ANTIPAROS, a small low-lying island in the Archi pelago, about sixteen miles in circumference, and of a long narrow irregular figure. It is separated from Paros by-a strait less than a mile broad, and lies in East Long. 25° 4', North Lat. 36° 58'.
An inconsiderable town, at one end, is inhabited by a few families, which are heavily taxed by the Turkish government. These carry on a trifling trade in wine and cotton, and cultivate as much ground as serves for their own subsistence. The total number of inhabitants does not exceed a few hundreds, most of whom are French and Maltese corsairs.• In point of spiritual rule, the island is dependent on the Greek archbishop of Naxos. Part of it belongs to the monks of a monastery in Siphanto, who, before the Venetians destroyed the olives, drew a considerable revenue from it. Now the produce is very small ; and four-footed animals so scarce, that flesh, as an article of food, is frequently wanting. There is a harbour, which is unfit for the reception of large vessels; but there is good anchorage in the middle of the strait.
Antiparos is supposed to have been known to the an cients. Pliny and Strabo call it Oliaros; and Hcraclides says it was inhabited by a colony of Sidonians. Although there is only one town on it now, there were formerly two; but, in consequence of an alarm, it is said that the whole inhabitants deserted both, and afterwards return ed to the smaller one only.
This island is celebrated for a remarkable cavern, or grotto, of great extent, of which there have been such various and exaggerated accounts, that we find it difficult to select the truth.
Whether or not the grotto of Antiparos was known to the ancients, is doubtful. There are two inscriptions on natural pillars at the mouth, bearing the names of se %end Greeks whose names are found in history ; and a tradition prevails among the inhabitants, that they were the conspirators against Alexander the Great, rho, hav ing failed in their design, took refuge here. As the name of Antipater is among them, this circumstance is thought to give probability to the tradition, because Diodorus Siculus alleges that certain historians had ac cused him of participating in the conspiracy. These
inscriptions were much obliterated even a century ago. Near them is a bas relief of a cross, also defaced, which belongs to a later period. If the ancients were truly ac quainted with the recesses of the cavern, the natives of the island had either lost all knowledge of it, or were afraid to enter, until the time of Alagni, an Italian tra veller, who is thought to have first penetrated the inte rior, in the seventeenth century. It was more recently visited by M. Tournefort; afterwards by several Eng lishmen; and then by M. Choiseul Gouffier, who gives exact details of its description, size, and structure. The entrance is by a low arch in the rocks, about thirty paces wide, which is divided into two portions by several natu ral pillars. To one of these a rope is fixed, to assist the traveller in his descent, and to facilitate his return. First there is found a small fiat space, which advances in descents of various steepness, some of which are ex tremely slippery, owing to the moisture exuding from the rocks, until nearly half way down, when the gen tleness of the inclination renders it unnecessary either to use a ladder, as is before clone, or to hold by a rope.
Here the loftiness of the vault is lost in darkness, and the humidity of subterraneous vapours makes the light of the torches more faint and obscure. Having turned around a rock which apparently closes the entrance, the traveller finds himself in a large vacuity, or hall, which terminated the cavern, or at least the part of it already explored. The sides of the grotto are covered with incrustations ; and immense stalactites, continually increasing in size, depend from the roof. In addition to the number of these, which is daily augmenting, many pillars, broken and entire, rise from the irregular surface below ; altogether forming a singular and interesting spectacle, and on a scale, that, for magnitude, is unex ampled in any other part of the globe. The length of the cavern, from the entrance, is nearly 1000 feet, the breadth above 300, and the hottom, at the deepest part, about 254 below the surface of the earth.