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Falkener, Edward
Ephesus and the temple of Diana — London, 1862

DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5179#0124

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98 ANCIENT EPHESUS.

within another. They are constructed of large
stone.1 The following particulars are important, as
they serve to confirm the idea that the superincum-
bent building was a gymnasium. The vaults, as we
are informed by two travellers,2 are intersected by
a canal communicating on the one side with the city
port; and if so, it is probable that the other extremity
communicates with the lake in the centre of the
forum. The water is knee-deep at the entrance,
but pure and limpid, and rather tepid. Spon and
"WTieler assert that two of the vaults were narrower
than the rest, and appeared like aqueducts, and that
water was still running in them; while Pococke3
notices a great number of earthen pipes in these
passages, which he suggests may have served as
water-conduits. Thus, independent of the cha-
racter of the superincumbent building, these sub-
terranean galleries and reservoirs of water would
lead us to determine the building to have been a
gymnasium ; especially if we may rely upon the
authority of Chishull, who states that he observed
similar substructions under several large buildings,
—some at Sardis, and others at this very place. So
that we may safely conjecture these subterranean
vaults to have answered a similar purpose to the
Piscina Mirabile at Cape Misenum, and that of
Sorrento. Although this building does not adhere
to the usual type of gymnasia, it having no diaulus,

1 Van Egmont and Heyruan, Travels, i. 107.

2 Id. Travels, pp. 106-7. 3 Descr. of the E. p. 52.
 
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