Most of the islanders devote themselves to agricul ture, and the acquisition of articles of the first necessity : they besides carry on a trifling traffic with the neighbour ing coasts.
Probably Cerigo was infinitely more populous of old, and has long been inhabited. Not far from the town is a hill, apparently composed of human bones alone, which, tradition says, was a cemetery in former times.
This island was known to the ancients by the name of supposed to be derived either from por phyry abounding in it, or from the shell producing a certain purple held in high estimation in antiquity; But it is not ascertained by the moderns that Cerigo has now to boast of tither. It was also called Cythera ; derived, as Ptolemy trinks, from Cytherus, the son of Pluenix, who established himself there. It is sufficiently authenticated, that the island was consecrated to the worship of Venus, under the name of Cythera ; and when that goddess sprung from the waters, according to ancient mythology, she was wafted thither in a pearl shell. A temple was here erected in honour of her, the most celebrated within the bounds of the Grecian ter ritories : it contained her statue, of unrivalled workman ship, with all her attributes ; and also another, of I lelen the queen of Menelaus. Ruins, conjectured to he those
of temples or palaces, still exist ; and some, more widely diffused, arc supposed the vestiges of an ancient city, where Menelaus reigned. The islanders point out a grotto among them as the bath of Helen, cut out of the solid rock. Such ruins are dispersed over all Cerigo, both in the interior and on the coast ; and in calm weather they are said to be discernible at the bottom of the sea. Coins and statues are sometimes dug up from the few decayed columns still remaining, which arc said to mark the site of the temple of Venus ; and an ancient quarry, of vast extent, shows that huge bloeka were detached from it for constructing edifices. Catacombs, of regular shape and dimensions, with several sarcophagi, were lately discovered : the interior of the walls is plas tered with a layer of pitch or mastic, whereon traces of painting could be recognised. (c)