Acknowledgements are due to all those who have kindly supplied information and photographs: particularly to Dr. Riemann, of the German Archaeological Institute, who generously gave me a copy of his forthcoming report in Archaeologischer Anzeiger, and allowed me to make free use of it; to Professor G. Oikonomos, the Director of the Greek Archaeological Department; to Professors Shear and Morgan, and others of the American School; to M. Paul Lemerle, the Secretary-General of the French School; to Drs. Hampe and Kübler of the German Institute; and to Dr. Säflund of the Swedish excavations. They are in no way responsible for errors in this account.

Athens and Attica

In August 1937 the National Museum received an acquisition of the first importance. It had been known for some time that a marble kouros had been dug up at Anavysos in Attica by a gang of tomb-robbers in 1932, and smuggled out of the country.

It is to-day a known and undisputed fact that the Polis was not only the characteristic and historically important type of Greek State, but that as a religious and political community it was for centuries the foundation and the support of Greek culture. But so far a true ‘history of the Polis’ has not been written. A reason for this may be that the Polis stands as the abstract representative of an enormous number of concrete independent States widely differing in form and development and known to us through traditions widely differing in quality. We must try, and the attempt has already been made, to define the main lines of this historical phenomenon and its evolution, and before all else to obtain a clearer view of the beginning, climax, and end of this evolution in time and manner.

To do this it is not sufficient to study only the external historical facts. In like manner we cannot be content merely to observe, for instance, under the Empire of Alexander or in the Hellenistic State-world the political insignificance of the Polis, and hence to conclude its downfall; or in the perfection of political leading, and the splendour of Empire and culture, in Periclean Athens to see the perfection of the Polis.

Once again I attempt, not without some trepidation, the task of surveying briefly the work done during the past two years in the field of Greek epigraphy, following the same order and observing the same principles as in my previous bibliographies. I include some specially valuable reviews published in 1937 of books issued in 1935 or 1936; on the other hand, I omit certain works which, though bearing the date 1936, were not actually issued, or at least did not become accessible to me, until 1937 was well advanced. As before, I mark with an asterisk books or articles of which I have only a second-hand knowledge. Once more I express my heartiest thanks to all scholars who have facilitated my task by sending me copies of their works.

Death has taken a sadly heavy toll in the ranks of Greek epigraphists during the two years under review; among the more serious losses are those of A. von Premerstein, E. Preuner, G. Glotz, J. Geffcken, H. Collitz, E. Pridik, P. Orsi, R. Heberdey, A. B. West, T. Wiegand and P. Wolters. Happily, some of the veterans are left to us with undiminished vigour and ever accumulating experience, such as A. Wilhelm and F. Hiller von Gaertringen, whose impress will remain indelibly printed on epigraphical studies: both of these attained their doctoral jubilees in 1936, and the latter has added to the history of those studies an autobiographical chapter which is as valuable as it is modest.

In the early years after its foundation in 1857, the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington pursued its policy of acquisition with a vigorously catholic taste. Since then its scope has become gradually limited to exclude work of the pre-Christian era, but in addition to the original purchases of Greek vases, the accession of large miscellaneous collections containing antiquities has contributed to what is now an excellent group of Greek and Roman objects. Important Greek vases were included in the big collection of modern European ceramics transferred in 1901 from the Museum of Practical Geology, Jermyn Street, and in 1910 the late George Salting bequeathed his entire collection, other than paintings, to the Victoria and Albert Museum. His good taste in every other direction was sufficient guarantee that the Greek civilisations should be represented by work of more than average merit. Unfortunately, Salting kept few records concerning the provenance of his acquisitions, and so one of the finest Etruscan engraved mirrors in existence came to the Museum without a past history.

From an old Italian collection there has come to Holland the bronze statuette here published, representing Poseidon as he is known to us from several marbles and bronzes and numerous Hellenistic and Roman coins. The god is shown leaning forward on his raised and bent right leg, his right forearm resting on his thigh, his left hand raised high. The statuette, which measures 17½ cm. in height, is in an excellent state of preservation; only the tops of the thumb and of three fingers of the right hand are missing; too vigorous cleaning has removed much of the patina; on the right side of the neck is a hole, probably a vent. The statuette is of very fine quality and excellent workmanship. In spite of its small size it is impressive and monumental, and strongly recalls a life-sized original; evidently this was a modelled, not a sculptured one; we have to think of a bronze statue. Coins of Demetrios Poliorketes, the figure on which shows exactly the same posture as our bronze, tell us that the right leg rested on a rock and the left hand held a trident.

The most famous of this well-known type is the Lateran statue, which has been much discussed as to the authorship of its original. Unfortunately this is rather a bad example of a Roman copy, made in a very classicist taste, probably in the first half of the second century A.D.; moreover, it has been much restored. Helbig tells us that nose, left arm, both legs up to the knee, ship, dolphin and plinth are restored, while parts of the hair and beard are new.

The excuse for this article is that the accepted reconstruction of the Hellenic policy of Amasis misinterprets statements of Herodotus and ignores the archaeological evidence. Most historians seem to agree that Amasis was put on the throne as the nominee of a fervid nationalist party; that about 565, to please this party, he concentrated the Greeks in Naucratis, reorganised, if not founded, at this time, and only permitted them access to Egypt by the Canopic branch of the Nile; that at the same time he brought to Memphis from Stratopeda, usually equated with Daphnae and Tell Defenneh, the Greek and Carian mercenaries—either to have them more securely under control or from latent philhellenism; and that later he began more openly to favour the Greeks. Further, the date of the foundation of Naucratis needs further discussion: the view most widely held puts it back to the middle of the seventh century.

This year again funds and labour have been scarce, and little work has been done by the archaeological departments for South Italy, except in Campania. Most of the finds have been made accidentally during operations of the Bonifica or of road-making.

In the basin of the river Gela, where the Bonifica was levelling the gorge of Mt. Dessueri for a dam, workmen reported the discovery of a Sicel site. The cemetery had already been found and illustrated by P. Orsi (NdS 1903, Mon Ant 21). The Department has preserved, among other finds (NdS 1937, 368), a jug with vase-spout containing a filter, the tall foot of a one-handled cup, some fragments of decorated bowls, and, among the bronze material, two axe-heads, a knife-blade, and a spear-head. These recall similar material found by Orsi in the cemeteries of Mt. Dessueri, Mt. Finocchito and Pantalica, and date the site to the second Sicel period.

In April 1937 the Sicilian Dept., financed by the Commune of Agrigento, practically completed its prehistoric excavations of the hill of Serraferlicchio above the old railway station, which were successfully started by Orsi and continued later by P. Marconi. It is one of the oldest sites of West Sicily; Orsi had acutely divined the importance of the region, and by 1928 the museum at Syracuse had been enriched by a large collection of painted pottery, of novel shape, with bold and complex geometric patterns.

Dr. Buckler's text (from Sterrett's and my copies of 1883) of a Benefaction made to the village Orkistos in 237 A.D. is a real gain. In regard to two small points I record a different opinion (as arranged with him last year). The exordium is modelled on that of Senatus Consulta and ends as usual with the statement of the place ἐν ᾿Ορκιστῷ οὐᾶι; my friend conjectures ἐν ᾿Ορκιστῶ. ἐν ᾿Ορκιστῶ Οὐά[ριος] to which there are many objections: P was not on the stone. The broken symbol is ι, not ρ or 1. Sterrett's copy confirms mine. Though I have transcribed the entire text several times, first for another friend in 1909, I have never thought it possible to restore ρ. I might hesitate to found any absolute assertion on my copy alone, for it was made with one eye on the stone and one on the workmen. Now Sterrett's copy confirms, as I study it here for the first time. My transcriptions were made from my own copy: details and comparison were left to an editor. According to the conjecture of Dr. B. the dosis is made by Ouarios Aur. Markos, but the acknowledgment is made to Aur. Markos.

My suggestion as to the date of the transfer of this statue to the Heraeum, on which Mr. S. Casson comments in the last number of the Journal (p. 80), was not regarded by me as proof of the Praxitelean authorship of the work, but was merely put forward as a possible explanation of the transfer on the supposition of that authorship, which is still, I think, the general one. It is impossible here to re-open the discussion conducted in The American Journal of Archaeology in 1931, but I may perhaps point out that the fact that Pausanias, in other cases, mentions the removal of original statues to Rome raises a presumption that where he makes no such statement the original remained; and also that he says expressly that there were in the Heraeum, besides the Hermes, chryselephantine statues of Olympias and Eurydice by Leochares.

One would naturally expect that the standards of the Christian emperors of Rome, which are often represented on Roman coins, would be decorated with well-known Christian symbols, and that they would show the cross when not the monogram. In fact part of them do bear the emblems we expect, but certainly not all: a great number of the banners show devices we never learned to look upon as Christian. Very frequent, for instance, is a big circle, or two concentric circles; a combination of five small this matter: they do not distinguish between the various forms of the standards, but call them all labarum.