either in Latin or in the lingua rustica of the Latin people. It would seem to be an attempt by the uneducated and illiterate to write according to the common pronunciation, and the common forms of popular utterance. The elaborated forms of conjugation and declension existing in the written and literary Latin are sometimes rejected, and sometimes caught after, in the terminations of words, so as to give it a literary air; but ordinarily, even in the earliest Italian documents, a simpler and less elaborated language is manifest-and this, it is certainly not "absurd" to fancy, may have been the lingua rustica or vulgaris of the people.

We are thus led to a consideration of the probable pronunciation of the Latin language by the ancients, for this would plainly throw an important light upon the subject. This question has been much mooted of late, and will form the continuation of this paper in the next number of this REVIEW.

W. W. STORY.

VIII.

EPHESUS, CYPRUS, AND MYCENE.*

SIDE by side with the splendid achievements in physical science which distinguish our generation must be placed the results of archæological research. The two forms of labor are not necessarily connected or interdependent, yet they have been equally stimulated by a common experience in detecting possibilities of entrance-often slight and inconspicuous posterns, discoverable rather to the eye of faith than to that of knowledge— in barriers which once seemed hopelessly closed. It is not so very long since the complete or at least formless ruin of the great cities and edifices of antiquity was a generally-accepted belief the phrase "not one stone shall be left upon another" was supposed to express a literal fact; the lost languages were given up as lost; and the unrecorded histories were never meant to be restored. Now scarcely a year passes without the discovery of some important historical landmark, and every new light of knowledge, illuminating the remote past of our race, reveals the dim outlines of a still remoter past behind it. As one climbing a long mountain-slope, we see farther backward in proportion

as we rise.

The great age of archæological discovery began with Layard's

"Discoveries at Ephesus, including the Site and Remains of the Great Temple of Diana." By J. T. Wood, F. S. A. 4to, pp. 475. James R. Osgood & Co.

"Cyprus: Its Ancient Cities, Tombs, and Temples. A Narrative of Researches and Excavations, during Ten Years' Residence in that Island." By General Louis Palma di Cesnola. Large 8vo, pp. 456. Harper & Brothers.

"Mycene: A Narrative of Researches and Discoveries at Mycena and Tiryns." By Dr. Henry Schliemann. Preface by the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M. P. 4to, pp. 384. Scribner, Armstrong & Co.

excavations on the site of Nineveh, and the researches of Sir Charles Fellowes in Caria and Lycia. Soon afterward M. Mariette, carrying a similar faith and enthusiasm to Egypt, found Memphis, and entered upon that long series of successes which has not yet come to an end. The race of explorers immediately begat a race of scholars: new Egyptologists appeared, and enforced their claims to honor and authority; Assyriologists for the first time came into being; and George Smith found history and religion on the dumb tablets exhumed by Layard. His own later researches at Nineveh; the excavations on the Palatine Hill, in Rome; Mariette's discovery of the statues of the Shepherd kings at Tanis; Schliemann in the Troad and at Mycenae; Wood at Ephesus; Cesnola in Cyprus; and Curtius at Olympia -to say nothing of such minor research as that of the Austrian Government at Samothrace, Davis at Carthage, and Burton in the land of Midian-constitute a body of discovery of such vast importance and absorbing interest, that the civilized world seems scarcely yet fully to credit its possession. It is a skeptical age, and, when it sees so many men, who at first sight appear to be guided only by an intense, unreasoning belief in their object, actually finding what they sought, the natural tendency is to doubt and question and seek for antagonistic views. All the precious material so recently acquired must first be classified and relegated to its proper place in our ordered knowledge of the human past, before the world shall clearly recognize its importance. Its influence on the class of intelligent thinkers is already very perceptible.

Almost every one of the great discoveries I have enumerated has been due to faith in the trustworthiness of the ancient authorities. Since Herodotus and Ptolemy, so long suspected of having been fabulists, have been wholly rehabilitated as careful and conscientious guides, Strabo, Pliny, Pausanias-indeed all descriptive passages of classic authors-receive an authentic stamp, which they scarcely possessed before. But the belief, which instigated such labors and trials of patience as every explorer must undergo, was not a mere uninstructed enthusiasm. Mr. Wood believed that there had been a Temple of Diana at Ephesus, and hence that its remains were not past finding out; General di Cesnola believed that there had been stately temples

at Idalium, Golgos, Amathus, and Paphos; and Dr. Schliemann, in turning to prehistoric Mycenæ, depended far more upon the statement of Pausanias than upon the strophes of Eschylus. Although in the story of each there may seem to be an element of lucky accident, it will prove to be hardly more than the luck which, in the end, rewards persistent enthusiasm. There was a point in the labors of each when a doubting explorer would have stopped short, discouraged; and the triumph lay beyond that point. The narratives of the three last-named archeologists have appeared during the past year, and they form, in conjunction with Dr. Hirschfeld's report on the explorations at Olympia, such a contribution of recovered knowledge as should make the year forever memorable.

Beginning with Mr. Wood's first excavations at Ephesus, in 1863, and closing with Dr. Schliemann's discovery of the royal tombs at Mycena in November, 1876, the labors of the three gentlemen are included within a period of thirteen years. Their tasks were wholly distinct in character, and their methods of labor, therefore, had but a general resemblance. Mr. Wood's was the simplest, his one aim being to discover the Temple of Diana, the situation of which was indicated by nothing upon the present surface of the soil. Dr. Schliemann's was the easiest, since his explorations were fixed within circumscribed and rather contracted limits; and General di Cesnola's was, at the same time, the most arduous, and the most uncertain in its probable results.

I shall take the three in the order of their labors, and endeavor to detach, in each case, the clear and simple story from the somewhat irregular mixture of personal narrative, description of objects, and antiquarian conjectures, which we find in the volumes. By adding thereto a statement of results, with impartial reference to the character of the objects discovered, I may be able to furnish the reader with the necessary basis of fact, and qualify him to examine, with some degree of independence, the conflicting theories which seek to establish themselves thereon. The spoils of Cyprus and Mycenae, as will be seen, are too new and unexpected to be readily disposed of, even by the most experienced scholars. In order to make room for them, the old adjustment of epochs in the art and general culture of the an

cients must be very materially changed; and the archæologists are almost as unwilling to accept such changes as are the theologians. Least of all, have they the right to disparage the enthusiasm of the explorer, over-credulous though it be; for to that enthusiasm they owe the achievements recorded in these three works. There are not many book-scholars who would have labored at Ephesus for years, before grasping the clew which led Mr. Wood to the temple of Diana: still fewer would have dreamed of digging at Mycenæ, with the expectation of finding anything beyond the foundations of Cyclopean walls; and in 1862, more than three years before General di Cesnola reached Cyprus, the French archæologist, Count de Vogué, makes this report of his researches: "Quant à l'exploration extérieure de l'île, je puis le dire, elle a été aussi complète que possible; rien d'apparent n'a été omis." It is, perhaps, not in human nature that a man of distinguished learning shall find that a favorite theory, upon which he has lavished years of thought, is jarred and in danger of being overthrown, without jealously defending it; yet it is curious to notice what immediate receptance any discovery obtains, which seems to establish a point in what is called sacred history, and how much doubt and discussion follow the evidences of a fact underlying some episode of the semi-mythical age of profane history.

In beginning his work at Ephesus, in May, 1863, Mr. Wood had several ancient authorities-the most important being Pliny, Strabo, Pausanias, and Philostratus-to guide him in his researches. They coincided in stating that the temple was built on low, marshy soil, and the last two clearly indicated, in their accounts, that a road led from it to the Magnesian Gate of Ephesus. But Mr. Wood, trusting to a statement of Philostratus that Damianus, a rich Roman, had connected the temple with the city by a stoa, or covered portico, one stadium (600 feet) in length, was misled by a ridge of soil on the seaward side of the city, and sought for the temple at that distance. His agreement with the British Museum to excavate both the Odeum and the Great Theatre probably prevented him from wasting much time and money in fruitless labor; and it was the means, finally, of guiding him to the true locality. After working three years with unimportant results, he confined his work to the Great