The union Democrat. [volume] (Sonora, Calif.) 1854-1946, 1870-12-10

Another BARRED City discovered,

The Revue Jes pesx Mondes gives an &C
count of the discovery Of buried city, eide,
than Pompeii. 1t is on Thsrasia. small
island of the Greek Archipelago, which, with
two others. form sort of circular bay.
The inner eoast presents a series of cliffs,
sometimes reaching to height of 800 feet.
On the top of these cliffs lies band Of pumice
stone of brilliant whiteness. From the sum-
NIT the land slopes away gently to the open
sea, and is everywhere covered with coat
ing of tulla or pozzulolana, at times more
than hundred feet deep. Here and there
upon the slopes are scattered populous vilag-
es. There is, however. no soil bat fEiahle
pumice. tAe dust of which is raised and car
ried in eddies by very strong srtong winds.
This pumice, when duly mixed with lime,
produces a hard cement which has the quail
ty Of great resistance to the action of the
weather or sea water. 1t has for some time
been exported, and the works at the Suez Ca
nal have caused lately an increased demand
for it. In quarrying, the tula has been quite
cnt through, and beneath have been found re-
mains of buildings erected by the primitive
dwellers in the islands,
The first discoveries were made in Thera-
STA. On the southern face of the islands, be-
tween the two capes in which it terminates,
are vast open quarries. The works are a.
the edge of the elf, and the material IS hurl-
ed down some five hundred feet to the base,
when it is directed by shoots into boats. The
workmen have been accustomed not to cut
down to the bottom of the stratum, since below
a certain level they found that the pozzulola-
ma was mixed with blocks of stone, which,
besides making it more difficult to work, re-
duced its value. Those blocks lay in regular
lines, and were the crests Of walls.
There can be no doubt that the buildings
were raised to dwell in, and that the pumite
which covered them had not been stirred
since it first fell from the volcanoes.
The principal building uncovered contains
rooms of various sizes, thelargest being about
twenty by seventeen feet, the smallest little
moro than eight feet square. One of the
walls is carried out so far as to inclose sort of
court, about twenty-sx feet long, with sin
gle entrance. 4 SIMILAR buildingof one cham
Der has been opened close to this, and the
erests Of several walls in the neighborhood
bear witness to the existence of houses buri-
ed still deeper.
The masonry is quite different from that at
present in use on the island, containing Meth
er pozzulolana nor lime. The walls are COM
posed of irregular blocks of unhewn lava,
terstices being filed up with reddish-colored
volcanic ashes. Among the walls are laid in
every direction long branches of olive wood,
now for the most part so decayed that they
crumble at the first touch. The object of these
was to make the walls less rigid, and so less
subject from disturbance from earthquakes.
One human skeleton was found-that of q
man of middle age, doubled up in one corner
of the room as if crushed under the weight OF
the roof when it broke in. Much of his pro-
perty escaped destruction, and objects Of va.
rious kinds were there-vessels of lava and
earthenware, grain, straw, bones of animals,
tools of flint and of lava. There was no trace
CT metals, not even o rail in the woodwork
of the roof. The pottery is of several kinds,
large, yellowish Jars, holding sometimes as
much as twenty gallons. are the most com
mon. They contained barley, peas, anise,
&c.