er similar associations in having two places of meeting, the sanctuaries of two divinities; which were the temple of Demeter (Ceres), in a village of Anthela, near Thermopylae, where the deputies met in autumn; and that of Apollo, at Delphi, where they assembled in spring. Its connexion with the latter place not only contributed to its dignity, but also to its permanence.

Its early history is involved in obscurity. Most of the ancients suppose it to have been founded by Amphictyon, the son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, from whom they imagined that it derived its name: but this opinion is destitute of all foundation, and arose from the ancients assigning the establishment of their institutions to some mythical hero. There can be little doubt as to the true etymology of the word. It was originally written audikrioves, and consequently signified those that dwelt around some particular locality. Its institution, however, is clearly of remote antiquity. It was originally composed of twelve tribes (not cities or states, it must be observed), each of which tribes contained various independent cities or states. We learn from Aeschines that, in B. C. 343, eleven of these tribes were as follows: The Thessalians, Boeotians (not Thebans only), Dorians, Ionians, Perrhaebians, Magnetes, Locrians, Oetaeans or Oenianians, Phthiots or Achaeans of Phthia, Malians, and Phocians; other lists leave us in doubt whether the remaining tribe were the Dolopes or Delphians; but as the Delphians could hardly be called a distinct tribe, their nobles appearing to have been Dorians, it seems probable that the Dolopes were originally members, and afterwards supplanted by the Delphians. All the states belonging to each of these tribes were on a footing of perfect equality. Thus Sparta enjoyed no advantages over Dorium and Cytinium, two small towns in Doris: and Athens, an Ionic city, was on a par with Eretria in Euboea, and Priene in Asia Minor, two other Ionic cities.

The ordinary council was called Pylaea (πvλaíα), from its meeting in the neighbourhood of Pylae (Thermopylae), but the same name was given to the session at Delphi as well as to that at Thermopylae. The council was composed of two classes of representatives, one called Pylagorae (IIvλayópaι), and the other Hieromnemones ('Iepoμvýμoves). Athens sent three Pylagorae and one Hieromnemon; of whom the former were elected apparently for each session, and the latter by lot probably for a longer period. Respecting the relative duties of the Pylagorae and Hie

name of the latter implies that they had a more immediate connexion with the temple. We are equally in the dark respecting the numbers who sat in the council and its mode of proceeding. It would seem that all the deputies had seats in the council, and took part in its deliberations; but if it be true, as appears from Aeschines, that each of the tribes had only two votes, it is clear that all the deputies could not have voted.

In addition to the ordinary council, there was an ecclesia (¿ккλŋσía), or general assembly, including not only the classes above mentioned, but also those who had joined in the sacrifices, and were consulting the god. It was convened on extraordinary occasions by the chairman of the council.

Of the duties of the Amphictyons nothing will give us a clearer view than the oath they took, which was as follows:-"They would destroy no city of the Amphictyons, nor cut off their streams in war or peace; and if any should do so, they would march against him, and destroy his cities; and should any pillage the property of the god, or be privy to or plan anything against what was in his temple (at Delphi), they would take vengeance on him with hand and foot, and voice, and all their might." From this oath we see that the main duty of the deputies was the preservation of the rights and dignity of the temple of Delphi. We know, too, that after it was burnt down (B. C. 548), they contracted with the Alcmaeonidae for the rebuilding. History, moreover, teaches that if the council produced any palpable effects, it was from their interest in Delphi; and though it kept up a standing record of what ought to have been the international law of Greece, it sometimes acquiesced in, and at other times was a party to, the most iniquitous acts. Of this the case of Crissa is an instance. This town lay on the Gulf of Corinth, near Delphi, and was much frequented by pilgrims from the West. The Crissaeans were charged by the Delphians with undue exactions from these strangers. The council was against them, as guilty of a wrong against the god. The war lasted ten years, till, at the suggestion of Solon, the waters of the Pleistus were turned off, then poisoned, and turned again into the city. The besieged drank their fill, and Crissa was soon razed to the ground; and thus, if it were an Amphictyonic city, was a solemn oath doubly violated. Its territory-the rich Cirrhaean plain-was consecrated to the god, and curses imprecated upon whomsoever should till or dwell in it. Thus ended the First Sacred War (B. c. 585), in which the Athe

AMPHICTYONES.

nians were the instruments of Delphian vengeance.

The second, or Phocian War (B. C. 350), was the most important, in which the Amphictyons were concerned; and in this the Thebans availed themselves of the sanction of the council to take vengeance on their enemies, the Phocians. To do this, however, it was necessary to call in Philip of Macedon, who readily proclaimed himself the champion of Apollo, as it opened a pathway to his own ambition. The Phocians were subdued (B. C. 346), and the council decreed that all their cities, except Abae, should be razed, and the inhabitants dispersed in villages not containing more than fifty persons. Their two votes were given to Philip, who thereby gained a pretext for interfering with the affairs of Greece; and also obtained the recognition of his subjects as Hellenes.

The Third Sacred War arose from the Amphissians tilling the devoted Cirrhaean plain. The Amphictyons called in the assistance of Philip, who soon reduced the Amphissians to subjection. Their submission was immediately followed by the battle of Chaeroneia (B. C. 338), and the extinction of the independence of Greece. In the following year, a congress of the Amphictyonic states was held, in which war was declared as if by united Greece against Persia, and Philip elected commander-in-chief. On this occasion the Amphictyons assumed the character of national representatives as of old, when they set a price upon the head of Ephialtes, for his treason to Greece at Thermopylae.

It has been sufficiently shown that the Amphictyons themselves did not observe the oaths they took; and that they did not much alleviate the horrors of war, or enforce what they had sworn to do, is proved by many instances. Thus, for instance, Mycenae was destroyed by Argos (B. c. 535), Thespiae and Plataea by Thebes, and Thebes herself swept from the face of the earth by Alexander, without the Amphictyons raising one word in opposition. Indeed, a few years before the Peloponnesian war, the council was a passive spectator of what Thucydides calls the Sacred War (ó tɛpòç ñóλɛμoç), when the Lacedaemonians made an expedition to Delphi, and put the temple into the hands of the Delphians, the Athenians, after their departure, restoring it to the Phocians. The council is rarely mentioned after the time of Philip. We are told that Augustus wished his new city, Nicopolis (A. D. 31), to be enrolled among the members. Pausanias, in the second century of our era, mentions it as still existing, but deprived of all power and influence.

AMPHIDRO ΜΙΛ (Αμφιδρόμια or Δρομ lúμoiov nμap), a family festival of the Athenians, at which the newly-born child was introduced into the family, and received its name. The friends and relations of the parents were invited to the festival of the amphidromia, which was held in the evening, and they generally appeared with presents. The house was decorated on the outside with olive branches when the child was a boy, or with garlands of wool when the child was a girl; and a repast was prepared for the guests. The child was carried round the fire by the nurse, and thus, as it were, presented to the gods of the house and to the family, and at the same time received its name, to which the guests were witnesses. The carrying of the child round the hearth was the principal part of the solemnity, from which its name was derived.

AMPHITHEA'TRUM, an amphitheatre, was a place for the exhibition of public shows of combatants and wild beasts, entirely surrounded by seats for the spectators; whereas, in those for dramatic performances, the seats were arranged in a semicircle facing the stage. An amphitheatre is therefore frequently described as a double theatre, consisting of two such semicircles, or halves, joined together, the spaces allotted to their orchestras becoming the inner inclosure, or area, termed the arena. The form, however, of the ancient amphitheatres was not a circle, but invariably an ellipse.

Gladiatorial shows and combats of wild beasts (venationes) were first exhibited in the forum and the circus; and it appears that the ancient custom was still preserved till the time of Julius Caesar. The first building in the form of an amphitheatre is said to have been erected by M. Scribonius Curio, one of Caesar's partisans; but the account which is given of this building sounds rather fabulous. It is said to have consisted of two wooden theatres made to revolve on pivots, in such a manner that they could, by means of windlasses and machinery, be turned round face to face, so as to form one building. Soon after Caesar himself erected a real amphitheatre in the Campus Martius, made of wood; to which building the name of amphitheatrum was for the first time given.

The first stone amphitheatre was built by Statilius Taurus, in the Campus Martius, at the desire of Augustus. This was the only stone amphitheatre at Rome till the time of Vespasian. One was commenced by Caligula, but was not continued by Claudius. The one erected by Nero in the Campus Martius was only a temporary building, made of wood.

The amphitheatre of Statilius Taurus was burnt in the fire of Rome in the time of Nero; and hence, as a new one was needed, Vespasian coinmenced the celebrated Amphitheatrum Flavianum in the middle of the city, in the valley between the Caelian, the Esquiline, and the Velia, on the spot originally occupied by the lake or large pond attached to Nero's palace. Vespasian did not live to finish it. it was dedicated by Titus in A. D. 80, but was not completely finished till the reign of Domitian. This immense edifice, which is even yet comparatively entire, covered about five acres of ground, and was capable of containing about 87,000 spectators. It is called at the present day the Colosseum.

The interior of an amphitheatre was divided into three parts, the arena, podium, and gradus. The clear open space in the centre of the amphitheatre was called the arena, because it was covered with sand, or sawdust, to prevent the gladiators from slipping, and to absorb the blood. The size of the arena was not always the same in proportion to the size of the amphitheatre, but its average proportion was one third of the shorter diameter of the building.

The arena was surrounded by a wall distinguished by the name of podium; although such appellation, perhaps, rather belongs to merely the upper part of it, forming the parapet, or balcony, before the first or lowermost seats, nearest to the arena. The arena, therefore, was no more than an open oval court, surrounded by a wall about eighteen feet high, measuring from the ground to the top of the parapet; a height considered necessary, in order to render the spectators perfectly secure from the attacks of wild beasts. There were four principal entrances leading into the arena; two at the ends of each axis or diameter of it, to which as many passages led directly from the exterior of the building; besides secondary ones, intervening between them, and communicating with the corridors beneath the seats on the podium.

The wall or enclosure of the arena is supposed to have been faced with marble, more or less sumptuous; besides which, there appears to have been, in some instances at least, a sort of network affixed to the top of the podium, consisting of railing, or rather open trellis-work of metal. As a farther defence, As a farther defence, litches, called euripi, sometimes surrounded the arena.

The term podium was also applied to the terrace, or gallery itself, immediately above the arena, which was no wider than to be capable of containing two, or at the most three

ranges of movable seats, or chairs. This, as being by far the best situation for distinctly viewing the sports in the arena, and also more commodiously accessible than the seats higher up, was the place set apart for senators and other persons of distinction, such as the ambassadors of foreign parts; and it was here, also, that the emperor himself used to sit, in an elevated place, called suggestus or cubiculum, and likewise the person who exhibited the games on a place elevated like a pulpit or tribunal (editoris tribunal).

Above the podium were the gradus, or seats of the other spectators, which were divided into macniana, or stories. The first maenianum, consisting of fourteen rows of stone or marble seats, was appropriated to the equestrian order. The seats appropriated to the senators and equites were covered with cushions, which were first used in the time of Caligula. Then, after an interval or space, termed a praecinctio, and forming a continued landingplace from the several staircases in it, succeeded the second maenianum, where were the seats called popularia, for the third class of spectators, or the populus. Behind this was the second praecinctio, bounded by a rather high wall; above which was the third maenianum, where there were only wooden benches for the pullati, or common people. The next and last division, namely, that in the highest part of the building, consisted of a colonnade, or gallery, where females were allowed to witness the spectacles of the amphitheatre, some parts of which were also occupied by the pullati. Each maenianum was not only divided from the other by the praecinctio, but was intersected at intervals by spaces for passages left between the seats, called scalae, or scalaria; and the portion between two such passages was called cuneus, because the space gradually widened like a wedge, from the podium to the top of the building. The entrances to the seats from the outer portices were called vomitoria. the very summit was the narrow platform for the men who had to attend to the velarium, or awning, by which the building was covered as a defence against the sun and rain. The velarium appears usually to have been made of wood, but more costly materials were sometimes employed.

At

The first of the following cuts represents a longitudinal section of the Flavian amphitheatre, and the second, which is on a larger scale, a part of the above section, including the exterior wall, and the seats included between that and the arena. It will serve to convey an idea of the leading form and general disposition of the interior.