June 14, 1858.] 
ADDITIONAL NOTICES. 
377 
flock for the last three years, being too much occupied with “ important 
business ” in Constantinople. 
The Archbishop’s influence procured us the best horses and saddles in the 
town, and, accompanied by him, we all started at 10 o’clock a.m. for the ruins 
of Sizicus, where we arrived in about an hour, the distance being only 5 miles. 
These ruins are situated on the n.e. end of the isthmus separating the penin- 
sula of Artaki from the mainland. 
Comparatively few traces of Sizicus now exist above ground ; even the 
name would in all probability have long since been unknown in the country 
but for the creation of an archbishopric of the same name. 
The most remarkable ruins are an aqueduct and some sarcophagi ; the 
latter are, indeed, in such good preservation that they cannot well be called 
ruins. Close on the sea-shore are two of these tombs ; they were lately un- 
covered, being only 3 to 4 feet below the surface, and are in fine preservation. 
The covering-lid of each sarcophagus is hewn out of one block of white 
marble, of which there are extensive beds in the adjacent island of Marmora, 
and each of those blocks must have weighed upwards of 20 tons. The interior 
of each sarcophagus was divided into two stories by a thick flagged floor, 
inserted in and supported by the side-walls. In the lower story were found 
eight, and in the upper seven, human skeletons. In the general outline the 
figure of the Egyptian sarcophagus in the British Museum is alike to those of 
Sizicus. The recesses of the architraves of the latter do not appear to have 
been quite finished, but the workmanship of the mouldings is excellent. One 
sarcophagus is ornamented with an “ egg and dart ” moulding, running quite 
around in full relief, and wrought as finely as anything of the sort, ancient or 
modern, within my knowledge. 
The whole breadth of the Isthmus of Sizicus is covered with broken columns 
and massive walls faced with square blocks of black granite, and backed with 
rubble masonry set in lime cement. The walls are distinctly traceable across 
the isthmus, from sea to sea, at the junction of the peninsula of Artaki ; and 
appear to have served as the line of fortifications for Sizicus facing the con- 
tinent. The city extended from those walls into the peninsula of Artaki, and 
at a distance of about a mile there still remain the ruins of a large aqueduct, 
in many parts over 100 feet high. 
Strabo represented the peninsula as an island, and there is a tradition 
amongst the present inhabitants that the sea formerly ran across the isthmus, 
and that ships passed and repassed ; but, if ever such a communication 
existed, there is no trace of it to be found at present. 
The chart of this coast (Sea of Marmora), published and compiled in 1830- 
31 by our Admiralty, from surveys purporting to have been made by French, 
Spanish, and English, is not as accurate as could be wished. This chart 
shows a considerable inlet or canal cutting the isthmus almost across, whilst 
in fact there is no inlet whatever. The isthmus maintains a regular breadth 
of about a mile, without any indent or projection from sea or land. There is 
a sort of marsh in the middle which becomes a lake in wet weather. 
Another and more serious error of the chart is the rock which is represented 
above water 1 mile s.s.e. of Mola island, at the entrance of the Bay of 
Panorma, and in the direct course from Constantinople to Panorma. There 
is no rock visible in that situation ; but exactly in the same position there 
is a rock having four feet water over it, and is consequently very dangerous. 
Many vessels have been lost upon it, owing possibly to an over-confidence in 
the chart, and a consequent belief that no dangerous rock existed under water. 
The Admiralty charts, prepared from the surveys of British officers, receive 
universal confidence for accuracy, and, in truth, they defy all criticism both 
for accuracy and clearness. An error of the sort just alluded to is the more 
dangerous because of this confidence, as foreigners unable to read English 
