In its first dim days it had been perched on a crag that juts out from the overhanging mountain; there its life began, we hardly know when, in the dawn of Greek history.

But it had been worn down in the fifth century between the upper and the nether millstone of the rival powers of Samos and Miletus.

Early in the Macedonian age it was refounded.

The old Acropolis was given up.

Instead, a broad sloping terrace, or more exactly a series of terraces, nearer the foot of the hill, was laid out with public buildings--Agora, Theatre, Stoa, Gymnasium, Temples, and so forth--and with private houses.