II.—Excavations at Sparta, 1906

It is not intended in the present preliminary report to discuss controversial questions of Spartan topography. The solution of some of these will be provided, it is to be hoped, by our future excavations on the site. It is permissible, however, to dwell for a short time on the position of the Acropolis and the Agora, since the information of Pausanias and the results of last year's work are sufficient, in my opinion, to establish their identity. That the whole surface of the Palaeocastro hill should have been called the Acropolis is unlikely. A passage in Thucydides renders its position on the theatre-hill, or western summit, almost certain. From this passage we learn that Pausanias, the king of Sparta during the Persian wars, was buried ἐν τῷ προτεμενίσματι or, as the Scholiast explains ἐν τῷ προπυλαίῳ ἐν τῷ πρὸ τοῦ ἰεροῦ προαστείῳ . The Hieron referred to is the temple of Athena Chalkioikos on the Acropolis, and we know that the tomb of Pausanias was opposite the theatre. We may thus legitimately infer that the temple of Athena stood on the theatre-hill

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