ARCHAEOLOGY AND EXCAVATION 273 



MISCELLANEOUS SITES OF THE NEARER AND MIDDLE EAST 



Cyrene. (E. B. vii, 704). Excavations were begun in 1910 by an American expedi- 

 tion representing the Archaeological Institute of America and the Boston Museum of 

 Fine Arts. The members, led by R. Norton, had great difficulties to contend with owing 

 to the suspicion and indiscipline shown at first by the local tribes; but these had been 

 largely overcome when, in March 191-1, the second in command, H. de Cou, was shot by 

 three strangers from the Tolmeita district, sent to murder the leader. The other mem- 

 bers of the American party, however, stayed on till May, and were about to return to 

 the site in October in A. V. Armour's yacht, when the outbreak of war between Italy 

 and Turkey in Tripolitana and Cyrenaica foiled their plans. Cyrene became inaccessi- 

 ble from the coast, and the objects discovered by the Americans remained on the spot 

 in the hands of Enver Bey's force. They include two very fine pieces of sculpture, a 

 torso of a dancer or a Victory, and a head of Athena, the first of the earlier part, the other 

 of the later part, of the 4th century B.. Besides these much sculpture of the Roman 

 period was discovered including a great number of conventional figures for sepulchral 

 use, whose faces were left blank to be painted with features as required. A large deposit 

 of terracottas, mostly representing the city goddess bearing the silphium, was partly 

 cleared, and much pottery etc., chiefly late, was extracted from tombs half robbed in 

 antiquity. The main work of excavation was done on the hill above the Apollo spring, 

 where a large building of uncertain nature and Ptolemaic date was in process of explora- 

 tion when work stopped. The digging had not penetrated deep enough except in one 

 or two pits to tap early strata and the promising virgin field below the Apollo spring, 

 occupied by the grounds of the Senussi Convent, was not touched. 



An important site of the earlier Greek period was discovered at Messa, about five 

 hours S.E. of Cyrene, by the party under J. W. Gregory who in 1908 visited Cyrenaica 

 to inquire (reporting adversely) into its possibilities as a field for the Jewish Territorial 

 Organisation; and it was revisited by R. Nortori and also by an Italian expedition 

 under F. Halbherr in 1910. 



Didymi.(E. B. viii, 207); The temple has now been disengaged from debris by 

 the German excavators under Th. Wiegand. A small township is found to have en- 

 circled it, leaving a clear precinct. Of the earliest shrine some scanty remains have been 

 found at the E. end with a fragment of an archaic inscription. The rest of the remains 

 are Hellenistic in the main, and of Roman date in part. Several inscribed marbles 

 record details about the building, towards which kings and other rich men contributed 

 during a long period (e.g. Ptolemy XIV gave 34 elephant tusks to meet the cost of the 

 great central E. door). Other marbles record the treasures deposited in the temple, 

 oracular responses, etc. There were no architectural sculptures beyond heads Ornament- 

 ing capitals, etc. of columns and the beautiful enrichment of bases at the E. end; and 

 few remains of free sculpture have been found. The main additions to the work done 

 by Pontremoli and Haussoullier have been: (i) discovery of outlying dependencies such 

 as a semicircular terrace for the deposit of offerings and an altar on the E., and a stadium 

 on the S.; (2) clearing of the 122 columns, almost all of which stand at half height or 

 more; (3) clearing of the pronaos with its 12 columns and wonderfully preserved W. 

 wall; (4) opening out of the stairs leading to the two subterranean chambers of the 

 adyton under the pronaos; one of these stairways is perfectly preserved even to its ceiling, 

 decorated with maeander design; (5) clearance of the spacious stairway which leads 

 down to the cello, at a level six metres below the pronaos; (6) dis'covery of many" details of 

 the enrichment of the upper members of the colonnades. There was no opisthodomos. 

 The Byzantine castle, into which the cello: was converted, and spoliation by natives 

 have done much damage; but even as it now stands, this temple is by far the best 

 preserved of the greater. Hellenistic buildings. Many dedications to Artemis, who was 

 here associated with Apollo, have come to light; and the sacred Tvay to Panormus has 

 been explored more thoroughly than by Newton (See Vorlaiif. Berichte ilber die*". . . 

 in Milet u. Didyma '.- ; ; - Ausgrabungen nos. vi, vii, 1910, 1911* by Th. Wiegand). 



Miletus. ^-(E. B. xviii, 443). The excavations carried out by Messrs. Wiegand, 



