SECT. XI.

GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE.

133. The architecture of Greece is identical with columnar architecture. Writers on the subject have so invariably treated the hut as the type on which it is formed, that, though we are not thoroughly satisfied of the theory being correct, it would be difficult to wander from the path they have trodden. In the section on Egyptian architecture, we have alluded to the tombs at Beni-hassan, and we here present a representation of a portion of them from a sketch with which we were favoured many years since by Mr. Charles Barry

Fig. 90.

(fig. 90.). The reader will, in it, be struck by the appearance of the Doric column, almost in its purity. Wilkinson (Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians) is of opinion that the date of these tombs is 1740 B. c., that is, in the time of the first Osirtasen, an antiquity which can be assigned to no example in Greece. These tombs are excavated in a rock, a short distance from the Nile, on its right bank, about forty-eight French leagues south of Cairo. Two of them have architectural fronts like the above plate. The columns are five diameters and a half in height. The number of the flutes, which are shallow, is 20, and the capital consists of a simple abacus. There are no indications of a base or plinth. Above the architrave, which is plain, there is a projecting ledge of the rock, somewhat resembling a cornice, whose soffit is sculptured, apparently in imitation of a series of reeds, laid transversely and horizontally. There certainly does, in this, appear some reference to imitation of a hut, and the refinement of the Greeks, in after ages, may have so extended the analogy as in the end to account for all parts of the entablature. The tradition doubtless existed long before Vitruvius wrote, who gives us nothing more than the belief of the architects of his time. The point is not, at this time, likely to be answered satisfactorily; if it could, it might be important, as leading to the solution of some points of detail, which limit the propriety or impropriety of certain forms in particular situations. Having thus cautioned the reader against implicit faith in the system we are about to develope, we shall preface it by the opinion, on this subject, of M. Quatremère de Quincy, an authority of great value in everything that relates to the art. Carpentry, says that writer, is incontestably the model upon which Greek architecture is founded; and of the three models which nature has supplied to the art, this is, beyond doubt, the finest and most perfect of all. And again, he observes, whoever bestows his attention on the subject, will easily perceive that, by the nature of it, it includes all those parts that are effective for utility and beauty, and that the simplest wooden hut has in it the germ of the most magnificent palace.

134. We must here premise that this section is strictly confined to the architecture of Greece and its colonies. Much confusion has arisen from the want of strict limits to the term Grecian Architecture, one which has been indiscriminately applied to all buildings in which the orders appear. The orders were altered in their profiles, proportions, and details by the Romans; and though between them and those of the Greeks there is a general resemblance, and their members are generally similar, yet, on a minute examination, great difference will be found. In the former, for instance, the contour of every moulding is a portion of a circle; in the latter, the contours of the mouldings are portions of conic sections. In Roman architecture, we find the dome, which in Greek architecture never occurs. In the latter, the arch is never seen; in the former, it is often an important feature. Indeed, the columnar style, as used by the Greeks, rendered arches unnecessary; hence, in all imitation of that style, its introduction produces a discord which no skill can render agreeable to the educated eye. Attempts have been made by the modern German architects to introduce the use of the arch with Greek forms; but they have been all signal failures, and that because it is incapable of amalgamation with the solemn majesty and purity of Greek composition. Before such blending can be accomplished with success, the nature of pure Greek architecture must be changed.

135. Following, then, the authors, ancient and modern, on the origin of the art, we now proceed to a development of its origin. The first trees or posts which were fixed in the earth for supporting a cover against the elements, were the origin of the isolated columns which afterwards became the supports of porticoes in temples. Diminishing in diameter

as they rose in height, the tree indicated the diminution of the column. No type, however, of base or pedestal is found in trees: hence the ancient Doric is without base. This practice, however, from the premature decay of wood standing immediately on the ground, caused the intervention of a step to receive it, and to protect the lower surface from the damp. Scamozzi imagines that the mouldings at the bases and capitals of columns had their origin in cinctures of iron, to prevent the splitting of the timber from the superincumbent weight. Others, however, are of opinion that the former were used merely to elevate the shafts above the dampness of the earth, and thereby prevent rot. In the capital, it seems natural that its upper surface should be increased as much as possible, in order to procure a greater area for the reception of the architrave. This member, or chief beam, whose name bespeaks its origin, was placed horizontally on the tops of the columns, being destined, in effect, to carry the covering of the entire building. Upon the architrave lay the joists of the ceiling, their height being occupied by the member which is called the frieze. In the Doric order, the ends of these joists were called triglyphs, from their being sculptured with two whole and two half glyphs or channels. These, however, in the other orders in strictly Greek architecture, do not appear in the imitation of the type, though in Roman architecture it is sometimes otherwise, as in the Composite order of the Coliseum at Rome, where they are sculptured into consoles. The space between the triglyphs was, at an early period of the art, left open, as we learn from a passage in the Iphigenia of Euripides, where Pylades advises Orestes to slip through one of the metopæ, in order to gain admission into the temple. In after times, these intervals were filled up, and in the other orders they altogether disappear, the whole length of the frieze becoming one plain surface. The inclined rafters of the roof projected over the faces of the walls of the building, so as to deliver the rain clear of them. Their ends were the origin of the mutule or modillion, whereof the former had its under side inclined, as, among many other examples, in the Parthenon at Athens. The elevation, or as it is technically termed, pitch of the pediment, followed from the inclined sides of the roof, whose inclination depended on the nature of the climate. Thus authors trace from the hut the origin of the different members of architecture which a consideration of the annexed diagram will make more intelligible to the reader. Figs. 91. and 92. exhibit the parts of a roof in elevation and section: a a are the architraves or

trabes; bb the ridge piece or column; c the king-post or columna of a roof; d d the tie-beam or transtrum; e the strut or capreolus; ff the rafters or cantherii; gggg the purlines or templa; hh the common rafters or asseres. The form of the pediment became an object of so much admiration, and so essential a part of the temple, that Cicero says, if a temple were to be built in heaven, where no rain falls, it would be necessary to bestow one upon it. "Capitolii fastigium illud, et cæterarum ædium, non venustas sed necessitas ipsa fabricata est. Nam cum esset habita ratio quemadmodum ex utraque parte tecti aqua delaberetur utilitatem templi fastigii dignitas consecuta est, ut etiam si in cœlo capitolium statueretur ubi imber esse non potest, nullam sine fastigio dignitatem habiturum fuisse videatur." (De Oratione, lib. iii.) The inclination of the pediment will be hereafter discussed, when we speak on the article Roof, in another part of the work. Under the section on Cyclopean Architecture, mention has been made of the works at Tiryns and Mycene. We do not think there is sufficient chain of evidence to connect those ruins with the later Grecian works, though it must be confessed that the temples of Sicily, especially at Selinus, and perhaps those at Pæstum, are connecting links. Perhaps the sculptures at Selinus might be properly called Cyclopean sculpture, in its more refined state.

136. Architecture, as well as all the other arts, could only be carried to perfection by slow steps. Stone could not have been used in building until the mechanical arts had been well known. It is curious that Pliny gives the Greeks credit only for caves as their original dwellings, from which they advanced to simple huts, built of earth and clay. His words are (lib. vii. s. 57.), "Laterarias ac domos constituerunt primi Euryalus et Hyperbias

How

fratres Athenis: antea specus erant pro domibus." This, perhaps, is no more than a traditionary fable. Fables of this kind, however, often have some foundation in fact. We are not always inclined to discard them, for we have little more than tradition for the early excellence of the Athenians in civilisation, a nation among the Greeks who first became a body politic, and whose vanity caused them to assume the name of Auroxtoves, from a belief, almost sanctioned by Plato, that their ancestors actually rose from the earth. strong the prevailing opinion was of the original superiority of the Athenians, may be gathered from Cicero, in his oration for Flaccus. "Adsunt," he says, "Athenienses, unde humanitas, doctrina, religio, fruges, jura, leges ortæ, atque in omnes terras distributæ putantur: de quorum urbis possessione, propter pulchritudinem, etiam inter deos certamen fuisse proditum est: quæ vetustate eâ est, ut ipsa ex sese suos cives genuisse dicatur." But we shall not attempt, here, an early history of Greece; for which this is not the place, and, if accomplished, would little answer our views. The Greeks exhibited but little skill in their earliest edifices. The temple of Delphi, mentioned by Homer, in the first book of the Iliad (v. 404. et seq.), which Bryant supposes to have been originally founded by Egyptians, was, as we learn from Pausanias (Phocic. c. 5.), a mere hut, covered with laurel branches. Even the celebrated Areopagus was but a sorry structure, as we learn from Vitruvius (lib. ii. cap. 1.), who judged of it from its ruins. The fabulous Cadmus - for we cannot help following Jacob Bryant in his conjectures upon this personage. has been supposed to have existed about 1519 B. C., to have instructed the Greeks in the worship of the Egyptian and Phoenician deities, and to have taught them various useful arts; but this carries us so far back, that we should be retracing our steps into Cyclopean architecture, if we were here to dwell on the period; and we must leave the reader - as is our own, and as we apprehend will be the case with all who may succeed us — -to grope his way out of the darkness as best he may.

137. The earliest writer from whom gleanings can be made to elucidate the architecture of Greece is the father of poets. To Homer we are obliged to recur, little as we approve of the architectural graphic flights in which the poet is wont generally to indulge. Though the Odyssey may not be of so high antiquity as the Iliad, it is, from internal evidence, of great age, for the poem exhibits a government strictly patriarchal, and it sufficiently proves that the chief buildings of the period were the palaces of princes. We may here, in passing, observe, that in Greece, previous to Homer and Hesiod, the sculptor's art appears to have been unknown, neither was practised the representation of Gods. The words of Athenagoras (Leg. pro Christ. xiv.) are — Αἱ δ' εικονες μέχρι μηπω πλαστιχη, και γραφική, και ανδριαντοποιητική ησαν, ουδε ενομίζοντο. The altar, which was merely a structure for sacred use, was nothing more than a hearth, whereon the victim was prepared for the meal; and it was not till long after Homer's time that a regular priesthood appeared in Greece. In Sparta, the kings performed the office. In Egypt, the dignity was obtained by inheritance; as was the case in other places. The Odyssey places the altar in the king's palace; and we may reasonably assume that the spot was occasionally, perhaps always, used as the temple. From such premises, it is reasonable to conjecture that until the sacerdotal was separated from the kingly office, the temple, either in Greece or elsewhere, had no existence. It may not be without interest to collect, here, the different passages in the Odyssey, which bear upon the nature and construction of the very earliest buildings of importance. Between the avλŋ and the doμos there must have been a distinction. The former, from its etymology aw, must have been a locus subdialis; and though it is sometimes used ( Iliad, Z. 247.) for the whole palace, such is not generally its meaning in the Odyssey. The auλn was the place in which the female attendants of Penelope were slain by Telemachus ( Odyss. X. 446.), by tying them up with a rope over the Soxos or ceiling. Hence we arrive at the conclusion that this oxos belonged to the abovσa or cloister, supposing, as we have done, that the avλn was open at top, and the abovσa is described (Iliad, T. 176.) as epidouros, that is, sonorous or echoing, and as circumscribing the open part of the avλn. The Soλos was supported by Kloves, posts or columns, and in the centre of the avλn stood the Boμos or altar. If our interpretation be correct, the μeσodμaι in this arrangement must be the spaces between the columns or posts, or the intercolumniations, as the word is usually translated; and the passage in the Odyssey (T. 170.), wherein Telemachus is said to have seen the light on the walls, becomes quite clear. The passage is as follows:

Εκπης μοι τοίχοι μεγάρων, καλαι τε μεσόδμαι,
Είλατιναι τε δοκοί, και κίονες υψοσ έχοντες,
Φαινοντ' οφθαλμοίς.

There seems no doubt that the word abovσa will bear the interpretation given, and the arrangement is nothing more than that of the hypæthral, and even correspondent with the Egyptian temple, particularly that of the temple at Edfou, described by Denon, and represented in his plate 34.

138. Before we quit this part of our subject, let us consider the description which Homer (Odyss. H. 81.) gives of the house of Alcinous as illustrative of Greek architecture. This dwelling, which Ulysses visited, had a brazen threshold, oudos. It was vlepeons or

lofty-roofed. The walls were brazen on every side, from the threshold to the innermost part. This, however, is rather poetic. The coping Sprykos was of a blue colour. The interior doors are described as gold. The jambs of them, σTabμo, were of silver on a brazen threshold. The lintel rep0uptor was silver, and the cornice koрon of gold. Statues of dogs, in gold and silver, which had been curiously contrived by Vulcan himself, guarded the portal. Thus far, making all due allowance for the poet's fancy, we gain an insight into what was considered the value of art in his day, more dependent, it would seem, on material than on form. Seats seemed to have been placed round the interior part of the house, on which seats were cushions, which the women wrought. But we must return to the construction of the avλŋ, inasmuch as in it we find considerable resemblance to the rectangular and columnar disposition of the comparatively more recent temple.

139. It would be a hopeless task to connect the steps that intervened between the sole use of the altar and the establishment of the temple in its perfection; though it might, did our limits permit the investigation, be more easy to find out the period when the regular temple became an indispensable appendage to the religion of the country. It is closely connected with that revolution which abolished the civil, judicial, and military offices of kings leaving the sacerdotal office to another class of persons. Though in the palace of the king no portion of it was appropriated to religious ceremony, the spot of the altar only excepted, yet, as it was the depository of the furniture and utensils requisite for the rite of sacrifice, when the palace was no more, an apartment would be wanting for them; and this, conjoined with other matters, may have suggested the use of the cell. Eusebius has conjectured that the temple originated in the reverence of the ancients for their departed relations and friends, and that they were only stately monuments in honour of heroes, from whom the world had received considerable benefit, as in the case of the temple of Pallas, at Larissa, really the sepulchre of Acrisius, and the temple of Minerva Polias at Athens, which is supposed to cover the remains of Erichthonius. The passage in Virgil (Æn. ii. v. 74. )— tumulum antiquæ Cereris, sedemque sacratam

Venimus

is explanatory of the practice of the ancients in this respect; and, indeed, it is well known that sacrifices, prayers, and libations were offered at almost every tomb; nay, the restingplace of the dead was an asylum or sanctuary not less sacred than was, afterwards, the temple itself. From Strabo (lib. ii. ) it is clear that the temple was not always originally a structure dedicated to a god, but that it was occasionally reared in honour of other personages. 140. Before proceeding to that which is more accurately known, it may not be uninstructive to the reader to glance at the houses of the Greeks, as may be gathered from passages in the Iliad and the Odyssey. We shall merely remind him that Priam's house had fifty separate chambers, though he lived in a dwelling apart from it. These houses were, in some parts, two stories in height, though the passages militating against that assertion (Iliad, B. 514—16. 184.) have been pronounced of doubtful antiquity. There is, however, not the slightest doubt that the dwellings of the East consisted of more than a single story. David wept for Absalom in the chamber over the gate (2 Sam. xviii. 33.). The altars of Ahaz were on the terrace of the upper chamber (2 Kings, xxii. 12.). The summer chamber of Eglon had stairs to it, for by them Ehud escaped, after he had revenged Israel (1 Judges, iii. 20.; 1 Kings, vi. 8.). In the Septuagint, these upper stories are all represented by the word wepwov, the same employed by Homer. The Jewish law required (Deut. xxii. 8.) the terraces on the tops of their houses to be protected by a battlement; and, indeed, for want of a railing (Odyss. K. 552. et seq.) of this sort, Elpenor, one of the companions of Ulysses, at the palace of Circe, fell over and broke his neck. The use of the word κλιμαξ in the Odyssey, connected with the words αναβαίνειν and καταβαίνειν, and the substantive neрwov, is of frequent occurrence: it is either a ladder or a staircase, and which of them is unimportant; but it clearly indicates an upper story. To a comparatively late period, the Greek temple was of timber. Even statues of the deities were, in the time of Xenophon, made in wood for the smaller temples (lib. iv. c. 1.), where the revenue of them was not adequate to afford a more expensive material. But time and accidents would scarcely permit their prolonged duration, and none survived long enough to allow of a proper description of them reaching us. The principle of their construction necessarily bore some relation to the materials employed, and the use of stone must have imparted new features to them. In timber, the beam (epistylium), which was borne by the columns, would probably extend in one piece through each face of the building. But in a stone construction this could not take place, even had blocks of such dimensions been procurable, and had mechanical means been at hand to place them in their proper position. From this alone follows a diminution of spaces between the columns. The arch, be it recollected, was unknown. It is curious to observe that the relative antiquity of the examples of Grecian Doric may be expressed in terms of the intercolumniations; that is, the number of diameters forming the intervals between the columns. There is, moreover, another point worthy of notice, which is, that their antiquity may be also estimated by the comparison of the heights of the columns compared with their diameters. This, however, will require

further consideration when we come to treat of the orders: here it is noticed only incidentally. Though we are not inclined to place reliance on the account given by Vitruvius of the origin of the orders of architecture, we should scarcely be justified in its omission here. It seems necessary to notice it in any work on architecture; and, after remarking that the age which that author assigns for their origin is long before Homer's time, at which there seems no probability of their existence, from the absence of all reference to them in his poems, we here subjoin the account of Vitruvius (lib. iv. c. 1.):-" Dorus, son of Hellen and the Nymph Orseis, reigned over Achaia and Peloponnesus. He built a temple of this (the Doric) order, on a spot sacred to Juno, at Argos, an ancient city. Many temples similar to it were afterwards raised in the other parts of Achaia, though, at that time, its proportions were not precisely established. When the Athenians, in a general assembly of the states of Greece, sent over into Asia, by the advice of the Delphic oracle, thirteen colonies at the same time, they appointed a governor over each, reserving the chief command for Ion, the son of Xuthus, and Creusa, whom the Delphic Apollo had acknowledged as son. He led them over into Asia, where they occupied the borders of Caria, and built the great cities of Ephesus, Miletus, Myus (afterwards destroyed by inundation, and its sacred rites and suffrages transferred by the Ionians to the inhabitants of Miletus), Priene, Samos, Teos, Colophon, Chios, Erythræ, Phocæa, Clazomene, Lebedos, and Melite. This last, as a punishment for the arrogance of its citizens, was detached from the other states in the course of a war levied on it, in a general council, and in its place, as a mark of favour towards king. Attalus and Arsinoe, the city of Smyrna was received into the number of the Ionian states. These received the appellation of Ionian, after the Carians and Lelega had been driven out, from the name of Ion, the leader. In this country, allotting different sites to sacred purposes, they erected temples, the first of which was dedicated to Apollo Panionius. It resembled that which they had seen in Achaia, and from the species having been first used in the cities of Doria, they gave it the name of Doric. As they wished to erect this temple with columns, and were not acquainted with their proportions, nor the mode in which they should be adjusted, so as to be both adapted to the reception of the superincumbent weight, and to have a beautiful effect, they measured a man's height by the length of the foot, which they found to be a sixth part thereof, and thence deduced the proportions of their columns. Thus the Doric order borrowed its proportion, strength, and beauty from the human figure. On similar principles, they afterwards built the temple of Diana; but in this, from a desire of varying the proportions, they used the female figure as a standard, making the height of the column eight times its thickness, for the purpose of giving it a more lofty effect. Under this new order, they placed a base as a shoe to the foot. They also added volutes to the capital, resembling the graceful curls of the hair, hanging therefrom, to the right and left, certain mouldings and foliage. On the shaft, channels were sunk, bearing a resemblance to the folds of a matronal garment. Thus were two orders invented; one of a masculine character, without ornament, the other of a character approaching the delicacy, decorations, and proportions of a female. The successors of these people, improving in taste, and preferring a more slender proportion, assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric column, and eight and a half to the Ionic. That species, of which the Ionians were the inventors, has received the appellation of Ionic. The third species, which is called Corinthian, resembles, in its character, the graceful elegant appearance of a virgin, whose limbs are of a more delicate form, and whose ornaments should be unobtrusive. The invention of the capital of this order arose from the following circumstance. (Fig. 93.) A Corinthian virgin, who was of mar

riageable age, fell a victim to a violent disorder: after her interment, her nurse, collecting in a basket those articles to which she had shown a partiality when alive, carried them to her tomb, and placed a tile on the basket, for the longer preservation of its consents. The basket was accidentally placed on the root of an acanthus plant, which, pressed by the weight, shot forth, towards spring, its stems and large foliage, and in the course of its growth, reached the angles of the tile, and thus formed volutes at the extremities. Callimachus, who, for his great ingenuity and taste in sculpture, was called by the Athenians KaTaTeXVos, happening at this time to pass by the tomb, observed the basket and the delicacy of the foliage that surrounded it. Pleased with the form and novelty of the combination, he took the hint for inventing these columns, using them in the country about Corinth," &c. Now, though we regret to damage so elegant and romantic a story, we must remind those who would willingly trust the authority we have quoted, that Vitruvius speaks of matters which occurred so long before his time, that in such an investigation as that before us we must have other authentication than that of the author we quote, and most especially in the case of the Corinthian capital, whose type may be referred to in a