The daily gazette., 1877-07-19

THE GOLDEN TREASURES OF KCRIUM.
Mr.. VIM. y, Prime contributes very
scholarly and interesting paper on this
subject TO Horper's Magazine for August
He thus describes the finding of the long
buried wealth:
"Long before the traditional period of
the Trojan war, Cyprus had cities and
came Egyptian for a while after the
fifteenth century r. c. Ku-ium had pro-
badly been founded before the Egyptian
conquest in 1442 B. O.; hence the accumu.
lation of the art of many centuries in the
treasures of her temples.
81 General Cesnola found at Kurium
only vast heaps of rum. The city was
built ON bluff three hundred feet in per-
pendicular height on three sides. The
rock of the bluff was soft calcareous
stone, and around the city in the sides of
the bluff, he found terrace hundred
feet feet wide, cut and followed deep in
the rock, in the sides of which were
tOmbs. Among the ruins on the hill he
identi fled the Site of temple, and here
was that explorers before him had made
excavations and abandoned them. He
saw induced to go deeper then they had,
under the mosaic floor of the temple. At
the depth of twenty rect he struck a
dark passageway, which he penetrated
till stopped by low stone door Burst
Ing this, he found himself at the entrance
of series of vaulted rooms in the rock.
The rooms were full of fine earth which
had sifGed through the rock walls.
"The explorer did not know where he
was, but be was standing at the door
way which leads the student of art into
the hitherto unknown fields of lnvesti-
CATION among the early Greeks and their
Phenician and Egyptian predecessors.
The General soou perceived that the
room which he was to enter was not a
tomb. Commencing to remove the
earth in the slow and careful manner
PRACTICES, he began to find beautiful OBJ
jects in god lying in heaps on the floor
Of the vault. Then came the evidence
that he had opened the treasure cham
bers of the temple. Twenty-Five hun
dred years ago the priests in the temple
were suddenly alarmed by the rush of a
besieging army over or through the
lofty walls of Kurium. la the wild haste
of the unex pected attack, they swept
from alters and shrines, where they
were exposed, the votive offerings Of
generations Of worshipers, FASTENED
down the dark passage, and threw them,
heaps Oh heaps, into the treasury vault,
closed the stone door, and doubtless al
81 ClO6tu Tie SeCTcb W OuC pas
sagewAy. The enemy came in, and
hewed dom the priests before the altars,
or carried them away captive to Asia.
The temple was desecrated, robbed, de-
stroyed its walls and columns hurled
down in hideous ruin, and for twenty
five centuries the gold of the old Phoe-
nician and E4yption and Greek wor-
shippers lay dark and unknown in the
vaulted chamber. From the gold cham
ber a low doorway, 2 feet inches high,
opened into the next vault, which was
the silver room. Black, corroded, un-
slightly as 1t is, this treasure was not
less i'm portaut than the gold, for ancient
silver objects are very rare, especially
cups and vases. There were piles OF
these corrJded into. m asses. But a con-
siderable number were perfect, and are
OF the greatest arch biological Importance.
From this room opened another low
door into a third vault, in which were
found objects in alabaster, terra Gotta,
&C., and beyond his vault, and at right
angle with it, was fouI tn room, which
contained objects in bronze, many of
which were in very fair preservation.
From this room narrow passageway
descended in The rock, which the Cen
eral explored for 130 feet and tnen
abandoned because OF the fonl air and
the difficulty of proceeding.