Page:History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 1.djvu/212

 180 HISTORY OF AUCHITECTURE. Part I imitation of nature, than the earlier examples, though inferior to them in grandeur of conception and breadth of design. The architectural details also display a degree of elegance and an amount of elaborate finish not usually found in the earlier examples, as is well illustrated by the Woodcut No. 72, representing one of the pavement slabs of the palace. It is of the same design, and similarly ornamented, but the finish is better, and the execution more elaborate, than in any of the more ancient examples we are acquainted with. 72. Pavemeut Slab from the Central Palace, Koyunjik. Besides these, there were on the mound at Nimroud a central palace built by Tiglath Pileser, and one at the south-eastern angle of the mound, built by a grandson of Esarhaddon ; but both are too much ruined for its being feasible to trace either their form or extent. Around the great pyramid at the north-west angle of the mound, were buildings more resembling temples than any others on it — all the sculptures upon them pointing apparently to devotional pur- ])0ses, though in form they differed but little from the palaces. At the same time there is certainly nothing in them to indicate that the mound at the base of which they were situated was appropriated to the dead, or to funereal purposes. Between the north-west and south- west ])alaces there Avas also raised a terrace higher than the rest, on which were situated some chambers, the use of which it is not easy to determine.