ISLAND OF PAROS. 135 
(he Parian is extolled by Slrabo 6 ; audit pos- CHAP, 
sesses some valuable qualities unknown even to * v -' 
the Antients, who spoke so highly in its praise 7 . 
These qualities are, that of hardening by ex- 
posure to atmospheric air (which, however, is 
common to all homogeneous limestone), and the Cause of 
,, . . the Preva- 
consequent property of resisting decomposition fence of 
through a series of ages, and this, rather than Mai-hie in 
the supposed preference given to the Parian 
marble by the Antients, may be considered as 
the cause of its prevalence among the remains 
of Grecian sculpture. That the Parian marble 
was highly and deservedly extolled by the 
Romans, has been already shewn : but in a very 
early period, when the Arts had attained their 
full splendour in the age of Pericles, the pre- 
ference was given by the Greeks, not to the 
marble of Paros, but to that of Mount Pentelicus; 
because it was whiter ; and also, perhaps, be- 
cause it was found in the immediate vicinity of 
Athens. The Parthenon was built entirely of 
Pentelican marble. Many of the Athenian sta- 
tues, and of the works carried on near to Athens 
during the administration of Pericles, (as, for 
(6) 'Ev $1 ry n.(>/u it Hagla KiSat teyifnivv, a-piffrt] iffis TJJV ftagfA 
Ibid. 
(7) " PAROS, cum oppido, ah Delo XXXTIII mill, mat-more nohilis; 
quaiu primb PACTIAM (MS. PLATEAM), postea MINOIDA vocarunt." 
Plin. Nal. Hist. lib. iv. c. 12. L. Bat. 1635. torn. 1. /J.223. 
