Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 1.djvu/190

 Troy. 169 Ilium with a visit. Lysimachus went even further in his appreci- ation of the city, and built a temple to the local goddess, which he decorated with sculptures. The metope in fine style unearthed by Schliemann, which he presented to the Berlin Museum, belonged to this temple. He also surrounded the town with a wall forty stadia in circuit, and increased the population by adding to it the inhabitants of old neighbouring cities.^ As soon as the Romans obtained a foothold in Asia,^ they showered upon the town whence had gone forth iEneas, the mythical founder of Rome, substantial tokens of their regard. The power and dignity of the Ilians was further enhanced when the Julian family, claiming descent from Anchises and Aphrodite, assumed sovereign power. Caesar confirmed their freedom, and exempted them from taxes and all public charges,^ adding to their domain the adjacent territories of Sigeum, Rhaeteum, and Gergis. The town preserved its importance to the last day of the empire. Every stranger of note travelling in the Troad visited its principal temple, situate on the fortress-hill, and as a matter of course laid rich offerings before its shrine. The foundations of the circuit- wall which once enclosed the houses on the plateau have been traced to a considerable distance. As a natural consequence of the erections, devastations, and reconstructions which went on for ages, the hill grew in height and spread to every point of the compass, so that each successive settlement has a larger area than the one immediately beneath. This peculiarity was brought about by the crumbling away of crude bricks that went to the making of the upper part of the enclosure, and along with the remains of decayed dwellings they slipped down the slopes and settled there, a small portion only of ruin and soil being carried by the large stones of the substructures into the plain ; each one, however, increased the width and thickness of the mound. Hence it is that the space parting the north from the south wall is but forty-six metres ; in the second or burnt city, this space rises to one hundred metres, and so on to the top. The masses of soil and rubbish with which the hill surrounded itself after the fall of the second city, in time settled down sufficiently to become the foundations of the houses of what Schliemann calls the Lydian and iEolian period. These in their turn were destroyed, and a
 * Strabo. 2 i^i b c, 3 Strabo.