Acropolitan

At Hastings and other towns, where archæological ruins monopolise the central height, you see an unwitting abandonment of the acropolitan ideal.

2007: Roman Payne, Cities & Countries, chapter XIII: The Conscription of the Troops, page 187 (ModeRoom Press; →ISBN The rising sun peered between the cypress trees flooding the Grand Plaza with yellow matinal light. The backside of the palace overlooked the plaza with balconies supported by two tiers of colonnades and was framed on each of the three other sides by columned façades of buildings constructed from marble and stone. This plaza was the pride of the acropolitan village that served the palace. It was separated from the foyer where Alexis’ window overlooked simply by a tiny lane of one-storey village houses.

And then, this enduring ocean of houses, of palaces, temples, porticoes, colonnades, which floated before her eyes from the Western Necropolis to the Gardens of the Goddess: Bruchion, the Hellenic town, dazzling and regular; Rhacotis, the Egyptian town, before which the light-flooded Paneion rose like an acropolitan mountain; the Great Temple of Serapis whose façade was horned by two long rosy obelisks; the Great Temple of Aphrodite, surrounded by the murmurs of three hundred thousand palm trees and of numberless waters; the Temple of Persephone and the Temple of Arsinoe, the two sanctuaries of Poseidon, the three towers of Isis Pharis, the seven columns of Isis Lochias, and the Theater and the Hippodrome and the Stadion where Psittacos had run against Nicosthene and the tomb of Stratonice and the tomb of the god Alexander — Alexandria! Alexandria — the sea, the men, the colossal marble Pharos whose mirrors saved men from the sea! Alexandria — the city of Berenice and of the eleven Ptolemaic kings, Physcos, Philometor, Epiphanios, Philadelphos! Alexandria — fulfillment of all dreams, the crown of all glories conquered during three thousand years in Memphis, Thebes, Athens, Corinth, by the chisel, by the reed, by the compass and by the sword!

Like the ancient citadel, the capitol zone is a place of power and privilege; unlike the earlier acropolitan destination, however, current public access to the capitol complex is thoroughly discouraged.