The temple was erected to Aphæa, protectress of women. Of the outer colonnade enough is intact to reveal the dignity of the original structure, but it was in the pediment sculptures that the art of Ægina was best expressed. Preserved now in the Munich Museum, they are heirs to the ancient fortune of many Æginetan products which were shipped to the north and to the south, to Egypt and to the barbarous shores of the Black Sea. These pediment groups, well known as examples of the work of the Æginetan school of sculpture in the early part of the fifth century, probably represented episodes of the Trojan War. This would seem to indicate that they were produced after the victory at Salamis which inspired so many symbolistic expressions in art and literature of the conquest of barbarians by Greeks. Ægina distinguished herself at Salamis, her sailors being awarded the first honours for valour. And her older heroes had fought conspicuously in the Trojan War, the earlier act of the long drama. [Illustration: ÆGINA Temple of Aphæa ] But it was the personal bravery of the Æginetans rather than their national policy which brought them glory at Salamis. The island-commonwealth was inclined to aid the Persians, and it was the interference of Athens at this crisis which brought on the open war between the two maritime powers. By the middle of the fifth century Ægina was completely conquered and made a member of the Confederacy of Delos. Twenty years later the Dorian inhabitants were expelled and the island freshly settled from Attica. Ægina’s heyday had antedated that of Athens by two centuries. Her argosies had been known in all ports where men bought or sold. Her system of coinage and of weights and measures had set the standards for the Greek world. At home her people displayed their restless energies in both industrial and artistic pursuits. In literature alone were they barren. Their claim to poetry lies only in the inspiration which one manifestation of their energy yielded to a foreign poet.