This paper, and the plates by Mr. A. C. Blunt which accompany it, are the first-fruits of a journey in Phrygia, October 15 to November 27, 1881, for which Mr. Blunt was sent out specially by the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies. It would be both unbecoming and unnecessary for me to speak of the drawings which he contributes to this paper; but I may say that he learned photography in the few days that were at his disposal before leaving England specially for the work of the expedition, so that he has been enabled to verify at home, by means of photographs, the drawings that he made on the spot. In addition to this, we together compared most of his drawings with the original monuments, and spared no care to attain accuracy. It has been necessary for me to write in Athens without seeing the completed drawings: this has added much to the difficulty of the work, but the reader who finds the text correspond with the plates will thus have an additional proof of the accuracy of both. I should, however, have found it quite impossible to write what I have here written without constant help from the drawings, the artistic taste and clear memory of one friend who accompanied us, to whom are due the discovery of many monuments in the two necropoleis, and several of the drawings here published.

“Und jenen Sängern zu Smyrna, Phokäa, Kyme, Neonteichos, Larissa lag immer der majestätische Sipylos vor Augen mit seinen Felsenhöhen und Abgründen, mit seinen Quellen und kleinen Seen, mit der Erinnerung und Mahnung grosser Erdrevolutionen und Zerstörung reichen irdischen Segens und menschlichen Glückes. So ist denn hier das Bild eines Himmels auf Erden, eines zum Himmel strebenden Menschenglückes, aber auch das Bild eines überkühnen Hochmuthes und göttlichen Strafgerichtes vor allen lokal befestigt worden.” These words of Stark (Niobe, p. 409) well describe the peculiar fascination that the splendid mountain still exercises on one that lives under its shadow, and the ever-growing interest with which one returns to its past history. The least satisfactory part of Stark's excellent work is precisely that which treats of Niobe in Sipylos (98–109 and 403–46). It suffersfrom the lack of trustworthy information about the district. Even after he had himself had the opportunity of seeing for a few hours the socalled “Niobe,” and had recognised in it ein Gebilde alter heimischer, in den phrygischen Bildwerken der Göttermutter vielfach sich später aussprechenden Kunst und eines tiefen Naturgefühls, his rationalising treatment of the myth (Nach d. Gr. Orient, pp. 231–54) is very unsatisfactory. We are to believe that a powerful empire under a king Tantalus existed here, that his capital was destroyed by an earthquake, and his empire ruined by an Assyrian invasion (Stark's account seems to waver between the two and finally to adopt both explanations), that his son went down to the seaport of the empire and sailed away to find an empire and a bride ready for him in Greece. Though a poetic and fervid imagination, stimulated by the charm of the wonderful Sipylos, has made Stark's account a seductive picture, yet it requires only a statement of the theory in its bare outlines to show how uncritical it is.

There is an interesting question in relation to Dr. Schliemann's Trojan excavations, which seems yet unsettled; it is this: when was the historical Ilion really founded? and the answer to this question involves another of considerable interest: was the historical Ilion on the site of the mythical Troy? If its foundation be recent, and in historical times, there is room for doubt as to the identity of the sites, and accordingly the ancient inquirers who denied this identity also denied the antiquity of Ilion. I propose, therefore, to review the evidence as briefly as possible by the light of recent discussions, and beg leave for this very brevity's sake to be allowed through the following argument to call the heroic city Troy, and the historical Ilion, without further specification.

Both Dr. Schliemann and I had come independently to the same conclusion on the seeond question just stated. He was led by his excavations, and I by a critical examination of the historical notices of the ancients, to assert the identity of the two sites, and we advanced from this to the further conclusion, that the alleged foundation of Ilion in historical times on a new site was not true, and that probably Ilion succeeded to the site and traditions of Troy without any considerable interruption. This was the general opinion throughout Greek history, till a very learned man, Demetrius of Scepsis, undertook to destroy the claims to a heroic ancestry of the Ilians, then rich and insolent through the favour of Lysimachus.

It is well-known how, in the spring of 1877, the German explorers at Olympia had the good fortune to dig up the chief parts of a statue which had been seen by Pausanias in the same spot, and had been described by him in the following words:—χρόνῳ δὲ ὕστερον καὶ ἄλλα ἀνέθεσαν ἐς τὸ Ἡραῖον, Ἑρμῆν λίθου, Διόνυσον δὲ φέρει νήπιον, τέχνη δέ ἐστι Πραξιτέλους (Paus. v. 17, 3).

The bulk of the statue is in exquisite preservation. The greater part however of the right arm of Hermes is missing. Since the whole motive of the subject depends upon the action of the arm, speculation has been busy as to the most probable restoration of this limb.

With a view to the solution of this problem, Benndorf has collected together a series of types of the Hermes and Dionysos group. His list is not exhaustive, and he seems to have passed over certain instances of importance.

My principal object in this paper is to attempt to show that a certain group of types contains the clue to the restoration of the missing arm, although they do not represent the arm in its true position; and on the other hand to show that certain types which have the arm in its true position, are untrustworthy guides as to the restoration of the attribute attached to it.

Upon examining the rich collection of silver vessels and statuettes discovered at Bernay in the Département de l'Eure now in the Cabinet des Médailles of the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris, I came upon a silver patera (Pl. XXII.) with an emblema in the centre, upon which, in most delicate repoussé work, is the figure of a youthful Hermes, nude, with a chlamys hanging over his left shoulder and down by the side of his arm, a caduceus in his left hand and a purse in his right, in an attitude indicative of a slow walk, and with the head turned upwards.

The valuable discovery of this large collection of ancient silver was made on the 21st of March, 1830. A Norman peasant named Prosper Taurin, while ploughing his field situated in the hamlet Le Villeret, Commune de Berthouville, Arrondissement de Bernay, Département de l'Eure, came upon an obstacle which, instead of simply avoiding as his predecessors had done, he resolved to examine. Borrowing a pick from a labourer he removed what appeared to him to be a large pebble, but what in reality was a Roman tile. When this was removed he came upon over a hundred objects in silver which were deposited on some pieces of marl at a depth of six inches, weighing considerably over 50 lbs.

The before unpublished bronze statuette here reproduced in its original size, No. 655 of the collection of bronzes in the Museum of the Louvre, is called, by the late M. de Longpérier, ‘Nero carrying Britannicus on his left arm.’ This distinguished and meritorious archæologist herein followed a tendency prevalent in former days of readily seeing the portrait of some historical person, especially a Roman Emperor, in purely ideal monuments.

It will be seen at a glance that we have in this work a representation of Hermes with the infant Dionysos, and moreover a modified replica of the statue of Praxiteles discovered by the Germans in 1877 at Olympia. Though there are some modifications, this statuette is the closest reproduction of the work of Praxiteles of all the replicas that have come to my knowledge.

Through the kindness of Mr. Newton I was informed that the British Museum is now the possessor of an inscribed gold tablet found on the site of the ancient Petelia, in Southern Italy, which had been considered as lost after the death of Millingen, to whom it first belonged. The inscription was published by Franz in 1836, and after him by Göttling; afterwards it appeared in the third volume of the Corp. Inscr. Gr. No. 5,772, and recently again in Kaibel's Epigrammata Graeca ex Lapid. No. 1,037. Franz's first reading, from the original, was not quite satisfactory, and the modified reading given by him afterwards, and by the others, was not founded on the inspection of the original, a fac-simile of which was never published. Recent discoveries having thrown a new light on this monument I was glad to hear of its existence in the British Museum, and Mr. Newton kindly favoured my wish of seeing it published again more completely and exactly, with a fac-simile. He entrusted this task to Mr. Cecil Smith, to whose skilful accuracy we are indebted for the fac-simile here published, representing the monument slightly larger than its real size, as well as for the following explanatory note on the reading of the inscription.

Nacoleia is situated at the western border of the wide treeless plain which extends over the greater part of northern Phrygia and Galatia. In front of it north and east lies the great valley, which is drained by the river Sangarius or Sagaris: behind it are the Phrygian mountains, in which are the most important remains of the old Phrygian kingdom about six hours' journey away. The ancient city was placed on an isolated hill at the mouth of a glen bordered by higher hills: the modern town of Seid-el-Ghazi lies below this hill in the glen. A very fine old mosque, which would well reward careful examination, is placed far up on one of the higher hills: in it are buried Seid-el-Ghazi, the Arab general of Haroun al Raschid, and his wife the Greek princess. Much interesting information about these personages, and about the later history of Nacoleia, may be found in Mordtmann's paper, Münch. Gel. Anz. 1860. It is unnecessary to repeat anything that has been already said by him about the city, which plays a considerable part in later Roman history and was the scene of several important battles.

I lately enriched a village library with some volumes of Dickens; but, to my disappointment, the country-folk did not care for them. And the reason was not only that all those amusing vulgarities seem neither vulgar nor amusing to rustic readers; but far more because their way of life is so entirely removed from that life of the office, the back-parlour, and the street, with which the great humourist has to do, that they cannot imagine it. My failure made me reflect how imperfect is our acquaintance with the scenery and associations of classical life, and how much of the wit and fun of ancient humourists may be lost upon us, who live in such a different world from theirs. This misgiving must strike the reader of the Characters: he feels that they are sketched from life, but he craves for a completer familiarity with the Athens of the 4th century, without which many of the minuter touches may be missed. The very quality in Theophrastus which some have called ‘superficial,’ makes a fresh demand upon the reader. The author indicates only the external symptoms of character, not concerning himself with a deeper analysis.

§ 1. Pindar is a classic of whom the study may be expected to grow with the growth of an interest in Greek archæology. Not, indeed, because it is indebted to him, so largely as to many other authors, for direct illustration. Rather because his ‘Odes of Victory’ are lit up in a new way by a fuller knowledge of the places with which they are concerned, of the contests which they celebrate, of the art and religion by which they were inspired. To take a single instance—the discoveries at Olympia, which have restored for us the main features of the altis, have given a new meaning for every modern reader to the beautiful, but hitherto indistinct, picture suggested by Pindar's description of ‘all the holy place resounding with festal joy,’ when ‘the lovely light of the fair-faced moon shone forth’ after a day of contests. Pindar's odes are poems of occasion, magnificent expressions of Hellenic life in its most distinctively Hellenic phases. Hitherto the real drawback to his popularity has not been obscurity of language, but the strain which he was felt to place on the modern imagination.

Unanimous recognition has justly been accorded to the rare energy and devotion by which Dr. Schliemann has achieved his enterprise of excavating the mound of Hissarlik, once the acropolis of the historic Greek Ilium. Whatever views may be held as to the origin of the older remains, or their significance in relation to the epic of Troy, there is only one opinion as to the interesting and valuable nature of the service which the sustained enthusiasm of the explorer has rendered to the study of antiquity.

The problem of Hissarlik involves two separate issues. It is the omission to distinguish these which, more than anything else, has impeded a clear view. The first issue is:—What are the ruins that have been found at Hissarlik?

In his valuable Contributions to the History of Southern Aeolis, Mr. Ramsay remarks (Journ. Hell. Stud. II. 2, p. 278): ‘In the plain of the Kodja we might expect more than one Aeolic settlement, if it be fully explored.’ This prediction was verified a few months only after it was written by discoveries made in this district in the spring of 1881, by Mr. George Dennis, M. Salomon Reinach, M. Baltazzi, and myself. I published a brief account of them in the Academy of April 9th, 1881, and M. Reinach has alluded to them, in the history of his excavations on the site of Myrina, in the Bulletin de Correspondence hellénique April 1882; but do details in regard to them have yet appeared. These details I now propose to give, throwing the account of them, for the sake of convenience, into narrative form.

Mr. Ramsay has already explained the topography of the coast from Myrina to Kymê. Midway between the two, about two and a half miles from Kyniê and three from Myrina, stands the little Greek village of Ali Aghá, while the Koja Chai, or ‘Big River,’ flows into the sea just below the ancient acropolis of Myrina, now known as Kalabassary. The Koja runs in an easterly direction, turning slightly to the north about eight miles from its mouth, towards the ruins of Namrût Kalessi, already described by both Mr. Ramsay and M. Reinach. Before entering the sea it is joined by a stream which runs past the village of Güzel Hissár.

Upon passing through the corridor which leads to the Salle des Bronzes in the Louvre Museum, my attention was attracted by a marble head (Plate XXIII.) placed on one of the higher shelves of the case running along the wall, which contains a number of marble fragments of all descriptions. The more I looked at this head, the more did it seem to manifest the peculiarities of style and workmanship as well as the peculiar dimensions (just under life-size) of the metopes of the Parthenon. It was at least evident that none of the remains of ancient art, not as yet identified with the metopes of the Parthenon, that had come to my notice, was so fully possessed of the characteristics marking these metopes. The experience resulting from a careful and scientific comparative study and observation of a great number of identified ancient monuments has shown that the works of the various periods, schools, and artists, are each possessed of marked individual characteristics, and differ very noticeably from one another in conception, style, and workmanship. These differences, however, only become noticeable and useful as guides to the classification and identification of works of ancient art when numerous works, or reproductions from them, are placed side by side, and are subjected to trained observation in all respects similar to the observation which has been so long and profitably in use in the natural sciences. Based upon this experience, the recognition of the characteristics of this head lead me to believe that it could not belong to a period posterior to the time of Pheidias or previous to the Persian wars. In fact, it appeared to me highly probable that the head really belonged to one of the metopes.

The horse's head, two photographs of which appear on Pl. XXIV., was procured in the neighbourhood of Tarentum and presented to the British Museum by J. Reddie Anderson, Esq.

This presentation is a new and pleasing indication of the interest felt by private collectors in the British Museum, and of the increasing feeling that only in public collections can ancient monuments be protected from risk; a thesis which I have already had occasion in my Introduction to Ancient Marbles in Great Britain to maintain and to enforce by many sad instances.

I comply with the request of the Editors of this Journal in accompanying the photographs with a few remarks.

According to a note by Professor Percy Gardner, the quality of the marble is not very fine. The length of the head, from end of mane over forehead to lip, is 0·46 m., the height from bottom of cheek-bone to top of head 0·34 m. The lower lip is wanting, the ears have been broken.

While excavating in the ruins of the palace of Sennacherib at Koujounjik in 1880 Mr. Rassam found a small figure of Herakles sculptured in calcareous stone, and inscribed on the front of the plinth with a dedication by a certain Sarapiodoros (Σαραπιόδωρος Ἀρτεμιδώρου—κατ᾿ εὐχήν), and on one side of the plinth with the name of the artist Diogenes (Διογένης ἐποίει). The letters are painted red. The figure is now in the British Museum. Its height is 1 ft. 9 in.

A Greek sculptor of the name of Diogenes is known only, so far as I am aware, in the one instance cited by Pliny, in speaking of the sculptural decorations of the Pantheon of Agrippa in Rome, among which he mentions Caryatides ‘in columnis,’ whatever that may mean. These Caryatides by Diogenes the Athenian were much admired. But if Brunn is right, as he appears to be in identifying the statue of this kind in the Vatican Museum as a survivor from the Pantheon, he is evidently right also in concluding that Diogenes had merely made very careful copies from the Caryatides of the Erechtheum. Even a careful copyist was perhaps rare to find in the time of Agrippa. Our Diogenes was no doubt also a copyist, but apparently not a very careful one. For this among other reasons he cannot well be identified with his Athenian namesake. If our Diogenes had been an Athenian he would have said so on the plinth unless he had sculptured his Herakles in Athens where there would have been no occasion to say it.

Few subjects have afforded more opportunities for archaeological controversy than the western pediment of the Parthenon; and of this possibly the most uncertain, as well as the most important part is the centre group, of whose meaning very many and very different explanations have been given. This controversy received a fresh start from the discovery, in 1872, of a vase which has represented upon it, partly in relief, partly in painting, a design which evidently bears a more or less close relation to the pediment itself. The vase, a hydria, was found in a grave at Kertsch, and it was published, with a long and learned discussion of its bearing and importance, by M. Stephani. It will perhaps be as well here to give a brief account of its composition. In the centre is an olive-tree, on the left of which is Athene, on the right, Poseidon. Amidst the branches of the tree is Nike, who floats towards Athene, so indicating the issue of the contest, and round its trunk is coiled a snake, which raises its head as if against Poseidon. This god stands half advanced upon his right foot. In his right hand he raises the trident, the points of which are just above the head of the snake; with his left he holds the bridle of a horse, which stands beside him. Between his legs is one dolphin, and another is a little beyond his left foot. Athene on her side has raised her spear, but its point, like that of Poseidon's trident, is directed downwards. On her left arm is her shield, the outer edge of which is close to the trunk of the tree. Behind her advances Dionysus, accompanied by his panther; he stretches out his thyrsus in front of her, towards the olive-tree. Behind him, on a higher level, is a female figure, nude to the waist, who is half reclining upon the ground. On the right, behind Poseidon and his horse, is a female figure, in long flowing drapery, flying from the centre of the composition. Beyond her there is a rock, upon which is seated a bearded man of kingly appearance with a long sceptre resting against his shoulder; he has his back to the centre group, towards which, however, he turns round his head. Above him is a small temple, on a higher level. Of these figures only those which form part of the central group are represented in relief as well as in colour. In the case of the others only small portions, such as the thyrsus or the sceptre, and especially gold bosses or ornaments, are raised, the rest of these figures being painted as on ordinary Greek vases.

Of the five Phrygian monuments now published from the drawings of Mr. A. C. Blunt, No. 4 on Pl. XXVIII, may be assigned to an early period of Phrygian history. It has been already published by Steuart, Anc. Monum.; but like all his drawings, this is very incorrect and gives an inaccurate idea of the original. The monument is at Yapuldak (see the map in last number of this Journal). There was at this place a town or fortification of some kind on the top of a hill, which rises about 200 feet above the plain. The western side of the hill is a precipice of rock, and on all other sides it is very steep. On the western side an underground staircase cut in the rock leads down to the plain: a similar one at Pishmish Kalessi has already been mentioned above, p. 6. Near this staircase there is a doorway leading into a small rock-chamber, from which another door in the opposite wall leads into a second chamber, larger than the first. At the back of the second chamber a door admits into a third chamber, and in the back of this third chamber there is a door or window which looks out over the precipice to the west. One can step out through this window and stand on a ledge about eighteen inches wide; and this is the only way to get a near view of the carved front which is now given according to Mr. Blunt's drawing and measurements. The architectural work round the door shows the love of ornament characteristic of both Phrygian and Mycenaean art. It does not consist of curved mouldings: the section shows only straight lines. There is a high pediment over the window, the centre of which is occupied by a peculiarly shaped obelisk. This pediment is very like one over the door of a tomb in the side of Pishmish Kalessi, engraved by Perrot, Voy. Archéol. p. 146; but is much more elaborate. On the two sides of the obelisk, arranged in the usual symmetrical fashion, are two animals, on the right side certainly a bull, on the left side probably a horse. The horse is frequently represented on the outside of Phrygian tombs, but I do not know any other case where the bull appears on them.