Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/138

 ii8 A HISTORY OF ART IN CHALD,KA AND ASSYRIA. made for building arches or vaults. Their obliquity varies according to their destined places in the curve. 1 The body of the enamelled bricks differs from that of the ordinary kind. It is softer and more friable, appearing to be scarcely burnt. 2 This difference, at which M. Place was so much surprised, had its reason. The makers understood that their enamel colours when vitrified would penetrate deeper into and be more closely incorporated with the material upon which they were placed were the latter not so completely hardened. Crude brick, burnt brick, and brick enamelled, those were the only materials at the command of the architect, in the cities, at, yg^^L^^S^SS^^ %MM^3iir FIG. 32. Babylonian brick ; from the Louvre. 16 inches square on face, and 4 inches thick. least, of Chaldsea. A few fragments of basalt and diorite have certainly been found in their ruins, especially at Tello, recently excavated by M. de Sarzec ; but we can easily tell from the appearance of these blocks that they played a very subordinate 1 See, for Chaldsea, LOFTUS, Travels and Researches, p. 133 ; and for Assyria, PLACE, A T inive et fAssyrie, vol. i. p. 250, and vol. ii. plates 38 and 39. As an example of the varieties of section presented by these bricks, we may cite those found by M. de Sarzec in the ruins of Tello, which belonged to a circular pillar. This pillar was composed of circular bricks, placed in horizontal courses round a centre of the same material. Elsewhere triangular bricks, which must have formed the angles of buildings have been found. TAYLOR, Notes on the Ruins of Mugheyr (Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society ', vol. xv. p. 266). At Abou Sharem, this same traveller found convex-sided bricks (Journal, &c., vol. xv. p, 409). 2 PLACE, Ninive, &c., vol. i. p. 233.