Ruins of Ancient Cities (Vol. 1 of 2): With General and Particular Accounts of Their Rise, Fall, and Present Condition — John Shaqi
Ruins of Ancient Cities (Vol. 1 of 2): With General and Particular Accounts of Their Rise, Fall, and Present ConditionBucke, Charles
History
Ruins of Ancient Cities (Vol. 1 of 2): With General and Particular Accounts of Their Rise, Fall, and Present Condition
Bucke, Charles
Cities and towns, Ancient
There are, as we have already stated, very few remains within the city
of any ancient buildings. The principal works are the aqueducts, and
some grottoes cut in the mountain. There were once two temples of great
celebrity, one of which was dedicated to Apollo and the other to the
Moon. At this moment not a vestige of these is to be discovered.
"Formerly," says Lord Sandwich, "it had a port of considerable
importance on the north bank of the Orontes, and on the shores of the
Levant; but the harbour is choked up, and not a single inhabitant
remains. The sun of Antioch is set. The present city is a miserable
place, extending four hundred yards from the side of the river to the
bottom of a mountain, on the summit of which, and round the town, the
crusaders, during their being in possession of Syria, built a strong
wall. Nothing remains of its ancient grandeur besides some stupendous
causeways and massy gateways of hewn stone."
At a distance of about four or five miles was a place called Daphne.
There Seleucus planted a grove, and in the midst of it he erected a
temple, which he consecrated to Apollo and Diana. To this place the
inhabitants of Antioch resorted for their pleasures and diversions, till
at last it became so infamous, that "to live after the manner of Daphne"
was used proverbially to express the most voluptuous and dissolute mode
of living.
Antioch is said to have been once greater than Rome itself; but often
ruined, and finally razed by the Mamelukes, it is now only a small town,
known by the name of Antakia. Its climate is so agreeable, that we may
cite some observations, made in regard to it in a passage in Mr.
Robinson's tour in Palestine and Syria. "For the breadth and brilliancy
of the eastern landscape, there is no architecture equal to the
Oriental. The solemnity and grandeur of the Gothic are suited to our
climate of cloud and tempest. The severe or even the florid beauty of
Greek architecture belongs to a country where the spectator sees it
under the lights and shadows of a sky as picturesque as the hills and
valleys that it covers. But the magnitude, strong colourings, and yet
fantastic finish of Eastern architecture are made to be seen across its
vast plains under the unclouded sky; and glowing with the powerful
splendour with which the rising and the setting sun less illumine than
inflame the horizon. At a distance it has the dream-like beauty which we
habitually attach to the edifices of the Arabian Nights[33]."
NO. XI.--ARGOS.
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