No part of the Greek world is richer in tradition and in the memories of a prehistoric past than the district that lies within the limit of a day's excursion from Smyrna. In the small but fertile plain that surrounds the head of the gulf, a great power existed long before the Ionians emigrated from Greece to Asia Minor. The names of Niobe, Tantalus, Pelops, are all most intimately connected with Mount Sipylus. The mountain was one of the chief seats of the worship of the goddess called Cybele by the Greeks; and in that worship the connection between Greece and the East is more apparent than in almost any other. Any new traces of this old empire must therefore have some value; and though the following notes are the result only of a first preliminary survey, they may give some new information about a race that is as yet too little known.

A Turk, the trusty and intelligent servant of a very kind English friend, had accompanied us in several excursions; and he told me of some ruins near his village that had hitherto escaped notice. M. Weber, an archaeologist in Smyrna, went with us in our visit to the spot.