Page:The Odyssey (Butler).djvu/364

326 used to sleep [translating (xxiii. 333) not "near the " but "near towards the "].

At the top of this tower there was a trap door g′ through which it was possible to get out on to the roof of the tower and raise an alarm, but which afforded neither ingress nor egress—or, as I have said, the  may have been a window.

C was the outer court or, approached by C′ the main entrance, or , a covered gateway with a room over it. This covered gateway was the or reverberating portico which we meet with in other Odyssean houses, and with which we are so familiar in Italian and Sicilian houses at the present day. It was surrounded by C″, covered sheds, or barns, in which carts, farm implements, and probably some farm produce would be stored. It contained,

h, the prodomus, or vestibule in front of the inner court, into which the visitor would pass through

i, the, or inner gateway (the word , however, is used also for the outer gateway), and

k, the tholus, or vaulted room, about the exact position of which we all know is that it is described in xxii. 459, 460, as close up against the wall of the outer court. I suspect, but cannot prove it, that this was the room which Ulysses built round his bed (xxiii. 181—204).

D was the, or level ground, in front of Ulysses' house, on which the suitors amused themselves playing at quoits, or aiming spears at a mark (iv. 625—627).