444 PELOPONNESUS. 
CHAP, heroic ages, as it was beheld by him, is perhaps 
only granted to the moderns in this single 
instance. They have remained nearly in their 
present state above three thousand years. It 
is believed that they were erected long before 
the Trojan war: as to the precise period, chro- 
nologists are so little agreed with regard even 
to the arrival of the Phoenician and Egyptian 
colonies under Cadmus and Danaus, that a dif- 
ference of at least a century may be observed 
in their calculations 1 . The celebrity of their 
Citadel is almost all that is now known of the 
Tirynthiansj excepting their natural tendency 
to mirth and frivolity. If we may rely upon 
an anecdote cited by the Abbe Barthelemy* from 
Athenceus*, in their characteristic disposition 
they were nearly allied to the Parisians of the 
present day; and, for want of a better argu- 
(1) The Editor of the Chronicle improperly called Parian (which 
we Stated to have been found in Ceos) dates the coming of Cadmus to 
Thebes 1519 years before Christ: but he adds, in a Note, " Diadorus 
and Euselius make Danaus go into Greece, before Cadmus went in 
search of Europa. Diod. Sic. lib. v. p. 329. Our chronologer places 
Cadmus eight years before Danaus." (Seep. 25. Lond. 1788.) Others 
date the arrival of Cadmus 1493 before Ckrist. 
(2) Voyage du Jeitne dnacharsis, torn. iv. p. 349. & Paris, 1790. 
(3) T/ieophraslus ap. Athen. lib. vi. c. 17. p. 261. Lugd. 1657. 
Eustath. iu Odyss. lib. xviii. p. 1839. lin. 47. 
