The Acropolis dominates the plain of Athens.  All the city seems to adjust itself to the base of its holy citadel.  It lifts itself as tawny limestone rock rising about 190 feet above the adjacent level of the town.[*] In form it is an irregular oval with its axis west and east.  It is about 950 feet long and 450 feet at its greatest breadth.  On every side but the west the precipice falls away sheer and defiant, rendering a feeble garrison able to battle with myriads.[+] To the westward, however, the gradual slope makes a natural pathway always possible, and human art has long since shaped this with convenient steps.  Nestling in against the precipice are various sanctuaries and caves; e.g. on the northwestern side, high up on the slope beneath the precipice, open the uncanny grottoes of Apollo and of Pan.  On the southern side, close under the very shadow of the citadel, is the temple of Asclepius, and, more to the southeast, the great open theater of Dionysus has been scooped out of the rock, a place fit to contain an audience of some 15,000.[&]

[*]It is nearly 510 feet above the level of the sea.

[+]Recall the defense which the Acropolis was able to make against Xerxes’s horde, when the garrison was small and probably ill organized, and had only a wooden barricade to eke out the natural defenses.

[&]The stone seats of this theater do not seem to have been built till about 340 B.C.  Up to that time the surface of the ground sloping back to the Acropolis seems simply to have been smoothed off, and probably covered with temporary wooden seats on the days of the great dramatic festivals.

So much for the bare “bones” of the Acropolis; but now under the dazzling sunshine how it glitters with indescribable splendor!  Before us as we ascend a whole succession of buildings seem lifting themselves, not singly, not in hopeless confusion, but grouped admirably together by a kind of wizardry, so that the harmony is perfect,—­each visible, brilliant column and pinnacle, not merely flashing its own beauty, but suggesting another greater beauty just behind.

192.  The Use of Color upon Athenian Architecture and Sculptures.—­While we look upward at this group of temples and their wealth of sculptures, let us state now something we have noticed during all our walks around Athens, but have hitherto left without comment.  Every temple and statue in Athens is not left in its bare white marble, as later ages will conceive is demanded by “Greek Architecture” and statuary, but is decked in brilliant color—­“painted,” if you will use an almost unfriendly word.  The columns and gables and ceilings of the buildings are all painted.  Blue, red, green, and gold blaze on all the members and ornaments.  The backgrounds of the pediments, metopes, and frieze are tinted some uniform color on which the sculptured figures in relief stand out clearly.  The figures themselves are tinted or painted, at least on the hair, lips, and