Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/417

Rh JEWISH.] ARCHITECTURE 393 cubits, or 33 feet high, and 1 2 cubits round, or about 7 feet in diameter. They had capitals (chapiters) also of molten brass, five cubits high, decorated with lily work, chain work, and pomegranates. In front of the porch was the altar, surmounted by a low wall three courses of stones in height. The whole building was enclosed by a walled court, called the inner court, or that of the priests. In front of this was another, called the lower court ; and the whole of this area was enclosed by a circumscribed court going round the whole of the other courts and O O buildings ; and this was called the outer court, or that of the Gentiles. It will be noted that in the careful descrip tion of the pillars, &c., no mention is made either of base or of moulded cornice. Canina (Tempio di Gerusalemme, Rome, fo.) conceives the style of the building to have been Egyptian ; that the temple was lighted like the hypostyle halls, by a range of windows over the roofs of the cells or priests chambers ; that these windows were like those of the clerestory of a church splayed at the bottom and sides ; that the walls of the temple itself sloped towards the top on the outside, or, to use the technical language, were built &quot; battering,&quot; while the walls of the priests chambers were built perpendicular, and for this reason each story measured a cubit more than the room below. He also supposed that the capitals of the columns, which are described as of lily work, were in fact the lotus (water lily) capital of Egypt. The porch itself he considers to have been like the propylon, containing other chambers like those of Egypt. Mr Fergusson s restoration, as given both in his History of Architecture and more at length in Smith s Dictionary of the Bible, is different. He assumes that the plan was somewhat analogous to that of tho still existing building known as the palace or temple of Darius at Persepolis, which has a range of chambers on each side. The difficulty as to the upper chamber being wider than the lower he solves in a very satisfactory way, by supposing that there was a set-off in each story on which the flooring just rested, so as not to cut into the walls of temple. In the prophecy of Ezekiel (ch. xl. sqq.J we have a very full and interesting account of what the temple was in his time. The house itself and the oracle do not appear to have been altered, but the old courts seem to have been swept away and succeeded by vast atria, and a mass of halls and chambers. jmple )f In the time of Cyrus the temple was rebuilt, but this second temple was demolished by Herod, who constructed a new one of the same dimensions as that of Solomon. The outer house was 40 cubits long, and the Holy of Holies 20 cubits ; but it was nearly double the height of the first temple. The porch also, instead of being the width of the house, 20 cubits, was 100 cubits long and 100 high, crossing the temple in the form of a T, and forming a magnificent facade much longer than that of St Paul s in London. Round the house were three stories of priests chambers. The court had three entrances on each side, which were called respectively the water-gates, the fire-gates, and the oblation-gates. But the peculiar difference between Herod s temple and the earlier building was that there was, in front of the court last described, another of about the same size, surrounded by a colonnade and chambers, which was the place set apart for the women. These courts were surrounded by an outer court, having a species of cloister on the north, east, and west sides, composed of a double row of columns. On the south side was a similar con struction a furlong in length. It consisted of three rows of columns, forming with the outer wall, three aisles the two outer being 30 feet wide and 50 feet high ; the centre heing 45 feet wide and 100 feet high no doubt with a species of clerestory. These columns are described to erod. of Lela- non. have been so large that it took three men with extended arms to span their circumference. The outer court was elevated six steps above the basement level; the inner courts stood on a sort of plateau, with retaining walls and parapets round it, which was ascended by fourteen steps ; this was on the level of the women s court. Be tween this and the inner court was a gate called that of Nicanor, in front of which was a semicircular flight of fifteen steps. The temple itself was entered by a flight of twelve steps, so that its floor must have been between 20 and 30 feet above the ground-level of the surrounding city. The whole was built of the most beautiful white marble. We read in the First Book of Kings (vii. 2, 8), that House of Solomon built &quot;the house of the forest of Lebanon,&quot; his house where he dwelt,&quot; and &quot; a house for Pharaoh s daughter.&quot; Some have supposed these to have been three distinct palaces, but Canina considers them as all connected, and as three parts of one large structure. The house of the forest of Lebanon so called, in all probability, from the cedar of which it was constructed is described as being 100 cubits long, 50 wide, and 30 high (180 feet by 90 by 54). Its horizontal area was thus very nearly equal to that of Westminster Hall. It had four rows of cedar pillars, or, as the Vulgate more cor rectly renders it, four corridors (deambulacra) formed by three rows of cedar columns, fifteen in each, or forty-five in all, with cedar architraves, and covered with cedar. This Canina restores as an Egyptian hall, lighted, as described by Vitruvius, with a portico in front, of 50 cubits by 30. The great hall, he supposes, led on one side to the palace occupied by the king, in which was the hall of judgment and the throne, and on the other side, to the queen s palace and the women s apartments, or, as it has been called in later times, tho harem. The porticoes and hall seem to have been of cedar, but the houses were &quot; of costly stones &quot; (1 Kings vii. 9). The excavations recently made, at the expense of tho Palestine Exploration Fund, have disclosed considerable remains of the massive ancient masonry, and of the cisterns, conduits, etc. But, with these exceptions, no part of old Jerusalem appears to be extant. There are, however, some objects, formerly considered to belong to Jewish times, that should be mentioned. There are, first, what are called the tombs of the kings of Judah. These are a Tombs of number of sepulchral chambers hewn out of the solid rock, t^ e kings. and containing sarcophagi. They vary from 10 to 20 feet square, and are entered, exactly like the tombs of Beni Hassan, by a portico in antis, about 40 feet wide. There are two columns and two pilasters in front, of Greek Doric character, about 13 feet high. The most curious feature of these is, that a broad band, about 3 feet wide, richly sculp tured with foliages, runs down on each side 4 or 5 feet and over the columns horizontally. Above this last, quite independent of the lower construction, is a regular Doric architrave and frieze, of a character between Grecian and Roman; this is ornamented with triglyphs, patera?, and foliage. In front of the portico is a large court-yard, about 100 feet square. In the Valley of Jehoshaphat, near Jerusalem, are three extremely curious relics ; two stand alone, on platforms excavated from the rock, and the third is scarped into the rock itself. The first is called the tomb of Absalom. It is a square building with a solid wall, in which are engaged Ionic columns, about 1 3 feet high ; over this is a Doric entablature with triglyphs, and an altar, surmounted by a very curious sort of hollow-sided cupola of trumpet-mouth section, and a terminal. The whole, including the flight of steps, is about GO feet high. Another similar buildincr, of at&amp;gt;out the same size, is cora- II. 50