Page:History of Art in Phrygia, Lydia, Caria and Lycia.djvu/77

 SlPYLUS AND ITS MONUMENTS. 6l her children were not." We rather incline to believe, with Dr. Fabricius, that this was a vedette, whence the watch, comfortably sheltered behind the cliff, had a full view of the path from its first winding up the steep side of the hill. 1 We have not seen the ruins specified by Humann. Bearing in mind, however, the straits to which the Mussulman conquest reduced the populations of Asia Minor, we should be tempted to think that a village, almost as inaccessible as an eyrie, might, after all, date from the Byzantine rule, but for the fact that M. Humann seems to have no misgivings as to the high antiquity of these remains. Needless to add that the avowed opinion of so experienced an explorer of the Asiatic peninsula is entitled to serious consideration. 2 In its favour are those cisterns and domestic dwellings excavated in the living rock, together with the kind of para- pet, i m. high, obtained in the rocky mass by the same process, which is visible on many a point along the edge of the precipice. 3 Similar struc- tures, reserved for the most part in the cliff upholding them, have struck all travellers who have seen them With the Strong 1 resemblance they 3 . * bear to those on the Pnix at Athens. Such constructions (we have adduced and shall yet adduce numerous instances) were of long standing, and lasted many centuries with the older inhabitants of these provinces, until a more advanced culture caused them to adopt a more convenient style. 4 Our leanings are all for considering this elevated site as the Phrygian Acropolis, where the population of the town below could find temporary shelter whenever a sudden panic overtook 1 M. Fabricius admits the possibility that the term "throne of Pelops," under which the vedette is popularly known, may be due to a late period. 2 MM. Ramsay and Fabricius are equally positive on the subject. 8 The detail is due to M. Ramsay, loc. cit., p. 36. 4 M. RAMSAY (Sipylos and Cybele) states that, besides multitudinous pieces of plain red ware, he picked up a fragment of black pottery, recalling Greek vases. No conclusion, however, can be reached from a single piece of this kind. In the early stage of Hellenic civilization the village may have been inhabited by woodmen or other colonists who supported themselves from the land produce. v. . 33- Niche hollowed in the rock. Longitudinal section. After Dr. Fa- bricius.