Page:History of Art in Persia.djvu/110

 The Column. 97 architrave, as if to keep it in sight and furnish it with a better stipport ; its mass is about the same as that of the bull capital of the Persepolitan orders, before blocking out The shaft is very slender and slightly tapering towards the top, in remembrance of the tree, with a diameter less above than below. Every detail in this rustic order, down to the base, foreshadows that which the builders of Darius and Xerxes were subsequently to chisel with such loving care. It is a huge block of stone, almost unhewn, diminishing from the base to the top, with a circular hole i n the centre receive the post. Its shape, despite I. Pihce No. a. •i — r 3. Piropylica. 3. Pidace No. 8. 4. IsUkbr. 5. Palace No. 3. Fio. 38.— 'The sevenl cohumu at Pcrsepoiis .-iml Istakhr compared. FLANDIN and Costs, Ane ancUnne, Plate CLXVUL a. its rudeness, is more or less pyramidal ; so that when we feel the need to choose a well-defined type, there will be no diffi- culty to draw from this roughly outlined sketch, the happy contour of the bell whose elegant profile and wealth of ornament we have admired in the palace of the king of kings. We have abundantly proved in another place the persistency of