Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/157

Rh is 1,648 feet above the sea. It is about two hours south of the village of Koushibashi, and is laid down in the Admiralty chart, but has, I think, been very little noticed by travellers. The walls, built of blocks of granite in polygonal courses, are nearly perfect all round. The fortress is of a rhomboidal form, and may be compared to a kite. Its greatest length is from S.E. to N.W. It took us twenty minutes to walk right through it lengthways, so that it is more than a mile long. It has a number of gates flanked by towers.

On the N.E. side is a gateway which seems to have been rather more accessible than the others, and to which an ancient causeway still leads. This gateway is 16 feet wide. The doorway stands back about 7 feet 7 inches behind the gateway. The jambs of this doorway are still in position. The width between them is 9 feet. One of them has a deep horizontal groove for the bolt. This gateway is flanked on one side by a tower, on the other by an abutment. Within the walls are traces of foundations of many houses. A spring still flows within the ruins, and there is an old well filled up.

The extent and the preservation of the defences make this fortress a most interesting example of early military architecture, the work probably of Hellenic settlers. The walls terminate in natural precipices at either end, and great judgment has been shown in taking advantage of every natural barrier to add to the strength of the fortifications. Thus the precipices at either end are surmounted by vast masses of rock which rise far above the walls, and