Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/396

 372 A HISTORY OF ART IN CIIALD.-KA AND ASSYRIA. that the building has a front and a back. The front is almost entirely taken up with wide staircases. 1 The staircase leading from the first story to the second must alone have been con- cealed in the interior of the building, an arrangement which avoided the necessity for breaking up the ample solidity of that imposing stage (see Plate II.). The surroundings of the temple in our plate the background of slightly undulating plain, the houses similar to those found by Taylor and Loftus, in which they discovered vaulted passages traversing the thickness of the walls- are, of course, purely imaginary. The temple itself, like the palace at Khorsabad, was raised on a vast platform upon which the city walls abutted. This platform was reached by wide flights of steps. 3 Lateral ramps led to a second platform, inclosed on every side, with which the sacred part of the building, the Haram, began. We have already spoken of the panelled ornament with which the great, flat surfaces of its walls were relieved. 4 The lowest stage of the temple was provided with buttresses like those that still exist in the temple of Mugheir (Fig. 43). A high, rectangular plinth- decorated in our restoration with glazed faience 5 was inter- posed between the first and second stage. 6 A rectangular chapel decorated, in all probability, with metal plaques and glazed poly- chromatic bricks, crowned the whole. Traces of this chapel have been found at Mugheir, and the wealth of its decoration is attested by many pieces of evidence. 7 At Abou-Sharein also there are vestiges of a small and richly ornamented sanctuary crowning the second stage of a ruin whose aspect now bears a distinct resemblance to that of the temple at Mugheir. The 3 LOFTUS, (p. 129). "It rather struck me, however, from the gradual inclination from top to base, that a grand staircase of the same width as the upper story, occupied this side of the structure." 2 LOFTUS, Travels, &:c., p. 133. 8 At Warka, around the ruin called Wuswas by the Arabs, LOFTUS traced the plan of these great courtyards and platforms (Travels, p. 171). 4 See above, p. 246, figs. 100 and 102. 5 Numerous pieces of glazed tile were found in these ruins. 6 The idea of this plinth was suggested to M. Chipiez by a remark made on page 129 of LOFTUS'S Travels: "Between the stones is a gradual stepped incline about seven feet in perpendicular height, which may however, be accidental, and arise from the destruction of the upper part of the lower story." 7 See TAYLOR, Journal, &c., pp. 264-5.