A NEW POMPEIL

Taranaki Daily News, 1 November 1919, Page 10

A NEW POMPEIL

RECENT DISCOVERIES IN NORTH AFRICA.

All during the war a work of great interest has been quietly proceeding in the Italian colony of Cyrenaica, on thff North African littoral (.writes the Rome correspondent of the London Observer). The tumult of the last years has given little opportunity for the voices of art archaeology to make themselves ! heard, but during this time the Italians lhave made discoveries of antique statues and- monuments in the neighborhood of Cyrene, which in more tranquil times | would have made no little stir in the newspapers. Those interested in archaeology and the ancient Greek and Roman civilisations must know that the excavations in Cyrenaica during the last few years have revealed to use another stratum of Greco-Roman life. Cyrene and its environs have yielded a series of discoveries comparable almost in importance with the great archaeological finds of men like Sehliewann, Evans, and Wood. It is the Alexandrine or colonial phase of Greek civilisation which has yielded these new treasures. The work ha 3 been carried on uninterruptedly during the war under the aegis of Professor Lucio Mariani, Director of the Archaeological Services .of the Ministry of the colonies.

I had the pleasure of an interview with the illustrious professor the other day, when he spoke to me of the importance of these Cyrenoan discoveries with the modesty of . a highly-cultured man who knows everything that is to be known of his Bubject. Cyrene may prove 'to be a new Pompeii, only larger and richer in statues and monuments than the excavated city at the feet of Vesuvius. Work is still proceeding at Cyrene with renewed vigor, and the shortly-expected colonial report of the most recent discoveries promises to be a document of the highest interest. The operations on the spot are and have been for some time conducted under the personal supervision of Professor Ettore Ghislanzoni. chiefly with indigenous labor, with the assistance of some Italian engineers and soldiers. The well-stocked museums of Bengals (the ancient Berenice) and Cyrene will demand a visit from all students of archaeology and Greco-Roman life; in fact, from all tourists who now feel it their duty to visit Pompeii. The most celebrated finds are the statues of the Graces, the Hermes of Cyrene, the Alexander {he Great, the Eros, and most remarkable of all, the marvellous Aphrodite of Cyrene. This latter statue, discovered just before the war, now stands in the National Museum in Rome, and is considered by connoisseurs to be one of the loveliest of all the famous Aphrodites of antiquity, not unworthy to enter the category of such celebrated statues as the Venus de Milo and Venus of Cnidus, It was discovered quite by accident. On the night of December 27, 1913, a torrential downpour of rain assailed Cyrene, and, washing away banks of earth, broke open a spot in the hillside, revealing to the Italian soldiers a beautiful Greek status of the Aphrodite Anadyomene, with its head and arms missing. It was taken to Bengasi, and thence eventually to Rome. Thus, as Professor Ghislan/.oni, in his official report for the Ministry of the Colonies says, Venus, who was born from the water, owes to the water her resurrection.