DOI Artikel:
Waldstein, Charles: [Excavations and discoveries at Eretria, 1891-1895]
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.8681#0185
THE GYMNASIUM AT E HE TBI A.
173
gymnasium. Eretria, too, had its honorable record at Olympia.
This is probably the one gymnasium of the city. The inscriptions
know no other. A gymnasium once built would probably cling to
the same spot through destructions and rebuildings. As a caution
against ruling out the idea of an earlier occupation of this site, we
have ;i vase-fragment that is dated certainly in the fourth century
b. c, and two coins, one a tetradrachm of Lysimachus and
another from Arados in Phoenicia of a date prior to 370 b. c.
There are also traces of changes covering perhaps many years.
The south wall of B has been referred to. The most significant
change, however, is that which is shown in the arrangements for
the delivery of water into the basins. In the triangular space
north of B is a rock-cut channel which was subsequently aban-
doned for a system of round tiles, both directed to a point near
the head of the series of basins. Both of these were apparently
abandoned for a later system coming from a point farther north.
In E there is no trace of the continuance of either system,
although the wall has a hole at the end of the rock-cut channel.
The inference is that both systems once came across the space
now occupied by E, which is another reason for supposing E in
its present state to be late. There is another line of round tiles
passing through K, laid a foot below the floor-level in a trench
dug in very hard bottom to receive it. This is in line with other
similar tiles further up the hill, and seems to lead to the room
east of L; but there is no hole in the walls or floor of this room
to admit water, although it does have the appearance of a cistern.
This also, then, looks like an abandoned system, although it is
possible that it ran under the whole gymnasium, delivering water
further down. The tiles of this line are larger and more finished
than those of the other lines, and are probably somewhat older.
In E, below the floor-level of the last arrangement, there was so
much charcoal that one may believe in a destruction by fire and a
rebuilding with considerable alterations, among them an altera-
tion of level in E.
We can hardly feel any certainty as to the use of any room
except B, where the athletes doubtless took their cold bath by
having water from the basin poured over them. One room, how-
ever, from its different shape challenges us to attempt an explana-
173
gymnasium. Eretria, too, had its honorable record at Olympia.
This is probably the one gymnasium of the city. The inscriptions
know no other. A gymnasium once built would probably cling to
the same spot through destructions and rebuildings. As a caution
against ruling out the idea of an earlier occupation of this site, we
have ;i vase-fragment that is dated certainly in the fourth century
b. c, and two coins, one a tetradrachm of Lysimachus and
another from Arados in Phoenicia of a date prior to 370 b. c.
There are also traces of changes covering perhaps many years.
The south wall of B has been referred to. The most significant
change, however, is that which is shown in the arrangements for
the delivery of water into the basins. In the triangular space
north of B is a rock-cut channel which was subsequently aban-
doned for a system of round tiles, both directed to a point near
the head of the series of basins. Both of these were apparently
abandoned for a later system coming from a point farther north.
In E there is no trace of the continuance of either system,
although the wall has a hole at the end of the rock-cut channel.
The inference is that both systems once came across the space
now occupied by E, which is another reason for supposing E in
its present state to be late. There is another line of round tiles
passing through K, laid a foot below the floor-level in a trench
dug in very hard bottom to receive it. This is in line with other
similar tiles further up the hill, and seems to lead to the room
east of L; but there is no hole in the walls or floor of this room
to admit water, although it does have the appearance of a cistern.
This also, then, looks like an abandoned system, although it is
possible that it ran under the whole gymnasium, delivering water
further down. The tiles of this line are larger and more finished
than those of the other lines, and are probably somewhat older.
In E, below the floor-level of the last arrangement, there was so
much charcoal that one may believe in a destruction by fire and a
rebuilding with considerable alterations, among them an altera-
tion of level in E.
We can hardly feel any certainty as to the use of any room
except B, where the athletes doubtless took their cold bath by
having water from the basin poured over them. One room, how-
ever, from its different shape challenges us to attempt an explana-