Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/662

 646 POLYIIEDIUM. " Tcnulsque censu civitas Polygium est, Turn Mansa vicus oppidumque Naustalo." There is nothiiif; to say about a place for whose site there is no sufficient evidence. Menard supposed it to be Bourhjues on the Etang de Tau. The name seems to be Greek, and the place may be one of the Massaliot settlements ou this coast. [Nau- stalo]. [G. L.] roLYME'DIUM (novjj.r)5tov, Strab. xiii. pp. 606, 616: Polymedia, Plin. v. 30. s. 32), a small place in Jlysia, between the promontory Lectuni and Assus, and at the distance of 40 stadia from the former. POLYKRHE'NIA(noAt;(5prji'ia,Ptol.iii. 17. § 10; XloXiippt}!/, TloAvpriv, Steph. B. s. r., corrected by Meineke into UoKvpp-qvia ; TloWvplnifa, Seylax, p. 18, corrected by Gail ; UoXupp-qviov, Zenob. Frov. V. 50 ; Polyrriienium, Plin. iv. 12. s. 20 : Eth. TloAvppi'ii'ios, Polyb. iv. 53, 55 ; Strab. x. p. 479), a town in the NW. of Crete, whose territory occupied the whole western extremity of the island, extending from N. to S. (Seylax, p. 18.) Strabo describes it as lying V. of Cydonia, at the distance of 30 stadia from the sea, and 60 from Phalasarna, and as con- taining a temple of Dictynna. He adds that the Polyrrhenians formerly dwelt in villages, and that they were collected into one place by the Achaeans and Lacedaemonians, who built a strung city looking towards the south. (Strab. x. p. 479.) In the civil wars in Crete in the time of the Achaean League, B. c. 2 1 9, the Polyrrl-.enians, who had been subject allies of Cnossus,' deserted the latter, and assisted the Lyctians against that city. Tht-y also sent aux- iliary troops to the assistance of the Acliaeans, be- cause the Gnossians had supported the Aetolians. (Polyb. iv. 53, 5.").) The ruins of Polyrrhenia, called Palaeokastro, near Kisamo-Kasteli, exhibit the remains of the ancient walls, from 10 to 18 feet high. (Pashlev, Crete, vol. ii. p. 46, seq.) "POLYTIME'TUS. _Oxu. Palus.] PO-AIK'TIA. [SUESSA P(MIETIA.] POMPE'II (UoiMTTr^ta, Strab.; Xluampoi, Dion Cass. : Eth. noix-mfiavos, Pompeianus : Poupeii), an ancient city of Campania, situated on the coast of the beautiful gulf called the Crater or Bai/ of Naples, at the mouth of the river Sarnus {Sarno), and im-- mediately at the foot of Mount Vesuvius. It was intermediate between Herculaneum and Stabiae. (.Strab. V. p. 247 ; Pliny, iii. 5. s. 9 ; Mela, ii. 4. § 9.) All accounts agree in representing it as a very ancient city: a tradition recorded by Solinus (2. § 5) ascribed its foundation to Hercules; but Dionysius, who ex- pressly notices him as the founder of Herculaneum, says nothing of Pompeii (Dionys. i. 44). Strabo says it was first occupied by the Oscans, subsequently by the Tyrrhenians (Etruscans) and Pelasgians, and afterwards by the Sanmites (Strab. I. c). It con- tinued in the hands of these last, that is, of the branch of the nation who bad assumed the name of Campanians [Campania], till it passed under the government of Rome. It is probable tliat it became from an early period a flourishing town, owing to its advantageous situation at the mouth of the Sarnus, which rendered it the port of Nola, Nuceria, and all the rich plain watered by that river. (Strab. I. c.) But we meet with no mention of its name in hi-story previous to the Roman conquest of Campania. In ]•.. c. 310 it is mentioned for the first time, when a Roman fleet tinder P. Cornelius touched there, and the troops on board proceeded from thence to ravage the territory of Nuceria. (Liv. ix. 38.) No sub. POMPEII. sequent notice of it occurs till the outbreak of the Social War (i?. c. 91), in which it appears to have taken a prominent part, as the Poiiipeiani are men- tioned by Appian apart from the other Campanians, in enumerating the nations that joined in the insur- rection. (Appian, B. C. i. 39.) In the second year of the war (b. c. 89) Pompeii was still in the hands of the insurgents, and it was not till after repeated engagements that L. Sulla, having defeated the Sam- nite forces underL.Cluentius, and forced them to take refuge within the walls of Nola, was able to foi-m the siege of Pompeii. (Appian, ib. 50; Ores. v. 18 ; Veil. Pat. ii. 16.) The result of this is nowhere mentioned. It is certain that the town ultimately fell into the hands of Sulla ; but whether by force or a capitula- tion we are not informed ; the latter is, however, the most probable, as it escaped the fiite of Stabiae, and its inhabitants were admitted to the Roman franchise, though they lost a part of their territory, in which a military colony was established by the dictator, under the guidance and patronage of his relation, P. Sulla. (Cic. p7'0 Still. 21 ; Zumpt. de Colon, pp. 254, 468.) Before the close of the Republic, Pompeii became, in common with so many other maritime towns of Campania, a favourite resort of the Roman nobles, many of whom had villas in its immediate neighbourhood. Among others, Cicero had a villa there, which he frequently mentions under the name of " Pompeianum," and which appears to liave been a considerable establishment, and one of his favourite residences. (Cic. Acad. ii. 3, ud Att. i. 20, ad Fam. vii. 3, xii. 20.) Under the Empire it continued to be resorted to for the same purposes. Seneca praises the pleasantness of its situation, and we learn both from him and Tacitus that it was a populous and flourishing town Q^ cehhre oppiduin," Tac. Ann. xv. 22; Sen. Nat. Qu. vi. 1). In addition to the colony which it received (as already mentioned) under Sulla, and which is alluded to in an inscription as " Colonia Veneria Cornelia" (Mommsen, Inscr. Ii. N. 2201), it seems to have received a colony at some later period, probably under Augustus (though it is not termed a colony by Pliny), as it bears that title in several inscriptions (Mommsen, I. c. 2230 — 2234). In the reign of Nero (a. d. 59) a tumult took place in the amphitheatre of Pompeii, arising out of a dispute between the citizens and the newly-settled colonists of Nuceria, which ended in a conflict in which many persons were killed and wounded. The Pompeians were punished for this outbreak by the prohibition of all gladiatorial and theatrical exhibi- tions for ten years. (Tac. Ann. xiv. 17.) Only four years after, the city sufi'ered severely from an earth- quake, which took place on the 5th of February, A. D. 63. The expressions both of Seneca and Taci- tus would lead us to .suppose that it was in great part utterly destroyed; and we learn from existing evi- dence that the damage done was unquestionably very great, the public buildings especially having suffered most severely. (Sen. Nat. Qu. vi. 1 ; Tac. Ann. xv. 22.) The city had hardly recovered from this ca- lamity, when it met with one far greater; being totally overwhelmed by the famous eruption of Ve- suvius in A. D. 79, which buried Puinpeii, as well as Herculaneum, under a dense bed of ashes and cinders. The loss of life in the former city was the greater, because the inhabitants were assembled in the theatre at the time when the catastrophe took place. (Dion Cass. Lxvi. 23.) The younger Pliny, in his celebrated letters describing the eruption (Ep.vi. 16,20), does not even notice the destruction of Pompeii or Her-