Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/310

tat ATUENAE. the theatre, and which was hence called the "Street of Tripods." (Paus. i. 20. § 1.)

Of these temples only two remain; the monument of Thrasyllus, situated above the theatre, of which we have already spoken [see p. 285]; and the monument of Lysicrates, which stood in the street itself. It appears that this street was formed entirely by a series of such monuments; and from the inscriptions engraved on the architraves that the dramatic chronicles or didascaliae were mainly compiled. The monument of Lysicrates is of the Corinthian order. It is a small circular building on a square basement, of white marble, and covered by a cupola, supported by six Corinthian columns. Its whole height was 34 feet, of which the square basis was 14 feet, the body of the building to the summit of the columns 12 feet, and the entablature, together with the cupola and apex, 8 feet. There was no access to the interior, which was only 6 feet in diameter. The frieze, of which there are casts in the British Museum, represents the destruction of the Tyrrhenian pirates by Dionysus and his attendants.

STREET OF THE TRIPODS FROM A BAS RELIEF.

13. The Fountain of Callirrhoë, or Enneacrunus.

The fountain at Callirrhoë (KatJ^f^), or Ennearcrunus QEmiKf<yvm was situated in the SE. of the city. It was, as has been already remarked, the only source of good drinkable water in Athens. (Paus. i. 14. § 1.) It was employed in all the more important services of religion, and by women prior to their nuptials. (Thuc. ii. 15.) We learn from Thucydides (l. c.) that it was originally named Callirrhoë, when the natural sources were open to view, but that it was afterwards named Enneacrunus, from having been fitted with nine pipes {irpmnmi) by the Peisistratidae. Hence it appears that the natural sources were covered by some kind of building, and that the water was conducted through nine pipes. Enneacrunus appears to hare been the name of (he fountain, in the architectural sense of the term; but the spring or source continued lo be called Callirrhoë, and is the name which it still bears. (Compare Stat. Theb. xii. 629: "Et quos Callirrhoë novies errantibus undis Implicat.") It has been supposed from a fragment of Cratinus (ap. Schol. ad Aristoph. Equit. 530; Suidas, s. v. Sflfftiirdjrpoi'roi) that the fountain was alo called Dodecacranos; but it is more probable, as Leake has remarked, that the poet amplified for the sake of comic effect. The spring flows from the foot of a broad ridge of rocks, which crosses the bed of the Ilissus, and over which the river forms a

water-fall when it is full. But there is generally no water in this part of the bed of the Ilissus; and it is certain that the fountain was a separate vein of water, and was not supplied from the Ilissus. The waters of the fountain were made to pass through small pipes, pierced in the face of the rock, through which they descended into the pool below. Of these orifices seven am still visible. The fountain also received a supply of water from the cistern in the Olympieium, which has been already mentioned. [See above, p. 290, b.] The pool, which receives the waters of the fountain, "would be more copious, but for a canal which commences near it and is carried below the bed of the Ilissus to Vunó, a small village a mile from the city, on the road to Peiraeeus; where the water is received into a cistern, supplies a fountain on the high road, and waters gardens. The canal exactly resembles those which were in use among the Greeks before the introduction of Roman aqueducts, being a channel about three feet square, cut in the solid rock. It is probably, therefore, an ancient work." (Leake, p. 170; Forchhammer, p. 317; Mure, vol ii. p. 85.)

 

14. The Panathenaic Stadium.

The Panathenaic Stadium (rA ar^xav t^ nara- »i)faui,J») was situated on the south side of the Ilissus, and is described by Pausanias as "a hill rising above the Ilissus, of a semicircular form in its upper part, and extending from thence in a double right line to the bank of the river." (Pans, i. 19. § 6.) Leake observes, that "it is at once recognized by its existing remains, consisting of two parallel heights, partly natural, and partly composed of large masses of rough substruction, which rise at a small distance from the left bank of the Ilissus, in a direction at right angles to the course of that stream, and which are connected at the further end by a third height, more indebted to art for its composition, and which formed the semicircular extremity essential to a stadium." It is usually stated that this Stadium was constricted by Lycurgus, about B.C. 350; but it appears from the passage of Plutarch (Vit. X. Orat. p. 841), on which this supposition rests, that this spot must have been used previously for the gymnic contests of the Panathenaic games, since it is said that Lycurgua completed the Panathenaic stadium, by constructing a podium (*pi)irfi) or low wall, and leveling the bed (X<ipdlpa) of the arena- The spectators, however, continued to sit on the turf for nearly five centuries afterwards, till at length the slopes were covered by Herodes Atticus with the seats of Pentelic marble, which called forth the admiration of Pausanias, (Philostr. Vit. Soph. ii. 1. § 5.) These seats have disappeared, and it is now only a long hollow, grown over with grass. Leake conjectures that it was capable of accommodating 40,000 persons on the marble seats, and as many more on the slopes of the hills above them on extraordinary occasions.

Philostratus states that a temple of Tyche or Fortune stood on one side of the Stadium: and as there are considerable remains of rough masonry on the summit of the western hilt, this is supposed to have been the site of the temple. The tomb of Herodes, who was buried near the Stadium, may have occupied the summit of the opposite hill. Opposite the Stadium was a bridge across the Ilissus, of which the foundations still exist. (Leake, p. 195.)