Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 2.djvu/181

 Doors and Windows. D/ the boundary walls of the Pharaonic period have almost entirely disappeared and their gateways with them. We have illustrated the first type in our restoration, page 339, Vol. I. (Fig. 206). The doorway itself is very high, in which it resembles many propylons of the Greek period which still exist at Karnak and Denderah.^ The thickness of the whole mass and its double cornice, between which the covered way on the top of the walls could be carried, are features which w-e also encounter in the propylon of Denderah and in that of the temple at Day bod in ^ Fig. 141. — Plan of doorway, Temple of Elephantine. Fig. 142. — Plan of doorway, Temple of Khons. Nubia. ^ We have added nothing but the wall, and a gateway, in Egypt, implies a wall ; for there is no reason to suppose that the Egyptians had anything analogous to the triumphal arches of the Romans. The temple was a closed building, to which all access was forbidden to the crowd. The doors may well have been numerous, but, if they were to be of any use at all, they must have been connected by a continuous barrier which should force the traffic to pass through them. W J=T Fig. 143. — Plan of doorway in the pylon, Temple of Khons. Description, iii, 54. Figs. 144, 145. — The pylon and propylon of the hieroglyph'. In our restorations this doorway rises above the walls on each side and stands out from them, on plan, both within and without. We may fairly conjecture that it was so. The architect would hardly have wasted rich decoration and a well designed cornice upon a mass which was to be almost buried in the erections on each side of it. It must have been conspicuous from a distance, and this double relief would make it so. There are, moreover, a few ' Ebers, ^gypfen, p. 250.-
 * Felix Tevxard, Vues (T Egypte et dc Xubie, pi. 106.