Page:History of Art in Persia.djvu/148

 Decoration. '37 at the very careful and clever composition of the stage on which the king is depicted worshipping before the fire-altar fit Naksh-i- Rustem (Fig. 44). The uprights that serve as supports to the upper floor could easily be mistaken for those of Assyrian pieces of furniture ; like these, they are adorned by superimposed rings and pendant leaves* and terminate at the top in fanciful animals* heads, whilst the feet are lions' paws/ Again, the simple but none the less impressive theme, composed of a double tier of human figures, on whose heads and arms the royal majesty is carried, is clearly borrowed from the Ninevitc artist* Amidst the number of designs derived from the decorative art of Mesopotamia, that which appears in the top cross-bar of the stage, consisting of alternate discs and beads, should not go unnoticed (Fig* 44) ; below it an egg-shaped moulding, and between each form, at the base, lance-heads. Should we be required to name its provenance offhand, it is ten to one but that the choice would fall upon some Greek building or another. Harmonious, on the other hand, with the general character of the composition is a scroll on the middle rail already referred to, akin both to the mean portion of the Persian capiul, and those which the Assyrian omamendst was wont to carve on bases and capitals alike (Fig. 45).* The rosette is uniformly simple, albeit the number of its petals is not constant ; it never loses altogether the aspect of a full-blown star of Bethlehem, conspicuous among all other flowers among the herbage clothing the stretches of Susiana and the tablelands of Iran after the first rains in early spring. It crops up as frequently on the enamelled bricks of Susa as in the stone orna- ment of the palaces of Fars (Fig. 64). Had the flagging at Persepolis been preserved like that of the royal residences at Calach and Nineveh, we should, perchance, light upon elaborate patterns, as such are revealed in the pavements of the latter.* The richest designs at Persepolis are seen in the upper part of the staircases, where the centre of the division is occupied by a number of sinuous stalks and regular curves (Fig. 65), that seem to have been unknown to the art of the Delta;' but, instead of the "knob and flower " border of alternating closed and open lotus flowers* which » Hist, c/Artt torn. ii. Figs. 383, 385, 389. 390. » Ibid., Kig. 337, p. 728. * Ibid., Figs. 74, 89, 83. L.i^u,^cci by Google
 * Ibid.t Figs. 96, 13a. * Jbid.i p. 320.