Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 1.djvu/345

 THE TEMPLES OF SICILY AND CARTHAGE. attention as a kind of blazon proper to Phoenician art, the solar disk here with a crown of rays and the crescent moon. In a neighbouring district, at Djezza, among the ruins of a Byzantine fort, a very curious and original capital may be seen (Fig. 235). It is of the Ionic order but the familiar elements are arranged in very novel fashion. The proportions are neither Greek nor Roman. The volutes are applied to the faces of a cubical calathos, from which they do not stand out on any side. The hollow beneath the egg moulding may once have been filled with a bronze astragal. The influence of classic types is here very strong but in its broad effect this capital is like nothing so much FIG. 235. -Capital at Djezza. Limestone. Drawn by Saladin. Height with astragal 20 inches. Diameter of the lower part 18 inches. as those Cypriot caps of which we have already given so many examples (Figs. Si-53)- 1 Even at Carthage itself there is no more satisfaction for our curiosity. Taken twice by the Romans, all buildings anterior to the victory of Scipio have utterly disappeared. Its demolition was begun by order of the senate in 146, and, under the empire, it was rebuilt in the style of the time upon the ancient site, a century and a half the ruins of Carthage served as a quarry for i We owe our thanks to M. Saladin for the drawings of these two fragments The faces of the capital are not parallel, and the one here shown is nc the remaining three.