DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1031#0097
CHAP. X.] CHANGE OF BEMA. 73
the present bema is concerned, I think we should
not.
It is asserted, on the supposed authority of
Plutarch, that the bema of that age looked towards
the sea; that it was afterwards turned toward the
land by the Thirty Tyrants, who are thought to have
thus intimated their antipathy to a popular govern-
ment ; a maritime and a democratic power being in
their opinion identical.
Now the present bema looks in an inland direc-
tion : it is not therefore the bema from which Pericles
spoke. It has been attempted to obviate this con-
clusion by different expedients. The veracity of Plu-
tarch has been questioned—his assertion rejected as
false. It is impossible, as is alleged, that the aspect
of the bema should ever have been such, that an
orator standing upon it must have turned his back
on the Agora and city of Athens. This seems to
be a cogent argument, but is it a pertinent one ?
The words of Plutarch4 require, I conceive, not so
much to be refuted as explained. Their meaning
seems to be this. According to its original structure,
from the bema in the Pnyx the sea was visible; the
Thirty Tyrants altered it in such a manner that it
should not command a view of the sea, but of the
4 Plutarch, v. Themist. (i. p. 476. Reiske.) to |8^a to ir XIvvkI
Treiroitjfxeirov wtrr' dTrofZXeireiu irpos tiJi/ BdXaaxrav (i. e. 80 that a
person might look off from it to the sea) vtrrepov oi TptaKovra Tpos
Trju x&pav dirirpe^tav. On this sense of dmflXeTrew, see Buttmann.
Excurs. Platon. Alcib. I.
the present bema is concerned, I think we should
not.
It is asserted, on the supposed authority of
Plutarch, that the bema of that age looked towards
the sea; that it was afterwards turned toward the
land by the Thirty Tyrants, who are thought to have
thus intimated their antipathy to a popular govern-
ment ; a maritime and a democratic power being in
their opinion identical.
Now the present bema looks in an inland direc-
tion : it is not therefore the bema from which Pericles
spoke. It has been attempted to obviate this con-
clusion by different expedients. The veracity of Plu-
tarch has been questioned—his assertion rejected as
false. It is impossible, as is alleged, that the aspect
of the bema should ever have been such, that an
orator standing upon it must have turned his back
on the Agora and city of Athens. This seems to
be a cogent argument, but is it a pertinent one ?
The words of Plutarch4 require, I conceive, not so
much to be refuted as explained. Their meaning
seems to be this. According to its original structure,
from the bema in the Pnyx the sea was visible; the
Thirty Tyrants altered it in such a manner that it
should not command a view of the sea, but of the
4 Plutarch, v. Themist. (i. p. 476. Reiske.) to |8^a to ir XIvvkI
Treiroitjfxeirov wtrr' dTrofZXeireiu irpos tiJi/ BdXaaxrav (i. e. 80 that a
person might look off from it to the sea) vtrrepov oi TptaKovra Tpos
Trju x&pav dirirpe^tav. On this sense of dmflXeTrew, see Buttmann.
Excurs. Platon. Alcib. I.