Perth Amboy evening news., 1923-03-10
Geographic News
Bulletins by the
National Geographic Society
PREHISTORIC TIME

PREHISTORIC TIME
Explorers are making forays
across the no mans lands of his
J tory taking trench after trench OF
| the prehistoric, in many other places
| than Luxor" says a bulletin from
| the Washington, ID. c., headquarters
/ of the National Geographic Society.
Notable work is being carried on
! in the Holy Land, in Mesopotamia,
| in Egypt, in the Turkish Peninsula,
and in Greece. Among the most in
| teresting of these remains are tenn
| pies of Greek mythology. An Ital-
| ian Mission has within the last two
or three years brought to light ruins
| of an acropolis and a temple of the
| Pythian Apollo at Gortyna, the cap
ital of Southern Crete, built at the
! foot of Mount Ida. In the interior
| of the temple stands beautiful
statue of Apollo as harp-player,
which reminds one of the noble fig-
ure of the god, created by Greek
| sculptors in the fourth century, now
| to be seen in the Vatican. The
ruins belong TO that period of Gre
tan history when the island was
rich and tfickly populated.
| Happy Hunting Ground of History
Diggers
ing the spring and summer of 1922
clearing and excavating the Agora
| or market place, the temple and its
surroundings, and a Byzantine
| church which had been built over
| the ruins of another temple, as well
! as the remains of many other inter-
esting buildings which had been con-
| structed at later date. Crete has
| long been the happy hunting ground
| of explorers of the past, the ruins at
Enossos being we'll known.
"The Crown Prince Of Sweden re-
Gently has been searching for trea-
sures of ancient Greek ceramic art
in the town of Asine in Laconia,
which the Argives captured because
| it took the side of Sparta against
Argos. AS the temple of the Pyth-
ian Apollo was all they left of the
city, the finds could not be startling
or impressive. However, he uncov-
cred many cremation graves IF the
early Iron Age and found vase COW
cred with geometric patterns or
quaint conventionalized animals.
"At Epidaurus, on the Saronlc
Gulf in Argolis, excavation work has
been going on since 1916. A basilica,
or portico of Greek temple, was
discovered on the site of the little
church of st. John, the central por-
ton of the pavement of which was
of mosaic. A small villa adjoining
the basilica, was paved with many
fine rlosaics..
Find Early Temple Form
Excavation work has been going
on for years at Mycenae. Though
much of it's history dates from 1400
3. c., the city was evidently flourish"
ing in 1000 Is. C. Recently mem
bers of the British school at Myce-
nae removed part of the foundations
of the Doric temple and discovered
further remains that throw light
upon the original form of the tenn
pie structure. Legend says that My
cenae was built by Perseus, and IN
the days of Homer was believed to
be the home of Agamemnon.
Recently newspapers published
accounts of the unearthing of an i'm
posing temple at Rerras, Thessaly.
The structure was in excellent pres
ervation and was said to be as largo
as the temple of Jupiter at Olym-
pia,
Olympia was a small plain In
Ellis bounded by the Rivers Alpheus
and Claudius, in which the Olym-
pic games were celebrated. The
plain and its immediate neighbor-
hood were adorned with numerous
temples and statues. The most cele-
brated of these was the Olympieunl,
largest temple in Greece and one OF
the largest in the ancient world. 1t
contained that masterpiece, the col
ossal Zeus of Phidias.
cone can only guess at the amount
of treasure that the great temple
at Delphi contained. The remains
now standing of the structure built
in the fourth century B. c., have
braved many a cataclysm. The tenn
pie remained pagan, No Christian
church was built on its foundations,
as in the case OF most Greek tenn
ples.'