DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4266#0055
22
PLAN OF THE PNYX.
the Areopagus,) the City Wall3, which, at this spot appears to be alluded to by ancient authors, and
was of* very considerable height, must have intercepted any view of the sea or country from such a
level, (even if the walls of the structure itself, remains of which exist, had not adequately interposed,)
unless we suppose some improbable perforation to have occupied the immediate point of view toward
the iEgean. This consideration would cause us either to renounce the presumed authenticity of this
locality as that of the Pnyx, or to impugn the authority of Plutarch. Reluctant nevertheless to call
in question an historical assertion, by an Author of so much credit, yet contemplating the difficulties
already existing, in reconciling with the passage of that biographer % the aspect of the Oratory so
anciently and permanently sculptured upon the living rock, we are inclined to regard his statement,
written five centuries after the asserted fact, as resulting from some popular Attic tradition d, calculated
to exaggerate, and to visibly perpetuate the historical odium attached to the despotic measures of the
Thirty, whose reign was so justly execrated by the Athenians; the records of which must have been
associated, in a very great degree, with that of the earliest degradation and subjugation of their country *.
W. K.
a Pausanias says that the Wall of Athens which he calls 'the d The present place of the Bcma is evidently the original one,
ancient pcribolus ' enclosed the hill of the Museum ; conxe- coeval with the very ancient formation of the Structure, and its
quentlv, without the existing evidence of its traces, or of the re- existing position is consistent with that aspect for which it is
mains of this civic structure, it might have been inferred to in-
close or traverse also the adjacent height now termed the hill of
Pnyx. Attica, C. XXV.
b Suidas and others inform us that the sun-dial of the astro-
nomer Mcton was seen against the wall in the Pnyx, (by some
topographers considered to mean the City Wall,) before the archon-
ship of Pythodorus, which was in the first year of the Pelopon-
nesian war, Olym. 87- 1- B.C. 431. n»o riuMwsou Jt '/i7\mr^oirtot
vfi It rr, tvi ovar, \y.-/.}.nina ttjo; tu Ta'p^fi T» h Iltvy-i. Suid. Ill Metw:.
V. Schol. in Aristoph. Avib. See Fauvel's Plan of Athens, and
Hawkins on the Topography of Athens in Walpole's Memoirs,
V. I. pp. 480 501.
stated to have been altered by the Thirty, and consequently not
in apparent contradiction to the popular tradition here attributed
to ' the many ' of the Athenians, who may be supposed to have
been regardless of the date of the architectural execution, or the
impracticability of a more eligible place for the Pulpitum at this
locality ; unless indeed, ' by some temporary alteration' as in
vain suggested by Col. Leake, since it would appear never to
have been effected J for Aristophanes and his scholiast speak of the
Stone Pulpit in the Pnyx as it must have been ininmveably left
at the completion of the architectural operations of Themistocles.
"O; Tif xpaTsi' tvt TOV Aifiuu tov t Til livVKi.
Who now has possession of the Stone (Pulpit) in the Pnyx ?
Arist. Pax. v. 680, a Brunck. Achar. v. (J83, and Scholia.
c Leake's Topography of Athens, page *4'2, and Plan, PI. II.
* In Stuart's Athens, Vol. III. edit, of 1827, .PI. 38. Pig. 5, we have introduced a new representation of the Pnyx, and of the
distant scenery, including an outline of the Pineeus, as seen from the higher vicinity, overlooking the site of the ancient City Wall. This
view it has been suggested would be appropriately introduced in this volume ; the reader's attention is therefore referred to it as being
calculated to elucidate this plan, and the previous observations. See Stuart's Plan of the Walls of Athens, Vol. III. PI. I. Lett. A.
PLAN OF THE PNYX.
the Areopagus,) the City Wall3, which, at this spot appears to be alluded to by ancient authors, and
was of* very considerable height, must have intercepted any view of the sea or country from such a
level, (even if the walls of the structure itself, remains of which exist, had not adequately interposed,)
unless we suppose some improbable perforation to have occupied the immediate point of view toward
the iEgean. This consideration would cause us either to renounce the presumed authenticity of this
locality as that of the Pnyx, or to impugn the authority of Plutarch. Reluctant nevertheless to call
in question an historical assertion, by an Author of so much credit, yet contemplating the difficulties
already existing, in reconciling with the passage of that biographer % the aspect of the Oratory so
anciently and permanently sculptured upon the living rock, we are inclined to regard his statement,
written five centuries after the asserted fact, as resulting from some popular Attic tradition d, calculated
to exaggerate, and to visibly perpetuate the historical odium attached to the despotic measures of the
Thirty, whose reign was so justly execrated by the Athenians; the records of which must have been
associated, in a very great degree, with that of the earliest degradation and subjugation of their country *.
W. K.
a Pausanias says that the Wall of Athens which he calls 'the d The present place of the Bcma is evidently the original one,
ancient pcribolus ' enclosed the hill of the Museum ; conxe- coeval with the very ancient formation of the Structure, and its
quentlv, without the existing evidence of its traces, or of the re- existing position is consistent with that aspect for which it is
mains of this civic structure, it might have been inferred to in-
close or traverse also the adjacent height now termed the hill of
Pnyx. Attica, C. XXV.
b Suidas and others inform us that the sun-dial of the astro-
nomer Mcton was seen against the wall in the Pnyx, (by some
topographers considered to mean the City Wall,) before the archon-
ship of Pythodorus, which was in the first year of the Pelopon-
nesian war, Olym. 87- 1- B.C. 431. n»o riuMwsou Jt '/i7\mr^oirtot
vfi It rr, tvi ovar, \y.-/.}.nina ttjo; tu Ta'p^fi T» h Iltvy-i. Suid. Ill Metw:.
V. Schol. in Aristoph. Avib. See Fauvel's Plan of Athens, and
Hawkins on the Topography of Athens in Walpole's Memoirs,
V. I. pp. 480 501.
stated to have been altered by the Thirty, and consequently not
in apparent contradiction to the popular tradition here attributed
to ' the many ' of the Athenians, who may be supposed to have
been regardless of the date of the architectural execution, or the
impracticability of a more eligible place for the Pulpitum at this
locality ; unless indeed, ' by some temporary alteration' as in
vain suggested by Col. Leake, since it would appear never to
have been effected J for Aristophanes and his scholiast speak of the
Stone Pulpit in the Pnyx as it must have been ininmveably left
at the completion of the architectural operations of Themistocles.
"O; Tif xpaTsi' tvt TOV Aifiuu tov t Til livVKi.
Who now has possession of the Stone (Pulpit) in the Pnyx ?
Arist. Pax. v. 680, a Brunck. Achar. v. (J83, and Scholia.
c Leake's Topography of Athens, page *4'2, and Plan, PI. II.
* In Stuart's Athens, Vol. III. edit, of 1827, .PI. 38. Pig. 5, we have introduced a new representation of the Pnyx, and of the
distant scenery, including an outline of the Pineeus, as seen from the higher vicinity, overlooking the site of the ancient City Wall. This
view it has been suggested would be appropriately introduced in this volume ; the reader's attention is therefore referred to it as being
calculated to elucidate this plan, and the previous observations. See Stuart's Plan of the Walls of Athens, Vol. III. PI. I. Lett. A.