Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/377

 THE CIIALD/EAN TOMB. 355 Semites of Mesopotamia upon death and a second life, and to show that they did not differ sensibly from those of the Egyptians or of any other ancient people whose ideas are sufficiently known to us. 2. The Chaldcean Tomb. The principle of the Chaldaean sepulchre was similar to that of the Egyptian mastaba or hypogeum ; it had to supply the same wants and to render the same services ; the task imposed upon the architect was in each case governed by the same general idea, Why then have we found nothing in Mesopotamia that may be compared, even at the most respectful distance, with the splendid tomb-houses of the Theban necropolis, nor even with those of Phoenicia, Asia Minor, or Etruria ? The reason for the dif- ference is easily told ; it is to be found in the nature and configuration of the country itself. There were no mountains in whose sides tomb-chambers could be cut, and in the loose permeable soil of the plain it would have been practically impossible to establish pits that should be at once spacious and durable. We shall find, no doubt, in almost every country, sepulchres constructed above the soil likes palaces and temples. In Egypt we have already encountered the pyramid, but even there the tomb-chamber is in most cases cut in the rock itself, and the huge mass of stone above it is nothing more than a sort of colossal lid. Eunerary architecture is not content, like that of civil or religious buildings, to borrow its materials from the rock ; it cuts and chisels the living rock itself. In every country the first idea that seems to occur to man, when he has the mortal remains of his own people to make away with, is to confide them to the earth. In mountainous countries rock is everywhere near the soil and rises through it here and there, especially on the slopes of the hills. It is as a rule both soft enough to be easily cut with a proper tool, and hard enough, or at least sufficiently capable of hardening- when exposed to the air, faithfully to preserve any form that may be given to it. As soon as man emerged from barbarism and conceived the desire to carry with him into the next world the goods he had enjoyed in this, the hastily cut hole of the savage became first an ample chamber and then a collection of chambers.