ON THE TOPOGRAPHY OF ATHENS. 



501 



shape of a public building had ever existed here, for Aristophanes 

 speaks of the people, when assembled, as seating themselves on a 

 rock. There is a circumstance, however, mentioned in Plutarch's 

 Life of Themistocles, which helps us to fix its situation, for he tells 

 us it commanded a view of the sea. Now, there is a rocky eminence 

 between the last-mentioned spot and the Museum, which answers to 

 this description, and I know of no other within the old walls that does. 

 The surface of the rock is there cut into a form which appears to be 

 not ill calculated for the purpose to which Pnyx was appropriated. 

 According to Plutarch, Pnyx must have been near the Museum, for 

 he speaks of the hottest part of the combat of Theseus with the 

 Amazons as having taken place between these two places ; and Pnyx 

 appears to have given its denomination to a quarter of the city, 

 X^ ov s (vide Pollux,) which was inhabited, for Cimon dwelt there. 

 Moreover, it was bounded by the city wall, for Suidas, in Meruv, says, 

 Tlgo nv%o$w()}£ 3e 7iXiot^07Tiov vjv ev rv vvv vcvi eJCJtA7j<r/c4 7r^og rep ret^ei ra ev 

 Uyvx(- and the scholiast on Aristophanes (in Avibus) tells us, on the 

 authority of Philochorus, 'HXioT^o-n-iov Metonis extare -rr^cg ru> tux^ ru 

 ev rri TlvvKi. (Sal mas.) Enough, I believe, has been said, to fix the site 

 of the Areopagus, Pnyx, and the Museum. The Pirasan gate, as I 

 have already mentioned, lay between the two last. 



We are now arrived at the end of the topography of Athens, as it 

 is given us by Pausanias ; and in the course of these remarks, I have 

 endeavoured to explain that topography by the help of the existing 

 remains ; but, as the progress of the narrative has been much in- 

 terrupted, it may be useful to pass once more under review the whole 

 series of positions that have been fixed by this enquiry. 



The first point thus fixed, with reference to the plan of the ruins, 

 is the Piraean gate ; where Pausanias begins his description of the 

 city. By the second, which was Enneacrunos and the Eleusinium, 

 we obtained the general direction of the Ceramicus on the right, or 

 to the south of the Acropolis, and thus acquired some idea of its 

 extent. The third fixed point, is the situation of the new Agora ; 

 which is determined both by the order of the narrative, and by the 



