Handbook for Travellers in Greece Volume 1; Including the Ionian Islands, Continental Greece Peloponnese Islands of the Aegean Sea, Crete (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1884 Excerpt: ...Philip, dedicated to Apollo by Philip III. of Macedon. Down by the sea-snore, near the Stoa, lie some fragments2 of the colossal status, of Apollo erected by the Naxians. The date of its destruction is unknown. But Plutarch relates that Nicias when sent to Delos with the Theoria, re-established the ancient ceremonial, which had fallen into neglect, and among other votive offerings set up a bronze palm-tree to Apollo, 1 For all particulars respecting the discoveries of MM. Homolle and Hauvette-Besnault, see Bull, de Carres. Hell. vols. i.-viii. The inscriptions obtained by them are still in course of publication. 2 According to a tradition of doubtful authenticity, an English sea-captain carried oif the head of this statue early in the 17th cent. Another account, with more probability, attributes the removal to a Venetian proveditore. The greater part of the torso yet remained when Spon and Wheler (1C75) visited Delos, and Sir George writes of it: "The god himself is so ill-handled, that he hath neither hands, feet, nor head left him; yet what is remaining appcareth still most beautiful... The beauty of it is such, that I am apt to believe, if Michael Angelo had seen it, he would have admired it as much as he did that trun Vatican." "which palm-tree," adds Plutarch "was afterwards thrown down by the wind, and in falling earned with it the colossal statue which had been dedi cated by the Naxii." A fragment of the foot of Apollo was rescued by Mr. Kinnaird, in 1818, am is in the British Museum. The pedes tal of the statue is still to be seen in situ. On it is engraved the celebratec Inscriptio Deliaca, which the commentaries of Bentley and Montfaucon have made famous. The great Bentley restored it, and established his correction b...