LONG WALLS OF ATHENS. 



525 



fortified, and that the very existence of Athens as a great state de- 

 pended upon its being connected in this manner with its ships and 

 is arsenal. 



It may be said that this is merely presumptive evidence against 

 a third wall : I shall now therefore bring forward what may be re- 

 garded as a direct proof of its non-existence. 



Thucydides observes that the circumference of the walls of Sy- 

 racuse was not less [£hv Ixua-o-om) than that of the walls of Athens. 

 Now we learn from Strabo*, that the old walls of Syracuse measured 

 180 stadia : we must therefore conclude that there were two long 

 walls only, not three ; for under the first supposition the number of 

 stadia would be 183, and according to the other 218. ^ And it 

 follows from what has been said before on the passage of Thucydides, 

 that both these walls connected Athens in a straight line with the 

 Piraeus. 



It has been already remarked that the notion of two walls in this 

 direction is that which was generally adopted by the ancients. The 

 very general appellation of a-neKy and brachia which they bestowed 

 on these walls, very clearly denote this ; nor is there, I believe, a 

 single passage except those which I have cited, in which they are 

 not understood to be joined to the Piraeus. " TUyji tcutu" says Strabo, 

 when speaking of the wall of this town, " irui^-re to. zaMiXiaitfp&ct 



" Jj£ tod itgiidQ (TKsXr,' tccvtol <T 7jv pax/ice T£i%vi, reTToe^a.x.ovTex, g~xSluv to fjtvjy.og y 



" (rwarrrciira. to ot&o tu Tleigouei" And the same precise information 

 is given by Livy, " Inter angustias semiruti muri, qui duobus 

 " brachiis Piraeum Athenis jungit." 



* n=vT«7roXif ijv to TtaKaiov, Ixa-rov xai oySoyjxoyra g-xlluiv tyoixyu to ri^oj. L. ii, 

 f The measures, according to Thucydides, are as follows : — 



The walls of Athens 43 Stadia. 



The northern long wall 40 



The southern 40 



The Piraeus including Munychia 60 



183 



