Page:EB1922 - Volume 30.djvu/216

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182
ARCHAEOLOGY


Greece. There has been most archaeological activity at Athens, where its results have been mainly topographical. The cemetery of Kerameikos outside the Dipylon Gate was being extensively ex- cavated and restored, so far as possible, to its original 5th-century appearance by the German Institute in 1914. Ostraka inscribed with familiar political names were found in the course of the work. An examination of the Pnyx in 1911 showed that the supporting wall is no earlier than the 4th century. A search for the Odeion of Pericles on the south-east slope of the Acropolis was inconclusive. Some pieces of sculpture were found here, among them fragments of the Parthenon and a singular relief of Asclepius with a kneeling woman suppliant. Sculpture was also found in excavating the Stoa of the Giants and the Roman agora. A cemetery at Phaleron dating from the 7th century was examined. A curious find was a grave containing burials of eighteen men fettered with iron collars and shackles. At Sunium the west end, pediment, and roof of the temple of Poseidon was rebuilt with excavated fragments. A circular building identified (by Svoronos) as the Attic niint in the Peloponnesian War, was cleared, and a fine archaic relief of an ephebe crowning himself was discovered. A hoard of about 1,600 silver coins, found at Carditsa in 1914, was acquired by the National Museum of Athens. The coins are chiefly Theban, of all dates down to 315 B.C. There are about loo archaic Aeginetan staters, and some other rare coins.

The important excavations of the American School at prehistoric sites near Corinth have been mentioned. Work in the city had not been resumed after the war up to 1921 ; the last finds in 1914 were two colossal portrait statues of members of the Julio-Claudian family, perhaps Gaius and Lucius Caesar. The reexamination of Delphi by the French School was still going on in 1921, but on a small scale, while the publication of the first discoveries, made in 1892, was still unfinished. Among other details, the interior arrangements of the temple were studied, and it was established that there was no natural cave, but an artificial recess in the sanctuary, of which the walls still remain. The excavator also claimed to have found the omphalos itself. The pediment sculptures were reconsidered with fresh fragments and a better knowledge of the tympanon, an3 a new restoration of the eastern group has been proposed (F. Courby, 1914). A popular but scholarly account of Delphi was translated into English from the Danish of F. Poulsen in 1920.

Halae in Locris was dug by Americans in 1911. The cemetery, extending from archaic Greek to Roman times, and the acropolis were explored. The sanctuary of Apollo Corynthos at Longas was excavated in 1911. Five temples were found, and, among small objects, a number of bronzes. Material for reconstructing the megaron or Hearth of Despoina was found at Lycosura. The monu- ment was an open-air altar, a terrace with portico, dated about 200 B.C. Many votive terra-cotta statuettes were obtained, the com- monest being the figure of a sheep dressed as a woman, erect with a basket on its head, no doubt a ceremonial costume of worshippers. In the Roman city of Nikopolis the temple built by Octavian to Mars and Neptune, in commemoration of the battle of Actium, was excavated in 1912, and fragments of its structure were recovered. Further examination of towers in the town wall of Pagasae (or Demetrias) led to the discovery of many more painted grave- stones, like those first found in 1907. The town was explored in 19,12, and the cemetery from which the stelae came was found. The graves are mostly of the 3rd century B.C. At Tanagra a large series of graves was opened by the Greek authorities in 191 1, but the finds, though numerous, were poor. There were more than a hundred terra-cotta statuettes, but none of fine quality.

Thessaly and Macedonia.. Thessaly has been consistently studied by Arbamtopoullos in his capacity as Ephor of Antiquities and as a soldier in the Balkan wars (1912-3). The new territory here and in Macedonia was surveyed as soon as acquired, and a central museum for Thessaly was established in the former Turkish custom-house at Elassona before the cessation of hostilities. The sites of Pella and Dion were examined by the Greeks, and the French began to excavate the necropolis and theatre of Philippi in 1914. In the next war, the landing of the Allied forces at Salonica led to some ar- chaeological discoveries in the occupied territory. Reports of the work of British and French troops were published in the Annual of the British School at Athens in 1919. The results were scanty, as would be expected during a military campaign. Prehistoric sites were located on the characteristic mounds of the country, and some were superficially excavated; but most finds were accidental and un- recorded, and many were dispersed and lost. The antiquities col- lected at the headquarters of the British Salonica force were pre- sented to the nation by the Greek Government, and are now in the British Museum. Shortly before the war a double-chamber tomb was excavated in a tumulus at Langaza. This is the best example of the Macedonian tumulus-tombs, which seem all to be of I lellenistic date. One was excavated by the French in the town of Salonica, and another by the British on the Monastir road in 1919. The Langaza tomb had unusually elaborate architectural ornaments and two pairs of doors, one of wood, the other of marble. The doors were removed to the Ottoman Museum at Constantinople. A series of papers dealing with the little-known antiquities of Thrace has been published by G. Seure in the Revue A rcheologique since 1911.

South Russia. The sites of the colonies in South Russia used to be a copious source of Greek antiquities of all periods, but the supply

has ceased at the present time. From 1911 to 1914 Kerch (Panti- capaion), Old and New Chersonesos, Tanais, Olbia, a town on the Is. of Berezan, and a cemetery on the peninsula of Taman were being excavated. The results were annually reported by A. Pharma- kovski in the Archaeologischer Anzeiger of the Jahrbuch of the German Archaeological Institute. The typical objects from South Russia were jewellery, pottery, terra-cottas, and glass, mostly of florid Greek style. A remarkable glass bowl with coloured reliefs, said to be Alexandrian work, was found at Olbia in 1913. A glass cup with reliefs carved in the blue and white technique of the Port- land Vase, representing a pastoral sacrifice, which was sold by auc- tion in Paris in 1912 for 64,000 francs, was said to have come from Heraclea Pontica. The most valuable historical material from the Pontic colonies is archaic Ionian pottery from Berezan. An unusual find was a Scythian royal grave in a tumulus at Solokha, in 1913. The burial was richly furnished with barbaric jewellery, a gold comb, a bow-case and some vases decorated with Graeco-Scythian reliefs. A welcome work on Scythians and Greeks, interpreting material which has long lain inaccessible in Russian books and periodicals, was published by E. H. Minns, in 1913.

Greek Islands. Among the Greek islands Corfu has produced the most notable find. At Goritsa, the ancient Corcyra, in 1911, the Greek Archaeological Society discovered an early archaic temple of Artemis, the excavation of which was continued until 1914 by Doerpfeld at the expense of the former Emperor of Germany. The striking feature of the building is the sculpture of the west pediment, carved in high relief on limestone slabs. The subjects are, between two panthers, a central group of a gigantic Medusa with her two diminutive children, Pegasus and Chrysaor, and corner groups of apparently unconnected battle scenes. A large altar stood before the west front. The small Ionic temple at Kardaki in Corfu was recleared in 1912. The French have made good progress in their work at Delos, where the town site is now said to be a Hellenistic Pompeii, its houses still preserving their mosaic floors and fresco- painted walls. When Mytilene was recovered by the Greeks it was proposed to establish there a central museum for the Aegean islands, except Thasos, and the removal of antiquities was in progress in 1913. The Italian occupation of Rhodes put an end to the im- portant work of the Carlsberg Expedition, and caused the loss of much of the material which had been collected at Lindos by the Danes, but the valuable finds from the archaic town and cemetery at Vroulia were fortunately recorded by K. F. Kinch before their dispersal, and were published in 1914. Greek efforts to recover the Dodecanese led to the publication of a lavishly illustrated book describing the Hellenic antiquities of Rhodes, for the information of the Peace Conference. The Germans began to excavate the great temple of Hera at Samos in 1910. This was a stone building with outer columns of marble, not in the Doric style, as Vitruvius said. It was begun in the 6th century B.C. and never finished. Considerable work was done in Thasos by the French School in 1910 and later. Five gates of the city wall were cleared. They were decorated with archaic reliefs, some of which were previously known. Other important finds were seven statues of women from a sanctuary of Artemis Polo, a temple and altar of Apollo Pythius, decorative terra-cottas from an archaic Prytaneion, a cemetery with carved and painted tombstones, and remains of a triumphal arch of Caracalla.

Asia Minor. Political conditions in Asia Minor still prevented up to 1921 the reopening of the great city sites. During the war some show of general work was made by members of the German Archae- ological Commission with the Turkish forces, but this came to little more than notes on the preservation or destruction of well- known monuments. The French had lately renewed their arrange- ments for the excavation of Colophon, but no results had been ob- tained up to 1921 on the site. Very little was done in 1913-4; the " temple of Apollo Clarius " was found to be an exedra and a propy- laea, and an oracular grotto of the god was discovered in the hills. It contained potsherds which are said to range from " Troy I." to the Roman period. A small collection of pottery and implements made by H. A. Ormerod during journeys in Pisidia is a useful addi- tion to the scanty prehistoric material from Asia Minor, and shows that the characteristic fabrics of Troy and Yortan extend across the peninsula to Cyprus. A prehistoric settlement was found on Kilik Tepe at Miletus. The last excavations at Ephesus, Miletus and Pergamon produced (besides inscriptions) little more than archi- tectural remains of Hellenistic and Roman date. A report of the work done at Ephesus by the Austrian Archaeological Institute since 1909 was issued in 1913. The results of the German excavations at Miletus after the same year were published in 1911. The enormous temple at Didymi was cleared and all its columns were found to be standing to the height of several metres. The excavation of Miletus was completed in 1914. At Pergamon the Germans cleared two Hellenistic temples, in one of which a broken statue, identified as a portrait of Attalus II., was found. Another volume was added to the lengthy publication of the work at Pergamon.

The most brilliant results in Asia were obtained by American archaeologists at Sardis. Excavations were begun by the Princeton Syrian Expedition (H. C. Butler and W. H. Buckler) in 1910, and were continued actively for five seasons. The city lay between a mountain (its acropolis) and the river Pactolus, and its site was marked by two great Ionic columns standing deep in earth. The