DOI Artikel:
Hogarth, David G.: Egypt Exploration Fund, [4]: Report on prospects of Research in Alexandria
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.10057#0024
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Egypt Exploration Fund.
auce seems to have stood about here. Such edifices as the Tetrapylon,
remains of which might be found near the Zizinia Theatre, the Palace of
Hadrian 1 (of which, according to Neroutzos, some remains were found
in 1880 under the new Greek Hospital), or the Temple of Saturn, later
the Church of Alexander, to be sought under the neglected gardens
which intervene here and there between or behind the houses, were not
of sufficient moment to warrant foreign archa3ologists in undertaking
now a search for their ruinous remains.
The sites of the Gymnasium and Palaestra are, as I have indicated
already (note, p. 6), utterly uncertain; they may be equally as well on
one side or at one end cf the line of the Canopic Street as the other.
The former, celebrated by Strabo (p. 795) as the finest building in the
city, and possessing over a stade of porticoes, was rifled it seems by the
mob very early in the 1st century (Philo, de Virt. p. 5G5). I doubt if it
would be worth the while even of local antiquarians to seek for it now.
In order, however, to ascertain the depth of the deposit, and the general
state of preservation of the ancient town at this point, I sank a pit in
a plot belonging to Paron J. de Menasce, immediately to the west of tho
Zizinia Theatre, but some 170 feet back from the line of the Boulevard.
Had the proprietor been willing, I should have preferred a plot lying im-
mediately on the street front; but probably the one afforded as well as the
other would have done the desired indications. My sounding was at first
17 feet x 114 feet, and I carried it down to 17 feet, cutting at the bottom
for 6 inches into virgin yellow sand nearly as hard as rock. The surface
earth was loose and full of stones and rough red pottery. At 7 feet we
struck, at the west side of the pit, a very coarse but very strong Eoman
pavement of concrete laid on bricks, the latter resting on lime-mortar.
The whole stratum was 1 feet 8 inches thick. On its surface was a
circular depression 3 feet in diameter, evidently the bed of a column-
base uprooted and removed. Digging to the west and north, I found
that the concrete did not continue. Continuing , to descend below its
level, we hit at 12i feet the top of a wall of small stones mortared.
There were two courses of elevation 3 feet thick, and two courses also of
a wall returning south, but in this case only 2 feet thick. Below these
descended to the virgin earth foundation courses of little better than
rubble. This structure was evidently the ruin of part of a Eoman
house, fragments of whose wall-stucco, red, yellow and blue, were found
1 Is this the same as the Gymnasium of Hadrian, later of Liciaius, mentioned by
St. Epiphanius (in haer. ii. 2, p. 728) as converted into a church ?
Egypt Exploration Fund.
auce seems to have stood about here. Such edifices as the Tetrapylon,
remains of which might be found near the Zizinia Theatre, the Palace of
Hadrian 1 (of which, according to Neroutzos, some remains were found
in 1880 under the new Greek Hospital), or the Temple of Saturn, later
the Church of Alexander, to be sought under the neglected gardens
which intervene here and there between or behind the houses, were not
of sufficient moment to warrant foreign archa3ologists in undertaking
now a search for their ruinous remains.
The sites of the Gymnasium and Palaestra are, as I have indicated
already (note, p. 6), utterly uncertain; they may be equally as well on
one side or at one end cf the line of the Canopic Street as the other.
The former, celebrated by Strabo (p. 795) as the finest building in the
city, and possessing over a stade of porticoes, was rifled it seems by the
mob very early in the 1st century (Philo, de Virt. p. 5G5). I doubt if it
would be worth the while even of local antiquarians to seek for it now.
In order, however, to ascertain the depth of the deposit, and the general
state of preservation of the ancient town at this point, I sank a pit in
a plot belonging to Paron J. de Menasce, immediately to the west of tho
Zizinia Theatre, but some 170 feet back from the line of the Boulevard.
Had the proprietor been willing, I should have preferred a plot lying im-
mediately on the street front; but probably the one afforded as well as the
other would have done the desired indications. My sounding was at first
17 feet x 114 feet, and I carried it down to 17 feet, cutting at the bottom
for 6 inches into virgin yellow sand nearly as hard as rock. The surface
earth was loose and full of stones and rough red pottery. At 7 feet we
struck, at the west side of the pit, a very coarse but very strong Eoman
pavement of concrete laid on bricks, the latter resting on lime-mortar.
The whole stratum was 1 feet 8 inches thick. On its surface was a
circular depression 3 feet in diameter, evidently the bed of a column-
base uprooted and removed. Digging to the west and north, I found
that the concrete did not continue. Continuing , to descend below its
level, we hit at 12i feet the top of a wall of small stones mortared.
There were two courses of elevation 3 feet thick, and two courses also of
a wall returning south, but in this case only 2 feet thick. Below these
descended to the virgin earth foundation courses of little better than
rubble. This structure was evidently the ruin of part of a Eoman
house, fragments of whose wall-stucco, red, yellow and blue, were found
1 Is this the same as the Gymnasium of Hadrian, later of Liciaius, mentioned by
St. Epiphanius (in haer. ii. 2, p. 728) as converted into a church ?