Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 2.djvu/86

 64 A History of Art in Ancient Egypt corresponding to that which is called Cyclopean in the case of the Greeks. We find no walls built like those of Tiryns, with huge and shapeless masses of rock, the interstices being filled in with small stones. We do not even find polygonal masonry — by which we mean walls formed of stone dressed with the chisel, but with irregular joints, and with stones of very different size and shape placed in juxtaposition with one another. In the ancient citadels of Greece and Italy this kind of construction is to be found in every variety, but in Egypt the stones are always arranged into horizontal courses. Here and there the vertical joints are not quite vertical, and sometimes we find stones which rise higher, or sink lower, than the course to which they belong, tying it to the one above it or below it. Such [ifflnr HM MM m MM liiiii EMI 4-=

o accidents as these do not, how- ever, affect the general rule, which was to keep each course self- contained and parallel with the soil. All these varieties in Egyptian masonry may be seen in a horizontal section of the first pylon at Karnak (Fig. 41). This pylon is in such a ruined state that by means of photo- graphs taken from different sides we can form a very exact idea of its internal composition.' Great care in' execution, and ofreat size in the units of con- struction, are only to be found in comparatively few of the Egyptian monuments. We have already remarked upon the painstaking skill with which the granite or limestone casing of the chambers and passages in the Gizeh pyramids was fixed. Certain buildings of the Theban period, such as the vaulted chapels in the Great Temple at Abydos, and the courts of Medinet-Abou, are notable for excellence of a similar kind. Everything, however, must in this respect give way to the Grand Gallery in the pyramid of Cheops. The Egypt of the early Pharaohs set more than one good ^ This pylon dates from the Ptolemies, but if there was anything that did not change in Egypt, it was their processes of construction. Fig. 40. — Wooden pavilion, from a bas relief at Luxor (Champollion, pi. 339).