DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9840#0208
VIII.J ETYMOLOGY OF AXOS. 157
Some silver coins of Axos have been published.
The following is found in the Ducal cabinet at Modena,
and is like one engraved in the Gotha Numaria of
Liebe.
On leaving the village we began immediately to
descend towards the river, which we crossed to the
south-south-east of the acropolis, and soon after com-
menced our ascent. After passing the river we halted
to look back on the district about Axos, which is cer-
tainly very barren and rocky. The situation of the
city answers well to one of the etymologies of its name
given in Stephanus of Byzantium: it was called Axos
because the place is precipitous, Axos being used by
the Cretans in the same sense as agmos, a break, was
by the other Greeks39.
The vicinity of the village is covered here and there
by a few stunted olives, and some patches of tilled land :
but the dreary barrenness of its immediate neighbour-
hood must always have been much the same as it is.
I should imagine the district belonging to the ancient
city to have extended down past Gharazo, and to have
adjoined on the territory of Panormos somewhere in the
fertile plain of Mylopdtamos. Panormos is a city the
remains of which are still seen not far from the shore,
on a low hill near the ruins of Castle Mylopdtamo, and
they still retain their ancient name40. The situation of
39 STEPHANUS BYZANT. v. "Oa£os—tides—Sid to KaTaKprifivov elvai
tov tottov' xaXovari ydp tous toiovtovs TOTrovi a£ous KaQdirep Kal jj/ttets
dy/novs.
40 I did not visit this site, but have had the good fortune of finding,
at Venice, the clearest indications of its situation, in one of the numerous
Italian and Venetian manuscripts which I consulted respecting the history of
Crete between the twelfth and seventeenth centuries. This MS. is in the
Correr Collection, and is entitled, "Historia Candiana descritta da Andrea
Cornaro
Some silver coins of Axos have been published.
The following is found in the Ducal cabinet at Modena,
and is like one engraved in the Gotha Numaria of
Liebe.
On leaving the village we began immediately to
descend towards the river, which we crossed to the
south-south-east of the acropolis, and soon after com-
menced our ascent. After passing the river we halted
to look back on the district about Axos, which is cer-
tainly very barren and rocky. The situation of the
city answers well to one of the etymologies of its name
given in Stephanus of Byzantium: it was called Axos
because the place is precipitous, Axos being used by
the Cretans in the same sense as agmos, a break, was
by the other Greeks39.
The vicinity of the village is covered here and there
by a few stunted olives, and some patches of tilled land :
but the dreary barrenness of its immediate neighbour-
hood must always have been much the same as it is.
I should imagine the district belonging to the ancient
city to have extended down past Gharazo, and to have
adjoined on the territory of Panormos somewhere in the
fertile plain of Mylopdtamos. Panormos is a city the
remains of which are still seen not far from the shore,
on a low hill near the ruins of Castle Mylopdtamo, and
they still retain their ancient name40. The situation of
39 STEPHANUS BYZANT. v. "Oa£os—tides—Sid to KaTaKprifivov elvai
tov tottov' xaXovari ydp tous toiovtovs TOTrovi a£ous KaQdirep Kal jj/ttets
dy/novs.
40 I did not visit this site, but have had the good fortune of finding,
at Venice, the clearest indications of its situation, in one of the numerous
Italian and Venetian manuscripts which I consulted respecting the history of
Crete between the twelfth and seventeenth centuries. This MS. is in the
Correr Collection, and is entitled, "Historia Candiana descritta da Andrea
Cornaro