Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 1.djvu/539

 512 Primitive Greece: Mycenian Art. the requisite rest for the eye by subdividing his fields into panels. The tie-beams let into the brick or rubble wall, when not disguised by a plaster facing, would serve as a guide to partition the surface into more or less regular compartments. The apparent face of these timbers lent itself to painted orna- ment, or metal, ivory, and glass incrustations (crusie^). These might be purely decorative, or arranged into pictures the subject Fir,. 209.— Theru. Coloure<l slucco rraement. Actual siie. of which was derived from the living world, or again the two processes might be combined in one composition. That such was the plan generally adopted, appears from the decoration of the domed-tombs fa9ade. The reader can convince himself of this by a glance at our restored frontispiece (PI. V.). The decoration is bounded by narrow bands, which stand for the horizontal beams embedded in the wall, and the surfaces between these represent the masonry. On the bands are symmetric ornaments or spirals necessarily of feeble height ; but there is room in the larger spaces