Stanhope, John Spencer: Olympia or topography illustrative of the actual state of the plain of Olympia and of the ruins of the city of Elis (London, 1824)

side of the Aphesis was 400 feet in length, he means to express the total
width of the Hippodrome? Far from agreeing with the Count de Choisenl
in considering this prodigious extent as improbable, I cannot but recognise
the usual magnificence of the Greeks, in a construction fit to he associated
with the Temple of the Olympian Jupiter.

The Count de Choisenl finding only six stalls in his Aphesis wished to
persuade us, that only five chariots ran at the same time; he called in
Homer to his assistance and overlooked Pindar*, llic cclcbrator of these
very games, who speaks of twelve; and Sophocles y, who describes forty
chariots as running at the same lime. A number which sufficiently proves,
that the 400 feet is not a length so improbable as has been supposed.

The description given by Pausanias of the progressive advance of the
chariots does not correspond with the Count de Choiseul's Aphesis, where
the stalls are on the same line. There are, besides, several other points
mentioned by that author as connected with this building, which the
Count de Choiseul has entirely overlooked ; first, in his description of it
which we have already ([noted, and to which the Count referred as the
test of his hypothesis, we have seen that there was an altar of nnburnt
brick about the middle of the prow, upon which stood a brazen eagle with
extended wings ; an eagle, we must remember, of sufficient size to become
visible when raised in the air, to all the spectators assembled at the