PREFACE.

THE plan of the present Work being altogether similar to that on Italy, which has already appeared from the Clarendon Press, it will not be necessary to advert here to the method which has been adopted in its composition. Little also need be said on its utility, in a place where the history of antiquity forms so essential a branch of public instruction. The same inducements which led to the publication of the Ancient Italy, existed perhaps in a still greater degree with regard to Greece; since, from the geography of that country being less known, it appeared to be more susceptible of illustration and improvement. Till within a few years we possessed in no language a detailed and full description of the former state of that interesting country. The student, who was desirous of

becoming acquainted with its ancient topography, was compelled to collect his information from the Græcia Antiqua of Palmerius, a useful but unfinished manual; the abridgments of Ubbo Emmius and Cellarius; and detached dissertations and treatises scattered through the voluminous Thesaurus of Gronovius. The work of the Abbé Barthelemy must indeed be considered as having in some degree supplied the deficiency; but, though the Travels of Anacharsis communicate much valuable information on the political and moral condition of Greece, it is evident that many historical details are lost from the circumscribed plan which the author has adopted. Nor can these in fact be supplied but by the method here adopted of assigning to each people, province, and city its own local and peculiar circumstances and events. Professor Mannert of Landshut is the first writer who has treated at length of the history of Ancient Greece, with reference to its topography, in the seventh and eighth volumes of his very useful publication on the Geo