The height of the Long Walls is nowhere stated; but we may presume that they were not lower than the walls of Peiraeeus, which were 40 cubits or 60 feet high. (Appian, Mithe.r. 30.) There were towers at the usual intervals, as we learn from the inscription already referred to. We now returm to the Walls of the Asty. It is evident that the part of the walls of the Asty, which Thucydides says needed no guard, was the part between the northern Long Wall and the Phaleric Wall. The length of this part is said by the Scholiast in Thucydides to have been 17 stadia, and the circumference of the whole wall to have been 60 stadia. Thus the circuit of the Asty was the same as the circuit of Peiraeeus, which Thucydides estimates at 60 stadia. The distance of 17 stadia between the northern Long Wall and the Phaleric has been considered much too large; but it may be observed, first, that we do not know at what point the Phaleric wall joined the Asty, and, secondly, that the northern Long Wall may have taken a great bend in joining the Asty. la addition to this we have other statements which go to show that the circuit of the Asty was larger than has been generally supposed. Thus, Dion Chrysaostom says (Orat, vi. p. 87), on the authority of Diogenes of Sinope, "that the circuit of Athens is 200 stadia, if one includes the walls of the Peiraeeus and the Intermediate Walls (i.e. the Long Walls), in the walls of the city." It is evident that in this calculation Diogenes included the portions of the walls both of the Asty and the Peiraeeus, which lay between the Long Wails; the 60 stadia of the Asty, the 60 stadia of Peiraeeus, the 40 stadia of the northern Long Wall, and the 40 stadia of the Southern Long Wall making the 200 stadia. Other statements respecting the extent of the walls of Athens are not so definite. Dionysius of Halicarnaesns (iv. 13, ix. 68) compare the walls of Athens with those of Rome, and Plutarch (Nic. 17) with those of Syracruse; the walls of Borne being, according to Pliny (iii. 5), 23 miles and 200 paces, about 185 stadia; and those of Syracuse, according to Strabo (vi. p. 270), 180 stadia. There are good grounds for believing that the walls of Thermistocles extended from the gate called Diplylum, along the western descent of the hills of Pnyx and Museium, including both of these hills within their circuit; that they then crossed the Ilissus near the western end of the Museium, and ran the heights on the left of the river, including Ardettus and the Stadium within the city; after which, making a turn to the north, they again crossed the Ilissus, and leaving Mt. Lycabettus on the esst, they ran in a semicircular direction till they rejoined the Dipylum. (See the plan of Athena.) According to this account, the Acropolis stands in the middle of the Asty, as Strabo states, while Leake, by carrying the walls across the crest of the hills of Pnyx and Museium, gives the city too great an extension to the east, and places the walls almost under the very heights of Lycabettus, so that an enemy from the slopes of the latter might easily have discharged missiles into the city. It is important to show that the Museium was within the city walls. This hill is well adapted for a fortress and would probably have been chosen for |
that "the Museium is a hill within the ancient walls, opposite the Acropolis." Now if the Museium stood within the walls, a glance at the map will show that the western slopes of the Pnyx hill must also have been included within them. Moreover, we find on this hill remains of cisterns, steps, foundations of houses, and numerous other indications of this quarter having been, in ancient times, thickly inhabited, a fact which is also attested by a passage in Aeschines (περί τών οίκήσεων τών έν τή Πυκνί, Aesch. in Timarch. p. 10, Steph. § 81, Bekk.). There is likewise a passage in Plutarch, which cannot be understood at all on the supposition that the ancient walls ran across the crest of the Pnyx hill. Plutarch says (Them. 19), that the bema of the Pnyx had been so placed as to command a view of the sea, but was subsequently removed by the Thirty Tyrants so as to face the land, because the sovereignty of the sea was the origin of the democracy, while the pursuit of agriculture was favourable to the oligarchy. The truth of this tale may well be questioned; but if the people ever met higher on the hill (for from no part of the place of assembly still remaining can the sea be seen), they could never have obtained a sight of the sea, if the existing remains of the walls are in reality those of Themistocles. It is unnecessary to discuss at length the direction of the walls on the south and south-eastern side of the Asty. Thucydides says (ii. 15) that the city extended first towards the south, where the principal temples were built, namely, that of the Olympian Zens, the Pythium, and those of Ge and of Dionysus; and he adds, that the inhabitants used the water of the fountain of Callirrhoë, which, from the time of the Peisistratidae, was called Enneacrunus. A southerly aspect was always a favourite one among the Greeks; and it is impossible to believe that instead of continuing to extend their city in this direction, they suddenly began building towards the north and north-east. Moreover, it is far more probable that the walls should have been carried across the hills on the south of the Ilissus, than have been built upon the low ground immediately at the foot of these hills. That the Stadium was within the walls may be inferred from the splendour with which it was fitted up, and also from the fact that in all other Greek cities, as far as we know, the stadia were cituated within the walls. Is it likely that the fountain Callirrhoë, from which the inhabitants obtained their chief supply of water, should have been outside the walls? Is it probable that the Heliastic judges, who were sworn at Ardettus (Harpocrat. s. v.), had to go outside the city for this purpose? That no traces of the walls of Themistocles can be discovered will not surprise us, when we recollect the enormous buildings which have totally disappeared in places that have continued to be inhabited, or from which the materials could be carried away by sea. Of the great walls of Syracuse not a vestige remains; and that this should have been the case at Athens is the less strange, because we know that the walls |
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