Modern Greece/Notes

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"The Pæstan rose, from its peculiar fragrance and the singularity of blowing twice a year, is often mentioned by the classic poets. The wild rose, which now shoots up among the ruins, is of the small single damask kind, with a very high perfume; as a farmer assured me on the spot, it flowers both in spring and autumn."—Swinburne's Travels in the two Sicilies.

In the naval engagements of the Greeks, "it was usual for the soldiers before the fight to sing a pæan, or hymn, to Mars, and after the fight another to Apollo."—See Potter's Antiquities of Greece, vol. ii. p. 155.

The emigration of the natives of the Morea to different parts of Asia is thus mentioned by Chateaubriand in his "Itinéraire de Paris à Jerusalem"—"Parvenu au dernier degré du malheur, le Moraite s'arrache de son pays, et va chercher en Asie un sort ​moins rigoureux. Vain espoir! il retrouve des cadis et des pachas jusques dans les sables de Jourdain et dans les deserts de Palmyre."

In the same work, Chateaubriand also relates his having met with several Greek emigrants who had established themselves in the woods of Florida.

"La grace est toujours unie à la magnificence dans les scènes de la nature: et tandis que le courant du milieu entraîne vers la mer les cadavres des pins et des chênes, on voit sur les deux courant latéraux, remontes, le long des rivages des îles flottantes de Pistia & de Nénuphar, dont les roses jaunes s'élèvent comme de petits papillons."—Description of the banks of the Mississippi, Chateaubriand's "Atala."

"Looking generally at the narrowness and abruptness of this mountain-channel (Tempe) and contrasting it with the course of the Peneus, through the plains of Thessaly, the imagination instantly recurs to the tradition that these plains were once covered with water, for which some convulsion of nature had subsequently opened this narrow passage. The term vale, in our language, is usually employed to describe scenery in which the predominant features are breadth, beauty, and repose. The reader has already perceived that the term is wholly inapplicable to the scenery at this spot, and that the phrase vale ​of Tempe is one that depends on poetic fiction.————The real character of Tempe, though it perhaps be less beautiful, yet possesses more of magnificence than is implied in the epithet given to it.————To those who have visited St. Vincent's rocks, below Bristol, I cannot convey a more sufficient idea of Tempe, than by saying that its scenery resembles, though on a much larger scale, that of the former place. The Peneus, indeed, as it flows through the valley, is not greatly wider than the Avon; and the channel between the cliffs is equally contracted in its dimensions; but these cliffs themselves are much loftier and more precipitous, and project their vast masses of rock with still more extraordinary abruptness over the hollow beneath."—Holland's Travels in Albania, &c.

The modern name of the Peneus is Salympria.

"Towards the lower part of Tempe, these cliffs are peaked in a very singular manner, and form projecting angles on the vast perpendicular faces of rock which they present towards the chasm; where the surface renders it possible, the summits and ledges of the rocks are for the most part covered with small wood, chiefly oak, with the arbutus and other shrubs. On the banks of the river, wherever there is a small interval between the water and the cliffs, it is covered by the rich and widely spreading foliage of the plane, the oak, and other forest trees, which in these situations have attained a remarkable size, and in various places extend their shadow far over the channel of the stream."————"The rocks on each side the vale of ​Tempe are evidently the same; what may be called, I believe, a coarse blueish grey marble, with veins and portions of the rock, in which the marble is of finer quality."—Holland's Travels in Albania, &c

The Amphictyonic council was convened in spring and autumn at Delphi or Thermopylæ, and presided at the Pythian games, which were celebrated at Delphi every fifth year.

"This spot (the field of Mantinea) on which so many brave men were laid to rest, is now covered with rosemary and laurels."—Pouqueville's Travels in the Morea.

For the accounts of the upas or poison-tree of Java, now generally believed to be fabulous, or greatly exaggerated, see the notes to Darwin's Botanic Garden.

"The court most to be admired of the Alhambra is that called the court of the Lions; it is ornamented with sixty elegant pillars of an architecture which bears not the least resemblance to any of the known orders, and might be called the Arabian order.————But its principal ornament, and that from which it took its name, is an alabaster cup six feet in diameter, supported by twelve lions, which is said to have been made in ​imitation of the Brazen Sea of Solomon's temple."—Bourgoanne's Travels in Spain.

"Sept des plus fameux parmi les anciens poëtes Arabiques, sont designés par les ecrivains orientaux sous le nom de Pleïade Arabique, et leurs ouvrages etaient suspendus autour de la Caaba, ou Mosque de la Mecque."—Sismondi Litterature du Midi.

"The distress and fall of the last Constantine are more glorious than the long prosperity of the Byzantine Cæsars."—Gibbon's Decline and Fall, &c. vol. xii. p. 226.

See the description of the night previous to the taking of Constantinople by Mahomet II.—Gibbon, vol. xii. p. 225.

"This building (the Castle of the Seven Towers) is mentioned as early as the sixth century of the Christian æra, as a spot which contributed to the defence of Constantinople, and it was the principal bulwark of the town on the coast of the Propontis, in the last periods of the empire."—Pouqueville's Travels in the Morea.

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See the account from Herodotus of the supernatural defence of Delphi.—Mitford's Greece, vol. i. page 396, 7.

"In succeeding ages the Athenians honoured Theseus as a demi-god, induced to it as well by other reasons, as because, when they were fighting the Medes at Marathon, a considerable part of the army thought they saw the apparition of Theseus completely armed, and bearing down before them upon the Barbarians."—Langhorne's Plutarch, life of Theseus.

"From Thermopylæ to Sparta, the leader of the Goths (Alaric) pursued his victorious march without encountering any mortal antagonist, but one of the advocates of expiring paganism has confidently asserted, that the walls of Athens were guarded by the goddess Minerva, with her formidable ægis, and by the angry phantom of Achilles, and that the conqueror was dismayed by the presence of the hostile deities of Greece."—Gibbon's Decline and Fall, &c. vol. v. page 183.

"Even all the chief ones of the earth."—Isaiah, 14th chapter.

"How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished!"—Samuel, 2d book, 1st chap.

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For several interesting particulars relative to the Suliote warfare with Ali Pasha, see Holland's Travels in Albania.

"It is related as an authentic story, that a group of Suliote women assembled on one of the precipices adjoining the modern seraglio, and threw their infants into the chasm below, that they might not become the slaves of the enemy."—Holland's Travels, &c.

The ruins of Sparta, near the modern town of Mistra, are very inconsiderable, and only sufficient to mark the site of the ancient city. The scenery around them is described by travellers as very striking.

The inscription composed by Simonides for the Spartan monument in the pass of Thermopylæ has been thus translated—"Stranger, go tell the Lacedemonians that we have obeyed their laws, and that we lie here."

"In the Eurotas I observed abundance of those famous reeds which were known in the earliest ages, and all the rivers and ​marshes of Greece are replete with rose-laurels, while the springs and rivulets are covered with lilies, tuberoses, hyacinths, and narcissus orientalis."—Pouqueville's Travels in the Morea.

It was usual for suppliants to carry an olive-branch bound with wool.

The olive, according to Pouqueville, is still regarded with veneration by the people of the Morea.

It was customary at Eleusis, on the fifth day of the festival, for men and women to run about with torches in their hands, and also to dedicate torches to Ceres, and to contend who should present the largest. This was done in memory of the journey of Ceres in search of Proserpine, during which she was lighted by a torch kindled in the flames of Etna—Potter's Antiquities of Greece, vol.i. p. 392.

The Fountains of Oblivion and Memory, with the Hercynian fountain, are still to be seen amongst the rocks near Livadia, though the situation of the cave of Trophonius in their vicinity cannot be exactly ascertained.—See Holland's Travels.

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Elis was anciently a sacred territory, its inhabitants being considered as consecrated to the service of Jupiter. All armies marching through it delivered up their weapons, and received them again when they had passed its boundary.

"We are assured by Thucydides that Attica was the province of Greece in which population first became settled, and where the earliest progress was made toward civilization."—Mitford's Greece, vol. i. p. 35.

Fata Morgana. This remarkable aërial phenomenon, which is thought by the lower order of Sicilians to be the work of a fairy, is thus described by father Angelucci, whose account is quoted by Swinburne.

"On the 15th August, 1643, I was surprised, as I stood at my window, with a most wonderful spectacle: the sea that washes the Sicilian shore swelled up, and became, for ten miles in length, like a chain of dark mountains, while the waters near our Calabrian coast grew quite smooth, and in an instant appeared like one clear polished mirror. On this glass was depicted, in chiaro scuro, a string of several thousands of pilasters, all equal in height, distance, and degrees of light and shade. In a moment they bent into arcades, like Roman aqueducts. A long cornice was next formed at the top, and above it rose in numerable castles, all perfectly alike; these again changed into ​towers, which were shortly after lost in colonnades, then windows, and at last ended in pines, cypresses, and other trees."—Swinburne's Travels in the Two Sicilies.

All sorts of purple and white flowers were supposed by the Greeks to be acceptable to the dead, and used in adorning tombs; as amaranth, with which the Thessalians decorated the tomb of Achilles.—Potter's Antiquities of Greece, vol. ii. p. 232.

Pericles, on his return to Athens after the reduction of Samos, celebrated in a splendid manner the obsequies of his countrymen who fell in that war, and pronounced, himself, the funeral oration usual on such occasions. This gained him great applause; and when he came down from the rostrum, the women paid their respects to him, and presented him with crowns and chaplets, like a champion just returned victorious from the lists.—Langhorne's Plutarch, life of Pericles.

The peplus, which is supposed to have been suspended as an awning over the statue of Minerva, in the Parthenon, was a principal ornament of the Panathenaic festival; it was embroidered with various colours, representing the battle of the Gods and Titans, and the exploits of Athenian heroes. When the festival was celebrated, the peplus was brought from the Acropolis, and suspended as a sail to the vessel, which on that ​day was conducted through the Ceramicus and principal streets of Athens, till it had made the circuit of the Acropolis. The peplus was then carried to the Parthenon, and consecrated to Minerva.—See Chandler's Travels, Stuart's Athens, &c.

The gilding amidst the ruins of Persepolis is still, according to Winckelmann, in high preservation.

"In the most broken fragment the same great principle of life can be proved to exist, as in the most perfect figure," is one of the observations of Mr. Haydon on the Elgin Marbles.

"Every thing here breathes life, with a veracity, with an exquisite knowledge of art, but without the least ostentation or parade of it, which is concealed by consummate and masterly skill."—Canova's Letter to the Earl of Elgin.

Mr. West, after expressing his admiration of the horse's head in Lord Elgin's collection of Athenian sculpture, thus proceeds: "We feel the same when we view the young equestrian Athenians, and in observing them we are insensibly carried on with the impression, that they and their horses actually existed, as we see them, at the instant when they were converted into marble."—West's Second Letter to Lord Elgin.

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Mr. Flaxman thinks that sculpture has very greatly improved within these last twenty years, and that his opinion is not singular, because works of such prime importance as the Elgin marbles could not remain in any country without a consequent improvement of the public taste, and the talents of the artist.—See the Evidence given in reply to interrogatories from the Committee on the Elgin Marbles.

The Theseus and Ilissus, which are considered by Sir T. Lawrence, Mr. Westmacott, and other distinguished artists, to be of a higher class than the Apollo Belvedere; "because there is in them an union of very grand form, with a more true and natural expression of the effect of action upon the human frame, than there is in the Apollo, or any of the other more celebrated statues."—See the Evidence, &c.

"Let us suppose a young man at this time in London, endowed with powers such as enabled Michael Angelo to advance the arts, as he did, by the aid of one mutilated specimen of Grecian excellence in sculpture; to what an eminence might not such a genius carry art, by the opportunity of studying those sculptures in the aggregate, which adorned the temple of Minerva at Athens?"—West's Second Letter to Lord Elgin.

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In allusion to the theories of Du Bos, Wincklemann, Montesquieu, &c. with regard to the inherent obstacles in the climate of England to the progress of genius and the arts.—See Hoare's Epochs of the Arts, page 84, 5.