Days Near Rome (Volume 1)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1875 Excerpt: ...his figures were animated. His works are almost innumerable.--Lanzi. Mounting above the houses on the left of the town, a stony path over glaring steeps of limestone rock thinly planted with olives, leads to the Citta Vecchia. It has considerable remains of Cyclopean walls, and behind a church on the citadel is one of the earliest architectural monuments in Europe, a most remarkable arch of gigantic rough-hewn stones without cement, projecting in different courses till they meet. It is said to resemble the gates at Tiryns and Mycenae. It may be mentioned that the Cyclopes assisted in making the gate at Mycenae (vide Pausanias in Argol), and there they cut and even squared their blocks; and that Diomede, who of course had often seen that gate, founded the city of Arpi, in Apulia. Query: Did any of that or any other Greek colony reach Arpinum, the name of which seems a derivative?--for the gate of Arpinum, now called Acuminata, remains in such a state, that the size, the form, and even the number of stones seem almost a copy of the gate of Mycenae. The blocks also on each side of the portal advance, in the same manner, as if to embrace a triangular stone above the opening. The triangular stone, with the two jambs, and the architrave, unfortunately do not remain, but the upper part of the opening could have been closed in no other manner.--Gell. I stood high on the Cyclopean walls and gazed with rapture upon the Latian landscape, for the citadel being in such a lofty situation, the view around is grand and extensive. The hill of Sora looked like a little pyramid, like one of those in Egypt; and, in its black shadow, lay the town; and fully exposed to view was the valley of the Liris, majestically surrounded by high hills. There is La Po...