2o6 a G R 
ters feveral times during the conteft between thefe rival 
ftates, and in every in fiance fuffered the moft cruel out¬ 
rages. After this period very little mention of it occurs 
in hiflory, nor do we know the precife time of the deftruc- 
tion of the old city and the building of the new one. See 
Girgenti. 
The principal part of the ancient city lay in the vale ; 
the prefent town, called Girgenti, occupies the mountain 
on which the citadel of Cocalus (food. 
It was difficult to be more judicious and fortunate in the 
choice of fituation for a large city. The inhabitants were 
here provided with every requifite for defence, pleafure, 
and comfort of life; a natural wall, formed by abrupt 
rocks, prefented a ftrong barrier againft afl'ailants; plea- 
fant hills fheltered them on three tides without impeding 
the circulation of air; before them a broad plain watered 
by the Acragas, gave admittance to the fea-breeze, and to 
a noble prolpect of that awful element; the port or em¬ 
porium lay in view at the mouth of the river, and proba¬ 
bly the road acrofs the flat was lined with gay and popu¬ 
lous fuburbs. 
The hofpitality and parade for which the Agrigentines 
are celebrated in hiflory were fupported by an extenflve 
commerce; by means of which, the commonwealth was 
able to refill many (hocks of adverfity, and always to rife 
again with frelh fplendour. It was, however, crufhed by 
the general fall of Grecian liberty; the feeble remnants of 
it's population, which had furvived lb many calamities, 
were at length driven out of its walls by the Saracens, and 
obliged to lock themfelves up for fafety among the bleak 
and inacceflible rocks of the prefent city. 
At the north-eafl angle of the ancient limits, upon fome 
foundations of large regular (tones,.a church has been 
erefted; a road appears hewn in the folid rock for the 
convenience.of the votaries that vifited this temple in an¬ 
cient days. It was then dedicated to Ceres and her daugh¬ 
ter Proferpine, the particular patronefles of Sicily. Bi- 
fhop Blaile fucceeded to their honours. 
At the fouth-eafl corner, where the ground, rifing 
gradually, ends in a bold eminence, which is crowned with 
majeftic columns, are the ruins of a temple laid to have 
been confecrated to Juno. To the weft of this (lands the 
building commonly called the Temple of Concord ; the (lone 
of which, and the other buildings, is the fame as that of 
the neighbouring mountains and cliffs, a conglutination of 
fea-fand and (hells, full of perforations, of a hard and du¬ 
rable texture, and a deep reddilh brown colour. This 
Doric temple has all its columns, entablature, pediments, 
and walls, entire; only part of the roof is wanting. It 
owes its prefervation to the piety of fame Chriftians, who 
have covered half the nave, and converted it into a church 
confecrated under the invocation of St. Gregory bifliop of 
Girgenti. 
Proceeding in the fame direction, you walk between 
rows of fepulchres cut in the rock wherever it admitted of 
being excavated by the hand of man, or was fo already 
by that of nature, Some maffes of it are hewn into the 
fltape of coffins; others drilled full of fmall fquare holes 
employed in a different mode of interment, and ferving as 
receptacles of urns. One ponderous piece of the rock 
lies in an extraordinary pofition; by the failure of its 
foundation, or the (hock of~an earthquake, it has been 
loofened from the general quarry, and rolled down the 
declivity, where it now remains fupine with the cavities 
turned upwards. Only a Angle column marks the confu- 
fed heap of mofs-grown ruins belonging to the temple of 
Hercules. It flood on a projecting rock above a chafm in 
the ridge, which was cut through for a paffage to the em¬ 
porium. 
In the fame trad, over fome hills, is fituated the build¬ 
ing ufually. called the Tomb of Thero. It is furrounded by 
aged olive-trees, which call a wild irregular (hade over 
the ruin. The edifice inclines fo the pyrarrtidical (liape, 
and confifts ftt prefent of a triple plinth, and a bafe fup- 
A G R 
porting a fquare pedeftal: upon this plain folid foundation 
is railed a fecond order, having a window in each front, 
and at each angle two Ionic piiafters crowned with an en¬ 
tablature of the Doric order. Its iniide is divided into a 
vault, a ground room, and one in the Ionic (lory, com¬ 
municating with each other by means of a fmall internal 
flair-cafe. 
In the plain are feen the fragments of the temple of 
Efctilapius; part of two columns and two piiafters, with 
an intermediate wall, fupp.ort the end of a farm-houfe, 
and were probably the front of the cella. Purfuing the 
track of the walls towards the weft, you arrive at a fpot 
which is covered with the gigantic remains of the temple 
of Jupiter the Olympian, minutely deferibed by Diodorus 
Siculus, l't may literally be faid that it has not one (lone 
left upon another; and it is barely poilible, with tire help 
of much conjeCture, to difeover the traces of its plan and 
dimenlions. Diodorus calls it the largeft temple in the 
whole ifland : but adds, that the calamities of war caufed 
the work to be abandoned before the roof could be put 
on; and that the Agrigentines were ever after reduced to 
fuch a date of poverty and dependence, that they never 
had it in their power to finjfli this litperb monument of 
the tafte and opulence of their anceftors. The length of 
this temple was 370 Greek feet, its breadth fixty, and its 
height 220, exdufive of the foundations or bafement (lo¬ 
ry; the qxtent and folidity of its vaults and underworks 
were wonderful; its fpacious porticoes and exquiflte 
fculpture were fuited to the grandeur of the whole. It 
was not built in the ufual ftyle of Sicilian temples with a 
cella of maflive walls and a peryftile, but was defigned in 
a mixed tafte with half columns let into the walls on the 
outfide, the infide exhibiting a plain furface. 
The next ruin belongs to the temple of Caftorand Pol¬ 
lux; vegetation has covered the lower parts of the build¬ 
ing, and only a few fragments of columns appear between 
the vines. This was the point of the hill where the wall 
(lopped on the brink of a largefi(It-pond fpoken of by Dio¬ 
dorus : it was cut in the folid rock thirty feet deep, and 
water was conveyed to it from the hills. In it was bred 
a great quantity of fifit for the ufe of public entertain¬ 
ments; fwans and various other kinds of wild fowl fwam 
along its furface, for tlie amufement of the citizens, and 
the great depth of water prevented an enemy from furpri- 
flng the town on that lide. It is now dry, and ufed as a 
garden. On the oppolite bank are two tapering columns- 
without their capitals, moft happily placed in a tuft of'ea- 
rcb trees. Monte Toro, where Hanno'encamped with 
the Carthaginian army, before the Roman confuls drew 
him into an engagement that ruined his defenftve plan, is 
a noble back ground to this piClurefque group of objects. 
The whole fpace comprehended within the walls of the 
ancient city abounds with traces of antiquity, foundations, 
brick-arches, and little channels for the conveyance of 
water; but in no part are any ruins that can be prefumed 
to have belonged to places of public entertainment; This 
is the.more extraordinary, as the Agrigentines were a fen- 
fual people, fond of (hows and dramatic performances, 
and the Romans never dwelt in any place long without in¬ 
troducing their favage games. Theatres and amphithea¬ 
tres feem better calculated than moft buildings to refift 
the outrages of time ; and it is furprifing that not even the 
veftiges of their form (hould remain on the ground. 
AGRIMONIA,yi [from its abounding (agris) in the 
fields.] In botany, a genus of the dodecandria digynia 
clafs, ranking in the natural order of fenticofle. The ge¬ 
neric characters are—Calyx : perianthium one-leafed; five- 
cleft, acute, fmall, fuperior, permanent, fenced with an 
outer calyx. Corolla: petals five, flat, emarginate; claws 
narrow, inCertc-d into the calyx. Stamina: filaments ca¬ 
pillary, fhorter than the corolla, inferted into the calyx ; 
antherae fmall, twin, compreffed. Piftillum : germ infe¬ 
rior ; ftyles Ample, the length of the flamens; ftigtnas ob- 
tufe. Pericarpium: none; calyx contracted at the neck, 
and 
