Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/423

Rh ASSYRIAN.] ARCHITECTURE 399 recesses for the bolts, hiiiges, pins, or sockets have been found ; and Mr Smith has discovered a doorway with its actual lintel, now in the British Museum. Above the sculptured slabs decorations have been found of various kinds. The most lasting seem to have been of baked bricks richly coloured and glazed. At the city gate of Khorsabad blue glazed tiles with yellow reliefs have been found. Victor Place found also that the lower part of the walls near the gate were faced with coloured enamelled bricks, having human figures, lions, etc., within an ornamental border. The arch over the gateway was also richly decorated with glazed tiles. Large remains of coloured decoration in plaster have also been found at Nimroud, &c. They were of figures outlined in black on a blue ground, and below the outer coat of plaster more extensive decora tions have been found on an earlier coat. They were of various colours on a pale yellow ground. In other cases they had merely a black outline and were uncoloured. Now the difference of age between the several structures is some centuries, and it is curious to find that the earliest art works, viz., those in the N.W. palace, are the best in point of variety of detail and ornament, in severity of style and purity of outline. The later have extreme delicacy and minuteness, truth to nature and vigour of treatment, particularly in the animals, but they want, in the opinion of Mr Layard, the vigour of the old decorations. Of exter nal decorations we have a striking account in the inscrip tion relating to the Birs Nimroud, in which the several stages are described as being coloured as follows: the lowest, black; the others in succession, orange, red, yellow, green, and blue. This vivid colouring may be explained by a discovery made by Mr Loftus at Warka of a wall which Fid. 39. Elevation and Plan of Terra-Cotta Cone wall, Warka. 1 was richly decorated in geometrical patterns by means of small earthenware cones, the wide ends outwards and en- FIG. 40. Terra-Cotta Cone, reduced by one-seventh. amolled in different colours; also by Victor Place s dis covery at Khorsabad of four stages of a temple coloured in succession white, black, red, and blue. In the Assyrian and Chaldean buildings little use was made of marble, granite, or stone, the greater part of the edifices being built with bricks, the lower parts with burnt bricks put together with bitumen, and the rest with crude bricks and slime. Sometimes the walls were faced with burnt bricks. One wall has been found with 1 feet in thick ness of burnt brick facing, and 28 feet of crude bricking. In Assyrian art generally there is little analogy to that of f Figs. 39, 40, and 41 are from Loftus s Chaldcca and Susiana, by the kind prnnicsion of Messrs Nisbet, the publishers. Egypt. There is some slight resemblance in the mouldings and in a few of the ornaments, but in Assyria there are no forests of columns, no grand pylons, no enormous cloistered court, and nothing to equal the gigantic pyramids or tombs of Egypt. The sphinx is superseded by the winged bull, and the slightly cut intaglio by the magnificently sculptured slab. In these early Assyrian structures there is art at n high stage of perfection, but we have no means of discover ing the steps by which it was attained. PERSIAN ARCHITECTURE. Persia was one of the greatest of ancient nations. At one time it embraced all Upper Asia, and Asia Minor, Phoenicia, Egypt, Thrace, and Macedonia, and though the greatness of its glory has departed, it was still a great living nation even in the 1 8th century when its king Nadir Shah invaded India. Compared thus with Egypt, Assyria, and Babylonia, long since extinct, it has had a wonderful existence, reaching down from Cyrus to our own time. We know little of its early history. It cannot bo doubted, that long before the rise of the Persian power, mighty kingdoms existed in these regions, and particularly in the eastern part of Bactria, yet of those kingdoms we have by no means a consistent or chronological history nothing but a few fragments. It is probable that from dynasties which ruled in Media properly so called, imme diately previous to the Persians, the style of architecture may have been in some measure derived, though indeed we know of no remains of earlier date than those which are properly called Persian. Of the early times of the empire no authentic remains Tomb of exist, except those of the tomb of its founder, Cyrus, at C J 3 Murgab or Pasargadaj (east of the head of the Persian Gulf), and some of the walls, &c., of the ancient capital, Ecbatana, in North Media, The former is still in a wonderful state of preservation, but it can scarcely be reckoned amongst Persian edifices, as it is clearly a work designed by some architect from a Greek colony of Asia Minor. The tomb stands on seven bold steps of white marble, the lowest being 43 feet by 37 feet. The tomb itself is 21 feet by 16 ft, 5 in. outside, with bold mouldings to the door; it has a sloping roof of marble, with a pediment at each end, enriched with mouldings. The chamber itself is only 7 feet by 10, the walls being built up with thick blocks of marble. Near the tomb was the famous inscription, &quot; I am Cyrus the king, the Achccmenian,&quot; and though this is now wanting, recent discoveries seem to have disinterred the stone which had borne it, and which had been torn away. Round the tomb outside had evidently been a colonnade of 24 columns, fragments of which, with the bases, alone remain. They resemble those commonly used by the Greeks. This sin gular structure seems to have been unique in Persia. It is evidently the work of a foreigner, although the outline may represent, as is supposed, a temple. The famous walls of Ecbatana, the ancient capital, are said to have been 75 Remains at feet broad and 105 high, its stones 9 feet by 4 ft. 6 in., and Ecbatana. its gateways 100 feet high and 60 wide. The remains, how ever, show walls only 12 feet wide, stones only 2 feet by 1 ft. 2 in., and a gateway only 12 feet high and 1 feet wide. They deserve particular mention on account of their being among the earliest examples of constructive colouring on a grand scale. The walls are said to have been seven in number, one over the other on the sides of a conical hill, and coloured in succession, white, black, scarlet, blue, orange, silver, and the innermost gilt. From what has been discovered at Warka (see above), it is possible that this gorgeous description may have been founded on fact ; and we know that the Easterns in early times were pro fuse in their employment of glazed coloured bricks.