DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4098#0463
418 LONG WALLS.
were made to indicate roads through extensive plains and trackless
deserts. They were also raised to record memorable events. When
Darius arrived at the river Artiskos, in Thrace, he ordered his army
to raise heaps of stones upon its banks.1 Primitive altars were also
in the form of tumuli, and composed of heaps of stone and earth,
covered with grass ; these were the ara, graminecE, or cespititice.
The Eppcact, or cumuli Mercuriales, which were heaps round the
altars of Mercury, abounded in Greece.-—" Erexit subitas congestu
cespitis aras."2
The long walls or legs,3 or as others have called them, the arms4 of
Athens, which were of such surprising strength and dimensions, are
now level with the ground ! They may be traced, in several places,
on the way to the Phaleric and Piraean ports, and in some parts the
road passes over them: they consist in large quadrilateral blocks of
stone, which were fastened together with cramps of lead and iron f
they were sixty feet in height. Xenophon, in his Anabasis, men-
tions a town called Larissa, in Media, surrounded by a wall twenty-
five feet thick, and a hundred high ; and another called Mespila, the
walls of which were fifty feet thick, and a hundred and fifty high.
The walls of Athens dwindle into a dwarfish structure when com-
pared with such gigantic works.
The space of ground between the Phaleric and Piraean walls,
■which was adorned with numerous temples, and other public edifices,
is at present occupied with fields, vineyards, olive groves, and gardens.
But i'ew traces of antiquity occur; and even the foundations of those
Herculean ramparts are often sought in vain. I found no remains
of the third or middle wall, which, it is said, led to the Mounychian
port; and which with those of the Piraeus was built by Pericles.
These walls owed their origin to the policy6 of Themistocles; and
1 Herodot. b. 4. c. 92. 2 Lucan. Pharsal. b. 9. v. 988. 3 Strabo and others.
* Livy and others. s Thucyd. b. I.e. 93. Appian. de Bello Mithridat. p. 190.
6 About four hundred and forty-seven years before Christ.
were made to indicate roads through extensive plains and trackless
deserts. They were also raised to record memorable events. When
Darius arrived at the river Artiskos, in Thrace, he ordered his army
to raise heaps of stones upon its banks.1 Primitive altars were also
in the form of tumuli, and composed of heaps of stone and earth,
covered with grass ; these were the ara, graminecE, or cespititice.
The Eppcact, or cumuli Mercuriales, which were heaps round the
altars of Mercury, abounded in Greece.-—" Erexit subitas congestu
cespitis aras."2
The long walls or legs,3 or as others have called them, the arms4 of
Athens, which were of such surprising strength and dimensions, are
now level with the ground ! They may be traced, in several places,
on the way to the Phaleric and Piraean ports, and in some parts the
road passes over them: they consist in large quadrilateral blocks of
stone, which were fastened together with cramps of lead and iron f
they were sixty feet in height. Xenophon, in his Anabasis, men-
tions a town called Larissa, in Media, surrounded by a wall twenty-
five feet thick, and a hundred high ; and another called Mespila, the
walls of which were fifty feet thick, and a hundred and fifty high.
The walls of Athens dwindle into a dwarfish structure when com-
pared with such gigantic works.
The space of ground between the Phaleric and Piraean walls,
■which was adorned with numerous temples, and other public edifices,
is at present occupied with fields, vineyards, olive groves, and gardens.
But i'ew traces of antiquity occur; and even the foundations of those
Herculean ramparts are often sought in vain. I found no remains
of the third or middle wall, which, it is said, led to the Mounychian
port; and which with those of the Piraeus was built by Pericles.
These walls owed their origin to the policy6 of Themistocles; and
1 Herodot. b. 4. c. 92. 2 Lucan. Pharsal. b. 9. v. 988. 3 Strabo and others.
* Livy and others. s Thucyd. b. I.e. 93. Appian. de Bello Mithridat. p. 190.
6 About four hundred and forty-seven years before Christ.