312 ATHENS. 
CHAP, to the walls of the antient city, and the obliquity 
* of its position with regard to the peribolus which 
inclosed the plane of Hadrians Pillars, seems to 
authorise an objection, already urged 1 , against 
the notion of its having been originally a gate. 
Le Roy's view of it 2 is much finer, as to general 
effect, than that which Stuart has given 3 , and 
exhibits more of the grandeur of the original. 
The stones are put together without cement; 
but the work is adorned with a row of Corinthian 
pilasters and columns, with bases supporting an 
upper tier in the same style of architecture, 
thereby denoting a mode of building more cha- 
racteristic of the age of Hadrian than of any 
earlier period in Athenian history. In the 
its Origin, endeavours which have been made to trace its 
origin, and to ascertain its antiquity, it is some- 
what strange that no one has stated, what the 
first view of it seems to suggest as the most 
probable opinion concerning this structure ; 
namely, that it was a triumphal arch, erected in 
honour of Hadrian, upon his coming to ATHENS. 
Stuart has observed 4 , that "it appears evidently 
(1) Stuart's Antiq. of Athens, as above cited. 
(2) Les Raines des plus beaux Monumens de la Grece, PI. 81. 
Paris, 1757. 
(3) Antiq. of Athens, vol. III. c. 3. PI. 1. Land. 1794. 
(4) Ibid. p. 20, 
