Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 1.djvu/13

 ON INSCRIPTIONS OF THE AGE OF THUCYDIDES The study of ancient Greek inscriptions, to which so great an impulse has been given during the last sixty years by scholars, such as Boeckh, Kirchhoff, Kohler and Lolling in Germany, Lebas and Waddington in France, Mr. Charles Newton in England, as well as by Greek archaeologists such as Rangabe, throws a real but not a considerable light upon the history of Greece. Many thousands of them have been already collected ; and the number may be indefinitely increased by the zeal and industry of the present generation. None hitherto found are older than the seventh century before Christ, some of the oldest being written (3ov(rTpo(f>y]S6v (i. e. returning at the end of the line like the ox in the furrow) ; in the sixth century and down to the Persian war they are rare ; in the latter half of the fifth century they become more numerous, and there are many which have a direct connexion with the history of Thucydides ; sometimes coinciding with, often supplementing his narrative ; in one instance only (p. Ixxix) contradicting it. The study of inscriptions is not separable from the general study of the Ancient World. In so far as it illus- VOL. I. b