Page:History of Art in Phrygia, Lydia, Caria and Lycia.djvu/390

 374 HISTORY OF ART IN ANTIQUITY. The rocky mass was cut in such a way as to leave a " stepped " plinth and rectangular tower, with a recess or vault above, formed of four slabs of marble, 1 and a couple of tombs of the usual type below. The doors to the chamber in this and other sepulchres at Xanthus were all small, whilst a vault at Ghieul Bashi is but eighty-five centimetres by nine ; making it self-evident that similar tombs could only be used by practising incineration. The height of these sepulchral monuments averages from three to six metres ; their number is small, and does not amount to more than about fifteen throughout the extent of Lycia ; 2 they would seem to be the oldest tombs as yet discovered in this region. Such would be Figs. 273-275. Considered as a whole, the group leaves the impression of a type that never became popular, but was restricted to a few great families, and abandoned in very early days. The more recent tower-sepulchres would date from the fourth century B.C. In our estimation, the explanation offered as to the origin and character of the monuments under notice, has completely failed of its purpose. They have been compared to the funerary towers of Persia, and the question has been asked whether we are not faced here by tombs built for Persian satraps ; but one of these exemplars at least, that at Ghieul Bashi, does not lend itself to the above hypothesis, in that it may very likely be older than the con- quest of Lycia by Harpagus, and that the hold of the Achsemenidse over the province was purely nominal. Again, the Tomb of the Harpies, which, with its bas-relief, is far the most carefully wrought of the series, does not reveal a single point that could in any way remind us of Persian creeds. Admitting for the moment that a vague resemblance is perceptible between the Lycian towers and those of Meshed-i-Murghab and Naksh-i-Rustem, the differ- ences are distinct enough to nullify the hypothesis of direct imita- tion, and relegate the likeness, real or supposed, to the domain of coincidence. It is just possible that the notion of the tower-shaped tombs was suggested by those watch-towers of frequent occurrence in regions whose territory is divided between hostile clans, and that the guard-room perched on the top of the slender edifice became the mortuary chamber. Timber towers may have obtained at an early age, but the combustible materials of which they were 1 BENNDORF, Reisen, torn. i. p. 87.
 * A list of the sepulchres in question will be found in Ibid., pp. 107, 108.