched in vain there, in my former journey, for any traces of the tomb of Laius and his servant, which Pausanias describes as covered with a heap of stones.

§ 2.106   The road, as he justly observes, becomes more steep and rugged, from that point towards Delphi, and difficult even to a man on foot. Between Daulis and the Schiste, but at what distance from either Pausanias does not specify, stood the Phocicum, or place of meeting of the deputies of the cities of Phocis; it was a large building divided within lengthwise by columns, between which and the wall there were seats for the deputies. At one end, in an open space, was a Jupiter seated on his throne, Minerva and Juno standing on either side of him. The ascent from Daulis to the summit of Parnassus was less rugged than that from Delphi, but longer. This route probably led by the modern convent of Aghia Arsali. The road from Daulis to Ambryssus, now Dhistomo, follows up the vale of the Platania in nearly a straight course, having Mount Cirphis on the right hand, and on the other a part of the Helicon, which is so distinct from Paleovuni, or the proper Helicon, that it had undoubtedly some specific name among the ancients, though it has not been preserved by history. It is itself subdivided into two summits, that to the east called the mountain of Surbi, that to the west the mountain of Zara, or Tzara, from villages of those names.
Having crossed the Platania in twenty-five minutes from the foot of the hill of Daulis, we leave, in fifteen minutes more, the village of Malta on the right side of the road, and then in eight minutes arrive at 'Aio Vlasi.

§ 2.107   In the course of this route the Stena of the Cephissus, or Boeoto-Phocic Strait, opens from the foot of the hills of Khasnesi, and 'Aio Vlasi admits a view through the Stena: the hill of Krevasara being then nearly hid by the heights of Khasnesi, and that of the Paleokastro, near Belissi, appearing to advance half across the pass. In the course of our morning’s ride many όρνια, (vultures,) were in sight, and a great number of lapwings, which the Greeks call καλημανη. At 'Aio Vlasi the woman of the cottage where I dine wears a low bonnet or hat, made at Dhadhi, which is completely covered on the outside with a coat of mail made of paras. Just over the ears, instead of paras, the covering is made of Spanish or Austrian dollars and Turkish pieces of 100 paras. The owner is of Dhadhi, and in reply to my inquiries says, “this is the fashion of our town; here they have other fashions.”
On this side of Mount Oeta, it may be remarked, that itinerant salesmen, and even saleswomen are to be met travelling singly, which is hardly ever to be seen beyond Thermopylae. During the last two days we have met several persons from Aspraspitia selling fresh sea-fish; and at 'Aio Vlasi have found a caravan of asses laden with corn and kalambokki, and conducted by an Agrafiote woman. To be able to do this, or to wear such caps as that just mentioned, without risk, implies a greater degree of security than the Christians enjoy to the northward of Mount Oeta, where the resistance of the mountaineers to Aly Pasha, his continual attempts to reduce them, the march of his Albanians through the country,

§ 2.108   the incursions of the kleftes, and the poverty, idleness, and rapacity of the Turks, particularly those of Larissa, lead to the unceasing oppression of the Christians, and have made their condition more miserable than in this part of Greece, where the protection enjoyed by the districts of Livadhia and Athens, the one as a vakuf, the other as a royal appanage, is not without some beneficial effects upon the Christians; the administrators taking care to send proper persons to reside as Voivodas, and readily attending to the complaints of the Greeks, so that the Turkish governor finds it difficult to enrich himself by oppression. Another cause is the smaller proportion of Turks, the effect of whose bigotry, insolence, idleness, profligacy, and greediness of gain, has every where a tendency in proportion to their numbers, to degrade the condition and character of the rayah, and at length to drive him into the districts where the Turks are not so numerous, and which are better protected by the Porte. As to the circumstance of a large proportion of the lands to the southward of Oeta being held by Greeks, I fear it makes very little difference to the working farmer, in his profits or his enjoyment of the fruits of the earth; his terms of cultivation are the same, whether with the agas of Egripo and Thebes, or with the archons of Livadhia and Athens, all of whom take care that he shall never be out of their debt, nor enabled to obtain from the soil more than a subsistence of the scantiest kind.

§ 2.109   In proceeding from 'Aio Vlasi to Kapurna, we leave, at eight minutes beyond 'Aio Vlasi, a village called Mera to the right of the road, in the entrance of a valley leading into that which is watered by the western branch of the river of Livadhia, and along which leads the road from Livadhia to the Zimeno Pass, branching to the left to Dhistomo; these were anciently the routes from Lebadeia to Delphi and Ambryssus. Kapurna stands at the foot of the same ridge as 'Aio Vlasi, in a hollow between a steep summit and a long even height, which advances from the ridge into the valley in a north-easterly direction, and hides Kapurna from all the great plain towards the Lake Cephissis. A projection of the heights on the other side towards the vale of Mera conceals it in like manner from the upper part of the plain of Daulis, but the hill of Kervasara is seen from Kapurna, through the Stena of the Cephissus.
The rocky heights which overhang the villages of 'Aio Vlasi and Kapurna have preserved considerable ruins of Panopeus and Charoneia. Pausanias says, that Panopeus was distant 20 stades from Chaeroneia, and 7 from Daulis: but the latter number is obviously erroneous. I was 48 minutes in walking my horse from the foot of the hill of Daulis to 'Aio Vlasi, and 35 from thence to Kapurna. The latter space of time corresponds tolerably well to the 20 stades of Pausanias, according to the average rate of 30 stades to the hour; it

§ 2.110   is probable, therefore, that the number of stades between Daulis and Panopeus was 27 instead of 7, and that the word είκοσι has been lost by the copiers of Pausanias. The 7 stades which he assigns to the circumference of the walls of Panopeus is exactly confirmed by the present remains.
Panopeus partook of the ruin of the other cities of Phocis at the end of the Phocian war, but like them also was re-established by the Athenians and Thebans a little before the battle of Chaeroneia. In the time of Pausanias, although it had neither agora, nor theatre, nor gymnasium, nor fountain, nor public building for the use of the magistrates, and consisted only of huts on the side of a torrent, it was still called a city, and sent deputies to the Phocic council. The only antiquities besides its walls were the tumulus of Tityus on the side of the torrent, and a building of crude bricks, containing a statue of Pentelic marble, but whether intended for Aesculapius or for Prometheus, Pausanias could not ascertain. Panopeus having been placed between two cities, which were themselves not 5 miles asunder, seems to have derived its importance from being the frontier fortress of Phocis, towards Boeotia. We find, accordingly, considerable remains of the ancient walls; their general form is a triangle, of which the southern side follows a course parallel to the torrent of Mera, and the two others inclose the northern face

§ 2.111   of the hill, forming an angle, somewhat greater than a right angle, at the south-west They included a small portion of the plain at the northwestern end of the site. Here the walls are built in lines nearly straight, and were, flanked with towers at the usual intervals. On the height the sides are broken into re-entering and salient angles, in the manner best suited to defend the ascent of the rocks, with towers at the most prominent angles, projecting 20 feet from the walls, and in some places still 30 feet high. The masonry is of the third or intermediate order, between the polygonal, in which there were no regular courses, and that in which the courses were equal and horizontal. Each of the two summits into which the hill is divided had its interior inclosure. That to the south-west retains three gates: one leading to the lower town, and two opening to the country. In all the three, the entrance is oblique to the wall, as in the annexed plan of one of the latter gates.
The torrent of Mera is evidently the χάραδρα which Pausanias mentions, and was probably the Boeoto Phocic boundary. Some large masses of stone on this side, which appear to have fallen from the hill, may answer to those sandy coloured rocks from which Prometheus made the human race, but I can neither perceive the smell of human flesh in them, which Pausanias recognised, nor any remains of the tumulus of Tityus, although, according to the same traveller, it was not less than a stade in circumference.

§ 2.112   At Kapurna, scarcely any vestiges of the town wall of Chaeroneia are traceable in the plain, but in the acropolis, which incloses an extremely rugged height, there is a large piece of wall, of masonry of the third order, in excellent preservation, and well calculated to give an idea of the beautiful and imposing effect of this fine mode of building when complete. The hill corresponds exactly to the “precipitous height above the city, called Petrachus,” though Pausanias, who thus describes Petrachus, has not mentioned it as the acropolis of Chaeroneia, which the existing fortifications prove the hill in question to have been. The other remains at Kapurna are a theatre, of which all the middle part was excavated in the rock of Mount Petrachus, and the ends consisted of a mass of earth faced with masonry, of which the ruins still remain. Several rows of the lower seats are evidently buried below the earth, accumulated at the foot of the height; but there are two diazomata, or praecinctione, above ground, and consequently three divisions of seats. In the lowest division three or four seats only are now visible above the surface; the middle contains twelve rows, and the upper four, above which there is a high perpendicular excavation in the rock, and the remains of two or three rows of seats above it.

§ 2.113   On the face of the same rock is inscribed, in letters of the best times, with the omicron smaller than the other letters, the words Απόλλωνος δαφναφορίω, Αρτάμιδος σοωδινας. In some inscriptions reported by Meletius as existing at Chaeroneia in his time, we find the same Boeotic dialect employed, and the same Diana mentioned, but with the more common epithet of Eilethuia, or in the Boeotic dialect, Ειλειθίη. The worship of the same deity, but without the epithet is recorded on another monument, erected in honour of one of her priestesses by the council and people of the Chaeronenses.
A stone in the wall of a church near a fountain below the theatre, is inscribed with a dedication to the Emperor Macrinus, by the council and people of the Chaeronenses. It is difficult to decipher the second name of the emperor, but it certainly is not Opilius, as usually written in Latin authors. To me it appears to be 0ΝΦΑΛΙ0Σ, i. e. Omphalius.

§ 2.114   Another inscription on a stone at the same fountain was engraved in honour of Demetrius Autobulus, a Platonic philosopher, by his maternal grandson Flavius Autobulus. An ancient church of the Panaghia, in the village, preserves many remains of ancient art, particularly an inscribed marble, upon which are several records of the dedication of certain slaves, both male and female, to Sarapis, by which process they obtained their liberty, or at least became ιεροδουλοι, or slaves only to the god. In some instances the manumission was immediate, but more frequently after the life of the owners, and with a reserve of the children born of them in the meantime. The names of the Boeotian months Homolius, Alalcomeneius, Theluthius, Prostaterius, and Bucatius, occur in these documents. It appears from the inscriptions

§ 2.115   reported by Meletius, that slaves, both male and female, were dedicated in the same manner to Diana, Αρτάμιδι Ειλειθίη.. The other remains of antiquity in the church, of the Panaghia are an antique chair of marble, called by the learned ο φρόνος του Πλουτάρχου (Plutarch’s chair),—-two columns of dark grey granite, two Ionic capitals, and many ancient fragments in the walls. A large pedestal without any inscription forms the altar or holy table .
Pausanias has neither noticed the theatre of Chaeroneia, nor the temples of Diana and Sarapis, which the inscriptions prove to have existed here, and which stood, perhaps, upon the very sites of the churches where the inscriptions are found. According to him, the principal object of veneration at that time was the sceptre, or, as they called it, the spear of Jupiter, made by Vulcan, and the only one of the reputed works of Vulcan which Pausanias considered genuine. It was kept in the house of a priest annually appointed, and was said to have been found between Chaeroneia and Panopeus, whither it had been brought by Electra, daughter of Agamemnon, to whom it devolved through Hermes and Pelops. Daily sacrifices were made to the sceptre, and a table stood constantly before it, covered with meat and cakes, which accords so exactly with some of the representations on the temples of Egypt, that one cannot

§ 2.116   but suspect that the worship was derived from thence, together with that of Sarapis, and that the local mythus was a posterior invention.
On the summit of Mount Petrachus stood a small statue of Jupiter, and in some part of the territory were two trophies erected by Sylla and the Romans for their victory over Taxiles. Of the more celebrated victory of Philip, son of Amyntas, on the same scene of action, there was not any such monument, because the erecting of trophies was contrary to the Macedonian custom. But there was a polyandrium of the Thebans who were slain in that battle, surmounted by a lion, not far from Chaeroneia, on the road to Lebadeia, and it would seem from Strabo, that here stood also monuments, erected at the public expense, in honour of all who had fallen on the same occasion. As these memorials were probably on the field of the first battle of Chaeroneia, the situation of which no ancient author has exactly described, we may presume that a large tumulus, which rises conspicuously from the plain near the right bank of the Cephissus, is not a monument of the victory of Philip, but the place of sepulture of those who fell in the contest of the Romans with the Mithradatic army, for that tumulus, instead of being in the road from Chaeroneia to Lebadeia, is about midway to Orchomenus, and it seems evident from Plutarch, that the Roman battle occurred in the middle of the plain.

§ 2.117   In the time of Pausanias, Chaeroneia was noted for the manufacture of oils extracted from odoriferous flowers.
Quitting Kapurna at seven in the evening for Livadhia, we follow the foot of the hills for a quarter of an hour, then ascend them, and at the summit enter upon a plain of a rich soil, now very muddy, which we cross in a quarter of an hour by a paved road, then descend and enter the plain of Livadhia, fifty-five minutes from Kapurna. Ten minutes farther cross a stream flowing to the left, the same already mentioned as the western branch of the river of Livadhia, then passing through fields of rice and kalambokki, by a muddy road and bad pavement, at the end of one hour and twenty minutes from Kapurna, enter Livadhia.

§ 2.118   CHAPTER 12 BOEOTIA.
Dec. 2.—The town of Livadhia has an imposing appearance from the northward, and forms a scene no less singular than beautiful. Its houses are surrounded for the most part with gardens, and thus occupy a large space of ground on some steep acclivities at the foot of a precipitous height which is crowned with a ruined castle, said to have been built by the Catalans. This height is an abrupt northerly termination of Mount Helicon, and is separated eastward from similar hills by a torrent issuing from the mountain between lofty precipices, and falling with great rapidity over a rocky bed as it passes through the middle of the town. It is the ancient Hercyna. Above the Kastro, or castle hill, it is generally dry, the principal contribution of water being from some sources at the southern extremity of the town, under the eastern side of the Kastro.

§ 2.119   Derivations are made from it to every part of the town, and into the gardens which surround the houses. There are springs also in many parts of the site; so that by the effect of this abundance of water, combined with the shelter of the overhanging mountains, the air in the summer, in the upper part of the town, during an hour or two in the morning and evening, has a most agreeable coolness, as I experienced when I was last at Livadhia: the same mountains, however, by excluding the regular breezes, cause the general temperature to be excessively hot, and in winter create humidity, by depriving the town of the sun's rays, which at present no longer fall even upon the lowest quarter of the town after two o’clock. From these causes the climate is not considered either agreeable or healthy, and it is said that in summer, iu consequence of the want of ventilation, the noxious exhalations of the irrigated fields of cotton and rice, although near two miles distant from the upper quarter of the town, are felt in every part of it. Velitza, having a similar position and aspect, is affected in the same manner by the adjacent mountain; and there the village was in shade even before one o’clock. In fact, all the ancient cities of Doris, Phocis, and Boeotia, which occupied the strong and otherwise advantageous situations under the northern sides of Parnassus and Helicon, experienced more or less the same inconvenience, and had a similar climate in winter, as Pausanias has remarked in particular respecting Lilaea.

§ 2.120   Livadhia has a greater air of opulence than any place in Northern Greece, not even excepting Ioannina. This is partly real in consequence of the small number of Turks who generally are not only poor themselves but the cause of poverty in others, and is partly the effect of the construction of the larger Greek houses, which having spacious chambers and galleries in the Turkish manner, are shown to advantage on the steep declivity of the hill. It may be observed, however, that this style of building, the effect of Greek vanity always ready to ape Turkish grandeur, although agreeable in summer is in general little suited to a place where the winter is both long and severe. There are about 1500 houses in the town, of which 130 only are Turkish. The most conspicuous object is a tower with a clock in it. The district contains seventy villages, of which the largest are Dhadhi and Arakhova. Xerokhori, Fyla, and several others in Euboea, are inscribed in the vilayeti, as well as Kalamo and some others in Attica.
The Homeric Mideia was situated, according to Pausanias, on a height, from whence the inhabitants under the conduct of Lebadus, an Athenian removed to the lower ground, and there built the town to which they gave the name of Lebadeia. It would seem, therefore, that Mideia stood on the site of the Kastro, and of the western division of the modern town, having its eastern side defended by the Hercyna, and that Lebadeia occupied the lowest part of the present town.

§ 2.121   It is difficult to believe, however, that the Kastro was not at all times a part of the ancient city, being so essential to its safety. The only remains of antiquity are some Hellenic squared stones in the walls of the ruined castle, with a few inscriptions and architectural fragments dispersed in the town. This strong and well-watered position having always been occupied by a considerable population, the ancient materials have so long been applied to repairs that nothing is now left in its original position.
Lebadeia was chiefly celebrated for the oracle of Trophonius, son of Erginus, king of Orchomenus, who, at a time when the Greeks were chiefly indebted to Phoenicia for artists, obtained with the aid of his brother Agamedes, such celebrity as a constructor of temples, treasuries, palaces, and other works, that by a consequence natural in a superstitious age of the admiration in which his talents were held, he was believed after his death to predict futurity, and to have been the son not of Erginus but of Apollo.

§ 2.122   The extensive reputation which his oracle had acquired at a remote period, is proved by its having been consulted by Croesus and Mardonius; and more than six centuries afterwards, its administrators were still successful in maintaining the popular delusion. Pausanias, who himself consulted the oracle, has left us an accurate description of the process, omitting only what he saw or heard in the sacred adytum,.which it was not lawful to reveal. He describes the grove of Trophonius as situated at a small distance from Lebadeia, or as separated from Lebadeia by the river Hercyna, for the defective text leaves his meaning doubtful. The source of the river was in a cavern which contained upright statues holding sceptres with serpents entwined on them. It was uncertain whether these were statues of Aesculapius and Hygieia, or of Trophonius and Hercyna. On the river’s bank there was a temple of Hercyna, containing the statue of a virgin bearing a goose in her hand. It represented the nymph Hercyna, from whom, when playing with Proserpine, a goose escaped, flew into the cavern, and concealed itself under a stone: Proserpine, having drawn forth the goose and removed the stone, water followed, and became the source of the river Hercyna. Upon the bank of the river there was also a monument of Arcesilaus.

§ 2.123   The grove of Trophonius contained his temple, in which was his statue by Praxiteles, resembling a statue of Aesculapius,—a temple of Ceres, surnamed Europe, who was the nurse of Trophonius, and a statue in the open air of Jupiter Hyetius (Pluvius). Above this place was the oracle, and farther on in the mountain the hunting-place of Proserpine; also a large unfinished temple of Jupiter the King, a temple of Apollo, and another temple containing statues of Cronus, Juno and Jupiter. He who had resolved to consult the Oracle, first passed a certain number of days in a building sacred to the good daemon and to good fortune, where, among other expiations, he was enjoined to abstain from ablution in hot water, and to bathe in the Hercyna; he sacrificed to the deities worshipped in the grove, and a priest declared from the entrails of the victims whether Trophonius was favourable to the sacrificer. On the night of consultation he again sacrificed a ram in the trench of Agamedes, at the pillar of the same person, whom he invoked.

§ 2.124   At this trench the ground was said to have opened and received Trophonius when he quitted the earth. The appearance of the victim was here considered as of more importance than at the former place. If they were still found to be favourable, the consulter of the Oracle was conducted to the Hercyna, where he was washed and anointed by two young citizens of Lebadeia called the Hermae. He was then led to the two fountains of the Hercyna, which were close to one another, and drank of them; first of the fountain of oblivion, to obtain forgetfulness of preceding events; and then of the fountain of memory, to strengthen his remembrance of what he was about to behold. He next addressed his prayers to a wooden statue of Trophonius, made by Daedalus, which none but those who consulted the Oracle were allowed to see, after which, clothed in a linen garment, girded with sashes, and wearing sandals peculiar to the place, he was conducted to the Oracle. The first object which presented itself was a circular barrier, equal in size to a threshing-floor of very small dimensions, it was formed by a basement of white marble about two and a half feet high, upon which stood spits of brass connected together by bands of the same material. Within the circumference was a hollow, not natural, but constructed artificially in the

§ 2.125   most finished manner, and in form resembling an oven (or kiln), the diameter was about four peeks (six feet), and the depth not more than eight peeks (twelve feet). There was no constructed descent, but a light narrow ladder was brought for the use of him who descended, and who found at the bottom a small opening between the bottom and the masonry two spans (a foot and a half) wide, and of which the height appeared to be one span (nine inches). Lying on his back, and holding honey-cakes in his hands, he introduced his legs into the hole, and then his knees, when on a sudden the rest of his body was carried forward with rapidity, as if involved in the current of a rapid and mighty river. The future was then revealed to him; not to all persons in the same manner, but to some by the sight, and to others by the hearing. He returned by the same opening by which he entered, and again with the legs foremost. The priests then conducted him to the throne of memory, which was not far from the Adytum, where they questioned him as to what he had seen, and then delivered him to his friends, who led him back to the sanctuary of Agathodaemon. At first he was so terrified, that he appeared to have no recollection either of himself or others, but at length recovered his mind and the power of laughing, and was bound to inscribe on a tablet what he had seen or heard.

§ 2.126   Such is the account of Pausanias from his own experience. Philostratus, the only other author who has entered into particulars of the same kind, has added little or nothing to Pausanias, and differs from him only in describing as made of iron the railing of the circular barrier which Pausanias states to have been brazen.
I have already remarked, that the river which traverses Livadhia is the continuation of an occasional torrent from Mount Helicon, which is joined by some copious sources at the southern extremity of the town, on the eastern side of the Castle hill. It is evident that these were the reputed springs of the river Hercyna, adjoining to which was the Grove of Trophonius. They issue on either side of the torrent, those on the left bank from the rock, through several small spouts, which are sometimes dry in summer, as I witnessed in the month of July. Those on the right bank of the torrent form the main body of the river at all times, and flow perpetually from under the rocks in many large streams, the subterraneous course of which is, apparently, from near a cavern in the rocks on the right side of the ravine, which is now almost choked up by the rubbish of the town, of which that situation happens to be a common place of deposit. The great sources are called τά γλυφά νερά, or the water unfit for drinking, in contradistinction to the other springs, which are named τά κρύα, or the cold waters; in fact, the former are of a higher temperature, and not so agreeable to the taste. Immediately above the Kria on the side of the Castle hill, is the cavern which the learned of Livadhia point out as the Cave of Trophonius.

§ 2.127   It is not very deep, does not reach down to the soil of the valley, nor has it any appearance of an interior opening, though there are some traces of artificial excavations in it, and of niches and inscriptions near it.
Such being the present appearance of the sources of the Hercyna and adjoining places, it becomes impossible to apply the description of Pausanias with any certainty, there being, instead of one source in a cavern, two sources, and a cavern opposite to each, and neither source having its origin in its corresponding cavern. As to the latter discrepancy, nothing is more likely than that during the ages which have elapsed since the sacred grove and its buildings were first ruined, and their site left to the effects of natural causes, the torrent, or even the ordinary rains, should have obstructed the caverns with alluvial soil, and should have caused one or both the springs to emerge on the bank of the torrent below the cavern, instead of issuing in the cave itself. But admitting this supposition, there still remains the question, which of the caverns contained the reputed source of the Hercyna? I think the eastern; first, because the permanent and larger sources of the river are on that side; secondly, because that situation will suit either of the two interpretations given to the words of Pausanias descriptive of the position of the grove relatively to that of the city, while the western cavern is not well adapted to either; thirdly, because the wider and more sloping ground was there better suited to contain the grove and its buildings, which required a considerable space,

§ 2.128   than that on the western side, where the space between the Kria nera and the perpendicular rocks of the Castle hill is not only narrow, but almost entirely exposed to inundation from the torrent. It seems more probable, therefore, that the sacred inclosure and its various structures occupied the ground around the Glyfa and the cavern on that side. It is clear from the narrative of Pausanias, that the μάντεων, or place where the oracle was enounced, was quite distinct from the cavern of the sources, though it appears to have been situated also at the foot of the hill, since he describes it as επι του ορούς. The description which he has given of the well constructed of masonry, with an elevated border, surmounted by a railing of brass, is perfectly intelligible; but the οπή, or cavity, at the bottom of the wall within, was so small, that unless we suppose all that followed the introduction of the legs of the consulter of the oracle into this aperture, to have been the effect of his own imagination, it is necessary to conclude, that the priests had some concealed mode of enlarging the opening, which is the more probable, as a circumstance mentioned by Pausanias favours the opinion, that there was not only a cavern or subterraneous chamber, but a second opening. He states, that a soldier of Demetrius (Poliorcetes), who had entered the adytum without performing the previous rites, and with the hope of finding something there worth stealing, was deprived of life in consequence of his impiety; and his body was found cast out, not near the sacred entrance, but in another place.

§ 2.129   However this may be, it is evident that nothing but an extensive excavation can lead to the discovery of the adytum, since the οπή, or aperture, was twelve feet below the circular κρηνις of white marble, and there has probably been a considerable accumulation of soil above that which was the surface in the time of Pausanias. I am informed that the torrent, although now dry, sometimes pours a potent stream into the Hercyna; its origin is in an elevated plain, situated between the summit of Helicon, nearest to Livadhia, and the heights of which the Castle hill and opposite rocks form the termination. This plain is cultivated in some parts by the people of Surbi.
The three inscriptions which have been published by Spon and Wheler, are still in existence. That which is in the mosque, formerly a church on the hill near the castle, is in excellent preservation. The stone forms the lintel of the door of the minaret of the mosque. The two other inscriptions are lying in the yard of another mosque, at the Bazar, and seem to have suffered some erasure since the time of the two travellers. A third inscription in the same inclosure, not noticed by them, but published by Pococke, with his usual inaccuracy, still remains, but very much damaged. Of these four ancient documents the first mentioned is a dedication to Juno Basilis by a priest, at the termination of bis quinquennial administration;

§ 2.130   during which his wife also had been priestess. The epithet Basilis corresponds to that of the Jupiter Basileus, whose large unfinished temple stood in the grove of Trophonius. And the word πενταίτηξης is illustrated by a fifth inscription, which I found in a private house in the town. It is in the Boeotic dialect, in characters beautifully formed, and evidently of a much earlier period than the dedication to Juno Basilis. It testifies that Neon, the son of Ascon, after having held the office of Agonothetes in the Basileia, dedicated a vase, for anointing with oil, to Jupiter the king, and to the city. It can hardly be questioned, therefore, that the quinquennium mentioned in the dedication to Juno Basilis, related to the Basileia, which recurred, like the Olympic festival and many others, at the end of four complete years. The Basileia was probably the same institution named at a later period Trophonia, which we find noticed by two Greek authors, as well as in an inscription of Megara, published by Spon and Wheler; for it appears that the oracular predictions were ascribed to Jupiter, and that the deity worshipped here was often called Jupiter Trophonius.

§ 2.131   The great unfinished temple of Jupiter mentioned by Pausanias was probably commenced not long after the battle of Leuctra, for we are informed by Diodorus that Epaminondas, with a view to encourage the Boeotians, when preparing for the battle, procured a person to pretend that, having consulted the oracle of Trophonius, he was ordered to communicate to the army, that when they had obtained the victory, they were to institute a periodical festival at Lebadeia in honour of Jupiter the king. The Basileia was established accordingly, and was accompanied by a stephanites agon or contest, in which the victor was rewarded with a crown.

§ 2.132   The three inscriptions at the mosque in the Bazar are all in the Boeotic dialect. The first is a conscription of the young men of twenty years of age, in the year when Charopinus was archon of the Boeotians, and magistrate of Lebadeia.
The names I did not copy, because many of the letters are doubtful, and accuracy is the more necessary in consequence of the singularity of the dialect. The second inscription at the mosque is more complete, and contains a dedication to Trophonius (here written Trephonius), by the horsemen of Lebadeia, for a victory in the Pamboeotian festival. These two inscriptions were published by Spon and Wheler. The third, of which there is a copy in the Inscriptiones Antiquae of Pococke, has the remains of the words εδοξε τη πολι Λίβαδειήων in the first line, and seems to have contained a catalogue of dedications or deposits in the temple of Trophonius.

§ 2.133   From Dec. 3 to Dec. 8.—In the course of these days I made several excursions from Livadhia, particularly one in search of Coroneia and Alalcomenae, in company with Mr. Gell, whom I found at Livadhia. The former of these ancient places is supposed by the Greeks to have stood at Granitza, on the mountain to the eastward of Livadhia, because the Bishop of Coroneia resides there. But that situation does not agree with the ancient authorities. Following the road from Livadhia to Thebes, along the foot of the Granitza mountain, we arrive in forty-seven minutes at a κalyvia of Granitza, on the foot of the mountain: here stands a single Hellenic tower, about half of which remains. On the opposite side of the plain are seen the walls of Orchomenus, inclosing the extremity of the mountain above Skripu. We then follow the foot of the mountain for seven minutes, pass some large perennial springs, and in forty-seven minutes more, opening upon a valley which extends several miles in a southerly direction towards Helicon, arrive at a fountain where are two or three sepulchral inscriptions, with nothing but the name in the nominative and χαίρε. This was a common kind of epitaph in Boeotia. Another, often employed both here and in Phocis, was the name in the dative preceded by the preposition ΕΠΙ. In neither mode, the father's name occurs. The first is precisely the Sikyonian fashion, as described by Pausanias. The Athenians invariably inscribed the name both of the man's father and of his demus. We have now directly before us a bicipitous height, standing at the entrance of the valley, watered on either side by a rivulet, stretching southward towards Helicon, in a direction parallel to the adjacent mountains, and thus dividing the valley into two branches; this height is undoubtedly the position of Coroneia.

§ 2.134   Both the streams rise in Helicon; the eastern flows from Mount Zagara; the western, which is considerably the larger, is composed of branches from Steveniko and Mount Paleovuni, and from St. George and the mountain of Granitza. [I learn from Mr. Finlay, who in the spring of 1829 crossed from Khosia by Kukora and Steveniko to St. George, that the chief sources of this river are at a chapel between Steveniko [Agia Triada] and St. George, where are many remains of antiquity, and the following inscriptions...] This river is crossed by a bridge on the direct road from Livadhia to Thebes. In five minutes from the fountain we ford it, and in eighteen more arrive at the summit of the acropolis of Coroneia, which seems to have been of a circular form and large extent. There remain a fine piece of polygonal wall on the eastern, another on the southern side of the acropolis, some large masses of Roman tile-work on the very summit, and a piece of the town wall at the bottom of the hill, on the southeastern side. Fragments of ancient pottery are observable in the fields on every side, but more particularly toward the south-east, where the town seems chiefly to have been situated, and where a great part of it must have been hid from the view of Orchomenus and the plain. There are several sources of water on the same side of the hill, many pieces of ancient squared stones in two ruined churches, and at a third church, just below a ruined tower of lower Greek or Frank construction, two inscriptions, one only of which is in a

§ 2.135   copy-able state of preservation. It is in honor of one Paramonus, who had held the office of strategus; like many similar inscriptions, it does not contain the name of the city. Here also is a sculpture in low relief, almost buried in the ground, together with some fragments of sepulchral and other wrought stones. At a Turkish fountain close by are two or three other mnemata inscribed only with names.
Having crossed the stream on the eastern side of the hill of Coroneia, which, after following the foot of the heights for a short distance, crosses the plain, and joins the marshes below A. Dhimitri, we proceed eastward along the foot of the mountain, which here ends in a little low cliff and projecting point under the village of Koriani, or Goriani. This point,, as well as the slope of the hill has a fertile soil, and is now ploughed. Continuing along the extremity of the heights, we pass under the village of Sulinari, from whence flow two or three rivulets; beyond the last, on a rocky end of the slope, are some polygonal foundations, apparently those of a single building, such as a temple. They are remains perhaps of the peribolus of the temple of Minerva Alalcomeneis, already celebrated in the time of Homer; for the situation corresponds perfectly to that of Alalcomenae, as indicated by Strabo and Pausanias.

§ 2.136   The neighbouring stream therefore is the Triton, upon the banks of which, near the lake, stood the towns Athenae and Eleusis, which were destroyed by an inundation. About midway between the Triton and the projecting precipitous hill called Petra, are some squared stones and fragments of ancient pottery at a ruined church. The road from Sulinari to Rastamyti crosses a connecting ridge, which unites the Petra with the other mountains. Instead of following this road as far as the latter village, we turn to the left on the crest of the ridge, and proceed to the extreme summit of the Petra, where we find some remains of a small ancient tower, or fortress, having a wall of polygonal masonry, together with the foundations of a triangular castle of later date.
This height commands an extensive and interesting view of all the western division of Boeotia, comprehending its vast plain, with the surrounding heights from the neighbourhood of Thebes to Parnassus. Assisted by the recollections of my former journey, I easily recognize all the positions which Strabo and Pausanias have described around the Cephissian lake. The inner, or north-eastern bay of the lake lies before us, as far down as the katavothra, together with Topolia and the adjacent islands, about half-way between which and the mountain of the Sphinx, now called Faga, is a remarkable aperture in the hills on the borders

§ 2.137   of the lake, near which stands the village of Kardhitza, probably on the site of Acraephium. It is easy to distinguish the several summits in the mountainous region between the Euripus and the lake Copais, to which the ancients gave the names of Ptoum, Messapium, and Hypatus. Paraes rises behind the position of Thebes.
The marshy region around the lake leaves a broad plain opposite to Coroneia, but at Petra advances so far as to touch this point of the mountains. Near the position of Haliartus, which stood on a low but conspicuous eminence, close to the foot of the hills below Mazi, the marsh again approaches very near the hills, and beyond it is seen the plain of Haliartus, extending from Mount Faga to the lower acclivities of Helicon, and terminating eastward in the ridge of Onchestus, which connects those two mountains. Petra is very rocky on the northern side, and the descent is only practicable on foot. From the extreme point of the hill issue the copious sources which cause the marshes of the lake Cephissis to encroach so far upon this part of the plain, as to leave only room at the sources for the main route from Livadhia to Thebes, and thus to make the Petra a pass of some strength. The consequence is, that the road from Livadhia to Thebes is not unfrequently interrupted by robbers who establish themselves on the Petra. Some foundations of a Hellenic wall which are observable stretching into the plain, belonged probably to a work for the defence of the pass.

§ 2.138   Returning to Livadhia, we cross, in 37 minutes from Petra, the bridge over the river which flows on the north-western side of the hill of Coroneia. The rocky extremity under Sulinari, where are the ancient vestiges, is somewhat less than half way between Petra and the bridge. From the bridge there is an interval of 30 minutes to Kalamaki, where are several mills on the last slope of the mountain, turned by the copious springs which I passed in the morning by an upper road. Rakhi, a Kalyvia of Granitza, is half a mile to the right of Kalamaki, and beyond it, Karya, near the borders of the marsh.
A short examination of the description which Pausanias has given of the places, comprehended in this day’s excursion, will, I think, suffice to justify the ancient names which I have already assigned, as well as to identify the river Phalarus and the mountains Libethrium, Laphystium, and Tilphusium. He states, that Mount Tilphusium and the fountain Tilphusa were about fifty stades distant from Haliartus. Here it was said, that Teiresias, proceeding towards Delphi from Thebes, died on drinking the water. His tomb was at the fountain. Alalcomenae was a small town, situated on the extreme declivity of a mountain not very high. In the plain below it stood the temple of Minerva Alalcomeneis, which, having been deprived of its ancient statue of ivory by Sylla, was in consequence neglected; its ruin had been accelerated by an ivy tree, which had displaced the

§ 2.139   stones. A small torrent flowed near, called Triton. Between Alalcomenae and Coroneia, and not far from the latter, stood the temple of Minerva Itonia, where the common council of the Boeotians assembled. The temple contained brazen statues of Minerva Itonia, and of Jupiter, by Agoracritus, the disciple of Phidias, to which those of the Graces had recently been added. In Coroneia, the most remarkable objects were the altars of Hermes, Epimelius, and of the winds, and a little below them a temple of Juno, containing an ancient statue made by Pythodorus of Thebes, in which the goddess was represented, bearing in one hand the Sirenes. Mount Libethrium was about 40 stades from Coroneia; here were statues of the Muses, and of the nymphs Libethrides, and two fountains, named Libethrias and Petra, resembling the breasts of a woman, and producing water like milk. From Coroneia to Mount Laphystium and the sanctuary of Jupiter Laphystius, the distance was about 20 stades: the statue was of stone. Above it there was an image of Hercules Charops. Between Mount Laphystium and the temple of Minerva Itonia, the river Phalarus crossed the road, flowing to the Lake Cephissis. Over against Mount Laphystium was the city Orchomenus.

§ 2.140   This last remark of Pausanias seems alone sufficient to identify Mount Laphystium with the mountain of Granitza, which is separated from Mount Helicon by a pass leading from St. George to Livadhia, and advances near Kalamaki, north-eastward, into the plain exactly opposite to the hill of Skripu or Orchomenus. The exact situation of the temenus of Jupiter Laphystius cannot easily be ascertained but by the discovery of some remains of the temple, as the distance of twenty stades from Coroneia will correspond with many points on the mountain of Granitza. The temple of Minerva Itonia was at the foot of the mountain in the plain on the eastern side of Coroneia, and as it would appear from Strabo, on the bank of the torrent which flows there, for he observes of this temple, that it was founded after the Trojan war by the Boeoti of the Thessalian Arne, who having been expelled from Thessaly by the Epirotes, occupied Coroneia, and built the temple in the plain before the city ’. He adds, that the river which flowed by the temple, received its name Cuarius, written Coralius by Alcaeus in some verses relating to Coroneia, from a Thessalian stream, and that at the temple of Minerva Itonia, the Pamboeotian festival was celebrated. If, as seems evident from the various testimonies just cited, the river on the eastern side of Coroneia was the Cuarius, it follows that the river of St.

§ 2.141   George, on the western side, is Phalarus. According to Plutarch, a branch of the Phalarus, which joined it near Coroneia, was named Isomantus, and more anciently Oplias. This seems to be the rivulet from Steveniko, which joins that of St. George a little above the ancient site.
In like manner as the pass of St. George, separating the mountain of Granitza from the main body of Helicon, renders probable the supposition that the former mountain had a separate name, and was the ancient Laphystium, so a similar reason leads to the opinion, that the mountain of Zagara was the ancient Libethrium; that remarkable summit being completely separated from the great heights of Helicon, by an elevated valley, in which are two villages named Zagara, and above them, on the rugged mountain, a monastery. The distance of forty stades, which Pausanias places between Coroneia and Mount Libethrium, will correspond to some place in the vale or on the mountain of Zagara: and it is not impossible that the monastery may occupy the exact position of the sanctuary of the Muses.

§ 2.142   If Zagara was Libethrium, Tilphusium, Tilphossium or Tilphossaion was evidently confined to the height now called Petra. It is justly described by Harpocration as a mountain near the lake Copais. The fortress on the summit, probably bore the same name, which was derived from the source Tilphusa or Tilphossa, at the foot of the hill. In the hymn to Apollo, commonly ascribed to Homer, the word is written Delphusa, and seems in that ancient poem, which contains many geographical inconsistencies, to have been confounded with Delphi, a word of the same etymological origin, and derived also from its remarkable fountain. At Tilphusa, besides a tomb of Teiresias there was a sanctuary of Apollo Tilphosius.
Dec. 8.—At 10.5, quitting my lodging in the lower part of the town of Livadhia, I descend along the right side of the Hercyna into the valley, through gardens and a rich cultivated tract; and at 10.25, leaving the road to Kapurna to the left cross a little below the junction of its two branches, the river which is formed by the union of the Hercyna with that already mentioned as flowing from a valley to the westward. The Hercyna is the more considerable stream of the two, is permanent in summer, and abounds in trout, which are not produced in the western branch; the course of the united river, nevertheless, is a continuation of that of the western branch, and appears from Theophrastus to have been called, at its junction with

§ 2.143   the lake, not Hercyna, but Probatia, which was probably the name of the western branch. The valley which it waters, is the territory, perhaps, of a town near Lebadeia, named Trachin. I have already observed, that the road from Livadhia to Kastri and Salona by “the triple way,” as well as that to Dhistomo or Ambryssus, led along this valley. Proceeding, we soon arrive under some rocky hills on the northern side of the vale of Lebadeia,—and having passed, at 10.45, through the little hamlet of Krupi at the foot of these hills, soon begin to open the vale of Chaeroneia. At 11.15, we are at the eastern extremity of the heights which separate the valleys of Chaeroneia and Lebadeia, and which terminate northward in a projection immediately opposite to the high precipitous summit of Mount Acontium; midway in the plain, rises the barrow near the right bank of the Cephissus, which I suppose to be a monument of the battle between Sylla and the forces of Mithradates; near the tumulus, the river turns from its previous course along the foot of the Acontium, towards the middle of the plain, but near Orchomenus again approaches the mountain, and then “winds like a serpent” round Orchomenus into the marshes.

§ 2.144   The direct road from Livadhia to Talanda now branches to the left, and after crossing the plain of Chaeroneia enters the vale which separates Acontium from Edylium, from whence it proceeds, over the connecting ridge, to Vogdhani. Before we begin to cross the plain in a direct line to the extremity of Mount Acontium, upon which Orchomenus was built, we pass an insulated hill near the extremity of the Chaeronian ridges, on the summit of which stands one of a system of towers, resembling those which are observable in the Morea. They seem to have been intended for communication by signal, and may all be attributed to the Frank princes who possessed Greece in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Some of the most remarkable in Boeotia are— near Bissikeni, at Neokhorio in the district of Thespiae, at Megalomulki on the site of Haliartus, at Xeropyrgo on a point of the hill which projects into the marshes two miles E.N.E. of Orchomenus, and there is another beyond the latter, not far from Topolia. We now cross the opening of the vale of Chaeroneia direct to Skripu, cross the Cephissus by a bridge, and arrive at Skripu exactly at noon. This village consists of about one hundred houses, standing partly on the rocky base of the mountain, and partly on the river side in the plain, just where, after having flowed along the southern side of Acontium, it turns from an eastern to a north-eastern course, and thence north into the marshes. Passing through the village, we proceed to the monastery of the Θεοτόκος, situated a little beyond it to the northward.

§ 2.145   Orchomenus, like many other Greek cities, occupied the triangular face of a steep mountain, at its rise from the plain; and possessed in perfection those advantages of position, which the Greek engineers generally sought for, being defended on every side by precipices, rivers, and marshes. The summit is naturally separated from the ridge of Acontium, which accounts for the distinctive appellation Hyphanteium mentioned by Theopompus. But the upper part of the hill forming a very acute angle, was fortified differently from the customary modes. [map]

§ 2.146   Instead of a considerable portion of it having been inclosed to form an acropolis, there is only a small castle on the summit, having a long narrow approach to it from the body of the town, between walls which, for the last two hundred yards, are almost parallel, and not more than twenty or thirty yards asunder. Below this approach to the citadel the breadth of the hill gradually widens, and in the lowest part of the town the inclosed space is nearly square. It is defended on the lowest side by a wall, which crossed the slope of the hill along the crest of a ledge of rock, which there forms a division in the slope. In this wall, which is at three fourths of the distance from the castle to the monastery, there are some foundations of the gate which formed the lower entrance into the city; and on or the outside of it are many large masses of wrought stone, the remains, apparently, of some temple or other public building. The southern wall of the city, which follows a line parallel to the Cephissus, is traceable, with scarcely any intermission, through a distance of three quarters of a mile; and in many places several courses of masonry are still extant. The wall derives its flank defence from square towers, placed for the most part at long intervals, with an intermediate short flank, or break, in the line of wall. In a few places, the masonry is of a very early age, but in general it is of the third kind, or almost regular. The former dates from the earlier and more celebrated Orchomenus, the latter is probably posterior to the battle of Chaeroneia, when the Orchomenii were restored to their possessions by Philip, son of Amyntas, and when their city, which

§ 2.147   had been destroyed near thirty years before by the Thebans, was re-established.
Towards the middle of the northern side the hill of Orchomenus is most precipitous, and here the walls are not traceable. The circumference of the whole was about two miles. The citadel occupies a rock, about forty yards in diameter, and seems to have been an irregular hexagon; but three sides only remain, no foundations being visible on the eastern half of the rock. At the northern angle are the ruins of a tower, and parallel to the north-western side there is a ditch cut in the rock, beyond which are some traces of an outwork. The hill is commanded by the neighbouring part of Mount Acontium, but not at such a distance as to have been of importance in ancient warfare. The access to the castle from the city was first by an oblique flight of forty-four steps, six feet wide, and cut out of the rock; and then by a direct flight of fifty steps of the same kind.
The monuments which Pausanias remarked at Orchomenus were temples of Bacchus and of the Graces, the treasury of Minyas, a fountain, to which there was a descent, tombs of Minyas and of Hesiod, and a brazen figure bound by a chain of iron to a rock, supposed to represent a spectre which had haunted this rock, and which the oracle of Delphi, on being consulted, pronounced to be the ghost of Actaeon. The Oracle ordained that the remains of Actaeon should be buried, and the statue erected which Pausanias saw. The temple of the Graces was extremely ancient; they were

§ 2.148   worshipped under the figure of rude stones, said to have fallen from heaven in the time of Eteocles, the founder of the temple, who lived several generations before the Trojan war. It was not until the time of Pausanias that statues of the goddesses, in stone, were added. The treasury of Minyas was a circular building rising to a summit not very pointed, but terminating in a stone which was said to hold together the entire building.
Some remains, which have every appearance of having belonged to the last-mentioned building, are found to the eastward of the lower wall, where the height terminates in a low projection which is separated from the river by a level only a few hundred yards in breadth. The artists employed by Lord Elgin attempted to excavate the ruins of the building, but were deterred from making much progress by the large masses of stone which presented themselves, and which they had not the means of removing. As all the lower parts of the construction are buried in the ruins of the upper, they will probably be found in situ whenever a complete excavation shall be made. Some details may then be obtained of this curious edifice, which was supposed to be a century more ancient than the similar building at Mycenae, and the first of the kind that was ever erected.

§ 2.149   The doorway, of which there are considerable remains, closely resembled that of the treasury of Atreus. In both, the sides of the door inclined> so as to make it wider below than above; nor are the dimensions of the corresponding parts very different in the two doors. The width is the same within a few inches: here I measured eight feet three inches immediately below the soffit, at Mycenae eight feet six inches. There were probably two great slabs in the architrave, as at Mycenae, thongh one only is now left, which is of white marble, of six unequal sides, sixteen feet in its greatest length, eight in its greatest breadth, and three feet two inches and a half in thickness. It is consequently much smaller than the larger of the two slabs above the door of the treasury of Atreus, which is twenty-eight feet long and nineteen broad on its upper surface, and three feet nine inches in thickness. As at Mycenae, the edge of the stone, which formed a part of the interior surface of the building, was curved both horizontally and vertically. The versed sine of the arch on the upper surface is one foot three inches and seven-eighths, and the chord fourteen feet nine inches, which will give a diameter of about forty-one feet. [sketch]
The corresponding dimension of the treasury of Atreus, or its diameter at the top of the door, is about

§ 2.150   thirty-seven feet. From this comparison, therefore, it would seem that the treasury of Minyas was larger than that of Atreus, though there could hardly have been such a difference between the two monuments as the reader might infer from the admiration of Pausanias in the one instance, and his silence in the other. Of the Orchomenian building he asserts that there was nothing more wonderful either in Greece or in any other country, and he compares it to the walls of Tiryns and the pyramids of Egypt. But the extravagance of the latter comparison is brought down to a reasonable level by the former; and was probably suggested to Pausanias by a peculiarity in the Orchomenian treasury, in which it appears to have differed from that of Mycenae, namely, that the former was not subterraneous like the latter, and consequently that its exterior form resembled, in some measure, that of the Egyptian pyramids. A subterraneous construction of this kind, when formed on the side of a hill as at Mycenae, presented from without little more than an entrance into the hill between walls ending in a doorway; whereas the description of the treasury of Minyas as rising to a summit not very pointed, seems evidently to imply that it was not hidden in the earth. The situation of the ruins of the treasury of Minyas confirms in some measure this supposition, the ground being rocky and almost level, and therefore in neither particular adapted to a building like that of Mycenae, which required a sloping hill of friable materials. Perhaps the assertion of the Orchomenii as to the

§ 2.151   upper stone of their building, which suggests a difference of construction between their treasury and that of Atreus, may also be explained by the former having been exposed to view, and not subterraneous; since it is probable that in that case the upper stone was not simply super-imposed, as at Mycenae, but was connected with the surrounding masonry. It might even be inferred from the meaning which Pausanias on all other occasions gives to the word αρμονία, that the upper part of the building at Orchomenus was a dome constructed with stones shaped to a center; though it ought also to be remarked that Pausanias, by the addition of the word φασί, seems not to have been himself quite convinced that the assertion of the Orchomenii was correct.
Strabo observes, that the Orchomenus of his time was supposed to stand on a different site from the more ancient city, the inundations of the lake having forced the inhabitants to retire from the plain towards Mount Acontium. This seems to accord with the position of the treasury on the outside of the existing walls, since it cannot be conceived that Minyas would have so placed it. It is probable, therefore, that the city, in the height of its power, extended to the extreme point of the hill below the treasury, and perhaps even to the bank of the Cephissus.
The monastery of Skripu stands about midway between the treasury and the river, below the lowest slope of the hill, on a level with the river’s

§ 2.152   bank. It contains a large church, consisting of a dome and three aisles, which was built, as some inscriptions coeval with the walls of the church indicate, at the end of the ninth century, by Leo, who held the dignity of Protospatharius under the emperors Basil, Leo, and Constantine the seventh. The monastery probably occupies the exact site of the temple of the Graces; for it is in the memory of the present occupants that the pedestal of a tripod dedicated to the Graces, which is now in the church, was found in an excavation made on the spot. Of the other inscriptions which the convent contains, two have been removed by the persons employed by the Earl of Elgin since I was last here; [The two removed are now in the British Museum: one of these, which is the longest of all, relates to a loan which had been made by a man of Elateia to Orchomenus, and partly liquidated. As interest for the remainder he was to enjoy a limited right of pasture in the Orchomenian land.] the rest I have transcribed. They are all, except one, in the Boeoto-Aeolic dialect, which employed the digamma, and are consequently very important to philology. Among them are three epitaphs of a very remote antiquity. All the other documents in which the digamma is employed are in characters of a good time of art, and appear to be all nearly of the same date. That one of them, having no appearance of being more recent than the others, is not so old as Alexander, is proved from its being a decree of Proxenia in favour of “an Αεοlian from Alexandreia,” or native of Alexandreia Troas, the name of which city was not changed from Antigoneia to Alexandreia until after the death of

§ 2.153   Alexander. It is probable, therefore, that they are all of the third or of the latter end of the fourth century B.C., as after that time the cities of Greece were rapidly impoverished, in consequence of the wars between the Romans and their adversaries, of which Greece became the scene. The document in which the digamma and other dialectic forms are not used, we may suppose to have been posterior to the distinction of dialects; but not long afterwards, as it contains, like one of the dialectic inscriptions, a catalogue of victors in the games, with many of the same titles, and is engraved in characters indicative of no great difference of date. In the inscriptions in which the digamma is employed, the people are ψalled ’Ερχομινίοι, and the town ’Ερχόμενός, an orthography clearly showing that the coins bearing the types of a Boeotian shield, of an ear of wheat, a grain of wheat, and a garland of olive, with the legend EPXO, EPX, EP, or E, were all the money of this celebrated and wealthy republic.
One of the inscriptions which is inserted in the exterior wall of the monastery, is a dedication to Bacchus by two victorious choregi; probably the stone supported a tripod, as certainly did another in the church, which records the dedication of a tripod to the Graces by the Boeotians by command of the oracle of Apollo.

§ 2.154   This oracle was probably that of Tegyra, a place noted for its temple of Apollo and oracular responses, and at that period of time, a dependency of Orchomenus. Of the three sepulchral inscriptions of remote antiquity to which I before alluded, one is that of a woman named Cydille, in the nominative; the two others, which are on one stone, are those of Baceuas and Dexon in the dative, preceded by επι. Κυδίλλη is written Κυδίλλε. Baceuas is Βακευfας with the digamma, as in the more modern Boeotic inscriptions, and Dexon is Δεχσον, when neither Ξ nor Ω were in the alphabet. The A, B, Δ, Λ, N, Σ, Y, X, are all of very antique forms, and most of them resemble the same letters in the Latin alphabet.
Exactly at the foot of the precipitous rocks which formed the limit of the northern side of the city, are the sources of the river anciently called Melas, and now Mavropotami, synonyms derived apparently from the dark colour of its deep transparent waters. Among several sources there are two much larger than the others, and both considerable rivers. One flows north-eastward, and at a distance of little more than half a mile meets the Cephissus, which a little beyond the junction becomes so enveloped among the marshes extending from thence to the heights to the north-east, on

§ 2.155   which stands a tower called Xeropyrgo, as to be scarcely traceable; but it re-appears in a single body about three miles to the eastward of Skripu, and after flowing for some distance in the direction of Kardhitza turns towards Topolia, where it enters the lake, which in the present season Alls the whole of the north-eastern bay of the Cephissian basin.
The other large source or branch of the Melas, which is to the westward of the former, follows for a considerable distance the foot of the cliffs of Orchomenus, and is then lost in the marshes. This illustrates Plutarch, who, after having remarked that “the plain of Orchomenus is the largest and finest in Boeotia, but naked of trees and plants, except towards the Melas,” observes, that “this river rises below the city of Orchomenus, and is the only river in Greece which is navigable at its sources, though it has not a long course, the greater part being lost in impervious and muddy marshes, and the remainder uniting with the Cephissus near the place where the lake produces the auletic reed.” According to the same author, the Melas augmented about the summer solstice, like the Nile, and produced plants of the same kind as those of the Nile, but not so large, and bearing no fruit.
Although I cannot obtain a confirmation of the periodical swelling of the Melas from the present inhabitants, such a negative testimony will hardly

§ 2.156   invalidate the observation of the more enlightened native of the neighbouring Chaeroneia, especially as such an increase of waters about midsummer seems no more than natural, the subterraneous river, which here emerges from its limestone cavities, being probably fed by the melting of the snows on Helicon or Parnassus, and its water, therefore, being naturally most abundant in the season when the snows melt with the greatest rapidity. The marshes still produce in abundance the reeds for which Orchomenus was anciently noted. The auletic or flute-reed is described by Pliny as very long, and without knots. Plutarch observes, that the best were produced near the junction of the Cephissus and Melas. But the latter river was not generally favourable to them, according to Theophrastus, who mentions as the best situations some deep pools called the Chytri, in a place named Pelicania, between the Melas and Cephissus; the confluence of the Probatia and that of the Cephissus with the lake, a place to the northward of the latter junction, named Boedrias, and generally wherever the water was deep and the bottom muddy. Hence the growth and quality depended upon the depth of water in the lake, which varied annually, and was said to be greatest every ninth year. Distinct from the auletic reed were the

§ 2.157   Characeias, or reed serving to make fences and pallisades, which was very thick and strong, and grew on the banks of the lake; and the Plotia, so called as growing on the πλοαaς, or floating islands, which, like those of the Lake of Ioannina, are formed of decayed reeds, rushes, and roots of grass, furnishing a soil for fresh plants, and which, detaching themselves from the edge of large tracts of the same materials, are launched into the lake by the wind.
These and other peculiarities of the Cephissis it would be interesting to examine more minutely, but not a single monoxylo is possessed by any of the villages on this side of the plain. Hence the inhabitants derive little or no benefit from either the vegetable or animal productions of the lake and its surrounding marshes, though the monks of Skripu describe all the watery parts as being covered at times with water-fowl, and are fully aware of the excellence of those eels so renowned among the ancient Athenians, and which the monks describe as large, white, of delicate flavour, and light of digestion. They are taken in considerable numbers by the people of Topolia in the permanent part of the lake near that town, from whence, either fresh or salted, they are carried for sale throughout the surrounding country, especially in the time of Lent. When both Attica and Boeotia were rich and populous, the Cephissis and other lakes of Boeotia furnished the people of this province with the means of a constant and advantageous traffic with Attica, which possesses not a single trout stream, nor a lake except that of Marathon, which

§ 2.158   in the summer is reduced to such small dimensions, that a Boeotian eel could hardly exist in it.
Although the ancients employed the words Cephissis and Copais without any clear discrimination, a very convenient distinction may be made between the Copais or lake of Copae, which was the north-eastern extremity of the basin, where even in summer some water always remains, and the Cephissis, which comprehends the whole tract of occasional lakes and marshes, impassably limited by a range of heights on the northern and eastern sides, but blended with the plain in the opposite quarter, and in all directions enlarging or diminishing its boundaries according to the season. At present the plain is dry half way from Skripu to Xeropyrgo, the rest is a marsh; the edge of which follows a line drawn from Xeropyrgo to Petra; but the level of the waters is now much lower than it is expected to be in the spring. Southerly gales, as Pausanias has observed, are apt to inundate the levels near Orchomenus.
The fertility of this plain is shown by its maize: I counted 900 grains in one cob; the reed is very strong and large, and, plastered with mud, it forms the most common material of the cottages near the Cephissic marshes. The stem contains a considerable quantity of saccharine matter: I have often seen the Egyptians eat it like a sugar cane, but here it is too valuable to be much used in its immature state.
The citadel of Orchomenus, besides the unlimited view which it commands of the great western basin of Boeotia, and its renowned barriers, looks down

§ 2.159   to the north-east upon a country of considerable extent, lying between the mountains of Talanda and the northern shore of the lake. It is cultivated around a few villages, but in general furnishes pasture only, the soil being, in most parts, of no great fertility. The principal villages are Lutzi, Radhi and Pavlo, lying in that order from hence, and all belonging to the district of Thebes. Beyond them in the mountains towards the Euboic frith, are Proskyna and Malesina in the Vilayeti of Talanda, and Martino in that of Livadhia.
Xeropyrgo, situated three miles E.N.E.of Skripu, on the heights which hound the marshes, is probably the site of Tegyra, for Plutarch says that Tegyra stood not far from Orchomenus, above the marshes of the Melas, and that the road from the one to the other led through a pass caused by those marshes. This pass was the scene of an important victory gained by Pelopidas over the Spartans, and which was soon followed by that of Leuctra. Tegyra not being named in the Homeric catalogue of the Boeotian cities, and having been so near to the powerful Orchomenus, was probably never of any great importance, except from its temple of Apollo, and an Oracle which had ceased before the battle of Tegyra. In the time of Plutarch all the part of Boeotia to the northward of the lake Copais, seems to have been no better inhabited than it is at present, for in one of his Dialogues he introduces an assertion, that about Tegyra and Mount Ptoum, two places formerly so much famed for their oracles, hardly a

§ 2.160   herdsman or shepherd was to be met with in a day’s journey. All Greece, he adds, could hardly furnish 3000 hoplitae, or the number which the State of Megara alone sent against the Persians at Plataea. It is not to be supposed, however, that the best parts of Greece were as much depopulated as these unproductive districts; or that the population of Greece had diminished, in the same proportion as the number of regular troops maintained by it. The Roman conquest had put an end to the maintenance of native soldiers, and to the military art in Greece, and although as early as the time of Polybius, the population and wealth of the country had been grievously diminished, and had not improved in the reign of Augustus, there can be little doubt, that between this time and that of Hadrian, Greece had somewhat recovered, in consequence of the peace and protection which the country enjoyed in common with the other provinces of the Roman Empire, and to a greater degree than many of them.

§ 2.161   CHAPTER 13 BOEOTIA, PHOCIS, LOCRIS
Dec. 9.—This forenoon, having quitted the monastery of Skripu, I cross the north-eastern angle of the ancient city, and at 10.58 begin to pass by a narrow paved road, between the foot of the upper cliffs which formed the northern boundary of the city and the summit of the lower, which immediately overhang the principal source of the Melas, or that which joins the Cephissus. It is difficult to understand where the Temple of Hercules could have been, which Pausanias places at the springs

§ 2.162   of the Melas, seven stades from Orchomenus, for the rock rises so abruptly from them, that there is no position for a temple, and the sources are not seven stades from Orchomenus, but immediately under its northern side. At 11.9, we quit the lower range of cliffs, the higher still overhanging the road, and soon afterwards begin to descend the rugged side of the mountain, by a most perilous path. At 11.33, having arrived at the foot of the hill, we enter a plain on the north-eastern side of Mount Acontium, bounded eastward by the marshes of the Melas, and pursue the borders of the marsh to Tzamali, a small collection of huts on the brink, where we arrive at 11.45. This seems to be the site of Aspledon, a Boeotian city in the time of the Trojan war, but in that of the Roman Empire an abandoned site of the Orchomenia. Strabo states, that its distance from Orchomenus was twenty stades, which is sufficiently correct, and that the Melas flowed between them, which is true as to the northern Melas, though it is not crossed in the road. It is not easy, however, to understand “the western exposure,” by which Strabo endeavours to account for Eudeielus, the name of Aspledon in later times, Tzamali being open to the eastward, and surrounded by heights in a western direction. Nor is the abandonment of the place by its inhabitants in consequence of the scarcity of

§ 2.163   water, as reported by Pausanias, compatible with the vicinity of such a river as the Melas. Upon examining, however the words of the two authors, we find that neither of them guarantees the fact which he alludes to, from his personal knowledge. The word τάχα, employed by Strabo, and the φασι of Pausanias, leave the origin of the name, Eudeielus, and the cause of the abandonment of the site of Aspledon, equally doubtful.
At Tzamali we quit the Topolia road and turn to the left to the head of the plain; at 11.55 leave to the right that which conducts to the places lying between the northern shore of the Cephissis and the Euboic frith, and at 12.11, arriving at the western extremity of the plain of Aspledon, ascend some rugged hills which connect Mount Acontium with the peak now called Khlomo. At 12.35, at the head of the ascent, we enter upon a plain which, interrupted by some small heights, reaches to the northern side of Mount Acontium, and is connected in the opposite direction with a hollow which slopes to Khubavo, Belissi, and the Stena of the Cephissus. At 12.45 we halt till 1.24 at a fountain to dine; and after a rugged descent, arrive at 1.40 at Exarkho, a village of 30 houses, in a spot where two narrow valleys meet, which rise from hence towards two summits of the ridge of Khlomo. The northern is the largest, and is in great part cultivated.

§ 2.164   On a peaked hill above Exarkho, to the west, are the ruins of a small polis, probably Abae. The hill being, like all the others of this range, a bare rugged rock of white limestone, and the walls being built of the same stone, the ruins might easily be passed without notice at a short distance, although nearly half the height of the wall is in some places extant. No remains are now to be seen on the summit of the peak; but on its southwestern side two parallel walls are traceable at the distance of about 100 yards asunder, which formed apparently an interior inclosure of the citadel. These walls in most part are a perfect specimen of the second order of Hellenic masonry, having, as it were, but one course in the whole work. Some of the polygonal masses are very large. As usual in Greek fortresses of the highest antiquity, there were very few towers, the cross defence being chiefly procured by simple flanks at intervals. There is one tower, however, near the principal gate. This gate, which is now buried to within six feet of the top, is of a singular form, the upper part, which is three feet high, diminishing from ten feet in breadth to seven and a half. This seems to have been merely an opening to admit light, for immediately below it there are projections from the wall on each side, which were evidently pivots for the suspension of folding doors. There are the vestiges of two other gates immediately opposite to each other in the parallel walls before noticed. The hill is quite insulated, and is very difficult of ascent on the north-eastern and eastern sides, where no walls are now traceable. I cannot recognize any remains of the theatre which

§ 2.165   Pausanias remarked, and which, as well as the Agora, was of an antique construction. Having descended the hill on the west, passed through a ravine, and entered the plain at a point which is half way on the road from Exarkho to Vogdhani, we arrive a little farther at a small eminence advancing into the valley, upon which are some remains of a square building of regular Hellenic masonry, but built of stones smaller than usual. The lower part of the wall of one side of the inclosure is extant, together with a portion of one of the adjoining sides. Within the inclosed space lies a large square stone, with a simple moulding, together with another, circular and pierced in the middle, probably the peristomium of a cistern or granary. I have little doubt that these are remains of the temple of Apollo of Abae, whose oracle was of such ancient and extensive celebrity, that it was consulted, together with that of Trophonius, by Croesus, and again by Mardonius. It was twice destroyed by fire; the first time by the Persians, in their march through Phocis, after they had taken Hyampolis; and again, in the Phocic war, B.C. 346. The Boeotians were posted at the temple, while the Phocians were erecting a fortress at or near Abae, when a fire

§ 2.166   having occurred, accidentally according to Diodorus, but which Pausanias attributes with more probability to the Thebans, the temple was destroyed, as well as some Phocian refugees within it. Hence it is evident that the temple was not within the city, which agrees with the existing ruins. The most ancient and celebrated temples of Greece were generally so detached. The grove of Trophonius furnishes a neighbouring example, and perhape that of the Graces at Orchomenus was another. The practice was closely connected with the peculiar character of the people, whose sense of the inviolability of the sacred places, was only exceeded by their jealous mistrust of one another. After the second misfortune, the temple of Abae remained a ruin until the reign of Hadrian, when that emperor caused a smaller to be erected adjacent to the ancient building; and of this, or rather of its peribolus, the existing walls are probably the remains. In the new temple, Pausanias found three ancient upright statues, in brass, of Apollo, Latona, and Diana, which were dedications of the Abaei, and had perhaps been, saved from the former temple.
From hence it takes me 10 minutes to ride to Vogdhani a village smaller than Exarkho, and situated just at the upper extremity of a valley, which slopes to Belissi and Khubavo, and where the torrents from Mount Khlomo and the adjoining ridges unite, and descend through the middle of the aforesaid valley to the Cephissus.

§ 2.167   The principal branch comes from the north, along a vale which is inclosed between Mount Khlomo and a parallel ridge which has already been described as having its south-western termination at Khubavo, Merali, and Sfaka, at the northern entrance of the Stena of the Cephissus.
At 5 minutes northward of Vogdhani, a point or tongue, advancing from the western mountain into the valley, is crowned with the ruins of a small ancient town, which Pausanias shows to have been Hyampolis; for he states that the road from Orchomenus to Opus led by Abae and Hyampolis, but that Abae was a little on the left of the route Mount Khlomo being exactly interposed between Skripu and Talanda, near which latter Opus was situated, the road from Orchomenus to Opus naturally followed the easy valleys to the westward of that mountain, instead of making a direct course over it, and traversed consequently the site of Exarkho, leaving the hill of Abae on the left, from whence it passed under the walls of Hyampolis, which advance into the middle of the valley. The road from Hyampolis to Elateia is expressly described by Pausanias as a mountain-road; and we find accordingly, that a mountain occupies all the space between Lefta and Vogdhani.

§ 2.168  Hyampolis having been situated at the entrance of a narrow vale, leading to the Opontia and seacoast of the Epicnemidii, and which formed a convenient entrance from Locris both into Phocis and into Boeotia: its name occurs on several occasions in ancient history. Herodotus has related some remarkable circumstances attending a victory gained at Hyampolis by the Phocians over the Thessalians, and Diodorus informs us, that a contest took place here on a somewhat similar occasion, between the people of Boeotia and of Phocis, in the year B.C. 347. Before that time, Jason of Pherae, returning out of Boeotia after the battle of Leuctra, and passing by Hyampolis in his way to Heracleia Trachinia, had taken the προάστίιον, or outer city, probably from the same motive which prompted him to destroy the walls of Heracleia, namely, that they should not be any impediment to his free passage into Greece. It was undoubtedly for a similar reason that the walls of Hyampolis were demolished by Philip son of Amyntas.
The entire circuit of the fortifications is traceable, but they are most complete on the western side. The masonry is of the third, nearly approaching to the most regular kind. The circumference is about three quarters of a mile. The direct distance to this ruin from the summit of Abae is not more than a mile and a half in a north-west direction. Below Vogdhani, on the side of a steep bank which falls to the valley of Khubavo, a fountain issuing from the rock is discharged through two spouts into a stone reservoir of ancient construction, which stands probably in its original place.

§ 2.169   Dec. 10.—Ten minutes from Vogdhani southwestward, is another source of water, which issues from the rocks on the side of the road leading from Talanda to Livadhia, near three small ruined churches standing in a grove of trees: the stream from the rocks having joined that which flows from the fountain of Vogdhani, falls into the united torrent from the valleys of Abae and Hyampolis, and from thence flows to the Cephissus near Belissi. One of the ruined churches contains an inscribed stone, but ill preserved, and in so dark a situation that I was unable to copy it, though I could distinguish the words αργυρίου μνας τριάκοντα, and at the end μάρτυρας oi θεοί. Having returned to Vogdhani, and set out for Talanda, I again visit the ruins of Hyampolis. On a small level in the centre of the ancient site lie some architectural fragments of considerable dimensions, adorned with mouldings, and a large cistern faced at the top with wrought stones, but below hollowed out of the rock, which is here covered only with a thin layer of earth. The opening of the cistern is 9 feet 10 inches long, and 4 feet broad, and spreads below into the usual spheroidal form; it is now filled with rubbish.

§ 2.170   There are many other smaller cisterns of the same kind, some of which are lined with stucco. The ground within the fortress is partly cultivated. The valley of Hyampolis, like most of the similar sites in Boeotia, has a light fertile soil, but is marshy in winter.
Pausanias says of Hyampolis, that though it had been burnt by Xerxes, and again destroyed by Philip, there remained an ancient Agora, a small council-house, a theatre not far from the gates, a stoa built by Hadrian, and a temple of Diana, of which he did not see the statue, as it was shown only twice a year. He adds, that with the exception of a single well, the inhabitants had no other water than that which fell from heaven. The larger receptacle, therefore, was probably a public cistern, and the smaller excavations may have been private repositories for the same purpose. Abae was no better supplied with water than Hyampolis, but both of them had a good resource at no great distance in the fountains which I have described.
Leaving the ruins at 10.13, we follow the valley Which conducts to Talanda, and which at the widest part is half a mile broad, bounded on either side by the lower heights of the two including ridges. To the left leads the road to Kalapodhi, Geli, and a monastery of St. Elias; a part, probably, of the ancient ύρπνη οδος, from Hyampolis to Elateia. On our right are the steeps of Mount Khlomos, or Khlomo. At 10.43 the village of Valtesi is a quarter of a mile on the left; above which the vale narrows rapidly: instead of following it we ascend

§ 2.171   the lower heights of Khlomo, when Kalapodhi soon appears in a cultivated slope of the opposite hills, two miles in direct distance from us, and three miles distant Geli in a higher situation, to the northward of the former. St. Elias is on the other side of the ridge of Geli. We now pass over barren hills covered with the purno-kokki oak: at 11.18, Purnari, which derives its name from those shrubs, is a mile on the left, at the head of the little valley of Valtesi, which has now dwindled to a mere ravine. Soon afterwards, crossing a brook which flows into the plain of Talanda, we descend the mountain, and at 12.20, after a halt of 15 minutes arrive in the plain, at the entrance of which are some mills turned by the same stream. We then diverge to the right under Mount Khlomo, and at 12.38 enter Talanda, or Talandi.
This town contains about 300 houses, of which one-third are Turkish; some of these are large, and each having its garden, they look well at a distance; but the greater part are said to be desolate, and verging to ruin, partly in consequence of a plague, which carried off entire families not many years ago. The governor is Issed Bey, a son of the Kapijilar Kiayassy of Aly Pasha. The Greek quarter is separated from the Turkish. The bishop του Ταλαντίου, who is a suffragan of the metropolitan of Athens, is at the head of the community, and has a tolerable house at the Episkopi, standing in a garden of oranges, lemons, and other fruit trees, which, although a mere wilderness, is the best

§ 2.172   in the place, and is considered as something extraordinary in this country. The plain is very fertile, but little cultivated for want of hands. The marshy parts towards the sea yield kalambokki, the rest of the plain excellent wheat, vines, from which a tolerable wine is made, and a few olive trees, which succeed perfectly. The merokamato, or price of daily labour, is the same as at Athens, Livadhia, ac.; namely, forty paras a-day, with an oke of wine. The district contains between thirty and forty villages, the greater part of which are very small, and but half inhabited, many of the people having migrated to the districts of Livadhia and Athens since Aly Pasha has possessed the place. The mukata is now in the hands of his son Vely, who is endeavouring to induce the emigrants to return, by promising to remit a part of the impositions. The town stands entirely in the plain, but immediately at the foot of a steep and lofty mountain called Rodha, which is connected with Khlomo, and a branch of which intercepts the view of the south-eastern extremity of the gulf, while an advanced ridge of the mountain called Xerovuni obstructs it to the northward, leaving the plain only, which is included between them, visible from the town, and beyond it the Gulf of Talanda, the Euboic channel, and the cultivated region round Rovies in Euboea, on either side of which, but particularly to the southward, that coast consists of steep high cliffs.

§ 2.173   The island of Atalanta, now called Talandonisi, which is separated by a narrow frith from the Boeotian shore, and extends into the centre of the gulf, shelters the Skala, or port of Talanda, which is an hour distant from the town to the east; there are at present two three-masted vessels lying in the harbour.
It is evident that the modern town has derived its appellation from the island, for the loss of the initial vowel is common in the transition of ancient names into modern, and thus Talanda affords one among many instances in Greece of a preservation of name with a change of position.
Many fragments of Hellenic buildings are dispersed about the town. Among them I remarked a frize of Ionic dentils at the fountain in the Greek quarter, and some Ionic capitals in two ruined churches; a marble chair in a church on the outside of the town: in that of St. Panteleemon a broken inscription, which has been published by Meletius, and in that of St. Theodore another, which, as well as the former, contains the name of Opus. But notwithstanding these remains, and that Talanda occupies an advantageous and agreeable situation, abounding in water, it is certain that Opus was not exactly in this spot. The distance of Talanda is much too great from the sea to correspond with the testimony of Strabo and Livy, the former of whom places Opus at a distance of

§ 2.174   fifteen stades from the shore, the latter only a mile. The mountain, moreover, which rises immediately behind Talanda, steep and unbroken, affords no site for an acropolis, nor are there any traces of ancient walls to be found at Talanda.
At Kardhenitza, on the other hand, a village situated an hour to the south-eastward of Talanda, on the side of the hill which rises from that comer of the plain, and just above the inner extremity of the Opontian gulf, there exist the remains of an ancient city in a position more elevated than Talanda, and at a distance from the sea corresponding to the fifteen stades of Strabo. On the ridge above Kardhenitza stands a single tower, partly Hellenic, and conspicuous from all the plain of Talanda as well as from other parts of the adjacent country. It was well placed for commanding the road leading from the Opontia into Boeotia round the eastern side of Mount Khlomo. The inner extremity of the Opontian Gulf below Kardhenitza is a shallow bay bounded by a high peninsula on the north-western side; and on its opposite shore, joined by a river, which flows from a village called Proskyna, and which, as it corresponds to the Platanus of Pausanias, may guide us to the positions of Corseia, Cyrtones, and Halae.
Strabo confirms the position of Opus at Kardhenitza, by remarking that Cynus, the επινειον or emporium of Opus, was sixty stades distant from that city, on the cape which terminated the Opontian Gulf; and that a fertile plain lay between

§ 2.175   the two places, thus leaving little doubt that Cynus occupied the north-western cape of the gulf, where at the distance of about a mile to the north of the village of Livanates, is a tower called Paleopyrgo, and some Hellenic remains, distant about eight miles, in a direct line from Kardhenitza. On the heights above Livanates inland are the ruins of a Hellenic fortress, which seems to have been intended for the protection of Cynus towards Elateia, in the same manner as the tower before-mentioned protected Opus towards Orchomenus. Such having been the positions of Cynus and Opus, it is evident that Livy has given an incorrect idea of that of Cynus, in his narrative of the campaign of the year B.C. 207, when the Romans and Attalus king of Pergamus, were engaged in assisting the Aetolians against Philip. He relates, that when Attalus occupied Opus, Sulpicius, with the Roman fleet, anchored at Cynus, on his return from an unsuccessful attempt upon Chalcis, and his words are, “Romanus celeriter abstitit incepto, classemque mde ad Cynum Locridis (emporium id est urbis Opuntiorum mille passuum a mari sitae) trajecit,” giving the idea that Cynus was on the shore immediately below Opus, instead of being sixty stades distant. He had probably misapprehended Polybius, whose narrative he followed.

§ 2.176   Rovies, which is on the coast of Euboea, nearly opposite to Cynus, is a small town partly inhabited by Turks, but chiefly by Greeks. Here are some remains of the walls of Orobiae, of which Rovies is the modern form by the usual changes. Lipso indicates, by a similar corruption, the site of Aedepsus, and its hot baths, which were sacred to Hercules, are said to be still called τα θερμά. The distance from Cynus seems correctly stated by Strabo.
The eastern Locrians, the only Locri mentioned by Homer, and who were all under the command of Ajax, son of Oileus, are described by the poet as “the Locrians who dwelt opposite to Euboea”; at a later period they were divided into two parts by a narrow branch of Phocis, containing the district of Daphnus, which thus caused Phocis to extend from the Corinthiae to the Maliac Gulf. Daphnus, however, falling to ruin, and its lands having been assigned to the Opontii, the Locrians then occupied the whole shore from Thermopylae to Halae in Boeotia. If Strabo is correct, Daphnus might be exactly recognized by its distance of ninety stades from Cynus, and of one hundred and twenty from Elateia, as well as by its harbour. Between it and Cynus was Alope.

§ 2.177  Cnemides was a fortress, the situation of which may be recognized near the modern Nikoraki by its position on a projection of the coast opposite to the islands anciently named Lichades, and the Euboean promontory Kenaion.

§ 2.178   The site of Thronium was ascertained by Meletius, who found above the village Romani, at a place named Paleokastro, where some remains of the city still exist, a dedicatory inscription of the council and demus of the Thronienees. The situation is at the distance from the sea which Strabo mentions, on the bank of a broad torrent perfectly corresponding to the Boagrius, which flowed by Thronium, and which is described by Strabo as sometimes dry and sometimes flowing with a stream two plethra in width. Thronium was the chief town of the Epicnemidii, where the coins with the legend ΛΟΚ.ΕΠΙΚ. or ΛΟΚΡ. ΕΠΙΚΝΑ. were probably struck.
Thirty stades from Thronium, towards Nicaea and Thermopylae, stood another Locrian town, Scarpheia, ten stades from the sea, and something less than thirty from another place of which the name is lost. It appears from Pausanias that Scarpheia was in the ordinary route from Elateia to Thermopylae by Thronium, and equally so from Livy, who states that Quinctius, before the battle of Cynoscephalae, marched from Elateia by Thronium and Scarpheia to Heracleia. By this circumstance, therefore, and by the numbers of Strabo, the exact position of Scarpheia is ascertained to have been between the villages 'Andera by a view of the promontory,

§ 2.179   and Molo, which being fixed, it will follow that the deficient name in the text of Strabo is either Nicaea, of which the probable position has already been indicated, or the town which stood at Pundonitza; for to either of them the something less than thirty stades would be applicable. If the latter place was intended, the deficient word may have been Tarphe, or Pharygae, the former of which was the Homeric name, and the latter that attached in the time of Strabo to a town which then possessed a temple of Juno Pharygaea, and was supposed to be a colony of Argos. Tarphe was the only Homeric town in Locris then inhabited; and Pundonitza, from its strength, its fertile plain, and the relative importance and convenience of its position, is more likely than any other to have preserved its inhabitants then, as it does to this day. Its territory perfectly corresponds to the well-wooded and productive district which Strabo ascribes to Tarphe; and the word Pharygae is well adapted to a situation like that of Pundonitza, in the midst of the passes leading over Mount Cnemis into Phocis. Although the other Homeric towns of the Locri were no longer in existence, their sites were known. Augeiae was

§ 2.180   near Scarpheia, and Bessa and Calliarus were names descriptive of the places to which they were attached: the former among the woods of Mount Cnemis, the latter in a district well suited to the plough ’, and hence, probably, in some part of the elevated plain which lies between Pundonitza and Mount Cnemis. Calliarus was perhaps the place twenty stades from Tarphe, of which the name is wanting in Strabo.
The most difficult question in the geography of this part of the country, is that of the ancient appellation of the peak, now called Khlomo, the most conspicuous of the secondary summits of this part of Greece, and presenting itself on all sides as a mountain which could not have failed to have had some celebrity among the ancients. Was it the proper Cnemis, and were the ridges which lie between it and Callidromus, considered only subordinate portions of the same mountain ? some of the best authorities support this opinion. Anciently there was no distinction of Opontii and Epicnemidii, nor are the latter mentioned by Homer or Herodotus or Thucydides or Polybius, when speaking of the Eastern Locrians, of whom Opus was considered the metropolis.

§ 2.181   Even Strabo, from whom the distinction is chiefly derived, in one place describes Opus as the metropolis of the Epicnemidii, and the same is confirmed by Pliny and Stephanus. If Pliny is incorrect in adding that the river Cephissus flowed through the Epicnemidii to the sea, he shews at least that he protracted their boundaries quite to Boeotia, which accords with Mount Khlomo, and not with any mountain to the north-westward of it. Pausanias, though he has not employed the word Epicnemidii on any occasion, but has applied to all the Eastern Locrians the name Hypocnemidii, or Locrians under Mount Cnemis, includes among them the Opontii, as he shows in alluding to the mention of the Opontii by Herodotus, but more particularly in his description of the bounds of Phocis. “The Phocians,” he says, at the beginning of his Phocica, “extend to the sea opposite to the Peloponnesus and towards Boeotia, from Cirrha, the port of Delphi, to the city Anticyra. But towards the Maliac Gulf they are prevented from being a maritime people by the Hypocnemidii, who border on Phocis in that direction; these are the Scarphenses beyond Elateia, and above Hyampolis and Abae, those who possess Opus and its port Cynus.” It is probable that Pausanias here specifies Scarpheia, because it was the only town in that part of Locris subsisting in his time. From these several testimonies the inference would not be unreasonable, that the whole mountainous ridge of Eastern Locris was called Cnemis,

§ 2.182   and consequently that Khlomo, the highest, and by far the most remarkable summit, was the proper Cnemis. Upon examining the places themselves, however, there is great difficulty in agreeing to such an opinion. Mount Khlomo is so completely separated from the ridges of Fondana and Grados by the valley leading from Hyampolis into the Opontian plain, that it cannot be conceived that the two mountains were ever considered identical, or that they had not some separate denomination. Strabo more than once informs us, that the district of Daphnus, on the shore of the Euboic strait which was afterwards ascribed to the Opontii, belonged in more ancient times to Phocis, and thus separated the Opontii bordering on Phocis and Boeotia, from the Epicnemidii bordering on the Oetaei and Malienses. Now it is impossible to suppose that the proper Cnemis should at any time have been excluded from the Epicnemidii as distinguished from the Opontii, which it would have been when Daphnus belonged to Phocis, if we identify Cnemis with Khlomo. The position of the fortress of Cnemides, moreover, exactly at the foot of the central part of the mountains, which extend from the plain of Pundonitza to that of Talanda, is a strong proof that this was the real Mount Cnemis, which we may easily believe to have been sometimes considered as comprehending the district of Opus within its denomination, because it stretches into the plain of Opus, and because Cynus, the naval dependency of Opus, was in fact situated on its eastern extremity. On the other hand, it would be very difficult to believe that Mount Khlomo was

§ 2.183   ever entirely included within the boundaries of Locris, as it is surrounded on every side, except the north, by Phocic and Boeotian districts. Little can be adduced on either side of this question from the remark of Strabo, (p. 425), that Mount Cnemis was fifty stades distant from Cynus, since we are at liberty to make the measurement from the site of Cynus either to the nearest part of Mount Khlomo, or to the mountain of Grados, and in either case it will not be found very incorrect. So doubtful, however, is the text of Strabo in this place, that he may very possibly have meant by fifty stades, the distance, not to Mount Cnemis, but to Alope.
Upon the whole, I have little hesitation in concluding that the maritime summits lying between Pundonitza and Cynus, together perhaps with that more inland, named Fondana, were the proper Cnemis. Khlomo perhaps bore the same appellation as a Boeotian town described by Pausanias as built upon a lofty mountain, which from the tenor of his narrative could hardly have been any other than Khlomo. After having informed us that Holmones and Hyettus were villages of the ancient Orchomenia, the former twelve stades from Copae, the latter seven stades from Holmones, and that Hyettus still contained a temple, in which the sick sought remedies for their diseases, and where the Deity was worshipped under the shape of a rude stone,—he proceeds to remark, that about twenty stades beyond Hyettus stood Cyrtones, more anciently called Cyrtone. “It is built,” he adds,

§ 2.184   “upon a lofty mountain, and contains a grove, and temple of Apollo, with upright statues of Apollo and Diana, a source of cold water issuing from a rock, a temple of Nymphs at the source, and a small grove of planted trees.” After having crossed the mountain from Cyrtones, occurred the small town Corseia, half a stade below which there was a grove of wild trees, chiefly the holly-oak, and a small statue of Hermes in the open air. In the plain below, the river Platanus joined the sea, on the right of which was the small maritime city Halae, the last of those belonging to the Boeotians on the sea which separated Locris from Euboea. Considering the position of the Orchomenia in general with relation to that of Copae, now Topolia, and of the river Platanus near the maritime frontier of Boeotia at Halae, we cannot but infer that Holmones, Hyettus and Cyrtone, lay in a north-western direction from Copae, that the road to Corseia crossed Mount Khlomo not far to the eastward of the peak, and that as this summit is the only mountain in this part of Boeotia meriting the description of an opoς υψηλόν, the city Cyrtone was very near it on the eastern side. Whether any ruins still exist to confirm this opinion, remains to be explored. Corseia is noticed by Demosthenes and Diodorus as an important fortress of Boeotia; in the Phocic war it fell into the hands of the Phocians, together with Orchomenus and Coroneia. I am informed that ruins corresponding in situation to the description of Pausanias still exist near Proskyno, from the

§ 2.185   heights around which is collected the river, which I suppose to have been the Platanus.
Between the mouth of this river, and the shore below Opus, a large stream issues from the mountain, and joins the bay of Armyra to the eastward of the salt sources, from which that harbour takes its name. In a country where subterraneous rivers so often occur, we may readily suspect this stream to originate in the Cephissic basin, which has no discharge for its superfluous waters but through the mountains which separate it from the Euboic frith. Now it is remarkable, that Strabo notices a chasm near Orchomenus, which absorbed the waters of the Melas. and that in illustration of these words of the geographer, there is, to the northward of Orchomenus,' between Tzamali and Xeropyrgo, a bay similar to that at the north-eastern end of the lake, where the Cephissus begins its subterraneous course. I have already stated, that the northern Melas, instead of flowing like the southern to the Cephissus, takes from its very sources a direction entirely different, and which, although I could not trace it through the marshes, tends exactly towards the bay above mentioned; there is a great probability therefore that the stream finds its way through the marshes, and flowing to the end of the bay, there enters a Katavothra, of which the emissory is the river which issues between Opus and the mouth of the Platamis;

§ 2.186   for this point is exactly at the end of the shortest line through the mountains, from the extremity of the bay of the Cephissis near Tzamali. In summer, the question might perhaps be resolved, even by a distant view from the heights of Orchomenus, without descending into the unhealthy marshes. An actual inspection is the more necessary, as the testimony of Strabo regarding the chasm of the Melas is not free from suspicion: for he describes the Melas as flowing through the Haliartia, which being at the opposite end of the Cephissic basin, either shows Strabo to have been very ignorant of the locality, or his text to be here, as in so many other places, very much corrupted.
Dec. 11.—After employing the morning in a tour around Talanda, I proceed at 1.30, on my return to Livadhia, by the way of Parapotamu, and the Boeoto-Phocic straits. At 2.20 leave the road to Vogdhani on the left, and cross into the little vale of Purnari, which is connected with that of Valtesi, though a low ridge immediately above the latter village separates the course of the waters, flowing respectively to the Opontian bay and to the Cephissus. At 3, leaving Valtesi a little on the left, we ascend a cultivated champaign, which is separated from the valley of Khubavo and Belissi by the rocky mountain on the western side of the pass of Hyampolis; and on the other side is bounded by the rugged heights extending to Elateia, and in the direction of Cnemis. In the midst of this elevated valley stands the small village of Kalapodhi, where we arrive at 3.25, having stopt a few minutes at a

§ 2.187   ruined church on the side of the road, composed almost entirely of wrought stones and other Hellenic remains, among which are some portions of frizes and architraves; a little farther two pieces of a large Doric column, 4 feet 2 inches in diameter, lie nearly buried in the ground. These dimensions indicate the former existence of some large building in this place, for it is not easy to believe that such masses could have been brought hither from the temple of Abae, which is 4 miles distant, still less from that of Minerva Cranaea, near Elateia, which is at a much greater distance and separated by rugged hills.
In the church-yard at Kalapodhi lies a sepulchral stone, bearing the common ornament of a cockle-shell between two roses, and inscribed with the word 'Αμύνανΰρος in beautiful characters. Possibly the district around Kalapodhi was that of the Locrian town Naryx, noted for having been the birth-place of Ajax, son of the Oileus; for it is evident, from the description of the coast of Locris by Strabo, that Naryx was not near the sea; and there are two historical occurrences recorded by Diodorus, in which the reference to Naryx is well suited to this position. In the year B.C. 395, the same in which Lysander was slain at Haliartus, Ismenias, commander of the Boeotians, undertook an expedition against Phocis, and defeated the Phocians near Naryx of Locris; whence it appears that Naryx was near the frontier of Phocis. In the year 352, Phayllus, who commanded the Phocians, and their allies, and who not long before had been

§ 2.188   defeated by the Boeotians near Orchomenus, again on the Cephissus, and a third time near Coroneia, invaded the Epicnemidii, took several towns, occupied and lost Naryx, and advanced to Abae, where he was surprized by the Boeotians, who, elated by this success, entered and laid waste Phocis,—but in attempting to relieve Naryx, which was again besieged by Phayllus, were defeated by him. The town was in consequence taken by Phayllus, who soon afterwards died. The Doric column may have belonged to the principal temple of the Narycii, where Ajax doubtless received heroic honours.
Having lost 10 minutes at Kalapodhi, we proceed along the valley, and arrive at 3.47 at a rugged ridge, where begins the descent into the plain of Elateia. Dhragomano and Lefta are not seen, on account of a projection of the mountains on the right, but Turkokhorio is visible. At 4.15 we arrive at Sfaka, a small hamlet on the descent, and from thence, after having halted 10 minutes, descend into the plain at the point of the rocky mountain, which beginning from hence, stretches eastward to Vogdhani, where it forms the western side of the pass of Hyampolis; many copious springs issue from the mountain, and not only form a long lake at the foot of it, but make this whole comer of the Elatic plain marshy during the greater part of the year. A paved causeway leading to Lefta and Turkokhorio passes above the springs along the foot of the mountain, which to the very summit is a mere rock.

§ 2.189   The marshy edges of the lake begin a little below Sfaka, and the lake is prolonged round the point of the mountain as far as opposite Merali. where a stream issues from it, which, as I before remarked, joins the Cephissus, in the Stena; a part of the water is conducted by a canal to some mills between Merali and Khubavo.
We arrive opposite Merali at 5.5, but are obliged to make a detour in order to cross the canal and river, the latter by a bridge. The best lodging which the village affords, is a long cottage of the usual kind, but in this instance so filled with oxen, horses, asses, bags of wheat, and baskets of kalambokki, that with difficulty I find space sufficient in it. The wheat is the produce of the ημεροκάματο, or day-labourers’ share of the harvest, which is a kuveli of 22 okes per diem, now selling at Livadhia for 5 1/2 piastres; to this is added an oke of wine. The wages in the cultivation of vines and cotton are a piastre a day and an oke of wine, —the ordinary price of day-labour in Greece. In kalambokki it is customary for the labourers to take a tenth of the produce. Merali stands on the side of a round low hill, which, though now in pasture, consists of a very fertile and cultivable soil, without any rock. It is separated from the height of Krevasara, which is lofty and rocky, by a level of about three fourths of a mile, through which flows the Cephissus. The river approaches the south-eastern corner of the latter height, where it is crossed by a bridge in the main road from Zituni by Turkokhorio to Livadhia.

§ 2.190   In a line with the hill of Krevasara, and separated from it by a narrow plain, rises the lofty insulated conical height, which I have already remarked (Nov. 30) as being in face of Bissikεni, towards Krevasara; this height ends in a low summit, crowned with one of those towers of which I before remarked, that there appears to have been a system of them pervading Boeotia and Phocis. A castle of the middle ages, or perhaps of the same date as the towers, crowned the extreme point of the Edylian ridge, from whence to the opposite advanced heights of Parnassus the distance is about half a mile. This is the strongest part of the Boeto-Phocic pass. In the narrow level stands the khan of the Kadi on the right bank of the Cephissus, opposite to which the Kineta, or river which issues from the lake of Sfaka, joins the Cephissus just under the extremity of the aforesaid rocky point, upon which stands the ruined castle.
Dec. 12.—Leaving Merali at 9, and re-passing the bridge and canal, I ride up in 15 minutes to Khubavo, which stands on the foot of the rocky mountain, in the opening of the valley rising to Vogdhani, immediately opposite to Bolissi, on the foot of Mount Edylium. These are all small hamlets of about 20 houses, each with a pyrgo for the Spahi, who is generally an Albanian. While inquiring at Khubavo concerning a treasure of ancient medals, said to have been found by one of the inhabitants of that place, the sudden appearance of one of these Spahis, with hanjar

§ 2.191   and pistols in his girdle, puts an end to the enquiry, as none of the villagers dare answer such questions in his presence. Two or three of them, however, follow me in crossing the plain to the Paleo-kastro, and show me a large quantity of small gilt copper coins, of the lower empire, which were a part of the treasure.
The Paleo-kastro consists of the remains of a castle of lower times, inclosing a small table summit to the westward of Belissi. This height is connected with the foot of the extremity of Mount Edylium by a low ridge of rock, over which passes the road from Vogdhani to the bridge of the Cephissus near the khan of the Kadi. The hill is rocky all around, but the level summit is ploughed and cultivated. Among the remains of the modern castle are a few pieces of a Hellenic wall of the polygonal kind. There can be little doubt that these are remains of the city of the Parapotamii, the position, as I before remarked, agreeing in every respect with its description by Theopompus and Strabo.
Leaving the Paleo-kastro at 11, and passing over the ridge which joins it to the mountain, I descend to a ford of the Cephissus a little below the khan, and having crossed the river, follow its right bank: at 11.30 cross by a wooden bridge a canal derived from the Mavro-nero, and three minutes farther the united stream of the Mavronero and Platania by a stone bridge; the Cephissus being then only a few paces on the left.

§ 2.192   Soon afterwards the road quits the river, and crosses the plain in the direction of Kapurna, where I arrive at 12.8, and in the afternoon return to Livadhia.
Placed, as the valley of Chaeroneia is, at the entrance of the extensive and fertile plains of Boeotia, and most conveniently situated for observing all the entrances into them from the side of Phocis, it often became the scene of military operations, though, unfortunately for history, the most remarkable of them did not occur until after the time of the best historians. In the year B.C. 447, Chaeroneia was taken by Tolmides the Athenian, just before his defeat and death at Coroneia. During the Sacred or Phocic war it was attempted by Onomarchus the Phocian without success, was taken by Phalaecus his son, who succeeded to the command of the Phocians on the death of Phayllus, and was speedily retaken by the Boeotians. But no particulars are related on these occasions which can be illustrated by a view of the locality. Nor is that celebrated battle, which extended the Macedonian power over all Greece, and influenced the destinies of the civilized world for the ensuing two centuries, described in a manner more satisfactory either by Diodorus or by Plutarch, probably from the want of contemporary accounts of an event which was already ancient in the time of those authors, especially the latter, who might otherwise have had a good opportunity of enlarging on the details of the

§ 2.193   action, and of illustrating them by his knowledge of the topography of his native place. Of the battle between the Roman forces and the army of Mithradates, which occurred 250 years later, Plutarch had the means of leaving us a much fuller description. Sylla had taken Athens when Taxilles, entering Greece from the northward with a numerous army, and encamping in the plains of Elateia, left his opponent only a choice of difficulties. On the one hand the chariots of the enemy and the superiority of his cavalry, rendered it hazardous to meet him in the plains of Boeotia: on the other, Attica was unable long to afford supplies, especially when Archelaus, occupying Munychia with his fleet, had prevented their arrival by sea. The more powerful motive prevailing, Sylla moved into Boeotia, and encamped at a place in the plain of Chaeroneia, called Patronis. Here he was joined by Hortensius, who made his way from Thessaly by a circuitous route through Mount Parnassus to Tithorea, where he came into contact with the enemy’s forces, but having resisted their attacks during the day, succeeded in the following night in descending through difficult passes to the place where Sylla was expecting him. I have already shown the probability that the bye road by which Hortensius avoided the Asiatic army in the Elatic plains, was that which I followed from Velitza by Bissikoni into the northern valley of Dhavlia, and not far below which, near Khasnesi, are the sources of the Mavronero.

§ 2.194   Here being copiously supplied with water, and defended towards the enemy by the pass of Parapotamii, Sylla found a safe and convenient place of encampment, until he was reinforced by Hortensius. He then advanced towards the enemy, and took a position on a fertile woody hill, in the midst of the Elatic plains named Philoboeotus, at the foot of which there was water— a description which seems to agree with the remarkable insulated conical height between Bissikeni and the Cephissus. The Romans probably occupied both that height and the hill of Krevasara, as in that position they were not only masters of any sources of water there may be at the foot of those heights, but were near the Cephissus, their proximity to which is evident from what follows. As the Roman army consisted only of 15000 infantry and 1500 cavalry, while the enemy amounted to six or eight times that number, the former kept close within their intrench ments, when the Asiatics drew out their forces to display their strength; but when they proceeded to straggle over the country, destroying Panopeus, and pillaging Lebadeia and the oracular temple of Trophonius, Sylla became very desirous of engaging. In order to inspire his troops with an inclination to fight, he first imposed some severe labours upon them, such as cutting canals in the plain, and turning the channel of the Cephissus; and when they began to be tired of this employment, pointed out to them a position

§ 2.195   which he wished to occupy. It was a hill on which formerly stood “the acropolis of the abandoned city of the Parapotamii—a stony height surrounded with a precipice, and separated only from Mount Edylium by the river Assus, which at the foot of the hill fell into the Cephissus, and rendered the position very strong.” In this passage there is a difficulty. I have already remarked that the testimony of Theopompus, of Strabo, and of Plutarch himself, shows that Paleokastro is the ancient Parapotamii, and the rocky summit above it Edylium; in which case there is no stream which can correspond with the Assus but that named Kineta, which flows from the marsh of Sfaka, and is joined by the torrent of the vale of Khubavo. This river, however, does not divide the hill of Paleokastro from Mount Edylium, as Plutarch leads us to expect, but leaves it on the left, and joins the Cephissus a little below the hill of Paleokastro, which is in fact a low extremity of the mountain itself. The Romans drove away a body of Chalcaspidae, who were moving to the defence of the hill of Parapotamii, and took possession of it. Archelaus then moved against Chaeroneia, but the city was saved by the timely arrival of one of the Roman legions accompanied by the Chaeronenses in Sylla’s army; and Sylla having crossed the Assus, proceeded

§ 2.196   along the foot of Edylium until he arrived over against Archelaus, who was encamped behind a strong entrenchment at a place called Assia, between Edylium and Acontium. The place in the time of Plutarch was called from the circumstance Archelaus. It was probably situated in that bay of the plain between Edylium and Acontium, which is watered by a small branch of the Cephissus, and where now stands the village of Karamusa. Having remained a day in this position, Sylla left Muraena there in the command of a legion and two cohorts, and having sacrificed at the Cephissus, moved to Chaeroneia for the purpose of joining the troops who had occupied that place, as well as to examine the position of a body of the enemy which, after the unsuccessful movement upon Chaeroneia, had taken a position on Mount Thurium. This height, in the time of Plutarch, was called Orthopagium, and is described by him as a rugged pine-shaped mountain. Below it were the torrent Morius and the temple of Apollo Thurius, who received that epithet from Thuro, the mother of Chaeron, who was the founder of Chaeroneia. Two men of Chaeroneia having proposed to lead a detachment to the summit of Thurium by a road unknown to the Asiatics, Sylla ordered upon this service a body of Romans under Hirtius, and then drew out his army, placing the cavalry on

§ 2.197   either flank, himself on the right, Muraena on the left, and Hortensius, with a reserve of five cohorts, on the hills in the rear, in order to prevent the enemy from circumventing the Romans by means of their numerous cavalry and light troops.
The road indicated to Hirtius by the two Chaeronenses led from Mount Petrachus, by a temple of the Muses. As soon as he had obtained possession of the summit of the mountain, the Asiatics were immediately thrown into confusion by the unexpected attack of the Romans from above; 3000 were slain on the hills, others fell into the hands of Muraena, and the remainder arrived in such confusion at their own camp, as to create a general disorder. Sylla, on perceiving it, moved forward his right so promptly, that the chariots of the Asiatics, which required a certain space to be effectual, were unable to act to advantage. The combat now became general: the Romans threw aside their pilae and fought with swords only, but could not make any impression upon the long pikes and combined shields of the Asiatics, or upon the dense order of 15000 slaves, whom the Asiatic commanders had liberated from the Greek cities: these, however, were at length broken by the javelins and sling-shot of the adverse lightarmed. As Archelaus was extending his right wing in order to encompass the enemy, Hortensius advanced rapidly to meet him, but was obliged to retreat before the Asiatic cavalry to the hills,

§ 2.198   he was in so much danger of being cut off, that Sylla advanced from the right to his succour. Archelaus perceiving Sylla’s intention by the dust, quitted Hortensius and turned against the enemy’s right, while Taxilles, with the Chalcaspidae, attacked Muraena, so that a shout arising on both sides, and the hills around repeating it, Sylla was for a moment in suspense which way to move; but having resolved to return to his own post on the right, he took one of the cohorts of Hortensius with him, and sent the other four to the support of Muraena. On his arrival he found the right hard pressed by Archelaus, but his men receiving a new impulse from the presence of their commander, in one great effort routed the enemy, and drove him to the Cephissus and Mount Acontium. Sylla then moved to the assistance of Muraena, but found him already victorious over Taxilles, and joined him in the pursuit. Ten thousand only of the vanquished Asiatics arrived in safety at Chalcis (Egripo), while Sylla, according to his own assertion in his commentaries, had only twelve men missing. He erected two trophies, one in the plain where the troops of Archelaus first gave way and fled to the river Molus; the other on the top of Mount Thurium. The latter was inscribed with the names of the two Chaeronenses, who had led thither the Romans under Hirtius.
The narrative of which the preceding contains the substance, is rendered the more interesting by its being of a different kind from those which are usually given of military occurrences by Plutarch, to whom we generally look in vain for any accurate or topographical details of such events.

§ 2.199   It is indeed so well told, that I cannot but consider it as almost a literal extract from the commentaries of Sylla. I was the more anxious, therefore, to compare it with the scene of action. One of the points desirable to be identified is the summit named Thurium. The only remarkable peak in the range of heights which, branching eastward from the foot of Parnassus, border the plain of Chaeroneia on the south, is situated about three miles west of Petrachus, or the acropolis of Chaeroneia, and two south-east of Daulis; it rises from the right bank of the river now called Platani, which I have before described as crossing the plain of Daulis to the Cephissus. But this point is too distant from Chaeroneia, and there can scarcely be a doubt that it was within the Phocic boundary, and in the district of Panopeus, whereas Thurium, as well from the transactions on the day of battle, as from the local tradition concerning Thuro, mother of Chaeron, was evidently in the district of Chaeroneia, and not very far from Petrachus. I conclude, therefore, that Thurium was the highest point of the hills behind Chaeroneia, not far from the right bank of the rivulet, above the left bank of which, lower down, are the ruined walls of Panopeus. The name Mera, attached to a village in the valley, may be a corruption of Morius. The torrent called Molus would seem to be that which joins the left bank of the Cephissus, and which separates Edylium from Acontium. Here, therefore, was Assia, and the placed called Archelaus, where the commander of the Asiatics formed his entrenched camp after Sylla had taken Parapotamii.

§ 2.200   It is to be supposed, that although this was the position of Archelaus himself, his immense army extended quite across the plain to Chaeroneia and Mount Thurium. The hills in the rear, on which Hortensius was posted, and where he was attacked by a movement of the right of the Asiatics round the left of the Romans, seem to have been not far from Daulis. Although these are the conclusions to which I have come upon examining the scene of action, I am aware that the difficulty which I have already mentioned, may seem to throw some doubt upon the whole explanation. Supposing the narrative to have been written originally by Sylla, and that either the Roman general himself, or the copiers of his memoirs, may have been in error as to the course of the Assus near Parapotamii, it still seems unaccountable that the biographer who adopted the account, and who was describing places near his own door, should not have discovered and corrected the mistake. It may be thought, perhaps, that the citadel of the Parapotamii may not have been at the Paleo-kastro of Belissi, but on the hill of Merali, which being really separated from the adjacent mountain by the stream which joins the Cephissus below the Paleo-kastro, so far corresponds with the words of Plutarch. But the consequence would be that the mountain of Khubavo, and not that of Belissi, was the ancient Edylium, and that the entrenched camp of Archelaus was not near Karamusa, as I have supposed, but in the valley between Khubavo and Belissi, which is quite irreconcileable with the data of Theopompus and Strabo, as to Parapotamii, Edylium, and Acontium. The situation of

§ 2.201  Parapotamii, in the pass of five stades between Parnassus and the western end of the line of mountains, which terminated at the other extremity in Orchomenus, as well as the length of that ridge and the distance of Parapotamii from Chaeroneia, are all too near the accurate truth when applied to the site near Belissi, to admit of any doubt of the identity.
Perhaps it may be supposed that the hill which Sylla pointed out to his troops, and which they afterwards took, was the more conspicuous western extremity of the summit of Edylium, upon which are the ruins of a modern castle, that those ruins occupy the site of the citadel of the Parapotamii, that the Hellenic remains at the Paleokastro of Belissi belonged to the town only, and that the Assus was the small stream near Karamusa, which may seem the more likely, as there is every reason to believe that Assia was in that position. But this would not remove the difficulty, for notwithstanding the identity of name, it is impossible to suppose the river Assus and the village or place Assia to have been very near to each other, the former having flowed below the western extremity of Edylium, and the latter having been situated between Edylium and Acontium. [Soon after his victory at Chaeroneia, Sylla was called upon to oppose a new army of Asiatics which had landed at Chalcis, and after some skirmishing at Tilphossium, gained, near Orchomenus, a second victory over Archelaus, which was so destructive that two hundred years afterwards, in the time of Plutarch, arms were still found in great quantities in the marshes.]

§ 2.202   Dec. 14.—Since I have left Ioannina, the weather, with the exception of two days of southerly wind and rain at Dhomoko and Zituni has been constantly calm and clear, with a slight north-easter: yesterday it began to threaten, and the change this day declared itself in a tremendous storm of wind, accompanied with intermitting showers. Livadhia, among its other inconveniences of climate, is particularly subject in winter to these sudden and violent gales, which descend from Helicon with such fury as often to carry away tiles and chimneys, as occurred to-day in several instances. The gale when of this extreme violence is denominated a mega.
Livadhia being a vakuf is governed by a voivoda, who farms the revenue from the administration of the royal mosques; or more commonly by a vekil, or deputy, for whom the farmer is answerable. The Turk now residing at Livadhia is in the latter capacity, but is himself farmer and collector of the customs.
The municipal power is divided among three principal Greek families, of which the first is that of John Khondrodhima, commonly called the Logotheti, from his office in the church. All the affairs of the town pass through the hands of a grammatikos, appointed by these archons. Neither the Turkish voivoda nor the kadi interfere, unless when a Turk is concerned, and the former in particular abstains from it, as he dreads the loss of his usual presents from the Greeks, and the effects of their complaints at Constantinople. His chief business is to receive the imperial taxes,

§ 2.203   which are let at present to the three persons abovementioned, for 2500 purses a year. These taxes are the miri, or dhekatia, the avaresi, or tax on personal property, and the kharatj, or capitation.
The first is underlet in portions every year. Those who farm it visit the villages at the time of threshing, and receive their share, which in lands belonging to Greeks is about an eighth. The remainder is generally divided in the proportion of two thirds to the proprietor, he owning the stock, and supplying the seed corn. The harvestmen are generally paid in kind, either a stipulated quantity by the day, or a tenth of the crop: the remainder is the metayer’s portion, and is shared generally among several persons. In many instances the dhekatia is farmed by the Greek proprietor, in which case his share of the harvest becomes seventeen twenty-fourths nearly. Some of the lands of Livadhia are Spahiliks, and have been held on the feudal tenure of military service ever since the conquest. These pay a much smaller dhekatia to the Spahi, than the Greek lands to the farmer of the vakuf; they are generally hired by Greeks of Livadhia, and are cultivated like the others. Sometimes the Spahilik also is included, and it happens occasionally that the Greek resides in the village as Spahi, but the Spahilik is more commonly in the hands of Albanian soldiers, who find it a good mode of laying out their savings, as the Spahis, besides the tithe, have by custom established a title to a fee of a piastre per annum from every man, and half a piastre from every boy in the village, besides a certain

§ 2.204   allowance of provision when he resides, which the Albanian always does, for the sake of this maintenance, and other advantages which his station as a Musulman soldier gives him. It sometimes happens that the resident Spahi has not the tithe—only the fee, and what else he can extort.
The poor Greek peasant, as I before remarked, derives but little advantage from the land being held by his feliow-Christians. Though he can seldom obtain a fair market for his share of the produce, he generally has to furnish from it the exorbitant interest of some money which the Greek landholder or the Spahi has tempted him to borrow, after having forced him to the necessity of it: in short, he finds himself in no better condition than if he were a labourer on a Turkish tjiftlik. To complete his misery, the upper class of Greeks at Livadhia are as insolent and unfeeling to their inferiors, as they are malignantly jealous of one another; though it cannot be denied at the same time, that they have all the hospitality, wit, and sociable disposition of the nation, and, unlike the thesaurizing Jews and Armenians, generally live to the full extent of their means.
Aly Pasha is now more feared than the Porte at Livadhia; and it is found expedient to send every spring a deputation of 'Arkhondes to Ioannina with a present of about 100 purses. Not along ago he endeavoured to obtain possession of Dhadhi, but by the management of the chiefs of Livadhia, the ruin of that rising community was for the present avoided. His advances, however, threaten to increase in this direction, his son Vely having lately obtained the mukata of Talanda.

§ 2.205   Dec. 17.—From Livadhia to Mazi. In crossing the opening of the vale of Coronda, the principal summit of Helicon presents itself very majestically at the head of the valley. It is a round mountain standing rather separate from the rest of the range of Helicon, well clothed with firs, and now capped with snow. The modern name is Paleovuni, or Paleovuna. Half-way thither, hidden from sight in a ravine, is Kukora, from which village there is a road across the Heliconian ridge to Khosia, and Kakosia.
In two hours we arrive at the fountain Tilphossa, issuing from the foot of the rocky height now called Petra. The fortress Tilphossaion, which stood on the summit, appears to have been among the most important in Boeotia. Proceeding from thence at 3.5, we cross, in seven minutes, a brook from Rastamyti, a small village half a mile on the right in an angle of the hills, where a ridge connects Tilphossium with Libethrwm: and in ten minutes more cross a stream, the largest we have passed this day except the Phalarus. It rises in the eastern part of Mount Libethrium, and issues through a precipitous gorge lying between the eastern end of Tilphossium and a rocky peak which rises immediately behind the village of Mazi. On the right bank of this river, among a great quantity of loose stones, broken pottery, and other appearances of an ancient site, are several squared blocks, sufficient to indicate

§ 2.206   the position of Ocalea, a Homeric city, not mentioned by Pausanias, but well described by Strabo, as situated on the bank of a rivulet of the same name, midway between Alalcomenae and Haliartus. His distance, however, of thirty stades from each, though it accords with the fifty stades which Pausanias places between Haliartus and Tilphusa, appears to be too great by more than a third.
Leaving now the direct road to Thebes, we ascend obliquely to Mazi, a small village on the foot of a remarkable peaked hill. From Mazi the road continues southward to Mavromati and Eremokastro. The Maziotes chiefly cultivate kalambokki in the plain, and vineyards on the hills around the village.
Dec. 18.—I revisit this morning the remains of Haliartus, which are found on a low hill separated from the extremity of the height of Mazi by a narrow branch of the plain, and about a mile distant from the village. Towards the lake the hill of Haliartus terminates in rocky cliffs, but on the other sides has a gradual acclivity. Some remains of the walls of the acropolis, chiefly of polygonal masonry, are found on the summit of the hill, and there are several sepulchral crypts in the cliffs, below which, to the north, issues a copious source of water, flowing to the marsh, like all the other streams near the site of Haliartus. Although the walls of the exterior town are scarcely anywhere traceable, its extent is naturally marked to the east and west by two small rivers, of which that to the

§ 2.207   west issues from the foot of the hill of Mazi; the eastern, called the Kefalari, has its origin in Mount Helicon. Near the left bank of this stream, at a distance of 500 yards from the acropolis, are a ruined mosque and two ruined churches, on the site of a village which, though long since abandoned, is shown by these remains to have been once inhabited by both Turks and Greeks. Here are many fragments of architecture and of inscribed stones, collected formerly from the ruins of Haliartus. From this spot there is a distance of about three quarters of a mile to a tumulus westward of the acropolis, where are several sarcophagi and ancient foundations near some sources of water, marking probably the site of the western entrance of the city.
The tumulus covers perhaps the bones of the men who fell with Lysander in the celebrated battle fought here in the year B.C. 395; for the circumstances of the event point exactly to this situation. Lysander had been sent by the Ephori with a small body of Spartans into Phocis, to collect the forces of that nation, together with those of the contiguous people of Oeta, Heracleia, Melis, and the Aenianes, and had been directed to march to Haliartus, where Pausanias, with 6000 Peloponnesians, was to meet him. Lysander not only succeeded in his mission, but induced Orchomenus to revolt from Thebes, and took Lebadeia by assault, from whence he wrote to Pausanias, informing him that he should arrive at Haliartus on a

§ 2.208   certain morning at break of day. But the Thebans intercepted his letter, and thus obtained the means of anticipating him at Haliartus while Pausanias was left in ignorance of his motions. Leaving Thebes to the care of their Athenian allies, they marched in the night, introduced a part of their forces into the city, and with the remainder placed themselves in ambuscade, ready to fall on the enemy’s rear, at the fountain Cissusa, near which, adds Plutarch, were monuments of Rhadamanthus and Alcmena, and a place noted for producing the plants from which Cretan javelins were made. Lysander, on his arrival, thought at first of waiting for Pausanias on “the height”; but becoming impatient as the day advanced, he placed himself at the head of his troops, and moved forward with the phalanx in column along the road leading to the city. As soon as he arrived near the wall, the Thebans and Haliartii, rushing suddenly from the gate, slew him and his augur, with a few others, upon which the phalanx retreated to the hills. One thousand of them were slain in the pursuit; but it was fatal also to more than two hundred Thebans, who had rashly followed them into narrow and difficult places.

§ 2.209   The king of Sparta was on his march from Plataea to Thespiae when the news reached him. The next day he arrived at Haliartus; but finding that the Phocians and other allies had inarched off in the night, and Thrasybulus on the following day bringing a body of Athenians to the assistance of the Boeotians, all he could do was to enter into terms for the body of Lysander, which it would have been difficult to have obtained in any other mode, as it lay near the walls. Retreating out of Boeotia, he buried Lysander in the district of the Panopaei, in the road which Plutarch, being himself of Chaeroneia, very naturally describes as that leading from Chaeroneia to Delphi. It appears from the same author, that the rivulet which flowed along the western wall of Haliartus, where Lysander fell, was named Hoplites; the same probably as the Lophis of Pausanias, to whose fable concerning it the situation of the sources near the tumulus is well adapted. Cissusa was evidently the fountain below the cliffs of the hill of Haliartus; for the existence near that fountain, of plants from which javelins were made, indicates the proximity of the marsh, and that position accords with the remark of Plutarch, that the Thebans marched to Cissusa with the city on their left.

§ 2.210   They would naturally avoid its southern side, lest Lysander should be in possession of the heights, and the northern extremity was well suited to their intention in placing themselves there, if we suppose the entrance of the city where Lysander was slain, to have been near the tumulus.
The rocky gorges to the westward of the hill of Mazi agree exactly with the rugged places where the Thebans suffered, and as Plutarch adds that their loss had been predicted by an oracle which warned them to beware of Orchalides and the hill of foxes, which latter was in the district of Haliartus, towards Helicon, and in his time was called Alopecum, we cannot but infer that Alopecum was the peak of Mazi, and Orchalides a village which may have occupied the site of Mazi itself. Although the hill of Haliartus is not fifty feet higher than the lake, its rocky point projecting into the marsh is remarkable from every part of the plain. Possessing a fertile district, and commanding a pass in the center of Boeotia, which is well described by Strabo as a strait between a mountain and the lake Copais: Haliartus was one of the

§ 2.211   most important of the cities of this province, as the circumstances of the Boeotic war just mentioned prove. Having, unhappily, on two great occasions, sided with the weaker of two contending parties, it was twice exposed to the vengeance of power; first in the Persian invasion, when its conduct formed an honourable exception to that of the rest of Boeotia, and again in the last struggle of the Macedonians under Perseus against the Romans; the consequence of which latter imprudence was that Haliartus no longer existed in the time of Strabo. The praetor Lucretius, who took it after a spirited resistance, destroyed the town, sold its inhabitants for slaves,and embarked its pictures,statues, and other valuable property in his ships. The territory was afterwards given to the Athenians. Nor does it appear that Haliartus had recovered, like some other Greek towns, any portion of its former prosperity in the time of Pausanias, for he found here only seme temples without roof or statue, which had been destroyed by the Persians, and had been purposely left in that state, like some others at Athens; it was not even known to what deities they had been dedicated. A monument in honour of Lysander still remained, and a heroum of Cecrops, son of Pandion. The Haliartia extended westward to Mount Tilphossium, as appears by the remark of Pausanias, that the

§ 2.212   Haliartii had an open sanctuary of the goddesses called Praxidicae, which was very near that mountain.
The Kefalari, which is as large as the Phalarus, but does not like that river fail in summer, as I remarked on my former journey in this country, originates near DUsia and Mavromati, and receives the river of Zagara. At its entrance into the plain of Haliartus, the greater part of its water is turned eastward along the foot of the heights to some mills; but its natural course is by the village of Megalo Mulki into the marsh not far to the northeastward of Haliartus. The two branches of the river from Mavromati and Zagara seems to accord exactly with the Permessus and Olmeius, which, according to Strabo, flowed from Helicon, and after uniting entered the lake Copais near Haliartus. Zenodotus, whom Strabo quotes in reference to Ascra, and from whom he seems to have derived his information as to the Permessus and Olmeius, stated the former to have had its sources in the Thespiace, and described the latter as a stream towards the summit of Mount Helicon about three hundred stades from Thebes. The sources of the Kefalari being about midway between the sites of Haliartus and Thespiae, agree

§ 2.213   perfectly with those of the Permessus, and the river of Zagara so far accords with the Olmeius, that it flows from a valley which separates Libethrium from Helicon. The distance of three hundred stades from Thebes, however, is too great for any part of the Heliconian mountains.
Having crossed the Kefalari at the ruined mosque, and passed Mulki half a mile on the left, we proceed along the foot of the hills, and in fourteen minutes from the Kefalari arrive at a copious fountain at the foot of a low rock similar to the cliffs of Haliartus, and about half a mile from the edge of the marsh. Above it stands a square tower half ruined, and of the same construction as those at Xeropyrgo and other places in Boeotia. To the north-eastward of this point the slope of the mountain now called Faga meets the marsh in a projecting point; between which and another extremity towards Kardhitza the marsh forms a bay.
At 10.17 we begin to ascend the low ridge which separates the two great Boeotian basins, those of the Cephissis and of Thebes, and which connects Mount Faga with the roots of Helicon; at 10.21, on its summit, we arrive at a small piece of Hellenic wall, consisting only of three or four stones in their places, on the right hand side of the road. The direction of this foundation is oblique to the road, running north and south, while the direction of the road in this spot is south-east. On the height on either side are many stones in the ploughed land, not natural to the soil, as well as other usual indications of an ancient site.

§ 2.214   Pausanias, moving in the direction of this point from the Neitides gate of Thebes, arrives at about forty stades from thence, at a temple of the Cabeiri, to the right of which was the Teneric plain, and to the left a road branching to Thespiae, distant fifty stades. On the other side of the Teneric plain rose the mountain where the Sphinx was said to have lain in wait for passengers, putting them to death, if they were unable to interpret her enigma. The ruins of Onchestus, where still remained the temple and statue of Neptune Onchestius, in an αλσος, or sacred grove, were fifteen stades distant from the mountain. Pausanias does not mention the distance on the direct road from the Cabeirium to Onchestus, nor does he continue his route from Onchestus to Haliartus; but turning from the Cabeirium to Thespiae, describee the places in that part of Boeotia before he proceeds to treat of Haliartus, thus leaving no information as to the distance and direction of Onchestus, either from Thebes or from Haliartus. But Strabo has supplied this deficiency; for after censuring Alcaeus for placing Onchestus at the foot of Helicon, whereas it was at a considerable distance from that mountain, he states that it was in the Haliartia, on a naked hill near the Teneric plain, and the Copaic Lake. He farther remarks, that Medeon, another Homeric town of the Haliartia, was afterwards called Phoenicis, from its position at the foot of Mount Phoenicium, that Medeon was very near Onchestus, and that Mount Phoenicium was in the

§ 2.215   district of Thebes. Upon comparing these authorities with the places, it is evident that Faga was the mountain of the Sphinx, which the Greeks in general called Sphingium, but the Boeotians Φίκιον, or Φυκιον, from Φιξ, the Boeotic form of Σφίγξ, and it seems also that the same mountain, or at least a part of it, near the Haliartia, was named Phoenicium. The modern name Φαγας may be a corruption of Φίκιον, or it may be a vestige of the fable of the devouring Sphinx. It further appears from the same authors, that the Teneric plain was the north-western portion of the plain of Thebes, or that part of it which lies at the foot of Mount Faga to the southeast; and that Onchestus, having been within the Haliartia, fifteen stades distant from the mountain, and near the Copaic lake as well as the Teneric plain, could hardly have occupied any other position than the low ridge which separatee the plains, and where the Hellenic vestiges still subsist. Medeon having also been in the Haliartia, would seem to have stood near the lake in the bay on the northwestern side of Mount Faga, between the site of Haliartus and Kardhitza.
At 11.10, having halted till that time, I leave the supposed site of Onchestus and begin to descend from the pass into the plain, which at first is not so much as a mile in breadth, bordered on the right by gently-rising cultivated heights, and on the left by the rugged sides of Mount Faga. At 11.24 we

§ 2.216   have the foot of this hill near us on the left, and at 11.27 the highest peak. As we proceed, the plain between us and the mountain becomes broader, and is now inundated. In summer it produces kalambokki. Before us, as far as Thebes, the great level, as well as the long slopes of the hills to the right of it, is for the most part a continued corn-held, without a single fence. A part of the arable is lying fallow, and some part of the land is in pasture, but upon the whole it is as well cultivated a district as any in Europe. At 11.46, Vaia and Khasnesi, two considerable villages, separated only by a small ravine, are two miles on the right. Vaia is the lower. At 12.5 we cross the road leading from Vaia to Mazeraki, which latter is two or three miles on the left, in the Teneric plain near the foot of the lower declivities of Mount Faga, where are some sources of water, and above them on the heights a monastery.' At 12.15 we pass Tzodnno, and a few minutes further Morokamo at the foot of the slopes on the right. These, like Mazeraki and the others, are small villages. At 12.40 the most projecting point of Mount Faga is on the left, a low stony rise, which we may suppose to have formed the separation between the Teneric plain and that of Thebes. From thence the lower ridges of that mountain trend to the northward towards the heights connecting the mountains Phicium and Ptoum, and below which is an inundated κόλπος, or bay of the Teneric plain. At 12.50 we cross the Kanavari, or Kanavri, a small stream

§ 2.217   dry in summer, which rises at Erimokastro, and joins the Lake of Senzina near its southern extremity—halt five minutes. At about a quarter of an hour from Thebes we begin to ascend obliquely the heights on which that town is situated, and at 1.30 cross a rivulet called Platziotissa, which rises a little above Thebes, and flows in a ravine along the western side of the town. In ascending the bank of this ravine to the town, a fountain occurs named Paraporti.

§ 2.218   CHAPTER 14 BOEOTIA.
The hills immediately around Thebes are for the most part uncultivated, and, being intersected with large white charadrae or furrows, have rather a dismal appearance. They are capable of producing good wine, but the Thebans seem to think only of the culture of com. The πεδίον πυρηφορον is still noted for its fertility, and produced last year 148,000 kuvelia of wheat of excellent quality, while in almost every other part of Greece the crop was indifferent: 500 kuvelia of flour are sent

§ 2.219   weekly to Έgripο, there being no mills at the latter place. The greater part of the land in the district of Thebes is owned by three men of Egripo, Ahmed Pasha, mousellim of that place; Bekir, now Pasha of Bosnia, and Rashid Bey: the landlord and the Greek cultivator share the produce of grain equally, the former finding the seed and half the oxen; but there is a tribe of kiayas and grammatikoi who superintend the landlords’ concerns on the spot, and contrive to diminish very largely the receipts of both parties.
To the observer from Thebes, Mount Faga, the ancient Phicium, or Phoenicium, presents a single bare and rugged peak, which to the right is separated from a long even ridge equally bare, and nearly of the same height, by the opening in which stands the village of Kardhitza. The latter mountain is the ancient Ptoum, now known in different parts by the names of Palea, Strutzina, and Skroponeri, and extending from Kardhitza north-eastward until it is blended with Messapium, now called Khtypa. Midway between Thebes and Messapium, and hiding the highest part of the latter is the mountain named Samata, or Siamata, vulgarly pronounced Shamata, from a village of that name behind it. It is bold and rocky, with a flat summit; and being the nearest, is the most conspicuous of all the mountains around Thebes. It seems clearly to be the ancient Hypatus.

§ 2.220   Dec. 19.—Pass the forenoon on a height called Psilirakhi, that is to say, η Ύψηλη Pαχη, or the high ridge, which is distant two miles direct from Thebes to the east-southeast. It is the nearest point affording a good view of the southern Boeotian basin, or that which is bounded on the south by the Boeoto-Attic range of Cithaeron and Parnes, to the west by Helicon, and to the north by Phicium, Hypatus, and Messapium, and which, as I before observed, is separated only from the great northern valley of Boeotia by the ridge of Onchestus. On observing how completely distinct the two great valleys are, each of them being surrounded by mountains except at that ridge, one is not surprised that Boeotia should have been for a long time divided into two great political leagues, of which Thebes and Orchomenus were deservedly the chief places, nor that Thebes, surrounded by a larger extent of more uniformly fertile country, and happily situated at a moderate distance from three outlets of maritime commerce, should have acquired a preponderance over its rival, which would have raised Thebes to much higher destinies than it ever attained, had the Boeotians been more favourable to letters and instruction. To this cause alone a historian of the age of Alexander attributes the fact, that their power was never durable, notwithstanding their three seas, their ports on the Corinthiac Gulf, communicating with Italy, Sicily, and Libya, and those on the Euboic frith, which conducted on one side of the Euripus to Egypt and Cyprus, and on the other to Macedonia and the Propontis.

§ 2.221   The Psilirakhi, although not high, is the most central summit in the southern basin, and stands in the middle of a low range of hills, which, branching from the eastern end of Mount Helicon, extends to the Euboic frith, and divides the basin into two parts, of which the Parasopia, or vale of the Asopus, is the most remarkable plain in the southern division: and that of Thebes in the northern. The position of Thebes was determined by its being the only spot in the separating ridge where water is plentiful. Towards Helicon, in the vicinity of Thespus, the ridge becomes lower and rounder, and is well cultivated in many parts; to the eastward of Thebes it is not so fertile, and the villages are consequently less numerous than to the westward, but the hills are covered with a fine pasture, and abound in wild thyme, and other odoriferous herbs. Eastward of Psilirakhi the ridge rises to its highest peak, now called Soro, the falls of which approach so near to the foot of Mount Parnes that there is only a narrow rocky ravine between them, through which the Asopus finds its way from the Parasopian valley into the Tanagraan plain, and from thence by another similar ravine into the Oropia.
Thebes is now called τα Θήβα, or more commonly in Boeotia, τα Φήβα, by that easy substitution of the one aspirate for the other, of which there are many examples in the ancient language.

§ 2.222   The Turks say Stifa. The town stands on a hill, separated on every side from the adjacent heights, rising about 150 feet above the plain, and situated two miles to the northward of the highest part of the ridge. It is bounded to the east and west by the ravines of two small rivers, and is surrounded by a ruinous wall, composed of materials and repairs of various ages, among which are seen, in many places, Roman tile work, and large squared blocks in the Greek style. A low projection at the northern extremity was occupied by a keep or tower, which, as well as another tower at the north-eastern angle, with its adjoining gateway, are of more solid construction than the rest of the work, and are chiefly composed of ancient materials. The circuit is about a mile and a half, and is said to contain 700 families, of which about 250 are Turkish. The streets are narrow, and the houses stand close together, with few gardens. To the southward, between the town and the ridge, the hollow which was anciently occupied by lower Thebes, is now crossed by a ruined aqueduct upon arches, which still conveys water into the town from the western rivulet. The district contains 64 villages, most of which are small.
At Thebes, as in most of the towns of Greece, which continue to occupy their ancient sites, the remains of antiquity chiefly consist of fragments of architecture and sculpture, or of inscribed marbles, dispersed among the houses, mosques, baths, and fountains, in the walls, stairs, streets, and pavements. Not one of the ancient buildings

§ 2.223   can be traced; though it is very possible that some remains of them may be mixed with the modern structures, or buried by them, and that on the site of Lower Thebes to the southward of the town, where they are more accessible, many other valuable remains may still subsist below the surface of the soil.
The village of Tabakidhes, on the eastern side of Thebes, mentioned by Spon and Wheler, is no longer in existence, but the church of St. Luke still remains there, and contains the sorus, or great stone coffin, vulgarly called the tomb of St. Luke. The ten hexameters on one side of it, which have been published by those travellers have suffered an injury since their time, so that five or six letters towards the middle of each line are no longer legible. On the opposite side of the monument are two other inscriptions which they did not notice, one in hexameters, the other in trimeter iambics. The three are all of different dates, but relate to the same family. From that which was copied by Wheler and Spon, it appears that the monument was made by order of one Zosimus, to contain the body of his son Nedymus, whose mother was an Italian, named Adae.

§ 2.224   The second inscription in hexameters was in honour of the same Nedymus, and was placed upon the sorus by his son Zosimus, who reserved a place in the receptacle for himself, and declared that any one who should put any other body into it, should pay to the treasury ten thousand denaria. The third epitaph was not inscribed until the death of the second Zosimus, the body of whose son Nedymus had in the mean time been deposited in it The great grandfather, Zosimus the first, seems to have had a different sepulchre. In the third inscription the tomb declares itself to be full, and closed, and denounces the usual imprecation upon any one who should open it.

§ 2.225   The second inscription is imperfect at the end of several of the lines; the third is nearly complete. The monument is of white marble with a highly ornamented operculum, the surface of which represents a covering of leaves. But neither the letters nor the poetry admit of a date anterior to A.D. 300.
The inscriptions in the town are neither numerous nor well preserved. Two of them relate to Bacchus and his artists, that is to say, to the persons employed in his service in the theatre. A third is the sepulchral monument of a lady named Sacunda, styled a female hero. Below this inscription is another in smaller character, and apparently of a less ancient date. In this a priestess of Isis, named Nicaeo, daughter of Ariston, dedicates the Anthedonian coffin, (on which the inscription is engraved,) declares it to be sacred, that it shall not be used by her heirs, and that any one who shall force it open, or pollute it, shall pay 700 denaria to the goddess. It would seem from this document, that Anthedon was noted for producing stone, fitted for ληνοι, or stone coffins, more commonly denominated σοροι. Of the other inscriptions which I find here, the most remarkable are a fragment of names in the Boeotic

§ 2.226   dialect, and the sepulchral monument of one Chareas, qualified as an arch-physician and hero .
The only undoubted relic which I can discover of the walls of Hellenic Thebes, now forms the lowest part of the northern tower, just above the plain. About thirty yards of the ancient work are still traceable, and four or five courses are visible, if courses they can be called, the masonry of which, like that of Tiryns, is formed of very roughly hewn masses of stone, originally fitted in the intervals with smaller stones, which have mostly fallen out. This wall is not straight, but forms a curve. Its masonry, its curved form, but above all its thickness, which is more than twentyeight feet, seem to prove that in antiquity it may vie with Mycenae, or even with that of the Τιρύν0<ον νλινθενμα, which it most resembles. Another monument, apparently of remote times, is found to the eastward of the town, not far to the southward of the church of St. Luke.
It is a barrow of a form, which, though rare, is not unexampled — in Greece, having a double slope thus.
In the absence of remains of art, it is only by means of the landmarks of nature that we can hope to trace the ancient topography of this city. Besides the hill of the Cadmeia, which is well defined on every side, the only natural features

§ 2.227   that can be recognized are those celebrated rivers and fountains which first attracted inhabitants to the site, and which contributed with other advantages to make Thebes the chief city of Boeotia. Three torrents traverse the site, and flow northward into the plain of Thebes, one on either side of the Cadmeum hill, having their origin in the low ridge, which, two miles to the southward of the town, begins to fall in that direction to the Asopus. The third is a beautifully clear and copious pool of water, in an artificial basin, situated at less than a mile to the S.S.E. of the modern town. Its stream flows to the plain through a ravine where derivations are made from it at different levels, to turn mills, and irrigate gardens, so that little water remains in ordinary seasons at its entrance into the plain. The small church of St. John, from which the river is named, stands exactly at the fountain-head. The western river, named Platziotissa has a more constant course in the plain, though, being considered the purest of the Theban waters, no small quantity of its water is diverted to supply the fountains of the town. Several sources on, or adjacent to the ancient site, yield their contributions to this stream, some of which, in a country so subject as Greece is to earthquakes, may not now issue from the earth in the same positions as the fountains of ancient Thebes.

§ 2.228   The two most remarkable are that of Paraporti, which has already been noticed, and another situated five or six hundred yards higher up the river, and, like Paraporti, near, its right bank. To the eastward of the ravine of the Ai Ianni, distant a third of a mile from the town, is the most copious of the Theban sources, a modern δωδεκάκροννος, issuing from the side of the hill through twelve spouts. The place is called St. Theodore, and was described by Spon, in 1676, as the handsomest of the suburbs of Thebes, but of which three or four cottages only now remain. The superfluous waters of these rivers and sources serve to irrigate gardens, and plantations of cotton, tobacco, and kalambokki, in the plain to the northward, and in summer are entirely consumed in that manner: in winter they render the plain marshy.
Thebes had been thrice subverted when twenty years after its last destruction by Alexander, or in the year 315 B.C. Cassander, assisted by the Athenians and by the people of Messene and Megalopolis, in gratitude to their founder Epaminondas, restored the whole circuit of the walls, and laid out new streets. Dicaearchus, who wrote not long afterwards, thus describes the city. “The site is level, the form circular, with a

§ 2.229   circumference of seventy stades. It is plentifully provided with water, and abounds in green pastures and fertile hills, and in gardens beyond any city in Greece. Two rivers flow through the town, and irrigate all the subjacent plain; there is also a subterraneous stream issuing from the Cadmeia through conduits which are said to have been constructed by Cadmus. The abundance and coolness of the water, the agreeable breezes, the verdant aspect of the place, its gardens, fruits, and other productions of the season, render Thebes a most agreeable residence in the summer. In the winter, on the contrary, it is very unpleasant, being destitute of fuel, and constantly exposed to floods and winds. It is then often covered with snow, and is very muddy.” Although seventy stades is the circuit here ascribed to Thebes by Dicaearchus, he assigns in his verses a much smaller extent, namely, forty three; and this number being in metre, and consequently more free from suspicion of inaccuracy, was probably the reputed perimeter of the walls, as Pausanias still traced them with their seven gates, near 500 years afterwards.

§ 2.230   This circuit was very nearly equal to that of the Asty, or upper town of Athens. In the seventy stades, Dicaearchus may have intended perhaps to include the suburbs and the gardens, to which he particularly alludes. After the time of Cassander, Thebes suffered in common with the rest of Greece from the contests of which it became the scene, especially those between Rome and Macedonia; its particular calamities recommenced with the Mithradatic war, when Sylla punished Thebes for taking part against him, by presenting half its territory to the Gods, as an atonement for his having plundered their treasuries at Olympus, Epidaurus and Delphi. Although the Romans afterwards restored their land to the Thebans, the city never recovered from that calamity; but having largely shared, as well as Chalcis, in the chastisement inflicted upon the friends of Achaia by Mummius, after the capture of Corinth, it was reduced to such a miserable state in the time of Augustus, that it scarcely deserved, according to Strabo, to be called a town. Near two centuries later, when Greece had a little recovered under the Roman emperors, Pausanias found Thebes occupying, as it now does, the Cadmeia. In the decline of the empire, as the maritime towns of Baeotia became exposed to hostility or piracy, the population of this province was probably in great measure concentrated in the advantageous

§ 2.231   internal positions of Thebes and Livadhia, and the walls may then have been constructed, which, with a succession of repairs, have subsisted to the present time. In the fourth century Thebes was in so respectable a state of defence, that Alaric, impatient to reach Athens, would not. lose the time that a siege of Thebes would have required; and in the 12th century, it was of such magnitude, that, according to Benjamin of Tudela, the Jews alone amounted to 2000, who were “skilful workers in purple and scarlet.” Under the Turks, like all their towns, it has gradually declined.
Although inhabited Thebes was confined to the Cadmeia, when Pausanias visited the place, all the principal monuments connected with Theban .mythology and history were still in existence, more or less preserved. The following is an abstract of their description by that traveller. The road from Plataea entered at the gates Electrae; the other gates were the Proetides, the Neitae or Neitides, the Crenaeae, the Hypsistae, the Ogygiae, and the Homoloides. Not far from the gates (Electrae) was a Polyandrium of the Thebans, who fell in fighting against Alexander, and a little beyond it the place where Cadmus produced men, by sowing the teeth of the dragon which he slew at the fountain of Mars.

§ 2.232   To the right of the same gate was the hill sacred to Apollo, who was surnamed Ismenius, from the river flowing by it, which was more anciently called Ladon. Before the entrance of the temple was a rock, named the chair of the prophetess Manto, daughter of Tiresias; and to the right of it were statues in stone, supposed to represent Enioche and Pyrrha, daughters of Creon. At the entrance of the temple were statues in marble of Minerva and Mercury, surnamed from their situation Pronai; the former was said to be the work of Scopas, the latter of Phidias. The temple contained a statue of the god by Canachus, exactly resembling that made by the same artist at Branchidae, except that it was of cedar instead of brass. Among the tripods in the temple was that dedicated by Amphitryon for his son Hercules, when the latter officiated as Daphnephorus: a young man remarkable for beauty and strength was still chosen every year to fill this office. Above (or beyond ) the Ismenium was the fountain sacred to Mars, who placed it under the guardianship of the dragon which was slain by Cadmus; near the fountain was the tomb of Caanthus.

§ 2.233   To the left of the gate Electrae were the ruins of the house of Amphitryon, and the temple of Hercules. The house of Amphitryon contained the bedchamber of Alcmena, said to have been the work of Trophonius and Agamedes. Here, also, was a monument of the children of Hercules by Megara, a stone called Sophronister, said to have been thrown at Hercules by Minerva, to prevent him from slaying Amphitryon, the figures of women named Pharmacidae in low relief, and above the Sophronister an altar of Jupiter Spodius made of the cinders of victims.
The temple of Hercules contained his image in wood, which was supposed to be the work and dedication of Daedalus, with another in white marble, which was sumamed Promachus, and was made by two Theban artists, Xenocrates and Eubius. The aeti of the temple were adorned with figures by Praxiteles, representing all the twelve labours of Hercules, except the destruction of the birds of Stymphalus, and the cleansing of the Eleian land, instead of which there was the wrestling of Hercules with Antaeus. Within the building were colossal figures of Minerva and Hercules in relief,

§ 2.234   made of Pentelic marble by Alcamenes and dedicated by Thrasybulus and his comrades, when, having proceeded from Thebes to Athens, they there put an end to the tyranny of the Thirty. Adjoining to the Heracleium were the gymnasium and the stadium of Hercules. There was an altar at Thebes of Apollo Polius; and an altar in the open air, with a statue of Minerva bearing the Phoenician epithet of Onga, and said to have been dedicated by Cadmus. This statue had formerly stood in a temple, which appears from Aeschylus to have been without the city, near one of the gates.
As the ancient acropolis was the only inhabited part of Thebes when it was visited by Pausanias, the Agora of that time contained some of the most ancient monuments of the Cadmeia; a part of it was supposed to occupy the exact site of the habitation of Cadmus. Here were shown

§ 2.235   ruins of the bedchambers of Harmonia and Semele; the place where the Muses sang at the wedding of Harmonia, and a piece of wood adorned with brass by Polydorus, said to have fallen from heaven when Semele was stricken with lightning, and named Bacchus Cadmeius: also three statues; one of Bacchus in solid brass, by Onassimedes; with an altar wrought by the sons of Praxiteles; the second of Pronomus, a celebrated improver of the flute, and composer of music for that instrument; and the third of Epaminondas. Near the latter was the temple of Ammon, containing a statue by Calamis, dedicated by Pindar; also a triangular pillar, upon which was engraved an ode of Pindar, addressed to the Ammonii, and near it an altar dedicated by Ptolemy, son of Lagus. Near this temple was the place of augury, where Teiresias observed the flight of birds, and a temple of Fortune, whose statue, bearing the child Plutus, was the work of Callistonicus of Thebes, except the face and hands, which were made by Xenophon of Athens. There were also three wooden statues of Venus with the surnames of Urania, Pandemus, and Apostrophia, said to have been formed from the beaks of the ships of Cadmus, and to have been dedicated by Harmonia. There had formerly been a temple of Ceres Thesmophorus, and a house of the descendants of Cadmus, but a bust only of Ceres remained, and some brazen shields said to be those of Lacedaemonian officers who had fallen at Leuctra.

§ 2.236   Near the gates Proetides was the theatre, and adjoining to it a temple of Bacchus Lysius, which contained statues of Bacchus and of Semele. Here were also the ruins of the house of Lycus, monuments of Semele, of the sons of Amphion and of the daughters of Amphion, and a temple of Diana Eucleia, whose statue was by Scopas. Within the sanctuary were interred the two daughters of Antipoenus, who had devoted themselves to death for the public benefit in the war between Thebes and Orchomenus; and before the temple was the figure of a lion, dedicated by Hercules, when he had defeated the Orchomenii under their king Erginus; near it were statues of Apollo Boedromius and of Mercury Agoraeus, the latter presented by Pindar. Half a stade distant from the tombs of the children of Amphion was their funeral pile. Near (the heroum) of Amphitryon were two statues in stone of Minerva Zosteria, so called because Amphitryon here armed himself when he was proceeding against Chalcodon and the Euboeenses.

§ 2.237   The monument of Zethus and Amphion was a small barrow.
The funeral pile, as well as the objects subsequently mentioned, were, probably, without the walls. The tomb of Amphion certainly was, as appears by a fact related by Pausanias, and still more from Aeschylus. From a comparison of these authorities it seems to have stood in the plain between the site of the gate Proetis and the northern extremity of the Cadmeia.
As the torrent, which forms the ditch of modern Thebes to the eastward, and which marks the extent of the Cadmeia in that direction, is much the least considerable of the three rivulets of Thebes, there can hardly be a doubt that the two others were the two rivers of the ΰιποταμος πόλις, named Dirce and Ismenus.

§ 2.238   That the Ismenus was the eastern is manifest from Euripides, who represents Theseus as directing his herald in proceeding from Eleusis to Thebes to cross the Asopus and then the Ismenus. But Pausanias is still more conclusive, by describing the Ismenus as situated to the right of the gate Electrae, entering Thebes from Plataea, and the Dirce as crossed in the road which led from the gates Neitides towards the mountain of the Sphinx. The Ismenus, therefore, was the river now called Ai Ianni, and the Dirce the Platziotissa or western stream. The middle torrent may have been the Cnopus, for this was the name of a river, and of a village, (called also Cnopia,) through which the river flowed, and which was near Thebes on its southern side, exactly in the position of the torrent towards its sources.
in approaching Thebes from the south, ancient foundations are first seen at about a mile in direct distance from the modern town.

§ 2.239   Here I observed some remains of Hellenic walls, and an oblong quadrangular well or pit excavated in the rock. According to the data of Dicaearchus and Pausanias, this was nearly the situation of the Electris or gate entering lower Thebes from the southward, for this point being a mile and a half distant from the northern extremity of the Cadmeia, and the city having been nearly circular, the circumference would thus have been 4.7 miles, which, measured along the ramparts, would be not very different from the 43 stades of Dicaearchus. As the source of the Ismenus was no more than three quarters of a mile from the Cadmeia, and not so much from the river Dirce, it is evident that both that source, and a part of the course of the Dirce must have been included within the walls, if we comply with the conditions of Dicaearchus, which will require a diameter from east to west of at least a mile and a half; a distance confirmed by the remark of the same author, that two rivers flowed through the city. On the other hand, it appears from Aeschylus that the Ismenus at its entrance into the plain was without the walls, for he describes Tydeus, when presenting himself opposite the gate Proetides, which led to Chalcis, as halting on the bank of the Ismenus, and forbearing to cross, because the sacrifices were

§ 2.240   unpropitious. The same may be inferred from Euripides, who, in describing the military position of Theseus, when after the return of his messenger he marched in person at the head of the Athenians to recover from Creon the unburied bodies of the Argives, represents the infantry as drawn up on the heights along the Ismenus, the cavalry as occupying the extremity of the line near the fountain of Mars, (meaning one of the fountains of Dirce,) and the chariots on the right near the tomb of Amphion. Thus the army invested Thebes on every side, except to the northwest. The infantry was well protected in front by the ravine of the Ismenus, and the chariots were very properly stationed in the plain, where alone they could act. Even the messenger who describes the battle seems to have been well placed on a tower near the gate Electrae, which was toward the centre of the line and on ground commanding a view of the greater part of the site of Thebes.

§ 2.241   The seven gates of Thebes are alluded to by Homer and Hesiod, and frequently by Pindar and the Athenian poets: six of them are named by Aeschylus and Euripides, and all the seven by Apollodorus and Statius, as well as by Pausanias. But none of these five authors are in exact agreement as to the names, or have observed any regular order in naming them: of three gates, however, we have nearly the situation by knowing the places to which they conducted. These are, the Electris, Proetis, and Neitis; of which the first led to Plataea, the second to Chalcis, the third to Onchestus. The Neitis seems to have been not far to the westward of the northern extremity of the

§ 2.242  Cadmeia, for Pausanias describes three monuments in succession between it and the crossing of the river Dirce, thereby indicating a considerable interval between the gate and that crossing, which agrees with the actual course of the river at its entrance into the plain, whereas farther up the valley the river flows immediately at the foot of the Cadmeian hill.
The Homolois may be placed on the same side of Thebes, having been the gate through which the Thebans re-entered the city, when they were recalled by Thersandrus from Homole in Thessaly, whither they had fled after the victory of the Epigoni at Glisas.
Without the gate Proetis, on the road to Chalcis, were the monuments of Melanippus and Tydeus, then the tomb of the sons of Oidipus, and fifteen stades beyond them a cenotaph of Teiresias. Pausanias then observes, that the Thebans possessed a tomb of Hector, at the fountain Oidipodia, which was so called because Oidipus there washed himself after the murder of his father, and that they brought thither from Troy the bones of Hector by command of the Oracle, which directed them also to honour him as a hero. Near the same fountain was the tomb of Asphodicus, who was said by the Thebans to have slain Parthenopaeus, one of the seven chiefs. Although the mention of these monuments by Pausanias follows that of the cenotaph of Teiresias, there is great reason to believe that they were much less than 15 stades distant from the city; as well

§ 2.243   from the words of the oracle as from the ίστι Θηβαίοις with which Pausanias introduces the mention of the tomb of Hector, and equally so from the story attached both to the tomb and the fountain. On this supposition the fountain of St. Theodore agrees in situation with that of the Oidipodia. The source, according to Spon, was supplied from the head of the Ismenus; but even this would not be inconsistent with the words of Pausanias, who describes the Oidipodia as a κρύνη, or constructed fountain. I am more disposed, however, to believe that the fountain of St. Theodore is, in part at least, a vein of water separate from the Ismenus and which still flows perhaps in the ancient conduits. That the Oidipodia was, like the fountain of St. Theodore, to the right of the road to Chalcis, is supported by the observation of Pausanias as to the Gymnasium, Stadium, and Hippodrome. “Before the gates Proetides,” he says, “the Thebans have a gymnasium called the Gymnasium of Iolaus, and a stadium which resembles those of Olympia and Epidaurus, being a heap of earth. There also is the heroum of Iolaus. Beyond the stadium to the right is the Hippodrome, which contains the monument of Pindar. From thence there is a road to Acraephium, for the most part plain etc.” The three constructions here mentioned must have occupied a large space of ground, and seem to have filled up all the space between the roads to Chalcis and to Acraephium, the direct route to which latter town, as well as to Hyle and Aspledon, led probably through the northern gate.

§ 2.244   The remaining objects described by Pausanias in the vicinity of Thebes were on the north-western side. Very near the gate Neitides was the tomb of Menoeceus, son of Creon, and a little farther a monument of stone representing a shield upon a column, which marked the place where the two sons of Oidipus slew each other, and then the Syrma of Antigone, so called because Antigone being unable to carry, here dragged, the dead body of Polynices to the funeral pile of Eteocles. On the opposite side of the river Dirce were ruins of the house of Pindar, and a temple of Dindymene, containing a seated statue of the goddess, of Pentelic marble, dedicated by Pindar, and the joint work of Aristomedes and Socrates, artists of Thebes. In the road which issued at the gate Neitides was a temple of Themis, with a statue in white marble, then temples of the Fates and of Jupiter Agoraeus; the former without any statue, the latter containing the deity in stone. A little farther was a Hercules, surnamed Rhinocolustes, because he (here) cut the noses of the heralds of the Orchomenii. Twenty-five stades beyond it was the grove of Ceres Cabeiria and Proserpine, into which the initiated only were allowed to enter, and seven stades farther a temple of the Cabeiri, to the right of which was the Teneric plain, and to the left a road, which, at the end of fifty stades, conducted to Thespiae.

§ 2.245   Dec. 21.—From Thebes to Egripo.—At 10.27, quitting the eastern extremity of Thebes, I leave, at 10.33, the fountain of St. Theodore on the right, and at 10.50 the road to Bratzi, a branch of which leads to Sykamino. At 11.15 an ancient foundation, called by the modern Thebans “the Gates,” crosses the road. A mile before arriving at this place, we begin to descend a low root of the Psilirakhi, advancing into the plain in the direction of the heights of Moritzi, which latter are connected eastward with the mountain of Siamata. At 11. 21, the nearest point of a low rocky hill, small but conspicuous from its insulated position in the plain, is three or four hundred yards on the left; its termination at the opposite end is more abrupt, and is there separated only by a narrow continuation of the plain of Thebes from the foot of Hypatus or the mountain of Siamata. This low hill seems to correspond exactly to that Teumessus, which was on the road from Thebes to Chalcis, in sight from the walls of the Cadmeia, and which was

§ 2.246   described by the poet Antimachus as an ηνημόεις ολίγος λόφος, or little windy height; for its situation between the two mountains cannot fail to render it subject to the full force of the gales, both from the east and the west. The rich surrounding plain may also justify the epithet of λεχεποιη, or grassy, which the poet bestows upon Teumessus in the Hymn to Apollo. Nor are the words of Pausanias, which place it exactly upon the route’, adverse to the same conclusion, for our track is not the most direct way to Egripo, but a winter road, following the foot of the heights to the right of the direct route. In the time of Pausanias there remained at Teumessus only a temple of Minerva Telchinia, without any statue.
At 11.30, after crossing a small cultivated bottom surrounded by low shrubby terminations of Mount Soro, the road ascends a low ridge which forms a junction between that mountain and the otherwise insulated hill, the supposed Teumessus, At 11.41 we begin to descend, and at 11.44 arrive in the plain which forms a continuation of that of Thebes, by means of the opening already noticed, between the hill of Teumessus and Mount Hypatus, where the plain is not more than half a mile in breadth. At 11.50 Serghis is a mile and a half on the left, on the slope of the mountain; at 11.58 we are just below the centre of its summit and near its lowest falls. At 12.10 Spakhidhes is half a mile on the right. At 12.35, two

§ 2.247   or three miles on the right, a ruined tower of modern construction appears on the top of a rocky height, which hides from view the village of Andritza, where are some Hellenic remains, and a copious source of water. The ridge connecting Parnes with Cithaeron appears between the height of Andritza and that of Soro.
We now ascend a low root of Mount Hypatus, which is steep and rocky, or clothed only with wild shrubs; and after a delay of four minutes cross, at 1.5, some Hellenic foundations. At 1.22 an ancient sorus is in the road, and near it a wall, traversing the road obliquely: between this and a fountain, where we arrive at 1.28, are other Hellenic foundations near the road side, and 200 yards on the left, above the right bank of a torrent which descends from near Platanaki, a monastery on the. mountain, a small height retains evident traces of the citadel of an ancient town. The source of water and foundations probably mark the position of the city walls, and the sorus may have been one of the sepulchres outside the walls. The fountain is on the right bank of the torrent, which is now dry, but after rains unites with other torrents, and joins the sea near Dhramisi. A road along the left bank conducts to Bitzoni.
Having halted at the fountain till 1.57, we begin to mount a ridge of hills connected to the northward with Mount Khtypa, which now appears on the left. The road leads between two peaked heights of the ridge by a natural pass, where to the left are some remains of a wall of loose stones, ascending from the road side to the summit of the peak.

§ 2.248   The pass and ruined wall are conspicuous objects in the surrounding country. Although no towers are traceable, nor any squared blocks of stone remain in their places, there can be little doubt that this work is Hellenic, the wall having been of the usual thickness, and consisting of the rough materials of which the ancients usually formed the interior of their masonry. On the right hand, or eastern side of the pass, are vestiges of a similar wall, which extend, as I am informed, as far as the inclosure of an ancient city on the mountain immediately opposite to the town of Egripo. It is evident that the road from Thebes to the Euripus must in all ages have led through this pass. At 2.26 on the summit of the pass a beautiful view opens of the Euripus, of the town of Egripo, and of a great part of the island of Euboea. At 2.34 we begin to descend the mountain into the maritime plain, and at 3.7 to cross that plain towards Egripo. It consists of open corn land, without any trees, and is intersected with low rocks. The falls of Mount Khtypa, which bound it to the north-west, are also very rocky. The rocks in the plain are of white marble, and are covered with wild thyme. At 3.30 we pass along the shore of the southern bay of Egripo, under the hill of Karababa, and at its eastern extremity cross the bridge of the Euripus into the kastro, or fortress, of Egripo. The current of the Euripus is running to the southward very rapidly, with a visible difference of level between the two sides of the bridge. Having passed through the kastro, or fortress, I proceed to the house of the Russian consul, which is situated at the extremity of the glacis.

§ 2.249   Beyond Teumessus Pausanias describes the road from Thebes to Chalcis in terms of which the following is the substance. To the left of Teumessus, seven stades farther, were the ruins of Glisas, and near them, on the right of the road, a small heap of earth shaded with wild, as well as planted, trees: it was the burying-place of Promachus, and other Argive chiefs slain in the expedition of the Epigoni. On the direct road from Thebes to Glisas was a place surrounded with chosen stones, called the head of the Serpent. Above Glisas rose Mount Hypatus, upon which stood a temple and statue of Jupiter Hypatus. A torrent named Thermodon flowed from the mountain. Turning again towards Teumessus, and into the road to Chalcis, occurred the monument of Chalcodon, who was slain by Amphitryon, and farther on the ruins of Harma and those of Mycalessus. On the sea-shore of the Mycalessia stood a temple of Ceres Mycalessia, containing a statue of the goddess. The temple was to the right of the Euripus, which divides Euboea from Boeotia; a little farther in the same direction was Aulis. Here stood a temple of Diana, and two statues in white marble, one bearing torches, the other drawing a bow. In the temple was preserved some of the wood of the plane-tree mentioned by Homer. The fountain also was shown where the plane grew, and on a neighbouring hill the brazen foundation of the tent of Agamemnon.

§ 2.250   Before the temple grew some date trees, the fruit of which ripened better than in Ionia, though it was not so good as the date of Palestine. The few inhabitants who remained in Aulis were potters. Its territory, as well as that of Harma and Mycalessus, was possessed by the Tanagraei.
The principal question which arises from the preceding abstract of the remarks of Pausanias is, whether the ruins on the bank of the torrent of Platanaki are those of Glisas, or of Harma, Teumessus being placed at the insulated height before mentioned, and the Mycalessia having been the country adjacent to the Euripus. The mountain of Siamata, which rises immediately above the ruins, and in which the torrent flowing by them has its origin, seems to decide that they were those of Glisas, for the former answers exactly to Mount Hypatus, and the latter to the Thermodon, in regard to which we may remark, that there is no other torrent flowing from the eastern or southern side of this mountain, or that if any other could be found, it would flow into the Theban plain towards the lakes to the north of Thebes, whereas it is evident from Herodotus that the Thermodon had an easterly course, since he describes it as having flowed between Tanagra and Glisas.

§ 2.251   It may be objected to the positions of Teumessus and Glisas here supposed, that the distance between them is much greater than the seven stades of Pausanias, consequently that if Glisas was on the torrent of Platanaki, Teumessus could not have been situated on the insulated height. But it seems very unlikely that there should have been an interval of no more than seven stades between those two towns, for such they were in ancient times, though when Pausanias travelled one was a mere ruin, and the other only an insignificant place. I conceive therefore that there is an error in the distance, as stated in the text of Pausanias. If Glisas stood on the torrent of Platanaki, Harma occupied probably the important pass leading into the maritime plain, where the existence of the ancient wall affords a confirmation of all the three positions in question.
As to Mycalessus, the proofs of its situation are: —First, That Thucydides describes Mycalessus as sixteen stades distant from the Hermaion. which was on the sea-shore not far from the Euripus, as will be more clearly shown hereafter. Secondly, that the temple of Ceres Mycalessia was, according to Pausanias, on the shore to the right of the Euripus, by which he certainly meant the south, since he afterwards describes the Anthedonia as being to the left of the Euripus. It seems evident, therefore, that the temple of Ceres stood on the

§ 2.252   shore of the southern bay of Egripo, and that Mycalessus was the ancient city, of which the ruined walls still remain, on the summit of the height immediately above that bay. The connection of its fortifications with those in the pass of Harma by means of a long wall, tends to confirm this opinion, for as the plain certainly belonged to Mycalessus, it is not credible that Aulis, the only other ancient place to which the ruins can be ascribed, should have been in possession of the pass which led into the plain. Moreover, Mycalessus is described by Thucydides as a place of importance, and its autonomous coins still exist; whereas Aulis, although a city in the Trojan war, was chiefly known in after times as a harbour.
It is easy to conceive that the Mycalessii may have entered into a compact with the people of Harma for the common defence of their passes, or, perhaps, that as Mycalessus still subsisted in the time of Strabo, while Harma was deserted, the Mycalessii may have made the remains of Harma serve for the defence of the pass leading into their territory, and may have connected it for greater security with their own fortifications. In the time of Pausanias, Mycalessus was in ruins as well as Harma. The objection to the position of Mycalessus just indicated is, that Strabo places it on

§ 2.253   the road from Thebes to Chalcis, whereas its supposed ruins are near two miles to the right of that road; but Strabo seems to have been writing loosely of places which he had never seen, and his words παρ οδον do not imply that the ruins were exactly on the road, but only near it. Indeed it would not be easy to reconcile any situation on the road with the testimony of Thucydides.
The Sanjak of Egripo includes the kazas of Thebes, Athens, Livadhia, Salona, and Talanda, but the revenues of all those places being administered by voivodas having annual appointments from the Porte, the power of the Pasha in time of peace hardly extends beyond the island. He is now absent, and the government is in the hands of a Musellim. The revenue of the Pashalik amounts to about 400 purses, and is derived from the sale of the dhekatia of all the lands not feudal, or from the Spahiliks attached to the Pashalik, from the customs and kharatj, from an excise on grain and other objects of consumption, and from bribes to permit the forbidden exportation of corn and butter. The chief produce of the island is wine; from Cumae and Kastrevala alone, 20,000 barrels of 54 okes are sent to Smyrna and the Black Sea, of which the average price on the spot is five piastres a barrel. Wheat and oil are exported only in the years when the circumstances of production and demand happen to be favorable. Vallonea, cotton, wool, pitch and turpentine, are also exported, but in small quantities. The Russian consul has been obliged by his superiors to exchange the agreeable residence of Athens for this miserable place, not on account

§ 2.254   of the commerce, which is very small, but because it is the residence of the governor of this part of Greece, and therefore better adapted to the protection of the numerous Greek ships now sailing under the Russian flag, or of those of the Septinsular Republic. As the best security against insult, the consul has found it necessary to take into his service, as janissary, a certain Hassan, who is surnamed Karabeber, or Black Pepper, from his swarthy complexion, and the fame which he acquired here in his youth, by killing many of his fellow-citizens in those quarrels for which the Turks of Egripo are notorious. Hassan has acquired so much influence, that last year he quelled a mutiny of the people.
Both the Island of Euboea and its chief town are called Egripos, a manifest corruption of Ευριπος, and which the Turks pronounce Gribos, or Aegribos. The greater part of the best lands of the island are owned by about thirty Turkish families, residing principally in the Kastro of Egripo, which contains about 1000 others of the lower orders. These, with 200 families in Karysto, Rovies, Oreus, Kastrevala and a few smaller places, compose the whole Turkish population of the island. The Christians are about five times as numerous, but in the town of Egripo do not form above a third of the inhabitants. Many of the houses in the outer town are ruined and uninhabited, particularly on the southern side: this is in great measure the effect of the plague which lately raged here. The town is supplied with water from wells, the best of which was choked up on the 4th of last September, old style, by the earth brought down by a fall of rain,

§ 2.255   which lasted forty-eight hours. The famous Arethusa, which was disturbed in former ages by the effect of earthquakes, has now totally disappeared. The only remains of ancient Chalcis I can find are some fragments of white marble in the walls of the mosques and houses, and the bust of a statue in the wall of a house in the fortress. But it is difficult to explore among these intolerant barbarians.
The lion of St. Mark remains over the gate of the Kastro; many of the better houses are of Venetian construction, and there is a church with a high pointed roof, square tower, and Gothic windows, which was probably built by the same people, as they were in almost constant possession of this place for the three centuries preceding its capture by Mahomet II. in 1470. The most remarkable Turkish monument is an enormous piece of ordnance, like those of the Dardanelles, which defends the approach to the southern side of the Kastro.
This fortress is a construction of different ages; square towers erected before the invention of gunpowder are mixed with Venetian bastions of antique construction, or with Turkish white-washed walls and battlements. There is a dry ditch, intended to be flooded at pleasure, but which is now filled with rubbish.

§ 2.256   The glacis of the Castle is occupied by the Turkish burying-ground, beyond which is the Christian town surrounded by walls, in a wretched state of dilapidation, encircling the promontory of the Kastro in a semi-lunar form from bay to bay; beyond these the Turks have lately thrown up a pallisaded rampart of earth across the isthmus.
The bay on the northern side of Egripo is called St. Minas, that on the southern side Vurko, or Vulko, a name having reference to its shallow and muddy nature. This bay communicates by a narrow opening with a long winding strait which extends about four miles to a second narrow opening, where stands a tower upon a low point of the Euboean coast, in the plain of Vasiliko. No vessels except boats can approach Egripo on the southern side, nearer than the tower. On the north they have no difficulty in approaching, as there is a depth of four orghies, or more than 20 feet, near the walls; nor is there said to be any such danger in the anchorage as Livy would lead one to suppose, though it cannot be doubted that the entire strait between the island and the main, is subject to violent squalls from the mountains. The Euripus, which strictly speaking is no more than the narrowest part of the strait between the foot of Mount Karababa

§ 2.257   and the western walls of the kastro is divided as to its breadth into two unequal parts by a small square castle, founded on a rock, and having a solid round tower at the north-western angle. A stone bridge, 60 or 70 feet in length, connects the Boeotian shore with this castle, the entrance into which is by a drawbridge near the north-eastern angle. Another wooden bridge about 35 feet long, which may be raised at both ends for the purpose of admitting the passage of vessels, communicates from the small castle to the gate of the kastro, which is in a tower projecting from the walls. The inner channel is said always to afford a depth of eight or nine feet: under the stone bridge the water is much more shallow. Egripo having become more barbarous since Spon and Wheler travelled, it may be long before any person has such an opportunity of observing the flux and reflux of the strait as the Jesuit Babin, whose remarks have been published by Coronelli, Spon, and Wheler. He agrees with Livy, so far as to show the error of the common opinion entertained by the ancients, that the change of current occurred seven times a day, but he does not confirm the ancient historian as to its total irregularity, and its entire dependence on the winds; which, however, can hardly fail to affect the reciprocation in some degree, by means of the local and temporary currents which they cause in every part of the Aegaean. Babin seems to have ascertained that the tide was sometimes regular as in the ocean, and at other times irregular; and that both the regular and irregular tides followed the phases of the moon,

§ 2.258   though not to such a degree that the tides could be predicted to within a day or two before or after the changes; the regular days were generally 19 in the month, the irregular 11, and the former were in the first and third quarters, the latter in the second and fourth. The Jesuit’s facts seem to have been chiefly derived from the millers of the Euripus, but unfortunately the mills which are below the arches of the stone bridge are no longer worked.
It is believed by the people of Egripo, that the small castle on the rock in the Euripus did not exist in the time of the Venetians, but was built by the Turks soon after the conquest. Coronelli, however, whose work was published in 1686, the year before Athens was taken, and Negropont invested by the Venetians, states that the entrance from Boeotia first crossed a bridge of stone of five arches, about 30 paces long, that it then passed at the foot of a tower of Venetian structure, over the door of which the lion of St. Mark still remained (though the Turks had then possessed the place 200 years), and entered the town over a wooden drawbridge. These remarks seem sufficiently to explain that the round tower is Venetian, and the remaining part of the work Turkish, of which indeed there is every appearance. The communication from the bridge of stone to that over the inner channel now passes, as I have already stated, through the north-eastern angle of the castle, the round tower remaining to the right, which agrees with Coronelli.

§ 2.259   The earliest construction of a bridge over the Euripus known from history occurred in the 21st year of the Peloponnesian war, when the Euboeans revolted from the Athenians, and endeavoured to obstruct the Euripus. On this occasion they readily obtained assistance from the Boeotians, whose general interest it was that “Euboea should be an island for others, but a part of the continent to them.” A great number of hands were employed in narrowing the strait, so as not to leave a passage for a single ship, but only the necessary opening for the current between two towers which were built at the extremity of the διάχωσις, or mole which was thrown up from either shore. As the Athenians tried in vain to interrupt the work, and both Boeotians and Euboeans are stated to have joined earnestly in forwarding it, a part of its effects may possibly remain to the present day. The Boeotian mole probably extended across the shallow channel, and included the rock upon which the small castle stands.
During the expedition of Alexander the Great into Asia, the Chalcidenses not only fortified the bridge with towers, a wall, and gates, but, inclosing a place on the Boeotian side, called Canethus, within the circuit of their city, thus obtained a fortified bridge head. Canethus, therefore, was probably the hill of Karababa.

§ 2.260   About 140 years afterwards, in the campaign of the Romans against Antiochus in the year B.C. 192, the bridge seems no longer to have existed, for Livy speaks of the Hermaion before Salganeus as the ordinary place of passage into Boeotia, and in describing the entrance of a body of Achaeans into Chalcis, he employs the words, “tuto transgressi Euripum Chalcidem pervenerunt.” Such an expression is hardly suited to the passage of a bridge to which there was no impediment It is probable, therefore, that the bridge had been removed between the reign of Alexander and the Antiochian war. A fortified dependence of Chalcis on the Boeotian shore may have been offensive to the Boeotians, or to the Athenians, and sometimes to both: and if the people of Chalcis were not permitted to keep possession of that post, it may not have suited their interests to maintain the bridge.
Twenty-five years afterwards, however, if we may trust to Livy, a bridge had been thrown over the Euripus; for he states that P. Aemilius Paullus, in his journey through Greece after the conquest of Macedonia, found the Euripus in that state. But there may be some doubt whether the historian’s words in this place have been borrowed from the same accurate contemporary of the events described by him, whom he usually followed, or whether they do not rather describe the state of the Euripus in the time of the historian

§ 2.261   himself; when, as we learn from Strabo, there was a bridge two plethra, or 200 Greek feet in length, with a tower at each end, and a constructed canal through the Euripus, whence it would seem also, not only that no castle existed in the strait at that time, but that the strait was broader than it is at present. The σύριγζ, or canal, may perhaps have been confined to the passage between the intermediate rock, which must always have existed, though Strabo has not noticed it, and the entrance of Chalcis, and was probably nothing more than a construction of masonry on either side of that channel.
In the reign of Justinian the bridge had been so much neglected, that there was only an occasional communication by wooden planks.
In the plain adjacent to the town of Egripo are three ancient excavated cisterns of the usual spheroidal shape, lined with a coat of cement, and having circular openings at the top. Each of these has (what I have not seen elsewhere) an entrance on one side. In one of them which is clear of rubbish, a descent of steps appears, with an arched passage cut through the rock leading into the body of the cistern, which is small and not deep.

§ 2.262   It is now converted into a church of St. John Prodromus, and has a skreen and altar of rough stones. The two other cisterns, though now choked with rubbish, seem also to have been churches, as they bear the names of two saints. Farther south, at the distance of a mile from the town, are the ruins of an aqueduct upon arches, which supplied Chalcis in Roman times. Northward of the city the plain, and then a cultivated slope, extend along the foot of the mountains as far as Politika, a village near the sea, distant four hours; a little beyond which begin those great cliffs which are so conspicuous from many parts of Boeotia, and which border the sea for several miles, admitting of no road along the shore. To the southward of Egripo, midway between it and the tower, which I have described as defending the entrance of the narrow winding strait leading from the southward to the bay of Vurko, a round hill named Kalogheritza rises from the shore, and commands a good view of the Euripus and of the Euboic frith, as far as Lipso northward, and to a cape beyond Kalamo in Attica southward. Mount Messapium, and the adjacent heights, exclude the view of all the interior of Boeotia except the summit of Cithron, but to the northward Cnemis is seen, and to the southward Parnes, with Pentelicum appearing over the eastern part of its ridge, and to the left of it Mount Oche in Euboea.
Opposite to Kalogheritza, on the Boeotian coast, are two bays, separated from each other by a rocky peninsula; the northern is small and winding, the southern spreads at the end of a channel, into a large circular basin. The latter harbour, as well

§ 2.263   as a village situated a mile to the southward of it, is called Vathy, a name evidently derived from the βαθύς λιμην, or larger port of Aulis, in which Strabo supposes the fleet of Agamemnon to have been anchored, because the small port of Aulis was inadequate to receive more than fifty sail: the rocky peninsula which separates the two harbours corresponds equally well with the Αυλίς πετρύεσσα of Homer, and its distance from the Euripus agrees with the testimony of Livy as to that of Aulis from thence. Nor, indeed, are there any other harbours on the Boeotian coast to the southward, which can raise a question on the subject. Dicaearchus, who like Strabo proceeds along the coast from south to north, names the places in the following order: Oropus, the temple of Amphiaraus, Aulis, the promontory Emperesium and Euripus; which not only confirms the other authorities as to Aulis, but suggests also the probability that

§ 2.264   Emperesium was the peninsula which separates port Vurko from the southern part of the Straits. The space between the northern extremity of port Vathy and the bay of Vurko is occupied by the hill of Mycalessus. On the summit are the remains of an acropolis flanked with towers, and constructed of masonry of the third species—to which is attached, on the south-eastern side, the inclosure of the town, built of a very rude kind of Hellenic masonry, similar to that of the wall, which extends from the acropolis to the pass of Harma. [map]

§ 2.265   On the top of the hill of Kalogheritza are two ruined round towers, formerly, perhaps, windmills, and near them the foundations of a Hellenic wall, with an ancient column lying on the ground. Inland the height falls to a plain, forming a junction between that which incircles the town of Egripo and the larger plain of Vasiliko, which extends southward along the coast, almost to the ruins of Eretria. Towards the sea the hill of Kalogheritza is very rugged, and consists entirely of rock, in which many sepulchral crypts have been excavated, some of them having circular roofs: here also are stairs and niches cut out of the rock. A copious stream issues from the foot of the rocks, and flows immediately into the sea: and a paved road here leads along the shore to the village of 'Aio Nikola in the plain of Vasiliko. Possibly this hill may be the site of a place named Lelantum, for the plain behind it being exactly interposed between those of Chalcis and Eretria, could hardly have been any other than that plain of Lelantum which was an object of such deadly contention between the two rival states that a pillar still existed in the time of Strabo in the temple of Diana Amarysia, distant seven stades from Eretria, on which there was an inscription declaring that no missiles should be used in the war. The plain of Lelantum is mentioned in the Hymn to Apollo, and was famed for its vineyards, and vines are so extensively

§ 2.266   produced in the plain behind Kalogheritza, that a village in the midst of them is named Ambelia.
It was only in the most populous and opulent times that Eretria could maintain a rivalship with Chalcis, which by its numerous colonies sent to Italy, Sicily, and Thrace, and by its historical importance in every age, from the war of Troy to the Roman conquest, is shown to have been one of the most flourishing cities in Greece. Its silver coins are still found in surprising numbers. Under the successors of Alexander, when Greece became impoverished, and its resources and population inadequate to the maintenance of two large cities at so short a distance from each other, the peculiar advantages of the position of Chalcis gave it that superiority over Eretria which Strabo remarked, and an increase of the same causes has ended in making Chalcis the only town of any magnitude in Euboea. But the consequence of the opposite fate of Chalcis and Eretria has been, that at Chalcis scarcely any vestiges of antiquity are found, while Eretria, by means of its desolation, has preserved remains affording an interesting confirmation of the former importance of the city.

§ 2.267   Dec. 24.—Having recrossed the Euripus this morning at 9, we follow the same road by which we came, along the shore of the bay of Vurko, with the height of Karababa on the right, for fifteen minutes; then leaving the road to Thebes on the left, cross the plain in a direction parallel to the foot of the mountains with the sea on the right. At 9.30, in a ruined church, is a fragment of a large column, which may formerly have belonged to the Hermaion, or to the temple of Ceres Mycalessia. Here are a series of wells, the direction of which is towards the middle of the bay of Vurko. They are very narrow, lined with stone and well constructed, but do not appear to be of any great antiquity. At 9.35 Akhalia is half a mile on the right, not far from the sea; the foot of the lower heights of Mount Khtypa, the ancient Messapium, are at the same distance on the left. The intermediate level is well cultivated with corn, which is just springing up. The plain narrows in approaching Khtypa, and at 10 we reach the foot of the mountain just where it descends in a rapid slope from the summit quite to the shore.
Just in the angle where the plain terminates are the remains of a Hellenic town, on the side of a small port, directly under the highest summit of the mountain. The citadel occupied a height rising from the shore, ninety yards in length and about fifty broad, and having a flat summit sloping from the south-east towards the sea. The sides of the hill, which are about fifty yards on the slope, have been partly shaped by art, and then faced with stone in the manner of some ancient places in Syria, of which the castles of Hama and Aleppo are the most remarkable examples. The facing of stone is visible on every side except the north, where probably it still exists, though now covered by an alluvion of earth.

§ 2.268   Some remains of walls are visible on the crest of the summit, and a part of the town walls on the south-eastern side of the height. There can be little doubt that these are remains of Salganeus, which, although unnoticed by Pausanias, appears clearly from Dicaearchus and Strabo to have been a Boeotian fortress, situated between the Euripus and Anthedon, at the northern entrance of the narrow part of the Euboic frith. According to Strabo, the name was derived from the Boeotian pilot of Megabazus, who was put to death by the Persian commander, on suspicion that he was purposely leading the fleet of Xerxes to destruction, because no outlet appeared to the channel. Megabazus, afterwards regretting his error, erected a monument to the pilot in the place where his death occurred, and where the town afterwards stood.
I have already alluded to the mention of Salganeus by Livy in his narrative of the military transactions in this quarter, between Antiochus and the Romans. The first measure of Antiochus, on his arrival from Asia at Demetrias, was an attempt to obtain possession of Chalcis in concert with his allies the Aetolians. Having passed from Lamia through Phocis, he met the Aetolians at Chaeroneia, and then marched to Salganeus, from whence he crossed by water to the harbour of Chalcis, accompanied by the Aetolian chiefs. Having failed in his endeavour to convince the magistrates of Chalcis that it was for their interest to take part with him against the Romans, he returned to

§ 2.269  Demetrias, and in order to prevent succours from arriving at Chalcis, sent thither his fleet, commanded by Polyxenidas, and 3000 land forces under Menippus, who encamped before Salganeus at the Hermaion, which was the ordinary place of transit, into Euboea They were too late to prevent a small reinforcement of Achaeans and of troops sent by Eumenes from entering Chalcis, but in time to oblige Mictio of Chalcis, and 500 Romans who were approaching with the same design from the southward, to retire to Delium, from whence it was their intention to cross the Euboic frith into the island; but Menippus, having surprized them at Delium, and captured or slain a considerable number, Antiochus, who had followed Menippus into Boeotia, thereupon marched to Aulis, and was admitted into Chalcis. The remaining Romans then took possession of the castle of the Euripus, while Salganeus was occupied by the Achaeans and troops of Eumenes, who had retired from Chalcis; but Menippus, proceeding to besiege the latter place, and the king the castle of the Euripus, their opponents gave up the defence, and left Antiochus in possession of all Euboea.
From these circumstances, compared with the distance of sixteen stades, which Thucydides has assigned as that between the Hermaion and Mycalessus, it may be inferred that the Hermaion, so called we may suppose from a temple of Mercury, stood on the shore between Salganeus and the modern bridge, and that it was probably the

§ 2.270   ordinary place of passage because it was nearly opposite to the northern or principal harbour of Chalcis. The fortress which Livy describes by the words Euripi castellum, or in Euripo castellum, or simply Euripus, would seem from this designation to have occupied the site of the small castle on the rock in the strait, but as many obvious difficulties would arise from such a supposition, I am inclined to think it was the same place as Canethus, or the hill of Karababa.
Having quitted the ruins of Salganeus at 10.30, I begin, in eight minutes, to ascend the cliffs which now border the shore, and soon observe the traces of chariot-wheels in the rock. At 10.42, the road continuing to follow the summit of the cliffs, we arrive opposite to the southern extremity of an island named Gaidharo-nisi, distant half a mile from the coast, and which is a mile in length from north to south. Upon it stands a square tower, visible from Karababa, but not from the town of Egripo; ten minutes farther the road descends upon the sea-beach. At 11.4 are the foundations of a thick wall near the beach, parallel to the water's edge. Here is a source of saltish water. At 11.8 is another and more considerable saline source, where are the ruins of some mills. The wall, and the traces of wheels in the rock, are vestiges of that road from Chalcis to Anthedon which Dicaearchus has noticed, though his description is not exactly in accordance with modern appearances, for he represents the road as very smooth; instead of which it is like the shore, extremely rugged where it passes over the rocks,

§ 2.271   and where it follows the beach is liable to interruption from the overhanging cliffs, fragments of which often break off in such quantity as to render the road impassable. Though Dicaearchus mentions the sources of water, he does not remark that they are chiefly saline; and his description of the mountain can only be made to answer to Mount Khtypa by the omission of the word ούχ, for this mountain is lofty as well as steep. At 11.12 the pass terminates, and we enter on a slope covered with lentisk and holly-oak, which is continued quite to the summit of the mountain. At the head of the slope, and just under the steep side of the summit, stands the small village of Lukisi, towards which I proceed after leaving at 11.15 the road to Larmes branching to the right, and passing along the foot of the slope near the sea. At 11.25 an ancient foundation cut out of the rock is seen crossing the road; to the left of which, three hundred yards from the road, is a church surrounded with purnaria, in which are several ancient squared stones, and an aghia trapeza formed of an ancient sepulchral stone supported by part of a column. On the stone, which has a simple decoration of sculpture, is the name Καφισόδωρα, in letters of the best times. Leaving this place at 11.40, we continue to ascend, when the remains of another ancient wall occur at 11.48, and at 11.53 we

§ 2.272   arrive at Lukisi. Here the women, (the men being all at work in the fields); having brought me several ancient coins which have been found in ploughing the corn-fields at the παλαιά χώρα, or old town; which is distant a mile and a half at the foot of the slope on the sea side, I proceed thither, after dining, and find considerable remains of an ancient city. [map]
1,1. Are traces of the town wall, built with well squared stones, of the most regular kind of masonry. Its termination to the south-east I could not exactly trace: the entire circuit of the city seems not to have been more than 2000 yards. 2. An acropolis situated on a small height terminating towards the sea in cliffs; on the brow of which are found large pieces of the ancient wall; other remains of the wall are seen also on the land side of the acropolis.

§ 2.273   3. Midway between the wall of the town and the crest of the height of the acropolis are some cisterns of the usual form.
4. Part of the platform of a public building, thirty-four yards in length, founded in the sea; and supported on that side by quadrangular projecting buttresses, of which four remain; there was an ascent of a few steps from the sea to the platform. The port, in the midst of which this building stood, was defended from the open sea on the north by 5, a mole, connected with the northern wall of the town, and built upon a projecting ledge of rocks. All the foundations of the mole still remain, and it was probably surmounted with a wall, forming a continuation of the town wall. At 6, are the foundations of a similar work of smaller dimensions, the extremity of which approaches so near to a small sandy island near the extremity of the greater mole, as to suggest the probability that the opening was occasionally closed by a chain, by which the north-eastern part of the bay became a κλειστος λιμην, or closed port; it appears to have been excluded from the city by a wall branching from the western extremity of the northern mole, passing behind the building No. 4, and terminating, perhaps, at the nearest part of the acropolis. Strangers arriving by sea might thus have access to the building, which was probably a temple, without being admitted into the town, and the town might resist after the port had been occupied by an enemy.

§ 2.274   The town walls were defended to the west by the ravine of a torrent flowing from Mount Messapium. There can be no question that these are ruins of Anthedon, of the situation of which we have several descriptions in ancient history. According to a poet quoted by Athenaeus, Anthedon stood on the sea coast, opposite to Euboea, not far from the Euripus. Strabo places it on the shore between Salganeus and Larymna near Mount Messapium, Pausanias describes it as a maritime city at the foot of Mount Messapium to the left of the Euripus, and Dicaearchus as a small town on the Euboic sea, distant seventy stades from Chalcis and one hundred and sixty from Thebes. The soil on the slope of Mount Khtypa, around Lukisi, and that which surrounds the Palea-khora, is, as Dicaearchus remarks of the Anthedonia, much better adapted to vines than to corn, though there is very little of either at present. He adds, that the inhabitants were chiefly mariners, shipwrights, and fishermen, that they traded in fish, purple, and sponges, and that they had an agora surrounded with a double stoa, and planted with trees. In the middle of the town, according to Pausanias, was a Sacred Grove of the Cabeiri, surrounding a temple of those deities, near which was another dedicated to Ceres and Proserpine, and containing their statues in white marble. On the outside of the walls, on the land side, was a

§ 2.275   temple of Bacchus, containing his statue; and near it tombs of the sons of Aloeus and Iphimedeia, who were slain by Apollo. On the sea side there was a place called “the leap of Glaucus.” “It was from the Anthedonii,” adds the Greek traveller, “that Pindar and Aeschylus derived their fables of Glaucus, who was a fisherman of Anthedon, converted by the Anthedonii into a marine deity, predicting futurity and delivering oracular responses, which seafaring men still believe.” It seems not unlikely that the building on the shore of the harbour was a temple of Glaucus.
As to the vestiges of antiquity near Lukisi, it is not impossible that the Nisa, or Isus, of Homer, which latter name was still preserved near Anthedon in the time of Strabo, may have stood at Lukisi, and that the modern name may preserve remains of the ancient in its two last syllables.
Opposite to Anthedon on the coast of Euboea is Politika, from whence the coast to the northward consists for seven miles of lofty cliffs, terminating to the north in the remarkable peak called Kandili. The distance of this mountain from the site of Anthedon corresponds to the 120 stades which Strabo assigns as the interval between Anthedon and a lofty mountain on which there was a temple of Neptune Aegaeus. The city Aegae no longer existed in his time, but it stood probably towards Limni, as he states it to have been not far from Orobiae, now Rovies.

§ 2.276   CHAPTER 15 BOEOTIA
I had intended to have taken the road along the sea-side to Larmes, and thence to Martino, but the women at Lukisi having reported it impracticable, I proceed by the Lake Paralimni to Kokkino. At 1.32 cross the foundations of the town walls of Anthedon, and immediately afterwards the deep dry ravine of a torrent which descends from the part of Mount Khtypa, above Lukisi; on its left bank are some foundations of an ancient wall, the remains perhaps of a bridge. At 1.38, on a height on the side of the same torrent are two ruined churches, and the remains of two sepulchral receptacles cut in the rock. From thence, after a delay of 4 minutes, we continue to mount the slope, and at 1.50 arrive at the summit of a ridge which connects Mount Ptoum with the lower heights of Messapium about Lukisi.

§ 2.277   Here are several Hellenic foundations, belonging probably to works for the defence of this pass, which was on the road from Anthedon to Thebes. The ascent on either side is easy, and the ridge is not high, but it opens an extensive view between the mountains Ptoum and Hypatus, and looks down immediately upon the lake Paralimni, otherwise called the lake of Moritzi. It is observable from hence, that the length of this lake is in the direction of a peaked hill, over which our road afterwards passes towards Kokkino, that the summit of the mountain of Zagara is in the same line, and that a little to the left of the latter appears that of Faga. After a loss of 5 minutes in the descent, we arrive, at 2.35, opposite to the northeastern end of the lake, and then leaving it on the right, follow a rugged path along the last falls of the Messapian ridges. From the opposite shore rises the steep naked ridge of Mount Ptoum, of which the modern name in this part is Strutzina. To the northward of it is another summit of the same range, called Skroponeri, and to the southward of it that named Palea; the former terminates in a peaked cape two or three miles beyond Anthedon.
Continuing our route along the rocky foot of the hills, we arrive at 2.48 at a part of the ancient road, 200 feet long, excavated in the rock in the form of a shallow trench, 5 feet 9 inches in breadth. It winds in descending like a similar road between Sparta and Helos; and though it retains scarcely any of those marks of wheels which are generally seen on the remains of ancient roads in

§ 2.278   Greece, there can be no doubt that it is a part of that route for carriages described by Dicaearchus, which led from Anthedon to Thebes, and which was 160 stades in length. Having remained here 5 minutes, we emerge at 3.7 from between the Messapian hills and the lake, into a plain separated only by a small rise from the plain of Thebes. Moritzi is here half an hour on our left, hid by the rising ground. At 3.30 other small hills border the lake: at 3.35 there are traces of ancient walls near the road, and at 3.45 we arrive at the end of the lake, where on a low rocky height close on the left of the road, are foundations of buildings formed of very large stones, and having an appearance of remote antiquity. There are traces also of an ancient wall following the foot of the hill towards the lake. It is evidently the site of a Hellenic town.
From the head of the lake a plain begins, which, widening to the westward, is bounded by a mountain branching southward from Mount Palea, and terminating in the plain of Thebes, at the eastern extremity of the Livadhi, or lake of Senzina, and thus separating from each other the basins which contain the two lakes with their adjacent plains.
Having left the ancient site by the lake Paralimni at 3.56, we fall into the road from Thebes to Talanda by Martino, and at 4.15 begin to ascend the separating ridge above-mentioned, which is very rugged: at 4.40 arrive at the summit, where the steep rocks of Mount Palea are not far to the right, while on the left we look down on the plain and lake of Senzina.

§ 2.279   Before us are the hills above Kardhitza together with a part of the lake Cephissis, and the marshes bordering on it: beyond these appear Helicon and Parnassus. We quit this spot at 5, and keeping close under the precipices of Mount Palea, wind round them to the right, until at 530 the road passes a modern fountain, constructed chiefly of ancient squared stones, mixed with stelae and pedestals. Here stood formerly the monastery of Palea, by which the adjacent summit of Mount Ptoum is still known. The name seems to have been derived from some Hellenic ruins once existing here in greater quantity than at present, and which may have given to the monastery the appellation of ή Παναγία στα Παλαια, or “Our Lady at the Antiquities.” The ruins were probably those of the temple of Apollo Ptous, or Ptoius, famous for an oracle delivered by a priestess, who when consulted by Mardonius, replied to his messenger, who was a Carian, in his own language. The oracle belonged to the Thebans, and ceased when Thebes was destroyed by Alexander the Great.

§ 2.280   Kardhitza is now about half an hour below us on the left, but having determined before proceeding thither to visit the subterraneous discharge of the Cephissus, and to search for Larymna, I turn from it to the right, descend by a winding course, in order to avoid the rocky summits overhanging Kokkino, and then leaving to the left the road to Martino, turn under the northern side of the abovementioned cliffs, and arrive at Kokkino at 6.8. This is a village of thirty houses, which as usual, in this part of Greece, consist only of one apartment, serving both for a stable and a lodging for the whole family. The people are of Albanian origin, and use that language among themselves, so that many of the women are ignorant of the Greek: at Mazi and Lukisi it was the same. The owner of the cottage in which I lodge is said to possess several thousand goats on Mount Ptoum, but dares not live better than the other people of the village.
Dec. 25.—After having visited, this morning, three small churches, a quarter of a mile to the N.E. of Kokkino, where the village formerly stood, and where I find only an altar with an ill-executed ornament of metopes connected by festoons, and a few other trifling remains of Hellenic times, I proceed at 8.45 to the Katavothra of the Cephissus, descending the rugged hill till 9, when in a ravine we rejoin the road from Thebes to Martino, which we quitted yesterday evening. Continue descending, and pass over a small plain at the head of a bay of the lake Copais, which is cultivated by the people of Kokkino, but in the upper portion only, on account of the inundations to which the lower part is subject. The lake abounds

§ 2.281   in fish, and its surface is now covered with wild fowl, but the peasants reap no advantage either from the one or the other, for want of the means of catching or killing them; the people of Topolia, however, enjoy a profitable fishery in the lake, and sometimes take, especially at the katavothra, great quantities of those Copaic or Cephissic eels renowned among the ancients for their bulk and fatness, and which Pausanias commends from his own experience. At 9.18 we arrive on the water’s edge, and then ascending the rocky foot of Mount Skroponeri arrive in three minutes more at a great cavern, at the foot of a perpendicular rock eighty feet high. It is the entrance of a low, dark, subterraneous passage, one hundred and twelve yards long, through which a part of the river or current of the lake slowly flows, and rejoins the rest of the river very near the entrance of the south-easternmost of the katavothra. In summer this cavern, or false katavothra, as it may be called, is dry, and there is a passage through it on foot; but at present it is the resort of a multitude of fishes.
The south-eastern katavothra resembles the cavern in outward appearance, being an aperture at the foot of a perpendicular rock of equal altitude. But there is much more water here: the stream which enters is about thirty feet broad, and four

§ 2.282   or five feet deep, and now entirely fills and conceals the opening, which in summer is exposed. Now that the lake extends as far as Topolia and fills all this part of the basin, it is not easy to distinguish the river from the inundation, unless from some favourable position on the surrounding heights, especially as the current flows not more rapidly than a yard in a minute, and there is little difference in the depth or colour of the water in any part of this inner bay, which is divided from the main body of the lake of Copae by a projecting point under Kokkino, concealing Topolia from the katavothra. I now ride over the rocky foot of the mountain near the lake, and in twelve minutes arrive at a second katavothra, situated like the first at the end of an inlet of the lake terminating in a perpendicular cliff, but much smaller both in the size of the stream and in the height of the cliff, which is not more than twenty feet. The stream flows rapidly into the cavern, and there is a bank of loose stones across it, intended for catching fish when the water is low. In summer the inlet is quite dry, and often the river itself: all the adjoining part of the lake is then converted into a pasture, with cattle grazing on it. Two minutes beyond the second katavothra is a third, at the foot of a perpendicular rock of fifty feet; here the course of the river is well marked, having sandbanks on either side, and a broad stream running into the cavern. From hence, after riding for a quarter of an hour along the lake northward, in search of other subterraneous entrances, without finding any, I return to the third katavothra and proceed from thence to the emissory of the river in the valley of

§ 2.283   Larmes. For ten minutes the road mounts a stony hollow between low hills of the same description, after which the same vale is continued with a descending surface. The Cephissus pursues its subterraneous course in the same direction, as appears by a line of quadrangular shafts or perpendicular excavations in the rock, evidently made for the purpose of clearing the subterraneous channel when by some accident it had been obstructed, and had thereby submerged, or endangered, a great part of the fertile plain which extends to the sites of Acraephium, Haliartus, Tilphossium and Orchomenus. The first shaft is at two minutes’ distance from the third katavothra. It is five feet eight inches square, entirely excavated out of the rock, and is filled with stones and earth to within a few feet of the top. The second shaft, which is three minutes farther, is clear to the depth of forty-five feet. The third shaft is at three minutes’ distance from the last, and is filled at the depth of twenty feet. The mouths of many of these shafts are concealed by the bushes of lentisk and purnari which cover the valley, but they are easily traced by means of the mounds of earth and broken stones around them, which were formed probably when the wells were excavated. Their obstruction has obviously been caused by their all lying, more or less, in the course of the waters down the valley. The fourth shaft is one minute beyond the third, and not less than ninety feet in depth, with stones and earth at the bottom, like the others. It diminishes gradually downwards, not in a straight line, but by a succession of ledges.

§ 2.284   The second is constructed in the same manner, and so are probably several of those which are filled. All are cut entirely through the rock: some have small steps on either side of one of the angles. The fifth shaft is one minute beyond the fourth, and is entirely filled with the earth and stones washed into it from the hills on either side. Its situation, however, is ascertained by the mounds around the hollow, and we may infer, from the height and extent of the mounds, that this shaft must have been the deepest of all. Here in fact the valley is highest, and from hence the ground descends all the way to the vale of the lower Cephissus. The elevation I should conceive to be at the utmost one hundred and eighty feet above the level of the lake. The sixth shaft is at the same distance of about one hundred yards from the fifth, that the fifth is from the fourth: and, like the fifth, it is quite filled. The seventh is in an exact line with those preceding, but as the valley here takes a turn to the left, this shaft is on the rocky foot of the mountain, instead of being in the lowest part of the vale. The engineers who undertook, by means of these shafts, to clear the subterraneous channel of the river, naturally proceeded upon the supposition that the stream would run direct or nearly so, from the entrance towards the issue, and hence without regarding the nature of the ground above, they proceeded to excavate the seventh shaft in the same line with those preceding it. In forming it they probably discovered that the subterraneous channel does not follow the straight line, but conforms to the structure of the ground on the surface, turning in the direction of a ravine to the left; they continued, therefore, their work in that direction to the eighth shaft, which is found in a point

§ 2.285   forming an angle to the left of the former line, at the usual distance from the seventh, but just at the entrance of the ravine, which is here closely confined by the adjoining rocky hills, and descends rapidly. The seventh shaft is twenty feet deep, the eighth, much ruined, about forty-five; between them to the right, in a little level which occupies the corner at the turn of the valley, are foundations of an oblong building, of large rough stones. The ninth shaft, which is seventy or eighty feet deep, occurs at the usual distance; the tenth at the same distance, has a depth of twenty feet. The eleventh at a like distance, is something less deep than the ninth. The twelfth at a like distance, is about as deep as the ninth. The thirteenth at an equal distance, has the same depth as the last. Here ends the ravine, which now opens upon a rugged slope, descending into the valley of the lower Cephissus, which lies to the right, and is hid from view by a rugged point projecting from the ridge of Skroponeri. The line of the shafts here changes its direction towards the right, and three more are found on the slope above mentioned, in a direction bending towards the rocky point. The distances between the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth, are about double the former intervals. Their depth is about ten feet. At the fifteenth the valley widens, and the road to Larmes continues to follow the slope leaving the rocky point to the left, and entering the lower valley just at the place where the river issues.

§ 2.286   Its position relatively to the sixteenth shaft, indicates the direction of the subterraneous current under the rocky hill. The river emerges at the foot of a precipice about thirty feet high, in many small streams, which immediately unite and form a river forty or fifty feet wide, and three or four deep, flowing with great rapidity down the vale. The road follows its right bank for sixteen minutes, then crosses, on the same side, a rocky projection of Mount Skroponeri, which is divided only by the river from an equally abrupt termination of the mountain on the western side of the vale, and in ten minutes descends to a large old church, and the mills of Larmes, which are turned by a canal derived from the river. Where we crossed the height, the river is precipitated over the rocks for a short distance with great rapidity. In very dry summers it entirely fails, when the mills are scantily supplied by a fountain, which issues from a rock on the right side of the rapid. From the mills to the head of the bay, where the river joins the sea, the distance is thirteen minutes, the stream winding with rapidity through a small plain cultivated with cotton. The fall of the river through the subterraneous channel over the cataract, and along the two valleys, can hardly amount to more than a perpendicular of fifty feet.
In the valley above the cataract the river flows through a thick copse of agnus-castus, and produces a great quantity of water-cresses. In the lower valley it is bordered with reeds and myrtles. A steep peaked mountain rises on the left of the river’s mouth, behind which are the villages of Martino and Malesina: the latter towards the sea, Martino more inland.

§ 2.287   At about an hour and a quarter beyond Martino is Proskyna, upon the small stream which flows into the south-eastern angle of the bay of Opus, and which I suppose to be the Platanus, or Platanius, of Pausanias. Between Martino and Proskyna, not far from the latter, are the remains of an ancient city: probably Corseia.
The ruins of Larymna are situated on a level covered with bushes, on the shore of the Bay of Larmes, ten minutes to the left of the mouth of the Cephissus. The circuit of the walls is less than a mile. The annexed sketch will give an idea of the remains still existing. [map] LARYMNA.
1. Is a small port, anciently closed in the manner here described. 2. The town wall, traceable all around. 3. Another wall along the sea, likewise traceable. 4. A mole, in the sea. 5. Various ancient foundations in the town and acropolis. 6. A Sorus. 7. Glyfonero, or Salt Source. 8. An oblong foundation of an ancient building.

§ 2.288   The walls, which in one place are extant to near half their height, are of a red soft stone, very much corroded by the sea air, and in some places are constructed of rough masses. The sorus is high, with comparison to its length and breadth, and stands in its original place upon the rocks: there was an inscription upon it, and some ornaments of sculpture, which are now quite defaced. The Glyfonero is a small deep pool of water, impregnated with salt, and is considered by the peasants an άγιονέρι, or sacred water, because it is cathartic. Meletius, who supposed it to be the lake Anchoe mentioned by Strabo, states, that in his time persons resorted to the place in spring and autumn to drink of the water, and to some of those, he adds, who drank too much, it proved fatal. This coast, as well as Euboea, abounds in salt springs, and Halae perhaps derived its name from similar sources near it. Some ruins like those of Larymna are said to exist at a church of St. John Theologus, near the cape which projects to the northward, beyond Malesina and Proskyna. They are probably remains of Halae.
Upon the projection of Skroponeri, which separates the upper from the lower valley of Larmes, I observed some foundations of Hellenic walls surrounding a height on the right hand side of the road. These seem to have been merely the remains of a small dependent fortress, commanding the pass which led to the town.
On the rocks above the issue of the Cephissus, the road from Kokkino to Larmes is crossed by that from Lukisi to Martino.

§ 2.289   The latter, as I am now informed, is by no means so bad as the women of Lukisi, for some reasons of their own, thought proper to represent it. From Lukisi it crosses the mountain which borders the valley of Anthedon to the west, and descends upon a vale at the head of the bay of Skroponeri, where are some copious sources issuing not far from the shore of the bay, and flowing into it. From thence the road crosses Mount Skroponeri to the vale of Larmes. The distance from Lukisi to Larmes is reckoned two hours and a half.
Although the name Larmes, or Larnes, which is applied as well to the ruins just described as to the adjacent bay and valley, leaves little doubt that the ruins are those of Larymna, yet, as Strabo mentions two towns of that name, there may be some doubt to which of them these remains are to be attributed. He observes, that the Cephissus broke forth from its subterraneous channel at the Upper Larymna, and joined the sea at the Lower Larymna; that Upper Larymna had belonged to Locris until it was annexed to the Lower or Boeotian Larymna by the Romans; that the place where the river issued at Upper Larymna was called Anchoe, and that there was a lake of the same name which, it is fair to presume from the etymology of the word, was the same as that lake at

§ 2.290   Larymna, which Pausanias describes as a λιμνη αγχιβαθης, or a lake profound at the very margin. At Larmes, however, there is nothing resembling a lake, except the small pool or source of salt water near the ancient walls, which leads one to suspect that Pausanias could not have alluded to Larmes in describing Larymna, the more so as the words ύπερβαλόντων το ορος τό Πτώον, which he employs in alluding to the road from Acraephium to Larymna, would lead us to suppose that he crossed not merely the low ridge between the Katavothra and the emissory, but a part of Mount Skroponeri itself, and that he really did so is the more probable from his having made no mention of the lake Copais on this occasion, or of the subterraneous channel of the Cephissus, although the road from Acraephium to Larymna, supposing his Larymna to have been at Larmes, could not but have followed the shore of the lake, and have passed both by the entrance and exit of the subterraneous stream. There is reason to suspect, therefore, that the Larymna of Pausanias was not the town which stood at Larmes, but another in the valley at the head of the bay of Skroponeri; that the Boeotian, or Lower Larymna, was there situated, and that Larmes was the site of the Upper, or Locrian Larymna. I cannot affirm, indeed, that there is a lake corresponding to the Anchoe in the vale of Skroponeri; nor if

§ 2.291   that were the site of the Lower Larymna, is it easy to explain how either of them could have belonged to Locris, all the surrounding districts being Boeotian; although it cannot be denied, that the Larymna at Larmes was the nearer of the two to the Locrian frontier. It seems unaccountable also, that Pausanias should have omitted to notice so curious an object, both natural and artificial, as the Chasms of the Cephissus and its shafts; but it is consistent with the supposition of his not having visited the Larymna at Larmes, which may have happened because it had been abandoned, soon after it had been annexed by the Romans to the Lower Larymna. As to Strabo, who seems to have been correct only in saying, that the Cephissus emerged near the Upper Larymna, there is great reason for believing that on this, as on many other occasions, he described places confusedly, which he had never seen, and his text, perhaps, may be partly in fault. To the one or the other of these causes may also be attributed his assertion, that the subterraneous passage of the Cephissus was thirty stades in length; for, with all its windings, it is not half so much.
At the issue of the Cephissus, in the upper vale of Larmes, I was struck with the smallness of the quantity of water when compared with the aggregate of that which enters at the three katavothra,

§ 2.292   and could not but infer that one of the streams, at least, has a different issue. The two northern katavothra seem too near to each other, as well as to the commencement of the line of shafts on the surface, not to have both conducted to the subterraneous channel below those shafts. It will probably be found, therefore, that the river which issues in the vale of Larmes, and which is about equal in volume to those two streams, is derived solely from them, and that the southern katavothra, which is nearly half a mile distant from the nearest of the two northern, has a different discharge, perhaps, at the sources in the bay of Skroponeri. This would partly justify Strabo in saying, that the Cephissus flowed into the sea near the Lower or Boeotian Larymna.
Having taken my Christmas dinner at the Mills of Larmes, I return to Kokkino, following the same road by which I came, with the exception of crossing the rocky height from near the issue of the river directly to the sixteenth shaft, and without finding any other shaft, though the subterraneous stream flows probably in that direction. It takes three quarters of an hour to mount from the nearest katavothra to Kokkino, where we arrive at sunset.
The only passage in ancient history illustrative of the shafts and subterraneous course of the Cephissus, occurs in the pages of Strabo to which a reference has just been made. After describing the river as entering a chasm near Copae, the geographer subjoins that one Crates of Chalcis

§ 2.293   had been employed by Alexander the Great to remedy the effects of an obstruction of the subterraneous channels which had caused the submersion of several places situated on the margin of the lake: and that he, Strabo, had seen the report made by Crates to Alexander, wherein that engineer stated that he had been successful in drawing off the water from some districts, especially those of Eleusis and Athenae, Boeotian towns on the river Triton, when dissensions among the Boeotians put a stop to the work. Although one of the operations of Crates was to make an embankment near Athenae, it is evident that his principal means of desiccation were derived from the clearing of the subterraneous channels of the river, and hence we might be justified in the inference that the existing wells were the work of Crates; there are strong reasons, however, for believing that they are more ancient, and that Crates only repaired or cleared them. It is obvious that all valleys so inclosed as to admit of a passage to the running waters only through the surrounding mountains cannot but be liable to occasional inundations from the obstruction of the subterraneous

§ 2.294   channels. Ancient history records the occurrence of inundations, thus caused, in the valleys of Stymphalus and Pheneus, where such is the height of the mountains that the inconvenience can only be remedied by nature herself. But the chasmata of the Cephissus are more accessible, and allowed of the excavation of a line of shafts, by means of which the channel of the river might not only be kept clear but even enlarged, with a view to a more extensive drainage of the plain. Strabo remarks, with reference to the ancient riches of the Orchomenii attested by Homer, that, according to a Boeotian tradition, they had been caused by the draining and subsequent cultivation of a large portion of the plain, which in the time of the geographer had again become a part of the lake, and is still an impracticable swamp. Now there is certainly no period, in history, to which that great and useful undertaking can be attributed with so much probability as to that, when all Western Boeotia was united under the Minyae of Orchomenus. To that age, therefore, rather than any other, the original excavations are to be attributed, when they were formed perhaps under the direction of the Orchomenian princes Trophonius and Agamedes, who, by their mechanical skill in an age when it was extremely rare in Greece, attained the honours of divinity.

§ 2.295   Dec. 26.—This morning a strong north-wester sets in with rain. A ride of three quarters of an hour carries me to Kardhitza, the road passing along the rugged flanks of Mount Ptoum. Midway a small plain lies below us to the right, at the foot of the mountain on the border of the lake, and opposite to the plain, not far from the right bank of the Cephissus, an island surrounded by cliffs, the summit of which is incircled by the remains of a Hellenic wall. In the inclosed space, as I am told by some peasants who have been there, are some foundations of buildings, but no columns. It seems to have been some small town to which the little plain just mentioned may have appertained, together with that which is now an inundation surrounding the island, but which in summer may be valuable land either for grain or pasture. At Kardhitza I find ample employment for the rest of the day in examining the adjacent ruins, which are undoubtedly those of Acraephium, and in copying inscriptions, of which there is a large collection in an old church of St. George, standing within the walls of the ancient city.
Dec. 27.—The longest of the inscriptions has required a continued labour of six hours, the letters being small, and in some places much defaced; and the stone which is in the wall of the church on the outside, on a level with the earth, being so placed that the lines are perpendicular to the horizon, whence it is impossible to obtain a distinct view of them without lying on the ground.

§ 2.296   The monument is in honour of one of the citizens of this place named Epaminondas, son of Epaminondas. After recording some of his former services to his native city, one of which was the reparation, at an expence of 6000 denaria, of a mound twelve stades in length, probably for the purpose of protecting the plain of Acraephium from the inundations to which it is subject from the lake, the inscription proceeds as follows: “A legation having been required to the Young Augustus, in the general assembly of the Achaeans and Panhellenes at Argos, and many illustrious and leading men in the Boeotian cities having met together and refused and appealed to him, he extending his magnanimity to the whole nation of Boeotians, and setting aside all consideration of his private interests, most readily accepted the charge from the nation of Boeotians, applying the strength of his mind to this important and unpaid legation. Whence, having become admired and thought worthy of approbation, he was honoured by the Panhellenes, as they testified in the letter sent by them to our city. Having concluded the legation together with the other nations, and brought back the answer from. . ., he was honoured, together with his co-legates; and the general assembly of the Pamboeoti, mindful of his spontaneous

§ 2.297   liberality and benevolence, decreed to him the honours due, and made a communication of the act to our city He excelled in greatness of mind and virtue all his love of glory and goodness by successive entertainments, being thus held to be the greatest of patriots and benefactors. And when the games called the Ptoia had been omitted for thirty years, having been named to preside over them, he most readily accepted the office, thinking it an honour to renew those ancient games, the great Ptoia and Caesareia, and became a second founder of them. Having taken the direction of them, he forthwith performed the sacrifices and prophetic offices of the god, entertaining the archons and assessors five times every year with magnificent suppers, and giving a dinner to the city in the fifth year, without a single omission in the other years either of sacrifice or of expence. And when the games occurred in the sixth year, he made a distribution for the approaching feast to all the citizens as well as to the inhabitants and alien proprietors, giving to each man a Cophinus of wheat and a Hemina of wine, and religiously executed the ceremonies derived from our ancestors, the great processions, and the dance of the Syrta. And sacrificing a bull to the gods and the Augusti, he omitted neither the distribution of meat, nor dinners, nor desserts, nor suppers, entertaining at every dinner the children and young slaves of the cities according to their classes, from the tenth to the thirtieth, while his wife Noticha gave a dinner to the wives of the citizens, their

§ 2.298   unmarried daughters, and female slaves. Nor did he neglect those who had charge of the tents or of the decoration of the festival, but he gave them a dinner apart by proclamation, which none of his predecessors had done, being desirous that every one should be a partaker of his generosity. In the scenic spectacles he treated all the spectators and persons assembled from the cities with sweetmeats, and made large and exquisite cakes, so that his munificence became celebrated in all the surrounding cities. At the end of the games, after a supper given to the whole people, recommencing his expences, he made a distribution of eleven denaria to each couch of three persons, and a Ceramaion of old wine and six denaria to defray the remaining expences for meat. After the performance of all these things, as he descended from the temple to the city, all the citizens met him in a body, in order to show him every kind of honour and thankfulness; and he, not unmindful of his magnanimity, sacrificing in the city a bull to Jupiter the Greatest, moved the congregation to gratitude. Since then it is proper to exhibit good and magnanimous and patriotic men adorned with becoming honours and rewards; it has seemed good to the archons, the assessors, and the people, to bestow praises upon the aforesaid Epaminondas, for that he has conducted himself towards his native city with assiduous benevolence, and towards the nation of Boeotians with magnanimity, and has conferred honour upon his native city by his embassy. .. And to honour him with a golden crown, and a good full-length painted portrait-statue.

§ 2.299   and that all succeeding Agonothetae shall in the games to be directed by them invite him with other benefactors to the first seat, in order that, from these results, our city may appear grateful to its benefactors, and that many others may become emulous of good actions thus attested. Also to erect images or statues of him, one in the temple of Apollo Ptoius, the other in the agora of the city, together with gilded portrait-statues of him, bearing the following inscription: The people and the council (have honoured) Epaminondas, son of Epaminondas, as an excellent citizen: and to place a copy of the decree in the temple of Apollo Ptoius, and another in the agora of the city.”
The mention made of the Caesarean games, and of their renewal, implying their cessation for a considerable time, shows that the monument was not of an early period of the Roman empire; which is confirmed by the worship of the Augusti in the plural. The earliest emperors who held that rank simultaneously were Marcus Aurelius and L. Verus; but the words Νέος Σεβαστός designating the Young Augustus, who presided in the council of the Achaeans and Panhellenes in Argos, to which the embassy of the Boeotians and others was sent, seems not to apply so well to Verus as to Commodus, who was in Greece with his father on their return from the East, when Aurelius visited Athens, in the year 176, and was initiated in the Eleusinian mysteries.

§ 2.300   It is true that Commodus was not honoured with the title of Augustus until the following year. But as, according to the tenor of the inscription, the embassy occurred before the Ptoia, and consequently some years prior to the date of the monument, we may easily conceive that after such an interval the people of Acraephium would not studiously refuse to apply the title of Augustus to Commodus, because he had not yet received it at the period referred to, especially as the honour became the greater to Epaminondas, and as Commodus at the time of the inscription was probably sole emperor. The next Young Augustus, to whom the words Νεος Σεβαστός may be applied, was Caracalla, who with his father Severus, passed through Moesia and Pannonia in returning from the East in the year 203: but there is no evidence of either of them having been in Greece, and the form of the letters in the inscription is more conformable to those in use in the time of the Antonines than to any subsequent period. The Σ and E are still angular. The final iota of the dative cases is constantly omitted, but this omission was already common in the reign of Hadrian. The confusion which occurs in the use of ι and ει is hardly consistent with the form of the letters, and may perhaps be partly an effect of the Boeotic dialect. Thus τιμη, γινωνται are written τειμη, γεινωνται, while εις, πρεσβείαν, αξιωθείς, τάξεις, δείπνον, μαρτυρεισθαι, are written ις, πρεσβιαν, αξιωθις, ταξις, διπνον, μαρτυρισθαι.

§ 2.301   This monument is a good example of the vanity of a rich Boeotian Archon in those times, or rather of the mean flattery of his fellow-citizens paying homage to his wealth. It is a complete specimen also, of the pompous inanity and wordy feebleness of the language, which it is curious to compare with some Attic inscriptions of about the same period, when Atticus Herodes was the arbiter of taste at Athens, and when amidst an abundance of affectation, there still remained some wit, learning and elegance of composition.
There are two other marbles in the walls of the church, bearing inscriptions not much shorter than the preceding; one of these is in the northern wall, where the effect of its exposure to this aspect has been to cover it with moss. As very little of it could possibly be deciphered, I have not attempted to copy it. The other forms one of the jambs of a side door, and has in one part been worn smooth; in another place the letters have been destroyed by the stone having been cut away to make room for a latch. The parts which have been exposed to the air are much defaced, and the stone is so placed that the letters are reversed, but I can perceive that mention is again made of the embassy of Epaminondas, son of Epaminondas, and that the names of the Boeotians, Locrians and Euboeans occur, being probably the nations whose ambassadors, according to the former inscription, accompanied Epaminondas to Argos. The words ανδριαντες, μεγαλοψυχία, and ταυροθυτύσας also occur as in the former, but the most important are Άκραιφιέων αρχουσι, which taken together with the mention of the temple of Apollo Ptoius

§ 2.302   in the other inscription, and compared with the situation of the town and temple, as described by Herodotus, Strabo and Pausanias, can leave no question that the ruins are those of Acraephium.
Of the other inscriptions in the church of St. George, the most curious are three fragments of catalogues of agonistic victors, all which probably belonged to one and the same record of certain triennial games called Soteria, when Theomnestus, son of Paramonus, was priest of Jupiter Soter, and when the Soteria were celebrated for the first time “after the war,” by which, as the characters are of considerable antiquity, the Mithradatic war is probably meant, when Boeotia suffered severely. Pausanias makes no mention of the Soteria, or of Jupiter Soter, or of any temple at Acraephium, except that of Bacchus, which contained a statue of the god.
Among other fragments of antiquity in the church of St. George, are a very small fluted Doric column with sixteen flutings, and two of those circular

§ 2.303   pedestals smaller above than below, which are often found in Greek churches, sometimes with Ionic, but more commonly with Doric capitals, mouldings and flutings. They were probably, as I have before suggested, the hypostates of the κρητηρες, or large basins which were used in the temples to contain lustral water, and which having been generally made of metal have disappeared, while their hypostates of stone have remained. Altars formed in the shape of a column surmounted with a square plinth, are not uncommonly found also in the modern churches, where they sometimes serve for the holy table. As the temples were generally converted into churches, on the establishment of Christianity, the hypostates and altars have often remained in their original places, while the temples themselves may have totally altered their appearance, in consequence of successive repairs and the change in their destination.

§ 2.304   There is no church in Greece more likely to have been a heathen temple than this of Kardhitza, standing as it does in the middle of the ancient site. It is supported within by columns formed of pieces of ancient shafts, put together without much harmony, but crowned with handsome Ionic capitals, which as well as the portions of shafts, belonged probably to the temple of Jupiter or Bacchus. The church has a dome, and the most modern part of the patchwork does not seem to be later than the twelfth century. There are several similar churches in Boeotia, which have outlasted many of later date: particularly those more recent than the Turkish conquest, scarcely any of which are more than half a century old, being like the modern houses, built so as not to be capable of enduring longer.
The name of Acraephium is obviously derived from the conspicuous insulated ακρα or summit on which the town was built, and which is noticed by Strabo. This height is steep and rocky, but much less so on the northern side towards Kardhitza, than in the opposite direction, where it falls to a plain which

§ 2.305   borders a bay of the Lake Copais, and separates the lower heights of Ptoum from those of Phicium, Between it and an extremity of Mount Ptoum to the northward, which terminates in bare and rugged rocks washed by the lake, is the opening which I have before noticed as conspicuous from many parts of the surrounding country. The ancient walls are partly of the polygonal, and partly of the third kind of Hellenic masonry. They are best preserved at the summit of the hill, where are some niches in the inside of the wall, six or eight feet asunder, and just wide enough for a man to stand within them. Their purpose was probably the same as that of the niches in the secret gallery of Tiryns, namely to oppose the advance of an adversary who had entered the passage. There are many Hellenic foundations on the slope of the hill towards Kardhitza down to the very bottom of it, but nothing sculptured except at the church. Such an advantageous position as that of Acraephium could scarcely have been unoccupied in early ages; and we cannot doubt, therefore, that it is the site of one of the Homeric towns of Boeotia. Some critics in the time of Strabo supposed it to have been the Arne of the poet; but Arne, there is every reason to believe, was the same place as Chaeroneia. Peteon, from the association of names in the catalogue, is that which may be attributed to it, with the greatest probability.

§ 2.306   Four roads lead from Kardhitza through openings in the surrounding mountains: 1, to Topolia [Kastro]; 2, its continuation to Thebes; 3, to Kokkino; and 4, through the chasm already mentioned, into the plain on the southern side of the hill of Acraephium. The road to Topolia, now inundated, crosses the river by a bridge, leaving the fortified: island a little on the right. The indications of Strabo, and the more particular description of Pausanias, leave little doubt that Topolia, where some remains of walls and some inscribed marbles have been found, was the site of Copae; for Copae, like Topolia, was on the margin of the lake, and its direction from Acraephium is shown by the narrative of Pausanias beyond Copae, to have been, towards Cyrtones, Corseia, and the river Platanius, which is exactly that of Topolia. He remarks, that between Acraephium and the lake Cephissis, otherwise called Copais, there was a plain named Athamantium, from its having been anciently inhabited by Athamas, and that not far from thence, the river Cephissus

§ 2.307   entered the lake, across which there was a navigation to Copae, a small town Containing temples of Ceres, Bacchus and Sarapis. Hence it is evident, that the plain Athamantium was not that to the southward of the height of Kardhitza, but that in the opposite direction', near the fortified island, which latter may have been a town or fortress named Athamantium, though Pausanias, perhaps from its having been a ruin in his time, has alluded to it only as the former residence of Athamas, and has described the plain only. The hill of Topolia resembles this island, as well in its degree of elevation as in its rocky margin, and is itself an island during a great part of the year, but being situated very near the neighbouring heights, it is sometimes a promontory, and generally presents that appearance.
The distance of Palea from Kardhitza agrees exactly with that which Pausanias states to have been the interval between Acraephium and the temple of Apollo Ptoius, namely, fifteen stades; and its position to the right of the road leading from Acraephium to Larymna seems equally to accord with his words, for the road to both the Larymnae could not but have followed the modern route as far as Kokkino.

§ 2.308   The three summits Palea, Strutzina and Skroponeri, each well defined, and yet forming one range of nearly equal altitude, perfectly illustrate the epithet τρικάρανον, which Alcaeus applied to Ptoum. Taking the fourth of the above-mentioned roads, I pass in 13 minutes from the church of St. George through the chasm into the plain on the southern side of the hill of Acraephium; in 10 more arrive at the mountains on the southern side of the plain, and then follow the margin of the lake, along the foot of the mountain which overhangs it, and where scarcely any path is traceable, sometimes passing through the water, sometimes over little green levels under the rocks. At the end of 27 minutes from the foot of the chasm of Kardhltza, a projecting point of the mountain affords from its summit a good view of the adjacent part of the lake where I had already noticed a causeway of stone, crossing the mouth of that bay of the Cephissis, which is bordered by the valley of Acraephium, and seems to have been sometimes known to the ancients by the name of the lake Acraephis. The causeway connected the foot of Mount Phidum to that of Mount Ptoum, and although defective in many places, would still with a little repair be carriageable all the way: its length was about two miles. A similar paved road may be traced near the island of Athamas, leading from the bridge of the Cephissus, towards Topolia, but it is not in such good preservation as the former. The solid construction of these causeways leaves little doubt that they are works of the ancients, and which seem to

§ 2.309   have been kept in repair, even during the Byzantine empire: the first is exactly in the direction of Acraephium, from Haliartus, not far from the former of which it joined the other causeway, which was in the direct road from Thebes to Copae. It is not impossible that these were the works upon 'which Epaminondas of Acraephium is recorded in the inscription of Kardhitza to have expended 6000 denaria, in which case it would seem that Pausanias visited Acraephium before the repair, since he speaks only of a navigation from the plain of Athamantium to Copae. In fact, this will agree perfectly with the date of the travels of Pausanias in Greece, which did not extend in time beyond the earliest years of the reign of Marcus Aurelius. Continuing to coast the lake for eight minutes, and having passed in one place through deep water at the foot of the rocks, I arrive at a katavothra, or small cavern, which is lower than the present level of the adjacent waters, and into which a slender stream now flows. A mile farther towards Haliartus is the Cape of Mount Phicium, at which the causeway leading to the foot of Mount Ptoum begins. All this part of the lake produces abundantly a rush, of which mats are made at Kardhitza and other villages near the lake. It has a soft round stem, and is called Papyri, the name by which the same plant is known at Ioannina, where it is equally used for making mats. Many other kinds of reeds and rushes are observable in the lake, but; their tops only are now visible above the water.

§ 2.310   Neither here nor in any other part of Greece have I seen the triangular Cyperus Papyrus, of which the paper used by the Egyptians and Greeks was made.
Strabo remarks that the whole lake, called in his time Copais, but which Pindar named Cephissis, had anciently separate denominations, derived from the adjacent cities. The Haliartian marsh is the more distinguishable from those of Orchomenus, Acraephium, and Copae, because the latter are -formed from the superfluous waters of the Melas, Cephissus, Probatia, Phalarus, and Curalius, whereas the marsh of Haliartus is caused by the rivers which descend into the basin near that, site, and which appear never to unite with the Cephissus, but to have an exit through Mount Phidum by katavothra; possibly that which I visited is not the only one. In summer the course of the streams may be more apparent in every part of the Cephissic basin, so that in the space which is now a continued inundation, distinguishable only by a greater depth of water in some places, there may be several separate portions of water divided from each other by firm land, explaining the several denominations of Acraephis, Copais, Haliartia. At present it is not even possible to say decidedly where the stream which flows into the katavothra of Mount Ptoum originates, but most probably it is formed from the junction of some, if not all, the rivulets anciently called Permessus, Lophis, Oplites, Ocalea, and perhaps also Tilphossa.

§ 2.311   Having returned along the margin of the lake to the plain of Acraephium, I follow the southern side of that plain, not far from the foot of the mountain, where some foundations of masonry are observable lying in the direction of the route, as well as some others at right angles to the former, at a point which is half way between the lake and a small ridge which separates this plain from that which borders the lake of Senzina. They appear to be the remains of some works intended to defend the upper part of the plain from those encroachments of the lake of Acraephium which now prevent all the lower part of it from being cultivated. The foundations have not much appearance of Hellenic work, but there are traces of a canal to the northward of them which seem to be of those times: here also is a line of wells, or shafts, some in the bed, and some in the direction of the canal, similar to those which are above the subterraneous channel of the Cephissus. I say the direction, because the hollow and mounds of excavated earth on either side, by which the former existence of a canal may be presumed, have been in some places obliterated by the plough, or have disappeared by the effects of alluvion in the parts where the ground is most marshy. The canal however is easily traced to the ridge at the end of the plain, which it seems to have entered between two ranges of rock, which my guide of Kardhitza calls the Vrakho. The position of some of the shafts is recognised only by small hollows and surrounding mounds, at equal distances; but two or three of them are still open, and, like those of the subterraneous channel of

§ 2.312   the Cephissus, are rectangular excavations in the rock,—not square, however, like them, but oblong, and having their long sides half as long again as those of the Cephissian wells. I observe that one of them widens below like an ancient cistern. The opening at the Vrakho makes a turn to the left, almost at right angles to the direction of the canal, and then again gradually to the right until it enters the plain of Senzina, at about a mile from that village. My guide supposed the opening at the Vrakho to be artificial, but though the sides are uniform, and the breadth nearly the same as that of the canal, or 50 feet, there are no marks of art on the rocks, and the great length, as well as the general appearance of it, make me believe it to be natural; though certainly very conveniently contrived by nature to facilitate the formation of a canal. The bed or bottom of the Vrakho is below the present level of the lake Copais, and a line of hollows is traceable along it, forming an evident continuation of those in the plain; but the hollows only are apparent, the shafts, if they exist being entirely buried. I was 18 minutes riding, preceded by a man on foot, from the south-western corner of the plain where I entered it from the katavothra, to the opening of the Vrakho near the centre of the head of the plain. Here leaving the road to Senzina to the right, I continue to follow the hollow between the rocks for 12 minutes before I enter the plain of Senzina. Although the hollow is in one place crossed by a ridge, vestiges of the canal are still visible as far as the plain, where it is again

§ 2.313   crossed by a ridge, and then ceases to be traceable, the Vrakho at the same place falling off to the right, and subsiding into the plain.
To the left of the apparent extremity of the canal are the foundations of a long quadrangular building of large squared stones, and beyond it, on the opposite side of a small torrent, a height only three minutes distant from the entrance into the plain, and occupying a large space in it. This height is situated midway between the lake and the foot of Mount Palea, from which it is separated by another torrent. On its summit are the remains of a quadrangular inclosure, consisting of walls flanked by towers and constructed of rough masonry and small stones; but among the foundations of which are some large hewn masses in the Hellenic style, showing that the ruins which are now called the Paleokastro occupy a Hellenic site. It was probably Hyle, for Homer places Hyle near the lake Cephissis, and Strabo describes the Hylice as a lake in the Thebaea, which was small compared with the Cephissis, and which was supplied from the latter by a subterraneous communication.

§ 2.314   In adding that it was situated between Thebes and Anthedon, he was not so correct, and seems to have confounded this lake with the Paralimni. Hyle appears from Homer to have been renowned for its manufacture of those Boeotian shields, which became the commonest type of the coins of this province, for the celebrated sevenfold shield of Ajax was made by Tichius of Hyle.
Below the hill of Hyle the plain suddenly changes its level, all to the northward bordering that side of the lake, being very little above the water, while that at the western end towards Senzina is much higher. Hyle stands in a line between the eastern extremity of Mount Faga and the pass of Palea leading to Kokkino, in a line between Kardhitza and Thebes, and in a line also drawn from Haliartus through the long diameter of the Paralimni, or lake of Moritzi, and the pass leading to Anthedon. I mention these interlineations, because there is no kind of geographical observation so convenient or infallible.
It takes fourteen minutes to ride from the Paleokastro to Senzina, which is a small village on a rocky hill connected with Mount Phicium: some higher ridges of the same mountain overhang the western extremity of the lake, where at less than a mile to the southward of Senzina is the emissory of the subterraneous stream from the lake Cephissis. The

§ 2.315   direct distance from the katavothra is about two miles, occupied entirely by a rocky ridge, advancing northward from the summit of Mount Phicium, and throwing out a branch to the south-east, which for some distance beyond the emissory continues to border the lake and then becomes a low ridge, separating it from the inundation of Purnari, in the Teneric plain. Further on, towards Thebes, the shore again becomes steep and rocky. The lake is named Livadhi, or lake of Senzina. It abounds with fish, is now covered with wild ducks, and appears to be deep, as might be presumed from the boldness of the greater part of its shores. Its depth, abruptness of margin, and inferiority to the Cephisos basin, indicated by the subterraneous river flowing into it from the Haliartian marsh, may serve to explain the intention of the ancient canal in the plain of Acraephium. Such a canal might obviously have been useful in draining the marshes near Acraephium and Haliartus, with very little risk of injury to the lands bordering on the Hylice, the shore of this lake being exposed to inundation only in the lower part of the plain to the eastward of Senzina, where it might be protected by means of an embankment of no great extent. Nature, indeed, seems to have shown the expediency of making this deep and rocky basin a recipient of superfluous waters, by directing into it a stream through Mount Phicium, and the construction of the ground between the lake Hylice and the shore of the Cephissis near Acraephium, gives great facility to the undertaking.

§ 2.316   It is to such peculiarities in the geological construction of this country, that the creation and development of Greek ingenuity may, in great measure, be attributed. As there are few more powerful stimulants to national industry, and to the exertion which leads to wealth and power, than lands subject to inundation, such lands in general being, when relieved from that inconvenience, the most fertile and productive of any, so there is no country more abounding in these motives to diligence and invention than Greece. From its intersecting mountains, incased valleys, and marshy levels, from the peculiarities of its maritime formation, and the wonderful extent of its sea-coast, ultimately proceeded all the features of the national character, and the effect of which has been to render the study of their history, arts, and literature, curious and instructive beyond that of all other nations. Even now the same causes seem to operate in rendering the Greeks, degraded as they are, industrious beyond any other people living in the same southern latitude.
If the canal of Acraephium was intended for the purpose of draining the Cephissis into the Hylice, it may have formed a part of the works of Crates, undertaken by order of Alexander the Great; and as there is reason to doubt whether it was ever finished, this would agree with the fact, that Crates was obliged to desist from his operations in consequence of the intestine quarrels of the Boeotians. When the Thebans were restored to their city and recovered their authority, they might not be very willing to promote a work which would benefit the people of Acraephium at the expense of their own

§ 2.317   dependent district of Hyle, however slightly it might injure the latter, and notwithstanding that many of the Thebans had been indebted to the hospitality of Acraephium, after the destruction of Thebes by Alexander. Soon afterwards the wars, of which Greece became the field and victim, with the generally increasing poverty of the country, were causes sufficient to prevent the undertaking from ever being renewed.
At 3 p.m. quitting Senzina for Thebes, we descend into the lower plain on the northern side of the lake, and at 3.11, leaving a tower standing on a rocky promontory in the lake, half a mile on the right, cross the lowest part of the plain, where a winter rema from Mount Palea inundates all the level ground as it meets the water of the lake, which is now gradually rising: at 3.25, at the end of the plain, we mount a rocky height, and at 3.40 descend into a little hollow on the side of a small bay, where on the opposite shore there is an opening in the rocky encasement of the lake, exactly in a line with Thebes. This opening is called the rema of the Kanavri, because through it the small river called Kanavri, or Kanavari, which rises near Erimokastro, and which I crossed in approaching Thebes from Livadhia, here enters the lake. We now pass over another rocky height, the continuation of that which we passed on the road to Kokkino, on the evening of the 24th, and descend upon another bay of the lake, from whence there is a passage of only a quarter of an hour over a ridge on the left,

§ 2.318   into the plain at the head of the lake Paralimni. At 3.57, having arrived at the end Of the second bay, we find the water at the foot of the rocks so deep, that we are obliged to return: from the head of this bay the ground rises gradually, and I observe ancient walls stretching across the valley, and along the slope of the hill to the right; At 4.4 we ascend from the head of the bay, and at 4.13 descend a little, with the village of Moritzi directly before us. The superiority of the level of the plain of Moritzi above the lake Livadhi, is here very apparent.
We now turn to the right, and at 4.22 arrive upon the extreme bay of the Livadhi, where a small rema, comin'g from the direction of Moritzi, flows into it. We then ascend ten minutes, and arrive in the plain of Moritzi, which, although it is not separated from that of Thebes by any marked ridge, is distinguishable from it by its superior level, and is intersected with low rocky heights or cultivated inequalities of ground, whereas the plain of Thebes is a dead flat. The soil of both seems equally good. Our road continues along the foot of the stony heights which border the lake Livadhi, passes some Hellenic foundations at 4.48, and at 4.50 enters the plain of Thebes, after a descent of several minutes. The road from Moritzi to Thebes, which we here join, enters the plain by an opening in the same bank, which we descended.

§ 2.319   This opening has an artificial appearance, and as the superfluous waters of the plain of Thebes flow through it occasionally after heavy rains, it would seem to have been a work of the ancient Thebans, to drain their plain into the Livadhi, probably by means of the torrent of Moritzi.
At 5 we arrive in a line with the south-eastern extremity of the hills which border that lake, where they approach nearest to Thebes, and having crossed the plain, pass a little below the town through a few ruinous plantations of mulberries and figs, which are irrigated in summer, as well as some cotton grounds near them, by the superfluous waters of the Theban sources, and at 5.46 we arrive at the eastern tower of the castle. Though there has been no great quantity of rain, the plain of Thebes is already well moistened. The soil is a light rich mould, like that of the Thessalian plains, and it often happens here, as in Thessaly, that the harvest is abundant when there is a dearth from the want of rain in other parts of Greece. The angle of the plain at the foot of Mount Phicium, which is separated only by a low rocky ridge from the lake Hylice, is now inundated to a great extent, as it usually is in the winter. In summer it produces good crops of kalambokki. Pausanias leaves no doubt of its being the extremity of the Teneric plain, having clearly described that plain as situated near the mountain of the Sphinx, and to the right of the temple of the Cabeiri, which stood at a distance of fifty stades from Thespiae, and about forty from Thebes.

§ 2.320   Strabo adds, that the Teneric plain was not far from Onchestus; whence he seems to have included under the denomination of Teneric, the plain at the foot of Mount Faga, on the south, where there is now an inundation as well as on the eastern side of that mountain. But his words are not to be taken rigorously, for his observation that Mount Ptoum rose above the Teneric plain, is obviously that of a person not well acquainted with the places: Phicium, or the mountain of the Sphinx, being totally separated from Mount Ptoum by the plains of Hyle and Acraephium. In the Teneric plain stood a large temple of Hercules, surnamed Hippodetus, because he bound the chariot-horses of the Orchomenii, when they had advanced into this plain in their war with the Thebans.
I am not aware that there is any allusion to the lake Paralimni in history. Possibly the name is ancient. It is a shallow stagnum, more resembling the inundations of the Teneric plain than the deep encased basin of the Livadhi, and in summer it is sometimes reduced to small dimensions. The ancient city, of which there are vestiges at its southern extremity, would seem from Strabo to have been either Schoenus, or Peteon, for he places both these towns near the road from Thebes to Anthedon, which is exactly the situation of those ruins. In regard to Peteon, however, he contradicts himself, by attributing it at the same time to the Haliartia;

§ 2.321   and it may be observed, in favour of Schoenus, that the ruins in question are very nearly at the distance of fifty stades from Thebes, stated by the geographer. On the other hand, he gives us to understand that there was a river flowing through the district of Schoenus, and that both the river and the district still preserved that name. Nicander also attests the existence of a river Schoenus, whereas there is no river near the Paralimni. One cannot but suspect, therefore, that the Kanavari, which is in fact the only running stream in this part of Boeotia, except the two rivulets of Thebes, was the ancient Schoenus, and that the town of that name stood on its bank,—notwithstanding the objections that no part of this river is so far as fifty stades from Thebes, or in the route from Thebes to Anthedon, and that Nicander makes his river Schoenus flow to the lake Copais. The last objection, however, is the less important, as the same poet assigns a similar termination to the Cnopus, which, according to his scholiast, was the same as the Ismenus; so that it is very possible that in both instances he confounded the Copais with one of the other lakes. As to the ruins on the shore of the Paralimni, they are

§ 2.322   perhaps those of Eleon, the name being well suited to a position on the borders of such a lake, and the arrangement of the towns in the Catalogue giving some reason for presuming that Eleon was not far from Hyle.

§ 2.323   CHAPTER 16 BOEOTIA.
Dec. 29.—From Thebes to Plataea.—Kokhla, a small village, situated near the ruins of Plataea, to the south-west, is about eight miles from Thiva, by the road, but the nearest walls of the two ancient cities were not more than six miles and a half apart, and the direct distance was little more than five geographical miles. At half an hour from Thiva the road to Livadhostra branches off to the right; a little beyond this place stood Potniae, if we may rely upon the imperfect text of Pausanias, from which it appears that Potniae occurred on the road from Thebes to Plataea, at a distance of ten stades from the gate Electrae in proceeding towards the

§ 2.324  Asopus. He seems to add that it stood upon a river, which there is some difficulty in understanding, as the Asopus is the only brook between Plataea and Thebes, and could not have been the river intended, as its distance was more than twice ten stades from Thebes. The descent from the Theban ridge to the Asopus is almost imperceptible, as far as a small branch of that river which flows from the Thespias along a valley between the heights of Parapunghi to the southward, and those of Khalki and Balitza, which last village we leave a mile on the right. The valley below it, which in summer when I last saw it was a dry and cultivated plain, without even a brook in it, is now an extensive inundation. Having passed between Platani and Pyrgo, each situated on a height at half a mile from the road, we cross, in twenty-seven minutes from the Thespian branch of the Asopus, the eastern branch of the Oiroe; in three minutes more a smaller branch of the same river, which, like the former, is dry, and in another minute the third or principal branch of the Oiroe, which originates in the fountain called Vergutiani, and now contains water, but without any current: six minutes beyond it, occurs a fourth branch, small and without water, and which, rising between the Vergutiani and Kokhla, follows a hollow just below the eastern walls of Plataea.

§ 2.325   The part of the plain intersected by these water-courses is a fertile level, now for the most part covered with corn just above ground. It is not so marshy as the plain of Thebes.
Six minutes beyond the brook last mentioned, are the north-western walls of Plataea. The masonry in general, both of the acropolis and of the town, has the appearance of not being so old as the time of the battle. The greater part is of the fourth order, but mixed with portions of a less regular kind, and with some pieces of polygonal masonry. The acropolis, if an interior inclosure can be so called, which is not on the highest part of the site, is constructed in part of stones which have evidently been taken from earlier buildings. The towers of this citadel are so formed as to present flanks to the inner as well as to the outer face of the intermediate walls, whereas the town walls have towers like those of the Turks, open to the interior. Above the southern wall of the city are foundations of a third inclosure, which is evidently more ancient than the rest, and is probably the only part as old as the Persian war, when it may have been the acropolis of the Plataea of that age. It surrounds a rocky height, and terminates to the south in an acute angle, which is only separated by a level of a few yards from the foot of the great rocky slope of Cithaeron. This inclosure is in a situation higher than any other part of the ancient site, and higher than the village of Kokhla, from which it is five hundred yards distant to the east.

§ 2.326   Its walls are traceable on the eastern side along the torrent which I before called the fourth branch of the Oiroe, nearly as far as the south-eastern angle of the main inclosure of the city. In a church within this upper inclosure are some fragments of an inscribed marble.
From the upper angle of the ruins I ride in twenty-three minutes, preceded by a man on foot, over the rocky slope of Cithaeron to the fountain Vergutiani, and from thence ascend in five minutes to a projecting rock now serving as a shelter for cattle, in the middle of a natural theatre of rocks at the head of a verdant slope above the fountain. Beyond it the mountain rises steep and rugged to one of the summits. Having descended from the fountain into the road which leads from Kokhla eastward to the villages along the mountain side, I cross the branch of the Oiroe, which, coming from Thebes, I called the first, and eight minutes farther a hollow, the waters of which form a branch of the Asopus; its upper extremity is very near the sources of the easternmost branch of the Oiroe. Here, therefore, is exactly the partition of the waters flowing on one side to the sea of Euboea, on the other to the Corinthiac Gulf.
The principal sources of the Asopus are at a spot just under the village of Kriakuki, where are two trees, a well, and several springs. Though these sources are plentiful and permanent, there is no water now flowing in the bed of the river below them. Having proceeded from hence eastward, and passed several small torrents flowing to the same branch of the Asopus, which may be called

§ 2.327   the main stream, I cross, at 4.48, the road from Thebes to Megara by Petrogheraki. The Asopus, which from Kriakuki to this place had a course nearly parallel to my route, now turns towards the plain, still continuing to receive some torrents from the mountain. A little beyond the great road I observe, on the foot of the mountain, a great quantity of loose stones in the fields, together with some traces of ancient walls, and the mouth of a well or cistern, of Hellenic construction, now filled up. The situation agrees exactly with that of Hysiae, where, in the time of Pausanias, there remained an unfinished temple of Apollo and a sacred well. At 5 we pass a fountain at the foot of Cithaeron, surrounded with large blocks like that of Vergutiani. At 5.3 cross a hollow descending to the Asopus, and at 5.11 arrive at Bubuka, situated under the steep slope of the mountain, on the western side of a ravine in which another torrent descends to unite its waters with the rivulet of Kriakuki, just above the union of the latter with the Asopus.

§ 2.328   Dec. 30.—On the summit above Bubuka are the ruins of a village named Alexopulo, where a small church still remains; after visiting this place I cross the ravine to Katzula, which, like Bubuka and many other small villages in the Parasopia, are Ziamets or Timars, more commonly in Greece called Spahiliks, belonging to Turks of Egripo, and consist, in general, of a few huts forming a quadrangle. They are usually estimated by the number of zevgaria of oxen which they employ; four oxen being reckoned to a zevgari. Bubuka and Katzula have each ten houses, with a pyrgo for the Spahi; few of them are so large, and some of them have only three or four houses.
At Katzula observing a circular inclosure of loose stones, having two nicely squared ancient blocks within it, one in the centre of the circle, the other near the circumference, and inquiring the use of this structure, I find that it is called a church, and that the stone near the circumference is the altar. It is common among the Greeks when they are unable to rebuild or repair their ruined churches, to preserve the vestiges of them as sacred relics, and occasionally to perform mass in them, or at least to repeat a prayer and to bum incense on the altar, which is often nothing more than a wrought block of stone from some ancient ruin: but I have never before seen such a mere symbol of a church as this, the diameter of the circle being only eight feet. The part of Cithaeron above Katzula on the right is not very high, and there is verdure among the rocks, where goats and sheep are fed. The situation is called Gavnitza, and upon it are the remains of a ruined village named Paleo Ghelissi.

§ 2.329   To the eastward of Katzula on the foot of the rocks, are some foundations of Hellenic walls, together with a church containing a Doric column and its capital. These remains are sufficient to mark the site of Erythrae, its position as well as that of Hysiae, having been exactly described by Herodotus, Thucydides, Euripides, Strabo, and Pausanias. That the eastern of the two positions was Erythrae and the western Hysiae, might be presumed from Pausanias, who, entering Boeotia from Attica, remarks that the ruins of Hysiae and Erythrae were a little on the right of the road, naming Hysiae first, and who adds that they were both in the Plataeis, and on Mount Cithaeron. But Herodotus leaves no doubt on this question, by informing us that the camp of Mardonius extended along the Asopus from the Erythraea beyond Hysiae as far as the land of Plataea, and that the Greeks who had been encamped at Erythrae opposite to Mardonius, moved by Hysiae into the Plataeis. Erythrae appears to have attained to great population in very early times, for Erythrae in Ionia was said to have been its colony. With the increase of Athens and Thebes it was probably reduced, like all the surrounding places, to comparative insignificance.
From Erythrae the road continues eastward along the foot of the rocks, at the head of a long slope which

§ 2.330   falls to the Asopus, crossing some tributary torrents, until at the end of two miles from Bubuka it arrives at a projecting point of Mount Cithaeron, which, though it does not advance much beyond the general line, is very conspicuous from almost every part of the Plataeis and adjacent country, because the entrance of the Pass of Cithaeron above Kriakuki, retires considerably within that line. A mile beyond the projection is Tarimari, a Turkish farm resembling the others; a little beyond it the road from Thebes to Athens by Phyle begins to ascend the Cithaeronian heights. This part of the range is nearly parallel to the low central Boeotian ridge of Thespiae, Thebes and Tanagra, of which the three principal summits, all lying south-eastward of Thebes, are now named Psilirakhi, Sulla and Soro. Just below the projection of Cithaeron, on a little rocky table-height overlooking the river, stands a metokhi dependent on a convent in the Eleutheris, called St. Meletius. Its position seems to answer exactly to that of Scolus, for Strabo describes Scolus as a village of the Parasopia below Cithaeron, and Pausanias in his description of the route from Plataea to Thebes, after observing that the river Oiroe first occurred, and then the Asopus, proceeds to remark, that if the traveller, instead of crossing the Asopus, were to follow that river for about forty stades, he would arrive at the ruins of Scolus, in which there was an unfinished temple of Ceres and Proserpine, with their statues half executed.

§ 2.331   Scolus having stood in a narrow part of the valley, between Cithaeron and the Asopus, was a position well adapted to one of those intrenchments which the Thebans erected in several parts of the Thebaea for its defence against the Lacedaemonians. The works at Scolus, however, were ineffectual against Agesilaus, who in his second invasion in the year B.C. 377, marched suddenly upon Scolus by the way of Erythrae, as soon as he had crossed the Cithaeron, while the Thebans were looking for him towards Thespiae; from Scolus he entered the country eastward of Thebes, and thus advanced to the walls of the city without opposition. The intrenchment of Scolus probably extended from the mountain to the Asopus. It is difficult to understand what there was in this situation which made it proverbially disagreeable; Strabo describes it as τραχύς, but this word seems applicable only to the rock on which it stood, the surrounding territory being the best part of the Asopian valley between the districts of Plataea and Tanagra.
Eteonus, afterwards called Scarphe, was another Homeric town of the Parasopii, whose villages in the time, of Strabo were all included in the government of Thebes.

§ 2.332   Some geographers, Strabo adds, attributed Eteonus, together with Scolus and Erythrae, to the Plataeis, which, as we have seen, is confirmed by Pausanias, at least with reference to Erythrae. And hence we may infer, the Asopus in the time of the latter author having been the boundary between the Plataeis and Thebaea, that Eteonus was to the right of that river. As Erythrae and Hysiae occupied the Parasopia westward of Scolus, Eteonus probably stood between Scolus and the frontier of the Tanagrice, which latter district is naturally separated from the Parasopia by the approach of the Cithaeronian range to that of Soro, forming a rocky gorge which begins about two miles beyond Tarimari, and through which the Asopus finds its way into the plain of Tanagra. The epithet νολύκνημος applied to Eteonus by Homer, would be well adapted to a place situated near such a defile. The Asopus in the ravine of Eteonus winds to the left, and then to the right, and at the end of two miles emerges in the plain of Tanagra, after crossing which it traverses another rocky strait in the branches of Mount Parnes, and enters the maritime plain of Oropus, Having returned to Bubuka I proceed to Platani, passing over ploughed heights intersected by three branches of the Asopus, all which are nearly equal in size. The last has its origin in a fountain which I examined on my former visit, and found even in that dry season as well supplied with water as the Vergutiani.

§ 2.333   It is incased, like that source, in an artificial basin covered with squared stones of ancient fabric. This I take to be the Gargaphia of Herodotus. In the wall of a ruined tower situated below the supposed site of Hysiae, I remarked several stones which have been employed in ancient buildings, and the fields around are spread with fragments of Hellenic pottery.
Just below Platani to the south, are the sources of a water-course, which after making a circuit at the foot of the hill of Platani follows the road from Thebes to Kokhla for some distance, and then joins the Thespian branch of the Asopus, just above a bridge in the road. From thence I cross the branches of the Oiroe to Vergutiani, and return by a lower route than that of yesterday to the same point at the southern angle of Plataea from whence I set out yesterday on this little tour, the object of which has been to visit some parts of the Plataeis, not properly examined on my former journey, to ascertain the sites of Hysiae and Erythrae, to trace the courses of the several branches of the Asopus and Oiroe, and to notice the principal springs of the Plataeis with a view of identifying the Gargaphia. If this be the fountain just indicated about midway between Kriakuki and Platani, it is probable that Vergutiani is the fountain of Diana, where Actaeon was said to have seen the Goddess bathing, and that the rock which I have described above the fountain, was that on which Actaeon was reported to have been in the habit of reposing when fatigued with the chace. Pausanias, after returning from Hysiae into the road leading from Eleutherae to Plataea, describes the monument of Mardonius

§ 2.334   as being on the right hand side of that road, and immediately afterwards states that there was a road from Megara to Plataea, on the right of which were the fountain of Diana and the rock of Actaeon. Thus it is evident that the road from Plataea to Megara was different from that leading from Plataea to Eleutherae; and we find the same distinction in Xenophon, who states that Cleombrotus, marching from the Peloponnesus into Boeotia, avoided the Pass of Eleutherae, which was in possession of an Athenian force under Chabrias, and mounted by the road which led to Plataea. If then the road from Eleutherae descended by the modern Derveni leading from the Isthmus to Thebes, and about Kriakuki turned towards Plataea, as seems to be its natural course, that from Megara probably descended the face of the mountain obliquely at a considerable elevation, where it would pass very near the fountain Vergutiani.
Immediately opposite to the southern angle of the walls of Plataea on the steep rocky rise of the mountain, which is here separated only by a narrow level from the ancient site, is a cavern 30 feet in length, 10 wide, and 4 high. Before it there is a little verdant level, surrounded and overhung by rugged rocks. The beauty of the spot would tempt one to believe it to have been the cavern sacred to the Nymphs of Cithaeron, called the Sphragitides, which once contained an

§ 2.335   oracle of the Nymphs, and was noted for Nympholepsy. But the testimony of Plutarch and Pausanias is positive in placing that cavern on the north-western side of one of the summits, and at a distance of only 15 stades below it, consequently much higher in the mountain, and having a different aspect. On the same summit there was an altar for the celebration of the lesser Daedala, which was a festival instituted by all the people of Boeotia in commemoration of their reconciliation and alliance with Plataea, after the restoration of Thebes and Plataea, by Cassander. As there are two summits of Cithaeron equally conspicuous, a circumstance explaining the words μία κορυφή, in Plutarch, it is not easy to determine on which we ought to seek for the altar or the cavern, though probability seems to incline towards that which is nearest to Plataea.
In order to justify the ancient names in the plan of the Plataeis, which accompanies the present volume, and the positions which are there assigned to the contending forces in the great military operations which terminated the Persian war, little more will be necessary than to describe succinctly the events immediately preceding the

§ 2.336   battle, and the circumstances of the action itself, both extracted almost entirely from the contemporary historian.
Xerxes had not been many days in possession of Athens, the chief object of his armament, when he was an eye-witness of the utter defeat and dispersion of his fleet, and found himself under the necessity of returning immediately to Persia. He was advised at the same time to leave three hundred thousand men in Greece; with these Mardonius undertook to complete the conquest of the country; but as the approaching season was unfavourable to military operations, (the battle of Salamis having been fought in October,) it was resolved that Mardonius should pass the winter in Thessaly and Macedonia, which were much more capable of supplying the wants of an army than the provinces within Mount Oeta. While Xerxes was in Thessaly on his retreat, Mardonius made choice of the troops who were to remain with him. They consisted of all the immortals, except their commander Hydarnes, who refused to be separated from the king, of the Persian thoracepheri, or cuirassiers, and of all the Medes, Sacae, Bactrians, and Indians, both horse and foot, with a selection from the other allies. Sixty thousand of these men, under Artabazus, served as a body guard to Xerxes in his march to the Hellespont, where he arrived with scarcely any other forces, so great had been the numbers left sick in Thessaly, Macedonia, and Paeonia, or who had perished on the way from hunger, plague,

§ 2.337   and dysentery. Artabazus on his return employed the remainder of the winter in reducing the revolted cities of Pallene, and was detained no less than three months in the siege of Potidaea, where he lost a considerable portion of his troops by the effects of a sudden inundation of the sea.
Mardonius did not advance from Thessaly until he had consulted some of the oracles of Greece, and until he had learnt the event of an embassy to Athens, the object of which was to induce the Athenians to make a separate peace. The oracular replies he considered favourable; and those of Thessaly and Boeotia were probably intended to be so by the priests, but Alexander, king of Macedonia, who was charged with his message to the Athenians, could make no impression upon a people whose city and villages were in ruins,—whose families, having taken refuge in the neighbouring Peloponnesian cities, became a surety in their hands for the fidelity of Athens to the general cause, and whose government in Salamis was beyond the reach of the Persians. So powerful were these motives, and so unbroken the public spirit of the Athenians, that when he again took possession of Athens, he found the people as determined as ever to resist his menaces and his offers. Deprived of the Persian fleet, he could not long remain in such an exhausted country; as soon as he was informed therefore by the Argives that the Peloponnesians were moving towards the Isthmus, he completed the destruction of Athens and returned into Boeotia, which afforded greater means of subsistence, a country better suited to the operations of

§ 2.338   his cavalry, and where he was surrounded by a friendly or submissive people. The Boeotians had endeavoured to dissuade him from marching to Athens and to assure him, that by bribing some of the leading men in the several cities, he might create a division among the Greeks, and at length overcome all those who should resist him. But Mardonius, according to the historian, was determined to gratify his vanity by a second capture of that city, although now empty and in ruins, and to have the pleasure of communicating the event to Xerxes at Sardes by fire-signals at night on the intermediate islands of the Aegaean.
If the Persian war produced some of the finest examples of human virtue which history affords, there is no period in which the Greeks have at the same time more strongly exhibited their characteristic selfishness, jealousy, and the want of general patriotism. It was chiefly the fear of an alliance between the Persians and Athenians, and of an attack upon the Laconic shores by their united fleet, that induced the Lacedaemonians to fight in company with the Athenians at Salamis. The same apprehensions made them diligent in endeavouring to counteract the efforts of Alexander, to produce a separate peace between the Persians and Athenians; but no sooner had their anxiety upon this head been relieved, than, regardless of the entreaties of the Athenians, who

§ 2.339   proposed that the Lacedaemonian army should unite with theirs, and fight the enemy in the Thriasian plain, at their entrance into Attica, they delayed until that province was once more overrun and despoiled, and were not at length prevailed upon to march until after some evasions and delays. Herodotus ascribes this conduct to the completion of the wall across the Isthmus, which was begun a little after the battle of Thermopylae, but was not yet finished when Alexander arrived at Athens on his embassy; nor were the Lacedaemonians, according to the same historian, at last moved to activity, but by the conviction that even the fortified Isthmus would little avail them, if the Athenians should be under the necessity of accepting the Persian proposals.
Mardonius, on his march from Athens towards Boeotia, received intelligence that 1000 Lacedaemonians had arrived in the Megaris, upon which he made a retrograde movement to intercept them, and his cavalry overspread the Megaris; but as soon as he heard that the rest of the Peloponnesian army had arrived at the Isthmus, he continued his route into Boeotia by Deceleia and Sphendaleae to Tanagra. Here he passed a night: then took the direction of Scolus, entered the Theban territory,

§ 2.340   and encamped along the left bank of the Asopus, his line extending from over against Erythrae as far as the Plataeis. In the midst of it he caused to be erected a wooden fortification, flanked with towers, and inclosing a square of eight stades; and in providing this place of refuge in case of disaster, was under the necessity of injuring the lands of the Thebans, although they were his friends. The Grecian allies by whom Mardonius was here joined, are vaguely computed by Herodotus at 50,000. In the motives of the alliance of some of them we have again some curious examples of the power of that neighbourly jealousy and hostility which are a part of the Greek character. Plataea and Thespiae were inimical to Thebes, and therefore allied with Athens; it was chiefly from a hatred to Athens that Thebes became the most zealous supporter of the Persian cause against the common interests of Greece; and the opposition of Sparta to the Persians made Argos favourable to them, though the situation of the latter was such as rendered it incapable of affording the Persians much assistance.

§ 2.341   Of all the auxiliaries, the Phocians joined Mardonius with the greatest unwillingness; the others had accompanied him to Athens, but it was not until he returned to Thebes that the Phocians joined him. Out of hatred to this people the Thessalians had prevailed upon Xerxes in the preceding year to destroy all the accessible parts of Phocis, and had obliged the Phocians to retire to the heights of Mount Parnassus, from whence they assisted the Greek confederates by excursions against the Persians and their allies; but now their country being at the mercy of the enemy, and surrounded by medizing Greeks, they sent 1000 men to the Persian camp, who, having been accused, as it would appear, by the Thessalians, either of cowardice or treachery, were not received until they had undergone the proof of standing an attack from the Persian cavalry, which seems from Herodotus to have been something more than a mere feint.
The Lacedaemonians were joined at the Isthmus by the other Peloponnesians, and the sacrifices having been found auspicious, the army advanced to Eleusis. Here the appearances of the victims having again been favourable, they moved forward together with the Athenians, under the command of Aristides, who had joined them from Salamis, and proceeded to Erythrae, where the position of the combined forces stretched along the roots of Mount Cithaeron, opposite to the camp of the Barbarians, on the Asopus. Mardonius perceiving that the Greeks did not descend into the plain, sent against them all his cavalry under the command of Masistius, who was esteemed the second man in the Persian army.

§ 2.342   The Megarenses, who were in the most exposed part of the Greek line, finding themselves unequal to withstand the attack, were obliged to call for succour, when the only volunteers to relieve them were a body of 300 select Athenians, under Olympiodorus, accompanied by a body of archers. The latter, by wounding the horse of Masistius, caused the rider to fall, when he was slain by the Athenians. His followers endeavoured to recover the body, but all the Greek infantry moving to the assistance of Olympiodorus, the enemy retreated. The body of Masistius carried through the camp of the Greeks animated them with the best hopes, while all Boeotia re-echoed to the sound of the enemy’s lamentations, who in token of mourning cut off their beards, and the manes of the horses and beasts of burthen. This was the only important occurrence in the first position of the two armies.
The Greeks now came to the determination of descending into the territory of Plataea, as being more convenient for encamping than that of Erythrae, because among other reasons it was better supplied with water. In fact, the Plataeis being situated at the foot of a high mountain, and at the sources of many rivulets, can never be totally deficient in water. The Greeks at Erythrae,

§ 2.343   therefore, taking up their arms, moved along the roots of Mount Cithaeron, and passed by Hysiae into the Plataeis, having entered which they drew up in order according to their respective nations, partly upon hills of no great height, and partly upon a level plain, near the fountain Gargaphia, and the temenus of one of the archagetae, or ancient heroes of Plataea, named Androcrates. As the position of this heroum is shown by Thucydides to have been on the right hand of the road from Plataea to Thebes, about a mile distant from the city, and as a part of the Greek position was in the plain, it is evident that the Gargaphia could not have been either the fountain Vergutiani, or that at Kriakuki.
By ancient custom and the consent of ail Greece, the Lacedaemonians had the post of honour on the right, and their king Pausanias the command (though not, as it appears by the sequel, a very absolute command) of the whole army. After a contest between the Athenians and the Tegeatae for the left, the Lacedaemonians awarded to the former that second place of honour; the Tegeatae took post on the left of the Lacedaemonians, and the other nations occupied the centre. The entire force was 110,000, in the proportions and drawn up in the order from right to left stated below.

§ 2.344   Their position is described by the historian as being επί τω Ασωπώ, (on the Asopus,) and as it appears from the subsequent part of his narrative, that the Persians followed the movement of the Greeks along the river, there could only have been a small space on either bank between the hostile armies. The fountain Gargaphia was in the part of the line occupied by the Lacedaemonians, or towards the right: the other Greeks watered from the Asopus until they were prevented by the Persian cavalry, to whom it appears that the Greeks had no cavalry whatever to oppose, not even an escort for the security of their convoys and reinforcements in crossing Mount Cithaeron. Nevertheless, the Persians derived little benefit from this superiority, but showed a supineness and want of enterprize similar to that exhibited by the army of Datis, when it was opposed for ten days to a handful of Athenians at Marathon.

§ 2.345   It was not until the end of eight days that Mardonius was persuaded by a Theban to send a body of horse to the pass of Mount Cithaeron, called by the Athenians the Oak-heads and by the Boeotians the Three-heads. Here they intercepted a convoy of 500 beasts of burthen, entering the plains, and killed the greater part of both men and cattle.
On the eleventh day, Mardonius, finding that the Greeks were daily increasing in number, resolved upon attacking them on the following day, regardless of the advice of Artabazus, supported by that of the Thebans, who recommended him to retire to Thebes, where his provisions, which began to fail, might be supplied; and from whence, protracting the war, he might, by means of the bullion, coin, and plate, which he possessed in great quantity, endeavour to gain over the leading Greeks to his party. The advice appears to have been good; for on the one hand the cavalry of Mardonius gave him the command of supplies, and the power of intercepting those of the Greeks as well as the means of distressing them by continual attacks, while, on the other hand, he had everything to fear from a close contest with an infantry compared with whom his own were but as lightarmed. It was probably in conformity with these opinions, that the Greek priests on the side of Mardonius had augured success to him, if he remained on the defensive, while Tisamenus, who accompanied the Spartans, probably from a similar view of the interests of his employers, promised

§ 2.346   victory to the Greeks, provided they abstained from crossing the Asopus, and awaited the attack. Mardonius, however, declared his determination to disregard every thing but the laws of the Persians, which enjoined them to engage the enemy, and thenceforth no one dared give utterance to an opinion contrary to that of the man to whom Xerxes had delegated his absolute power.
In the intervening night, Alexander, king of Macedonia, secretly visited the camp of the Athenians, and informed the commanders of the intentions of Mardonius, as well as of the approaching failure of his provisions; upon which Pausanias requested the Athenians to change places with the Lacedaemonians, on the plea that the latter were unacquainted with the Persian mode of fighting, whereas the Athenians had successfully opposed that people at Marathon; for Mardonius had placed the Persae, as being his best troops, opposite to the Lacedaemonians, and had opposed to the Athenians and to the Plataeenses and Megarenses, who were next to the Athenians on the left, the Macedonians, Thessalians, and Boeotians. But the Boeotians, having quickly discovered the change, and reported it to Mardonius, he restored the Persae to their position in the left wing, and sent an insulting message to the Lacedaemonians, who had returned to their original post, with a proposal for a battle between an equal number of Persians and Lacedaemonians. No reply having been given to his challenge, he ordered an attack upon the

§ 2.347   Grecian line by his cavalry, who not only annoyed extremely the hoplitae by their javelins and arrows, but succeeded at length in obtaining possession of the fountain Gargaphia, and in rendering it useless; and thus the Greeks, having already been driven by the enemy’s cavalry from the Asopus, found themselves distressed for water. They began also to be in want of other provisions, their convoys being blockaded by the enemy in Cithaeron, and unable to cross the mountain. The Greek commanders, having been assembled by Pausanias in the right wing, to consult upon these difficulties, it was resolved, that if the Persians should not come to action with their infantry that day, (for as yet the cavalry only had attacked,) the Greeks about midnight should retreat into a plain in front of the city of Plataea called the Island, where two branches of the river Oiroe, after flowing for some distance, with an interval of three stades between them, united, and formed one stream. This place was ten stades distant from Gargaphia, and from the position of the Greeks on the Asopus. The council also determined that half the army should be detached from the Island during the same night to Mount Cithaeron, to open the passage for the camp followers who had been sent to the Peloponnesus for provisions. During the remainder of the day, however, the Greeks continued to suffer so much from the enemy’s cavalry, that when the movement took place at night, none but the Lacedaemonians and Tegeatae on the right, and the Athenians on the left, continued resolute in the

§ 2.348   intention of marching into the island; the Greeks of the center, who perhaps with reason suspected that they should not long be secure from the hostile cavalry in the island, retreating as far as a temple of Juno, which was twenty stades distant from Gargaphia, near the city of Plataea. The Athenians, desirous of ascertaining whether the Lacedaemonians had begun to move, sent a messenger to the right of the camp, who found Pausanias detained by an unexpected difficulty. Amompharetus, the lochagus of the Pitanatae, refused to disgrace Sparta, as he termed it, by retreating before the enemy; and he persisted so obstinately in his determination, that daylight found the two wings of the Greek army in the position of the preceding day, but separated from each other by the whole interval left by the other Greeks, who were now at a distance of two or three miles in the rear. Pausanias, convinced that the enemy would soon take advantage of this state of things, and judging that Amompharetus would not long remain after his departure, retired with the main body of the Lacedaemonians and the Tegeatae along the heights and the base of Mount Cithaeron. thereby avoiding the enemy’s cavalry; while the Athenians proceeded through the plain, in the direction of Plataea. At the end of ten stades Pausanias halted on the bank of the Moloeis, at a place called Argiopius, where stood a temple of Ceres Eleusinia, and was joined there by Amompharetus.

§ 2.349   The Persian cavalry meantime, on perceiving that the Greeks had abandoned their position, pursued and harassed them on every side, while Mardonius, recollecting the pains which the Lacedaemonians had taken to avoid the troops opposed to them on the preceding day, and supposing that they no longer intended to fight, crossed the Asopus with all his army, who advanced in the most disorderly manner, shouting as if about to gain an easy victory, with which Mardonius himself was the more impressed, as the Tegeatae and Lacedaemonians only were visible, the Athenians in the plain being concealed by some heights, and the other Greeks being still more distant.
Pausanias having dispatched a horseman to the Athenians to require their aid, or, if they should be too much pressed by the enemy, at least that of their archers; the Athenians began to move to their right, but were so much exposed to the attacks of the auxiliary Greeks on the Persian right, that they were unable to give the Lacedaemonians any assistance whatever. Pausanias was obliged, therefore, to prepare for resisting all the efforts of Mardonius with the Lacedaemonians and Tegeatae alone, amounting to 53,000, of whom little more than a third were hoplitae. At first, the appearance of the victims was declared unfavourable, and the Greeks consequently remained inactive, suffering severely from the missiles of the Persians, discharged from behind a breastwork of shields; but

§ 2.350   at length Pausanias, having turned his eyes towards the temple of Juno, and invoked the assistance of the goddess, which was immediately followed by a favourable report of the victims, the Lacedaemonians advanced to the attack, though not until the Tegeatae, who had not waited for similar auspices, had already set the example. The action now became close and general, first at the breastwork of shields, and afterwards at the Eleusinium in Argiopius. The Persians were not inferior to their adversaries in valour, and such was their strength and resolution, that many seized upon the spears of the Greeks with their hands and broke them in pieces; but not being protected by such defensive armour as that of the hoplitae, being unused to the Greek mode of fighting, and being inferior in discipline and formation, their valour was of little avail; and as they rushed forward, either singly or in small bodies, they were slain by the Spartans.
Wherever Mardonius appeared, mounted upon a white horse, and surrounded by his select body of cavalry of 1000 Persae, they sustained the attack of the Lacedaemonians and slew many of them; but when he fell by the hand of the Spartan Aeimnestus, and his bodyguard was defeated, the rest gave way before the Spartans and fled, having little chance with their unarmed dresses and

§ 2.351   irregular order against men covered with armour, and formed into an inseparable phalanx. “And thus,” adds Herodotus, “Pausanias, the son of Cleombrotus, gained the most splendid victory I have ever heard of.” Meantime the Athenians, with their comrades of Plataea and Thespiae, had defeated the Boeotians, had slain 300 Thebans, and had obliged the remainder to retreat to Thebes.
When the Greeks at the Heraion heard that the battle was gained, they proceeded in a disorderly manner towards Argiopius. The Corinthians marched by the heights directly to the Eleusinium, and reached it in safety, but the Megarenses and Phliasii having followed the better road through the plain, were attacked by the Theban cavalry, lost 600 men, and were pursued to Cithaeron.
Artabazus, who had previously given orders to the 40,000 men whom he commanded, waited only to be assured of the result which he expected from the rashness of Mardonius, when he marched off from the field of battle towards Phocis, and continuing liis route to the northward with all possible celerity, preceded every where the news of the victory, and thus arrived at Byzantium, though not without having sustained considerable loss from famine, fatigue, and hostile Thracians. When the Persae began to retreat, great numbers of the army, who usually looked to them for example, fled without ever having been engaged and were slain by the Greeks, who would have effected a much greater slaughter had not the fugitives been protected by the cavalry.

§ 2.352   Of the Greek auxiliaries on the side of the Persians, the Boeotians alone fought in earnest, but particularly the Thebans, three hundred of whose best men were slain by the Athenians.
The Persians had only entered the wooden fortress, mounted the towers, and made some preparations for defence, when the Lacedaemonians arrived. But these being unskilled in the attack of fortified places, made little progress until they had the assistance of the Athenians. After a long and obstinate contest, a part of the wall was thrown down, and the Tegeatae had the honour of being the first to enter. The barbarians then made no further effort, but allowed themselves to be killed without resistance. Out of the original 300,000 there escaped, besides the 40,000 of Artabazus, not more than 3000, who were said to have been slain in their passage through Macedonia, by order of Perdiccas the son of king Alexander.
The spoil which fell to the share of the conquerors was immense. Besides the rich tents and their furniture, the clothing and arms of the slain, there was a profusion of utensils of gold and silver, as well as of the precious metals both in coin and bullion: so numerous in particular were the gold Darics, that they became for a long period afterwards one of the current coins of Greece, and are still often found in this country. From the tenth of the spoil, dedicated to the gods, were formed the golden tripod of Delphi, supported by three

§ 2.353   twisted serpents of brass, a brazen Jupiter fifteen feet in height at Olympia, and a brazen Neptune ten feet high at the Isthmus. Some presents were made, beyond their share, to those who distinguished themselves. The remainder was divided among the conquerors. To Pausanias was assigned a tenth of every thing: women, horses, camels, gold and silver. The Tegeatae, who were the first to enter the tent of Mardonius, carried off the brazen manger of his horses, and placed it in the temple of Minerva Alea, at Tegea; the Athenians obtained his silver-footed chair, and his scimetar, valued at 300 darics, which they dedicated in the temple of Minerva Polias in the acropolis. On the side of the Greeks there fell only ninety-one Lacedaemonians, sixteen Tegeatae, and fifty-two Athenians. As Herodotus particularly specifies, that these Lacedaemonians were Spartans, it appears that the numbers indicate the loss of the hoplitae only, and that he has omitted to notice, or was not informed, how many of the light-armed fell.
It is scarcely worth while to advert to the particulars in which the other ancient authors, who have related this great event, differ from Herodotus: Diodorus and Plutarch lived so long afterwards that they cannot have much weight against

§ 2.354   the testimony of the contemporary historian; the former, however, does not deviate from it in any important point, and the contradictions of the latter are undeserving of much respect, as being those of a Boeotian angry with Herodotus for having spoken freely of the disgraceful conduct of his countrymen, and thinking no mode of exculpation so effectual as that of throwing general discredit upon the historian’s accuracy. But impartiality and an anxiety for the truth are conspicuous in the narrative of Herodotus. Although he was by no means an admirer of the Lacedaemonians, and accuses them of habitual deceit and perfidy, both his facts and his sentiments give the chief glory of the day to the 10,000 Lacedaemonians and their comrades the Tegeatae, nor could the admirable conduct of Pausanias have received so fine a panegyric from the most laboured oratory, as it has from the simple language of the historian.
It has been doubted by some travellers who have visited the Plataeis, whether so great a number of men as Herodotus has mentioned, could have manoeuvred and fought on so small a field, and hence they have suspected some error or exaggeration on the part of the historian. It certainly appears possible, on considering how reluctantly some of the Greeks advanced into Boeotia, how ill others behaved in the field, and that the reinforcements were continuing to arrive at the Greek camp up to the very eve of the battle, that the amount of the several contingents stated by Herodotus, may rather have been that which each city engaged to send, than those actually present, and that in many

§ 2.355   instances there may have been deficiencies. As to the light troops, more than half of whom were composed of Helotes, attending upon the Spartans in the proportion of seven to one, we are too little acquainted with the details of Spartan discipline to know whether there was any accurate muster of this force, or whether their attendance depended upon the individual Spartans whom they served, for upon this must have greatly depended their complement in the field: whether complete or not, it appears, at least, that they were in little estimation as light troops. the Lacedaemonians having been urgent in requesting the assistance of the Athenian bowmen at Argiopius. Similar suspicions may attach to the numbers of the light-armed of the Greek centre. As to the most efficient part of the army, however, the Lacedaemonian and Athenian hoplitae, and those who fought with them, they fully amounted, as there is every reason to believe, to the numbers stated by Herodotus, so that it cannot be supposed that fewer than 30,000 hoplitae were assembled, nor less than double the number of light troops. For such an army the space was amply sufficient in each of the three positions which they occupied. In the first and second the front was about three miles in length, with an indefinite space in the rear. On the day of battle the hoplitae formed three separate bodies, two of these had each a mile for their front, and there was nearly a square league of ground to contain all the light troops, together

§ 2.356   with those hoplitae who had formed the centre of the Greek line in their second position, and who in the third were in the rear near the Heraion. The right, consisting of the Lacedaemonians and Tegeatae, amounted to 11,500 hoplitae; such a body drawn up in the space of a mile, which was about the extent of the position, with a breadth of three feet to each man, would have had about seven in file, a depth which, although very small compared with that of the phalanx when military science was at its height among the Greeks, was perhaps as great as was then customary. The left wing, composed of the Athenians and their comrades, amounted to about 16,000, including light armed, but their duty having been chiefly to resist cavalry, they were probably formed into a close phalanx, and occupied very little ground. As to the enemy’s force, the estimate of Herodotus has evidently no pretensions to accuracy, for though he conjectures the Greek auxiliaries to have amounted to 50,000, he admits that their real amount was unknown; and in reckoning the Persians at 300,000, he seems to have merely adopted the maximum of the army of Mardonius, as nominated by Xerxes ten months before, having been unwilling perhaps to question the accuracy of the tradition which had

§ 2.357   been sanctioned by the lapse of twenty years, and to which the Greeks, for the sake of their own glory, had readily given credit. The historian has not hinted at any recruiting from Asia for the purpose of supplying either the ordinary waste in the army of Mardonius, or that diminution of 20,000, which he shows to have taken place in the division of Artabazus, in the course of its march to the Hellespont, and in the subsequent operations in Thrace. But with every allowance for such deductions, it is difficult to believe that the Persian army on the Asopus was not two or three times as numerous as that of the Greeks, independently of its followers. Even on the supposition however that they were three to one, there was sufficient space for them in the Plataeis, as none but the choicest infantry were immediately opposed to the Greeks, and the cavalry, as well as the light armed, on both sides may have been spread over a space of 12 or 14 square miles. Even in modern warfare, in which the greater range of missiles has created an order of battle much less deep than among the ancients, examples might be found of fields of battle as small, in proportion to the numbers, as that of Plataea.
Another point in the narrative of Herodotus which may present at first sight some difficulty to a person who views the scene of action at Plataea, is the word νήσος, there being no island, properly

§ 2.358   so called, in front of Plataea or in any part of the Plataeis. The place which Herodotus so accurately indicates as being before the city, at a distance of ten stades from the Asopus as well as from Gargaphia, is nothing more than a level meadow intersected by several brooks uniting into one stream. But this is probably all that the historian meant by an island. His description of it as formed by two streams which were separated from one another in Mount Cithaeron, and were afterwards united, is entirely conformable to present appearances. If he had intended a real island, it would not have been necessary for him to make any mention of the two branches in Mount Cithaeron, since the separation of the waters of a single stream, and their reunion, would have been sufficient to form the island. It is easy to imagine that the Plataeenses may have distinguished this part of their plain by the name of Island, although it was in reality no more than a peninsula. The ambiguity of this passage has not been diminished by the translators of Herodotus, who, by referring the word oi to νήσος instead of to

§ 2.359   ποταμόc, have represented Oiroe as the name of the island, whereas the historian in describing the island as the place which Oiroe the daughter of Asopus surrounds, clearly shows Oiroe to have been the river. Their mistake may have partly arisen from the belief that the river which formed the island was a branch of the Asopus, a very natural supposition for them to have made in ignorance of the real topography, as Herodotus nowhere indicates the contrary, and as it is greatly favoured by the local mythus, according to which Oiroe was the daughter of Asopus. We find, however, as I have before stated, that although the sources of the Asopus and Oiroe are very near to one another, they are not only separate rivers, but flow in opposite directions, the former to the Euboic channel, the latter to the Corinthiac Gulf.
Plataea, although enjoying many local advantages, was not happily situated for the repose of its inhabitants, who continually exposed to danger from their more powerful neighbours of Thebes, and obliged to have recourse to the aid of Athens, were thus dependent upon a comparatively distant alliance, while their enemies were only two hours’ march from them. Hence the extensive walls, of which we still see the remains, and which served as an occasional shelter to the whole population of the Plataeis. The first alliance of Plataea with Athens was in the year B.C. 519; it was firmly cemented by the two Persian invasions, and by a community of perils and glory at Marathon and

§ 2.360  Plataea. These best times of Plataea, ended with the alliance of Thebes and Sparta against Athens. The first act of hostility of the Thebans against Plataea, in the Peloponnesian war, was an attempt to obtain possession of the place by stratagem. Three hundred men were admitted within the walls by some Plataeenses of the Theban faction, and the design only failed by the occurrence of a dark and rainy night, which being accompanied by a sudden increase of the Asopus, prevented the Thebans from supporting their comrades in the town, 180 of whom were, in consequence, taken and put to death.
In the beginning of the third summer of the same war, B.C. 429, the Lacedaemonians and Boeotians commenced a siege of Plataea, which lasted three years, and which has given occasion to Thucydides to furnish us with some curious particulars of the military customs of the Greeks, and of the state of the art of the attack and defence of fortified places at that remote period. In the first year, the besiegers, after various devices which were frustrated by the garrison, were equally unsuccessful in an attempt to bum the city by throwing sulphur and pitch into it, with faggots of wood, which the adjacent Cithaeron supplied in abundance. Thucydides observes, that they were prompted to this mode of offence, by the smallness of the city: a remark by no means in agreement with the existing ruins, which are not less than two miles and a half in circumference, but favourable

§ 2.361   to the conjecture already offered, that Plataea was confined at that time to the southern extremity of the existing remains. In almost every other part, the masonry is of a less ancient kind, and the ruins of former buildings may be detected among the materials, which is no more than consistent with the troubled history of the later Plataea, and the many repairs and renewals which it underwent. All the efforts of the allies during the first summer of the siege having failed, they converted it into a blockade, and raised a circumvallation round the city, consisting of two parallel walls, sixteen feet asunder, with a ditch on either side. Square towers, of the same breadth as the double wall, and covered with roofs, were raised at intervals of about seventy feet along the wall, and afforded a passage through them round the whole circumvallation. Huts were built for the blockading force between the walls, which thus served as an entrenched camp to the investing force, as well against the Plataeenses from within, as against the Athenians in the opposite direction.

§ 2.362   A detachment of Lacedaemonians was left to garrison one half of the work, and the Boeotians had the charge of the other, while the main body of the respective armies retired to winter quarters. The Plataeenses had sent all their women, children, and aged, to Athens, before the siege, and there remained in the city only 400 Plataeenses and 80 Athenians, with 110 women to prepare their food. A year afterwards, or in the course of the fourth winter of the war, the besieged being in great distress for provision, formed the design of forcing the enemy's line of blockade, and succeeded in effecting it: a portion of them escaladed the wall in the middle of a tempestuous night, and seized two adjacent towers, from whence, by the assistance of a false attack of the remaining garrison of the town, on an opposite part of the circumvallation, they effected their passage over the wall with the loss of only one man, though not without meeting with a vigorous opposition at the outer ditch. Foreseeing that the Peloponnesians would proceed to search for them on the road to the Dryoscephalae, they took the road to Thebes, along which they had marched seven or eight stades, when perceiving the torches of the enemy searching for them on the road to Dryoscephalae, they turned to the right, and made the best of their way to the mountains near Erythrae and Hysiae. Two hundred and twelve thus escaped in safety to Athens.
In the course of the ensuing summer, the remainder of the garrison of Plataea surrendered to the Lacedaemonians, and after pleading their cause against the Thebans before five judges sent for this

§ 2.363   purpose from Sparta, were all put to death, being in number 200 Plataeenses and 25 Athenians; the women who had remained in the city were sold for slaves, and the city having been given up to the Thebans, was razed to the ground in the ensuing year. The lands of the Plataeis were let for ten years to Thebans; a building of two stories, containing numerous chambers for the reception of travellers, was built out of the ruins of the city near the temple of Juno, and a new temple was constructed in honour of the Goddess.
The Plataeenses had remained for forty years in servitude or exile, when they were restored to their country by the effect of the peace of Antalcidas, B.C. 387, but they were only thirteen years in possession of it when the city was again razed to the ground by the Thebans, and the inhabitants once more obliged to take shelter in Attica On this occasion, as in the first year of the Peloponnesian war, the Thebans resorted to stratagem. At an hour when the people of Plataea were employed in the fields, and supposed the Thebans to be engaged in the public assembly, the latter marched round by Hysiae, and finding the city undefended, obliged those remaining within it to evacuate it by capitulation. After the battle of Chaeroneia, Philip, among other modes of humiliating the Thebans, restored the Plataeenses to their city. And to this date all the existing walls, except those at the southern extremity, may with great probability be attributed.

§ 2.364   If the Plataea of the time of the Peloponnesian war, was confined to the southern part of the ancient site, and the city was not then of large dimensions, it will follow that the table height, immediately overlooking the Island, was then excluded from the city, and this supposition seems necessary, to reconcile the words of Herodotus with present appearances. On that table height probably stood the Heraion, or temple of Juno before the city, which, in the time of the Antonines, was within the walls. Thus conspicuously situated without the walls, and just in the rear of the position of Argiopius, it was natural for the Greek commander to turn his eyes towards it, and implore the assistance of the Goddess when he was suffering under the attacks of the Persians, without being able to repel them, because the appearance of the victims was pronounced unfavourable. After the erection of the new temple of Juno by the Thebans, it is probable that the old Heraion was no longer repaired, for Pausanias mentions only one temple of Juno, and by remarking that it was of great magnitude, seems to identify it with that built by the Thebans, and described by Thucydides as a νεώς εκατόμπεδος λίθινος, which if we are to take the second word literally, would imply a building about the same size as the Parthenon. It contained a colossal upright Juno, surnamed Teleia, and at the entrance a Rhea presenting a stone to Cronus, both of Pentelic marble, and made by Praxiteles: there was also a Juno Nympheuomene by Callimachus. The temple of Minerva, surnamed Areia, was built from a share

§ 2.365   of the spoils of Marathon, and contained a statue of the Goddess by Phidias, nearly as large as that which he made from the same spoils for the Athenians; but the latter was of brass, whereas that of Plataea was acrolithic, the face, hands and feet being of Pentelic marble, and the rest of gilded wood. At the feet of the Goddess was the image of Arimnestus who commanded the Plataeenses both at Marathon and Plataea. There were two pictures on the walls of the Pronaus, one by Polygnotus, of which the subject was Ulysses slaying the suitors; the other by Onatas, represented the first expedition of the Argives against Thebes. The city contained also a temple of Ceres Eleusinia, and a tomb of Leitus, the only one of the Boeotian chiefs who returned from Troy. Within the gate which led to Eleutherae was the heroum of Plataea, daughter of Asopus, and on the outside of the same

§ 2.366   gate the temple of Jupiter Eleutherius, which in the time of Pausanias seems to have been reduced to an altar and statue: it was established after the victory by command of the Oracle of Delphi, and by a decree proposed by Aristides it was the scene of a quinquennial festival called the Eleutheria. Here stood also a brazen trophy for the victory over the Persians, tombs of the Lacedaemonians and Athenians who fell on that occasion, inscribed with elegies by Simonides, and a polyandrium of the other Greeks. The position of these monuments is marked, perhaps, by a ruined church

§ 2.367   near the right bank of the torrent, on the left bank of which, nearly opposite to the chapel, are the foundations of a gate, already alluded to, in the eastern walls of Plataea, not far from the northeastern angle. This gate is placed within a quadrangular court or retirement of the walls, and appears to have been the principal gate of the city, as we may easily conceive it to have been, since it was conveniently situated for leading not only to Eleutherae and Athens, to Megara and the Isthmus, but also to Thebes, Chalcis and Tanagra.

§ 2.368   CHAPTER 17 BOEOTIA, ATTICA, MEGARIS
Jan. 1, 1806.—From Thebes to St. Meletius on the way to Athens.—Leaving the town by the southern gate, which may stand nearly on the site of that which led from the Cadmeia into Lower Thebes, the aqueduct is on the right. Like the town walls, it exhibits many remains of antiquity, and stands perhaps on Roman foundations. In one place a sepulchral monument is inserted in the masonry, bearing the common device of a horseman, with one of his horse’s feet raised, and resting upon an altar. At 9.56 pass the fountain of the Ismenus on the left side of the road. At 10, leave on the right the road to Kriakuki and the pass of Mount Cithaeron, leading to Corinth, called by the Turks the Kasa derveni, and at 10.8 to the left, that which leads to Athens by Sialissi and Phyle.

§ 2.369   Having descended the long slope of the Psilirakhi, or low central Theban ridge to the Asopus, we cross that river at 11.1, at the point where if is joined by the Rema, which separates Katzula from Bubuka. A small tjiftlik belonging to Rashid Bey, called Samoili, stands on the bank to our left. The river flows with a brisk but slender stream. Therapnae seems to have stood in this route between Thebes and the Asopus; for Euripides, in describing the death of Pentheus, says that he went from Therapnae across the Asopus to the place in Cithaeron, where he met his fate; and which, as we learn from Strabo, was near Scolus. Ascending the cultivable slope of Cithaeron, but which like all this part of the Parasopia is little cultivated, we arrive, at 11.33, at the Metokhi, described on the 30th of December as standing below the projecting point of the Cithaeronian range. The brow of the summit on which the Metokhi stands is surrounded by the foundation of a Hellenic wall, and has evidently been a fortress or citadel; as I before remarked, it was probably Scolus. The walls were of a very antique kind of masonry. A little beyond the Metokhi is a copious source of water, which no doubt determined the site of the ancient town as well as of the modern farm. About a mile farther, in ascending the steep side of Cithaeron, we leave Tarimari [μ. Δαφνή], a village of thirty houses, below us, close on the left, and soon afterwards enter a ravine between two ridges of the mountain, answering exactly to

§ 2.370   the description given by Euripides of the place where Pentheus was destroyed by the Maenades, except that the pine-forests do not now extend below the higher parts of the mountain. The ravine continues, including a halt of ten minutes, until 12.25, when we ascend the steep side of the ridge on the left, and at 12.28, having arrived upon the crest, look down upon a small stony plain extending towards the summit of Parnes. The direct road from Thebes to Athens by Phyle crosses this elevated plain, and then enters another in which are the villages of Sialissi, vulgarly Shalish, and Skurta. We proceed at 12.42, and continuing along the same kind of rugged steep road, have, at 1.35, the plain of Sialissi on our left a mile distant; and the village of that name surrounded by vineyards, in the nearest corner of it: two miles farther, is Skurta, on the foot of the great heights of Parnes. The Phyle road leaves these places to the left. There are three other villages in the valley named Kako Niskivi, Kadhasula, and Kurora. This plain, which separates the great height of Cithaeron from those of Parnes, is probably that neutral territory of Panactum, of which Thucydides speaks. It yields corn and vines, but the soil seems meagre and stony, and better adapted to the latter production.

§ 2.371   The neighbouring heights of Parnes are well clothed with trees of various kinds, and the summit consists entirely of a forest of pines. We continue to mount, and at 1.42 arrive at the summit of the ridge of Cithaeron, from whence there is a fine view of the country on either side. The northern part of the Megaric peninsula lying between the western extremity of the Corinthian Gulf and the bay of Eleusis, and bounded by the plain of Megara to the south, consists chiefly of mountains, of which the two principal summits are Karydhi to the west, and Kandili, overhanging the bay of Eleusis. The latter, as well from the ancient authorities as from its form, is evidently the summit called τα Κέρατα, or the horns. The range of Karydhi has a direction parallel to that of Cithaeron, and is separated from it by the valleys of Ghermano, Vilia, and Myupoli, which latter is the largest of the three. Karydhi and Kandili have a similar separation by means of the hollows about Kundura. We look directly down the Saronic Gulf, upon the island of St. George, anciently Belbina; to the right of which are Salamis, and the mountains of Argolis and Aegina, and to the left the plain of Thria, and the mountains Hymettus and Parnes. A descent of thirty-five minutes by a winding road, through a forest of pines, brings us to the monastery of St. Meletius, situated on the southern face of the mountain, which falls into the plain of Myupoli by a succession of cultivated terraces. Assisted with a few of the conveniences and embellishments of art, St.

§ 2.372  Meletius would be a delightful retreat. The buildings are mantled with ivy, and around them issue plentiful sources of water, which descend, shaded by large bay-trees, to the gardens, and the hanging woods of olives and beeches on the side of the mountain, preserving them in a state of perpetual verdure, which is finely contrasted on every side with the wild rocks and the dark pine-forests of Cithaeron. The weather is now perfectly clear and serene, and the season more deserves the name of καλοκαιρών than the greater part of that to which the word is usually applied, when the air is inflamed, the ground parched, every stream dried up, and not a green herb to be seen. The monastery is well endowed, and besides corn land possesses 3000 head of sheep and goats on the mountains. The church of St. Meletius, which is of the time of the Byzantine empire, is supported within by two octagonal columns of a veined marble of the colour of porphyry, which, according to the monks, was extracted from the side of the hill, not far above the monastery. As the Greek advent is not yet over, the house contains but scanty fare; but the Igumeno, immediately on my arrival, sends one of his monks to the rocks in front of the convent, who, with a voice that would have done honour to Menelaus, calls out to the shepherds in a distant part of the plain below to send up one of their fattest sheep. According to the abbot, the summits of Cithaeron have several modern appellations.

§ 2.373  Elatia is the name of the two great peaks above Plataea, so called from the fir-trees which cover all but the highest points. A summit between them and the Kaza derveni, or road across the mountain from Ghyftokastro to Kriakuki, is named Osna: Kurteza is that between the latter and the convent, and another towards Tarimari is called Pastra.
The plain below the monastery is the eastern extremity of a valley extending four or five miles westward towards Vilia, which village is situated in another valley separated by rugged heights from Ghermano, a small port on the Corinthiac Gulf, and distant two hours from Vilia. At about two miles to the south of the monastery, in the valley, are the ruins named Myupoli, which I formerly visited. The remains are those of a very small town, which had a citadel or interior inclosure at one angle. The masonry is for the most part regular, and is extant in many places two or three courses above the ground.
The ruins at Ghyftokastro, which I also visited at that time, are about an hour to the westward of Myupoli, at the entrance of the pass leading to Kriakuki and Thebes, on the summit of a steep and lofty rock between two torrents, one of which has a distant origin in Mount Cithaeron, the other rises at the foot of the hill on the road side, in a copious fountain called Petrogheraki. The entire circuit of the fortress still exists, flanked by square or oblong towers of masonry, and is preserved in some places as high as the battlements.

§ 2.374   The walls consist for the most part of polygonal masonry, though some parts, particularly the towers, appear to be more modern. The torrent of Ghyftokastro, increased by the fountain of Petrogheraki, and united to the waters which rise near St. Meletius and Myupoli, form a branch of the stream now called Saranda-potamo, and anciently Cephissus, which joins the sea near Eleusis, Another branch flows from Vilia, and a third from Kundura.
The road from St. Meletius to Megara, as well as that from Thebes, by Ghyftokastro to the same place, passes a little to the right of Myupoli, then crosses a steep root of Mount Karydhi, and enters the valley of Kundura, a town of four hundred families, chiefly Albanian, distant four or five miles from St. Meletius, and the same from Eleusis, The vale of Kundura is separated from the plain of Eleusis by the root of Mount Cithaeron, on which St. Meletius stands, and which follows the western side of the plain and bay of Eleusis until it unites with Mount Kandili. The Cephissus passes through this ridge by narrow ravines into the plain. The communication from Kundura into the plain of Megara is by a remarkable chasm midway between the two towns, and separating the western termination of Mount Kandili from the adjacent heights of Karydhi. This and all the other important defiles of the Megaris are under the guardianship of six towns or villages of this district, hence called the Derveno-khoria, and which, in consideration of the expences of their charge, are exempted from lodging strangers as well as from all other impositions, except 110 paras a head for kharatj.

§ 2.375   These places are Vilia, Kundura, Megara, Mazi, Bissia, and Perakhora. They maintain thirty or forty soldiers at their own expence; but, being all armed, can turn out, to the number of three or four hundred, which they often do when a Turk of high rank passes through the derveni. The Dervent Aga is a Turk, residing at Corinth, but having a deputy in constant attendance at the derveni house, near the monastery of Kyparissi, on the northern side of Mount Makryplai, or Geraneia: it is necessary that he should read Turkish, as he has to inspect the Buyurdi of the Pasha without which no person is allowed to pass out of the Morea to the northward.
On referring to a verse of Sophocles, cited by Strabo; and to Pausanias, who describes the Eleutheris as situated between Eleusis and Mount Cithaeron there can scarcely be any doubt that Myupoli and Ghyftokastro are the ancient Eleutherae and Oinoe, for the plain which reaches from Ghyfto-kastro to Myupoli is the only considerable valley between Plataea and Megara, and the two ruins on its borders exactly illustrate the word σύγχορτα of the poet. There may be some question, however, which of these ruins was Eleutherae, and which Oinoe.
In behalf of the opinion that Ghyftokastro was Eleutherae, it may be said that this city was formerly

§ 2.376   an independent member of the Boeotian community, which voluntarily joined the Athenians, but never became an Attic demus, consequently that there is little probability that Oinoe, which was always an Attic demus, should have been situated between Eleutherae and the Plataeis, which would be the case if Myupoli were Eleutherae. On examining, however, the ruins called Ghyfto-kastro, its position and dimensions evidently show that it was a fortress, not a town, being only seven or eight hundred yards in circumference, and standing upon a strong height at the entrance of the principal pass of Mount Cithaeron, whereas Myupoli has every appearance of having been a town with an acropolis placed as usual on the edge of a valley, and commanding only the pass which led from the Eleutheri into the plain of Thria, or Eleusis. The town appears, indeed, to have been of small dimensions, but its state of ruin will hardly admit of our forming a decisive opinion on this subject, while Ghyftokastro is so well preserved as to leave no doubt concerning the object for which it was intended.
The importance of Oinoe as a military post, as well as its vicinity to Hysiae, is shown by Herodotus in describing the unsuccessful invasion of Attica by Cleomenes, in the year B.C. 507, when he marched from the Isthmus to Eleusis, while the Boeotians, in concert with him, took Oinoe and Hysiae, the frontier demi of Attica, towards Boeotia And Thucydides twice mentions Oinoe in a manner to support the opinion that it was Ghyftokastro; at the commencement of the

§ 2.377   Peloponnesian war, when its siege delayed the first invasion of Attica by Archidamus; and again, in the twenty-first year of the war, when it was besieged by the Corinthians and Boeotians, and betrayed to them by a stratagem of Aristarchus, one of the oligarchical party at Athens. On both occasions the historian describes Oinoe as a fortress of the Athenians on the confines of Boeotia. It is sufficient to observe the situation of Ghyfto-kastro, to be assured that no other position in this vicinity could be equally important to the Athenians. It secured the dependence or alliance of Eleutherae and Plataea, formed an outer gate of defence to this entrance into Attica, and if an enemy penetrated into the plain of Eleutherae from the Parasopia by St. Meletius, it placed him between two fortresses; in short, it was the necessary completion of the system of defence of the Attic frontier towards Boeotia, of which Eleusis, Harma, Phyle, Panactum, and Decelia, were the other fortified points. Pausanias, therefore, in describing the Plataeis as bordering on the district of Eleutherae, without noticing Oinoe, though it lay between them, seems, as usual with him, to have had the ancient history and condition of Eleutherae chiefly in view, and to have neglected the mention of Oinoe, as being merely a fortress, perhaps already in ruins, or as being one of the demi of Attica, of all which he has treated very briefly.

§ 2.378   When the ridge of Cithaeron became the boundary between Attica and Boeotia, Hysiae, being on the northern side of the mountain, was ascribed to Boeotia, while Oinoe continued to be an Attic demus. Placed in the line of communication between Northern Greece and the Peloponnesus, so small a state as Eleutherae was peculiarly exposed to the ruinous effects of such a position, as well in the greater contests in which Greece was engaged, as in every quarrel in which either Attica or the Peloponnesus was opposed to any part of Northern Greece. The Roman wars having left Eleutherae in a state of desolation, it became the resort of robbers, who have often in later times also found this thoroughfare an excellent place for the exercise of their profession. Pausanias, soon after the time of the author who represents Eleutherae in that condition, could ascertain only the position of the city by the ruins of the fortifications and houses, which he describes as being situated “a little above the plain towards Cithaeron.” In the plain there still remained a temple of Bacchus, containing a copy of the original statue of the god which had been transferred to Athens. Near it was a cavern, in which Antiope exposed her twin sons, and a fountain of water, in which the infants were washed by a shepherd who found them.

§ 2.379   Jan. 2.—At 8.5, descending from the monastery by a winding road to the right of the gardens, we leave the Paleo-kastro of Myupoli a quarter of a mile on the left at 8.40, and follow the main route from Thebes to Megara by Kundura for some distance, before we arrive at the turning to Lepsina, or Eleusis, which at 8.52 again brings Myupoli at a quarter of a mile to our left. We now quit the cultivated land and enter upon a rocky level covered with small bushes, where the road is both muddy and rough. At 9.22 enter a forest of pines. The whole of the branch of Cithaeron, which extends from near St. Meletius to Mount Kandili, and to the plain of Megara, and which separates the vales of Myupoli and Kundura from the plain of Lepsina, is covered with these trees. After a halt of five minutes, we descend at 9.40 into the bed of a torrent, which has its origin in the mountains around Vilia, and which at 9.50 joins the Sarandaporo, otherwise called Sarandaforo, or Saranda-potami. The latter, which is the main branch of the Eleusinian Cephissus, originates

§ 2.380   in Mount Karydhi, and flowing by Kundura, from thence enters a ravine between two high summits on our right. At the junction of the two rivers we fall into the road from Kundura to Athens. On the summit of the mountain on the left, one mile distant, may be perceived the lower part of a Hellenic round tower.
The road now leads along the side of the Sarandaporo, through a forest which seems as if it would not long exist, as the greater part of the trees are in a process of destruction for the purpose of collecting their resin to make pitch. All the bark having been stripped off towards the foot of the tree, and a part of the wood cut away, a hollow is made in the ground into which the turpentine flows: the trees which lean a little are preferred, the reservoir and incision being made on the upper side. The process may be repeated for several years before it kills the trees. At 10.42 a chapel and well are on the right-hand side of the road: at 10.51 are marks of chariot wheels in the rocks. At 11 we arrive at the junction of the Sarandaporo with the branch of the Cephissus from Ghyftokastro, which receives the collected waters of the valley of Myupoli a little to the east of the latter ruin.
The bank of this stream above its junction with the Sarandaporo is steep and high, and upon it there are some remains of ancient walls and towers, and on the right side of the road the foundations of another tower. We halt here till 11.30. The wood continues until the ravine gradually opens into the Thriasian or Eleusinian plain, where

§ 2.381   at 11.42 the road to Lepsina branches off to the right, and on each of the summits, bordering the opening of the valley, the ruins of a Hellenic tower may be seen. These numerous remains of ancient works show how anxiously the Athenians fortified this important entrance into their plains, which may be considered as the division between the north-eastern extremity of the Oneia and the range of Cithaeron and Parnes. This perhaps was the particular pass of Mount Cithaeron, in which, in the year B.C. 200, Philocles, an officer of Philip son of Demetrius, stationed himself on arriving from Euboea, while his troops plundered the Eleusinian plain, and where he was joined by the king himself, coming from Achaia. They then proceeded to attack Eleusis, the Peiraeus, and Athens, but having been unsuccessful in every attempt, Philip then destroyed every thing in the unprotected demi which had escaped his former invasion, leaving not a temple or building uninjured, and ceasing only from the work of destruction when there remained no longer any materials to gratify his vengeance The road now enters the northern angle of the plain of Thria, and at 11.48 crosses the dry bed of the Sarandaporo, or Cephissus, which joins the sea a little on the eastern side of Eleusis: all the northern and western part of the plain is stony, barren, and higher than the maritime and cultivated level, which does not extend very far to the northward of Lepsina. As we descend into

§ 2.382   the lower plain, this village remains a mile and a half on the right at 12.28. Here we cross the foundations of what I take to have been one of the reservoirs of the ancient aqueduct of Eleusis, some ruined arches of which are seen to the right, near the entrance of Lepsina from Athens. Our road crosses the plain of Thria diagonally in the direction of the mills at Rheiti, leaving Lepsina about 3 miles on the right: at 12.40 we halt at a well near the foundations of a small temple, or other public building. The kalyvia of Khassia is half a mile on the left, 2 miles beyond which a road begins to mount the lowest steep of Parnes, towards Khassia. The greatest length of the Thriasian plain, about nine miles, is from the angle of the Eleusinian gulf, westward of Lepsina, to a bay in the plain to the left of our road, where are the lowest hills which unite the range of Aegaleos with that of Parnes, and where the Athenians had fortified that pass into the plain of Acharnae with a rampart or breastwork, which still remains.
The sepulchre of Strato, son of Isidotus, on the northern side of the Sacred Way, is 150 yards on the right of our road, at 13 minutes beyond the well above-mentioned; 5 minutes farther our road unites with that from Eleusis to Athens. The monument of Strato seems not to have been a pyramid, but a cubical mass of earth cased with marble, on some of the blocks of which mouldings of architecture are still to be seen. It was probably surmounted by a stele. From hence to Eleusis the Sacred Way was a causeway raised above the plain, which is low and marshy in this part.

§ 2.383   Its utility on the great road from Athens to the Morea has caused it to receive frequent repairs, but these, since the decline of Greece, having been of the rudest kind, the causeway now preserves little resemblance to the massy and finished works of the ancients. Many vestiges, however, of the original ιερα οδός may still be distinguished. In the bay of Eleusis, and the marshy part of the plain, immense numbers of wild ducks are now congregated. Quitting the junction of the road at 1.43, I pass at 1.57 the first mill of the Rheiti, and at 2.2 the second. The water which turns these mills is produced from very copious saline springs at the foot of the mountain, which are not suffered to take their natural course into the sea as they did anciently, but are formed into a large pond or mill-head by means of a stone dam which extends from one mill to the other. At this pass the Sacred Way was cut in the rock; it is first visible between the two mills,, and is then traced along the foot of the rocks above the salt ponds, whereas the modern road follows the sea shore. Having passed the salt ponds, the Sacred Way descends upon a modern paved road, which it follows along the sea-side, as far as the opening of the valley of Dhafni, where that valley ends in the shore of the Eleusinian bay, and where both the modern causeway and the traces of the ancient road terminate.
We arrive at the beginning of the paved road at 2.8, and at the end at 2.12. Here on the edge of the beach lies part of the body of a seal, thrown up by the sea.

§ 2.384   The cultivable ground at this extremity of the valley of Dhafni is prolonged in a narrow stripe along the shore of the bay, at the foot of Mount Corydallus, as far as the Metokhi of Skarmanga. We now ascend the valley of Dhafni, the pass narrowing gradually until it arrives, at 2.27, at some niches in the rocks on the left of the road, below which are the foundations of the peribolus of a temple, which it is evident from ancient testimony was that of Venus on the Sacred Way. Just opposite to the niches are some traces of the road, and the ruins of stone walls which supported both sides of it for a considerable distance. The remains of the peribolus, which are between the road and the niches, are 24 yards long and 12 wide; the foundations of the walls are 5 feet thick, and constructed of great rude masses of stone, exactly answering to the αργοί λιθοι which Pausanias here describes. To the westward of this spot are the foundations of a square tower of similar construction. Under two of the niches I distinguish the words Φίλη Άφροδιτη, which not only prove this to be the site of the temple of Venus, but also that it was the Philaion mentioned by Plutarch, and by a writer cited by Athenaeus, though the latter authority has not correctly described it as being at Thria.

§ 2.385   The temple was probably of ancient date, and was repaired perhaps by Demetrius Poliorcetes, when he here instituted divine honours to his wife Phile, with the surname of Venus. At 2.3, leaving the temple of Venus, I proceed along the left bank of a torrent flowing to the Bay of Eleusis, and observe the traces of the Sacred Way on the opposite bank, in some places cut in the rocks, but, for the most part, a causeway supported on the side of the rema by a wall of rough stones. At 3.49 arrive at the Monastery of Dhafni: there can be little doubt that this building occupies the site, and consists in great part of the remains of the temple of Apollo on Mount Pοecilum, which was probably converted into a church on the establishment of Christianity at Athens. The modern name Δαφνη seems connected with the worship of Apollo, and may have been derived from a grove of sacred bay, which had survived that worship. But at present no bay trees remain here. Although Dhafni is despoiled of the finest of those remains which formerly made it interesting, the outer inclosure of the monastery, and the church itself, are still made up almost entirely of Hellenic materials; and there are several sarcophagi remaining, the most remarkable of which stands with the bottom upwards in the portico before the cells of the monks: it is of white marble, large and massy. These sepulchral monuments were probably collected from the Sacred Way, the sides of which were a continued cemetery from Athens to Eleusis. The dome of the church at Dhafni is now supported by

§ 2.386   two cross beams of wood, and shows several large cracks caused by the operation of taking away three Ionic columns, which, on my first visit to Attica, were in their original places, enveloped in the wall of the monastery. A high square tower with a little dome at the top, like those in Syria, appears to have been erected in the time of the Franks.
One of the greatest objections to the removal of ancient remains from Greece to England, or other countries, is, that in consequence of the negligence of those who remove or collect them, it is not always known from whence they came, so that monuments serving to illustrate ancient history on the spot, often become useless for that purpose. Nor is this remark confined to inscriptions, although it is undoubtedly most applicable to them, since, in a great majority of instances, Grecian works of art, of every kind, had some peculiar reference to local history and mythology. It has often happened moreover, that while by the separation of the monument from the place, both have lost a portion of their interest, the former, either from its want of merit or its state of preservation, has been of little utility to modern art in the place where it has been deposited. The evil is by no means of recent occurrence, for every collection in Europe contains remains of antiquity, which have become inexplicable by our ignorance of their origin.
The monastery stands at the highest and narrowest part of the Pass: beyond it the road is level for a short distance, and then gradually widens until, at the end of 12 minutes from the monastery in passing

§ 2.387   between a conical hill on the left, and the slope of Mount Corydallus on the right, Athens and its plain opens to view. The prospect from this point, although not so extensive as that from the fortress of Phyle on the road from Thebes, is more interesting from the greater proximity of the city, and of all the more remarkable objects. On former occasions I have seen it only in the midst of summer, but it is more beautiful in the present season, the larger proportion of the trees of Attica being evergreens, such as the pine, the prinus, and the olive, together with a variety of shrubs, and the fields and pastures, which have recovered a portion of their verdure, affording a peculiarly agreeable contrast to the rocky mountains. In summer the scene displays an arid monotony, relieved only by the pale green of the olive; and a vapour rises so rapidly from the earth, that there is a constant haze over the distant objects, which are always more distinctly seen in a fine winter’s day. In entering Attica, after a journey in Boeotia, the causes are forcibly apparent of that atmospheric difference between the two provinces, which gave rise to the Athenian sarcasm adopted by the Latins, on the density of Boeotian air and intellect. Three-fourths of the valleys of Boeotia are so entirely encased by mountains, that even the running waters are discharged into the sea by subterraneous channels, whence lakes and marshes abound, and the vapours arising from them, detained by the surrounding mountains, are slowly dissipated; while the Attic peninsula, labouring under a deficiency of water, and ventilated, often to excess, from the

§ 2.388   Corinthian, Saronic and Aegaean seas, enjoys with these inconveniences, and in consequence of them, a purer air and serener sky than Boeotia. This physical difference may possibly have had some influence on the moral cause to which the low station of Thebes among the states of Greece was justly attributed by Ephorus, and which ought to be a lesson to all governments on the importance of encouraging arts and literature. But the proverbial contempt of Boeotian intellect was carried far beyond the bounds of truth and justice, as a long catalogue of heroes, statesmen, poets, sculptors, philosophers and engineers might be adduced to demonstrate.
Having descended into the plain, we pass at the end of thirty-eight minutes from Dhafni, by the chapel of St. George at the entrance of the olive wood, the road through which is now muddy and cut up by the torrents. At 4.30 pass by the pyrgos and tjiftlik of Hadji Aly, and enter Athens at the Mora Kapesi, or Πορτα της Μορίας, at 4.15.
In order to complete that comparative view of the ancient and modern geography of Greece which has been the principal object of the present work, as well as of two others, I shall here subjoin some remarks on the topography of the Megaris, which district I visited in a former journey.

§ 2.389   Of the great isthmus which extends from the foot of Mount Cithaeron to the Acro-Corinth, and which connects Northern Greece with the Peloponnesus, about one fourth, including the narrowest part or Isthmus properly so called, belonged to the Corinthia, the remainder, which was included within a sea coast of about thirty miles on either gulf, with a breadth varying from twenty miles to thirty, formed the Megaris. Like the Corinthia, it was too small to have had much influence on the general politics of Greece, or even to preserve its own independence; and by its position it was not less exposed than that territory to the effects of the frequent contests between the states of Greece. Being very mountainous, barren, and incapable of supporting a large population, it sent forth in the times of its prosperity colonies to the Euxine, Propontis and Sicily, and from the same cause, under different circumstances, experienced the greatest distress, when the Athenians, justly incensed against the Megarenses for having joined the Corinthians, and massacred the Athenian garrison at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, excluded them from the use of the Attic ports and markets. The redeeming attribute of the Megaric territory was its excellent position for the pursuit of commerce both by land and sea; and it was undoubtedly to this advantage that Megara owed an opulence and splendour, which were quite disproportioned to its natural resources.

§ 2.390   Like Aegina, and many other once-flourishing republics, its decline is to be dated from that increase of power in the leading states, which destroyed the independence of those of second rank. Its commercial advantages, however, still maintained it in a respectable condition, as long as Greece was wealthy, and densely inhabited, but when it became poor and depopulated, and still more when the Roman government was no longer able to protect its distant subjects, insecurity was the only effect of the peculiarities of the situation of Megara, and has continued to be its ordinary condition during the long ages of the debasement of Greece. An inscription copied by Chandler at Megara, shows that its towers were repaired in the end of the fifth century, by one Count Diogenes, an officer of the emperor Anastasius. But in later ages, the Byzantine government was incapable of affording any protection to these coasts from the pirates or cruisers of Europe, and the Turkish navy has been so unequal to the task, that the inhabitants of Megara have more than once been obliged to abandon the town, and retire to the villages of the Oneia.
In proceeding to trace the ancient geography of the Megaris I shall, as usual, chiefly follow Pausanias.

§ 2.391   The places mentioned by him between Eleusis and Megara are, 1. The well called ανθιον or ανθινον, the flowery this answers to a spring on the road side, in a branch of the Eleusinian plain near the head of a small curve of the coast, which forms the north-western angle of the bay of Eleusis. 2. A little beyond the well, stood the Temple of Meganeira, and the monuments of the Argives who were slain at Thebes in the war between Creon and Adrastus, and whose bodies were said to have been rescued by Theseus, and here interred by him. 3. The sepulchre of Alope, and not far from it, 4. The palaestra of her father Cercyon, by whom she was killed. No remains of these monuments have yet been discovered. Pausanias has not exactly stated the boundary between the Eleusinia and Megaris; but we can hardly doubt that it was Mount Cerata, now Kandili, which interrupts the

§ 2.392   level coast for a considerable distance, and the projection of which occurs at about a third of the distance from Eleusis to Megara. It would seem from Philochorus, cited by Strabo, that there was a temple of Apollo Pythius on this part of the coast, which Philochorus considered the boundary of the Megaris; it is not noticed by Pausanias.
Megara retains little of antiquity but the name, which is still τα Μέγαρα, and seems originally to have been derived from certain μέγαρα, or sanctuaries of Ceres, though the later Megarenses preferred, as usual, a heroic origin, and derived their name from Megareus, son of Neptune, a native of Onchestus. Pausanias remarks, that the vengeance of the Gods for the murder of the Athenian herald Anthemocritus, had never been thoroughly appeased, and that Megara had been an exception to the cities of Greece which had profited by the munificence of Hadrian.

§ 2.393   Nevertheless, there still existed public edifices, and monuments of art sufficient to prove the former existence of that opulence, which has been variously attested in ancient history. The town stood on a low hill with a double summit, situated a mile and a half from the shore of the Saronic gulf, near the southern extremity of a plain six or seven miles in length as well as breadth, of no great fertility, and which is bounded on every side, except towards the sea, by the mountains Oneia. The following is a brief abstract of the description of the city by Pausanias, in which I shall exactly follow the order of his narrative, as it is among the clearest and most methodical which he has given of the more celebrated cities of Greece, and may lead to some interesting discoveries, when circumstances shall allow the site to be properly explored. The fountain, which took its name from the Nymphs Sithnides, was adorned by Theagenes, tyrant of Megara, with a building remarkable for its magnitude and numerous columns. Near it stood an ancient temple, containing a brazen statue of Diana Soteira by Strongylion, statues of the twelve gods, the reputed works of Praxiteles, and images’ of the Roman emperors. In the adjoining Olympieium, or inclosure of Jupiter Olympius, stood a magnificent temple, containing a statue of the God, the finishing of which was interrupted by the enmity of the Athenians in the Peloponnesian war: hence the face of the God was of ivory and gold, and the remaining parts of clay

§ 2.394   and plaster. It was the joint work of Phidias and of Theocosmus of Megara. On the head of Jupiter were represented the Hours and Fates. In the back part of the temple were some half-wrought pieces of wood, prepared by Theocosmus for the reception of the ivory and gold with which the remaining parts of the statue were to have been adorned. The temple contained also the brazen beak of a galley taken, as the Megarenses asserted, from the Athenians in the contest for the possession of Salamis.
Anciently, each summit of the hill of Megara was occupied by a citadel; one was named Caria, from Car, son of Phoroneus son of Inachus, the other Alcathoe, from Alcathous son of Pelops. Having ascended from the Olympium into Caria, there occurred a temple of Bacchus Nyctelius; this citadel contained also a sanctuary of Venus Apostrophia, an oracle of Night, a roofless temple of Jupiter Conius, statues of Aesculapius and Hygieia by Bryaxis, and the Μέγαρον, or temple of Ceres, said to have been founded by Car during his reign.
Below the citadel Caria to the northward, near the Olympium, was the tomb of Alcmene, from whence Pausanias was conducted by his Megarean guide to Rhus, a place so called because the waters

§ 2.395   from the neighbouring mountain were collected in this place, until Theagenes having turned off the water, erected an altar here to Achelous. Not far from thence was the monument of Hyllus, son of Hercules, and near the latter a temple of Isis, with another of Apollo Agraeus and Diana Agrotera, which is said to have been dedicated by Alcathous when he had slain the Cithaeronian lion. On descending from this temple occurred the heroum of Pandion, and near it the tomb of Hippolyte, fashioned like an Amazonian shield, then that of Tereus, who married Procne, daughter of Pandion, and who is asserted by the Megarenses to have ruled over the country about Pagae.
On the right hand of the ascent to Alcathoe was the sepulchre of Megareus, near which was the hearth of the Prodomeis, or place where Alcathous sacrificed to the deities who assisted him in raising the walls of Megara; here was the stone on which Apollo laid his lyre on that occasion, and which thenceforth uttered when struck

§ 2.396   a musical sound, similar to that which Pausanias heard at Thebes in Egypt from a half statue generally called the statue of Memnon, but which was said by the natives to be that of Phamenoph, though some ascribed it to Sesostris. In Alcathoe was a council-house, formerly the sepulchre of Timalcus, and on the summit of the same citadel stood a temple of Minerva,

§ 2.397   containing a statue of the goddess, entirely gilded except the face, hands, and feet, which were of ivory. Here likewise were sanctuaries of Minerva Nικη and Minerva Αίαντις, the latter so called, in the opinion of Pausanias, because the statue was dedicated by Ajax, son of Telamon. The temple of Apollo was anciently of brick, but had been rebuilt of white marble by Hadrian. It contained three statues of Apollo made of ebony; those surnamed Pythius and Decatephorus were in the Egyptian style: the Archagetes was in the Aeginetan manner. There was also a sanctuary of Ceres Thesmophorus, in descending from which occurred the sepulchre of Callipolis, son of Alcathous.
On the way to the Prytaneium were the following monuments: the heroum of Ino surrounded with a stone fence, within which was a plantation of olives,—the heroa of Iphigeneia and of Adrastus, both of whom, according to the Megarenses, died at Megara, and a temple of Diana, said to have been founded by Agamemnon. In the Prytaneium were the sepulchres of Menippus, son of Megareus, and of Echepolis, son of Alcathous, and near the same building a stone named Anaclethra, because here Ceres, when searching for her daughter, sat down and called her. The Aesymnium was a council-house, so named from its founder; it contained a monument of the heroes of Megara. There were also sepulchral monuments of the Megarenses who had fallen in fighting against the Medes, and the tombs of Pyrgo, wife of Alcathous, and of his

§ 2.398   daughter Iphinoe, which were in the way from the Aesymnium to the heroum of Alcathous: the latter structure served in the time of Pausanias for depositing writings. In the entrance to the Dionysium, or sanctuary of Bacchus, was a tomb of Astycrateia and Manto, daughters of Polyeidus, son of Coeranus, who founded the sanctuary, and placed in it a wooden statue of the god surnamed Patrous, of which the face only was visible. Near it was a Satyr of Parian marble, by Praxiteles, and a Bacchus, surnamed Dasyllius. Near the Dionysium was the temple of Venus. It contained a very ancient statue in ivory of the goddess, surnamed Praxis, and images of Persuasion, and of Consolation, made by Praxiteles, and of Love, of Allurement, and of Desire, the works of Scopas. Near the temple of Venus was that of Fortune, containing a statue by Praxiteles, and another temple in which were the Muses, and a brazen Jupiter by Lysippus.
In the Agora stood the tomb of Coroebus, which was inscribed with verses relating to the story of Coroebus and Psamathe, and supported statues representing Coroebus killing the monster Poena: Pausanias thought they were the most ancient specimens of sculpture in stone which he had seen in Greece. Near this sepulchre was that of Orsippus, who gained a victory in running at Olympia, and who, when military commander of the Megarenses, enlarged the boundaries of the Megaris.

§ 2.399   In descending from the agora by the street called Eutheia, the temple of Apollo Prostaterius stood a little on the right; it contained, an Apollo of great merit, a Diana, and a Latona, besides which were Latona and her children, by Praxiteles. In the ancient Gymnasium, near the gates called Nymphades, was a small pyramidal stone, named Apollo Carinus, and a temple of Lucina. On the descent to the port of Megara, which in the time of Pausanias still bore the appellation of Nisaea, there was a temple of Diana Malophorus, the roof of which had fallen in. The citadel of Nisaea still remained; on the sea side was the tomb of Lelex, who is said to have been an Egyptian, the son of Neptune and Libya, and to have reigned at Nisaea. Near Nisaea, adds Pausanias, there was a small island, where Minos of Crete was said to have sheltered his fleet in his war with Nisus.
There remains nothing of ancient Megara aboveground, save some fragments of the walls of the three citadels, Caria, Alcathoe, and Nisaea, together with some vestiges of the Long Walls, and some fragments of the buildings of the city, but the place has been fertile in inscriptions; and if the situations in which they were found had been exactly noted they might have contributed not a

§ 2.400   little to a knowledge of the ancient topography. From one which is now at Oxford we learn that it was deposited in the Olympium. Another in honour of some gymnasiarche was probably in the Gymnasium. The modern town occupies only the hill of the two ancient citadels, and extends not much beyond the western summit: unlike the other towns of the continent of Greece, the houses are built with flat roofs like those of the Grecian islands. Alcathoe having been the more important of the two citadels, was probably the western, or that upon which the modern village is chiefly situated; and in that case, the tower which crowns it occupies the site of the temple of Minerva. The Olympium was on the northern side of Caria: and the Agora seems to have been towards the southern end of the ancient site, as the street Eutheia led from thence through the gate Nymphades into the Longomural street, and to Nisaea. As nature has probably resumed her sway in regard to the course of the waters from the neighbouring mountains, their natural receptacle, called Rhus, from which Theagenes turned away the water in order to form a fountain in a more convenient situation, might be thus identified, and it would serve as an important guide to the ancient topography.
The Long Walls which connected Megara with its maritime fortress Nisaea, in the same manner that the Piraeus was connected with Athens, were constructed by the Athenians in the year B.C. 455, when in consequence of the naval power which the victory of Salamis had given them, and the

§ 2.401   disgust conceived by the Megarenses against the Corinthians, the Athenians obtained a paramount influence at Megara, and placed garrisons in Nisaea and Pagae. These, together with Naupactus, which city at the opening of the Peloponnesian war they occupied with the refugees from Messenia, gave them stations at both the extremities of the Corinthian Sea, and consequently the naval command of it. The Megaric Long Walls are noticed at this time by Aristophanes; they were destroyed by the Megarenses themselves upon recovering them out of the hands of the Athenians, in the eighth year of the Peloponnesian war. Seventy-four years afterwards they were restored by Phocion. Strabo alludes to them as if they still existed, but the silence of Pausanias seems to show that they had fallen to ruin before his time.
The harbour of Nisaea was formed by the island Minoa, which, from the description given by Thucydides of the operations of the Athenians against Megara, in the fifth and eighth years of the Peloponnesian war, seems not to have been the nearest island opposite to Megara, which is too small, and too distant from the shore, but the peninsula, a mile farther to the east, at the entrance of the strait of Salamis.

§ 2.402   Pausanias, in describing Minoa as an island, adverted perhaps to its earlier condition rather than to that which existed in his time; for Strabo, near two centuries before had applied to it the word ακρα, or promontory. The examples of the conversion of islands into peninsulae are so numerous on the coasts of Greece, that the present instance has nothing surprising in it, especially as the strait which separated Minoa from the main appears from Thucydides to have been narrow at the entrance from the sea, and to have terminated in a marsh, over which there was a bridge or causeway. In the fifth year of the war, the Athenians perceiving that Minoa, in which the Megarenses had only a tower, would be a much better station than Budorus and Salamis for observing the Peloponnesian fleet, and for blockading Megara, Nicias seized two of the towers of the walls of Nisaea, which had prevented his ships from passing between them and the island of Minoa, and then built a wall in the island, by which he cut off “the communication between Megara and Minoa by means of the bridge which led into the island across the marsh.” He then formed a fortress in the island and left a garrison in it. If such was the situation of Minoa, it will follow that the length of the Long Walls was not 8 stades, as the text of Thucydides gives it, but

§ 2.403   18, as we find it in that of Strabo; the peninsula being not less than three miles from Megara.
In the eighth year of the war, the Athenians still holding Minoa, but the Peloponnesians having a garrison in Nisaea, the former in conjunction with a body of troops from Plataea, and by the assistance of a party in Megara, obtained possession of the Long Walls, and built a cross wall within them for protection against Megara. They then prolonged the circumvallation of Nisaea to the sea on either side, obtaining plentiful materials from the suburb, and making its houses serve, with the addition of battlements, for a part of the fortification. The Peloponnesians in Nisaea being thus deprived of their daily supplies, were obliged to surrender, when the Athenians took possession of Nisaea, and entirely separated it from Megara, by breaking down a part of the Long Walls. Brasidas, the Lacedaemonian, who was then at the Isthmus preparing to march into Thrace, on hearing of the first success of the Athenians at the Long Walls, summoned the Boeotians, who were already collected at Plataea for the relief of Megara, to meet him at Tripodiscus, a Megaric town at the foot of Mount Geraneia. The united forces amounted to 6000; and the Athenians, who had received a large reinforcement from Athens, were not much inferior in number.

§ 2.404   Each party being more anxious to support its adherents in Megara than to come to action, nothing took place but a combat of cavalry in the plain, in which the Athenians had some advantage. At length Brasidas, having succeeded in obtaining admission into Megara, the oligarchy was reestablished in the city, the Athenians still retaining possession of Nisaea and Minoa. It was in the ensuing winter that the Megarenses, having been sufficiently strong to recover possession of their Long Walls, entirely destroyed them.
From a part of the narrative of Thucydides, it appears that there was a sanctuary of Mars, called the Enyalium, not far from the gate by which the Athenians first made their irruption into the Long Walls, and which seems to have been a gate opening from the northern Long Wall into the suburb on that side.
We find by the terms of the truce agreed upon between the Athenians and Lacedaemonians in the spring of the ninth year, that towards the sea on the north-eastern side of Nisaea, there was a monument of Nisus, at a gate of Nisaea, and a Posidonium, or sanctuary of Neptune, between it and the bridge leading into Minoa. By the conditions of the treaty, the line of demarcation between the Athenians in Minoa and Nisaea, on one side, and the Megarenses and their allies, on the other, was the road which led from that gate of Nisaea to the Posidonium, and from thence a direct line to the causeway.
Having finished the description of the city, Pausanias proceeds to notice the places situated in the ορεινή, or mountainous part of the Megaris to the northward of the plain, after which he describes

§ 2.405   the road from Megara into the Corinthia. The only places named by him in the Oreine are Pagae, Aegosthena, and Erineia.
Although the historians and geographers have left little doubt that Aegosthena was at Ghermano, it is satisfactory to be able to confirm this fact by means of an inscription found on the spot; from a copy of which, although very imperfect, I have been able to decipher enough to show that it was a decree of the people of Aegosthena in favour of Apollodorus, son of Alcimachus of Megara, granting him the ordinary rights of proxenia, with the use of the pastures of the district for his cattle, and the privilege of a front seat at the public ceremonies.

§ 2.406   The decree is to be recorded in the temple of Melampus, and mention is made of the Melampodeia, which we learn from Pausanias to have been a festival celebrated every year at Aegosthena.
The position of Aegosthena thus ascertained, illustrates two interesting passages in the Hellenics of Xenophon. Between Ghermano and the vale of Livadhostra, which stands on or near the site of the ancient Creusis, a projection of the highest part of Cithaeron terminates abruptly in the Corinthiae or Alcyonic Gulf, and forms a natural separation between the Megaris and the Boeotian district of Thespia, of which city Creusis was the port, leaving no passage along the shore except a path on the mountain’s side, which now serves for a road from Livadhostra and Ai Vasili to Ghermano and Vilia. Like the Scironian rocks, along which there is a similar road from Megara to Crommyon, this termination of Mount Cithoeron, as well as all the adjoining part of the Alcyonic sea, is subject to sudden gusts of wind, by which the passage of such a cornice is sometimes rendered dangerous.
The Lacedaemonians under Cleombrotus were here overtaken, on their march from Creusis to Aegosthena, when retreating from Boeotia in the winter of B.C. 379-378, by one of these tempests.

§ 2.407   Such was the force of the wind, that the shields of the soldiers were wrested from their hands, and many of the asses that carried the burthens were blown over the precipices into the sea. Seven years afterwards the Lacedaemonians again retreated by the same road after their memorable defeat at Leuctra. Little trusting to the peace which the Thebans had granted them, they avoided crossing Mount Cithaeron by the ordinary route in the face of their conquerors, and preferred the risk of marching in the night by the narrow and dangerous path at the back of the mountain. The historian states that the Spartan commanders concealed their intention by moving from the field of battle near Leuctra in the evening, with the avowed purpose of being ready to cross the Cithaeron by the usual route in the morning at daybreak; but that, instead of pursuing it, they turned off to Creusis, and proceeded from thence to Aegosthena of the Megarice, where they met the army of Archidamus coming to their support.
Not less certain than the position of Aegosthena is that of Pegae or Pagae, as it was called in the Megaric dialect. From Thucydides and Plutarch we learn that it was the principal harbour on the western coast of the Megaris; and from Strabo that it formed with Nisaea the narrowest part of the Megaric Isthmus, the breadth of which was 120 stades. These data correspond exactly with the port of Psatho, not far from the shore of which are found the remains of an ancient fortress. Near the road from Megara to Pagae there was a rock (according to Pausanias) covered with marks

§ 2.408   which were supposed to have been made by the arrows of an advanced body of Median cavalry, when Mardonius, hearing of the arrival of the Peloponnesians at the Isthmus on their way to Plataea, made a movement from Attica to intercept them ’. Pausanias relates that they wandered to the rock on the road to Pagae in the night; that under the impulse of a madness inspired by Diana, they consumed their arrows by discharging them at the rock, mistaking it for the enemy, and that thus disarmed they were attacked in the morning and put to death by the Megarenses. At Pagae there was a brazen statue of Diana Soteira, erected in memory of this event, and exactly resembling another dedicated to the same deity at Megara. Pagae contained also the heroic monument of Aegialeus, who fell at Glisas in the second expedition of the Argives against Thebes.
The third town of the Oreine, mentioned by Pausanias, was Erineia, in which was a monument of Autonoe, daughter of Cadmus. As Vilia and Kundura are the only inland positions in the northern part of the Megaric isthmus having any natural advantages, we may presume Erineia to have occupied the one or other of those sites; and as Strabo notices Isus, formerly a town of the Megaris, as having been situated near Cithaeron, I am disposed to place Isus at Vilia, and Erineia at Kundura. There can be no doubt, as before

§ 2.409   remarked, that Kandili is the mountain which the ancients named Κέρατα, from the sharp rocks which rise from its summit; the ancient name of Karydhi I am unable to discover, except that it was the highest summit of the Oneia, as Strabo defines those mountains, that is to say, as extending from the rocks Scironides to Cithaeron and the confines of Boeotia. Other authors, however, appear to have comprehended in the Oneia, not only all the mountains as far as the Isthmus, but even the ridge to the southward of it, which stretches from Cenchreice to Corinth, having apparently considered Geraneia only as the highest summit of the Oneia.
In a verse preserved by Strabo, which the Athenians were suspected by some of the ancient critics of having ejected from the Iliad, for the sake of interpolating another, which proved that Salamis in the time of the Trojan war was a dependency

§ 2.410   of Athens, mention is made of Aegeirusa, Nisaea, and Tripodi, in the Megaris, as part of the dominions of Ajax of Salamis. Whether the latter was the genuine version or not, it is at least evident from Strabo, that Aegeirusa and Tripodi, like Nisaea, still existed in his time. Of Polichne, the fourth Megaric town named in the verses, we have no other notice in ancient history.
Tripodiscus is shown by Thucydides, on the occasion already mentioned, to have been at the foot of Mount Geraneia, in a situation convenient for forming a junction of troops who were assembling from Plataea in one direction, and the Isthmus in the other, for the purpose of acting at Megara. And accordingly, at the foot of Mount Geraneia, in the road from Plataea to the Isthmus, four or five miles to the north-west of Megara, I remarked in my former journey, when passing by that route

§ 2.411   from Megara to Corinth, the evident vestiges of an ancient town. The position is perfectly in agreement with the fable of the foundation of Tripodiscus, related by Pausanias. According to that author, Coroebus the Argive, after having slain the monster Poena, which had been sent by Apollo to punish the Argives for the death of the child of Apollo by Psamathe, daughter of their king Crotopus, went to Delphi to give himself up to punishment. He was ordered by the oracle to take a tripod out of the temple, to return towards Argos, and wherever the tripod fell to the ground to reside there, and to build a temple to Apollo. The remains are exactly on the shortest route from Delphi to the Isthmus, over Mount Geraneia, leaving Megara a few miles on the left.
It is probable that Aegeirusa, like Nisaea and Tripodiscus, was in the western part of the Megaris, for none of the places mentioned in the Megaric reading of the verses in the Iliad are among those which, according to Pausanias,

§ 2.412   occupied the Oreine, or mountain district to the northward and eastward, whence it would seem also that the western part only was claimed by the Salaminii and Megarenses as the ancient dominion of Ajax. Aegeirusa, according to Theopompus, was also called Aegeirus. In Scylax, we find Aris noticed as the last place on the Alcyonic or northern coast of the Megaris. It is not improbable that among the numerous corrections required in the names of Scylax, should be that of Αιγυρος in place of Αρις. In this case it becomes likely that Aegeirus occupied the slope of Mount Geraneia towards the Corinthian Sea, and that its district bordered upon that of Oinoe of the Corinthia, which appears from Strabo to have been situated not far to the eastward of Cape Olmiae. On some part of Geraneia there was a town or fortress, homonymous with the mountain. This appears as well from Scylax as from Thucydides, who states the Athenians to have maintained a garrison there before the Peloponnesian war, and that by the possession of Geraneia, Pagae, and Megara, they commanded the communication

§ 2.413   between Northern Greece and the Peloponnesus. When Cassander, after having reduced a great part of the Peloponnesus in the year B.C. 316, retired into Macedonia, he left a garrison in Geraneia. The fortress probably stood at the summit of the ridge where the road must in all ages have Cimolia is known only as having been the scene of action of a victory, obtained by the Megarenses and Athenians over the Corinthians in the year B.C. 458. It appears to have been in the plain of Megara: perhaps at the place where Wheler found the remains of several churches built on the ruins of more ancient buildings, and where he copied a Latin and a Greek inscription: this place, called Paleokhori, is three or four miles northward of Megara.
In the western angle of the Bay of Megara, at the commencement of the rocks Scironides, Chandler observed many Hellenic foundations and other remains. It is not improbable that they may indicate the site of a come named Scirone, for as well as can be understood from the imperfect passage in Pausanias, which introduces his mention of the rocks Scironides, and the story of Ino and Melicerte, there was a place named after Sciron, who was polemarch of the Megarenses when Nisus was their king, and who was the first to make a footpath

§ 2.414   along the rocks. This path may easily be made impracticable, as the Greeks rendered it after the loss of Thermopylae, or it may be made passable by two carriages abreast, as Hadrian rendered it. Wheler passed it in 1676 with horses, but at present it is only practicable by foot-passengers. The length of the Scironian rocks was reckoned six Roman miles, and according to Pausanias they were all comprehended within the Megaris. The two most projecting and remarkable rocks were named the Moluris, and the εναγείς, or execrable. From the rock Moluris it was reported that Ino, or Leucothea, pursued by her husband Athamas, threw herself into the sea with her son Melicertes, otherwise called Palaemon, who was carried by a dolphin to the Isthmus, where the Corinthians worshipped him as a divinity and instituted games in hia honour. The “execrable” rock was that from which Sciron the robber threw strangers into the sea, and from which he was himself thrown by Theseus. On the summit of the mountain there was a temple of Jupiter, who received the epithet Aphesius for

§ 2.415   having removed the drought, which ceased after Abacus had sacrificed to Jupiter Panhellenius in Aegina. The temple of Aphesius contained statues of Venus, Apollo, and Pan. Beyond the “execrable” rock occurred the sepulchre of Eurystheus, who was slain here by Iolaus, after which there was a descent to the temple of Apollo Latous, near which was the boundary of the Megaris and Corinthia, in a spot where Hyllus, son of Hercules, was said to have fought with Echemus the Arcadian.

§ 2.416   CHAPTER 18 ATTICA, BOEOTIA.
Jan. 10.—A continuation of the serene weather, which I found on entering Attica, tempts me to make an excursion to the summit of Mount Parnes, notwithstanding the time of year. This point, although not so distinct and unambiguous as the summits of Pentelicum and Cithaeron, or that of Khlomo near Talanda, is more comprehensive than any near the south-eastern extremity of Greece in the extent of its view over Attica, Boeotia, Euboea, and the Saronic Gulf. Passing through the Gribos Kapesi, or Πόρτα του Έγρίπου, at 1.41, we very soon afterwards enter the olive woods: at 2 pass many foundations of ancient walls; at 2.27 cross the Ποδονίφτη, or Washfoot, as the Cephissus is now called, and in four minutes more a larger branch

§ 2.417   of the same river, from which many channels are derived for mills and gardens. At 2.45 Dervish Agu and Turali, two small villages on the river, are at a small distance on the right. At 3.20 we arrive at Menidhi. Here on some rocky heights a little to the left of the town, are foundations and antique fragments, indicative of the site of a demus; at a small chapel there is a sarcophagus in its place, and lying near it an inscribed marble adorned with a vase in relief; both which were excavated on the spot. On the northern side of the village is an abundant source of water, which does not fail in summer. Menidhi is the largest village in Attica next to Khassia; it consists mostly of small houses two stories high, and is surrounded by a plantation of olive trees and some gardens.
From hence I proceed to the monastery of Aio Nikola, at the foot of Mount Parnes. A little beyond Menidhi a massy foundation of ancient wall crosses a torrent now dry, which flows from Parnes in a wide gravelly bed, and after passing Menidhi joins the Cephissus. A Menidhiote peasant, of whom I inquire whether he knows of any other walls of the same kind in the neighbourhood, describes to me the situation of Phyle above Khassia, and when I ask him the name of that castle, answers στο Φυλί λεγομεν ημεϊς; thus showing that Phyle still preserves its ancient appellation, though, like many other Greek names, it is neutralized into Φυλί instead of being Φυλή. The λεγομεν ημεις of the Menidhiote was not without its Attic salt. Knowing that the ruins are of Hellenic construction, he

§ 2.418   thought that the place might have had a different name anciently, which name I might know, though he was ignorant of it. He seems pleased to learn that Φυλί was the Hellenic name of the castle, and this little lesson in archaeology an Attic peasant is not likely to forget.
We are just an hour in riding from Menidhi to St. Nicolas. The road passes along the right side of the torrent before mentioned, and then ascends by a gentle slope to the monastery, which stands immediately below woods of pine which cover the steep acclivity of the mountain, and commands a beautiful view of the plain of Athene, including the city, and the Saronic Gulf. St. Nicolas is a small metokhi dependent on the monastery of 'Αγία Τριας, vulgarly Aia Triadha, or the Holy Trinity, situated midway between the metokhi and the summit of the mountain, in a valley abounding in sources of water, and shaded with walnut and chestnut trees. The εορτή, or feast of the saint, is in May, and is much resorted to from the city. I am lodged at St. Nicolas in a cell of one of the monks, small, but having a ceiling, floor, and fireplace; luxuries to which I have been little accustomed in Thessaly and Boeotia. Indeed, in every part of Greece it must be the lot of the exploring traveller to partake of those miseries of Greek poverty of which Aristophanes drew a picture in the Plutus so true and lively, that the traveller, who has once read the verses, will not fail to be continually reminded of them.

§ 2.419   The snug cell at St. Nicolas is peculiarly opportune, as a violent southerly wind, accompanied with rain, detains me all the 11th of January, and an ascent of the mountain in such weather is out of the question. I have not observed in Attica any of the birds called Toia, a species of bustard which I saw in immense numbers in the plains of Boeotia, and which I suppose to be the ωτιδες observed in the same plains by Pausanias. A nobler bird of the same genus, the wild turkey, exactly resembling the domestic, makes its appearance in the spring, and I was informed by Mr. Consul S. at Patra, that they are sometimes sold there in the market. The bird and its name were probably introduced into England from this country.
Jan. 12.—The Igumenos of Aia Triadha, who came to St. Nicolas yesterday on hearing of my arrival, accompanies me to the summit of the mountain. The shortness of the days, and the uncertainty of the weather, making the most direct road preferable, we do not pass by Aia Triadha, but ascend the south-eastern slope of the mountain, in face of Kifissia and Mount Mendeli, crossing

§ 2.420   two or three remata which flow to the Cephissus. The lower part of the mountain is covered with pines; these, as we proceed, are mixed with holly-oaks and firs, and at length, towards the summit, the wood consists entirely of the last. Three years ago an accidental fire caught the firwood, and consumed three quarters of it; such at least is the calculation of my companion the abbot; but one quarter perhaps would be nearer the truth. He says that the fire burnt four days, but that the greater part of the mischief was done in a few hours. Not much of the timber has been destroyed, but the dead and leafless trunks give a desolate appearance to the scenery, which before this accident must have been beautiful even in the present season: frequent rivulets and green ravines occur amidst the firs, and here and there a small space is cultivated with corn. With these exceptions the mountain is entirely covered with forests, and contains an inexhaustible supply of timber for the Athenians. It is to the manufacture of plank that I am indebted for the means of ascending the mountain on horseback by a tolerable road.
Parnes still continues to supply Athens with charcoal, but the demand not being such as to cause any great consumption of wood in the manufacture of it, the people of Menidhi and Khassia, who have succeeded the ανθρακεις of Acharnae in its manufacture, have no necessity at present to ascend very high in the mountain for their materials. The wild thyme, lentisk, myrtle, and other shrubs, produced in abundance upon Hymettus and the uncultivated parts of the Πέδιον,

§ 2.421   supply a sufficiency of wood for heating the ovens of Athens, and the mangol is not much used during the brief Athenian winter, when it is more the custom among the upper classes, all whose apartments have chimneys, to burn on their hearths some old olive or ilex, which has been overthrown by Boreas or Sciron. Both those trees make excellent firewood, but particularly the olive.
Mount Parnes still contains wild boars, as in the time of Pausanias, but bears are very rarely if ever seen. It abounds also in wolves, hares and partridges, and is covered with a good soil, better indeed than that of the now totally uncultivated plain which lies between it and Mount Pentelicum. Towards the top of the mountain, the rock makes its appearance on the most exposed ridges, but in general the firs reach to the very summit, and they impede in some directions the view, which is one of the most extensive in Greece. Attica, Boeotia, a part of Phocis, the southern portion of Euboea, the barriers of the Isthmus and the Saronic gulf, with the opposite coast of Argolis are ichnographically displayed. To the right of Mount Parnassus rise the snow-capped range of mountains on the borders of Aetolia and Doris, which extend to Oeta, to the right of which a long snowy ridge makes its appearance above the Boeotian mountains Ptoum and Hypatus, which I recognize for Othrys. In the northern portion of Euboea, the cliffs which border the coast between Politika and Limni are conspicuous, and the highest summit of them, called Kandili,

§ 2.422   shows itself between Khtypα and Egripo. Still following the horizon to the right, are seen the hill of Kalogheritza, the straits near it, the mouth of the Asopus, Mount Dhelfi, anciently Dirphe or Dirphys, the highest mountain in Euboea next to Oche, and remarkable for its sharp cone, then the mountain immediately above Kumi in Euboea, then Kalamo in Attica.
The channel of Euboea changes its direction from north to north-west at the cape of Rhamnus, in Attica, which is the termination of the great Boeoto-Attic chain of Cithaeron and Parnes, and is immediately opposite to the bay of Stura, the ancient Styra, in the midst of which is an island, probably the Aegilia of Herodotus.

§ 2.423   Here the island of Euboea is narrower than in any part, except at the isthmus of Lithadha at the northern extremity. Both these narrow places seem to be unknown to modern geographers; the isthmus of Stura is noticed by Plutarch in the life of Phocion, who after the battle of Tamynae occupied a fortress on the isthmus, named Zaretra. The peninsula to the southward of Stura terminates in the great round mountain, the highest in Euboea, anciently called Oche, which to the north-east throws out the terrible Caphareus, now Xylofago or Kavo Doro, and to the south-west cape Mandili, the south-eastern extremity of the island, and anciently named Geraestos. It appears from the ancient authors, that there was a town and temple of Neptune on this cape, and a port below it. which seems very small, though Livy describes it as “nobilis Euboeae portus.” It may have derived some shelter from a small island which lies immediately off the cape. Between this promontory and the islands Petalius, the ancient Petaliae, is the great bay of Karysto, and in the middle of it is the town seen a little to the right of Kavo Doro, and situated, as Strabo describes it, at the foot of Mount Oche.
In the Gulf of Eghina or the Saronic Gulf, it is observable that the eastern end of Salamis, the western end of Aegina, the eastern end of Pityonesus (now called Anghistri), the western end of the peninsula of Methana, and the summit of mount Ortholithi in the Argolic peninsula, fall in the same line.

§ 2.424   To the right of these, is the cluster of rocks called the Pendenisia, or five islands; in a line with Mount Arachnaion near Ligurio. A little to the right of the Pendenisia is seen a cape of the Argolic coast, round which the coast retires to the left, and forms the bay of Sofiko. Another small island shows itself a little to the right of Anghistri, lying between it and the Pendenisia, and another of the same size nearer to Salamis, forming nearly an equilateral triangle with the former and Pendenisia.
The nearest district on the Boeotian side is the Tanagrice, or Tanagraea, inclosed between the lower heights of Parnes and the low Theban ridge, of which the principal summit is now called Soro. The Asopus is seen forcing its way through a rocky ravine of no great length from the Parasopia into the plain of Tanagra, which is separated only from the maritime plain of Oropus by the last falls of Parnes near Oropo and Sykamino, above which two villages the Asopus again traverses a rocky defile, which probably formed the separation between the Tanagrice and Oropia. At the head of the plain of Tanagra, just under Parnes, stands Mavromati, in a line with the convent of Siamata. In the middle of the plain of Tanagra, Skimatari interlineates with Mount Kandili of Euboea; and near the sea Vathy is seen in a direction a little to the left of the Euripus; close under Parnes, on the right bank of the Asopus, is the tower and village of Staniates. In the direction of Pentelicum we look down on Tatoy, near which village a fountain, some fragments of ancient sculpture, and the foundations of walls, indicate the site of the celebrated Deceleia.

§ 2.425   On the slope of a round mountain behind Rhamnus, and in a line with its summit, are seen Kapandriti, and a little beyond it Khalkuki. From thence a cultivated slope descends to the valley of Marathon. From the north-western side of the same height, and from the adjacent parts of Parnes, the waters meet, and form a torrent, which passes a little to the right of Markopulo, and falls into the sea between the mouth of the Asopus and Kalamo.
The direction of the streams in Attica shows the different slopes of the land. All the waters from the south and south-east of Parnes flow to the Cephissus, the most distant origin of which is in some heights attached to the north-western side of Pentelicum, about four miles to the south-east of Tatoy. The river receives contributions from Pentelicum as it proceeds through the plain, particularly that rising at Kifisia, which in fact is the principal source of the river. The waters from the northern side of Pentelicum and from the southern side of the range which stretches from Parnes to Rhamnus, meet and form the Charadra of Marathon; the low ridge of Tatoy which connects the slopes of Pentelicum and Parnes, separates the waters contributing to the Cephissus and flowing to the Saronic Gulf, from those which flow to the Charadra and the Euboic frith.
The mountains of the Mesoghia are well distinguished, but the greater part of its plain is hidden by Hymettus, which is now called Telovuni. The first mountain of the Paralia, seen to the left of Hymettus, is Elymo, a round hill of no great height and not far from the sea, and which has a village of the same name at its foot. To the left of it appears Mount Pani, which beginning eastward of Vari, runs inland to the plain of the Mesoghia and to Keratia. Beyond Pani rises the ancient Laurium, for which I cannot learn any modern name, then a hill the highest of all the minor ones, and similar in form to Hymettus, near the village Markopulo (of Mesoghia); beyond which are two pointed heights, one on the southern, the other on the northern side of Porto Rafti.

§ 2.426   Jan. 13.—Return to Athens, leaving St. Nicolas at 8.21, and passing through Menidhi at 9.3. At 9.20 halt by the side of a cultivated rising ground, on the summit of which are modern walls. Soon afterwards reach the side of a torrent called Ianula, now running rapidly in consequence of the late rains. It rises in a gorge of Parnes eastward of Phyle, passes by Khassia, receives the great torrent from Parnes which passes by Menidhi, and thus forms a principal branch of the Cephissus, which it joins at some mills a little below Turali. We pass the junction of the two streams at 9.57, and a few minutes after cross the Cephissus. At 10.50 enter the Egripo gate: the Menidhi road branches from that of Egripo at the passage of the Cephissus.

§ 2.427   Jan. 28.—From Athens to Kifisia and Vrana. —At 9.55 pass through the Egripo gate: at 10.20 arrive at Ambelokipo, where are gardens and olive-grounds with small casini, situated along the Ilissus, for a considerable distance above the monastery of Petraki: from thence proceed along the south-eastern side of a ridge called Lule-vuno, the Ilissus remaining at a short distance on the right. By the road side are several round holes of great depth cut through the rock, belonging to a conduit apparently of ancient workmanship which still supplies the town, entering it at the north-eastern gate, which is vulgarly called Bubunistra, from the noise of the water in the conduit. At 11 on our left are the ruins of a Roman aqueduct on arches, crossing a valley, and which appears by its direction to have brought water from Mount Parnes. It was probably the same which was constructed for the Athenians by Trajan, and terminated by Antoninus Pius, as we learn from an inscription over the gate at Bubunistra. It is very possible that here, as at Eleusis, there was more than one source to the aqueduct; and that all the three mountains, Parnes, Pentelicum, and Hymettus, may have contributed water to the supply of Roman Athens. The work of Trajan was perhaps an addition from Mount Parnes to the original conduit which was excavated in the rock, according to the mode customary in Greece before the time of the Romans.
We now enter the olive plantations which surround Kifisia and the adjacent villages. At 11.22 pass Kato Marusi, often called Logotheti, as belonging to the English vice-consul of that name.

§ 2.428   It contains only a pyrgo, a garden, and two or three cottages. At 11.25 cross a stream called Pispir, which originates near the monastery of Mendeli; it forms a considerable branch of the Cephissus. Haying crossed several other smaller remata, and at 11.35 passed through Upper Marusi, we arrive at 11.56 at Kifisia, vulgarly pronounced Kifisha or Tjifisha. Here are several large pyrghi with good gardens, and a mosque, before which are a fountain and a beautiful plane-tree. The rare advantage in Attica of an abundance of running water in the middle of summer has rendered this place a favourite abode of the Turks of Athens; but the generality of the houses are in a ruinous condition, and all in the present season are empty. The Greeks are at work in the olive-grounds, corn-fields, and vineyards; and the women, alarmed at the sight of an armed Albanian servant of mine, lock up their houses and hide themselves.
Having proceeded from Kifisia at 12.38, the olive-woods soon cease, and we enter upon the uncultivated root of Mount Pentelicum, which unites that mountain with Parnes. All the upper part of the plain of Athens adjacent to this ridge is covered with arbutus and stunted pines. At 1.25, having turned the end of the mountain, we are in a line between its summit and the pass of Deceleia, where the modern road to Egripo passes between two heights which are separated by a deep rema originating at a Kefalovrysi under Tatoy, a village, the territory of which is a narrow strip of cultivated land among the pine-woods.

§ 2.429   The torrent of Tatoy is a tributary of the Cephissus, but the fountains of Kifisia are the principal feeder of that river, though not the most distant, which is at Fasidhero, on the heights between Kifisia and Tatoy: this branch flows through the plain at no great distance to the west of Kifisia.
At 1.50 we pass the small village of Stamata in an elevated situation, surrounded by a few barren fields, among woods of pine. It was probably the site of a demus; but no fortifications or other remains are to be seen, although the position is important as being in the middle of the communication between the plain of Marathon and that of Athens. Several torrents flow through ravines on our right from Mount Pentelicum, and after uniting, enter the plain of Marathon at Vrana. We ascend through a barren mountainous tract studded with pines, until at 2.36, being at no great distance to the northward of the peaked summit of Mount Aforismos, an opening in the ridge commands a view of the plain of Marathon, the marsh, and salt lake, together with the channel and island of Euboea, Mount Oche, the islands Petalice, and the bays of Marmari and Stura. Aforismos, though steep, has a very regular slope, and is beautifully clothed with pine-woods. It is probably the ancient Icarius. The descent from hence to Vrana is long, and we do not arrive there till 3.10. This village stands immediately at the foot of the mountain, on a low rocky height surrounded on three sides by the deep stony bed

§ 2.430   of the torrent before mentioned, which spreads and is lost in the plain of Marathon. The peaked summit of Mendeli, or Pentelicum, appears through the opening of the torrent at the back of the village. A third peak, in the same cluster of mountains, called Argaliki, lying eastward of Aforismos, rises immediately from the plain, and sends forth a deep charadra which extends from the summit quite into the plain. On its bank, just at the foot of the mountain, are some remains of Hellenic walls among other ruins of a more modern date; this I take to be the site of the Heracleium, or temple of Hercules, near Marathon; for this demus I believe to have been situated not at the modern Marathona, but at Vrana. Each of the three summits called Mendeli, Aforismos, and Argaliki, had probably its ancient name; but the whole mountain I conceive to have been that called Brilessus, which may also have been the specific name of Mendeli, as being the highest and most conspicuous of the three. The identity of Pentelicum and Brilessus can hardly be doubtful on comparing Thucydides, Theophrastus, Strabo, and Pausanias. There is no other summit in this part of Attica of sufficient importance to answer to Brilessus; nor any author but Pausanias, who employs the word Pentelicum as the name of the modern Mendeli; about his time, therefore, this appellation probably became common in consequence of the celebrity of the marble of the

§ 2.431   demus Pentele, and thus expelled the old word Brilessus or Brilettus, which, like Hymettus, and several others having a similar termination, belongs to the earliest language of Attica.
The season has been so dry, that at present there is not a drop of water in the Charadrus, or torrent of Marathon, with the exception of a few stagnant pools towards the mouth. The wheat is just above the ground, the barley some inches high: large tracts in various parts of the plain are covered with hyacinths in bloom, and the uncultivated parts are clothed with a fine grass, affording pasture to large flocks of sheep and goats, which have been brought hither for the most part from Mount Helicon, and are now followed by a great number of lambs and kids.
Jan. 29.—Having on a former occasion passed four days at Marathon, I have little to detain me here. While I was employed on the summit of the Soros, as the tumulus of the Athenians is called, my servant amused himself in gathering, at the foot of the barrow, a great number of small pieces of black flint which happened to strike his observation. These flints are so numerous, and have been so evidently chipped by art into their present form, like gun-flints, that there is good reason for believing them to have been the heads of arrows discharged by the Persians who fought at

§ 2.432   Marathon, and to have been interred with the Athenians, after having been gathered from every part of the plain, after the battle: Herodotus shows, that some of the Barbarians were armed in this manner, though his remark is applied not to the army of Darius, but to that of Xerxes. Flint of this kind, if produced in any of the adjacent parts of Greece, is at least very rare. I have heard that arrow heads of bronze have also been found here, but we searched for them without success. The earth of the tumulus is mixed with a fine sand, and resembles that of the soil of Egypt.
Marmari, on the opposite coast of Euboea, is an ancient name mentioned by Strabo, from whom we learn that it was so called from the quarries of marble commonly called Carystian, which were there situated. With rather more accuracy than usual, Strabo describes it as over against Halae Araphenides in Attica. Opposite to the middle of the Bay of Marathon is an island named Platia, situated two or three miles from the Euboean coast. At Cape Cynosura, of the Marathonia, the channel narrows to five miles, and the Bay of Stura extends from thence to Porto Bufalo. Stura, the ancient Styra, is near the shore in the inner part of the bay, in the middle of which is the Stura-nisi, or Aegilia.
From Soros I proceed to the chapel of St. George, under Mount Stavrokoraki; and from thence ride round the foot of that mountain to the

§ 2.433   corner of the great marsh, which stretches from thence to the salt lake of Dhrakoneria. Towards Kato-Suli the road passes over rocks, from under which issue some copious springs of water; a little below them is the deepest part of the lake of Marathon. In summer, when the water is confined to a small space, eels are caught here. This, and the Dhrakoneria at the foot of the ridge of Cynosura, or cape at the northern extremity of the Bay of Marathon, are then the only parts of the marsh which preserve any water. The springs at the foot of Stavrokoraki are probably the fountain Macaria.
Having sent my baggage by the ordinary route to Grammatiko and Kalamo by Upper Suli, I proceed with a single attendant to visit the sites of Tricorythus and Rhamnus. That of the former demus is at thirteen minutes from Kato-Suli, on the right of the road to Rhamnus, where a rising ground is covered with fragments of Pentelic marble, many wrought blocks, and in one place some remains of columns without, flutings. The plain of Tricorythus is of a semicircular form, and terminates in a pass, from which a torrent issues, and, after crossing the plain, joins the marsh.
At 1.4, ten minutes beyond the ruins of Tricorythus, we enter the pass, which at 1.10 opens into a plain, about three miles in length, and one in breadth, separated from the shore only by a rocky ridge, and inclosed on the opposite side by the mountain of Dhimiko.

§ 2.434   This valley formed the best part of the ancient Rhamnusia. Like the plain of Suli, it contains many velanidhi trees, has a tolerable soil, but is ploughed only in a few places. At the northern extremity are the ruins of the temple of the Rhamnusian Nemesis, lying in a confused heap on the peribolus, the wall of which is still a conspicuous object. In the plain, at a small distance from the wall, is the foundation of a square and another of a round monument, of small dimensions, probably sepulchral. The peribolus included two temples, and stood at the head of a gorge leading by a regular slope to Ovrio-kastro, which is eleven minutes distant from the temples on the sea shore; the remains of a wall are observable on the left of the road all the way down. Ovrio-kastro, a common Romaic form of Έβραιό-καστρον, or Jewish Castle, is situated on a small height overhanging the sea, and is closely surrounded on every other side by higher hills, which are barren and covered with shrubs. To the north the height is strengthened by a deep torrent, now dry: on the opposite side there is a hollow and a small level by the sea, so that the fortress itself was only connected with the hills at the back by a little ridge, on which stand the remains of a gateway, with the adjacent walls still extant to half their height. They are of the third order of masonry, built of Attic marble, and being mixed with shrubs and bushes form a very picturesque ruin. On the highest part of the hill, a small quadrangular keep occupied

§ 2.435   an angle of the inclosure: the walls are traceable in most parts, but are not of any considerable height except near the gate. The whole circumference of the inclosure was little more than half a mile, but the ground about the temples seems also to have been inhabited. In the middle of the inclosure of the fortress lies a monument of white marble, concave on one of the sides, and broken into two pieces, on one of which, in the middle of the concave side, are the words, ΡΑΜΝΟΥΣΙΟΣ
ΚΩΜΟΙΔΟΙΣ
in very neat characters. The name of the man of Rhamnus, who dedicated the monument, was probably on another stone. Immediately opposite to Rhamnus, in the narrowest part of the Euboic frith, where the breadth is only two miles, is the entrance of Porto Bufalo, which I take to have been anciently the harbour of Porthmus. The occupation and destruction of the fortress of Porthmus by Philip, after expelling the Eretrians, to whom it belonged, was one of the accusations repeatedly urged against him by Demosthenes: the orator particularly alludes to its position, απαντικρύ της Αττικής, or opposite to Attica, and his commentator Ulpian observes, that Porthmus was a harbour dependent on Eretria. The advantages of this harbour seem to have given importance to Porthmus during a long succession of ages.

§ 2.436   A little to the northward of Porto Bufalo is Dhysta, the ancient Dystus, against which, according to Theopompus, Philip proceeded from the vicinity of Eretria, in the course of the same transactions referred to by Demosthenes. Styra, now Stura, is seen to the southward, and Mount Dirphe bearing 6° to the north of west.
From the temple of Nemesis, a line drawn through the pass leading into the plain of Tricorythus will cut a cape near Porto Rafti, which I observed from the foot of Mount Stavrokoraki; Ovrio-kastro is in the same line produced northward. At 3.22, quitting the temple and crossing a part of the plain, we ascend the mountains to the north-westward, which are a continuation of Mount Dhimiko, and follow the torrent of Ovriokastro to its source, where we arrive at that of another rema, flowing to the plain of Suli, and from thence, after having crossed some cultivated heights which extend in the direction of Kalamo, arrive at 4.35 at Grammatiko, a village of 30 or 40 houses, prettily situated in a sequestered hollow among orchards and corn-fields. In one of these orchards the rain has lately brought to light a sepulchral stone, adorned in the usual manner with a pediment, below which are three figures about one quarter of the human size, in high relief. A woman seated has her right hand joined to that of another woman standing: between them is a man with a front face in lower relief. The women are clothed in long drapery, covered with a loose upper robe thrown over the shoulders; above the three figures are the names ΘΕΟΓΈΝΙΣ ΝΙΚΟΔΗΜΟΣ ΠΟΛΥΛΛΟ
almost obliterated: the form of the characters is of a good time, as well as the style of the sculpture. The monument, as well as the situation of the place, leave little doubt that Grammatiko was the site of a demus; but there is no clue to guide us to the name.

§ 2.437   Jan. 30.—At 8.24, leaving Grammatiko, we ascend a high round ridge north-westward of it, which I observed from the summit of Parries. It is usually called the mountain of Varnava (Barnabas), from a small village below it on the side towards Tatoy. It is higher than either Dhimiko, or the hill of St. Demetrius, which is another similar summit between Grammatiko and Marathona. The mountain of Varnava terminates abruptly at the sea in a rocky peak to the south-east of Kalamo, which I have remarked from several points, among others from Psilirakhi. Inland this mountain takes a sweep at the back of Kalamo, where one of its highest tops is called Mavronoro, and despite its name, is, like the greater part of the ridge, a round bare white rock. From thence there is a branch of rugged pine-clad hills as far as Oropo, which place is situated at the foot of the extremity of this ridge. Though much broken, it is in all parts a cultivable mountain with an easy slope. It comprises all the territory of Markopulo and Kalamo, except a small plain on the sea-side northward of Kalamo, and another smaller to the southward;

§ 2.438   Kalamo itself standing on an extremity of the hills between them. I take these mountains to be the ancient Phelleus.
Having crossed the ridge of Varnava, we begin to descend at 9.15, and at 9.30 having the highest summit on the right, arrive at a Hellenic tower, half ruined, and prettily covered with ivy. Just below it is a fine source of water and a ruined church, in which are some pieces of small columns, with a fragment, preserving part of a figure in low relief. Both the tower and the sculpture are like almost every thing ancient in Attica, of white marble. They indicate the site of another of the demi of Mount Phelleus, of which we shall never know the names, unless some inscriptions should hereafter reveal them. Near the ancient tower stands another of modern date. The village of Varnava is not far below us on the left. After a loss of ten minutes we continue our progress over a mountainous road, through a country in which there is some cultivated land amidst oaks, pirnaria, and the common shrubs. At 10.10 we are opposite the opening of Tatoy, in the ridge which joins Parnes to Pentelicum: the summit of Hymettus is seen over the opening. Many torrents as we proceed flow to the right in deep ravines towards the sea, particularly one which we cross a quarter of an hour short of Kalamo, and which terminates in the small maritime plain already mentioned. Others on the left of the road contribute to the river of Marathon.
Kalamo, where we arrive at 11.23, is situated on the heights above the sea, in face of the deep gulf of Aliveri, in Euboea.

§ 2.439   It belongs to the district of Livadhia, contains about 200 houses, and has an air of improvement and comparative opulence: there are several new houses of two stories, smartly white-washed, and having outhouses and inclosed yards. The Proestos has even glass to his windows. The hill above Kalamo commands a good view of all the surrounding parts of Attica and Boeotia, and of the opposite coast of Euboea. On that shore, a little to the northward of Porto Bufalo is seen Dhysta, a village with a pyrgo and lake, then the southern cape of the Bay of Aliveri, and Aliveri village, at the bottom of the bay, about two miles from the shore. The coast has a westerly direction from thence as far as Eretria. To the southward of Aliveri, the position of a Hellenic ruin near Kalentzi is pointed out to me, bearing N. 73 E. On the northern side of the plain, snowy cliffs which I observed from Psilirakhi reach from N. 35 E. to N. 18 K, to the westward of which latter direction is seen the village of Ghymno, situated in a plain, at the foot of a high mountain which extends to Eretria. Ghymno is perhaps the site of Tamynae, and the mountain the ancient Cotylaion. The acropolis of Eretria is visible, and on the adjacent coast four small rocky islands. The topography of the Euripus is well seen. Fyla, which bears N. 28 1/2W., seems to have derived its name from its position exactly on the communication between the plains of Egripo and Vasiliko,

§ 2.440   and occupies perhaps the site of an ancient fortress named Φυλή. Beyond the town of Egripo, the cliffs which stretch along the coast from Politika northward are again conspicuous, and their highest point, Kandili, bearing N. 24 W. The principal summits near Chalcis and Thebes are easily recognized. The easternmost point of the Boeotian shore is in a line with the summit of Othrys. Kumi, the ancient Cume, from which the towns of the same name in Ionia and Campania were named, lies on the eastern end of the cliffs, which are to the north of Aliveri.
An inscription at Kalamo contains a grant of proxenia by the Oropii to one Oinophilus of Crete, and directs a copy of the decree to be placed on a pillar in the temple of Amphiaraus.
Quitting Kalamo at 1.40, and descending over the hills by a bad road, we arrive, at 2, at the great Charadra, or torrent, which I observed from the summit of Mount Parnes, and which is said to contain water all the year. The place is called Mavro-dhilissi, to distinguish it from another Dhilissi beyond Oropo; and there was probably once a village of that name, but no habitations now exist, though the sides of the hills are well cultivated; a mile below, the torrent taking a great turn to the

§ 2.441   right, enters the northern plain of Kalamo, and there joins the sea. There are many ancient remains at Mavro-dhilissi, particularly the foundations of walls on the steep slope of the hills on either side of the ravine, which seem to have been intended only for supporting terraces, some of those on the slope of the northern hill being traceable parallel to each other at small distances. A more explanatory relic of antiquity, however, has been lately brought to light by the rains, and is now lying near some ancient foundations. It is part of a cornice of some great building, formed of white marble, and inscribed with the letters AEI in large characters of the best times, deeply engraved, and at a great distance asunder. Another and larger portion of the same cornice was not long since carried to Kalamo, to be used in the new buildings where I saw it. The latter is inscribed with the letters ΤΟΣΑΜΦΙ. From this evidence of the practice of resorting to Mavrodhilissi for the materials of the buildings which have lately been erected at Kalamo, there can be little doubt that the inscribed marble, now at Kalamo, which records the favours granted to Oinophilus, was brought from Mavro-dhilissi, as well as another which has been carried from Kalamo to Athens, and which, like the former, appears to have been anciently deposited in the temple of Amphiaraus. The ΑΜΦΙ on the comice at Kalamo, may be a part of the name Amphiaraus, and all the three monuments, therefore, concur in proving this place to be the site of the Amphiaraeium, which having stood near Psaphis, between Rhamnus and Oropus

§ 2.442   on the road from Athene to the latter place, and not far from the sea, agrees in position with Mavro-dhilissi. As the words of Strabo imply only that the temple was near, and not at Psaphis, and as Kalamo stands in a situation which the ancients are likely to have occupied, it is very probably the site of that Attic demus, for such Psaphis became, although originally, as it would seem from Strabo, it was a dependency of Oropus, and consequently a part of the Boeotian community .
At 2.30, I begin to descend from Mavro-dhilissi through a gorge in the hills by a gradual slope, and in a few minutes perceive the village of Markopulo on the left, in a lofty situation, and distant about as far from the left bank of the torrent of Mavro-dhilissi, as Kalamo is from the right. At 2.53 enter a plain which extends along the shore as far as the mouth of the Asopus, and immediately afterwards cross another, great rema, now dry. At 3.3 pass a third torrent of the same kind, not far to the right of a range of cultivated hills, which are a continuation of Mavronoro. At 3.21 arrive at “the Holy Apostles,” so called from a ruined church,

§ 2.443   near which is a hut with some gardens and wells, situated on the sea side, in the centre of a bay included between two low projecting points about two miles asunder. Here are some remains of a Hellenic wall just within the sea, apparently an ancient jetty, and in the church a fragment of a small Doric column.
Opposite to Apostolus, on the shore of Euboea, is Kastri, the site of Eretria, which celebrated city stood on a projection of the coast, at the southwestern extremity of a great plain extending inland between two high mountains, and containing the village of Ghymno. At the opposite comer of the plain is Vathy, a small village near the shore. The entire circuit of the ruined walls and towers of the acropolis of Eretria, still subsist on a rocky height, which is separated from the shore by a marshy plain. At the foot of the hill are remains of the theatre, and in the plain a large portion of the town walls, with many foundations of buildings in the inclosed space. The situation was defended to the west by a river, and on the opposite side by a marsh.
Above Apostolus rises an insulated hill, having a small conical termination on the further part of the summit, where I find some foundations of ancient walls, amidst a heap of rough stones. They seem to be the remains of a small fortress or watch-tower. The monastery of Ambighi is seen from hence, pleasantly situated in a wood on the mountain side, at about one third of the distance from Markopulo to Oropo. Markopulo, as well as Apostolus, belongs to Rashid Bey of Egripo.

§ 2.444   At the foot of the same height on the western side, and not far from Apostolus, a ruined chapel contains a sepulchral stone inscribed with the name Τιμανδριδης, in neat and antique characters. In a little rema at the foot of the height, nearer the sea, are some ancient squared blocks of stone.
Leaving the foot of this hill at 4.5, and crossing the plain at no great distance from the right bank of the Asopus, we arrive at 4.37 at Oropo This village, which contains about thirty houses, with a pyrgo and kiosk of the Turkish Spahi, stands on the lower heights of the ridge of Markopulo, above some gardens containing a few olive and fig-trees, which extend to the Asopus. The hills above the village are partly clothed with pines: their highest summit, which is at no great distance to the southward, is called Karakaxa. The plain of Oropo extends along the sea shore from Apostolus to the village of Alikuki, a distance of about three miles, and narrows from its maritime base, until it ends in the angle, not quite so distant from the sea, where Oropo and Sykamino are separated from each other only by the Asopus.
A summit on the south-eastern side of Oropo has the appearance of an acropolis; no remains of walls are to be seen, but at the foot of the hill several ancient sepulchres were uncovered by the floods of last October, when among other usual contents of Greek tombs, were found many heads of spears and lances made of brass, some of which I purchase from the people of the village.

§ 2.445   These remains of antiquity, added to the preservation of the ancient name without any corruption, cannot leave much doubt as to the position of the city, notwithstanding that they are in contradiction to some authorities, from which Oropus would seem to have stood on the sea coast. Strabo, continuing his route along the coast from south to north, notices next to the Amphiaraeium the sacred port of Delphinium, and twenty stades beyond it Oropus, then Delium. Opposite to Delphinium was Old Eretria in Euboea, and, opposite to Oropus, New Eretria: the passage across the strait in the former situation was sixty stades, in the latter forty. As the mouth of the Asopus makes a projection in the coast, and narrows the strait between it and Kastri, from whence the shore of Euboea retires in an easterly direction to Vathy, leaving the respective breadths of the channel from the mouth of the Asopus to those two places, nearly as Strabo has indicated, his description leads directly to the conclusion that Oropus was at or near the mouth of the Asopus, New Eretria at Kastri, Delphinium at Apostolus, and Old Eretria at Vathy or thereabouts; and this maritime position of Oropus is

§ 2.446   confirmed by other authorities. Pausanias describes it as being επι θαλάσσης. and we learn from Diodorus that in the year B.C. 402, the Thebans, who had taken it from the Athenians in the twentieth winter of the Peloponnesian war, removed the inhabitants, in consequence of a sedition, to a distance of seven stades from the sea Perhaps this latter fact may lead to an explanation of the difficulty. As the removal was evidently made for the purpose of placing the town out of the reach of the Athenian ships, an opposite motive may have induced the Athenians to make it a maritime town when it was in their possession. Oropo, therefore, I conceive to have been the site of the original Boeotian city, as well as that to which the Thebans removed the Oropii, though it must be admitted that the distance is greater than the seven stades of Diodorus; and here they probably remained for a long time, even after the cession of Oropus to the Athenians by Philip, and the destruction of Thebes by Alexander, for Dicaearchus, after the restoration of that city by Cassander, still describes Oropus as belonging to, or as being a colony of Thebes, although he describes the Oropii as Athenian Boeotians, an expression which he applies also to the Plataeenses. As to the επί θαλάσσης of Pausanias, there seems no mode of accounting for it, but by the supposition that the Oropii had, in his time, again removed to the sea.

§ 2.447   They then occupied, perhaps, the site of Delphinium at Apostοlus, for it is remarkable that Pausanias makes no mention of Delphinium, and his distance of twelve stades from Oropus to the Amphiaraeium, though still much within the real distance from Apostolus to Mavro-dhilissi, will at least be fifteen stades nearer the truth, than if the Oropus of his time had been at Oropo.
There are several ruined churches at Oropo which show that it was once a Christian town of some importance. One of them contains a broken marble inscribed with portions of three decrees of Proxenia by the people of Tanagra; one of the foreigners is of Chalcis, the native city of the two others is not preserved. The inscription is valuable from being, like those of Orchomenus, in the Aeolic or Bοeotic dialect; but there is some difficulty in accounting for its being found here, for

§ 2.448   Tanagra could not have been less than four miles distant from hence, and the Bοeotic dialect was probably not employed at Oropus, unless in the ages prior to its dependence upon Attica. The inscriptions found at Mavro-dhilissi, which was in the Oropia, are in Hellenic, and three tombstones at Oropo bearing names, have the father’s in the possessive case, which was the Attic method, and not the usual Boeotian form. It is observable, however, that they have not the name of the demus, which favours the supposition, that Oropus never was an Attic demus. The probability is, that the Tanagraean decree, which is on a thin slab of white marble, and lies in a ruined church, unattached to the building, was brought to Oropo from the deserted site of Tanagra, for the purpose of preserving it, as the Greeks are often in the habit of doing when they find inscribed marbles.
Having crossed the Asopus, we arrive in fifteen minutes at Sykamino, which is now smaller than Oropo, and does not possess so many zevgaria, though three ruined churches, and some modern remains upon the hill above the village, show that it was once a place of greater magnitude than it is at present. It stands exactly at the opening of the ravine through which the Asopus finds its way from the plain of Tanagra. The channel of the river is now quite dry: the modern name, which in the interior is Vuriemi, is here pronounced Vuriendi. In one of the churches is still preserved the sepulchral inscription in memory of Aphrodisius, son of Zoilus, of Oropus, which was published by Spon.

§ 2.449   Jan. 31.—Having sent my baggage horses to Skimatari by a road which leads by Inia and the left bank of the Asopus, I follow the Egripo road, at 8.23, in search of Delium, and cross the hills extending from Sykamino to the sea. These are partly in cultivation, and partly consist of a forest of pines, among which there is some good pasture; for some time our road lies in a line parallel to the shore at the distance of about a mile, but at length, at 9.15, descends upon the sea-beach. In three minutes more, after passing a ruined church in which are some ancient fragments, we again leave the sea-side and enter a small plain, which is about a mile in width at the water-side, and narrows from thence to Dhilissi, situated at its southern extremity, where I arrive at 9.25. The village consists only of five or six houses and a roofless chapel, where are some Hellenic fragments and squared stones, a large bowl made of stone, 2 feet I inch in diameter, 4 inches thick, 9 inches high, pierced with a hole in the centre, and op the outside cut into furrows. In a field below the chapel there is a large wrought stone of five sides, or rather quadrilateral, with one angle cut off. There is no water here, and the village is supplied from wells near the sea-shore.

§ 2.450  Delium is described by Strabo as a temple of Apollo, and a small town of the Tanagraei, thirty stades distant from Aulis. It is celebrated for having witnessed the defeat of both the most illustrious people of antiquity. That of the Romans by a part of the army of Antiochus I have already had occasion to refer to. In the eighth year of the Peloponnesian war, the Athenians formed a design against Boeotia, which was to be executed in the beginning of the winter by simultaneous operations at the two extremities of that province. On the Phocic frontier a revolt in the cities of Siphae and Chaeroneia was to be supported by a landing at Siphae of Acarnanian auxiliaries from the Athenian fleet, which was at Naupactus, under the command of Demosthenes, while the Athenians from the Attic frontier were to seize and fortify Delium. The Boeotians, however, obtained notice of the design, Demosthenes failed at Siphae, and the Boeotians had time to place garrisons in the disaffected places on the Phocic frontier, and to return to Tanagra before the Athenians had been more than three days at Delium. During that time Hippocrates, the Athenian commander, had fortified the consecrated ground at Delium, after which his army encamped among the hills between Delium and Oropus, at a distance of ten stades from the former. The Boeotians consisted of 7000 hoplitae, 10,000 light-armed, 600 peltastae, and 1000 cavalry. The Athenians had about the same force of hoplitae, and were well provided with cavalry, but they had no light troops, except some followers of the regulars, indifferently

§ 2.451   armed, the greater part of whom, as soon as the fortifications were finished and the army in position, returned to Athens.
It was towards evening when Pagondas of Thebes, the Boeotian commander, advanced from Tanagra. Hippocrates, who happened to be at Delium, joined his camp as soon as he heard of the enemy’s approach, leaving 300 horsemen to protect the fortress and to act during the battle according to circumstances. The two armies were separated by a hill and unseen to each other, until Pagondas, crossing the ridge, advanced in quick time, and was met in like manner by the Athenians. The extremities of either line were prevented from encountering by certain ravines, but in the centre there was close fighting. The Athenians overthrew the left of their opponents’ centre, where the Thespienses were the chief sufferers, but on their own left were obliged to give way before the Thebans, whose phalanx was twenty-five file in depth, while that of the Athenians had a depth of only eight. Pagondas at this moment sent to the relief of his left a body of cavalry which, appearing suddenly from behind the hill, made the Athenians suppose that the enemy had received a reinforcement, and caused them, though victorious in that part of the line, to retreat just about the time that the Thebans had broken the adverse phalanx; a complete defeat of the Athenians was the consequence, and it would have been still more disastrous had not Pagondas on the approach of night withdrawn his forces to Tanagra. Some of the Athenians reached Delium, others Oropus, and others the

§ 2.452   heights of Parnes, after having suffered greatly from the Boeotian cavalry, and from some Locri who had just arrived to the assistance of the Boeotians. To the request of the Athenians for permission to inter their dead, Pagondas replied, that if the dead were in Boeotia, the Athenians might carry them away on quitting the Boeotian territory, but that if they were on the Athenian territory, it was for themselves to act as they thought proper; by this answer implying, that the cession of the Oropia was to be the condition of compliance with their request, Oropia being a Boeotian district which had been conquered by the Athenians. It shows that the boundary of the Oropia and Tanagrice was less than ten stades to the eastward of Delium. On the seventeenth day after the battle, Pagondas took the fortress which the Athenians had constructed at Delium. The description of it by Thucydides gives a good idea of a Greek fieldwork, and the mode in which it was destroyed by the enemy is not less curious. In fortifying the place, the Athenians first excavated a trench round the consecrated ground containing together with the temple, the portico of which was in ruins, a well, or source of water. Having thrown the earth of the ditch outwards, they drove a circle of piles along the edge of the ditch, and then filled the interval between the piles and the embankment with mixed materials composed of earth, of vines which grew around the temple, and of some ruined buildings. On the summit of the wall thus constructed they erected wooden towers. It was not until the Boeotians had been reinforced from Corinth and Megara

§ 2.453   and by the Peloponnesian garrison which the Athenians had recently driven out of Nisaea, as well as by some archers and slingers from the towns of the Maliac Gulf, that they ventured to return from Tanagra to Delium in order to attack the fortress. After several attempts they succeeded in setting fire to the combustible materials of the walls. Their engine for this purpose was nothing more than a hollow mast or trunk of a tree, to one end of which was adjusted a cauldron filled with charcoal, sulphur, and pitch, and to the other a pair of bellows, for the purpose of raising the fire as soon as the cauldron was brought in contact with the rampart. The machine having been conveyed to the fortress upon carts, the conflagration of the wood and vine branches soon obliged the garrison to abandon the walls. Some of them were slain, 200 were made prisoners, the remainder escaped to their ships and to Athens.
The facility with which the Athenians retreated to their vessels renders it probable that Delium was situated not at the modern village, but on the sea-shore, where alone wells are now found corresponding to the “water at the temple” mentioned by Thucydides. But Livy is decisive on this point. His words are, Templum est Apollinis Delium imminens mari; quinque millia passuum a Tanagra abest; minus quatuor millium inde in proxima Euboeae est mari trajectus.

§ 2.454   The ιερον, therefore, with its consecrated ground and surrounding vineyards, was near the shore, and the πολιχνιον, or small town of Delium, at the modern village of Dhilissi .
Having ascended a narrow but well cultivated valley from Dhilissi, I arrive in thirty-five minutes at a source of water and a reservoir, from whence the remains of an aqueduct are traceable in the direction of Dhilissi. A road to Dhramisi, Vathy, and Egripo turns off at the reservoir to the right.

§ 2.455   Soon afterwards we enter an open country well cultivated, and in twenty-seven minutes enter the [plan of Tanagra] village of Skimatari. Three miles to the southward of it is Grimadha or Grimala, once perhaps the name of a modern village, but now attached only to the ruins of a Hellenic city which was certainly Tanagra, and which seems to preserve some traces of its Homeric name Γραία. in the present appellation. Tanagra was advantageously situated in the center of a fertile champaign, consisting of plains and undulated ground included between Mount Parnes and the Euboic frith, and extending in the other direction from the Thebaea to the Oropia. Standing at the eastern extremity of the ridge of Mount Soro, and not far from the root of Mount Parnes, which stretches to Delium and Oropus, it was placed exactly in the point of communication between the plains at the foot of Parnes and those towards Aulis and the sea. The town was near two miles in circumference, of an irregular form, determined by the nature of the ground, which consists of a height commanded by the eastern extremity of the ridge of Soro, at the distance of about a mile above the junction of the Vuriemi or Asopus with a rivulet named Lari, which we crossed midway from Skimatari. The upper angle of the site is rocky and abrupt, and looks down on a natural terrace, below which stood the

§ 2.456   body of the town on a broad level raised a little above the third or lowest plain which reaches to the two rivers, and has a breadth varying from three to five hundred yards. The town walls followed the crest of the height and the last falls of the ground above the plain. No acropolis is distinguishable, though probably there was some interior inclosure at the upper angle. About one hundred yards below the summit are ruins of a theatre excavated in the bank which separates the highest point from the terrace immediately below it. Its diameter is between three and four hundred feet. A part of the masonry which supported the two ends of the cavea remains, but neither seats nor proscenium are visible, nor any vestiges of the stoa which Pausanias describes as attached to the theatre of Tanagra. On the terrace below the theatre, to the north-east of it, are the well-constructed foundations of a public building, formed of marble of a very dark colour, with a green cast. The city walls, which are of ordinary limestone, are a mere heap of ruins, though they are traceable in the whole periphery, as well as many of the towers. The masonry is almost regular, and as usual is faced only with wrought stones, the center being filled with rubble.
On the left bank of the Asopus, a little above its junction with the Lari, stands a mill which is turned by derivations from both the rivers, and opposite to their junction, not far from the right bank of the Asopus, is one of the high towers which I have before alluded to, as not unfrequent in Boeotia, and as having been built probably by the Franks.

§ 2.457   This tower has since been converted into a Greek church, in which are lying several fluted Doric shafts covered with a coat of stucco, and a large rectangular block of the same kind of black marble as that which was used in the great building in the city. Inscribed on it, in characters of ancient date, is the name ΗΣΧΙΝΑΣ, the Boeotic form of Αισχίνης, In the wall on the outside of the tower is another inscribed marble, but not of the dark kind. The inscription begins with an epigram in two elegiac couplets, showing that the stone supported a statue dedicated by one Phorystas, son of Triax, who had obtained a victory in the games of Jupiter, and who, upon several other occasions, had been the first in the foot race. Below the verses, which are in common Hellenic, is a decree of Proxenia, in Boeotic, by the people of Tanagra, in favour of one Dioscorides of Athens; the form is exactly similar to that of the Tanagraean decrees at

§ 2.458   Oropo. There is no apparent connection of subject between the epigram and the decree, and it is difficult to understand how they came to be on the same stone. But that the verses should be in Hellenic and the decree in Boeotic is not surprising, even if we suppose them to be contemporary, since Pindar preferred the Doric to his own native dialect, and poets claimed the privilege as early as the time of Homer, of using any dialect or all of them at once. Diplomacy on the other hand, appears to have preserved the local forms in many parts of Greece, even after the period when they ceased to be in common use. We find in the first inscription, that while the poet wrote in Hellenic, the maker of the statue recorded his name in Boeotic by the words Kαφισιας επόεισε.
In the Augustan age Tanagra and Thespiae were the principal towns of Boeotia, and were larger, or at least more populous, than Thebes. In the time of the Antonines Thebes seems to have recovered a little, but Tanagra still possessed the lands of Aulis, Harma, and Mycalessus. Pausanias praises the Tanagraei for having placed their sacred buildings in a place entirely separated from, and unmixed with, the houses of the town, whence it would seem that all the temples mentioned by him were on the height near the theatre, where, unincumbered by any ordinary buildings, they were seen undoubtedly to great advantage.

§ 2.459   The principal temple was that of Bacchus, which contained a statue in Parian marble by Calamis, and the figure of a headless triton. Near it were temples of Themis, of Venus, and of Apollo, in which last Diana and Latona were also honoured. All these buildings may have stood on the platform which still exists. There were two temples of Mercury, in one of which he was surnamed Criophorus, in the other Promachus: in the former he was represented in a statue made by Calamis as bearing a ram on his shoulders. The latter temple was near the theatre, and probably near the gymnasium also, the surname having been derived from a fable of the Tanagraei, according to which Mercury had led them to victory against the Eretrienses, marching at the head of the ephebi, armed only with a strigil. The same gymnasium contained a picture of Corinna with the band of victory on her head, and represented as so beautiful that Pausanias is disposed to attribute her success over Pindar to this cause, not less than to the Aeolic dialect of her verses, which had an advantage over the Doric of her great rival in being more intelligible to her hearers. There was also a monument of Corinna in a conspicuous part of the city. At a place called Poloson was the observatory of Atlas, and on Mount Cerycium, in which mountain the Tanagraei reported that Mercury was born, was the tomb of Orion. If we are to take literally the assertion of Pausanias, that these two pi aces were “in Tanagra,” it would follow that Mount Cerycium was no other than the height above the theatre, and perhaps that Cerycium was the name of the acropolis, and that

§ 2.460   the temple of Hermes Promachus stood on the hill, on which he was reported to have been born; but it is very possible that by εν Τανάγρα Pausanias meant the district of Tanagra, and that Cerycium was the entire mountain stretching westward from Grimadha.
At the time when Thebes had recently been restored by Cassander, and its desert inclosure laid out in streets, Dicaearchus described Tanagra in the following terms: “The road from Oropus to Tanagra leads for thirty stades through a country covered with olive plantations and forest trees, where the traveller is free from any apprehension of robbers. The city stands on a rugged and commanding height, and has a white argillaceous appearance. The houses are remarked for their handsome porticoes, and encaustic paintings. The country abounds less in corn than in wine, which is the best in Boeotia.” He then commends the inhabitants, who were all landholders, for a frugality void of avarice, for justice, good faith, hospitality and charity; and adds, that Tanagra was the safest and most agreeable residence in Boeotia for a stranger .

§ 2.461   The river Lari, although only a small brook, is said not to fail in summer. It receives a considerable contribution from some springs, which issue from the rocks, on its banks just below the city. No notice occurs of this stream in ancient history, and it seems not unlikely that it still preserves its ancient name.
From Grimadha to the foot of Mount Parnes, and to the slope which conducts to the Pass of St. Mercurius, extends a plain, which is covered with pines towards the foot of Parnes, and in the other parts is fertile, and well cultivated. Low pines and brushwood cover the part of Mount Soro, near Grimadha. The place where the Asopus issues from the rocky ravine, which I have before described as separating the Parasopia from the Tanagrice, is not far above Tanagra: the summit of Cithaeron appears through the gorge; just below the exit the river is joined by a deep rema from Mount Parnes, and in the angle formed by the junction stands the hamlet of Latani, in a lofty situation. This gorge of the Asopus being exactly in the direction of Scolus and Plataea, Dicaearchus has correctly described the road from Tanagra to Plataea, as having been in some degree desert and stony, and as having passed near Cithaeron. His remark that it was not very dangerous, alludes probably to the robbers who appear to have frequented Cithaeron from that time to the present.
On the edge of the hills which stretch along the sea-coast, and meeting a branch of Parnes, bound the plain to the eastward, are seen near

§ 2.462   the left bank of the Asopus the village and tower of 'Inia, or Staniates, at the entrance of the lower gorges which separated the Tanagrice from the Oropia, and through which the river flows to Sykamino. Further on, towards St. Mercurius, is the hamlet of Buiati. The champaign country around Tanagra extends beyond Skimatari, as far as the range of Khtypa and Siamata, and communicates in the direction of Vasiliko, in Euboea, with a descent into a lower maritime plain, in which are Dhramisi, Vathy, and the great port of Aulis.
The Tanagrice having been near the frontier of Attica and Boeotia, was frequently the scene of contention between the two rival people, or their allies. Besides the battle of Delium, there were two other celebrated actions fought in this district twenty-five years before the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, and with an interval of only two months between them. In the first, the Athenians, with their allies, who were chiefly of Argos, and amounted in all to 14,000, were opposed to a somewhat smaller force of confederates, headed by Pleistoanax and his tutor Nicomedes, who in returning home with 1,500Spartans from Doris, where, in union with a large army of allies, they had been defending their kinsmen, the Dorians, against the Phocians, were afraid of attempting a passage through the Megaris, which was in possession of the Athenians, and diverged therefore into the territory of Tanagra.

§ 2.463   They were victorious on this occasion, in consequence of the treachery of a body of Thessalian cavalry, who turned against the Athenians during the battle. The scene of action was probably the plain between Tanagra and the foot of Parnes, across which mountain the Athenians received their supplies. Diodorus relates, that there were two actions: that the Thessalians who deserted in the first, attacked on the same night a convoy of the Athenians, which brought on the second general conflict; that the latter was of doubtful event, and that it was followed by a truce of four months.
Sixty-two days after the battle of Tanagra, as it was usually called, Myronides of Athens, who had in the preceding year been twice successful in battle with the Corinthians in the Megaris, obtained a third victory over the Boeotians at Oinophytae, which was of much greater importance than the former, as he followed it up by razing the walls of Tanagra; from whence he led his victorious forces to Thebes, and through Boeotia to the frontiers of Phocis and Locris, receiving the submission of many Boeotian and Phocic cities. and taking hostages from the Opontii of Locris. As we cannot doubt from the circumstances of the event, that Oinophytae was in the Tanagrice, not far from the Attic frontier, the name further shows that it was the place where the wine was chiefly produced, for which the Tanagrice was renowned. It is by no means unlikely that the modern Inia, written Οινια, is a corruption of Οινοφύται: it stands, as I have already remarked, in a commanding position near the left bank of the Asopus, between Tanagra

§ 2.464   and Oropus, or nearly in the situation where it is probable from history, that the battle was fought.
Returning to Skimatari, I overtake a monk belonging to a convent not far distant, who says that he has always understood the ancient name of the ruins at Grimadha to have been Tenagra, so he pronounces it, quasi Ταιναγρα. In a tower a little to the left of the road, which, like that near Grimadha, has been converted into a church, I find on a block of the same kind of black marble which was employed in the principal building at Tanagra, the name Hipparchia in very ancient characters, the X being formed like an ordinary Ψ, and the initial aspirate expressed by H. Another marble has the name Βιοττος. Several other sepulchral stones, each with a name in the nominative, without either paternal or ethnic, are preserved in the churches in or near Skimatari. There is one also of a woman named Lais, in the dative preceded by επι. These two forms appear from a variety of examples to have been the Boeotian mode of inscribing names on tombstones, and to have been adhered to at very distant periods of time; whereas, so near as Oropus we find the name of the father added on four sepulchral inscriptions at Oropo and Sykamino. In Attica the demus seems to have been an indispensable adjunct. All the inscriptions at Skimatari are on black marble, except one which is not sepulchral, and on which I can distinguish only the letters ΟΝΤΑΝΑΓΡΑ. These letters, and the marble of the other inscribed stones, render it probable that they were all brought from Grimadha, from which place, as it has been long deserted, the neighbouring inhabitants have been accustomed to remove the ancient inscribed or sculptured stones, as they have been brought to light by the rains or the plough, to the churches in the surrounding country.

§ 2.465   Feb. 1.—From Skimatari to Andritza and Thebes: the road follows the left bank of the Lari in a direction parallel to the range of Soro. Besides the sources which issue from the bank of this river near Grimadha, there are others more copious, which join it not far above the tower or church, which I visited in returning from the ruins; but above the latter sources the Lari is nothing but a dry torrent, and in most places the water-course is even ploughed. We cross it, and a little afterwards, at 8.20 (having set out at 7.55), the village of Bratzi is at the foot of the mountain on the left. Soon afterwards we ascend the inferior hills of the range of Soro, which border the plain on the west, and then arrive in a deep χείμαρρος, or torrent-bed, in a rich soil, and which, though now dry, is occasionally the principal feeder of the Lari. It receives others from the northward, and flows at first to the east, but afterwards turns to the southward, through the plain of Bratzi and Skimatari. It is clearly not the Thermodon. At 8.44 the hamlet of Kapandriti is on the right, at the distance of a mile and a half: at 9.8 we arrive at Andritza, a village of ten or twelve houses, forming what in the northern parts of European Turkey is called a palanka, that is to say, a quadrangle, having all the doors and windows of

§ 2.466   the houses within, and a single gate; thus the whole constitutes a rude fortress. This village, though little more than two miles distant from the road from Thebes to Egripo, is entirely concealed from it by a range of heights, which ate distinguished from the low undulating hills characteristic of this part of Boeotia, by precipices of white rock, which crown the summits.
On a part of these rocky heights, distant 6 or 7 minutes to the north-west of the village of Andritza are found the remains of a small Hellenic polis, or fortified come. The walls of the citadel are traceable round the most precipitous part of one of the rocky brows, which is about 140 yards long and 40 broad; and those of the town are in many places visible, enclosing a slope to the south and west of the acropolis, in which direction the site was bounded by a small torrent, descending from Mount Soro, and flowing into the plain eastward of Mount Siamata, where it joins the torrent which descends from the convent of Platanaki on that mountain. The ruins of the ancient walls are most considerable on the eastern side of the citadel, where a projecting rock is occupied by a square tower, and a similar piece of the wall adjoins it to the northward. Here the remains are about 15 feet high. [sketches]

§ 2.467   The masonry in the upper parts of the work consisted for the most part of irregular polygons joined with the utmost accuracy, but the basis is formed of narrower and regular courses. Beyond the torrent, where are some foundations, perhaps those of a temple, the rains of last October have uncovered an ancient pedestal, formed of a handsome kind of breccia with a red cement, about 2 feet 9 inches square, and I foot 6 inches high, divided in its mid-height by a moulding, and shaped at the top in the form of a triangle with a round hole in the middle, to which a statue may have been attached, or perhaps a tripod. There is no inscription, but on one side below the moulding a large vase is represented between an ox and a man, who is seated in a chair with a sceptre in his right hand: the two figures look inwards towards the vase. The style and execution are indifferent. The vase and ox may allude to the productions of the landed property of the seated figure, who was perhaps the dedicator of the tripod.
Between the place where this monument is lying and the S.W. angle of the acropolis, where the rocks are highest, a copious fountain issues from under them, and discharges itself by two spouts. A small church stands just above it, and there are several other churches on the hills around, but all are in ruins except one near the village similar to that at the fountain. On the western and highest extremity of the hill stands a high square tower in ruins, which I remarked in proceeding from Thebes to Egripo; it seems to be of the time of