DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4593#0382
ISLANDS OF THE /EGEAN 35 I
ever, we had come not to inspect the wine-works, but
the famous water-works which Herodotus describes.
A short trip round the other side of the island
gave us a view of the Asiatic shore with lofty Mykale,
the mountain monument of the Persian naval defeat,
and brought us to the old village of Tigarni. An
hour's walk, and we reached the hillside opening of
the famous aqueduct. Lighting candles we entered a
hole about four feet high and just large enough to
admit one person. Fifty feet farther it widened into
a capacious tunnel, some eight feet high and as many
broad, with a small channel on the side for the water.
Herodotus tells us that the excavation was made from
both ends, and that the workmen met in the middle.
The source of the water was at a high point on the
mountain, so that the tunnel penetrated for a great
distance into the mountain's heart. Just why this
vast subterranean aqueduct was made, when the
water might have been conducted on the outside of
the mountain, it is not easy to explain, except on
the supposition that it was for greater protection in
time of war and that the sources were carefully con-
cealed.
After an hour's walk from the tunnel we reached
the ruins of the great temple of Hera, one of the
largest ever built. Its breadth was equal to the
length of the Zeus temple at Olympia, 210 feet; its
exact length cannot be determined, because it has
not been sufficiently excavated. Only one vast Ionic
column is left to give some idea of the height of this
imposing building.
At night wc reversed our course and anchored in
the morning at Mykonos, opposite Delos, where the
ever, we had come not to inspect the wine-works, but
the famous water-works which Herodotus describes.
A short trip round the other side of the island
gave us a view of the Asiatic shore with lofty Mykale,
the mountain monument of the Persian naval defeat,
and brought us to the old village of Tigarni. An
hour's walk, and we reached the hillside opening of
the famous aqueduct. Lighting candles we entered a
hole about four feet high and just large enough to
admit one person. Fifty feet farther it widened into
a capacious tunnel, some eight feet high and as many
broad, with a small channel on the side for the water.
Herodotus tells us that the excavation was made from
both ends, and that the workmen met in the middle.
The source of the water was at a high point on the
mountain, so that the tunnel penetrated for a great
distance into the mountain's heart. Just why this
vast subterranean aqueduct was made, when the
water might have been conducted on the outside of
the mountain, it is not easy to explain, except on
the supposition that it was for greater protection in
time of war and that the sources were carefully con-
cealed.
After an hour's walk from the tunnel we reached
the ruins of the great temple of Hera, one of the
largest ever built. Its breadth was equal to the
length of the Zeus temple at Olympia, 210 feet; its
exact length cannot be determined, because it has
not been sufficiently excavated. Only one vast Ionic
column is left to give some idea of the height of this
imposing building.
At night wc reversed our course and anchored in
the morning at Mykonos, opposite Delos, where the