Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/34

 18 NORTH-WEST AFRICA. more elevated terrace south-east of the ruins stands another cistern, that of Safsaf, which has the form of a canal about 300 yards long. Throughout its entire length it is faced with enormous slabs measuring nearly 20 feet. Cyrene, whose name has been applied to the whole region, preserves a few remains of the monuments erected during its flourishing period, when it held the Libyans in check, presented a bold front to Egypt, and diffused Greek culture far and wide throughout the African Continent. Aristotle wrote a history of Cyrene, which has since been lost, and amongst its famous citizens were such men as the philosopher Aristippus, the poet Callimachus, and the astronomer Eratosthenes, Since the time of l^acho, the first European traveller who visited the place in the present century, the ruins have become less distinct, and many sculptures have been carried off. But the sites may still be recognised of temples, theatres, the stadium, colonnades, and the walls enclosing a portion of the plateau, with a circumference of about 6 miles. Towards the plain the ground occupied by these remains terminates in escarpments, separated by abrupt and deep ravines. In many places the rock had been levelled and the intermediate fissures filled in to secure more convenient foundations for the public buildings. The plateau is traversed by routes still furrowed by the ruts of chariots. But what most surprises the traveller is the vast city of the dead, which encircles that of the living on the west, east, and south, for a distance of several miles. Cyrene would appear to have been, above all, a vast necropolis, in this respect rivalling all other Hellenic towns. The neighbourhood and subsequent sway of the Egyptians had evidently influenced the Greek settlers, who instead of burning the dead, buried them in caves and tombs. In certain ravines the yawning mouths of these sepulchral caverns are seen in thousands, and here and there the traces may still be distinguished of their polychrome decorations. Most of the tombs rest on crypts cut in the limestone cliff, which being of a porous nature, was easily worked, and thus converted into a vast underground city. A monastery of the Senusiya brotherhood has even been established in one of the great mausoleums of Krennah. At the foot o£ the spurs projecting from Cyrene on the route to Apollonia, large storehouses had also been excavated in the rock, which may have afterwards served as tombs. Of the old route itself nothing but a few traces has survived. Smith and Porcher had it partly restored, or rather had a new road built for the purpose of transporting the fine sculptures collected by them for the British Museum. But this work met with little favour from the natives, who reflected that a good highway gives ready access to troops and to the tax-collector. Some 60 miles to the south-west a depression in the plateau about 18 miles long and from 6 to 7 broad, is known to the Arabs by the name of Merj. Here nothing is visible except a solitary palm-tree, serving as a familiar landmark to the way- farer. But on the old lacustrine bed stands the site of the ancient city of Barke, which was first the Hellenic rival of Cyrene, and afterwards the first in rank of the " five cities " whence the country received its name of Pentapolis. It marks the extreme western point of the continent reached by the Persians under Darius, four-