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LECTURES 
 
 ON 
 
 ARCHITECTURE, 
 
 COMPRISING THE 
 
 HISTORY OF THE ART 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 EARLIEST TIMES TO THE PRESENT DAY 
 
 DELIVERED AT THE SURREY AND RUSSELL INSTITUTIONS, LONDON, 
 AND THE PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTION AT BIRMINGHAM. 
 
 By JAMES ELMES, 
 
 ARCHITECT, 
 
 Author of " The Memoirs of the Life and Works of Sir Christopher Wren," " A 
 Treatise on Dilapidations," " Hints for the Improvement of Prisons," &c. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PRIESTLEY AND WEALE, HIGH-STREET 
 BLOOMSBURY. 
 
 1823. 
 
TO 
 HIS MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY 
 
 GEORGE THE FOURTH, 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNITED KINGDOM 
 
 OF 
 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, 
 
 KING, 
 
 &c &c. &c. 
 THE ENLIGHTENED PATRON AND PROTECTOR 
 
 OF THE 
 
 BRITISH SCHOOL OF ART, 
 
 THESE 
 
 LECTURES ON ARCHITECTURE 
 
 Are, by his gracious Permission, 
 AND WITH ALL HUMILITY, 
 
 DEDICATED 
 
 BY HIS MAJESTY'S 
 
 MOST FAITHFUL AND MOST OBEDIENT 
 
 SUBJECT AND SERVANT, 
 
 JAMES ELMES. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 The following Lectures were originally 
 written for, and delivered at, the Surrey 
 Institution, in the winter of 1819-20. They 
 were, secondly, with much alteration and with 
 many additions, made after a tour through 
 parts of Ireland interesting for architectural 
 antiquities, delivered at the Russell Institution 
 in the winter of 1820; and, thirdly, re-deliver- 
 ed at the Surrey Institution in the spring of 
 the present year. 
 
 The Lectures again underwent a considera- 
 ble change in their arrangement : retaining the 
 additions above alluded to, I pruned the re- 
 dundancies of the whole, and read them, for 
 the fourth time, in the early part of this sum- 
 mer, at the Philosophical Institution of Bir- 
 mingham, by solicitation of its Committee: 
 
VI ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 here, as well as at both of the London Institu- 
 tions, they appeared to afford to my auditors 
 a degree of satisfaction which was to me pecu- 
 liarly flattering. 
 
 I have quoted my authorities at the bottom 
 of the page in the principal instances, not only 
 to give a sanction to what I have brought for- 
 ward, but to point out the sources to which the 
 student may apply for more particular infor- 
 mation. 
 
 I should be deficient in respect and gratitude 
 did I not acknowledge the kindness and atten- 
 tion with which I was treated, during the 
 period of reading these Lectures, by the Di- 
 rectors, Members, and Subscribers of the Sur- 
 rey, the Russell, and the Birmingham Institu- 
 tions. 
 
 J. E. 
 
 Londo7i, 
 August 12, 1821. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 Lectvke \.— Introduction. Definition and Character of Ar- 
 chitecture: the Cultivation and Encouragement of it always 
 found among the true Signs of Greatness and a high State of 
 Civilization. Historical Sketch of the Art among the ancient 
 Jews, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Egyptians, and Phanicians. More 
 particularly considered in Egypt, with illustrative Exaynples 
 and Description of its Style and Modes of Construction. Con- 
 temporary Nations historically cited 3 
 
 Lecture II. — Architecture considered as an Art. Its Types 
 and Prefigurations. On Imitation, legitimate and false. The 
 Art investigated among the Nations of' India, the ancient 
 Hindus, and other Eastern People. Excavations in Salsette, 
 Ellora, and Elephanta; their Use and Origin considered. 
 Analysis of the Eastern Styles of Architecture, and Investiga- 
 tion of their constituent Elements. Persepolitan, Phanician, 
 Hebraic, and Chinese Architecture, with their Characteristics. 7.") 
 
 Lecture III. — The Subject continued from the Time of the 
 Assyrians and their Contemporaries : the Founding of Athens, 
 Thebes, and other cities of ancient Greece, down to the Age of 
 Pericles, being the First Epoch of Grecian Architecture. 
 The Elements, Style, and Modes of Construction of some of 
 the most Ancient Specimens. Prom the Beginning of the 
 Age of Pericles to the Decline of the Arts in Greece; the 
 Second Epoch. Elements of the pure Greek Style defined ; 
 its Variations and Schools detailed 133 
 
 Lecture IV.— The Causes of the Superiority of the Greeks in 
 Architecture traced, and considered comparatively with 
 their other Arts and with their Literature. Constituent Ele- 
 ments of their purest Style. The Orders and their Divisions 
 illustrated and described. Their different Examples. The 
 Seven Orders of Temples. Rules o/" Intercolumniation and 
 other Architectural Details. Greek Architecture traced 
 through its Colonies, Pastwn, Sfc. till its Establishment in 
 Etruria. Character of the Etruscan School 181 
 
VIU CONTENTS. 
 
 Lecture V .—The Etruscan School of Architecture continued 
 to the Period of the Conquest of Greece by the Romans, the 
 First Epoch of Roman Architecture. Early Etruscan 
 Buildings iii Rome. Roman Architecture, from the Conquest 
 of Greece to the beginning of' the Reign of Augustus. Se- 
 cond Epoch. From Augustus onwards. Characteristics of 
 the Roman style and Buildings. The Roman System of the 
 Orders defined and illustrated, and their Variations described. 
 Their Buildings and Method of constructing Temples, Tri- 
 umphal Arches, Columns, 4"C- The elementary Principles of 
 Roman Architecture elucidated, and its History carried on to 
 the end of the Reign of Hadrian. The close of Roman 
 greatness m Architecture 233 
 
 Lecture VT. — Roman Architecture continued from the Death 
 of Hadrian to the removal of the Seat of Empire and the Arts 
 to Constantinople. Their Aqueducts, Amphitheatres, Baths, 
 and Bridges described and illustrated. The History of the 
 Art continued till its Immersion in the Dark Ages, and its 
 Revival in the Graco-Gothic, Saracenic, Moorish, the Style 
 generally called Gothic, and the Italian or Modern Architec- 
 ture. Characteristics in Style of the Age,. .., 287 
 
 Lecture VI I. — The Origin and History of Architecture in 
 Great Britain and Ireland. Ancient British or Druidical ; 
 Stonehenge; Avebury, 6fc. the round Towers and Excavations 
 in Ireland. Conjectures thereon. Gothic Architecture briefly 
 considered and traced to its elementary Principles. Introduc- 
 tion of Italian Architecture into England, and the History 
 and Progress of the Art, from Inigo Jones to the Death of 
 Sir Christopher W ren. Its Torpor during the Reigns of 
 Geo7'ge I. and II. and Revival, with the other Arts, under 
 George III. Architectural Characteristics of this Period to 
 the Introduction of the pure Greek Style 334 
 
 Lecture VIII. — Consideration of the Subject from the Time <f 
 Chambers, Wyatt, anrf Stuart, to the present Day. Cri- 
 tical Examination of the principal Architects and Buildings of 
 this Period. The Character of English Architecture, as pre- 
 sented in our Public Buildings, investigated and compared with 
 that of other Countries. The Progress of the Art compared 
 with the Progress of Painting and Sculpture. Hints on Do- 
 mestic Architecture. Brief Recapitulation or Summary of the 
 Course ; and Conclusion 389 
 
LECTURE I. 
 
 Introduction. Definition and Character 
 of Architecture : the Cultivation and En- 
 couragement of it always found among the true 
 Signs of Greatness and a high State of Civili- 
 zation. Historical Sketch of the Art among 
 the ancient Jews^ Assyrians^ Chaldeans, Egyp- 
 tians, and Phcenicians. More particularly con- 
 sidered in Egypt, with illustrative Exainples 
 and Description of its Style and Modes of Con- 
 struction, Contemporary Nations historically 
 cited. 
 
ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 The difficulties which surround the acquire- 
 ment of a knowledge of the elements of civil 
 architecture are less formidable than appear at 
 first sight. These become easier of access as 
 we advance, and more pleasing of aspect as 
 we become intimate with them. The dense 
 medium of technical formalities which obscures 
 their attractions, like a thick and yellow fog, 
 vanishes before the heat of determined ardour, 
 and leaves nothing but their beauties to allure 
 and to reward. 
 
 I therefore propose to make the following 
 course of lectures as popular, that is to say as 
 intelligible and as entertaining, as the tech- 
 nical nature of architecture will admit. They 
 are offered as introductory to a more practical 
 investigation of the subject, and intended to 
 clear away some of the briers and brambles 
 
 B 2 
 
4 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 which have overgrown its territories, and 
 deterred many an admirer of the art from 
 searching into its beauties. 
 
 To these difficulties, and their consequence, 
 namely, a deficiency of acquaintance with the 
 more pleasant and tasteful departments of the 
 art on the part of the leading members of society 
 in England, compared with those of other 
 nations, are to be attributed the numerous 
 monuments of bad taste which disfigure our 
 metropolis and country. Were architecture, 
 as a fine art, equally well understood by the 
 nobility and gentry, by the literary and scien- 
 tific world, and by the more opulent of the 
 middle classes of England, as it was by the 
 nobility and gentry of the Italian states and 
 the opulent merchants of Florence and other 
 commercial cities of modern Italy, a pure and 
 classical style of architecture, and a refined 
 taste in all our arts and manufactures, would 
 equally predominate, and equally embellish 
 the palaces, the streets, the villas, and the 
 mansions of England, as they did the palaces, 
 the piazzas, and the villas of Italy. Were 
 architecture thus generally understood, non- 
 descripts of every sort, from the plasterer to 
 the paper-hanger, without a single necessary 
 qualification, could not then impose them- 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 6 
 
 selves as architects upon their opulent but 
 tasteless employers, to their infinite cost and 
 disgrace. With such easy and necessary ac- 
 quirements, the patrons of architecture would 
 then be men of taste and knowledge of the 
 art, and in detecting and dismissing into well- 
 merited contempt these assuming pretenders, 
 would conduce to the solid improvement of 
 tasteful and correct architecture, and redound 
 to the glory of their country. " I cannot 
 touch the lute," said Themistocles, the Athe- 
 nian, when questioned on his skill in music, 
 " but I can make a small town a great city."* 
 To such honourable and respectable classes 
 of amateurs or non-professors these lectures 
 are principally addressed ; with a firm assurance 
 that we have yet to be as great in art as we are 
 in literature, science, and commerce, and with 
 a conviction that a pure and original style of 
 national architecture will finally prevail in this 
 country ; which has been proscribed, by some 
 critical drivellers of the latter part of the last 
 century, as beyond the latitude of excellence 
 in any of the arts dependent on design. 
 
 Architecture, like poetry, like painting, 
 and all other excellencies that exalt our nature, 
 
 * Bacon's Essays. 
 
6 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 has had its rise^ its progress, its perfection, and 
 decline : and is closely connected with the pro- 
 gress of intellect and the philosophy of the 
 human mind. Its rise took place in the very 
 infancy of the world ; its progress was made 
 among- the Egyptians and the early inhabitants 
 of Greece ; it reached perfection among the 
 Greeks in the age of Pericles ; declined and 
 scintillated among the Romans ; became torpid 
 in the middle ages ; and was revived, with 
 literature and the other arts, by the great and 
 illustrious people of modern Italy. 
 
 With us again architecture has made its 
 progress with other arts in a similar degree ; 
 and had also its rise among the ancient Britons, 
 its progress through the Anglo-Saxons, the Nor- 
 mans, and the English, properly so called ; 
 with whom one branch arrived to a splendour 
 of perfection in construction, and then sank 
 into a death-like slumber. The style called 
 the classical, which is more properly the Ita- 
 lian, was introduced to this country by Inigo 
 Jones and his followers of the Palladian 
 school, was continued by the illustrious Wren, 
 and, with various degrees of talent, by Van- 
 burgh, Gibbs, and Kent. The art was then 
 all but lost in the dark and tasteless days of 
 George the First and Second, till it revived 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTUKE. 7 
 
 under George the Third, in Chambers, Wyatt, 
 and Stuart; and appears now, like its sister 
 art of painting, still in its progress towards a 
 great and glorious meridian of perfection. To 
 our late venerable sovereign, the arts are all 
 deeply indebted, and architecture not the least. 
 Possessed of a sound and pure taste himself, 
 initiated early in life in its elementary prin- 
 ciples, both of design and construction, his 
 judgement was guided by his knowledge ; and 
 the names of his architects, Chambers, Wyatt, 
 and Stuart, and the purity of style which he 
 patronized, are proofs of the accuracy of his 
 discernment and the excellence of his taste. 
 To George the Third, the gratitude of the na- 
 tion must be ever due for his personal exertions 
 in the cause of all the arts, without which the 
 Boeotian darkness of his predecessors would 
 have continued ; for unaided by his ministers, 
 who neither loved nor understood the arts, 
 clouded by days of turbulence and warfare, he 
 did more for art than any preceding British mo- 
 narch since the days of the unfortunate Charles. 
 This encouragement, patronage, and royal 
 favour, paved the way to our present degree of 
 excellence, whatever it may be in the eyes of 
 posterity ; and to our present flattering pros- 
 
8 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 pects of approaching greatness, that enable 
 us to 
 
 *' Bid the lovely scenes at distance hail."* 
 
 Richardson, whose works elicited the dor- 
 mant genius of Reynolds nearly half a century 
 ago, prophetically exclaimed, " I am no pro- 
 phet, nor the son of a prophet; but 1 will ven- 
 ture to predict, that if ever the ancient great 
 and beautiful taste in painting," to which 1 take 
 leave to add in architecture also, " revives, it 
 will be in England." Our dearest wishes and 
 our most strenuous endeavours should be 
 exerted that it maybe in our days, and that we 
 may see it with our eyes. This progiessive 
 march of art continues with slow but with 
 auspicious promise, and appears to be ap- 
 proaching to an epoch. What can be done 
 for art in these turbulent times? is often asked. 
 The titles certainly are turbulent enough, but 
 ^^e nuisi not be content to wait for times of 
 comparative repose. Every nerve must be 
 strained without a moment's intermission, or 
 we shall have all to begin again. It must be 
 remembered, that the days of Pericles, of Leo 
 
 * Collins. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 9 
 
 the Tenth, of Julius the Second, of our first 
 Charles, and of our third George, were not the 
 most peaceable in history; and yet, in tlie tirst 
 cited of those days, the works of Phidias, of 
 Raffaelle, and of Michelangiolo were produ- 
 ced ; and the last-mentioned are as yet the most 
 celebrated in English art. The reasons are, that 
 the governments and sovereigns of those days 
 had a knowledge of art, and a fine taste and a 
 passion for their encouragement, and when men 
 have passions to gratify, we all know they do 
 not wait for convenient opportunities to indulge 
 them, but make the most of their actual situa- 
 tions. 
 
 Happy will it be for us, if the most be made 
 of our actual situation, — if patronage and en- 
 couragement be given to the mass of talent in 
 all the arts now in the country, — and if to the 
 glorious names of Pericles, of Julius the Se- 
 cond, and of Leo the Tenth, we may be 
 enabled to add the name of George the Fourth, 
 as the most enlightened and liberal protector of 
 the arts since the great days of Italian splen- 
 dour. 
 
 This epoch, " a consummation devoutly to 
 be wished," if I am not deceived, is fast ap- 
 proaching. I have watched it long and wish- 
 fully, and have ventured to urge, in a respect- 
 
10 ELMES S LECTURES , 
 
 ful manner,* to those in whose hands the power 
 lies, the necessity of seizing upon the mass of 
 unemployed genius and power in art, while 
 there yet be time. The opportunity has not 
 been neglected. The last reign, including the 
 period of the regency, was the first to appro- 
 priate a large sum of the public money exclu- 
 sively to the arts, in the purchase of the 
 Townley, the Elgin, and the Phigaleian mar- 
 bles ; and the government of our present king 
 deserves to be recorded as the first in English 
 history to announce in parliament an intended 
 public patronage of those arts, which conduce 
 so much to the fame of a great and mighty 
 nation. " As far as his Majesty,"! said the 
 ostensible minister of the crown, in the House 
 of Commons, on the first meeting of parlia- 
 ment in the new reign, " had already presided 
 over the councils of the nation, the result had 
 been glorious. He trusted and was persuaded, 
 that his Majesty would have the gratification 
 of adding a new page of lustre to the English 
 history ; and that, as there was nothing of 
 
 * See Annals of the Fine Arts, (edited by the Author of 
 these Lectures,) from its beginning to its end. 
 
 t Lord Castlercagh's speech on the address of condo- 
 lence, Feb. 17, 1820. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. |1 
 
 glory left to achieve, his Majesty would snatch 
 the only remaining laurel, by cultivating the 
 arts of peace." 
 
 May this persuasion of his Majesty's kind- 
 ness towards the arts and love for the laurels 
 of peace, be speedily accomplished ; for every 
 good man must sigh to think, how more than 
 ever necessary they are now become; and 
 may these peaceful laurels, the enchanting, 
 fragrant, and ever blooming flowers of paint- 
 ing, of sculpture, and of architecture, of mu- 
 sic, of literature, and of poetry, entwine around 
 our country's brows, and make our times the 
 golden age of England ! 
 
 In these auspicious prognostics for art, 1 
 would presume to hint, that an indiscriminate 
 patronage of ancient or foreign art is not the 
 encouragement now required by the British 
 school. Had the Greeks fostered alone Egyp- 
 tian art, they would certainly never have be- 
 come the inventors of their own pure style. 
 The Romans, on the contrary, by their exclu- 
 sive patronage of Greek architects, are known 
 only as degenerators, instead of inventors or 
 restorers. Nor will collecting alone the mas- 
 ter-works of ancient art, however fine, make 
 us rank as inventors, or raise us a splendid 
 name. 
 
12 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 A recent* historian of the fine arts, who did 
 not live to accomplish his task, says, that this 
 rage for collecting, among the Romans, " led 
 to no improved knoivledge, and supplied no 
 ambition of taste, although the hands of pri- 
 vate individuals became filled, by degrees, 
 with the productions of Grecian excellence. In 
 general, they estimated what they possessed 
 with no more sense than Mummius, who 
 looked at most to the value at which the ar- 
 ticle was put. But Agrippa strove to carry 
 those habits to a wiser and more useful end : 
 in his celebrated speech soon after the close 
 of the republic, he recommended it as an ordi- 
 nance, that the works of art should be devoted 
 to the public use in some public repositories, 
 for the improvement of those ivho meant to pro- 
 secute the arts, and for the admiration and plea- 
 sure ©/"all. It is remarkable, too, that Agrip- 
 pa was \\\e first and last of all the Romans who 
 thought such a regulation worthy of their atten- 
 tion ;" and his celebrated portico to the Pan- 
 theon immortalizes his name. 
 
 There certainly does appear now a prospect 
 of English Agrippas, but they must not con- 
 fine every effort in favour of the art of other 
 
 The Rev. R. A. Bromley, B.D. vol. ii. p. 47. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 13 
 
 nations and other times ; nor must they satisfy 
 themselves by affording means of study for our 
 students, if they do nothing for them, when 
 they have studied, by pubhc encouragement. 
 
 Now I am upon the subject of public en- 
 couragement, patronage, and the present rage 
 for collecting, permit me to quote another ex- 
 tract from the same author, on the contrast 
 between the Roman and Grecian modes of 
 patronage, most applicable to the present times, 
 when a danger is apparent of falling into an 
 erroneous system. " The Greeks," says Mr. 
 Bromley, " resorted to their own genius for 
 what they possessed. But in Rome, what 
 was executed as original works, and by na- 
 tive artists, bore a very small proportion to 
 what was brought there by distant collections ; 
 and where the passion for collecting is predomi- 
 nant, all pretensions to patronage must be gone. 
 But the Romans collected even from Egypt, 
 not merely the golden statue of Cleopatra, 
 which Augustus set up in the temple of Venus, 
 and which might have accounted in some de- 
 gree for such spoils of Egyptian art, but what- 
 ever else of ingenuity could be drawn from 
 thence. And those Egyptian collections they 
 made when Rome had been long enriched in 
 
14 ELMEs's LECTURES 
 
 the arts of Greece, Sicily, and Carthage. 
 Under such circumstances, to collect from 
 Egypt, and in abundance, certainly argued 
 at least more vanity than taste, and showed 
 they sought those works more as spoils than as 
 treasures^ 
 
 Let it not be said of us, as it was of the Ro- 
 mans, and recently with as much propriety of 
 the French, that we obtain from other countries, 
 and from other times, what we could not gain 
 from our native genius ; and that we copy and 
 imitate more than we adopt and invent. 
 
 Our present state of art, and of its noblest 
 treasures of other times, resembles that of the 
 Romans at the time of Marcellus, who, ac- 
 cording to Plutarch, (in his life of that illustri- 
 ous Roman,) after possessing themselves of 
 all the best treasures of art, which had enrich- 
 ed Greece, Macedon, and Sicily, together 
 with the sculptures of Carthage, said they were 
 now in a state, (and we may apply the remark 
 to ourselves) " to begin to talk of arts and ar- 
 tists'' 
 
 Man is by nature a building, a contriving 
 being, prone to supply his wants from the near- 
 est source. These primary necessities being 
 :supplied, he as regularly seeks to decorate 
 
T] ON ARCHITECTURE, 15 
 
 and to superadd luxuries and embellishments. 
 Thus,* " architecture owed its hirth to neces- 
 sity, and its emhellishments to luxury." Thus 
 the cave grew into a temple, the hut into a 
 mansion, and the cabin became converted to 
 a palace. 
 
 In a state of simple nature, man is in w ant 
 of every necessary, it being a part of the com- 
 pact by which he holds his divine gift of rea- 
 son. Man alone, of all created beings, never 
 stands intellectually still : man, of all created 
 beings alone, improves as he proceeds. Other 
 sentient beings are the same to day as they 
 were in the infancy of the world : man, only, 
 as a species improves or degenerates. Every 
 necessary required by him is to be sought and 
 formed by himself from its simplest elements. 
 Naked came he into the world, and naked 
 (as to his own exertions) must he depart from 
 it. He has to feed, and clothe, and lodge 
 himself. 
 
 In the natural history of our species, whe- 
 ther we seek it in the records of the earliest 
 inhabitants of the ancient world, or among: the 
 uncultivated inhabitants of what to us may be 
 called a new world, — the culinary, the cloth- 
 
 * Goguet I'Origine des Loix, des Arts, &c. torn. i. p. 133. 
 
16 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ing, the building, and the graphic arts, to 
 whatever degree of culture they may have ar- 
 rived, have invariably the same origin. 
 
 Architecture, or the building art, is neces- 
 sarily of too much importance to the welfare 
 and comfort of man, to be neglected or de- 
 spised by any but by the most vain and super- 
 ficial . It is the art by which we can best dis- 
 tinguish civilized man from his rude and bar- 
 barous ancestry ; and, what is of more impor- 
 tance, it forms a scale of comparative cultiva- 
 tion, and of the progress of intellect between 
 nation and nation. The divine Plato* even ad- 
 mits that the study of politics and legislation 
 began with the building of cities. Architecture 
 is the most faithful recorder of the great and 
 noble deeds of nations long since sunk into 
 obscurity, and its works bear existing testimony 
 to the truth of history. 
 
 By the gigantic pyramids, by the lofty obe- 
 lisks, and the stupendous temples of Egypt, 
 we have genuine documents and ocular demon- 
 stration of the veracity of the historic page, 
 which relates the numbers and the power of 
 the mighty people that once inhabited the ex- 
 tensive shores of the prolific Nile. 
 
 * Plato de Les:. 1. 3 & 6. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 17 
 
 The Parthenon, the Erectheum, nay, all 
 that remains of ancient Athens, bear witness 
 to the refined taste of the Greeks as attributed 
 to them by the historians and critics of anti- 
 quity. The Acropolis and its lovely structures 
 vouch for Pausanias ; the pyramids of Ghiza 
 for the venerable father* of history ; and Rome, 
 " the eternal city," owes its most lasting cele- 
 brity to architecture. 
 
 By architecture too, we learn how painting 
 and how sculpture flourished among the an- 
 cients ; for it has not only preserved upon its 
 walls, as in the temple of Tentyra, in the 
 magnificent baths of the Roman emperors, and 
 on the walls of Herculaneum and Pompeii, 
 positive vestiges of their pencils :— but by rati- 
 fying (as it were) the truth of the historians' 
 relation of their architecture, gives us a point 
 whereon we may fix our belief in their descrip- 
 tions of the powers of their ancient painters. 
 Thus— the existing works of Phidias, Ictinus, 
 Callicrates, and Mnesicles, prove the reality 
 and the power of the highly and justly lauded 
 productions of Zeuxis, Parrhasius, and Apelles, 
 of which we have only written testimony. 
 
 * Herodotus. 
 
18 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Architecture has this manifest advantage 
 over painting, which to the student in choice 
 of a profession is by no means a contemptible 
 one ; namely — that while in painting one must 
 be superlatively great, or positively contempti- 
 ble ; in architecture there are many grades 
 below its highest, (which in sublimity yields 
 not to painting,) wherein industry and talent, 
 below the brilliancy of genius, may occupy a 
 moderate station with much dignity and use to 
 society. 
 
 Architecture has its infancy, and may be 
 seen in its cradle as well as the other arts ; but 
 its first attempts are not so helpless as those of 
 painting. j^Elian* says it was no uncommon 
 thing in those earlier essays of painting, for an 
 artist to inscribe under his figures, " this is ati 
 ox that is a horse ; this is a man, that is a tree^ 
 Now surely there can be no occasion to inscribe 
 on the infantine essays of architecture, this is 
 a hut, that is a cave, or this is a house. 
 
 Now I am upon the advantages which archi- 
 tecture possesses, permit me to say a few 
 words also upon its c?j5-ad vantages. Architec- 
 ture is not, like painting, a marketable art. The 
 
 * Var. Hist. lib. x. cap. 10. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 19 
 
 architect cannot, like the painter, or the sculptor, 
 complete his works in private, and exhibit them 
 in public ; he cannot carry a cottage under his 
 arm, a villa in a hackney coach, or a palace 
 on the more magnificent appendages of a porter's 
 horse and two livery chairmen, to an exhibition 
 for his credit or for sale. For him there is no 
 British Institution for the sale of his w orks, 
 for him there are no auctions with public, or 
 more select and fashionable private views. His 
 designs, without patrons, must lie neglected 
 for years in his portfolios. The painter, without 
 even a commission from a sitter, can paint a 
 picture ; the sculptor can model or carve his 
 statue or basso-rilievo, and without either em- 
 ployers or connexions, can carry his works for 
 sale. The architect must calmly wait his em- 
 ployer's day. 
 
 It may be easier, I admit, to design a 
 common house than to paint a decent picture ; 
 yet the acquirements necessary to produce an 
 accomplished architect are more numerous and 
 more difficult of attainment than those required 
 to form a painter ; hence, the world has pro- 
 duced fewer great architects than great painters. 
 
 Nothing is more necessary to the due un- 
 derstanding and to the proper study of archi- 
 
 c 2 
 
20 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 lecture, and to the formation of an architect, 
 than a habit of application and industry. With- 
 out them, even the lowest departments of the 
 art are not to be mastered. It is not a rapid 
 growth that produces a sound and skilful 
 architect, any more than a mushroom preco- 
 city, or a feline fecundity, are emblems of a 
 great painter. It is not by occasional fits of 
 application, by short starts of preparation, by 
 numerous progenies of little works, performed 
 in a little time and with less study, — sometimes 
 discontinued, and again renewed by intervals, — 
 that eminence is to be attained in either of these 
 sublime and difficultly-attained arts. On the 
 contrary, it is only by regular application, by 
 a constant study of good examples, by able 
 instructions, by deep and intense study of the 
 elementary principles of each, with an unin- 
 terrupted practice solely directed to the object; 
 grown up almost into a habit, and ready to be 
 called into use at the shortest notice, and as 
 it were with more arms than are required for 
 the contest; it is only by sacrificing every com- 
 fort that aims at prevention, by having resolu- 
 tion to suft'er nothing to impede our progress, 
 by avoiding the dead sea of idleness and plea- 
 sure, that the professional man can be enabled, 
 
 1 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 21 
 
 even if blest with sufficient natural abilities, to 
 shine in either of the three illustrious arts of 
 painting, sculpture, or architecture. 
 
 Michelangiolo, when asked why he did not 
 marry, said, his art was his wife, and his 
 works were his children. Yet the powerful 
 energy, "and the commanding decision of cha- 
 racter of that great man, who, in his eightieth 
 year, could go early on a cold and frosty 
 morning to the Colosseum, acknowledging he 
 required yet to learn, (ancora imparo,) would 
 not have suffered any domestic arrangements, 
 or even disaiTangements, to have prevented his 
 studying, his practising, or his working at his 
 art. They who rely alone on their own 
 genius, as they vainly call it, without this 
 heroic, this self-denying sacrifice to the deity 
 of the arts, will find their road cloudy and 
 darksome, and their end vainglory, frivolity, 
 and nothingness. 
 
 Much more may easily be said on the ad- 
 vantages of architecture, and on the interest- 
 ing nature of its studies ; but I trust enough 
 has been introduced to convince the unpreju- 
 diced. 
 
 An enlightened patronage of architecture, 
 which of necessity includes an encouragement 
 of all the arts, embellishes the names of mo- 
 
22 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 iiarchs and princes with unfading lustre, equal 
 to any and superior to most of their other acts. 
 A great and good prince is rendered yet more 
 illustrious by such encouragement; and the 
 infamy of a bad one is gilded over to his co- 
 temporaries, and overpowered to posterity, by 
 the brilliancy of its lustre. The bloody and 
 drunken insanities of Alexander, by some 
 called the Great, are shaded by his patronage 
 and love of art ; and the nameless atrocities of 
 Hadrian are softened by his deeds in art almost 
 to a name of repute; while the mild lustre of 
 Titus receives a brilliant accession from the same 
 causes. So is the tyranny of Pericles adorned 
 and neutralized by his enlightened patronage of 
 Phidias. The Parthenon has remitted his sins; 
 and Hadrianopolis, with its tasteful structures, 
 sheds rays of glory round the head of the other- 
 wise contemptible and infamous patron and as- 
 sociate of Antinous. Architecture was held in 
 such esteem by the Greeks, that none but the 
 well-born were allowed to study it, and princes 
 gloried in its practice. " If," as Sir Joshua 
 Reynolds asserts, *' the value and rank of 
 every art" be "in proportion to the mental la- 
 bour employed in it, or the mental pleasure 
 produced by it," then must architecture rank 
 very high indeed. " As this principle is ob- 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 23 
 
 served or neglected," our profession becomes 
 either a liberal art, or a mechanical trade. In 
 the hands of one man it makes the highest pre- 
 tensions, as it is addressed to the noblest facul- 
 ties, and becomes a matter of phi losophy ; while 
 in those of another, it is reduced to a mere 
 matter of ornament, and the architect " has 
 but the humble province of" building elegant 
 trifles. 
 
 Architecture is divided into two general or 
 primary divisions — civil and military ; but it 
 is with civil architecture only that we have to 
 do in this course. Civil architecture is again 
 primarily divided into monumental, sacred, 
 and domestic ; and those again into their various 
 subdivisions, as will be hereafter defined. 
 
 In attempting a sketch of the history of 
 architecture among the most ancient nations 
 of the world, the first steps are doubtful, and 
 must be in a great degree hypothetical ; for it is 
 incorrect and unphilosophical to attribute the 
 invention of architecture to any one ancient 
 nation or people. On the contrary, it is indi- 
 genous to every country where human reason 
 has in any degree developed itself Archi- 
 tecture, like the productions of nature, assumes 
 different forms according to the nature of the 
 
24 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 climate, the wants it may superinduce, the na- 
 ture of the soil, the building materials, and 
 personal character of the human beings com- 
 posing the various nations which practice it. 
 
 Among savage people, architecture as an 
 art is scarcely known, and painting and sculp- 
 ture are as rude as their manners. We find 
 these arts, with music, dancing, eloquence, and 
 poetry, in every country, and among every peo- 
 ple which have arrived at the first degree of 
 civilization ; and mankind was certainly in this 
 state in the earliest antediluvian times, after the 
 families of Adam's immediate progeny settled 
 themselves. 
 
 Among the most ancient people whose 
 records have reached our times, are those 
 who lived before the flood, and whose his- 
 tories and actions are recorded in the books 
 of Moses. The history of architecture, con- 
 sidered philosophically and as connecting itself 
 intimately with the other arts, with science 
 and with legislation, is, properly speaking, 
 the history of the human mind. It bears so 
 strong an impression of the character of the 
 people by whom it has been cultivated, that an 
 attentive examination of its origin and progress 
 is the most effectual way to discover the genius, 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 25 
 
 the manners, and the mental characteristics of 
 the various nations of the world. '* The arts," 
 says Wieland, " under the guidance qfivisdom^ 
 embellish, evolve, and ennoble mankind ; art," 
 he says, *' is the half of our nature, and with- 
 out art man is the most miserable of animals." 
 
 Among the antediluvians, architecture as an 
 art cannot be supposed to have made mucli 
 progress. The principal objects of these an- 
 cient people, whose times may be called the 
 heroic or poetical period of the world, from 
 their native simplicity of manners, must have 
 been the chase, and other methods of providing 
 food, without the labour of cultivation. Sa- 
 coniatho* says, *' that fishing was one of the 
 earliest inventions which the ancients attributed 
 to their heroes." The Bible and Homer are 
 full of the manners of our earliest ancestors. 
 Fishing, hunting, the care of flocks, and, later, 
 agriculture, were the employment of their mo- 
 narchs and heroes— their shepherd kings ; 
 cookery, washing, making garments, and other 
 domestic employments, of their women of 
 rank, their princesses, and their queens. 
 
 The history of the ages before the deluge 
 furnishes but few materials for the history of 
 
 * Apud Euseb. praep. Evang. 1. i. c. 9, p. 35. 
 
26 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 architecture.* Moses has related only those 
 grand events with which it was necessary for 
 posterity to be acquainted, and omitted all 
 details which might only have been useful to 
 gratify curiosity. 
 
 De Goguetis of opinion, that we may fix the 
 date of the far greatest part of human laws, 
 arts and sciences, posterior to the deluge, as 
 the few traces of antediluvian knowledge of 
 which we have heard, and which might have 
 escaped that tremendous desolation, were after- 
 wards greatly defaced and obscured, if not 
 totally lost. 
 
 This important fact in the history of our 
 globe (the deluge) is daily becoming more a 
 matter of proof, from the continual discoveries 
 of fossil remains. But let any one who may 
 still doubt the historical veracity of this terrific 
 visitation, which the ancient histories of all na- 
 tions record, hear the opinion of our great phi- 
 losopher Sir William Jones. 
 
 *' The sketch of antediluvian history, as 
 given by most ancient historians of the race of 
 Adam, in which we find many dark passages, 
 is followed by the narrative," says Sir William, 
 '* of adeluge,f which destroyed the whole race 
 
 * De Goguet, Preface, vol. 1, p. x. f Ninth Discourse- 
 
T] ON ARCHITECTURE. 27 
 
 of man, except four pairs — an historical fact 
 admitted as true by every nation to whose 
 literature we have access, and particularly by 
 the ancient Hindus, who have allotted a whole 
 purana to the detail of that event, which they 
 relate as usual in symbols or allegories. I 
 concur most heartily," he says, " with those 
 who insist, that in proportion as any fact men- 
 tioned, in history seems repugnant to the course 
 of nature, or, in one word, miraculous, the 
 stronger evidence is required to induce a ra- 
 tional belief of it ; but we hear," he continues, 
 '* without incredulity, that cities have been 
 overwhelmed by eruptions from burning moun- 
 tains, territories laid waste by hurricanes, and 
 whole islands depopulated by earthquakes : if 
 then we look at the firmament, sprinkled with 
 innumerable stars ; we conclude by a fair 
 analogy, that every star is a sun, attracting like 
 ours a system of inhabited planets ; and if our 
 ardent fancy, soaring hand-in-hand with sound 
 reason, waft us beyond the visible sphere into 
 regions of immensity, disclosing other celestial 
 expanses, and other systems of suns and 
 worlds on all sides without number or end, we 
 cannot but consider the submersion of our little 
 spheroid as an infinitely less event in respect 
 of the immeasurable universe, than the de- 
 
28 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 sti'uction of a city, or an isle, in respect of this 
 habitable globe. Let a general flood, however, 
 be supposed improbable, in proportion to the 
 magnitude of so ruinous an event, yet the con- 
 current evidences of it are completely adequate 
 to the supposed improbability." The state of 
 mankind immediately after this general deluge 
 is clearly shown in the Mosaic history. The 
 families which emerged from the ark, after 
 paying their grateful adoration to the Deity 
 who had preserved them to perpetuate their 
 race, erected an altar of stones, and offered 
 sacrifice thereon. This is one of the most 
 ancient examples of post-diluvian sacred archi- 
 tecture on record, rude as it might have been. 
 
 It is easy to conceive the progressive im- 
 provements from this rude place of worship to 
 a temple. First, the altar erected on the earth, 
 — next a pavement round it to prevent the 
 earth being sodden by the blood of the ani- 
 mals, and the wet offerings, — then a row of 
 rude upright stones, equidistantly placed round 
 it, — which, being covered over, preserve the 
 sacrifices, priests, and offerings, from the rain 
 and sun : — thus it becomes a primeval temple, 
 with its roof, its cell, and its altar. 
 
 The family of Noah remained no longer 
 united in one society than was necessary for 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 29 
 
 their increase and security. As soon as they 
 were become sufficiently numerous, they dis- 
 persed themselves into the different regions of 
 the earth, about a century and a half after the 
 deluge. It, however, does not appear that it 
 was their intention at first to separate perma- 
 nently, though they were often obliged to part 
 to seek subsistence. " With this view," says 
 De Goguet, " they formed the design of build- 
 ing a city, and raising a tower in the centre of 
 it to a great height, as a signal and point of 
 re-union." For this purpose he attributes the 
 erection of that vast structure called the Tower 
 of Babel ; whilst the best translators of the 
 Hebrew^ Bible render the 4th verse of the 1 1th 
 chapter of Genesis, " Let us build us a city, 
 and a tower whose top may reach unto Heaven; 
 and let ics make us a name, lest we be scattered 
 abroad ;" giving the desire of perpetuating their 
 celebrity as their motive for this great under- 
 taking. 
 
 We learn the simple manners and customs of 
 the ancient Israelites, and the nations in im- 
 mediate contact with them ; and Homer, in 
 describing the manners of the Cyclops, gives 
 a corroborating idea of the uncultivated state 
 of many of the ancient nations. " The Cy- 
 clops," says the poet, " know no laws. Each 
 
30 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 governs* his family, and rules over his wife and 
 children. They trouble not themselves with 
 the affairs of their neighbours, and think not 
 themselves interested in them. Accordingly, 
 they have no assemblies to deliberate on public 
 affairs. They are governed by no general laws 
 to regulate their manners and their actions. 
 They neither plant nor sow. They are fed by 
 the fruits which the earth produces sponta- 
 neously. Their abode is on the summits of 
 mountains, and caverns serve them for re- 
 treats." This uncultivated, unsociable life 
 could not be of long continuance with regard 
 to a great part of mankind. So many motives 
 must have concurred to induce families to 
 associate and mingle with each other, that 
 several of them must have united early. But 
 as we have no certain monuments or records 
 of this reunion and subsequent government of 
 nations, and as there is no end of forming con- 
 jectures, we must proceed to such authentic 
 documents as we possess. 
 
 The connexion of architecture, and the rest of 
 the arts and sciences, with the laws, government 
 and manners of various people, is a curious 
 and useful subject of inquiry. Its relation to 
 
 * Odyss. 1. ix. v. 106, el seq. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE 31 
 
 the history of the human mind is clear and 
 indisputable, although it has been thought be- 
 low the dignity of the philosopher and states- 
 man, and that the arts were mere amusements 
 and relaxations to superior minds. I shall not 
 stop to controvert this fallacious doctrine, for 
 it requires no denial. > It was the mere subter- 
 fuge of a dogmatic connoisseur, when driven 
 from his false positions by the knowledge 
 of a philosophical and enlightened practi- 
 tioner. 
 
 Architecture has taken its styles, its varieties, 
 its colouring, if we may so call it, from the 
 nations who successively invented or intro- 
 duced it, and their moral characters as a peo- 
 ple may be deduced from their national styles 
 of architecture, as I will endeavour to show. 
 
 The first epoch in the history of archi- 
 tecture is that period before the deluge, a term 
 of nearly 1700 (1655 exactly) years. That 
 architecture must have been understood before 
 the flood is clear from the length of time that 
 had elapsed for the improvement of man, from 
 the knowledge exhibited in the construction of 
 the ark of Noah, and from other similar 
 causes. " The children of Seth," says Josephus, 
 '* erected two pillars, one of brick and the 
 other of stone, on which they engraved the 
 
32 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 principles of astronomy." The making of 
 bricks, the building with hewn stone, and the 
 art of sculpture, here shown, are proofs of a 
 high degree of civilization, and a knowledge 
 of the arts and sciences. The people who 
 could construct such a vast floating machine 
 as a receptacle for a numerous family, with a 
 pair of every species of living creatures, and 
 with necessary articles of subsistence for a 
 great length of time — a work which sets itself 
 in competition with the floating castles of our 
 days, that waft the riches of the world from 
 pole to pole, could not but have made great 
 progress in constructive architecture. 
 
 In the second age of the v/orld, which is 
 calculated from the building of the tower of 
 Babel by the posterity of Noah, to the foun- 
 dation of Athens by Cecrops, in the year 
 before Christ 1556, many large cities were 
 founded, and architecture consequently began 
 to uplift itself into manhood. In the early part 
 of this period, Nimrod began to exalt himself 
 by laying the foundation of the Assyrian em- 
 pire, and Nineveh, the celebrated metropolis 
 of Assyria, was built. Nearly at the same 
 time Troy was founded by Scamander; Miz- 
 raim, the son of Ham, led a colony into Egypt, 
 and laid the foundation of a kingdom which 
 
1] ON AKCHITECTURE. 3/3 
 
 endured 1663 years ; and Cadmus, the re- 
 puted inventor of letters, with Moses, the great 
 legislator, and Aaron, his brother, flourished. 
 
 In this early period the Assyrians cultivated 
 the arts, and are celebrated as having excelled 
 in that of architecture. This second epoch, 
 or age, is peculiarly distinguished by the 
 building of the tower of Babel, and by the de- 
 sign formed by the posterity of Noah, and in 
 part executed, of building a city in the plains of 
 Shinar.* According to some historians, Behis, 
 known in the scriptures by the name of Nimrod, 
 the first king of Assyria, was the reputed pro- 
 jector of this structure. He built afterwards, 
 in the same place, the celebrated city of Baby- 
 lon, where he arrogated to himself the honours 
 of divinity. Ninus, his son, erected to him 
 the first known temple, consecrated a statue 
 to his memory, and ordered it to be wor- 
 shipped, which is the first recorded instance 
 of idolatry. 
 
 All historians agree that Babylon was a 
 large and beautiful city. Pliny relatesf that it 
 was sixty miles in circumference, that its walls 
 were two hundred feet high, and fifty thick ; 
 
 * Genesis, xi. 4. t PHn.lib. vi. cap. 20. 
 
34 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and that the magnificent temple of Jupiter 
 Belus was standing there in his time. Hero- 
 dotus says, that it was four hundred and eighty 
 furlongs in circumference ; that it was full of 
 magnificent structures, and celebrated for the 
 temple of Belus ; that it had an hundred gates 
 of brass, which proves that the fusion and mix- 
 ture of metals were known, and that other arts 
 dependant on design were then practised. 
 
 This statue of Belus was constructed about 
 two hundred years after the flood, and is the 
 same idol mentioned in the scriptures under 
 the name of Baal and Baal Phegor. This 
 same Ninus was the founder of the city of 
 Nineveh, of which Diodorus* says, the city 
 was four hundred stadia^ or, if reduced to 
 English measure, fifty miles in circuit, and is 
 described in the book of Jonah as an exceed- 
 ing great city of three days journey. 
 
 In less than two hundred years after the 
 flood, architecture was cultivated in Chaldea, 
 China, Egypt, and Phoenicia. Mosesf has 
 preserved the names of several cities which 
 Nimrod built in Chaldea. The Chinese, say 
 the Fohi, enclosed cities and towns with walls.f 
 
 * Diod. lib. xi. p. 65. f Genesis, x. 10. 
 
 X Martini Hist, de la Chine, liv. i. p. 28. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 35 
 
 Among the Phoenicians, Semiramis the wife of 
 Ninus finished in this age the stupendous walls 
 of Babylon, which were reckoned among the 
 seven wonders of the world. This illustri- 
 ous princess, to whom the administration of 
 government was left by her husband, as- 
 cended the throne about 1700 years before 
 Christ,* and is one of the first examples in 
 history of a throne being filled by a female. 
 DiodoiTJS, and other ancient writers relate, 
 that among the works executed by Semi- 
 ramis,"]' she caused the images of all kinds 
 of animals to be sculptured, in rilievo, on the 
 walls of her palace, which were coloured after 
 nature. These figures they say were more 
 than four cubits high. In the middle, appeared 
 Semiramis, piercing a tiger with her dart, and 
 near her her son Ninias slaying a lion with his 
 lance. In another part of the same palace, 
 were the statues of Jupiter Belus, Ninus, 
 Semiramis, and of her principal officers of 
 state. These statues, they say, were of bronze. 
 They further add, that three statues of massy 
 gold, representing Jupiter, (whom the Babylo- 
 
 * Diod. lib. ii. p. 114, 120. Goguet, vol. i. p. 42. 
 t Goguet, vol. i. p. 167. Diod. lib. ii. p. 121, 122. 
 
 d2 
 
36 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 nians called Belus,) Juno, and Rhea, were 
 erected by her, on the summit of a temple de- 
 dicated to Jupiter Belus, and erected by the 
 command of Semiramis, in the middle of Ba- 
 bylon. 
 
 These works, however stupendous and mag- 
 nificent they may appear, shrink into trifles 
 when compared with that which the same au- 
 thor informs us this great Queen caused to be 
 executed on the mountain Bagisthan.* This 
 mountain, which, according to Diodorus Sicu- 
 lus, on one side presented a rugged rock, six- 
 teen furlongs, or two English miles, in perpen- 
 dicular height, she ordered to be sculptured 
 into a group of colossal statues. Paolo Lo- 
 mazzo Cin his Ideal del I del Pit.) says, the 
 mountain was seventeen furlongs in circumfe- 
 rence, and was carved into a group of a hun- 
 dred of her guards, and other of her subjects 
 offering sacrifice to her. Compared with this, 
 the scheme of carving Mount Athos into a sta- 
 tue of Alexander the Great is but as a mole- 
 hill to a mountain. Valerius Maximus also 
 gives an account of a prodigiously colossal 
 brazen statue of this celebrated Queen, who 
 
 * Diod. lib. ii. p. 123. 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 37 
 
 died about 1750 before Christ, after reigning 
 forty-two years, as the successor to her hus- 
 band Niniis. 
 
 Many other similar works of grandeur are 
 mentioned as having been constructed by this 
 princess, of which the necessary limits of a 
 lecture will not find room even for enumeration. 
 Besides, it being well known* that there were se- 
 veral queens of Assyria named Semiramis, these 
 authors may have attributed to the great Semi- 
 ramis, the spouse of Ninus, what was probably 
 executed in another age, and by some other 
 princess of the same name. 
 
 From these several examples, founded on 
 the authority of the most authentic historians, 
 we may perceive that architecture flourished 
 in a splendid manner even in these ancient 
 days. None of these relations, magnificent 
 and splendid as they appear; not even the walls 
 of Babylon, the tower of Babel, nor the extent 
 of Nineveh, a circuit of sixty miles, spreading 
 over an area nearly six times the size of that 
 of London, should surprise us into an unbe- 
 lief, from their stupendous sizes ; when "we re- 
 flect upon the existing pyramids of Egypt, and 
 
 * Goguet, vol. i. p. 168 ; Cedrenus, p. 15 ; Conon apud 
 Phot. n. ix. p. 428; Euseb. Chron. lib. ii. p. 80. 
 
38 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 know that the great wall of China, also a work 
 of high antiquity, is 1500 miles in length, 
 forty-five feet in height, and eighteen feet in 
 thickness, with towers of corresponding pro- 
 portions, and reasonable distances.* Here, 
 again, we find architecture bearing testimony 
 to the truth of history. Many cities were built 
 in Palestine, and the neighbouring countries, 
 during the days of the patriarchs Abraham 
 and Jacob. Tosorthes, the successor of 
 Menes, the first king of Egypt, is said to 
 have invented the art of cutting and hewing 
 stones ; and Venephes, or Cephrenes, had al- 
 ready constructed the first pyramid, which 
 served as a model to the others, which were 
 shortly afterwards erected. 
 
 Architecture, having thus been successfully 
 practised among the Assyrians, was by them 
 carried into Egypt, and other countries which 
 they conquered. The Egyptian style of archi- 
 tecture is characterized by a solidity of con- 
 struction, by an originality of conception, and 
 by a boldness of form. The civilization of 
 this people, and the consequent cultivation of 
 the arts, commenced in Upper Egypt. The 
 architectural remains of this portion of Egypt 
 
 ' Bromley, vol. i. p. 115. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 39 
 
 are more numerous, more characteristic, and 
 more ancient than those of Lower Egypt, whose 
 inhabitants, for a long period after the know- 
 ledge of architecture in Upper Egypt, lived in 
 natural caves and excavations in the mountains. 
 The excavations now remaining, and mentioned 
 by travellers, are possibly of this period. The 
 hieroglyphics and other figures which are sculp- 
 tured in these caverns are of a style indicative 
 of a later period than that of their first inhabit- 
 ants. 
 
 All the Egyptian structures are not built of 
 such imperishable materials as their pyramids, 
 their obelisks, and their temples ; for in many 
 places have been found the ruins of palaces and 
 common habitations, built with bricks, some of 
 which were burnt, and others merely dried 
 in the sun. The origin of all arts was very 
 ancient in Egypt ; their existing ruins would 
 prove their skill in constructive architecture, 
 hewing and polishing of the hardest stones, 
 and a characteristic style of sculpture, inde- 
 pendently of the testimony of historians. The 
 earliest dwellings of all nations bear a general 
 resemblance to each other; those of Egypt and 
 Palestine were of reeds and canes interwoven,* 
 
 * Diod. lib. i, p. 52, Sanchon. apud Euseb. p. 35. 
 
40 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and are the types of their reeded columns. It 
 is singular that there were houses of this de- 
 scription seen in Peru,* among a people whose 
 vast constructions in many instances rival those 
 of the Egyptians. 
 
 Wood or timber is a material so proper for 
 building, that it was undoubtedly employed 
 for this purpose, where it could easily be pro- 
 cured. In Egypt this material was peculiarly 
 scarce, even for fuel,! and the natives were 
 driven to other and less manageable materials. 
 
 The construction of their first buildings re- 
 quired but little preparation and little know- 
 ledge. We may judge comparatively of the 
 knowledge of so ancient a nation by that of 
 the Peruvians, before the arrival of the Spa- 
 niards in that country. By degrees the Egyp- 
 tians improved in skill and industry ; they 
 substituted vitrified bricks and granite in the 
 place of dried clay and mud, and raised build- 
 ings equally strong and magnificent. 
 
 The art of building with such immense blocks 
 of stone as we find in the Egyptian buildings 
 must have cost their first architects much 
 thought and study. These immense masses 
 
 * Voy. au P^rou par M. Bouguer, p. 8, 10. 
 t Herodotus. 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 41 
 
 of such hard and ponderous materials, and the 
 astonishing size of their columns, give their 
 buildings an appearance of grandeur and sim- 
 plicity, that even at first sight inspires ideas 
 of w^onder and delight. 
 
 But, upon inspection, a want of symmetry 
 of proportion, and of elegance is apparent. 
 The ornaments are often misplaced, ill-applied, 
 crowded, and executed in a dry and hard style. 
 The architecture of Egypt sprung rapidly to a 
 certain degree of perfection, beyond which it 
 never improved, because the political institu- 
 tions of the country, and the attachment of 
 the people to their ancient customs and man- 
 ners, were averse from alteration or improve- 
 ment. Neither were they likely to derive their 
 architectural knowledge from other nations, 
 when, according to Diodorus* and Strabo,t 
 one of their first maxims was never to leave 
 their own country ; and one of their first poli- 
 tical institutions to exclude all strangers from 
 it : and least of all was it likely they should 
 borrow from India, when the Indians left their 
 own country as little as the Egyptians. 
 
 * Diod. lib. i. p. 78. 
 
 t Stra. lib. xvii. p. 1174, also Clemens Alex. Strom, lib. i. 
 p. 354. 
 
42 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 The earliest and most celebrated architec- 
 tual works of the Egyptians are their excava- 
 tions, their pyramids, and their obelisks. The 
 pyramids and obelisks arose from the idea of 
 flame, or the rays of light, the original emblems 
 of the supreme principle of all things.* Of 
 these latter works many were transported to 
 Rome. Among their most surprising works 
 was tlie Labyrinth, that immense assemblage of 
 rooms, halls, and passages, of which Herodotus, 
 Pliny, and Strabo, have left us ample descrip- 
 tions; their canals, which however belong 
 rather to public economy than to art ; the 
 monolithes, or chambers of one single stone, and 
 the numerous and immense temples, covered 
 with hieroglyphics, sculptured, painted, and 
 decorated with rows of animals, sphinxes, or 
 obelisks : their colossal statues, and other 
 similar works, which will be noticed in their 
 order. 
 
 Before coming to the details of the Egyptian 
 buildings, I will first analyse and describe the 
 character of their architecture. The charac- 
 teristics or elementary principles of Egyptian 
 architecture are, walls of a great thickness ; 
 roofs generally of a single block of stone, which 
 
 * D'Ancarville, vol. i. p. 55. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 43 
 
 reached from one wall to another ; a multiplicity 
 of columns, some of which are square, some 
 octangular, some with sixteen faces, and more 
 round upon their plan. The proportions as 
 well as the decorations of the columns vary in 
 almost every example, and rarely approach the 
 regularity and dignity of an order. They sel- 
 dom had bases, and when they had, they mostly 
 consisted of mere plain plinths, or a few simple 
 water caves, enveloping a small portion of the 
 bottom of the shaft. Their capitals varied con- 
 siderably, sometimes being only a simple die 
 or abacus, either plain or covered with hierogly- 
 phics.* Sometimes they are ornamented with 
 foliage; in some they resemble a vase; in 
 others a bell reversed. Their most usual 
 ornaments are palm leaves, and those which are 
 the most decorated may be reckoned among 
 the least ancient. In this style of architecture 
 there is no frieze, nor properly speaking any 
 architrave or cornice, and their substitutes are 
 either ; for something resembling them may be 
 traced in the epistylia or beams of stone which 
 reach from column to column. 
 
 Another characteristic of the Egyptian style 
 is a peculiar narrowness of intercolumniation, 
 
 * Sec the works of Denon, Pococke, Belzoni, &c. 
 
44 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 being often not more than three feet and a half. 
 The want of the principle of the arch, which is 
 mostly supplied by epistylia, or stone beams, 
 or lintols, is also another and peculiar charac- 
 teristic of this original style. Dr. Pococke 
 thinks that the ancient Egyptians were not 
 entirely ignorant of the construction of the arch, 
 but does not give satisfactory proofs of his con- 
 viction ; and the president Goguet, in his 
 learned dissertation on the origin of laws, arts, 
 and sciences, assumes, from their not using it in 
 their temples, that they did not understand it. 
 The proofs which the author gives in his third 
 volume of monuments, drawn from Egypt, 
 that the Egyptians were ignorant of the art 
 of making vaults or arches, might as well be 
 drawn to establish their contempt of this mode 
 of construction, and their preference for tlie 
 colossal masses they used to cover their aper- 
 tures, and which reach from column to column 
 and from wall to wall. The subject must re- 
 main conjectural ; yet the nearest approaches, 
 that I am at present aware of, to this scientific 
 element of modern architecture, are exhibited 
 in the entrance of the great pyramid at 
 Memphis. It is but justice, however, to M. 
 Goguet, to say that these discoveries are since 
 the period of his writing. 
 
T] ON ARCHITECTURE. 45 
 
 Signor Belzoni, our most recent traveller in 
 Egypt, who has seen more of what may be 
 termed inedited Egyptian buildings, and whose 
 works I have only seen since writing the above, 
 agrees with my pre-conceived opinion of their 
 complete knowledge of the arch, and appears 
 to have produced ample proofs of this curious 
 fact. He found Egyptian arches at Thebes, 
 and one at Gournon, under the rocks that se- 
 parate this place from the valley Beban el 
 Malook. 
 
 However conjectural may have been the 
 origin or rise of ornamental architecture, of this 
 we are certain, that among the most ancient spe- 
 cimens with which we are at present acquainted 
 and from which the moderns have most drawn, 
 is the Egyptian. Its style bears all the marks 
 of freshness of invention, drawn from their 
 own peculiar materials and their own national 
 symbols; and their authors deserve the cha- 
 racters of original inventors. It is in this por- 
 tion of the globe, that those colossal wonders, 
 those architectural monsters, the pyramids, are 
 situate. It is needless to dwell upon a long 
 description of these structures. The largest 
 of the three, which are some leagues distant 
 from Cairo, forms a square, each side of whose 
 base is 660 feet; its external circuit being. 
 
46 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 therefore, 2640 feet, and is nearly 500 feet in 
 height.* As a general idea of this stupendous 
 building, it is nearly the size at its base of the 
 area of Lincoln's-Inn Fields, London, which has 
 been said to have been made by its architect Inigo 
 Jones of that size for the purpose of illustration, 
 and its apex nearly one-third higher than the 
 summit of the cross of St. Paul's cathedral. 
 The summit of this largest pyramid at present 
 finishes by a platform of about 16 or 17 feet 
 square. This amazing mass of masonry is 
 constructed with stones of an extraordinary 
 
 * The dimensions of the great pyramid differ extremely in 
 different authors, as may be seen in the following table. 
 
 Ancients. Height. Width l side. 
 
 Herodotus 800 feet 800 
 
 Strabo 625 600 
 
 Diodorus 600 some inches • • • • 700 
 
 Pliny 708 
 
 Moderns. 
 
 Le Brun 616 704 
 
 Prosp. Alpinus • • • • 625 750 
 
 Thevenot 520 612 
 
 Niebuhr 440 710 
 
 Greaves 444 648 
 
 Number of the layers or steps. 
 
 Greaves says 207 Pococke 212 
 
 Maillet 208 Belon 250 
 
 Albert Leivenstein 260 Thevenot 208 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 47 
 
 size, many of them being 30 feet long by four 
 in height, and three in thickness.* Herodotus,*!" 
 Diodoms,! ^^^ Pliiiy§ say, that the stones 
 employed in building the pyramid were 
 brought from Ethiopia and Arabia. This fact 
 M. Goguet with much probability doubts ; for 
 " in the first place," he says, " it is not likely 
 that the kings of Egypt, having excellent ma- 
 terials at hand, should have unnecessarily ex- 
 pended immense sums to bring them from afar. 
 Again, the stones of the pyramid have too 
 near a resemblance to those which are found in 
 the neighbourhood for us to imagine that they 
 were not taken thence.|| Yet it is probable 
 that the stones referred to by these ancient 
 authors may have been the marble with which 
 the outside of the pyramids were covered, and 
 may have been procured from the neighbour- 
 hood of the Red Sea, and from Upper Egypt. 
 The origin of the pyramids, the causes of 
 their erection, and by whom, are differently 
 related ; but Belzoni has, I think, set the ques- 
 tion at rest by his interesting discoveries, and 
 
 * Herodotus, lib. ii. n. 124; Pietro della Valle, let. 11, 
 torn. i. p. 224, 225. Maillet Description de I'Egypte, 
 p. 224, 230, 231, 253. * 
 
 + L. 2, n. 124. I L. 1. p. 72. §. L. 36, sec. 17, p. 738. 
 
 II Thevenot, torn. ii. p. 484, and Vansleb.Relat. d'Egypte. 
 
48 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 proved that they were undoubtedly tombs of 
 their founders. In a learned and interesting in- 
 quiry into Egypt and the Nile, from the ancient 
 books of the Hindus, by Captain Francis Wil- 
 ford, published in the third volume of Asiatic 
 Researches, which our illustrious countryman 
 Sir Wm. Jones admits removed the greatest part 
 of that natural distrust and credulity which had 
 taken possession of his mind, the able author 
 says, " It is no wonder that authors differ as 
 to the founders of these vast buildings, * for 
 the people of Egypt,' says Herodotus, ' held 
 their memory in such detestation, that they 
 would not even pronounce their names ;' they 
 told him, however, that they were built by a 
 herdsman, whom he calls Philitius, and who 
 was a leader of the Palis or Bhils, mentioned 
 before."* However, it is more with their con- 
 struction and architective merits that we have 
 to do in the present inquiry. 
 
 Herodotus, the father of Pagan history, re- 
 cordst the methods used for constructing 
 these mountains of masonry, with an accuracy 
 and probability, that leaves nothing to doubt, 
 and shows how far they were advanced in me- 
 chanical science. This great historian, after 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 438. t Herod. 1, ii. n. 124. 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 49 
 
 having gathered knowledge and experience in 
 all the arts and sciences, cultivated and known 
 in every part of Greece, (of which country he 
 was a native,) Thrace, and Scythia, travelled 
 also in pursuit of knowledge to Arabia, Pales- 
 tine, and Egypt, where he carefully viewed and 
 described the chief curiosities, both of art and 
 of nature, and the most remarkable places 
 which he visited. 
 
 He relates, that a hundred thousand work- 
 men were employed at the same time in the 
 construction of this pyramid ;* but Diodorusl 
 and Plinyl say, with less probability, three 
 hundred and sixty thousand : they were re- 
 lieved by an equal number every three months. 
 Ten years, he reports on the authority of the 
 Egyptian priests of those days,'^ were employ- 
 ed in hewing and conveying the stones, and 
 twenty more to finish this enormous structure, 
 which contained, in its inside, galleries, cham- 
 bers, and a well. 
 
 II " This pyramid," says Herodotus, from actual 
 
 * Herodot. lib. ii. n. 124. + Diod. lib. i. p. 73. 
 
 ; Plin. lib. xxxvi. sect. 17. § Herodot. lib. ii. n. 124. 
 
 II Fuit autem sic extructa hcec pyramis in speciem gra- 
 dnum quas quidam scalas quidtm arulas vacant. Postequam 
 earn primo talem fecerant, attohhant reliquos lapides ma- 
 chinis factis e brevibus lignis ab humo in primum ordinem 
 
50 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 inspection, " is quadrilateral, evei-y face contains 
 eight plethrons* in length, and the same mea- 
 sure in height. All the stones are thirty feet 
 long, well squared, and jointed with the great- 
 est exactness, rising on the outside by a gra- 
 dual ascent, which some call stairs, and others 
 little altars, contrived in the following manner; 
 namely, when they had laid the first range of 
 stones, they carried other stones up thither by 
 a short engine of wood, and from thence to 
 the several orders or courses of stone, or per- 
 haps the engine was but one ; and being easily 
 managed, might be removed as often as they 
 placed a stone ; " for I have heard," he says, 
 " the relation both ways. The highest were 
 first finished, and the rest in their proper 
 order; but last of all, those that are lowest 
 
 graduum levantes. Uhi ad hunc lapis ascenderat alteri 
 machince imponebatur quee in ipso primo ordine stahat. Ab 
 hoc deinde in alterum ordinem trahebatur i>upcr alteram 
 inachinam. Nam quot erant ordines graduum totidem quo- 
 que machine erant, sive etiam eandem machinam quce erat 
 una et facilis adferendem, transferebant ad nnumquemque 
 
 ordinem quoties saxum exemerant Effecta sunt igitur 
 
 ita prima ejus quceque altissima, deinde sequentia absolve' 
 runt, novissima vero quce solo sunt juncta et injima perege- 
 runt." — Herod. Euterpe, 2, 125. 
 
 * Six plethrons make a slade, a stade is equal to 125 
 geometrical paces, or 625 feel. 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 51 
 
 and nearest the ground." Some commentators 
 on til is text tliink that this finishing refers to 
 the marble casing, but I am rather of opinion 
 that it refers to the exterior facing of the stone 
 steps. 
 
 Captain Wilford, whom I have before quoted, 
 in his very curious dissertation on this subject, 
 from the ancient books of the Hindus, says, 
 they are called " three stupendous mountains 
 of gold, of silver, and of precious stones:' 'and 
 that they might have been called the three moun- 
 tains of gold, of silver, and of precious stones, 
 in the hyperbolical style of the east ; but he 
 rather supposed from this very facing: that the 
 first was said to be of gold, because it was 
 coated with yellow marble ; the second of sil- 
 ver, because it had a coating of white marble; 
 and the third oi' jewels, because it excelled the 
 others in magnificence, being coated with a 
 beautiful spotted marble of a fine grain, and 
 susceptible of an exquisite polish.* 
 
 Diodorust says, that they accomplished the 
 building of the pyramids by means of terraces 
 disposed in manner of an inclined plane ; and 
 Pliny relates the same upon his authority. 
 
 * Savarv, vol. i. p. 246. Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 438. 
 t Diod, lib. i. p. 73. Plin. lib. xxxvi. sect. 17. 
 
 E 2 
 
52 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 The account of Herodotus is, however, in 
 every respect entitled to most credence. On 
 this pyramid, says Herodotus,* was an inscrip- 
 tion, in Egyptian characters, declaring how much 
 was expended in radishes, onions, and garlick 
 for the workmen, " which the interpreter," says 
 he, " I well remember, told me amounted to 
 no less than the sum of sixteen hunldred talents 
 of silver." 
 
 If, however, these pyramids were faced with 
 marble, and ornamented with sculpture, and if 
 these tremendous masses of masonry were but 
 cores to ornamental structures, such as I have 
 just described; they may, nay they must have 
 been, particularly if their apexes were crowned 
 by obelisks, the grandest architectural works 
 ever produced by man. 
 
 The relations of the ancients concerning 
 the galleries and chambers of this pyramid 
 have been singularly confirmed by modern tra- 
 vellers, more particularly by the enterprising 
 Belzoni, whose researches into Egyptian 
 archaiology do credit to modern discoveries 
 in art and science. 
 
 At a small distance from these pyramids, 
 
 * Herod, lib. ii. n. 125. Diod. lib. i. p. 73. Plin. lib. 
 xxxvi. sec. 17, p. 738. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 53 
 
 and about a quarter of a mile from the banks 
 of the Nile, is another astonishing production 
 of this wonder-working people: — the mon- 
 strous figure called the sphinx of Ghiza, 
 the face of which is that of a woman, and 
 the body that of a lion. This extraordinary 
 figure is said to have been the sepulchre of 
 their king Amasis. It is of one entire stone, 
 and is said to have been cut out of a solid 
 rock. Till the time of the French invasion 
 of Egypt, little was to be seen of this celebrated 
 figure except the head, the rest being buried 
 in sand, which they cleared away in a consi- 
 derable degree, and laid much of it open 
 to view. From recent measurements, calcu- 
 lated when cleared from the sand with which 
 it is almost enveloped, it is about a hundred 
 feet in length and forty feet wide. Dr. Po- 
 cock, and M. Goguet, after him, reckoned 
 the head to be twenty-six feet high, thirty-five 
 feet round, and fifteen feet from the ear to the 
 chin. Pliny,* as usual, exaggeratesf prodigi- 
 ously the proportions of this sphinx, when he 
 says that in measuring the circumference of the 
 head at the forehead it is about one hundred 
 and two feet in compass, and one hundred 
 
 * Pliu. lib. xxxvi. sect. 17. t Goguet, vol. iii. p. 76. 
 
64 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and forty-two in height. Paul Lucas* gives 
 the head as one hundred feet in compass, and 
 about seventy feet from the chin to the top of 
 the forehead. 
 
 Captain CabilHa,'!' who pursued his researches 
 into these antiquities a Httle before the enter- 
 prising Belzoni, succeeded with great labour 
 in uncovering the front of the great sphinx. 
 He found a small temple between the two paws, 
 and a large tablet of granite on its breast. The 
 tablet is adorned with several figures and hiero- 
 glyphics, and two representations of sphinxes 
 are sculptured on it. Before the entrance into 
 the small temple was a lion, placed as if to 
 guard the approach. From the base of the 
 temple to the summit of the liead he gives as 
 sixty-five feet; the legs of the sphinx are fifty- 
 seven feet long from the bi^ast to the extremity 
 of the paws, which are eight feet high. The 
 captain also found a Greek inscription of the 
 time of the Ptolemies, one alluding to the Em- 
 peror Antoninus, and another to Septimus 
 Severus. 
 
 The sphinxes of the Egyptians, and all their 
 combined figures of animal creation, took their 
 
 * Voyage to the Levant, vol. i. p. 46". 
 t Belzoni's Egypt, p. 138. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. •'iO 
 
 origin from the fable of the mother of tlie 
 Scythians, who in her intercourse with Jupiter 
 produced an offspring* half females and half 
 serpents. 
 
 Next in point of celebrity, and among the 
 most considerable and singular works which 
 have ever been imagined, must be reckoned the 
 Egyptian labyrinth, which the Greeks imitated 
 among others in the well known labyrinth of 
 Crete, by Daedalus. Tt has been doubted, if 
 any ruins of this wonderful structure have 
 been discovered, but my before quoted autho- 
 rity, Captain Wilford, asserts,! that its ruins are 
 still to be seen near the lake Moeris, at a 
 place which the Arabs have named the kasr 
 or palace of Karim, whom they suppose to 
 have been the richest of mortals. We must, 
 however, rely upon the credit of ancient au- 
 thors for any account of it; and the authority 
 of Herodotus, for the reasons I have before 
 given, is again the best we can refer to upon this 
 head. There is great diversity of opinion upon 
 the period to which this much-boasted edifice 
 ought to be attributed : Herodotus | attributes 
 
 * D'Ancaiville, vol, i. p. Ho. 
 t Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 426. 
 : Herod, lib. ii, n. 148. 
 
66 elmes's lectures 
 
 its construction to the twelve kings who 
 reigned at the same time, about six hundred 
 and eighty years before the Christian sera. 
 Pomponius Mela* agrees in most points with 
 Herodotus, and these two authors give a tole- 
 rably clear idea of the labyrinth of Egypt. 
 
 This edifice, Herodotus, who had visited it 
 and examined it very closely, affirms to have 
 surpassed every thing that he could have con- 
 ceived. Within one and the same circuit of 
 walls it contained twelve magnificent palaces, 
 regularly disposed and communicating with 
 each other. These palaces contained three 
 thousand halls, twelve of which were of a par- 
 ticular form and beauty .f Half of these halls, 
 or chambers, were interspersed with terraces, 
 and ranged round the twelve principal halls, 
 and communicating with each other, but by so 
 many turns and windings, that, without an ex- 
 perienced guide, it was impossible to escape 
 wandering. The other half were under ground, 
 cut out of the rock, and said to be used for the 
 sepulchres of their kings. Herodotus assures 
 us, that he visited all the apartments above 
 ground ; but those which were subterraneous 
 
 * Pomp. Mela de situ orbis, 8vo. Lugduni Batovorum, 1722. 
 t Herod, lib. ii. n. 148. 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 57 
 
 they would not, from motives of supersti- 
 tion, permit him to enter.* Captain Wilfordf 
 thinks the various apartments under ground to 
 have been used for depositing the chests or 
 coffins of the sacred crocodiles, called sukhus, 
 or sukkis, in old Egyptian,! and soukh to this 
 day in Coptic, or the vernacular language of 
 Egypt. The halls had an equal number of 
 doors, six opening to the north and six to the 
 south, and at each angle of the external wall 
 of the labyrinth was erected an immense 
 pyramid, for the sepulchres of its founders. 
 The whole building of the labyrinth, walls, and 
 ceilings, were of white marble, and exhibited 
 a profusion of sculpture. § Each of the before 
 mentioned twelve halls or galleries were sup- 
 ported on columns of the same marble. This 
 building, or rather city of palaces, is also men- 
 tioned by Diodorus Siculus, who thinks it was 
 nothing but a grand cemetery for the Egyptian 
 monarch s and their families ; by Strabo and 
 by Pliny, who, however, only confirm the de- 
 scriptions of Herodotus. 
 
 * Herod, lib. ii. n. 148. 
 
 + Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 425. 
 
 X Strabo, b. xvii. p. 811. Damascus Life of Isidorus. 
 
 § Herod, lib. ii. n. 148". 
 
58 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 The next striking* feature in the ancient ar- 
 chitecture of Egypt is their obelisks. 
 
 Obelisks have generally been considered as 
 peculiarly Egyptian, and of Egyptian origin ; 
 yet, if what Diodorus* says be true, it must 
 have been in Asia and not in Egypt that they 
 took their rise. This author speaks of a pyra- 
 midal spire, erected by the commands of Semi- 
 ramis on the road to Babylon, which was, ac- 
 cording to him, of a single stone of one hun- 
 dred and tliirty feet in height, and each side of 
 its base, which was square, was twenty-five feet 
 broad. Pliny, t on the contrary, asserts, that 
 the idea of this species of monument is due to 
 the Egyptians, and that a king of Heliopolis, 
 called Mestres, was the first who caused one 
 to be raised. There are so many doubts as to 
 the period when this monarch flourished, and 
 so many agreements between what Pliny says 
 of Mestres, and what Herodotus, Diodorus 
 Siculus, Isidorus,| and other historians, have 
 related of the successor of Sesostris, that the 
 learned and investigating De Goguet§ presumes 
 
 * Diod. lib. ii. p. 125, 126. 
 t Plin. lib. xxxvi. sec. 14, p. 735. 
 
 I S. Isidori omnia Opera, lib. xviii. c. 31, p. 159, in to. 
 Colonice Agrippince, 1617. 
 § Goguet, vol. ii. p. 131. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 59 
 
 that Pliny was mistaken, and that we ought to 
 look upon Sesostris as the first who raised 
 obelisks. 
 
 Be this as it may, the Egyptian monarchs 
 and people appear to have had a great taste 
 for obelisks. The names of all who are known 
 to have erected them would be here only a 
 dry catalogue of names, which may all be 
 found in the works of the elder Pliny.* 
 
 Two of the principal of these obelisks were 
 those which were erected by Sesostris, with the 
 design of communicating to posterity the ex- 
 tent of his power, and the number of the na- 
 tions he had conquered.-^ These obelisks were 
 each of one immense piece of granite, and 
 were a hundred and eighty feet high.^ Au- 
 gustus, according to the report of Pliny, § 
 transported one of these obelisks to Rome, and 
 place i it in the Campus Martins. Of the 
 three Egyptian obelisks now in Rome, doubts 
 have been raised whether either of them are 
 of tliose raised by Sesostris, on account 
 of their much smaller height. The height 
 of that now by the fountain of the Piazza 
 del Popolo is seventy-four feet, without its 
 
 * Pliu. 1. xxxvi. sec. 14, p. 735. 
 
 t Diod. lib. i. p. 67. J Ibid. 
 
 § Plin. lib. xxxvi. sect. 14, p. 736. 
 
60 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 modern pedestal ; that of the Vatican, in 
 front of St. Peter's, seventy-eight feet, and 
 that on Trinita de' Monti, forty-five feet, without 
 their pedestals ; while those of Sesostris were 
 of the enormous altitude of one hundred and 
 eighty feet. If the two larger be the same, it 
 is probable they were broken shorter in their 
 fall. The obelisk of the Piazza del Popolo is 
 that which was brought to Rome by Augustus, 
 after being spared from the ravages of Cam- 
 byses, from respect to its origin, at the time 
 when that furious prince put all to fire and 
 sword in Egypt, and spared neither palaces, 
 nor temples, nor those superb monuments, 
 which, ruined as they are, are still the admira- 
 tion of travellers. When this conqueror had 
 rendered himself master of Heliopolis, he 
 gave up the whole city to the flames ; but 
 when he saw the fire approach this obelisk, he 
 ordered it to be immediately extinguished. 
 From the place where it was erected by Au- 
 gustus, it was removed to its present situation 
 by order of Sextus the Fifth, in 1589, under 
 the direction of the Cavalier Fontana, who also 
 designed the fountain which accompanies it, 
 and its pedestal. The one now in front of St. 
 Peter's is also said to be one of those erected 
 at Heliopolis, by Sesostris, and was brought 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 61 
 
 to Rome by Caligula in a vessel, the largest 
 then ever seen upon the sea, and which was 
 afterwards sunk to form the port of Ostia.* 
 That emperor erected it in his circus at the 
 Vatican, which was destroyed by Constantino 
 the Great, to build the first basilica of St. 
 Peter's ; but he left the obelisk standing in the 
 place now occupied by the sacristy of St. 
 Peter. It was removed at an expense of nearly 
 £10,000 sterhng, in 1586, by Sextus the Fifth, 
 to its present situation, nearly a century before 
 the construction of the colonnade which sur- 
 rounds it. Other historians^ say it was brought 
 over by the Emperor Constans, the son of Con- 
 stantino the Great. This may probably refer 
 either to the obelisk of the Trinita de' Monti, 
 or that of the Monte Cavallo. 
 
 Having briefly investigated the architecture 
 of Middle and Lower Egypt, and pointed 
 out their leading characteristics, I shall pro- 
 ceed to the monumental architecture of the 
 Thebais, or Upper Egypt, which will not detain 
 us long, although its former magnificence was 
 very considerable. It is the most southerly 
 part of Egypt, nearest to Ethiopia, is named 
 
 * Plin. lib. xxxvi. p. 736, and lib. xvi. c. 40, p. 35. 
 t Pliny, Ammiaiius Marcellinus, Marsham, &c. 
 
62 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 from its principal city, Thebes, and was nearly 
 as large as the other two parts of Egypt toge- 
 ther, including in its boundaries all the country 
 on both sides of the Nile down to Heptanomis. 
 At the period of the Trojan war, Thebes was 
 reckoned the most opulent, and the best peo- 
 pled city in the universe.* Among the prin- 
 cipal edifices of the Thebais was the magni- 
 ficent palace of Memnon, which, according 
 to Strabo, stood in the city of Abydus, the 
 second city in Egypt after Thebes. This 
 author informs us, that Abydus stood about 
 seven miles and a half to the west of the Nile; 
 that a celebrated temple of Osiris was near to 
 it, and the magnificent palace of Memnon ;t 
 that it was famed also for a well or pool of 
 
 * Iliad, lib. ix. v. 381, &c. Odyss. lib. iv. v. 126, 127. 
 
 t Lieut. Wilford, whose excellent paper in the Asiatic- 
 Researches, on Egypt and the Nile, from the ancient books 
 of the Hindus, I have mentioned more than once, says, in 
 corroboration of my opinion of the affinity between the 
 ancient Egyptians and Hindus, that he is not " disinclined 
 to believe that the famed statue of Memnon in Egypt 
 was erected in honour of Mahiman, which has Mahimna in 
 one of its oblique cases, and the Greeks could hardly have 
 pronounced that word otherwise than Maimna or Memna. 
 They certainly used Mai instead of Maha ; for Hesychius 
 expressly says M«*, ixeyu, 'h^oi ; and Mai signifies great, 
 e\c^u in modern Coptic." — Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 415. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 63 
 
 water, with winding steps all round it ; that the 
 structure and workmanship of the reservoir 
 were very singular, the stones used in it of an 
 astonishing magnitude, and the sculpture on 
 them excellent.* 
 
 Another principal structure, which graced this 
 portion of Egypt, was the palace of Ptolemy, 
 at Ptolemais. Under the Ptolemies, the style 
 of architecture in Egypt experienced a complete 
 revolution, and their buildings approached the 
 style of the Greeks, yet never assumed tl^e noble 
 and pure style of those whom they attempted 
 to imitate. These works were probably executed 
 by some of the Greek architects called into 
 Egypt by the Ptolemies and their successors. 
 This conjecture appears the better founded, as 
 a modern traveller! describes a temple which he 
 had seen of the Corinthian order ; and further 
 observes, in speaking of a palace which he 
 believes made part of ancient Thebes, that the 
 capitals of the columns were of the composite 
 order, highly finished.! 
 
 The chief pride of Upper Egypt was, as I 
 have said, its metropolis, the celebrated city of 
 Thebes, distinguished from the Thebes in Boeotia 
 
 * Strabo, lib. ix. p.' 434, 438. 
 
 t Granger, p. 38, 39. I Ibid. p. 58. 
 
64 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 by the epithet Hecatonpylos, from its hundred 
 gates. It was not only the most beautiful city in 
 all Egypt, but is supposed by many ancient wri- 
 ters to have surpassed every other of its time in 
 the whole world,* as well for the splendour of 
 its buildings, as for extent and the number of its 
 inhabitants. Homer saysf that Thebes was 
 able to furnish twenty thousand chariots of 
 war, by which we may judge of the number 
 of inhabitants which it contained. Tacitus 
 relatesj^ that, when Germanicus visited its 
 magnificent ruins, there were still to be seen, 
 on ancient obelisks, a pompous description, in 
 Egyptian characters, of the wealth and gran- 
 deur of the place. From the account of an 
 elderly priest who interpreted the hieroglyphics, 
 it appeared that Thebes, at one time, contained 
 within her walls no less than seven hundred 
 thousand men capable of bearing arms. The 
 object, however, which most concerns my 
 present inquiry is its buildings. Its four prin- 
 cipal temples were of an immense size and of a 
 singular beauty of workmanship. The gold, 
 ivory, and precious stones, with which they were 
 decorated, were stripped and earned away by 
 
 * Diod. lib. i. p. 54. f Iliad, lib. ix. v. 383. 
 
 I Tacitus, lib. ii. c. 60. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 65 
 
 the Persians, when Cambyses conquered and 
 ravaged Egypt. Their domestic architecture 
 must have arrived to a high |Jegree of perfee- j 
 tion, for Diodorus says* the houses of private 
 persons in Tliebes were four and five stories in 
 heiglit, which proves the knowledge of floors, 
 stairs, and other necessary mechanism of storied 
 dwellings. At Cnuphis, another city of the 
 Thebais, so called from the god of that name, 
 was a magniticent temple dedicated to that 
 idol. At Carnack, a large city near Thebes, 
 there are still the remains of a superb temple 
 of Jupiter, now the most perfect in that part 
 of Egypt. The magnificent temple of Apollo, 
 at Apollinopolis, was 170 feet long, J 80 
 broad, and 70 high, as appears by the ruins, 
 which are still extant. The inhabitants of 
 Dandera, or Tentyra, were great worship- 
 pers of Isis and Venus. From the existing 
 ruins it appears that the temples of this 
 city were more beautiful and splendid, and of 
 a better style of art and workmanship, than any 
 other now remaining in Egypt. Dr. Pocock, 
 Captain Norden, Paul Lucas, Granger, Mail- 
 lett, Capas, and latterly Denon, the French 
 architect and antiquary, have been very diffuse 
 and enthusiastic in their descriptions of Tentyra. 
 
 * Diod. lib. i. p. 54. 
 
 F 
 
66 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Denon was so enraptured when he stood be- 
 neath the portico of the temple of Isis, at 
 Tentyra, that he exclaimed, *' I thought myself, 
 nay I really was, in the sanctuary of the arts 
 and sciences. 1 was agitated by the multipli- 
 city of objects, amazed by their novelty, and 
 tormented by the fear that I should never be- 
 hold them again." The extent of this temple 
 was such, that the Arabs had formerly a village 
 on its roof, the ruins of which are still to be 
 seen. A more superb illustration is not in ex- 
 istence than the exquisite and elaborate work of 
 Denon and his associates, on Egyptian architec- 
 ture and antiquities. Belzoni also says, that, on 
 his arriving before this temple of Isis, he was at 
 a loss for some time to know where to begin his 
 examination. The numerous objects before 
 him left him for a while in a state of suspense 
 and astonishment. In his recent work he says,* 
 *' On the 19th, early in the morning, my cu- 
 riosity was at a high pitch, the noted temple of 
 Tentyra being the only thought I had in my 
 head. Accordingly, we set off on asses, as 
 usual, and proceeded to the ruins. Little could 
 be seen of the temple till we came near to it, as 
 it is surrounded by high mounds of rubbish of 
 the old Tentyra. On our arriving before it I 
 
 * Belzoni's Egypt, p. 33. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 67 
 
 was for some time at a loss to know where I 
 should begin my examination. The numerous 
 objects before me, all equally attractive, left me 
 for a while in a state of suspense and astonish- 
 ment. The enormous masses of stone employ- 
 ed in the edifice are so well disposed, that the 
 eye discovers the most just proportion every 
 where. The majestic appearance of its con- 
 struction, the variety of its ornaments, and, 
 above all, the singularity of its preservation, 
 had such an eflfect on me, that I seated myself 
 on the ground, and for a considerable time was 
 lost in admiration. It is the first Egyptian 
 temple the traveller sees on ascending the Nile, 
 and it is certainly the most magnificent. It has 
 an advantage over most others, from the good 
 state of preservation it is in ; and I should have 
 no scruple in saying, that it is of a much later 
 date than any other. The superiority of the 
 workmanship gives us sufficient reason to sup- 
 pose it to be of the time of the first Ptolemy, 
 and it is not improbable, that he, who laid the 
 foundation of the Alexandrian library, insti- 
 tuted the philosophical society of the museum, 
 and studied to render himself beloved by his 
 people, might erect such an edifice, to convince 
 the Egyptians of his superiority of mind over 
 the ancient kings of Egypt, even in religious 
 
 F 2 
 
68 
 
 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 devotion. This is the cabinet of Egyptian arts, 
 the product of study for many centuries ; and 
 it was here that Denon thought himself in 
 the sanctuary of the arts and sciences. The 
 quadrangular form of the capital 
 (as shown in the annexed cut) 
 first strikes the eye. On each 
 face, there is a colossal head of 
 the goddess Isis with cow's ears. 
 They are all mutilated ; yet not- 
 withstanding this disadvantage, 
 and the flatness of their form, there 
 is a simplicity in their countenance 
 which approaches to a smile. On all the 
 walls, columns, ceiling, or architraves, there is 
 no where a space of two feet that is not covered 
 with some figures of human beings, animals, 
 ])lants, emblems of agriculture, of religious 
 ceremony." 
 
 There are few subjects on which men of 
 learning and taste have differed more than upon 
 the Egyptian school of art. Some raising it to 
 the skies, others scouting it as the barbarous of 
 barbarism. The learned French antiquary, 
 De Goguet, and his followers, treat it with the 
 utmost contempt. Denon, we have just heard, 
 was a warm admirer of its beauties. Sonnini, 
 in his interesting Travels, says, " We soon 
 
1] ON ARCHITECTURE. 69 
 
 reached Carnack, a miserable village, whose 
 cottages would serve to heighten the magni- 
 ficence of the splendid ruins which surround 
 them, if there were any thing in the world to be 
 compared with the remains of Thebes, that 
 famous city of antiquity which was celebrated 
 by Homer. Luxor, another village, built at 
 the southern extremity of the seat which this 
 illustrious city held on this side of the river, lies 
 about a league farther off. It would have re- 
 quired more time than I had to spare, and more 
 safety than was to be found in this soil, cover- 
 ed over with ruins and highway robbers, 
 to have minutely examined relics which im- 
 mortality had preserved amid the shock of 
 ages and the rage of barbarism. It would be 
 no less difficult to describe the sensations which 
 the sight of objects so grand, so majestic, 
 raised within me. It was not a simple admira- 
 tion merely, but an ecstacy which suspended 
 the use of all my faculties. I remained for 
 some time immovable with rapture, and felt 
 inclined more than once to prostrate myself, in 
 token of veneration, before monuments, the 
 rearing of which appeared to transcend the 
 strength and genius of man."* 
 
 * Sonnini's Travels, vol. iii. p. 234. 
 
70 ELMEs's LECTURES 
 
 Another extract from the same animated 
 writer so completely defines the leading 
 characteristics of Egyptian architecture, that 
 I will venture to quote it. " Obelisks ; colos- 
 sal and gigantic statues ; avenues formed by 
 rows of sphinxes, and which may still be 
 traced, although the greater part of the statues 
 are mutilated or concealed under the sand ; 
 porticoes of a prodigious elevation, among 
 which there is one of the height of a hundred and 
 seventy feet, by two hundred feet in breadth ; 
 immense colonnades, the pillars of which are 
 twenty and some thirty-one feet in circum- 
 ference ; colours still wonderful on account of 
 their brilliancy ; the granite and marble lavish- 
 ed on the buildings ; stones of high dimensions 
 supported by capitals, and forming the roof of 
 these magnificent edifices ; in a word, thousands 
 of columns overthrown, occupy a space of a 
 vast extent."* 
 
 The eloquent Bossuet, in his elaborate Dis- 
 course on Universal History, is no less descrip- 
 tive and animated. "The works of the Egyp- 
 tians," he aflirms, " were made to resist the effects 
 of time; their statues were colossal, their 
 columns were immense. Egypt aimed at vast 
 
 * Sonnini's Travels, voi. iii. p. 235. 
 
I] ON ARCHITECTURE. 71 
 
 objects, and sought to strike the eye at a dis- 
 tance, but always gratifying it by justness of 
 proportion. Temples and palaces, to this day 
 almost entire, where these pillars and statues 
 are immovable, have been discovered in the 
 Thebais. One palace above all is admired, 
 whose remams seem to have subsisted only in 
 order to efface the glory of all the greatest pro- 
 ductions of human power and skill. Four 
 alleys extending farther than the eye can fol- 
 low them, and terminating at each end in 
 sphinxes, of a composition as rare as their 
 size is remarkable, serve as avenues to four 
 porticoes, whose height astonishes the beholder. 
 What magnificence and what extent! Indeed 
 of all those who have described the prodigious 
 edifice, no one has had time to make the tour 
 of it, nor are they even certain of having seen 
 the half of it: but all they did see was 
 surprising. 
 
 " A hall, which apparently stood in the mid- 
 dle of this superb palace, was supported by one 
 hundred and twenty columns of six fathoms in 
 thickness, and lofty in proportion, intermingled 
 with obelisks, which so many ages have not 
 been able to lay low. Even colours, which 
 yield the soonest to the power of time, still 
 endure amid the ruins of this wonderful edifice. 
 
7*2 ELMES's LECTURES. 
 
 and preserve their vivacity; so well did Egypt 
 know how to impress the character of immor- 
 tality on all her woiks. "* 
 
 After all, the Egyptian style is monotonous, 
 sombre, heavy, and unfit for modern adoption ; 
 and if studied exclusively, till friendship for 
 antiquity begets love for ugliness, destructive 
 of a pure taste. What made an excellent par- 
 lour in Egypt would be a delightful coal-cellar 
 in England. From the examples and works that 
 I have quoted, all that is necessary may be 
 gathered of the Egyptian style of architecture; 
 so interesting to the antiquary, so delightful to 
 the traveller, and bearing such testimony to 
 the truth of history in the earliest periods of 
 the world. Although the lively Frenchman 
 Sonnini says, that before it " the so much 
 boasted fabrics of Greece and Rome must come 
 and bow down;"! yet, when it is calmly inves- 
 tigated and brought to the test of judgement, it 
 will not bear a momentary comparison with 
 either, for chasteness, real beauty, or true 
 sublimity. 
 
 • Bossuet's Disc, on Univ. Hist, part iii. sect. 3. 
 t Sonnini's Travels, vol. iii. p. 235. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 Architecture considered as an Art. Its Types 
 and Prejigurations. On Imitation, legitimate 
 and false. The Art investigated among the 
 Nations of India, the ancient Hindus and other 
 Eastern People. Excavations in Salsette, Ellora 
 and Elephanta; their Use and Origin considered. 
 Analysis of the Eastern Styles of Architecture^ 
 and Investigation of their constituent Ele- 
 ments. Persepolitan, Phoenician., Hebraic, and 
 Chinese Architecture, with their Characteristies. 
 
I 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 Having, in my last Lecture, briefly ex- 
 plained the elements of architecture among the 
 Egyptians, I shall now proceed to the deve- 
 lopement of the art among other nations which 
 were nearly contemporary with that ancient and 
 celebrated people ; whose deficiencies in taste, 
 when compared with Attic simplicity and ele- 
 gance, were more than compensated by those 
 important inventions which owe their origin to 
 them : which have been the foundations of the 
 art, and which have rendered all subsequent 
 ages eternally their debtors, more particularly 
 for their cultivation of geometry and architec- 
 tural construction. 
 
 Architecture is an art purely imitative, and 
 its three leading types or prefigurations are the 
 cavern, as exemplified in the Egyptian, the 
 Indian, and their like : the tent, as in the 
 Chinese and its species ; and the cahin, or 
 wooden hut, as displayed in the Greek and its 
 imitators ; that is to say, that the Egyptians, 
 the Indians, and their like, imitated in their 
 buildings their ancient excavations ; that the 
 
76 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Chinese, in their pagodas and other public 
 buildings, imitated their tent ; that the Greeks 
 imitated and refined carpentry in their marble 
 temples ; that the Romans imitated the Greeks ; 
 that the early architects in England imitated the 
 Romans; that we of the present day (the archi- 
 tect of the new street excepted) imitate the 
 Greeks almost to a servile pedantry; and that 
 the architects misnamed Gothic imitated their 
 primitive places of worship, their sacred groves. 
 The cavern (or Egyptian and Indian style) is 
 dark, heavy, and monotonous. The tent, or 
 Chinese style, light, feeble, and fragile. The 
 cabin, or Greek style, (which will be explained 
 in its proper place,) is at once solid and light, 
 is susceptible of being made more or less solid 
 or light, according to necessity or required 
 character, is the richest in its combinations, 
 and that which unites in itself, in the highest 
 degree, the advantages of solidity and an in- 
 finite agreeableness of variety. Of the ele- 
 ments of the hut, or Greek style, Algarotti 
 says, in his '^ Saggio sopra I'Architettura,* that 
 " it is the material the most capable of furnish- 
 ing the art with the greatest number of profiles, 
 modifications, and varied ornaments ;" which 
 
 * Opere del Contc Algarotti, torn. iii. Vcnezia, 1791. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 77 
 
 said profiles, modifications, and varied orna- 
 ments, the Greeks have indurated, sublimed, 
 and immortalized ; while the Romans debased, 
 lowered, and degraded them below even their 
 original types. 
 
 There are factions in art as weW as in poli- 
 tics ; and it may be but candid to declare thus 
 early that I am of the Greek faction. 
 
 While 1 am upon the subject of that imita- 
 tion which is essential to the character of a 
 pure style in architecture, an imitation which 
 is by no means destructive of legitimate in- 
 vention, I shall take leave to offer a few words 
 in elucidation. 
 
 By imitation I do not mean that servile 
 counterfeiting of an original, so much the cha- 
 racter of some of our modern Greeks, who 
 copy the very fractions of lines and profiles 
 instead of composing in the same spirit, but, 
 that bold pursuit of a sublime original, by 
 parallel images and examples, sometimes more 
 refined, but never below their type, which dis- 
 tinguishes true genius, cultivated and improved 
 by practice and study, from the common herd 
 of lineal copyists of modules, of minutes, and of 
 lines. Such a free imitation as the Eneid is of 
 the Iliad ; such a bold and original imitator as 
 Milton is of Homer and of Virgil ; such imita- 
 
78 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tions, in short, as bear the marks of real genius, 
 " that quality," says Dr. Johnson, " without 
 which judgement is cold and knowledge is 
 inert: that energy which collects, combines, 
 amplifies, and animates." 
 
 There are two methods by which a people 
 can imitate the architecture of another country; 
 the one true and the other false. The true 
 mode is less an imitation than an adoption, 
 and consists in receiving as an alphabet, in 
 their entire shape, the system, the rules, and 
 the taste of a style of architecture. It is thus 
 that the Romans adopted the architecture of 
 the Greeks, or perhaps I should say of the 
 Etmscans, which was incontestibly the same. 
 It is thus also with the nations of modern 
 Europe, who, abandoning the Gothic and the 
 incongruities of the middle ages, have appro- 
 priated the Greek and Roman styles by legiti- 
 mate adoption. 
 
 It was after this true mode that Palladio, by 
 his imitations and inventive restorations of 
 Roman magnificence, has founded a legitimate 
 and splendid school. It was thus that Michel- 
 angiolo fairly imitated the Pantheon of Agrippa 
 in his tremendous cupola of the Vatican. And 
 it was thus that our illustrious and neglected 
 countryman. Wren, whose transcendent talents 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 79 
 
 I hope, ere long, to display to the public,* 
 rivalled and surpassed in purity of taste and 
 scientific construction the basilica of St. Peter's 
 at Rome, the work of more than twenty archi- 
 tects,t supported by the treasure of the Chris- 
 tian world and by the protection and under the 
 reigns of twenty successive Popes,| in his un- 
 rivalled work of St. Paul's, London; that 
 glorious but unfinished monument of the piety 
 and magnificence of our ancestors. 
 
 Such imitations are not plagiarisms, but skil- 
 ful adoptions or adaptations, bearing proofs of 
 legitimate and inventive talents. " Genius," 
 says Reynolds, '* at least what is generally 
 so called, is the child of imitation ; it is in 
 
 * In a life of that illustrious man, on which I have been 
 engaged for some time past, and have nearly completed. 
 
 f Bramante, G. di San Gallo, Raft'aelle, Balthazar Per- 
 ruzi, Antonio Sangallo, Giocondo, Michelangiolo, Giulio 
 Romano, Domenico and Giovanni Fontana, Giacomo della 
 Porta, Carlo Maderno, Luigi Cigoli, Borromini, C. Rai- 
 naldi, Bernini, Fontana, Vignola, Pirrho Ligorio, Fillippo 
 Ivara, and Antonio Caunevari. 
 
 I Julius II. Leo X. Adrian VI. Clement VII. Paul III. 
 Julius III. Marcellus II. Paul IV. Pius IV. Pius V. Gre- 
 gory XIII. Sextus V. Urban VII. Gregory XIV. Innocent 
 IX. Clement VIII. Leo XI. Paul V. Gregory XV. and 
 Urban VIII. 
 
80 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 vain to endeavour to invent without ma- 
 terials on which the mind may work, and from 
 which invention must originate. Nothing can 
 come of nothing."* 
 
 The other or false mode of imitation is 
 plagiarism and downright theft, with not even 
 that ingenuity to conceal it which among the 
 Lacedemonians procured pardon for the thief. 
 It consists, as it were, in importing by whole- 
 sale, such portions of a foreign or ancient style 
 as may appear suited to the purposes of its im- 
 porters, and converting them to their own use, 
 not as their originals would have done in their 
 time and place, but forcibly torturing ancient 
 art to modern uses. T'hese are mean copiers 
 and importers of architecture, common bor- 
 rowers ; the others, liberal adopters of the 
 great works of the great masters of our art, 
 from whom " the modern arts were revived, 
 and by whose means they must be restored a 
 second time." " However it may mortify our 
 vanity, says Reynolds, " we must be forced 
 to allow them (to be) our masters ; and we 
 may venture to prophesy, that when they cease 
 to be studied, arts will no longer flourish, and 
 we shall again relapse into barbarism."! 
 
 * Discourse vi. f Ibid. 
 
11] ON ARCHITECTURE. 81 
 
 It was not in this way that the Greeks bor- 
 rowed the idea of the Corinthian capital from 
 the Egyptians. They boldly adopted and na- 
 turalized it, and with Spartan skill concealed 
 the circumstance, and gratified their natural va- 
 nity in giving credence and currency to the inge- 
 nious hypotheses of Callimachus and the votive 
 vase. The primitive types of the two capitals 
 are the same ; the original of each is a vase sur- 
 rounded by foliage and covered by an abacus, 
 and a verbal description of the two would 
 nearly assimilate. Yet, in the essentials of a 
 national style, they widely differ. The Egyp- 
 tians used the flowers and plants of Egypt, 
 and the Greeks those of Greece. 
 
 If, however, Grecian architecture be, as is 
 often asserted, borrowed, adopted, or stolen, 
 from that of the Egyptians, the Greeks have 
 most gorgeously embellished their robbery ; 
 and if from their own huts and cabins, the 
 metamorphosis of the cabin into the temple is 
 as rapid and complete as that of the cottage 
 of Baucis and Philemon, in the metamorphoses 
 of Ovid. 
 
 " Ilia vetus, dominis etiam casa parva duobus 
 Vertitur in tcmplutn : furcas subiere coluranae." 
 
 Ov. Met. lib. viii. 
 
 These resemblances and differences between 
 
 G 
 
82 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the Egyptian and the early Greek styles will 
 be further attended to and elucidated when we 
 come to investigate the architecture of the an- 
 cient Greeks. 
 
 Thus I have ventured to give my opinion upon 
 what appears to me the true and only method 
 in which the imitation of foreign art may be pro- 
 perly introduced into a national style of archi- 
 tecture ; and shall proceed to an inquiry into 
 the sacred architecture of the ancient people 
 of Asia, — a portion of the world which that 
 distinguished ornament of our country, Sir 
 William Jones, says, *' has ever been esteemed 
 the nurse of sciences, the inventress of delight- 
 ful and useful arts, the scene of glorious 
 actions, fertile in the productions of human 
 genius, abounding in natural wonders, and 
 infinitely diversified in the forms of religion 
 and government ; in the laws, manners, cus- 
 toms, and languages, as well as in the features 
 and complexions of men."* 
 
 The Indian styles of architecture appear to 
 have been drawn from their original dwellings, 
 caves, and other excavations. Man, by na- 
 ture, is undoubtedly, in countries where the soil 
 admits, a burrowing animal, and mostly car- 
 
 * Sir William Jones's Introductory Discourse, 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. &3 
 
 ries his original propensities even into states of 
 refinement. 
 
 The period of authentic history in India, as 
 in other countries, is comparatively of recent 
 date. It is scarcely more than three thousand 
 years since the most ancient and only genuine 
 historical records* of the ancient world, ascribed ; 
 to Musah, or Moses, (as we call him after the 
 Greeks and Romans,) were composed, Hero- 
 dotus, the most ancient Heathen historian 
 whose works have reached our times, flourish- 
 ed a thousand years later ; and Homer, the 
 third ancient author who speaks of our art, is 
 of too doubtful a period to establish dates. 
 
 The remains of architecture in India, from 
 style and construction, seem to prove an early 
 connexion between that covmtry and Egypt. 
 The pyramids, the colossal statues, the obelisks, 
 the sphinx, the mummy pits and subterranean 
 temples with colossal figures, and the lion-head- 
 ed sphinxes, recently discovered by Belzoni, in 
 Egypt, indicate the style and system of my- 
 tholo^ to be akin to those of the indefatiga- 
 ble workmen who formed the vast excavations 
 of Canarah, Elephanta, and Ellora; the vari- 
 
 * Dr. Robertson's Historical Disquisition concerning an- 
 cient India. 
 
 g2 
 
84 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 ous immense pagodas, pillars, and colossal 
 images of Buddha, and other Indian idols. 
 
 Sir William Jones, than whom a greater 
 man hardly ever graced our annals, who de- 
 serves to be ranked with Shakspeare, Mil- 
 ton, and Newton, and to whom may be ap- 
 plied the remark of Dr. Johnson upon Newton, 
 ** that if he had flourished in ancient Greece 
 he would have been worshipped as a divinity," 
 has incontestibly proved, in his incomparable 
 Discourses delivered to the Asiatic Society,* 
 that the whole population of this globe descend- 
 ed from three primitive stocks, which he calls 
 Indian, Arabian, and Tartarian. The resem- 
 blance, therefore, in language, architecture, 
 sculpture, and customs, between even distant 
 nations, is not to be wondered at. After 
 various observations on the language, manners, 
 and antiquities of the ancient inhabitants of 
 India, in these Discourses, which are the con- 
 crete of many volumes, this profound philoso- 
 pher comes to the result that they had an im- 
 memorial affinity with the ancient Persians,t 
 Ethiopians, and Egyptians ; the Phoenicians, 
 Greeks, and Tuscans ; the Scythians, or Goths, 
 and Celts ; the Chinese, Japanese, and Peru- 
 
 * Sir W. Jones, Discourse viii. t Discourse iii. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 85 
 
 vians ; and I will endeavour to show, in the 
 course of these Lectures, as I successively 
 touch upon these various countries, that their 
 ancient buildings all corroborate and prove this 
 important fact in the history of mankind. 
 
 The principal remains of the most ancient 
 specimens of the Indian, or Hindu, style of 
 architecture, which have been hitherto disco- 
 vered, are of a singular and extraordinary 
 kind, being mostly excavations in the solid 
 rock. Immense subterraneous temples have 
 been discovered in various parts of the Indies, 
 which are wonderful monuments of the skill 
 and industry of the people who achieved 
 them. These subterraneous caverns are ap- 
 parently as ancient as the oldest Egyptian 
 temples : and M. D'Ancarv ille, in his Recherches 
 sur rOrigine, f Esprit y et les Progrh des Arts 
 de la Gr^ce, thinks them even anterior to 
 the time of about two thousand years before 
 Christ. 
 
 Some antiquaries have supposed these won- 
 derful sculptured caverns to be no older than 
 the first ages of Christianity, after the Indians 
 had received the knowlege of the liberal arts 
 and sciences from the Greeks, llie absurdity 
 of this hypothesis is apparent at a single glance ; 
 for, in the first place, the Greeks did notprac- 
 
86 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tise excavations ; not to say that the style, cha» 
 racter, and execution are as different as light 
 and darkness from the style, character, and 
 execution of Greek architecture. 
 
 Dr. Robertson,* on the contrary, thinks them 
 to be of very remote antiquity, as the natives 
 cannot, either from history or tradition, give 
 any information concerning the time in which 
 they were executed, universally ascribing the 
 formation of them to the power of superior 
 beings. 'Thus Stonehenge has been attributed 
 to the magical power of Merlin the enchanter: 
 and the Devil is recorded as the architect of, 
 and has given his name to, many a stupendous 
 work of human skill. 
 
 Mr. Goldingham, one of the Honourable 
 East India Company's astronomers at Fort St. 
 George, and a gentleman who had applied 
 himself with much assiduity to the study of the 
 antiquities of Hindustan, visited the Elephanta 
 cave in 1795, and published an interesting and 
 faithful account of this wonderful effort of 
 human skill in the fourth volume of the Asiatic 
 Researches.t This gentleman argues ably in 
 favour of its having been an Hindu temple ; 
 
 * Hist. Disq. Appendix, p. 222, edit. 8vo. Edin. 1819. 
 t Page 405 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 87 
 
 but General Carnac, of Calcutta, who intro- 
 duced and prefaced Mr. Goldingham's paper, 
 and understood the antiquities of India in no 
 common way, does not assent to this opinion. 
 These immense excavations, cut out of the 
 solid rock, appeared to the General to be 
 operations of too great labour to have been 
 executed by the hands of so feeble and effe- 
 minate a race of beings as the aborigines of 
 India have generally been held to be, and still 
 continue ; and the few figures that yet remain 
 entire, represent persons totally distinct in ex- 
 terior from the present Hindus, being of a 
 gigantic size, having large prominent faces, 
 and bearing some resemblance to the Abyssi- 
 nians, who inhabit the country on the west 
 side of the Red Sea, opposite to Arabia. 
 
 There is no tradition of these caves having 
 been frequented by the Hindus as places of 
 worship ; and at this period, the General adds 
 on his own authority, no poojah is ever per- 
 formed at any of them, and they are scarcely 
 ever visited by the natives. He says he recol- 
 lected particularly that Ragonath Roiv, when 
 at Bombay, did not hold them in any degree 
 of veneration ; and yet an intelligent observer,* 
 
 * Archaiologia, vol.vii. p. 286, &c. 
 
88 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 who visiited the cave of Elephaiitain 1782, states 
 that he was accompanied by a sagacious Brah- 
 min, a native of Benares, who, though he had ne- 
 ver been in it before that time, recognised at once 
 all the figures, was well acquainted with the 
 parentage, education, and life of every deity, 
 or human personage there represented, and 
 explained with fluency the meaning of the va- 
 rious symbols by which the images were dis- 
 tinguished. This, I think, is a clear proof that 
 the mythology of the present day is not differ- 
 ent from that delineated on the walls of these 
 excavations : the most remarkable of which is 
 at Elephanta, a small island in the harbour 
 of Bombay.* An elephant of black stone, 
 large as the life, is seen near the landing place, 
 and most probably gave name to the island. The 
 cavern is about three quarters of a mile from 
 the beach ; the path leading to it lies through 
 a valley ; the hills on either side are beautifully 
 clothed, and, except when interrupted by the 
 voices of the birds, a solemn stillness pre- 
 vails ; the mind is fitted for contemplating the 
 approaching scene. 
 
 The cave is formed in a hill of stone, is about 
 one hundred and thirty-five feet square, andnear- 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. iv. p. 407. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 89 
 
 ly fifteen feet high ; its massy roof is supported 
 by rows of columns, regularly disposed. Gigan- 
 tic figures, in relief, are observed on the walls; 
 these, as well as the columns, are sliaped in 
 the solid rock, by artists of some ability, and 
 of unquestionable and astonishing perseve- 
 rance. 
 
 There is reason for supposing that the Brah- 
 mins were originally a colony from Egypt, 
 who fixed the first establishments in the vicinity 
 of Bombay ; and by degrees engrafted their 
 superstition on the ignorance of the Hindus, 
 adapting the deities and mystical philosophy 
 of Africa to the Asiatic fables and heroes, and 
 carefully introducing the Egyptian cast and 
 ceremonies. 
 
 Dr. Francis Buchanan, whose profound 
 Essay on the Religion and Literature of the 
 Burynas, a people in the island of Ceylon, 
 forms one of the best essays in the sixth volume 
 of Asiatic Researches,* thought the images 
 in the cave at Elephanta, after he had become 
 acquainted witli the subject, to be evidently 
 those of the gods of the Brahmins. " I well 
 remember," says the Doctor, " when I viewed 
 them, (although then quite unacquainted with 
 
 * Pace 251. 
 
90 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the controversies concerning their origin) that 
 I was struck with the African appearance of 
 their hair and features; and conceived them to 
 be the work of Sesostris, as I had imbibed the 
 vulgar idea that they were not the idols of the 
 Brahmins'' In various apartments of the cave, 
 and on its walls, are sculptures, for a descrip- 
 tion of which I must refer the curious inquirer 
 to the Asiatic Researches, the Archaiologia, and 
 other able works on this interesting subject. 
 
 The form of its columns, although doubtless 
 inferior to Grecian beauty, is, however, far 
 more agreeable to the eye of taste than those 
 of the Egyptians. The capitals resemble 
 round cushions, pressed down by the incum- 
 bent weight. 
 
 The excavations in the island of Salsette, 
 which is about ten miles north of Bom- 
 bay, are among the architectural wonders 
 of India. The artist employed by Governor 
 Boon* to make drawings of them, asserted, 
 that it would require the labour of forty thou- 
 sand men for forty years to finish them. They 
 are found near to Ambola, a village about 
 seven English miles distant from Tanna. 
 
 The temple, or pagoda, is entered by a 
 
 * Archaiologia, vol. vii. p. 336. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 91 
 
 doorway, which is twenty feet in height, and 
 leads to the grand vestibule, at the end of 
 which is the real door of the temple, on the 
 two sides of which are sculptured various 
 figures in relief. The temple itself is a square 
 cell, of about twenty-eight feet ; the upper 
 part of which is supported by twenty coluinns 
 nearly twenty feet high, of a form resembling 
 in style those of Elephanta. This excavation 
 much resembles that at Elephanta, both in 
 style, design, and execution ; but being wrought 
 in a softer rock, the figures and hassi rilievi are 
 not so perfect as at Canara, which is situate 
 about ten English leagues from Tanna, on the 
 north of the foregoing excavation at Ambola. 
 There is another rock entirely excavated into 
 similar caverns, but of different shapes and 
 dimensions; and none equal in beauty to those 
 before mentioned. Some of these caverns are 
 very lofty, and appear to have been divided into 
 two stories, as if for habitation ; their want of 
 sculpture also strengthens this surmise. They 
 have apertures cut for light above, and square 
 holes cut in each side of the rock, at an equal 
 height on both sides, and opposite to each 
 other, as if for the purpose of receiving joists 
 or beams of timber. The columns found in these 
 
92 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 caverns are ill formed, and of indifferent work- 
 manship ; and, being plainer and more simple in 
 their execution than those of Elephanta and 
 Ambola, are supposed to have been of older 
 date. Views of these may be seen in the Voy- 
 ages of Mebula, in the Archaiology, in the 
 Recueil des 3Ionumens de Vlnde, and in the 
 beautiful works of Mr. Thomas Daniells. 
 
 The elements of the Indian style of archi- 
 tecture, like those of the Egyptian described 
 in my last Lecture, are derived from these ex- 
 cavations, which were their earliest dwellings, 
 and their earliest temples. They are more to 
 be admired for their vastness, and singular style 
 of decoration, than for grace in form or good 
 taste in design. 
 
 Among the other excavations worthy of atten- 
 tion both for number and extent are those found 
 in the mountain at about a mile to the eastward of 
 the town of EUora, Elloor, or, as it is called on 
 the spot, Verrool. These are named the pagodas 
 of Paraswa Rama Saba and Indur Subba, or 
 Sabha. They are situate also nearDowlatabad,* 
 a fortified town in the Deccan of Hindustan, 
 fifteen miles from Aurungabad, the capital of 
 
 * The same with the ancient Tagara. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 93 
 
 the province of Dowlatabad, or Amednagure ; 
 and are most of them cut out of the natural 
 rock. For the space of nearly two leagues to- 
 gether there is little else to be seen than pa- 
 godas, in which there are thousands of figures, 
 appearing, from the style of their sculpture, to 
 have been of ancient Hindu origin. M. Theve- 
 not, who first gave any description* of these 
 singular works, asserts the above fact. 
 
 The height of the excavation of Indui' Subbat 
 is forty feet, its depth fifty-four, and its breadth 
 foity-four. The height of the obelisk by the 
 side of the pagodas is twenty-nine feet, inclu- 
 ding its pedestal and the group of human sitting 
 figures which is on the top. The obelisk is 
 fluted and ornamented with some taste, and 
 has a light appearance. On the other side is 
 the representation of an elephant, whose back 
 just rises above the front wall, but without 
 rider or hoda. The plans of these excavations 
 are as regular as if built ; and the piers, pilas- 
 ters, or square pillars, are equidistant, and 
 sculptured in a bold and original style. 
 
 What I have ventured to advance concerning 
 the elegance and taste of some of the oma- 
 
 * Voyages, part iii. chap. 44. 
 t Asiat. Res. vol. vi. p. 399. 
 
84 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ments in Indian architecture is confirmed by 
 Colonel Call, formerly chief engineer at Ma- 
 dras,* who urges this circumstance as a proof 
 of the early and high civilization of the Hindis. 
 " It may be safely pronounced," says he, 
 *' that no part of the world has more marks of 
 antiquity, for arts, sciences, and civilization, 
 than the Peninsula of India, from the Ganges 
 to Cape Comorin. I think the carvings on 
 some of the pagodas and choultries, as well as 
 the grandeur of the work, exceed any thing 
 now-a-days, not only for the delicacy of the 
 chisel, but the expense of construction, con- 
 sidering, in many instances, to what distances 
 the component parts were carried, and to what 
 heights raised." 
 
 The column from the interior of a temple 
 near Mud dumpure, as shown in Daniell's Views, 
 although very ancient, has the elements of a 
 beautiful and more modem style. The grada- 
 tion from the octangular base to the multan- 
 gular shaft, setting off to the circular upper 
 shaft, is at once elegant, and possessed with 
 the greatest constructive strength. The mas- 
 culine style of the necking, under the quadri- 
 frontal capital, is bold and characteristic. 
 
 * Philosophical Transactions, vol, Ixii. p. 354. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 95 
 
 The most learned and profound of the eastern 
 antiquaries, members of the celebrate<J Asiatic 
 Society,* differ as to the periods of these excava- 
 tions ; and the discussion of the question would 
 be too long for this place, although of a most 
 interesting nature for the study. They are 
 undoubtedly of most remote antiquity, and 
 appear to be derived from the same elements, 
 if not from the same people, as those-f" in 
 Egypt. 
 
 Another fine example of a column is from an 
 ancient Indian temple (engraved in Hodges's 
 Views) near Benares, a splendid, rich, and popu- 
 lous city, on the north side of the Ganges, which 
 is here very broad, and the banks very high. 
 The appearance of this ancient city from the 
 water is extremely beautiful. Several Hindu 
 temples embellish the banks of the river, and 
 
 * See Dr. Buchanan's Essay on the Religion and Litera- 
 ture of the Burmas, in vol. vi. of Asiatic Researches, and 
 Sir William Jones's Discourses throughout. 
 
 t Different learned men have supposed, that BooDHA of 
 the Hindus to !iave been the same with Noah, Moses, or 
 SiPHOAS, the thirty-fifth king of Egypt. Sir William Joues 
 supposed BooDHA to have been the same with Sesac, or 
 Sesostris, king of Egypt, " who by conquest spread a new 
 system of religion and philosophy from the Nile to the 
 Ganges, about a thousand years before Christ." — Sir Wm. 
 Jones, Discourse vii. 
 
96 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 many other buildings, public and private, 
 ancient and modern, are magnificent. 
 
 This singular and most beautiful column, 
 which to the variety of the Indian, adds many 
 of the ornamental graces of the Grecian style, 
 is thought to be of the age of Alexander by Mr. 
 Hodges. This eminent artist, and indefatigable 
 traveller, conceived, from the striking resem- 
 blance which many of its parts bear to the 
 Greek style, that it must have been executed 
 by Greek architects shortly after Alexander's 
 expedition into India, which, according to Dr. 
 Robertson,* was about a hundred and sixty 
 years after the reign of Darius Hystaspes. 
 The biographer of Apollonius Tyaneusf re- 
 lates, that when he visited India three hundred 
 and seventy-three years after Alexander's expe- 
 dition, twelve stupendous altars, which he erect- 
 ed as monuments of his exploits, were still re- 
 maining, with legible inscriptions. Be this as it 
 may, the elements and style of the co- 
 lumn bear out Mr. Hodges's hypothesis. Its 
 elements, perhaps from compliment to the 
 country, are Indian, its ornaments pure Greek. 
 Its base, its shaft, its capital, are all, in shape, 
 situation, and distribution, completely Hindu, 
 
 * Historical Disquisition, sec. i. p. 13. 
 
 + Philos. Vita Apol. lib. ii. c. 3, edit. Olear. Lips. 1709. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 97 
 
 with its multangular and mixed circular shaft, 
 its quadrifrontal capital, and truss-shaped aba- 
 cus. Its decorative sculptures are essentially 
 and finely Greek. In its pedestal is found the 
 Grecian honey- suckle in its greatest purity ; 
 the angles of the shaft are embellished by the 
 sacred water-leaves of the Hindus; above 
 these are Doric flutes ; and in the capital are 
 found the leaves of the Greek acanthus. 
 
 For beauty of outline, for a graceful setting- 
 off from a square to an octagon, and thence 
 to a circle, for richness and purity of style, 
 this column of Benares stands unrivalled in 
 Eastern art. 
 
 Splendid and celebrated as is the city where 
 this column is to be seen, it is yet more distin- 
 guished as the ancient seat of Braminical learn- 
 ing; and the same manners and customs still 
 prevail among the people as at the most re- 
 mote period that can be traced in history, as 
 they most pertinaciously guard against inno- 
 vations from foreigners. 
 
 The next Indian specimens are a series of 
 examples from the early periods of the Mogul 
 empire, which exhibit their modes of con- 
 struction, both square and circular, proving 
 their early knowledge of the arch, the cupola, 
 and other difficult and scientific modes of ron- 
 
 H 
 
98 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 struction ; all of which are to be found in the 
 works of Daniel and Hodges. 
 
 One of these is a singular building in the 
 fort of Qualior, which stands on a vast rock, 
 about four miles in length at the base, but nar- 
 row and nearly flat at the top, the sides of 
 which are so steep as to appear nearly perpen- 
 dicular ; for, where it was not naturally so, it 
 has been cut away. The height from the plain 
 below is from two to three hundred feet, and 
 the only entrance is by steps running up the 
 bide of the rock. 
 
 Mr. Hunter,* who visited this singular 
 fortress, in February, 1792, says, the acclivity 
 on which the fortress stands is one mile and 
 six-tenths in length, and its greatest breadth 
 not above three hundred yards. Its greatest 
 height is at the north, where it is three hundred 
 and forty-two feet. At this end is a palace, 
 and about the middle of the fort are two re- 
 markable pyramidal buildings, of red stone. 
 They are in the most ancient style of HindA 
 architecture, and are said to have been built 
 foi*the residence of the mother-in-law and sis- 
 ter-in-law of a rajah, who reigned in a very 
 remote period, when this fortress stood in the 
 
 * Asial. Res. vol. vi. p. 17. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 99 
 
 capital of an extensive empire. It was con- 
 sidered perfectly secure from assault till Major 
 Popliam took it by escalade, on the 3d August, 
 1780. 
 
 To enter into the details of the specimens to 
 which I last alluded would occupy an entire 
 lecture, but what I have already stated serves 
 to point out the essential elements of the 
 Hindu style. I have before said that the 
 elements both of the Egyptian and the Indian 
 styles are derived from excavations. In proof 
 of which I take leave to call your attention to 
 the excavated pagoda at Elloor, and the con- 
 structed temples of Hermopolis and Tentyra. 
 In these works we find close intercolumnia- 
 tions, short and low architraves, and columns 
 of low stature rudely sculptured. Nor is there 
 any apparent difference to show whether the 
 excavation be a construction, or the construc- 
 tion an excavation. 
 
 As another proof of a similarity of style which 
 I have remarked upon before, between the 
 ancient Egyptians and Hindus, is their mutu- 
 ally using lofty spires, like the tower of Alla- 
 habad,* and the singular conical brick build- 
 ing in the Hadjipoor district, near the Gunduc 
 
 * Allahabad is considered by Dr. R,obertson, who differs 
 from Major Rennell, as the Palibothra of antiquity. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 river. This immense pile of brick* is about two 
 days' journey up the Gunduc, one of the tribu- 
 tary streams on the north of the Ganges, near 
 a place called Kessereah ; it is called the 
 Dewry of Bheem Sain. But Mr. Burrow, who 
 visited it about 1 785, and took its dimensions, 
 conceives it to be evidently intended for the 
 w ell-known image of the god Mahadeo ; having 
 originally been a cylinder placed upon the 
 frustrum of a cone, for the purpose of being 
 seen at a distance. It is at presentf very much 
 decayed, and it is not easy to tell whether the 
 upper part of the cylinder has been globular or 
 conical. A considerable quantity of the outside 
 is fallen down, but it still may be seen a great 
 distance up and down the river. 
 
 The dimensions of this colossal edifice, as 
 given by Mr. Burrow in the Asiatic Researches, 
 are — the diameter of the cone at the base three 
 hundred and sixty-three feet; height of the 
 conic frustrum on which the cylinder is placed, 
 ninety-three feet; diameter of the cylinder, 
 sixty-four feet, which is nearly two-thirds the 
 size of the diameter of the base of the cupola of 
 St. Paul's ; height of the present remains of the 
 cylinder, or round tower, sixty-five feet; entire 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 477. t Ibid. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 101 
 
 height, one hundred and fifty-eight feet, or 
 nearly the height of the Monument without its 
 pedestal. Both the cylinder and the cone 
 which forms its base are constructed of well 
 burnt bricks; those of the cylinder are of vari- 
 ous sizes, many of them two spans long and 
 one broad ; others of the common size but 
 thinner. There is no appearance of the cylin- 
 der being hollow, but some future Belzoni may 
 discover an interior like those of the pyramids 
 which he has successfully investigated. 
 
 The pillar of Allahabad, as described by the 
 late Captain Hoare, is a lofty conical structure, 
 covered with inscriptions, which are given in 
 the second volume of the Transactions of the 
 Asiatic Society, with an engraving of its eleva- 
 tion; but neither Captain Hoare, Mr. Cole- 
 brooke, nor 3Iooushee Mohammud Morad, 
 who accompanied the Captain to Allahabad, 
 could obtain any information respecting it. 
 
 Allahabad is such a seat of Hindii devotion, 
 that it is called the king of worshipped places * 
 The territory round it, to the extent of forty 
 miles, is deemed holy ground. The Hindus 
 believe that, when a man dies in this place, 
 whatever he wishes for he will obtain in his 
 
 * Ayeen Akberry, vol. ii. p. 35. 
 
102 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 next regeneration. Although they teach that 
 suicide in general will be punished with tor- 
 ments hereafter, yet they consider it as merito- 
 rious for a man to kill himself at Allahabad.* 
 
 Another splendid remain of Hindustanee 
 magnificence is the ruins of the beautiful stone 
 building at Delhi, called the Shikargah or 
 bunting place of Feeroz Shah, supposed to be a 
 cemetery or mausoleum, with its remarkable 
 pillar of a single stone upon the top, called 
 the Lat, or staff, of the same monarch. The 
 date of this building is involved in great 
 obscurity. From a translation made by 
 Col. Foilien from its inscriptions, it would 
 appear to be as old as the year A.D. 67 ; but 
 from a more correct version made by Mr. 
 Henry Colebrooke, who is celebrated as a 
 Sanscrit scholar by his version of the Hindu 
 LawDigest, compiled under the superintendence 
 of Sir Wm. Jones, it is made A.D. 1164. One 
 inscription, however, may relate to the pillar, 
 and the other to the main building. 
 
 The Feeroz Shah, whose name is now at- 
 tached to the pillar, which is acknowledged to 
 be a very ancient Hindu monument, appears 
 from Ferishtuh's history to have reigned at Delhi 
 
 * Ayeen Akberry, vol. iii. p. 256. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 103 
 
 between the years 1351 and 1388, in the last of 
 which he died, at the age of ninety ; and Ferish- 
 tuh, according to his translator, Col. Dow, 
 gives him the following character, which must 
 make the heart of every architect leap for joy 
 at the very idea of such a patron having occur- 
 red, and by a bare possibility occurring again.* 
 *' Though no great warrior in the field, he was 
 by his excellent qualities well calculated for a 
 reign of peace. He reigned thirty-eight years 
 and nine months, and left many memorials of 
 his magnificence in the land. He built fifty 
 great sluices, forty mosques, thirty schools, 
 twenty camvanseras, an hundred palaces, five 
 hospitals, an hundred tombs, ten baths, ten 
 spires, one hundred and fifty wells, one hun- 
 dred bridges, and the pleasure-gardens he 
 made were without number." 
 
 Mohammud Ameen Rasee, a native his- 
 torian, who wrote a history of the world in 
 the reign of Akbar, affirms that this building 
 was a hunting place of Feeroz Shah. It is a 
 house of three stories, in the centre of which 
 is a pillar of red stone of a single piece, round 
 which are engraved several inscriptions of a 
 character which has hitherto remained unde- 
 
 * DoVs History of Hindoostan, vol. i. p. 336, 
 
104 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ciphered. This historian says only one-third 
 is visible and the remaining two-thirds are 
 buried by the ruins : which account, how- 
 ever, I have not as yet found authenticated. 
 Its length or rather height above the roof is 
 thirty-seven feet, and its circumference, as 
 measured by Captain Hoare's Moonshee Mo- 
 hammud 3Iorad, ten feet four inches. Some 
 authors* say that the pillar is a monument of 
 renown to the rajahs or princes of Hindustan, 
 and that Feeroz Shah erected the building on 
 which it stands for a menagerie and aviary, as 
 an atonement for the severities he practised on 
 the inhabitants of Cumassu. It is, however, 
 a beautiful remain of Hindu art, and is agree- 
 ably varied in its several stories for effect of 
 light and shade. When perfect, with its veran- 
 das and porticoes, it must have presented a 
 graceful appearance. 
 
 In noticing the architecture of Hindustan 
 the picturesque ruins of the ancient metropolis 
 of Dacca should not be omitted ; for the splen- 
 dour and taste of its architecture and its 
 striking variation from all the other examples 
 in this part of the world entitle it to particular 
 notice. Dacca is a city of Bengal, lying on 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. vii. p. 177, &c. 
 
II] ON ARCHITFXTURE. 105 
 
 the banks of the Ganges, is the third city in 
 the province for extent and population, and 
 has large manufactories of the finest muslins 
 and silks. This interesting part of India was 
 not visited by the Messrs. Daniel, nor, till 
 recently, by any European artist. The striking 
 peculiarities of these buildings, to which my 
 attention was first called by the exquisite 
 engravings of the antiquities of Dacca by Mr. 
 Land seer,* are their lightness and elegance, 
 their square rectangular panellings, which are 
 peculiar to these structures, their arched perfora- 
 tions somewhat resembling the Gothic, their 
 lofty, light, octangular minarets, the beautiful 
 play of light and shade over their elevations, 
 and the elegantly-proportioned cupolas which 
 crown and finish the whole; making them 
 valuable studies for the young architect, and 
 interesting to the amateur and antiquary. 
 
 Ere I conclude this portion of my duties, 
 and in order to assist you in forming some idea 
 of these buildings, I shall briefly describe the 
 celebrated pagoda of Seringham, (in the words 
 of the elegant and accurate historianf of India,) 
 which, according to the best authorities, sur- 
 passes the venerated pagoda of Chillambrum 
 
 * Landseer's Dacca. 
 
 t Orme's Hist, of Milit. Trans. ofHindustan, vol.i. p. 178. 
 
106 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 as much in grandeur as it is superior in sanctity. 
 It is situated about a mile from the western 
 extremity of the island of Seringham, formed 
 by the division of the great river Caveri into 
 two channels; and "is composed of seven 
 square enclosures, one within the other, the 
 walls of which are twenty-five feet high and 
 four thick. These enclosures are three hun- 
 dred and fifty feet distant from one another, 
 and each has four large gates, with a high 
 tower, which are placed, one in the middle of 
 each side of the enclosure, and opposite to the 
 four cardinal points. The outward wall is near 
 four miles in circumference, and its gateway to 
 the south is ornamented with pillars, several of 
 which are single stones thirty- three feet long, 
 and nearly five in diameter; and those which 
 form the roof are still larger: in the inmost 
 enclosures are the chapels. The extreme 
 veneration in which Seringham is held, arises 
 from a belief that it contains that identical 
 image of the god Wistchnu, which used to be 
 worshipped by the god Brahma. Pilgrims 
 from all parts of the peninsula come here to 
 obtain absolution, and none come without an 
 oflfering of money ; and a large part of the re- 
 venue of the island is allotted for the main- 
 tenance of the Brahmins who inhabit the 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 107 
 
 pagoda ; and these with their families formerly 
 composed a multitude of not less than forty 
 thousand souls, maintained, without labour, by 
 the liberality of superstition. Here, as in all 
 the other great pagodas of India, the Brahmins 
 live in a subordination which knows no resist- 
 ance, and slumber in a voluptuousness which 
 knows no wants/' 
 
 The length to which I have already gone 
 upon the ancient architecture of Hindustan, 
 and a reference to the contents of the present 
 Lecture, give me warning that I must conclude 
 this portion ; for which 1 have so many mate- 
 rials, that with a trouble little more than hold- 
 ing my pen, I could continue for two or three 
 more lectures. 
 
 In that same period of the world which was 
 treated of in the early part of this investigation, 
 Noah is supposed to have founded the vast em- 
 pire of China. To continue the parallel, the 
 Assyrians also, under Semiramis, as mention- 
 ed in my last Lecture, founded many illustrious 
 cities, and cultivated architecture in a magni- 
 ficent manner. 
 
 The brief mode in which the historical or in- 
 troductory part of each style is obliged to be 
 conducted, so as to leave sufficient time to 
 
108 ELM ESS LECTURES 
 
 dilate upon the necessary individual speci- 
 mens, allows me but to add, that the most 
 splendid architectural works of this age, ac- 
 cording to the most authentic historians, were 
 to be found in Mesopotamia; of which we have 
 but few traces, it having been, unfortunately, 
 fate of the early achievements of that country 
 to be nearly obliterated. Babylon and the 
 temple of Belus, the stupendous wall^.-and 
 hanging gardens of that magnificent empire, 
 are but little more than as tales of old romance. 
 Yet we may ere long expect some interesting 
 and authentic documents of ancient Babylon, 
 from the valuable labours of Captain Lockett, 
 whose drawings I believe are now in the hands 
 of the engraver. Many ancient historians* 
 speak of temples, palaces, and other structures, 
 raised by the first sovereigns of Egypt, Nine- 
 veh, and Babylon. 
 
 At this same period too, 1 582 years before 
 Christ, to keep up the chain of historical con- 
 nexion, Cecrops left Egypt to colonize ancient 
 Greece, where, some authors say, he built 
 twelve cities.f He taught the Greeks to build 
 
 * Herodot. lib. ii. n. 99. Diod. lib. i. p. 16, 18, 55 ; lib. 
 ii. p. 115, 120. Jul. African, apud. Syncell, p. 54, 55. 
 t Philicor. apud Strab. lib. ix. p. 609. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 109 
 
 houses, and founded a city which he called 
 after himself Cecropia ;* and, to put his new 
 colony in a perfect state of security, he built 
 a fortress on rising ground, where they after- 
 wards built the temple of Minerva.t Scaman- 
 der founded Troy. 
 
 Athens, Sparta, Cranaus, and Grecian 
 Thebes owe their origin to this period. Egypt 
 was overrun by the Ethiopians, but its inde- 
 structible edifices bade defiance to the flames. 
 Tyre was also built about the year 1060 before 
 Christ, of which I shall speak more hereafter. 
 Dido, about the year 900 before Christ, found- 
 ed Carthage ; and in these days the Babylonian 
 and Persian empires flourished. It is to the 
 architecture of this latter people that I now 
 wish briefly to call your attention. 
 
 The architectural ruins of the old inhabit- 
 ants of that great empire, improperly called 
 by Europeans Persia,]: (the name of a single 
 province being applied to the whole empire of 
 Iran, as it is correctly denominated by the 
 present natives of it, and by the learned mus- 
 sulmen who reside in British India,) are con- 
 clusive evidences of the grandeur of this 
 
 * Apollod. lib. iii. p. 192. Plin. lib. vii. sect. 57, p. 413. 
 t Thucyd. lib. iii. p. 110. Valcr. Max. lib.v, c.3. 
 ! Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 43. 
 
no ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ancient people. They differ in style both 
 from the Egyptian and Hindu, yet possess a 
 general affinity. Sir Wm. Jones, after due 
 investigation, (and who was a more ardent 
 or laborious investigator than he?) concludes 
 from the most unexceptionable evidence that 
 the Iranian or Persian monarchy must have 
 been the oldest in the world ; but was doubt- 
 ful to which of the three stocks, Hindu, 
 Arabian, or Tartarian, the first kings of Iran 
 belonged. He also, after a most learned and 
 interesting disquisition, holds this proposition 
 firmly established, that Iran, or Persia, in its 
 largest sense, was the true centre of population, 
 of knowledge, of languages, and of arts. Of 
 such a people, an account of their architecture 
 cannot but be of consequence, and it is there- 
 fore to be lamented that so few faithful delinea- 
 tions of their buildings have as yet been made. 
 The ruins of Persepolis are the principal re- 
 mains of Persian architecture. This city was 
 taken by Alexander, who was persuaded by 
 Thais, during a drunken revel, to set it on fire. 
 At the place now called by the natives Kil- 
 manar or Tschilminar, the Forty Columns, fi:om 
 the circumstance of there being that number 
 standing when the Mahometans invaded this 
 part of Iran, at present, I believe, there are not 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. Ill 
 
 above nineteen left. The splendid edifice, of 
 which these are the remains, is supposed to 
 have been erected by their ancient king Jem- 
 shed, or Shemsheddin. The style of the archi- 
 tecture and sculpture proves their antiquity ; 
 every column being surmounted by a figure of 
 some animal, and the well known circumstance 
 of the ancient Persians performing* their reli- 
 gious duties in the open air proves, in opposi- 
 tion to the opinion of Millin, (for the building 
 could never have had architraves or a roof,) 
 that it was an ancient Persian temple. These 
 singular columns are formed of a beautiful 
 white marble, which is found in the mountain 
 Rachmed near the spot. 
 
 Count Caylus thought he perceived, and en- 
 deavoured to draw, an analogy between the 
 Persepolitan and the Egyptian styles, but we 
 have not sufficient authority of the former to 
 examine these claims. 
 
 My next inquiry into these remote ages of 
 the world, and of which we have nearly as little 
 existing ruins accurately delineated, on which 
 to found a system, is the architecture of the 
 Phoenicians. This primitive people, who were 
 civilized from the earliest times, occupied the 
 
 * Millin. 
 
112 ELMES's LtCTURKS 
 
 coast of Asia eastward of Egypt, and ex- 
 tending from Arabia Deserta to the Mediterra- 
 nean Sea. It is but a small territory, but its 
 people have been greatly celebrated as the in- 
 ventors of navigation, and, according to some, 
 of arithmetic and writing.* Its inhabitants 
 were the first, of whom we have any account, 
 who traded with Britain for tin. 
 
 The Phoenicians are generally supposed to be 
 those descendants of Noah who settled on the 
 coast of Palestine, and are the same people 
 who are called in the Old Testament the Ca- 
 naanites,t a word signifying merchants,]: and 
 afterwards by the Greeks§ Phoenicians. Sidon, 
 their capital, so often spoken of by Homer and 
 which was afterwards eclipsed by its own 
 colony Tyre, was founded by Sidon, the 
 eldest son of Canaan. Inhabiting a barren 
 soil they applied themselves to commerce 
 and the arts, and appear to have been distin- 
 guished for their excellence in manufactures 
 
 * Polydor Virgil, lib. iii. c. 2, art. 1, p. 212. 
 
 t " The Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of 
 Jordan." Numb. xiii. 29. 
 
 I Braun. de Vestitu Sacerdot. Hebr. p. 251. L'Hist. 
 Univers. torn. i. p. 219. 
 
 § Ibid. p. 576, torn. ii. p. 53 and 61 . Marsh, p. 290. CaU 
 met, vol. i. p. 272, &c. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 113 
 
 and works of taste.* Their first settlements 
 were in the isles of Cyprus and Rhodes,"]" and 
 they passed successively into Greece, Sicily, 
 and Sardinia; afterwards into Gaul, and, al- 
 ways advancing, discovered the southern and 
 western coasts of Spain, and onwards into 
 Britain. It is even thought that the isles of 
 Cassiterides, whence they obtained their tin,J 
 were the Solingues and part of Cornwall. Of 
 their beautiful city Tyre, the twenty-seventh 
 and twenty-eighth chapters of Ezekiel give a 
 grand and poetical description; describing it as 
 " of perfect beauty"§ " in the midst of the sea."|| 
 Its buildings and fortifications were of great ex- 
 tent; "The men of Arvad, with their army, 
 were upon thy walls, and the Gad dims were 
 in thy towers : they hanged their shields upon 
 thy walls round about."^ The whole of the two 
 chapters are worthy of reference for their 
 striking description. 
 
 The Phoenicians had several cities distin- 
 guished for their magnificence, wealth, manu- 
 
 * Bocbart in Phaleg. lib. iv. c. 35, p. 343. 
 t Goguet rOrigine des Loix, toui. ii. p. 295. 
 t Bochart Can. lib. i. c. 39, p. 722 and 724. 
 § Ezek. xxvii. 3. || Ibid. ver. 4. IF Ibid.ver. 11. 
 
 I 
 
1J4 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 factures, and extended commerce. Among- 
 the principal were Joppa, Damascus, and 
 Baalbec. Herodotus mentions a splendid tem- 
 ple of Hercules at Tyre ; and Hiram, King of 
 Tyre and Sidon, is mentioned as the founder 
 of many considerable places. It is probable 
 that the Phcenician architecture was of a style 
 differing from that of neighbouring nations, as 
 Strabo, in speaking of Tyrus and Aradus, 
 two islands in the Persian Gulf, says, they 
 had temples resembling those of the Phceni- 
 cians. 
 
 It has been conjectured, and with much pro- 
 bability, that the Phoenician architects con- 
 structed their edifices of timber, as Mount 
 Lebanus supplied them with a considerable 
 quantity ; and with what we are acquainted of 
 the construction of the temple of Solomon, 
 which was built by Phoenician artists and work- 
 men, much timber was used in its construction. 
 
 This brings us to a much darker subject, 
 the history and characteristics of architecture 
 among the early Jews. 
 
 The Hebrews, Israelites, or Jews, by a resi- 
 dence in Egypt of nearly four hundred years, 
 had attained a considerable degree of civiliza- 
 tion. After their deliverance from slavery, in 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. Hi) 
 
 that country, they led a wandering life for 
 forty years. The temples which they had 
 seen in Egypt, dedicated to the Egyptian idols, 
 led them to consecrate a temple, where they 
 might assemble in public worship of the true 
 God. As it was necessary, from their mode of 
 life during their sojournment in the wilderness, 
 that it should be portable, they constructed it 
 in the form of a spacious tent.* In the plan 
 and general appearance of this temporary build- 
 ing, known by the name of the Tabernacle, 
 they took, it has been conjectured, the form 
 of the Egyptian temples for their guide ; but 
 in the details and ornaments, they adopted a 
 peculiar and national style. The whole struc- 
 ture, according to the best authorities, covered 
 a space of one hundred biblical cubits by fifty 
 cubits wide, and the enclosure five cubits high, 
 foniied of wooden columns with brass bases 
 and silver capitals, having curtains of tapestry 
 suspended between them. These columns 
 were sixty in number, twenty on each side, 
 which lay north and south, and ten on each 
 end, which faced the east and west. The 
 Jews used this moveable temple for a length 
 
 * Calracl, torn. ii. p. 391. 
 
 I 2 
 
lid lljMess lectures 
 
 of time after the conquest of Palestine ; but 
 under the reign of Solomon they constructed 
 a permanent temple at Jerusalem. 
 
 David, the father of Solomon, had made 
 considerable preparation for its construction, 
 which was greatly facilitated by the alliance of 
 the Jews with the Tyrians, who furnished them 
 with architects, workmen, and the necessary 
 timber. The accounts of this building, trans- 
 mitted to us by the Bible, are not sufficiently 
 clear to enable us to form a precise idea of it ; 
 nor have other authors much cleared the 
 way. 
 
 The clearing of the site of this temple, a 
 work of immense labour, was begun under the 
 reign of David, and the whole structure finish- 
 ed and dedicated bv Solomon. 
 
 The summit of Mount Moriah formed a 
 plain of thirty-six thousand three hundred and 
 ten square feet. They began by levelling the 
 top and sides of the mountain, against which 
 they afterwards built a wall of free stone four 
 hundred cubits high. The circumference of 
 the mountain at the foot was three thousand 
 cubits.* Upon the plain he built the temple, 
 
 * According to Pocock therf are still some remains of 
 litis wall. 
 
11] ON ARCHITECTURE. 117 
 
 divided like the tabernacle, into two divisions, 
 by a partition of cedar. 
 
 Under the second, or the sanctuary, it ap- 
 pears, they preserved the treasures of the tem- 
 ple. 
 
 In the principal front was the ulam, probably 
 a grand portico, such as they had formerly 
 seen in several Egyptian temples, the construc- 
 tion of which may serve to explain this of 
 Solomon. The temples of the ancients were 
 generally without windows; but that of Jeru- 
 salem appears to have had them, and of the 
 same form as those observed in the ruins of the 
 great temple of Thebes. The timbers of the 
 ceiling were of cedar, and it appears that the 
 roof was flat like the Egyptian temples. 
 
 Round the temple was a wall or enclosure, 
 and the space between that and the temple 
 was occupied by a porch divided into three 
 stories. The principal edifice was preceded by 
 two courts ; the first and largest was for the 
 assembly of the people: in the second, called 
 the priests' court, was the temple. It was sur- 
 rounded with apartments or houses which were 
 for the lodgings of the priests, for the preser- 
 vation of the instruments used in sacrifice, and 
 to confine the beasts, &c. 
 
118 ELMES'S LECTL'RES 
 
 Before the ulam were two columns of bias;*, 
 of twelve cubits circumference, and eighteen 
 high, without reckoning the capitals, which were 
 executed in bronze, and five cubits high. These 
 capitals resembled, according to the expression 
 of the Bible, " lily work," which indicates 
 some resemblance to the Egyptian capitals, 
 composed from the lotus flower. There is 
 no mention made of bases, and it is probable 
 that they had none. These were, no doubt, 
 intended as a decoration to the whole, like 
 the obelisks which were placed before the 
 Egyptian temples. 
 
 The exterior walls of the temple were of 
 stone, squared at right angles, and ornamented 
 with the figures of cherubim, palm-leaves, flow- 
 ers, &c. sculptured probably in the stone 
 like the Egyptian hieroglyphics. The roof was 
 covered with plates of gold, and the interior 
 decorated in the richest manner; the He- 
 brews following the custom at that time of all 
 civilized people in ornamenting their temples, 
 they used a greatquantity of gold and precious 
 stones. Besides this temple, Solomon erected 
 many other works, as the walls of Jerusalem, 
 several public granaries, stables, &c. 
 
 The accounts of this building given to us in the 
 
llj ON ARCHITECTURE. 119 
 
 Ijooks of the Old Testament are too well known to 
 need repetition here; but, as 1 have said, they are 
 not sufficiently clear and technical to enable 
 us to form an architectural idea of its construc- 
 tion. Dr. Pocock and other modern travellers 
 give sufficient accounts of its ruins to prove its 
 existence and extent. Among other Jewish 
 buildings, King David is related to have built 
 a palace on Mount Sion, by T5 rian artists ; 
 and Solomon one of considerably more 
 splendour which was thirteen years in build- 
 ing, another for one of his wives, a daugh- 
 ter of the king of Egypt, and a summer 
 palace, called the House of Lebanon ; he 
 also fortified many of his towns and cities. 
 All the timber used in these buildings was 
 taken from Mount Lebanon, which abounded 
 with cedars and firs. They were all executed 
 by Tyrian workmen, for Solomon would not 
 have one of his subjects employed upon the 
 works. 
 
 I have but little doubt, although in opposi- 
 tion to a recent ingenious essay, attempting to 
 prove Solomon's temple to have been of the 
 pure Grecian Doric order, that all these ancient 
 Jewish buildings resembled those of the Egyp- 
 tians and Phoenicians. The disposition of the 
 
120 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 whole, the pyramidal construction of the walls 
 and the ulam before the temples, are among 
 many proofs destructive of the singular hypo- 
 thesis alluded to. Conjecture is apt to be- 
 wilder and often to betray ; it is thus that 
 Inigo Jones has absurdly twisted Stonehenge 
 into a temple of the Tuscan order. 
 
 The next subject of contemporary archi- 
 tecture is that of the Chinese. Tents and pa- 
 vilions appear to have been the original types, 
 and to have served for architectural models 
 to this extraordinary nation. From this origin 
 arises its essential character — lightness, and 
 its essential defects — weakness and bad taste. 
 The materials principally used by the Chinese 
 are wood of different kinds, bricks and tiles, 
 burnt or dried in the sun ; marble and stone 
 are very rarely used, which may be attributed 
 to the climate. The heat and humidity of the 
 southern provinces render it very unhealthy to 
 reside in houses built of stone, and, according 
 to the missionaries of Pekin, they would be 
 uninhabitable for more than half the year in the 
 northern provinces. The general style of 
 Chinese architecture must be familiar to every 
 one who has drank from a China tea-cup, or who 
 has seen many of the signs of grocers' shops, 
 
11] ON ARCHITECTURE. 1*21 
 
 Sir William Chambers's Pagoda in Kew Gar- 
 dens, or Mr. Nash's Pavilion at Brighton. 
 
 The Chinese are governed more by the police 
 than liy either theory or good taste in their 
 architecture. Their laws prescribe with the 
 greatest accuracy how the lou or palace should 
 be built of a prince of the first, second, or 
 third order of the imperial family, of a grandee 
 of the empire, or of a mandarine ; and they 
 also regulate, like a building act of parliament, 
 the public edifices of the capital, and of pro- 
 vincial cities and towns, according to their 
 several ranks or grades in the empire. Ac- 
 cording to these laws, which are said to be 
 very ancient, the number of courts, the di- 
 mensions of the terraces, the length of the 
 buildings, and the height of the roofs are 
 ordered by progressive degrees of increase, 
 from the simple citizen to the man of letters, 
 from the man of letters to the mandarine, from 
 the mandarine to the prince, and from the 
 prince to the emperor. 
 
 All these measurements are fixed to within a 
 few inches. These laws have of course produced 
 an uniformity in the houses of individuals ; and, 
 after the gradation prescribed among all build- 
 ings, it is Jiot astonishing that the common 
 
122 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 houses are but mere huts of a single floor ; the 
 climate also may perhaps prevent their building 
 them of many stories. Their plan is also a8 
 uniform as their elevation. More than half 
 the ground plan is occupied by courts and 
 passages. The facade next the street of the 
 Chinese houses has no windows, except when 
 employed as a shop. There is but one opening, 
 viz. the door, before which they hang a mat or 
 place a screen, to prevent passers-by from 
 looking in. The form of the Chinese roofs is 
 characteristic, always producing the idea of a 
 tent or pavilion as the model of their architec- 
 ture ; they are terminated by a platform with a 
 species of parapet, and finish with a curve. 
 Pillars are very common in Chinese architec- 
 ture, and are used as supports to the roofs 
 of their houses. They are generally formed of 
 timber, with stone or marble bases, without 
 capitals, and sometimes with wreathed shafts ; 
 and, when used externally, support a kind of 
 veranda, or outer roof, which being too low 
 for a house, the builder is led to construct 
 a second roof, within the peristyle, much 
 higher. 
 
 In Chinese architecture are found doors of 
 a circular form, approaching to the idea of an 
 
11] ON ARCHITECTURE. 123 
 
 arch, but resembling the door of a bird-cage 
 raore than the entrance of a house. The 
 palaces of China, especially those of the empe- 
 ror, are distinguished by their vast extent, 
 by the number of large c ourts, turnings, gal- 
 leries, porticoes, halls, &c. of which they are 
 composed. 
 
 As to their temples or pagodas, the finest are 
 in the palaces of the emperor. Some of those 
 in the other parts of Pekin and its environs, 
 are of an immense height, the finest and best 
 preserved being generally such as contain 
 lamas or bonzes. The fairs, which are held 
 every month in the different parts of Pekin, 
 are kept in the great miao, or temple, the large 
 and numerous parts of which are surrounded 
 with galleries, which make them very conve- 
 nient for that purpose. Lofty towers are also 
 common in China, which Europeans impro- 
 perly call pagodas. In some provinces every 
 town has them, even to the most inconsiderable 
 hamlets. The most celebrated is that in the city 
 of Nankin. It is usually called the Great Tower, 
 or the Porcelain Tower, because it is encrusted 
 with this material. Models of it in relief in 
 porcelain and in bronze may be seen in several 
 cabinets. The Chinese ffive these towers difFe- 
 
J 24 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 rent names, according as they are used for 
 astronomical or atmospherical observations, 
 to enjoy an open view of the country, or as 
 sepulchral towers, or whether they are sim- 
 ply buildings of several stories. They are 
 isolated, round, square, hexagonal, or oc- 
 tagonal, and built with various materials. The 
 number of arches raised in honour of celebra- 
 ted characters, which are often improperly 
 called triumphal arches, is very great in China. 
 They have often three openings, one large one 
 in the middle and two small ones on the side ; 
 these arches are generally ornamented with 
 figures of men, birds, flowers, and are tied together 
 by cords. The annals of China mention three 
 thousand six hundred and thirty-six celebrated 
 persons to whose memory arches of honour have 
 been erected. Captains, generals, princes, phi- 
 losophers, mandarins, who have rendered ser- 
 vices to the public ; and there have been also 
 many women who have obtained such memorials. 
 Many of their other national works are of a 
 more substantial and durable nature; but I can 
 see nothing in their style, even after reading at- 
 tentively the best European-Chinese architect, if 
 I may so express myself. Sir Wm. Chambers, and 
 inspecting the best d esigns both executed and un- 
 
11] ON ARCHITKCTURF.. 1 ^-i 
 
 executed, to commend on the score of propriety, 
 beauty, or good taste. Among the first of them, 
 which, however, are but semi-Chinese, are the 
 mausoleum of Teshoo Lama in Thibet, and the 
 temple of Shoomadoo at Pegu. The first 
 requires no particular description; its charac- 
 teristics are the same as I have just described, 
 but its proportions and execution somewhat 
 l)etter. 
 
 The other, which is a large and splendid coni- 
 cal structure, is the great temple or pagoda called 
 Shoomadoo Praw, situated in the metropolis of 
 Pegue, a kingdom between India and China, but 
 partaking more of the elementary style of the 
 Chinese, the tent, than that of the Hindus. I 
 have classed it on the present occasion with the 
 former. Its pyramidal shape is graceful ; its 
 apex approaches even to the elegant, and, ex- 
 cept a tendency too much to the florid, its ac- 
 cessories are rich and beautiful. 
 
 This singular building is called the Temple 
 of Shoomadoo* or the Golden Supreme, com- 
 pounded of the Birman word shoo, golden, and 
 viadoo, a corruption of the Hindu Maha Deo. 
 Its addition Praw, signifies in the Birman lan- 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. v. p. 115. 
 
126 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 guage Lord, and is always annexed to the name 
 of a sacred building. As farther proof of my 
 hypothesis of the Indian derivation from Egypt, 
 I would add that phra is the proper name under 
 which the Egyptians first adored the sun, be- 
 fore it received the allegorical appellation of 
 Osiris, or author of time. 
 
 This extraordinary edifice, according to Col. 
 Symes, who delineated and described it a few 
 years since, is built on a double terrace, one 
 raised upon another. The lower and greater 
 terrace is quadrangular and raised about ten 
 feet above the natural level of the ground. 
 The upper terrace is smaller, of a like shape, 
 raised about twenty feet above the lower. The 
 length of one side of the lower terrace is about 
 one thousand three hundred and ninety-one 
 feet; and of the upper, six hundred and 
 eighty-four.* These terraces are ascended by 
 flights of stone steps ; on each side are dwell- 
 ings of the Rahaans, or priests. 
 
 The iemple itself is an octangular pyramid, 
 built with brick and fine shell mortar, without 
 any excavation or cavity of any sort. Each 
 side of the octagon, at the base, measures one 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. v. p, 110. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 127 
 
 hundred and sixty-two feet. This immense 
 breadtli diminishes abruptly to a spiral top, 
 and may not inaptly be compared in shape to 
 a large speaking trumpet.* 
 
 The tee^ or umbrella, which serves as a 
 finial, is to be seen on every sacred building in 
 the Birmdn empire, which is in repair. The 
 raising and consecration of this last and indis- 
 pensable appendage, is an act of high religious 
 solemnity, and a season of festivity and relaxa- 
 tion. The monarch who was on the throne 
 when Col. Symes visited Pegue bestowed the 
 present tee. It was made at the capital, and 
 many of the principal nobility came down from 
 Ummerapoora to be present at the ceremony 
 of putting it on; its circumference is fifty-six 
 feet. It rests on an iron axis, fixed in the 
 building, and is farther secured by large chains 
 strongly rivetted to the spire. The under part 
 of the umbrella, or upper part of the spire, is 
 girt with circular mouldings, above which there 
 are ornaments in stucco, not unlike the leaves 
 of a Corinthian capital. 
 
 Round the lower rim of the umbrella are ap- 
 pended a number of bells, of different sizes, 
 
 Asiat. Res. vol. v. p. 117. 
 
128 ELMEi5.S LECTURES 
 
 which, agitated by the wind, make a continual 
 jingling. The tee is gilt, and it was the inten- 
 tion of the king to gild the whole of the 
 spire. The extreme height of the building 
 is three hundred and sixty-one feet, which 
 is very little short of the entire height of St. 
 Paul's. 
 
 Among the greatest works of the Chinese is 
 their celebrated wall, alluded to in the last 
 Lecture, before which all the walls of the 
 Romans, the Picts, and others, must bow in 
 acknowledgement of superiority. This mar- 
 vellous work was upwards of two thousand 
 miles in length, and contained more than forty- 
 five thousand towers. Their canals also are 
 prodigies of science and mechanics, and they 
 have eminently excelled in bridge building. 
 But no mind, alive to genuine beauty and 
 good taste, can admire the style of Chinese 
 architecture. 
 
 Before closing this Lecture, I cannot refrain 
 from again calling public attention to the im- 
 portance of cultivating a pure taste in architec- 
 ture, and of encouraging none but legitimate 
 professors, who scorn to soil their hands with 
 the anomalous and disgraceful practice of being 
 builders and architects of the same concern. 
 
II] ON ARCHITECTURE. 129 
 
 The present time, as I ventured to hint in my 
 last Lecture, is most auspicious to the arts, and 
 our good or ill name to posterity now almost 
 hangs upon a thread. 
 
 I hope to be allowed a few more words before 
 closing, on some immediate causes of the pre- 
 sent depressed state of architecture. Among 
 the foremost of the list, is the want of ^ criti- 
 cal acquaintance with its excellencies and de- 
 fects, in those whose situations enable them to 
 be employers and patrons. This results partly 
 from the difficulties professors themselves raise 
 about the art, which shodld be publicly taught, 
 as in Dean Aldrich's days, to the young nobility 
 and gentry in both our Universities. 
 
 But I place, without fear of contradiction, as 
 a more immediate and fatal cause, the indis- 
 criminate patronage and employment by the 
 public of persons totally ignorant of every 
 branch of education requisite to a knowledge 
 of design. It would be easy to show that this 
 preparative education is necessary, but I ap- 
 prehend it will readily be granted that much 
 more than the acquirements and capacity of a 
 mechanic, liowever intelligeiit, is requisite 
 to the formation of an able architect. It is 
 a well known fact, that William of Wick- 
 ham, Inigo Jones, Sir Christopher Wren, Sir 
 
 K 
 
130 ELMES'S LECTURES. 
 
 John Vanbrugh, Lord Burlington, and James 
 Wyatt, were men of excellent education, and 
 well versed in all the elements of fine art, lite- 
 rature, and science. Can magnificence, ele- 
 gance, or good taste, be expected from men 
 of inferior qualities? Do we gather grapes 
 of thorns, or figs of thistles ? 
 
 If mere building only be required, the carpen- 
 ter, the bricklayer, the mason, the plasterer, 
 the paper-hanger or upholsterer, may perhaps 
 sometimes accomplish his employer's object. 
 But when a man of rank, who enjoys his dig- 
 nity for higher and nobler purposes, is content 
 with a design from a carpenter, he does a mis- 
 chief to the country whence he derives his rank, 
 and himself no service, even on the score of 
 economy ; for an honest workman, he may be 
 assured, will not be the less honest when he has 
 a controuling check on his natural and fair de- 
 sire of gain. 
 
 The more tasteful and elegant the design, 
 the more economical may it be also: for 
 
 " Certain in its aim, 
 ** Taste never idly working saves expense." 
 
 Thomson. 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 The Subject continued from the Time of the 
 Assyrians and their Cotemporaries : the Found- 
 ing of Athens y Thebes^ and other Cities of An- 
 cient Greece, down to the Age of Pericles, being 
 the First Epoch of Grecian Architecture. 
 The Elements, Style, and Modes of Construction 
 of some of tJie most Ancient Specimens. From 
 the Beginning of the Age of Pericles to the De- 
 cline of the Arts in Greece; ^/ie Second Epoch. 
 Eletnents of the pure Greek Style defined ; its 
 Variations and Schools detailed. 
 
 k2 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 Having, in my preceding Lectures, brought 
 down the history and elementary principles of 
 civil architecture from the time of the most 
 ancient people of whom we have any record to 
 that of the Assyrians and their cotemporaries, 
 1 shall proceed to develope the history and 
 elements of the art, from the close of the fore- 
 going period to the brilliant days of Attic 
 splendour. 
 
 There is no certainty that architecture was 
 practised in any degree approaching to the 
 wisdom of the orders, earlier than the year of 
 the world 2600.* 
 
 The Egyptians communicated a knowledge 
 of the arts to the Phoenicians, the only nation 
 which their narrow policy allowed to trade 
 w ith them ; and the Phoenicians carried it into 
 Greece. 
 
 When mankind derived their whole subsis- 
 tence from the fruits which the earth produced 
 spontaneously, from their hunting, their fish- 
 
 * Monier. 
 
134 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ing, and their flocks, they lived in tents, and 
 had no settled dwelling-places or habitation. 
 The discovery of agriculture introduced other 
 manners. They built and inhabited cities, and 
 constructed temples, and other sacred edifices. 
 Thus was agriculture the parent as it were of 
 architecture, and the other arts of which they 
 now had more need. 
 
 In after periods, the Greeks themselves be- 
 came acquainted with Egypt, and, correspond- 
 ing with the Egyptians, borrowed their arts, 
 their learning, and their customs, as the Ro- 
 mans did afterwards from the Etruscans and 
 the Greeks. The Egyptian records bear testi- 
 mony to the visits of many of the learned men 
 of Greece to the shores of the Nile. 
 
 Herodotus, the venerable father of history, 
 travelled into Egypt, as well as all over his 
 own country, Thrace and Scythia, Arabia and 
 Palestine. In Egypt he minutely inspected 
 the chief curiosities, and most remarkable 
 places, conversing with the Egyptian priests, 
 who informed him of their ancient history and 
 made him acquainted with all their customs, 
 sacred, civil, and warlike. Indeed, he speaks 
 of their religious observances with such clear- 
 ness and precision, and with such reverence 
 and reserve upon some of their mysteries, that 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 135 
 
 it appears more than probable, that he was 
 initiated into their ceremonies, and consecrated 
 a priest of some of their orders.* 
 
 Among other eminent Grecians who are 
 known to have visited Egypt, are Orpheus, 
 Musaeus, Melampiis, Homer, Lycurgus, Solon, 
 Pythagoras, Plato, Eudoxus, and Demo- 
 critus. 
 
 The religion and laws of the Greeks are 
 acknowledged to have been derived from the 
 creeds and institutions of Egypt; and their 
 architecture, 1 will endeavour to prove, in 
 spite of the hypotheses and splendid fables of 
 Vitruvius, to have been adopted and improved 
 from the same source. Herodotus assures us, 
 that the worship of the greatest part of the first 
 gods that were adored in Greece came from 
 Egypt ;t and that all antiquity regarded the 
 Egyptians as the first who paid a solemn and 
 public worship to the Deity,| and therefore as 
 the first inventors of sacred architecture. He 
 excepts only Neptune ; and says farther, that 
 the worship of this deity was derived from 
 Libya.§ Saturn, Jupiter, Ceres, &c. were the 
 
 * Herod. (Gale's edition) lib. ii. sec. 3, p. 91 ; sec. 65, 
 p. 114; sec 171, p. 156. 
 
 t Herod. lib, ii. n. 50. See also Diod. lib. i. p. 109. 
 t Herod, lib. ii. n. 4. § Ibid. 
 
13(J ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 first j^ods of Greece. It is probable* that the 
 Titans introduced these deities into Greece, 
 and consequently, that those princes came 
 from Egypt; for the worship of Saturn, Jupiter, 
 Ceres, &c. was established, according to 
 Diodorus, from time immemorial.t Hence 
 the Titans taught the Greeks the first elements 
 of the arts and sciences, and their earliest 
 sacred edifices were likewise borrowed from 
 them. 
 
 Plato advises to search for the roots of 
 Greek words in some barbarous or foreign 
 soil ; so must we search for the roots or origin 
 of Greek architecture also in a foreign soil, 
 and that soil is Egypt. 
 
 Cadmus, who lived about fifteen hundred 
 years before the Christian aera, and was the 
 grandson of Agenor, king of Tyre, brought 
 arts and sciences into Greece five hundred and 
 sixty-two years after the building of the walls 
 of Babylon. In the part of Greece where 
 he settled, he built a city which he named 
 after the celebrated Thebes, in Egypt, and 
 has doubtlessly imitated the Egyptian style 
 of architecture in his earliest structures. In 
 corroboration of this, Pliny expressly says, 
 
 * Dc Goguot. t Diotl. lib. i. p. 17. 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 137 
 
 that Daedalus, the architect of the Grecian 
 labyrinth, imitated that of Egypt in every re- 
 spect. This same Thebes afterwards became 
 so celebrated, that Germanicus made a journey 
 purposely to survey its magnificent ruins.* 
 
 Ogyges, Inachus the first king of Argos, 
 Cecrops, Cadmus, Lelex, and Danaus founded 
 successively the kingdoms of Athens, Argos, 
 Sparta, and Thebes ; but it was in the colonies 
 of Asia Minor that sacred architecture began 
 to exhibit its greatest splendour. The inven- 
 tion of the first two Grecian orders is attributed 
 solely to the inhabitants of these countries, 
 as their names, Doric and Ionic, sufficiently 
 prove. The Corinthian did not appear till 
 long after these two orders ; it seems to have 
 been invented in Greece, properly so called, 
 and is the richest, the most magnificent, and 
 the most elegant of all the Grecian orders, and 
 perhaps of any that architecture ever invented. 
 Among the earliest specimens of sacred archi- 
 tecture among the Greeks, was the superb 
 temple of Jupiter, at Olympia, which, accord- 
 ing to the calculation of Pausanias, was 
 erected about the year 630 B.C. the temple of 
 Diana at Ephesus, and the magnificent temple 
 
 '- Tacilus, lib. ii. sec. GO. 
 
138 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of Jupiter Olympius at Athens, the foundations 
 of which were laid by Pisistratus, and all of 
 which prove the absurdity of the Vitruvian hy- 
 pothesis of the invention of the orders. 
 
 The first material used by the Grecians in 
 their buildings was timber ; next brick, which 
 they learned the art of making from the Egyp- 
 tians ; stone next succeeded, as in the temple 
 of Apollo at Delphos, built by Amphictyon; 
 and afterwards, when they had accomplished 
 the complete glories of their style, they immor- 
 talized it in marble. In the time of Pericles, 
 the Athenians used Pentelican marble, and a 
 species from Mount Hymettus, in their build- 
 ings. The sort called Parian was the most 
 admired, but was nearly exclusively appropri- 
 ated to sculpture. Bronze was also used for 
 building in some of the earlier times, as Pau- 
 sanias mentions several buildings of this costly 
 material, particularly a small temple of Mi- 
 nerva, called, for this reason, Chalcicecus, 
 which was standing in his days in Lacedaemon. 
 Stones of an immense size, after the manner of 
 the Egyptians, were also amongst their earliest 
 methods of construction, whence has originated 
 the tradition that ihey were the works of the 
 Cyclops. In later periods they used stones of 
 a smaller size, of irregular polygonal figures, 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 139 
 
 of four, five, or six sides, joined with the most 
 exact care and nicety. The walls of the an- 
 cient city of Poestum are thus built of huge po- 
 lyhsedric masses. Chandler, the Grecian travel- 
 ler, discovered walls of this method of con- 
 struction, near to Troezene, Epidaurus, and 
 Ephesus ; and Dr. Pocock also in the island 
 of Mytelene. 
 
 As architecture and other arts and sciences 
 advanced, they used cubical and oblong stones, 
 with which they constructed after two methods : 
 one called Isodomon, which, as it intimates, 
 was of courses of equal thicknesses and equal 
 lengths ; and the other, Pseudisodomo7i, where 
 the height or thickness, and length of the courses 
 differed. The first, or true manner, was always 
 used in their grandest buildings, as being the 
 most beautiful ; and the latter, or false me- 
 thod, where beauty of appearance was of less 
 consequence. Another, and still inferior mode 
 was also used by them for works of lesser 
 consequence, and called Emplecton. The front 
 stones only of this manner were wTought, and 
 the interior left rough, and filled in with stones 
 of various sizes, or rubble. It was principally 
 used in walls of great thicknesses, such as those 
 with which they surrounded their cities. In 
 
140 elmes's lectures 
 
 some instances they built their walls of brick, 
 or common stone, and faced them with marble. 
 Cement was seldom used by the Greeks in their 
 best works, as the size and ponderosity of the 
 blocks, and the great exactness with whicli 
 they were squared, were sufficient for solidity, 
 and made more perfect and complete joints. 
 
 The ancient Greek architects were judici- 
 ously careful, that every ornament they used 
 should always accord in character and situa- 
 tion with the order they applied it to ; and 
 both the ornament and the order were charac- 
 teristic of the destination of the edifice : never 
 building- a pi-ison of the Corinthian order, nor 
 a theatre of the Doric. The external ornaments 
 were bold, simple, and distributed with a ju- 
 diciously sparing hand. The pediment of the 
 temple, and the metopes of the frieze, as in 
 those of the temples of Minerva and Theseus 
 at Athens, and of Jupiter Panellenius at 
 jEgina, were decorated with hassi-rilievi, and 
 the angles of the walls with pilasters or 
 antae. The porticoes which surrounded their, 
 public squares, in which were often exhibited 
 pictures and other works of art, appear to have 
 been more elaborately decorated than their 
 temples, theatres of declamation, and gyrana- 
 
JII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 141 
 
 sia ; and with regard to interior oraaments, 
 little can be known, from the general destruc- 
 tion of those parts. 
 
 Even in the most flourishing and polished 
 times of the Grecian states, so much did an 
 austere simplicity of taste pervade this great 
 people, that the private houses of the most 
 distinguished and rich among them were in the 
 same style of plainness and simplicity with 
 their fellow-citizens. But as luxury increased, 
 so did the splendour of their houses, and they 
 began to bestow on them a more commodious 
 distribution and greater ornament. 
 
 The character of the genuine architecture of 
 the Greeks, in their brightest days, the days of 
 Pericles, Alexander, Plato, Aristotle, Apelles, 
 Phidias, Sophocles, and Euripides, is that of 
 an imposing grandeur united to pleasing sim- 
 plicity, elegance of ornament, and harmony 
 of proportion in an eminent degree, together 
 with a certain relation or coincidence of parts, 
 as necessary in works of art as in those of 
 literature. 
 
 Architecture, after the Greek style, may be 
 divided into five principal epochs, according to 
 the historical periods which gave rise to five cor- 
 responding styles. Thej^r^^ embraces the works 
 
142 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of Trophonius, who built the temple at Delphos 
 and those of Agamedes and Daedalus. 
 
 This early period of Grecian history, which 
 may be termed the heroic age, does not furnish 
 any remains of architecture of positive cer- 
 tainty. Yet what lights are wanting from 
 the deficiency of existing ruins are supplied in 
 some degree by ancient authors, who however 
 are not sufl&ciently explicit nor circumstantial 
 in those details which alone could give us the 
 information we require. 
 
 Homer, for instance, in speaking of the 
 palace of Priam, says that it had at the 
 entrance fifty apartments well built, in which 
 the princes his children lodged with their wives, 
 and that it was surrounded with porticoes of 
 stone wrought with care. At the bottom of 
 the court there were twelve other apartments 
 for the sons-in-law of that monarch,* and a 
 magnificent dwelling for Paris,t which tend 
 only to prove that architecture was cultivated 
 as an art in Asia Minor, but gives us no infor- 
 mation as to style or taste. 
 
 Homer also describes the statues and other 
 interior ornaments which embellished the palace 
 
 * Iliad, lib. vi. ver. 242. + Iliad, lib.vi. ver. 315. 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 143 
 
 of Alcinoiis,* but only in very general 
 terms. 
 
 The second includes fi-om the time of Rhaecus 
 of Samos, and Theodorus, who lived about 
 seven hundred years before the Christian aera, 
 down to the time of Pericles ; in which period 
 flourished Ctesiphon, Metagenes, Andronicus, 
 Eupolemus, Callimachus, Libon, and other 
 eminent and celebrated architects. 
 
 The third epoch is the period from Pericles 
 to Alexander the Great; under the former of 
 whom, architecture reached the summit of 
 its perfection; a perfection, of which Sir 
 William Jones, with his accustomed truth 
 and perspicuity, says : — " In those elegant 
 arts which are called fine and liberal, it is 
 really wonderful how much a single nation 
 has excelled the whole world : I mean the 
 ancient Greeks, whose sculpture, of which 
 we have exquisite remains, both on gems and 
 in marble, no modern tool can equal ; whose 
 architecture we can only imitate at a servile 
 distance, but are unable to make one addition 
 to it, without destroying its graceful simplicity ; 
 whose poetry still delights us in youth, and 
 amuses us at a maturer age; and of whose 
 
 ' Iliad, lib. vi. ver. 313, et seq. 
 
144 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 painting and music we have the concurrent 
 relations of so many grave authors, that it 
 would be strange incredulity to doubt their ex- 
 cellence." In this brilliant epoch, flourished 
 Hippodamus of Miletus, Phidias, Ictinus, and 
 Callicrates, who were conjointly employed in 
 the building of the Parthenon. 
 
 The fourth great epoch is from the decease 
 of Alexander the Great to that of Augustus. 
 Alexandria, under the dominion of the Grecian 
 monarchs, was the principal school of the great 
 architects of this period, among whom Dino- 
 crates, whose proposal of forming Mount 
 Athos* into a statue of Alexander the Great, 
 
 * " I caDDOt conceive," says Spence, in his entertaining 
 Anecdotes, " how Dinocrates could ever have carried his 
 proposal of forming Mount Athos into a statue of Alexander 
 the Great into execution." — " For my part," says Pope, " I 
 have long since had an idea how that might be done ; and if 
 any body would make me a present of a Welch mountain, and 
 pay the workmen, I would undertake to see it executed. I 
 liave quite formed it, sometimes, in my imagination. The 
 figure must be in a reclining posture, because of the hollow- 
 ing that would otherwise be necessary, and for the city's 
 being in one hand. It should be a rude unequal hill, and 
 might be helped with groves of trees for the eyebrows, and a 
 wood for the hair. Tlie natural green turf should be left 
 wherever it would be necessary, to represent the ground he 
 rechnes on. It should be contrived so, that the true point 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 145 
 
 and subsequent founding of Alexandria, is 
 celebrated by Vitruvius, and Sostrates, were 
 the most eminent. In this epoch are to be 
 found the names of Saurusand Batraclius, who 
 executed several works in Rome, and not being 
 allowed to inscribe them with their names, 
 used the expedient of carving* a lizard and a 
 frog upon the pedestals as anagrams of their 
 names; o-au^o? signifying in Greek a lizard, and 
 
 of view should be at a considerable dislniice. When you 
 were near it, it should still have the appearance of a rough 
 mountain ; but at the proper distance such a rising should be 
 llie legs, and such another an arm. It would be best if a 
 river, or rather a lake, were at the bottom of it, for the rivulet 
 that came through his other hand, to tumble down the hill, 
 and discharge itself into it." — Spence's Anecdotes, edited 
 hy S. W. Singer, p. 209, 
 
 " It is somewhat singular tliat Mr. Pope should have 
 thought this mad project practicable ; but it appears there 
 are still persons who dream of such extravagant and fruitless 
 undertakings. Some modern Dinocrates had suggested to 
 Buonaparte to have cut from the mountain, the Simplon, an 
 immense colossal figure, as a sort of genius of the Alps. 
 This was to have been of such an enormous size, that all the 
 passengers should have passed between its legs in a zig-zag 
 direction." — Mrs Baillie's Tour on the Continent, 1819. 8vo. 
 p. 218. 
 
 * Some of these anagrammatic sculptures are still lo be 
 seen in the churches of St. Eusebius and St. Lorenzo Fnoii 
 le Mura, at Rome. 
 
146 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 ^xT^xx,o<; a frog. Cossutius was the first Roman 
 architect who followed the style and manner 
 of the Greeks, and was employed by Antiochus 
 the Great in finishing the temple of Jupiter 
 Olympius, at Athens. 
 
 The Jifth and last great epoch comprehends 
 from Augustus, in whose days Vitruvius is 
 supposed to have flourished, until the removal 
 of the seat of empire to Constantinople. 
 
 The pure architecture of Greece is superior to 
 all that preceded it, and all that has been de- 
 signed or executed since. Its architects and 
 sculptors never violated the inherent proper- 
 ties of any object for an artificial effect ; while 
 those of Rome perpetually committed such 
 violations, deteriorating all that they laid their 
 hands upon. The irregular and fantastic 
 variety of their orders, as I will hereafter show, 
 proves the truth of the accusation, and power- 
 fully opposes itself to the beautiful simplicity 
 of the Greeks. The Romans executed works 
 containing gross infringements of the sounder 
 laws of architectural taste, which have, how- 
 ever, obtained a general and a lasting reputation. 
 
 Such is the Colosseum, such is the Theatre of 
 Marcellus, such are the amphitheatres, such is 
 the Pantheon ; structures that excite wonder 
 and seize upon our admiration, certainly not 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 147 
 
 for the faults with which they abound, but not- 
 withstanding: and in spite of them. 
 
 I most willingly allow the Roman architects 
 to possess splendour, vastness of conception, a 
 noble carelessness of expense, and a profuse 
 redundancy of decoration in all their public 
 buildings, which, as Quintillian says, is more 
 easily cured than barrenness ;* and if they are 
 praised for knowledge of scientific construction, 
 and bold command of the arch, the vault, and 
 the cupola, 1 shall readily join in such praise; 
 but of this I am certain, that the Romans 
 never were eminent for that purity of taste, 
 elegance, and simplicity of invention and con- 
 struction, which characterize the Greeks above 
 all others. Hence, we find so many more 
 models of a fine style among the Greeks than 
 among the Romans. Give me simplicity and 
 good design, and keep your ornaments for 
 children. 
 
 The Romans are indebted for all the excel- 
 lencies of their architecture to the Greeks, and 
 their deficiencies and redundancies are their 
 own. Their earliest architects were all Greeks, 
 and it was not till late in their history that they 
 
 * Facile remediurn est ubertatis, sterilia iiullo labore via 
 cuntur. — Quint. 
 
 h2 
 
148 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 themselves made any figure in the arts of de- 
 sign. Thus all the Roman architects, with 
 Vitruvius at their head, follow the plans that 
 were laid down for them by the great master- 
 spirits of Greece. They every where imitate 
 the Greeks, and every where misrepresent 
 them; as may be seen in comparing the Doric of 
 the temple of Minerva Parthenon with that 
 of the theatre of Marcellus, the best of the 
 Koman specimens. Compare them together 
 and you will find them comments upon each 
 other ; the one showing the commanding ex- 
 cellence of purity of style, the other the glitter 
 and frivolity of false decoration. 
 
 What Cicero so truly says of the qualities 
 requisite to a fine oration, may be as correctly 
 applied to the qualities necessary to a fine 
 piece of architecture : "Let* ornament," says 
 this great writer, *' be manly and chaste, with- 
 out effeminate gaiety or artificial colouring; 
 let it shine with the glow of health and strength." 
 
 Had the taste of Vitruvius been as refined 
 and as unsophisticated as that of Cicero, the 
 Roman purity in architecture would have been 
 
 * Ornalus et virilis et foitis, et sanctus sit, nee effeminatttn 
 levitatera, et fuco ementituui coloreni ainet ; sanguine el viri 
 bus neteat. — Cic. 
 
HI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 149 
 
 upon an equality with that of their fine and 
 majestic language; on the contrary, we find 
 very many of their buildings frivolously rich 
 in ornament, and wretchedly poor in invention 
 and good taste. For with fillets upon fillets, 
 with bands over beads and beads over bands, 
 cavettos and cimas both right and reversed, 
 with ornamented plain fac^, (excuse the bull,) 
 carvings and dentels and denticles, drops and 
 flowers and festoons, and other tawdry, mis- 
 placed, and misapplied ornaments, they dis- 
 figured their spoliations from the Greeks. For 
 an example, look at the order of the Temple 
 of Concord at Rome, which is called a Roman 
 Ionic. Compare it with its lovely original in 
 any of the Greek examples. Of this expen- 
 sive barbarianism may be truly said that it is 
 
 " Of such a frightful mien, 
 As to be hated needs but to be seen." 
 
 Pope. 
 
 Yet such things find their admirers even in our 
 days. Little was it to have been expected, 
 after the introduction to this country of the 
 pure forms and fine proportions of Greece by 
 Athenian Stuart and his followers, that Batty 
 Langley and Borromini would, in our days, 
 aided by the powerful influence of the crown, 
 
150 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 have driven the Athenian antiquities from our 
 shelves, and the purity of Grecian art from 
 our pubUc streets, and substituted imitations 
 of the altogether inferior productions of Rome 
 and modern Italy. 
 
 But so unfortunately it is, and we need not 
 go far to witness it; and, at a more proper 
 period of these Lectures I will revert to it 
 more fully. At the same time I disclaim pos- 
 sessing any of those feelings whicli are usually 
 attributed to such as investigate, and speak 
 honestly of, the works of their cotemporaries. 
 The field of genuine art is large, and ever will 
 be so ; it has never yet been so totally explored 
 as to exclude from its delightful labours any 
 who truly devote themselves to its cultivation. 
 1 repeat, therefore, that I disclaim those feel- 
 ings, and am prepared for and armed against 
 the attacks of any who might impute to me 
 such unworthiness. But when the public cha- 
 racter is at stake, those who see the causes of 
 its depression sho"uld be bold, and I trust the 
 importance of the object may claim pardon for 
 the digression. 
 
 To return. About the end of the third age 
 of the world, or about the year 2496 B.C. 
 Athens was founded ; which, however, was 
 not the first city established in Greece, for 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. lol 
 
 many writers suppose that Argos, which was 
 founded by Inachus,* was of greater antiquity 
 than Athens, and Sicyone than either. 
 
 Athens was founded by Cecrops, a native of 
 Sais, a city of Lower Egypt,! ^^^^ ™^y be 
 called its first king ; for although Ogyges is by 
 somej invested with this honour, it is not known 
 who he is, nor whence he came. Several 
 kings are named between Ogyges and Cecrops, 
 but their history is quite unknown. In the 
 reign of the last of these unknown princes, 
 Cecrops arrived in Attica^ at the head of an 
 Egyptian colony, and brought with him from 
 Egypt into Greece the first principles of all the 
 arts and sciences ; and this is a farther proof, 
 if any were necessary, of the Egyptian origin 
 of Grecian architecture, and of the fallacy of 
 the Vitruvian hypothesis of the origin of the 
 orders. 
 
 The royal family of Athens had the honour 
 of giving birth to the celebrated Daedalus, 
 whose name is synonymous with excellence in 
 all the arts of design, and has furnished an 
 epithet (Daedalian) indicative of supreme taste. 
 
 * Strab. lib. viii. p. 578. t Diod. lib.i. p. 33. 
 
 ; Euseb. Chron. lib. ii. p. 66. Paus. lib. ix. c. 5. 
 § Diod. lib. i. p. 33. Paus. lib. i. c. 2. 
 
152 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Deedalus travelled into Egypt to see the 
 Labyrinth, from which he formed the design of 
 that which he afterwards built at Crete ; and 
 though it was considerably less in size than the 
 Egyptian, it was so celebrated for the beauty 
 of its architecture and sculpture, that it was 
 reckoned by Pliny among the seven wonders 
 of the world.* 
 
 x\fter Cecrops there was a succession of 
 sixteen kings. Erectheus VI. t was among the 
 most celebrated, and had a temple erected to 
 his memory, which is supposed to have been 
 on the site of the present temple of the same 
 name. From Erectheus to Theseus, the history 
 of Athens offers little remarkable. The age of 
 Theseus was that of a race of heroes. This 
 monarch enlarged and adorned the city,| 
 made it the metropolis of Attica, and was 
 commemorated after his return from Crete, 
 and in honour of his victory over the Mi- 
 notaur, by the beautiful temple which bears 
 his name. It was not the only one erected to 
 him in his life-time by the grateful Athenians. 
 They consecrated several to him : the hero ac- 
 epted four, and made them dedicate the 
 
 * Plin. lib. xxxvii. c. 13. 
 
 + ApoUod. lib. iii. p. 198, et seq. 
 
 I Isocrat. Plut. p. 11. 
 
ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 153 
 
 others to his kinsman Hercules, in remem- 
 brance of his deliverance from prison by that 
 heroic demi-god. The principal of these 
 structures, that now known by the name of the 
 Temple of Theseus, contains in the metopes 
 of the eastern front ten of the labours of 
 Hercules, and on the returns of the portico 
 eight of the achievements of Theseus himself, 
 four on each side. This temple is a fine ex- 
 ample of the Doric order in its greatest purity ; 
 and casts from its metopes are among the 
 invaluable Elgin collection at the British 
 Museum. 
 
 On all these accounts Theseus was esteemed 
 the second founder of Athens, and probably 
 purified the style of its architecture. He 
 also divided the people, after the manner of 
 the Egyptians, into three classes.* 
 
 The interval between Theseus and Codrus, 
 the son of Melampus, the seventeenth and last 
 king of the Athenians, who, in his war with 
 the Dorians, deliberately gave up his lifef for 
 the safety of the state, affords but little archi- 
 tectural or historical detail. 
 
 After the death of Codrus, Athens was go- 
 
 * Plut. p. 11. 
 
 + Codrus pro patria non timidus mori. — Hor. Carm. lib. iii. 
 h|. 19. 
 
164 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 verned by perpetual archons^ who had neither an 
 absolute nor a regal power, but were subject to 
 those laws which they were empowered to exer- 
 cise for the good of the whole state. Thus the 
 monarchical form of government was changed 
 to a repubHcan.* There were thirteen of these 
 perpetual magistrates, and this form of govern- 
 ment lasted three hundred and fifty years. 
 
 The last perpetual archon was Medon, the 
 son of iEschylus, after whose death the dignity 
 of archon ceased to be perpetual, and was 
 limited to the term of ten years-t There were 
 seven of these limited chief magistrates, be- 
 ginning with Charops, in the year 754 before 
 Christ, and ending with Eryxias, who having 
 been banished, the form of government was 
 again changed. Many variations took place 
 in the Athenian government till the time of 
 Solon, who new modelled and reformed the 
 state, and likewise repaired the public edifices.^ 
 
 The republic continued in this form for about 
 eighty years, when Pisistratus usurped the 
 government, annihilated the tyranny of the 
 people, and improved the state in every way. 
 He founded, in the latter part of his reign, one 
 
 * Justin, lib. ii. c. 7. Val. Max. lib. v. c. 6, p. 489. 
 Pausau. lib. vii. c. 25. 
 
 t Pausaii. lib. vii. c. 11. J Pint, in Solon, p. 85. 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 155 
 
 of the finest libraries that ever was collected 
 in Greece, built the magnificent temple of 
 Jupiter Olympius, at Athens, and made his 
 court the resort of genius. 
 
 Afier the death of Pisistratus, he was suc- 
 ceeded by his sons Hippias and Hipparchus. 
 The latter was killed by Harmodias and Aris- 
 togiton, and Hippias, his brother, was banished 
 for his tyranny. 
 
 Many other revolutions took place in Athens, 
 till the illustrious Pericles changed the whole 
 form of government, and gave to Athens 
 her briglitest era. His age is now distin- 
 guished by all the graces of art, and needs no 
 other eulogium than those standards of taste 
 and style which he has left to instruct and 
 enlighten the world. 
 
 Delightful to the eye of taste are the mys- 
 terious and solemn vistas of an ancient English 
 cathedral : grand and majestic are the ruins of 
 the Nerva Forum : awfully severe, impressive, 
 and overpowering is the Colosseum of an- 
 cient Rome : elegant is the circular temple 
 of the Sibyl at Tivoli, which graces, with its 
 endless rotunda and sweetly proportioned cu- 
 pola, its own delightful surrounding country, 
 and many of the sweetest landscapes of the 
 tender and fascinating Claude : magnificent are 
 
156 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the triumphal arches and aspiring colunnis of 
 imperial Rome. 
 
 Yet, neither the magnificence of these tri- 
 umphal structures with all their maddening 
 associations ; nor the sweet proportions of 
 the fane of Tivoli, with the fascinations of its 
 scenery, and the magic pencil of Lorraine ; 
 nor the grandeur of the Roman forum in its 
 pristine perfection; nor the majesty of the 
 Colosseum, great in ruins and sublime in 
 dust, or filled M'ith the whole population of a 
 mighty city, headed by an Augustus ; — are 
 equal in majesty, dignity, awfulness, splen- 
 dour, perfection, to the temple of the virgin 
 goddess of the Greeks. 
 
 The arrangement of this celebrated edifice 
 may be seen from its plan in Stuart's Antiqui- 
 ties of Athens ; and the style of architecture, 
 the purest and grandest Doric, from many en- 
 graved views. This temple is two hundred 
 and twenty-seven feet in length, which, for the 
 purpose of immediate comparison, I take leave 
 to mention is only one foot short of the length 
 from the inside of the north door of the princi- 
 pal transept of St. Paul's, to the inside of the 
 south door of the same transept ; and one hun- 
 dred and one in width, the width of the nave 
 and aisles of St. Paul's on each side of the 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 157 
 
 cupola between the walls ; and sixty-five feet 
 six inches high, to the summit of the pediment, 
 which is somewhat higher than the bases of the 
 composite order of columns of the second story 
 of St. Paul's taken from the ground. These 
 general dimensions may serve to give some 
 idea of its magnitude ; but its g^'andeur and 
 sublimity is not the result of its size. 
 
 It stands upon a pavement elevated on three 
 steps, and was surrounded by forty-six columns, 
 thirty-four feet one inch high ; eight feet in the 
 front of each portico, and seventeen on each 
 flank, including the angle columns. The por- 
 ticos were both surmounted by pediments filled 
 with statuary, of which some of the most glorious 
 remains, which have immortalized the name of 
 Elgin, and do honour to the British legislature, 
 form that collection at the British Museum 
 which Canova declared was alone worth a 
 journey from Rome to see, and which has 
 formed an epoch in his style, as will in due 
 time be witnessed with pleasure by this na- 
 tion. 
 
 A contemplation and examination of this 
 wonderful structure, in all its bearings, would 
 alone occupy more than an entire lecture ; and 
 I most reluctantly withdraw your attention 
 from it to an examination of the principles of 
 
158 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the style and elements of the sacred architec- 
 ture of the Greeks ; another fine example of 
 which is the temple of Jupiter Panellenius, in 
 the island of Egina, which was recently dis- 
 covered by Messrs. Cockerell, jun. Foster, 
 Linckh, Baron Haller, and others ; than which 
 discovery of Grecian architecture and sculp- 
 ture none of modern times can be considered 
 as more extraordinary, or more interesting and 
 important to the history of art. It is only to be 
 regretted that, having been discovered by Eng- 
 lish travellers, its sculptural remains do not 
 grace our national museum, as well as those of 
 Athens and Phigaleia. 
 
 The inhabitants of the island of Egina were 
 the first European Greeks* who became con- 
 siderable for their intelligence in maritime traf- 
 fic. Pausanias"]" relates, that soon after the re- 
 turn of the Heraclidae in Peloponnesus, the 
 Eginetans had much commerce in Greece. 
 iElian,J Strabo,§ and other authors, believe 
 that the builders of this beautiful temple were 
 the first among the Greeks who brought coined 
 money into use. 
 
 The power of the Eginetans was destroyed, 
 
 * Goguel, vol. iii. p. 156. t Paus. lib. viii. c. 5. 
 
 i iEl. Var. Hist. lib. xii. c 10. § Strab. lib. viii. p. 577. 
 
TU] ON ARCHITECTURE. 159 
 
 after a short but brilliant career, by the Atheni- 
 ans, in the time of Pericles,* who drove them 
 from their island, and annihilated their wealth 
 and their power in a moment. 
 
 The sculptures of this fine temple are now at 
 Munich, and are the property of the Prince 
 Royal of Bavaria. They were discovered un- 
 der the fragments of its architecture, where 
 they had been concealed from the rapacious 
 conquerors of Greece for a period of nearly 
 two thousand years. They have been united, 
 and the very few parts of them which were 
 deficient restored at Rome, by Thorwaldsen, 
 the celebrated Danish sculptor, 
 
 Mr. Cockerell, in his excellent paper on 
 these scLdptures, published in the 12th No. of 
 the Journal of Science and Arts, says : — " But 
 what may be considered of still greater interest, 
 8^nd that which renders the discovery of the 
 first importance to architecture as well as to 
 archaiology is, that they afford us a complete 
 example of the great historical compositions of 
 entire statuary, with which the Greeks enriched 
 the pediments of their temples ; a species of 
 representation hitherto unknown to us, and 
 
 * Goguet, vol. iii. p. 156. 
 
I(i0 LLMES'S LECTURES 
 
 which far exceeds in scale and splendour of 
 effect any which the moderns have attempted : 
 for the greatest efforts of art hitherto employed 
 in the grand pictures (the stilo machinoso) of 
 the Italians, cannot vie with compositions of 
 this nature, any more than the materials by 
 which either were effected can be compared 
 together." 
 
 The style of these sculptures is ijiannered, 
 and possesses no variety of expression. "A 
 smile is seen on all the mouths, like that of an 
 opera dancer ; the cheeks are hollowed ; the 
 lips are thick ; the nose is short, but angular 
 and prominent; the eyes are protruded," pro- 
 bably for effect; "the forehead is flat and re- 
 tiring; and the chin is remarkably long, and 
 rather pointed ; the hair and drapery are ar- 
 ranged with the greatest precision. 
 
 " The style of the architecture is pure and 
 beautiful, and its order a grand and chaste 
 Doric. In it we find a very remarkable and 
 very ancient example of the practice whicli 
 prevailed among the Greeks of painting their 
 sculptures; for the style and execution of the 
 colours of tiie temple prove that they cannot 
 be of any other date than the original con- 
 struction." 
 
 J 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 161 
 
 " In order to relieve the statues, the tympa« 
 num of the pediment was of a clear light blue : 
 large portions of the colour were still seen on 
 the fragments," says Mr. Smirke, *' as we raised 
 them from the ground. The moulding, both 
 over and under the cornice, was painted ; the 
 leaf was red and white, and the superior 
 moulding of the cornice was painted in en- 
 caustic ; the colours being on marble, and more 
 exposed, had long disappeared, but the relief 
 in which the part so covered was found indi- 
 cated very perfectly its outline." 
 
 A publication of the details of this interest- 
 ing and important discovery may ere long be 
 expected on an enlarged scale by their royal 
 owners ; casts from them, I am happy to learn, 
 are also expected, according to an agreement 
 made by the discoverers. The exertions of 
 'Messrs. Cockerell and Foster to acquire the 
 originals for this country are well known and 
 justly appreciated ; we can only lament their 
 failure, which can in no way be laid to the 
 charge of these gentlemen. 
 
 The Eginetans formed a school, and after 
 them in succession, but perhaps before them in 
 point of merit, are the Corinthians. 
 
 The inhabitants of Corinth were very early 
 
 M 
 
162 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 distinguished* for their riches and their mari- 
 time force. Few situations are more favour- 
 able for commerce than that of Corinth ; and 
 Homer-j- and Thucydidesj: frequently gave 
 Corinth the epithet of opulent. 
 
 The genius§ and inclination of the Corin- 
 thians led them rather to cultivate commerce 
 and the peaceful arts than military enterprises. 
 Satisfied with gaining wealth by honourable 
 means, they next sought to enjoy it with taste, 
 and gave themselves up to the luxuries and 
 refinements which their opulence afforded 
 them. They applied themselves also to render 
 their city the most beautiful and magnificent of 
 Greece, and spared nothing to accomplish it. 
 Corinth was filled with temples, palaces, 
 theatres, porticoes, and a vast number of other 
 structures, as commendable for the rarity of 
 the marbles employed in their construction as 
 for the elegance of their architecture. These 
 magnificent edifices were moreover enriched 
 with an infinite number of columns and 
 statues of the most precious materials, and 
 
 * Goguet. 
 
 t Iliad, 1.2. b. V. ver. 77. 
 
 X Thuc. lib. i. p. 12. 
 
 § Goguet, vol. iii. p. 157. 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 163 
 
 executed by the hands of the most famous 
 masters. Luxury, opulence, and effeminacy 
 displayed themselves in every part of Corinth. 
 She was, without exception, the richest and 
 most voluptuous city that could be found in all 
 Greece. 
 
 The invention of the Corinthian order shall 
 be spoken of in its proper place, but of the 
 sacred architecture of the inhabitants of Corinth 
 we have little left to guide us. There are 
 ruins of a grand and solemn temple of the 
 Doric order; its style is of an early period, 
 as the shortness of the columns, with the 
 great height and form of the architrave, clearly 
 prove. The proportions of its columns and 
 capitals are nearly similar to those at Pces- 
 tum, which will be described in a subsequent 
 Lecture ; while the graceful form of its echi- 
 nus, and its great projection, have a very 
 striking appearance. 
 
 To the sacred architecture of the Greeks, as 
 exhibited in their various temples, we are in- 
 debted for the purest and best canons of archi- 
 tecture that the world has ever seen. 
 
 The elements of this pure style are three 
 classes or modes, called orders ; while those 
 of the Romans, their despoiling imitators, are 
 five. 
 
 M 2 
 
J64 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Nature dictates but three modes of building, 
 %vhich are clearly and distinctly visible in every 
 style of the art; namely, the robust, the chaste, 
 and the elegant. These the Gi^eks have em- 
 bodied in their Doric, their Ionic, and their 
 Corinthian. The Romans, restless after inno- 
 vation, sighing for more worlds of art to 
 conquer, and pining after more than all, would 
 have one more elegant than the elegant, and 
 more robust than the robust. Hence their 
 Tuscan, which is, as a musician would say, 
 but a variation upon the theme of the Doric, 
 and their Composite, which is any thing but an 
 improvement upon the Corinthian. 
 
 Architecture, that is to say, classical archi- 
 tecture, is generally divided into certain modes 
 or systems, called orders, named from the 
 country where they are supposed first to have 
 been used : — as the Tuscan from Tuscany, the 
 Doric from Doria, the Ionic from Ionia, the 
 Corinthian from Corinth, and the Composite or 
 Roman from Rome. Now, although the pre- 
 ceding orders form five in number, yet three 
 only are to be received as such in the pure or 
 Greek system of architecture. The Tuscan, 
 as I have already said, and will hereafter show, 
 when I arrive at the Roman system, is merely 
 a variation of the DoriC; and the Composite a 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE- 105 
 
 corruption of the Corinthian, and too much 
 like it in its essence and character to be distin- 
 guished by an untutored eye, or to be acknow- 
 ledged a distinct genus or order by the critic. 
 
 Our dehghtful poet Thomson, (whom, by 
 the way, it is the fashion among some hyper- 
 critics to decry,) who may be called the poet 
 of the tine arts, and whose taste was formed 
 by a long residence at the seats of ancient art 
 w ith the son of the Lord Chancellor Talbot, so 
 beautifully and characteristically depicts the 
 three orders in his " Liberty," that I cannot 
 refrain from quoting him, as applicable to the 
 purpose of detailing and defining them. In 
 the second part of that poem he personifies 
 public virtue in Greece as a goddess, and the 
 sister-arts of Painting, Sculpture, and Architec- 
 ture as 
 
 " The Graces they 
 To dress this fairest Venus." 
 
 And, farther on, he states that architecture 
 was 
 
 " By Greece refined. 
 And, smiling, high to bright perfection brought. 
 Such thy sure rules that Goths of every age 
 Who scorned their aid, have only loaded earth 
 
166 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 With laboured, heavy monuments of shame. 
 Not those gay domes that o'er thy splendid shore 
 Shot all proportions up." 
 
 ■ ■ " First, unadorned 
 
 And nobly plain, the manly Doric rose ; 
 
 Th' Ionic then, with decent matron grace 
 
 Her airy pillar heaved ; luxuriant last. 
 
 The rich Corinthian spread her wanton wreath. 
 
 The whole so measured true, so lessened oflf 
 
 By fine proportion, that the marble pile. 
 
 Formed to repel the still or stormy waste 
 
 Of rolling ages, light as fabrics looked 
 
 That from the magic wand aerial rise. 
 
 These were the wonders that illumined Greece 
 
 From end to end." 
 
 These orders undoubtedly derived their 
 origin from the chance-built huts and cabins of 
 the first inhabitants of the world, and which 
 as doubtlessly contained in themselves the 
 constituent elements of architecture, till drawn 
 forth by the hand and eye of taste, as the 
 marble block contained the statue whence 
 Canova drew forth his " Hebe, ever young." 
 As we cannot now derive our knowledge from 
 a better source than from Vitruvius, he must 
 be our guide through this obscure path. In 
 my description of the orders I must confine 
 myself briefly and generally to the three classi- 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 167 
 
 cal orders of antiquity, or run the risk of again, 
 exceeding: the bounds I ought to prescribe to 
 myself for one Lecture. 
 
 Vitruvius, our best authority, indifferent as 
 he is for historical truth, informs us that when 
 Dorus, the son of Helenus and the nymph 
 Optice, reigned over Achaia and all Pelopon- 
 nesus, he built in the ancient city of Argos a 
 temple to Juno, which was formed, by chance, 
 of the order since called Doric, and after- 
 wards used in the other cities of Achaia while 
 yet the ratio of its symmetries was undis- 
 covered. 
 
 Afterwards (he continues) the Athenians, 
 according to the responses of the Delphian 
 Apollo, by the common consent of all Greece, 
 sent out thirteen colonies at one time into Asia, 
 and, appointing a leader to each colony, they 
 gave the command to Ion, the son of Xanthus 
 and Creusa, whom Apollo of Delphos also 
 acknowledged to be his son. These colonies 
 were led into Asia by Ion, who seized upon 
 the country of Caria, where he built the large 
 cities of Ephesus, Miletus, Myunta, Priene, 
 Samos, Teos, &c. 
 
 These states were called, from their leader, 
 Ionia, and here they began to erect and dedi- 
 
168 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 cate temples to their deities, and first they 
 built one to Apollo Panionios in the manner 
 they had seen in Achaia, which manner or 
 mode they called Doric because they had first 
 observed it in the Dorian states. In this tem- 
 ple they intended to use columns, but not 
 knowing their symmetries, and while consider- 
 ing how they should proportion them, so that 
 they might support the weight and at the same 
 time have a graceful appearance, they measured 
 the length of the human foot, which, as they 
 found to be nearly the sixth part of the height 
 of a man, they used this proportion for their 
 columns, making the thickness of the shaft at 
 the bottom one-sixth part of the height, in- 
 cluding the capital. Thus the Doric column, 
 having the proportions of the human body, began 
 to be used in building with solidity and beauty. 
 Afterwards, being desirous of building a 
 temple to Diana, they invented a new order on 
 similar principles, using the proportions of a 
 female. They made the bottom diameter of 
 the column the eighth part of its height, and, 
 that it might appear the more graceful, they 
 added mouldings round its base, to represent 
 the shoe, and volutes to the capitals to imitate 
 the twisted braids of hair falling on each side, 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 169 
 
 and the cymatium and encarpse the locks of 
 hair braided and arranged over the forehead. 
 They also fluted the shaft from top to bottom 
 like the folds in the garments. Thus were the 
 two species or orders of columns invented, — one 
 representing the strength and simplicity of 
 man, the other the elegance and fine propor- 
 tion of woman. This latter order was called 
 Ionic, says Vitruvius, because it was invented 
 by the lonians. But subsequent architects, 
 who wished for lighter proportions, have often 
 made the height of the Doric column seven 
 diameters, and that of the Ionic eight and a 
 half, destroying the character and beauty of 
 each. 
 
 The third classical order, which is called 
 the Corinthian, is imitative of the delicacy of 
 shape and slenderness of proportion of a young 
 virgin. " For the limbs," says this ancient 
 writer, " at that early age, are formed more 
 slightly, and admit of more graceful decora- 
 tions." The invention of its capital is thus 
 related by Vitruvius. 
 
 A Corinthian virgin just marriageable, being 
 attacked with a fatal disorder, died. After 
 her interment, her nurse collected some vases 
 and toys, which pleased her when living, put 
 
170 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 them in a basket, and placed it on the top of 
 her tomb, covering it, that it might endure the 
 longer in the open air, with a tile. The basket 
 being placed on a root of acanthus, depressed 
 it in the middle, occasioning the leaves and 
 stalks which grew up in the spring to encircle 
 and twine round the basket ; but being resisted 
 by the angles of the tile, they convolved at the 
 extremities in the form of volutes. This was seen 
 by CaUimachus, who, on account of his taste 
 and skill in sculpture, was called Catatechnos ; 
 who, delighted with the novelty of its figure 
 and its delicate and appropriate form, encircled 
 by the beautiful foliage, formed from its model 
 a new capital to some columns he had sculp- 
 tured for Corinth, thus composing this most 
 elegant of the orders. 
 
 The above hypothesis I conceive to be no- 
 thing but a splendid fable; not agreeing with Mr. 
 Wilkins, who says, that " of all the opinions 
 entertained by Vitruvius on the origin of the 
 orders of architecture, that relating to the in- 
 vention of the Corinthian capital seems alone 
 entitled to any attention; both because the 
 reputed age of CaUimachus, its supposed in- 
 ventor, approaches within certain limits to the 
 first recorded instances of the introduction of 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 171 
 
 the order into Greece; and because" — pray 
 mark this because — *' the recital is less open 
 to the charge of absurdity and fiction." With 
 all due deference to such an authority, I con- 
 ceive the account just quoted of the origin of 
 the Doric and the Ionic not only less open to 
 the charge of absurdity and fiction, but as 
 nearly historically true; while the Vitruvian 
 hypothesis of the vase of toys, the protecting 
 tile, and the accommodating acanthus, appears 
 to me more worthy the reveries of a poet (and 
 a fine poetical episode it certainly is) than of 
 the historian of so matter-of-fact an art as is 
 architecture. 
 
 The Corinthian order is clearly derived 
 from the architecture of Egypt, adapted, 
 refined, and nationalized, as I will endeavour 
 to prove. First, Cecrops, the founder of Athens, 
 was an Egyptian ; next, Daedalus, the earliest 
 Athenian artist, visited Egypt to investigate 
 and study the principles of the fine arts. 
 Added to these facts, it is also well 
 known that the Greeks borrowed their laws, 
 their manners, and their customs, from the 
 Egyptians, and purified them in the alembics 
 pf their own brighter genius. 
 
 A colony at first always imitates its mother 
 
172 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 country, and afterwards as surely does all in 
 its power to render its origin forgotten. When 
 1 refer to the present examples, surely the 
 Egyptian origin of the Corinthian capital can- 
 not be denied. Their elements are incontesta- 
 bly the same, namely a vase surrounded by 
 flowers and covered with an abacus : the 
 story of the Corinthian girl was probably in- 
 vented by a Grecian poet, and related as genu- 
 ine by Vitruvius. 
 
 In corroboration of the Egyptian origin of 
 the Greek order, I take leave to bring forward 
 as an additional authority, the learned M. Qua- 
 tremere de Quincy, the present secretary to the 
 French Academy, who supposes that even the 
 Ionic also was borrowed from the Egyptians, 
 and is a beautiful adaptation of their capitals 
 of the head of Isis. As the learned French- 
 man's hypothesis possesses considerable inge- 
 nuity, I will endeavour to explain and illustrate 
 it. The ears of the Egyptian capital he meta- 
 morphoses into the Grecian volutes; the braids 
 of hair on the forehead into the helixes or 
 threads of the capital ; the throat into the 
 colarino or necking ; and so on. 
 
 Following up this hypothesis, the Doric may 
 also be said to have been drawn from the rude 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. J73 
 
 types or prefigurations of the Egyptians, which 
 contain all the elements of the beautiful exam- 
 ples of the Greeks. Belzoni says, that the Isis 
 of the Egyptians is the same personage with 
 the lo of the Greeks ; therefore, capitals de- 
 signed after the head of this goddess are Isis- 
 like, lo-like, or lonick. 
 
 Referring to the buildings, it will be seen 
 tliat the metopes, or spaces between the tri- 
 glyphs of the Parthenon, are filled with sculp- 
 tures ; which sculptures were those exquisite 
 combats of Centaurs and Lapithae in the Elgin 
 collection. These metopes in the earliest 
 Grecian buildings were open, and the triglyphs 
 justly represented the ends of the beams, their 
 types, as the following quotation from the 
 Iphigenia in Tauris proves. Pylades is coun- 
 selling Orestes to scale the Doric temple of 
 Diana, and says to his friend, 
 
 "But when the eye 
 Of night comes darkling on, then must we dare, 
 And take the polish'd image from tlie shrine. 
 Attempting all things; and the vacant space 
 Between the triglyphs, mark it well, enough 
 Is open to admit us ; hy that way 
 Attempt we to descend." 
 
 Iphigenia in Tauris, Potter's version. 
 
 The next portion of my subject is the earlier 
 
174 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 architecture of the Grecian cities and colonies. 
 The most ancient specimens we know of are 
 those of Corinth ; but a detailed description 
 and investigation of their qualities must be de- 
 ferred till the next Lecture ; and after treating 
 of these speciaiens of the finest period of the 
 art, I would say to the student and amateur, 
 investigate, compare, and reason for yourself, 
 and choose under which banner you would 
 serve. 
 
 I must, ere I conclude, like Hamlet still harp- 
 ing upon the daughter of Polonius, still harp 
 upon the necessity of public patronage, to ena- 
 ble our great and glorious country to elevate 
 itself to a level with the Greeks in art. Such 
 a judicious, liberal, and efficient patronage, 
 as " comes down as the rain, and distils as 
 the dew, as the small rain upon the tender 
 herb, and the showers upon the grass.'* A 
 patronage which a great government and an 
 enlightened nation alone can give, and which 
 is to the arts what the Nile is to Egypt, the 
 prolific source of all excellence. 
 
 That neglected historian of the fine arts, 
 Bromley, asks, " What was the cause that in 
 a hundred and thirty years the arts rose from 
 
 * Dcut, xxxii. C. 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 175 
 
 infancy to full maturity, and accomplished all 
 the vigour, perfection, and fame with which 
 they have ever been attended upon earth? 
 What was the cause," he asks, ''which gave 
 them that extraordinary growth ?" It was that 
 without which the fine arts are more imbecile 
 and weak than all the other gifts of man ; with 
 which, their lustre rivals any that from other 
 sources can ever encircle the human head. It 
 wdiS patronage — settled, systematic patronage; 
 patronage that rises not merely to the employ- 
 ment but to the advancement of talent; patro- 
 nage fed by a genuine sense of elegant im- 
 provements, as well as by views of glory. 
 Till such a patronage arose in former days, 
 vain was all other admiration, applause, or 
 encouragement of the arts, although backed 
 by the rich and great, or perhaps by the 
 show of royal gold. Till such a patronage 
 arose, how did the arts struggle no less than 
 three centuries for a faint existence, scarcely 
 able to keep towards strength, although they 
 wanted not occasionally the encouragement of 
 individuals, and at all times the applause of 
 all? What could they gain from the casual 
 favour of a Candaules more than the weight 
 of his money? The picture could make no 
 more proselytes in Greece, let its merit be 
 
176 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 what it might; it was gone with the enrap- 
 tured monarch into Lydia, where his zeal, 
 once roused so high for the works of the 
 pencil, had probably soon subsided, being 
 satisfied with what it had obtained. 
 
 Yet I have heard it asserted, and by per- 
 sons of high authority, as critics and as 
 patrons, that patronage will not create artists, 
 and that it is better to deter than to delude. 
 Granted ; but I would reply, that the greatest 
 artists have been produced in the golden sun- 
 shine of patronage. Phidias flourished under 
 the munificence of Pericles ; Dinocrates under 
 that of Alexander ; and hundreds under the 
 splendid employment of Hadrian. To descend 
 to later times, Michelangiolo became so rich 
 by the practice of his art, that he presented his 
 porter with two thousand crowns. RafTaelle, 
 in a letter extant, acknowledges himself to be 
 worth twelve thousand crowns of gold, ob- 
 tained by the same honourable means, having 
 had the most munificent prices for all his 
 pictures in the Vatican. He had also been 
 largely employed as an architect; he lived 
 like a prince in splendour and in affluence. 
 Giulio Romano also lived at the court of 
 Mantua, in all the enjoyments and elegancies 
 of wealth. Titian lived like a nobleman, and 
 
Ill] ON ARCHITECTURE. 177 
 
 died rich from his professional gains. Rubens 
 lived in a perpetual golden shower of patron- 
 age, and observe the golden fruits he thereby 
 j)roduced. Thus also lived Vandyke; thus 
 also Sir Joshua Reynolds : and with re- 
 spect to the Greek painters and architects, in 
 addition to the enthusiasm with which they 
 were hailed, they were rewarded with the most 
 unaccountable prices for their works. 
 
 The greatest men in the arts have been those 
 who made the greatest impression while they 
 weve alive, and were rewarded most munificent- 
 ly for their works. 
 
 So much for the cant of Vasari and his fol- 
 lowers about the greatest works being performed 
 in obscurity, and while their authors were suf- 
 fering under the oppressions of poverty. 
 
 The present day is too late, and the present 
 age too enlightened, for such assertions to ob- 
 tain belief. 
 
 N 
 
LECTURE IV. 
 
 The Causes of the Superiority of the Greeks 
 in Architecture traced^ and considered com- 
 paratively with their other Arts and with their 
 Literature. Constituent Elements of their purest 
 Style. The Orders and their Divisions illus- 
 trated and described. Their different Exam- 
 ples. The Seven Orders of Temples. Rides of 
 Intercolumniation and other Architectural De- 
 tails. Greek Architecture traced through its 
 Colonies^ Poestum, Sfc. till its Establishment in 
 Etruria. Character of the Etruscan School. 
 
 N 2 
 
LECTURE IV. 
 
 The great superiority of the Greeks in ar- 
 chitecture is to be traced to causes similar 
 to those which occasioned their pre-eminence 
 in every thing else : namely, a deep investi- 
 gation into first principles, — an accurate per- 
 ception of the elements of all that they at- 
 tempted to execute. 
 
 A similar investigation, and a similar per 
 ception or knowledge, and nothing else, will 
 produce the like effects in our country and in 
 our times. In Greece, no painter proceeded 
 without acquiring a knowledge of anatomy and 
 drawing ; which have been declared, even in 
 our Royal Academy of Arts, to be unnecessary 
 studies. Their sculptors carved their own 
 marble, and their architects understood design, 
 construction, perspective, and composition, 
 and had a clear preconception of effect. 
 
 I know it has been said that the Greeks did not 
 understand anatomy, and did not dissect ; that 
 we are uncertain as to their knowledge of geome- 
 
182 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 try, because Euclid, the earliest author in that 
 science with whom we are at present acquainted, 
 lived considerably after the construction of their 
 best edifices ; and that our certainty as to their 
 knowledge of perspective is still less. It has 
 also been said, in corroboration, that the Greeks 
 had laws prohibiting dissection ; therefore they 
 did not dissect. "The exception," says one 
 of our great luminaries. Lord Coke, in his cele- 
 brated treatise on Lyttleton, " proves the rule." 
 Therefore, even did not those sculptural won- 
 ders which now grace our national Museum, 
 and the anatomical details which are so abund- 
 ant in the poems of Homer, prove the depth of 
 their anatomical knowledge, this very excep- 
 tion proves that they did dissect, and that it was 
 even necessary to enact laws against the prac- 
 tice. Among the most remarkable proofs of 
 the deep knowledge of the Greeks in anatomy, 
 the Theseus and the Ilyssus of the Elgin col- 
 lection exhibit the perfection of art, and show 
 the most scientific research into anatomy and 
 the natural history of man, " by their dehcate 
 and appropriate hinting at muscles under the 
 skin, as they appear through that integument, 
 even showing muscles that are so deeply 
 seated as not to be visible but in the peculiar 
 
IVJ ON ARCHITECTURE. 183 
 
 action therein represented."* They are the 
 only marbles I ever saw that looked palpably 
 like flesh ; and when I first saw them unpack- 
 ed, covered with dust and rubbish, and in a 
 damp pent house, in company with the first 
 historical painter of the day, whose words I 
 have just quoted, they struck me as visions of 
 other times. The genius of 
 
 "Ancient Greece! whose form sublime. 
 Gigantic striding, walks the waves of time,"t 
 
 hovered around us, and they appeared to me 
 then as they have ever since, heroic forms of 
 heavenly proportions, held by the magic wand 
 of a Prospero in temporary inaction, and that 
 in a moment the spell would be withdrawn, 
 and they would leap into life. They appear 
 like petrifactions of heroic nature, and yet they 
 are but fragments of Grecian taste ; of that 
 skill which envious detractors, with ''see- 
 saw sceptic scruples hint,"| knew nothing of 
 anatomy. Their ignorance of drawing and of 
 construction was probably as great, and 1 shall 
 leave one with the other. 
 
 Did even their ignorance of geometry and 
 perspective depend upon similar grounds, name- 
 
 * Haydon on the Elgin Marbles, 
 t Shee. J Heroic Epistle. 
 
184 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 ly, the period of Euclid, who lived after the 
 time of the building of their greatest works, 
 and mentions nothing of perspective in his 
 treatises, I would leave the matter to the same 
 proofs, and let their works speak for them. But, 
 as I have before proved, the Greeks availed 
 themselves of all the accomplishments of their 
 masters, the Egyptians ; and they had attained 
 great proficiency in geometry long before 
 Euclid had laid down, or rather embodied in 
 one wo''k, the profound and irrefutable demon- 
 strations that pass under his name. The au- 
 thors of many of those theorems are well known, 
 but this is not the time to dilate upon them. 
 
 The works of the early Greeks, the whole 
 of their works, bespeak their profound know- 
 ledge of this science; and Homer, Hesiod, 
 Herodotus, Diodorus, Vitruvius, Strabo, Sene- 
 ca, Pliny, and Plutarch, agree in their excel- 
 lence, and inform us of all that was known in 
 their own time, and before it, of the arts and 
 sciences. The well-known anecdote of the 
 contest between Phidias and Alcamenes, to 
 j)roduce a statue of Minerva, that was to be 
 placed on the summit of a high column, in 
 which Phidias allowed for the height, the dis- 
 tance, and the optical effect occasioned there- 
 by, proves their acquaintance with perspective 
 
 I 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 18o 
 
 also ; indeed all the rest of their works, wherein 
 height, distance, and picturesque effect were 
 studied with the greatest accuracy, equally esta- 
 blish the fact. Columns of a great size were made 
 to diminish less than those of a smaller height; 
 angle columns were formed of a greater thick- 
 ness than those situate between other columns 
 or pilasters; all for an optical effect that no- 
 thing but a profound knowledge of perspective 
 could have produced. In addition to these 
 ocular demonstrations of their knowledge of 
 this most essential branch of the elements of all 
 the arts, if farther authority be required, Vitru- 
 vius says, in the praemio or preface to his 7th 
 book, that when iEschylus wrote his tragedies, 
 which was about the time when Xerxes invaded 
 Greece, or about the year of the world 3490, 
 " Agarthacus made scenes, and left a treatise 
 upon them;" and that "after him Democritus 
 and Anaxagoras went still farther in that way, 
 showing the power of imitating nature, by 
 making all the lines to vanish to one point, as 
 to a centre, when viewed at a fixed distance ; 
 by which means they were enabled to represent 
 in their scenes the images of real buildings, as 
 they usually appear to the eye ; whether they 
 w ere painted on horizontal or upright surfaces, 
 they exhibited objects near and at a distance." 
 
186 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 But there would be no end of refuting absur- 
 dities like the foregoing, which, but from their 
 having been put forth from a place of some 
 authority, I would not have dwelt upon at all. 
 It would not be surprising next to hear, with 
 the Parthenon in view, that the Greeks did 
 not understand construction, could not build, 
 and had no taste or knowledge in architecture. 
 
 I have before demonstrated, by the proofs 
 given us from existing remains that, as the 
 historians of Greece did not exaggerate in 
 their praises of their architecture and sculp- 
 ture, so we may give implicit faith to their 
 accounts of the great eminence of their painters, 
 who could not, from this authority of Vitruvius, 
 have been ignorant of perspective, any more 
 than they were of anatomy, or any other re- 
 quisite element of art. To the Greeks, there- 
 fore, and to them alone, let the student look for 
 grandeur of composition, and, indeed, for all the 
 laws of architecture, painting, and sculpture. 
 Apollodorus, the master of Zeuxis, said of 
 this his illustrious pupil, " that when the doors 
 of his art had been opened to him, he walked 
 in and carried asvay all that belonged to it." 
 
 The grand divisions of the architecture of 
 Greece are, first, the three orders of columns, 
 technically called the orders: secondly, the 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 187 
 
 several orders of temples, or their sacred edi- 
 fices; and, THIRDLY, the various methods of 
 intercoliimniations, or manner of regulating the 
 distances of columns. 
 
 It is these great or primary divisions, and 
 their due observance, which entitle the archi- 
 tecture of the Greeks to the dignified epithet 
 of the u'lsdom of the orders. All other systems 
 of architecture, the Roman excepted, (which, as 
 we should always bear in mind, is entirely bor- 
 rowed from that of Greece,) are styles ; classi- 
 fied according to the countries whence they 
 proceed, and subdivided according to the 
 dates of their construction. Such are the 
 Egyptian and Persepolitan, the Chinese, the 
 style called Gothic, and their several tribes or 
 classes. These evidently are not reducible to 
 the rules of an order of architecture. 
 
 First. — The Orders. — The Greek orders of 
 columnar architecture are three — the Doric, 
 the Ionic, and the Cormthian. Each of these 
 orders is divided and subdivided as in the 
 following table, which will be hereafter ex- 
 plained seriatim. 
 
188 
 
 ELIMF.S S LECTURES 
 
 ^ 
 O 
 
 
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 CO 
 
 *" 5 = f^ 
 
 
 
 'l-s 
 
 
 5 3 
 
 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 o O 
 
 £ S 
 
 
 
 3d a 
 
 'ra 
 
 "C =^ 
 
 o 
 
 a. o 
 
 r T 
 
 1 ?" 
 
 -« 
 
 c c 
 
 c 
 
 t/: 
 
 
 U5 1 
 
 
 — 4! 
 
 -i 
 
 
 5 "W 
 
 t/D 
 
 
 1 
 
 — u 
 
 C O 
 
 3 
 
 *- c 
 
 ^" 
 
 <ta <o 
 
 'y: 
 
 HU 
 
 
 5: 
 
 00 < fa 
 
 c 
 
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 ON ARCHITECTURE, 
 
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 ELMES S LECTURES. 
 
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IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. ' 191 
 
 An order of architecture may be defined as 
 one or more columns raised perpendicularly 
 to the horizon, with horizontal beams or stones, 
 called an architrave, laid upon them, reaching 
 from column to column, supporting a plain sur- 
 face, called the frieze, which is immediately 
 under a parallel range of mouldings, called the 
 cornice. 
 
 Every order is divided into two great or 
 principal parts, the column and the entabla- 
 ture, which again have their separate and se- 
 veral sub-divisions : — 
 
 1. The column is in general divided into 
 three parts — the hcise, the shaft j and the capital; 
 except the Doric, which has no base. Columns 
 are of three classes, called orders, and are in- 
 tended to support the entablature. 
 
 1. The base is the lowest part of the column, 
 and consists of a collection of mouldings, pro- 
 jecting equally all round, and encircling the 
 bottom of the shaft. 
 
 2. The shaft is a frustrum of a cone, and is 
 that plain or fluted part of the column, which 
 is situate between the base and the capital. 
 
 3. The capital is the ornamental part, which 
 crowns or finishes the upper part of a column, 
 and differs in the various orders, as will be 
 hereafter described. The capital is as useful 
 
192 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 as it is ornamental, embellishing the superior 
 extremity of the column, and at the same time 
 preventing its angles from being fractured, and 
 the architrave from being damaged. 
 
 II. The ENTABLATURE, Or horizontal part 
 of the order, which is supported by the column, 
 is also composed of three principal parts or 
 divisions ; namely, the architrave, the friezt, 
 and the cornice: — 
 
 1. The architrave is the undermost division 
 of the entablature, and is composed of one or 
 more faciae, according to the order to which it 
 belongs, and capped with a simple or com- 
 pound moulding. 
 
 2. The^ieze is the part comprised between 
 the upper surface of the architrave, and the 
 under side of the cornice : it is sometimes 
 plain, and sometimes embellished with sculp- 
 ture or inscriptions. 
 
 3. The cornice is that assemblage of mould- 
 ings, which crowns the entablature from the 
 frieze upwards, and is divided into simple and 
 compound mouldings, plain faces, &c. accord- 
 ing to the order. 
 
 Having thus divided an order into its two 
 grand divisions, the column and the entabla- 
 ture, and sub-divided the column into its base, 
 its shaft, and its capital, and the entablature 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 193 
 
 into its architrave, its frieze, and its cornice, 
 tlie next step will be to divide each of these 
 primary subdivisions into its several compo- 
 nent parts. 
 
 Every order is composed of these primary 
 and divisional parts, which differ in each of 
 the orders, as will presently be described. 
 
 I have before remarked that every column, 
 except the Doric, has three parts — the t)ase, 
 the shaft, and the capital. The lowest or 
 thickest part of the shaft is used by architects 
 as the universal standard whence all the mea- 
 sures which regulate and determine heights and 
 projections are taken; and this standard or 
 scale must be known before any of the great 
 architectural works of Stuart, Revett, the 
 Dilettanti Society, Wilkins, Allason, &c. can 
 be understood. 
 
 This universal architectural scale or standard 
 is, and is called, a diameter ; and, unlike the 
 foot, inch, or yard, is as various as are diame- 
 ters of columns. The diameter, of course, 
 implies the chord of the circle, which forms 
 the bottom of the column. Half of this 
 diameter is called a module, and is also used 
 as a primary standard of mensuration by 
 some writers upon architecture. These mea- 
 sures of length are subdivided as follows — 
 
 o 
 
194 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 namely, the diameter into sixty parts, and the 
 moduleinto thirty parts, each part being the same 
 in length, and are called minutes ; both man- 
 ners of mensuration being the same under diffe- 
 rent denominations ; as, for instance, one author 
 say§, a column, including base and capital, 
 (which are always understood by the word 
 column,) is six diameters twelve minutes high, 
 while another would say of the same column 
 and its measurement, that it is twelve modules 
 twelve minutes, both meaning the self-same 
 dimension. In the following lectures, and in 
 all modern works, the diameter and its divi- 
 sions comprise sixty minutes. These techni- 
 calities may appear dry to some, and unneces- 
 sary to others of my readers, but their mention 
 is indispensable to the due understanding of 
 what will follow. 
 
 The bases of the various orders differ from 
 each other in their essential parts, and even 
 among themselves in non-essentials, although 
 not in character. The base of a column is 
 composed of a series of mouldings encircling 
 the bottom diameter according to its order. 
 
 The Doric, as 1 have before said, has no 
 base. The Ionic differs in various specimens ; 
 but that which has been the most used for this 
 order is called the Attic base, and is composed 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 195 
 
 of a cubical plinth, on which are a circular torus, 
 a fillet, a scotia, and a compound moulding 
 called an astragal, consisting of a small torus 
 and two fillets, one above and the other be- 
 low. A small cavetto or hollow connects the 
 upper fillet, which is somewhat larger than a 
 diameter, to the lower extremity of the shaft. 
 
 From this simple and beautiful base all the 
 others appear to have emanated, as it contains 
 the component members and leading charac- 
 teristics of them all. It has also been more 
 universally used than any of the others, having 
 been borrowed from its Ionian proprietor by 
 the Corinthian, and even occasionally by the 
 Roman Doric. A fine instance of this adapta- 
 tion of the Attic base to a Corinthian order 
 may be found in the peristyle which encircles 
 the tambour of the cupola of our St. Paul's 
 cathedral. The exquisite taste of the illus- 
 trious architect of this cathedral led him to 
 adopt it at that great height, on account of its 
 parts being few and simple, in preference to the 
 real Corinthian base, whose members are more 
 numerous, smaller, and more complex ; with 
 its reeds, double scotias, and other reduplica- 
 tion of parts, which are not only characteristic 
 of the order, but really beautiful, when usied 
 near to the eye. The saving also of expense, 
 
 o2 
 
196 
 
 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 in this instance, was no small recommendation ; 
 for as Wren was limited in his pecuniary means, 
 he was enabled to apply the saving to other 
 portions of his work. 
 
 The lowest member of the base is the plinth, 
 which is a parallelopipedon, showing on every 
 face a perpendicular parallelogram. It is called 
 by ancient writers Zocolo or Plynthos, being a 
 cubical brick, or tablet, placed under the co- 
 lumn, to prevent it from rotting when of wood, 
 and from penetrating the ground when of 
 stone. 
 
 The member next above the plinth is the 
 large swelling circular moulding, called the 
 torus, from the Greek to^o?, a cable, which its 
 form resembles ; or perhaps from the Latin 
 tonis, a bed or cushion, which its outline, ap- 
 parently swelling by the superincumbent weight, 
 may justify. Its proper situation is always 
 immediately upon the plinth. The outline of the 
 torus varies essentially in the Greek and Ro- 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 197 
 
 man systems of the orders. In the Roman 
 it is always semicircular, and in the Grecian 
 never of that common-place and tasteless 
 outline, but always eliptical, parabolical, or 
 other contour of a conic section. The toruses 
 of the columnar bases of the temple of Minerva 
 Polias, one of which is now at the British 
 Museum, and those of the choragic monument 
 of Lysicrates, delineated in Stuart's splendid 
 work, the Antiquities of Athens, are fine ex- 
 amples of the eliptical form of this member. 
 
 The next member upwards is the fillet, which 
 is a perpendicular, circular, plain face, con- 
 tinued all round the base, like an iron hoop, or 
 fillet, intended to keep it from splitting ; from 
 which circumstance it undoubtedly took its 
 name. 
 
 The next is a compound concave member, 
 also encircling the base immediately upon the 
 fillet, the upper edge of which forms the under- 
 most of the scotia. This member is called 
 scotia, from the Greek o-xoto?, darkness, or 
 shadow, which the upper part occasions over 
 its deep and intense cavity. It is also called 
 by some ancient writers trochilus, from the 
 Greek T^oxtXo?, a rundle or pulley ; to the hollow 
 part of which, wherein the rope works, it bears 
 
198 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 a striking resemblance. It is sometimes, by 
 certain Italian and English authors, falsely 
 and improperly called cavetto, which means 
 simply a hollow, or an inverted ovolo, or quad- 
 rant ; and some Italian writers call it hastone. 
 
 The next member, and that which completes 
 the Attic base, is the astragal, so called from 
 the Greek ao-r^a-yaAof, the bone or curvature 
 of the heel ; from which cause the French 
 architects call it talon: terms correctly used 
 when the member is thus applied ; but when 
 placed at the upper part of the shaft, under 
 the capital, it is then called colari?io, a collar or 
 necking. 
 
 The investigation of the Attic base in detail 
 may serve for all the others, for they are all 
 founded upon it, and do not differ very essen- 
 tially in principle from its component parts. 
 The Tuscan base is mostly composed of a 
 plinth, a torus, a fillet, and the universal con- 
 necting hollow to the shaft. 
 
 The base, called by the Italian and Anglo- 
 Italian architects the Doric base, consists ge- 
 nerally of a plinth, a torus, and an astragal, 
 without its lower fillet, which is, in fact, the 
 Attic deprived of its scotia and two of its 
 fillets. 
 
 Some of the Greek, or true Ionic bases. 
 
IV] 
 
 ON ARCHITECTURfe; 
 
 J 99 
 
 differ from the Attic in their arrangements, but 
 are generally inferior where their difference is 
 essential. The annexed is one of the best of 
 the variations on the attic base. 
 
 u 
 
 1 
 
 The Corinthian base consists of a plinth, a 
 torus, a fillet, then a large scotia, next a fillet, 
 sometimes two beads, then a second and small- 
 er scotia, and the concluding astragal, fillets, 
 and usual hollow on the top to connect it with 
 the shaft. 
 
 The Composite base differs so little from the 
 Corinthian, where the Attic base is not used, 
 that it is not worth detailing. 
 
 Having thus defined the lower division of 
 the column — its base, our next step will be to 
 the shaft. The shaft of a column is that 
 columnar conical body which is situate between 
 the base and the capital. In some examples 
 it is plain, in others fluted, or divided into per- 
 
200 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 pendicular circular channels, which are diffe- 
 rently formed, and variously divided in the 
 different orders. In the Doric, that is the true 
 Doric, they are formed without intervening 
 fillets, the rules for dividing which are to be 
 found in most elementary books on architec- 
 ture, and are called by workmen arris flutes. 
 Such are Doric flutes, which should never be 
 used to any other order, nor should any other 
 kind of fluting ever be applied to the Doric 
 order. These rules are sanctioned by first 
 principles, and the examples of the Greeks, 
 and violated by the Romans, the modern 
 Italians, and the Anglo-Italian architects of the 
 present day. In some examples of sterling au- 
 thority, the shafts of the Doric order are 
 fluted only two-thirds of their length from the 
 top, and the remaining, or inferior third, left 
 either circular, or the angles continued down- 
 wards, the circular part between each angle 
 being made flat, and forming a polygonal 
 figure of twenty sides. 
 
 In the purest examples of this order, one or 
 more grooves or channels are cut of an equal 
 depth from the surface, each groove being 
 parallel to the capital of the column, as a sort 
 of necking. The Romans and their before- 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 201 
 
 mentioned followers convert this, as in the 
 example of the theatre of Marcellus, and the 
 new chapel in Regent Street, to an ugly pro- 
 jecting necking, like the colarino of the Corin- 
 thian order. 
 
 The flutings of the Ionic and Corinthian 
 shafts are differently executed. Between each 
 flute there is a fillet or part of the shaft left un- 
 cut, of half its width, and the flutes are chan- 
 neled in equal to half their width, forming 
 semicircles on their plan. These are also often 
 fluted only two-thirds of the way down, and 
 then the lower third is carved to resemble a 
 circular staff* placed in the flutes and rounded 
 on the top. They are divided in a similar 
 manner to the Doric, the circumference of the 
 shaft being divided into a certain number of 
 equal parts, which vary in different specimens ; 
 one of these parts is given to a fillet, and two 
 to a flute. 
 
 The next and concluding portion of the co- 
 lumn is the capital, which differs, according to 
 the order to which it belongs. The capital is 
 the most striking part of an order, and to com- 
 mon observers is the portion by which they best 
 judge the name of an order. In the pure, that 
 is, the Greek system of classical architecture, 
 every other part of an order bears its character 
 
202 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 as completely as the capitals ; but in the Ro- 
 man and modern systems, they are huddled, 
 mixed, and perverted, in a manner destructive 
 to good taste and correct classification. 
 
 In the earliest periods of the history of ar- 
 chitecture columns were used without capi- 
 tals, but necessity soon added the abacus or 
 tablet, w hich covers the capital ; in which 
 simple state of a shaft and tile it long conti- 
 nued, some examples of which may be found 
 in Egyptian architecture, particularly in the 
 ruins of Thebes, This was subsequently im- 
 proved to a sort of bell-shaped capital, at first 
 plain, but afterwards sculptured with hierogly- 
 phicks, figures, foliage, &c. The fruit or 
 flower of the Lotus, the sacred plant of the 
 Egyptians, probably suggested this form origi- 
 nally, which was sometimes embellished with 
 palm leaves, as in examples found at Esne. 
 In certain temples at Amara, and in the is- 
 land of Philoe, the capitals are formed of the 
 head of Isis, the original type of the Ionic. 
 Various other specimens of ancient capitals, 
 more or less ornamented, are to be found in 
 the works of Pococke, Norden, Savary, De- 
 non, Belzoni, Montule, and other Egyptian 
 travellers. 
 
 The capitals used in Persian architecture 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 203 
 
 are of three kinds, one of which is nearly half 
 the height of the column, and resembles a 
 plume of feathers, falling down at the top, in 
 the middle of which rises another range of 
 feathers, and from them a kind of non-descript 
 animal. The others are composed of the ante- 
 rior moieties of the fabulous unicorn, in the 
 manner of the double and quadrifrontal heads 
 of Janus of the Romans. Examples of these 
 may also be found in the works of Niebuhr 
 and Chardin. The capitals of the temple or 
 pagoda in the island of Elephanta resemble a 
 broad flat cushion somewhat depressed, or 
 rather a double echinus, one turned towards 
 the other, and separated by a fillet, as may be 
 seen in the works of Hodges, Thomas Daniell, 
 and other Indian travellers. 
 
 Capitals of columns are divided and classi- 
 fied according to their orders ; in which there 
 are many variations and deviations, which 
 will be more particularly noticed hereafter, 
 under their several and proper heads. 
 
 The Doric capital, as described by Vitruvius, 
 Scamozzi, Palladio, Chambers, and other emi- 
 nent masters of the Roman and Italian schools, 
 although divided with much mechanical skill 
 and accuracy, and possessing a certain share 
 of comparative beauty, yet differs so much from 
 
204 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 the genuine canons of the order that I shall 
 omit noticing it for the present, and con- 
 fine myself to the pure models of Grecian 
 elegance and simplicity ; for the oixler, mis- 
 named Doric by these masters, would never 
 have been acknowledged as a native of that 
 clime in the days of architectural purity. 
 
 The capital of the Doric order agrees in 
 character in all the ancient examples, although 
 it differs in minor parts, which difference is 
 specific, and does not detract from the generic 
 characteristics of the order: therefore the 
 following general description is applicable 
 to all. 
 
 The Doric capital is divided into three prin- 
 cipal parts : the abacus, the echinus, and the 
 annulets. The abacus, from aSa^, a tablet or 
 table, is the superior member or covering of 
 the capital, and appertains to each of the three 
 orders, but it assumes a different and charac- 
 teristic form in 'each. In the Doric and Ionic 
 the abacus is square in its plan, plain in the 
 Doric, and moulded in the Ionic ; and in the 
 Corinthian each face is hollowed into a circular, 
 and (with the exception of the example in the 
 portico at Athens, called the Poekile) cut off 
 at the angles. 
 
 The abacus of the Doric capital is a paral- 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 205 
 
 lelopipedon, or unequal cube, varying from ten 
 to twelve minutes, or about the sixth part of 
 the bottom diameter, in height, in the best 
 examples. Immediately under the abacus is 
 the large eliptico-circular member called the 
 echinus, from fxtvo?, a chestnut, the outline of 
 which it resembles. The echinus, in the finest 
 specimens of the order, is either elliptical or 
 hyperbolical in its perpendicular outline, but 
 never circular; and, with the annulets under 
 it, is the same height as the abacus. 
 
 The annulets, as their name imports, are 
 three rings, or circular fillets, under the echi- 
 nus, falling off under each other perpendicu- 
 larly, like an inverted flight of steps, and par- 
 taking of the general outline of the echinus in 
 the arrangement of its angles. 
 
 In many examples, at about thirty minutes 
 below the top of the abacus, is a channel sunk 
 round the shaft, as if to determine the size of 
 the capital, situated in the place of the Roman 
 hypotrachelion, or necking, whether the shaft 
 be fluted or plain. 
 
 In no instance is the superiority of the Gre- 
 cian style of architecture over the Roman 
 more apparent than when viewed comparatively 
 in this order, which Aikin* calls " the precious 
 
 * Essay on the Doric order, by Edmund Aikin, fo. Loud. 
 1810. 
 
*20({ KLMES'S LECTURES 
 
 lojiacy ho<]ut :iilu (1 h\ thr lirst-horn ;nul most 
 favouivd sons of taslo lo tlio atlniiralion of 
 suooooiliiiii :\^:os," and the iKsrndorir o( the 
 Roman and Itahan scliools. To the hrantifnl 
 and cluiraot eristic aharns of tlio trnt^ Dorir tht 
 K(>mans have adthnl t.ho mouMod r\matinm 
 and hllot on the top. For tho «'hast«' simphrity 
 and oh^iiant outhno of tlio ecliiniu* thoy have 
 sulvstilutod the clumsy and ta;stch\ss ovolo. 
 which they oven havt^ often s|X>ihHl by can insr. 
 For the annuhH tht^' often substitute an astra- 
 S^al, or a l>ead and tillet. For the ihMie;\t(^ :>nd 
 elVectivo ehaniulled liypotractrelion the\ IhiI- 
 ster rouiiil the shat'l the eolarino of the Corin- 
 thian ; and, to complete the absurdity, leavt^ 
 have even been added in tlie \vArt betueen the 
 necking and the under mouldinj; of the capital, 
 which Falladio, oddly enough, calls the iVieze 
 of the capital. To its beautil\dl\ proportioned 
 shaft they ha>e added several diameters in 
 height. FV-jr its conical outline they ha\e sub- 
 stituUnJ the swelling shaft, and ft»r the shallow 
 arris fbitings of the original the semieircularly 
 hollowed riutes ;uid wide fillets of the other 
 orders have not seldom been misapplied. 
 
IV 
 
 ON AKCHITECTURK. 
 
 W7 
 
 In the above cuts tbr; (jrcjir.ui Doric Ih con- 
 trasted with the Roman. Two other ^irecian 
 examples are annexed. 
 
 I must say a few words more before cAfmmu 
 
208 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 this section on the characteristic echinus of the 
 true Doric. Its contour is generally, as 1 have 
 before observed, elliptical or hyperbolical, but, 
 in many instances, it forms nearly a straight 
 line, and even when it does not it is compara- 
 tively very flat. Besides making the leading 
 and most characteristic feature of the Doric 
 capital it is always used in the Grecian system 
 for the superior or crown member of cornices 
 and architraves, and is peculiarly suitable for 
 mouldings receding from a flat surface ; of the 
 flatter forms are those of the capitals of the 
 Doric tetrastyle portico of the Agora, or 
 ancient market-place at Athens, the Doric 
 temple at Corinth, and the temples at Poestum, 
 in Italy : yet the hyperbolic forms are more 
 generally found in the capitals of Athenian 
 buildings than any others. Of such are the 
 temples of Minerva and Theseus, (fragments 
 of which, of infinite use to the architectural 
 student, are deposited in the British Museum,) 
 and the columns of the Propylea, or grand 
 entrance into the citadel at Athens ; all of 
 which cited specimens were built during the 
 glorious administration of Pericles. One in- 
 stance of the echinus being a perfectly straight 
 line from the under side of the abacus to the 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 20P 
 
 upper side of the annulets occurs, among 
 others, in the portico of Philip, king of Ma- 
 cedon. 
 
 Thus we find the Doric capital to be com- 
 posed of an abacus, an echinus, three annulets, 
 and an hypotrachelion. 
 
 Among- the b^st examples of this sublime 
 and majestic order, which may be called the 
 Grecian order, par excellence, are the remains 
 of the Greek temple at Thoricus, in Corinthia ; 
 the temple of Apollo, at Delos ; the temple of 
 Theseus ; the Parthenon ; the Propylea ; the 
 Doric tetrastyle portico, at Athens ; the temple 
 of Minerva, on the Sunium promontory ; the 
 temple of Jupiter Nemaeus, between Argos 
 and Corinth ; the temple at Selinus, and those 
 of Juno and of Concord, at Agrigentum, in 
 Sicily ; that of Jupiter Panhellenius, in the 
 island of Egina ; and those at Paestum, which 
 will be comparatively examined hereafter. 
 
 For the best descriptions and delineations of 
 this order I take leave to refer to Stuart's 
 Antiquities of Athens; Aikin's Essay on the 
 Doric Order ;* Wilkins's Antiquities of Magna 
 Grecia; Major's Ruins of Paestum. The best 
 
 * See a Table of the Pioporlioas of the Doric Order ;it 
 the end of this Lecture. 
 
•210 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 executed specimens in this country are Mr. 
 Harrison's grand entrance to Chester Castle, 
 Mr. Smirke's portico of Co vent Garden Theatre, 
 and Mr. Tatham's entrance to Cleveland House, 
 St. James's. 
 
 I shall now proceed to the investigation and 
 description of the Ionic order. The Ionic 
 capital is divided into two principal or leading 
 features — the abacus and the volutes. The 
 abacus is a right-angled parallelogram, nearly 
 square on its plan, and moulded on its per- 
 pendicular sides, or edges, sometimes with a 
 cymatium, sometimes with an echinus. The 
 volutes are two spiral mouldings on each side 
 of the front, perpendicular to the horizon, alike 
 on two faces, and the other two profiles or 
 sides alike in themselves, but differing from 
 the front ; the extremities of each are the same 
 distance from the centre of the column. Each 
 spiral, or volute, has the same number of 
 volutions, or spirals, which are differently con- 
 nected by mouldings, passing between and 
 behind them round the shaft of the column. 
 
 One of the most beautiful examples of 
 simple dignity found in this order, or perhaps 
 in any other, is that of the small Ionic temple 
 on the banks of the river Ilyssus, at Athens : cor- 
 rect adaptations and copies of which are to be 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 211 
 
 seen in Mr. Atkinson's portico of the Board of 
 Control, Cannon-row, Westminster; the late 
 Mr. Holland's colonnade before Carlton House; 
 Mr. Dance's portico of the College of Surgeons, 
 Lincoln's Inn Fields ; and many other build- 
 ings of the metropolis. 
 
 The simplicity and breadth of parts, their 
 judicious arrangement, the beautiful contour 
 of the volutes and graceful curve of the hem 
 hanging between, render the above one of the 
 most beautiful and bold examples of the Ionic 
 order. The grand proportion of the whole 
 entablature, the niassy and effective mouldings 
 of the cornice, the spacious surface of the 
 frieze, so well adapted for sculpture, and the 
 plain architrave, which is not broken and sub- 
 divided into several faciae, are considerations 
 which recommend this example as one of the 
 canons of the order. 
 
 Another fine and more embellished example 
 of the Ionic order is taken from the beautiful 
 temple of Minerva Polias, at Priene, in Ionia ; 
 the architect of which was Pytheus, who, re- 
 quiring an enriched order, did not, like the 
 Romans, corrupt the Doric with misplaced 
 ornaments, but rejected it entirely, and com- 
 posed this elegant specimen upon the pure 
 elements of the ancient order. The small 
 
 p 2 
 
212 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 projection of the cymatium, or upper mould- 
 ing- of the cornice, and its great height, is 
 beautiful and well adapted to receive its orna- 
 ments, as it is less obscured by the shadow of 
 the concave and convex parts of the moulding. 
 The dentels are introduced in the bed-mould 
 of the cornice with great propriety and effect, 
 as their bold and singular projection relieves 
 them completely from each other, and clears 
 the obscure part of the entablature with an 
 elegant play of minor light and shade in a low 
 key. The architrave is well proportioned ; but, 
 having three facise instead of two, it encroaches 
 too much upon the Corinthian. 
 
 The capital is an elegant and embellished 
 vaiiation of that from the Ilyssus ; it is more 
 enriched without destroying the harmony and 
 elegance of its proportions, and the spirals of 
 the volutes are elegantly and tastefully drawn. 
 The eyes of the volute are sunk two and a half 
 inches deep, probably for the purpose of affix- 
 ing a festoon of real flowers, as was the cus- 
 tom of the Greeks on days of public festivity; 
 which custom probably originated the stone- 
 carved garlands which decorate the Ionic 
 capitals used by Inigo Jones in the front of 
 his chapel at Whitehall, Shaftesbury House, in 
 Aldersgate-street, and other of his works in 
 
IV] ON ARCHITRCTURK. 213 
 
 Lincoln's Inn Fields. These festoons have 
 been also introduced, by needy minds, in pa- 
 nels ; and by others of still poorer invention, 
 as festoons of drapery, which, in their moulded 
 panels, look like imitations of dirty cloths 
 hung out to dry from a Parisian garret window. 
 The hem, or border, of this capital, from 
 volute to volute, with its delicate fillet resting 
 on the grandly designed ovolo, connecting 
 with a graceful curve the spirals of the volute, 
 seems to keep them in their situations, and 
 greatly conduces to the beauty of the capital. 
 The richness and delicacy of the ornaments, 
 and their bold relief, with the grand proportion 
 and distribution of the parts and mouldings to 
 each other, render the order of Minerva Polias 
 one of the most striking and beautiful of the 
 Ionics.* 
 
 * The best studies of this order are the remains of the 
 Greco-Ionic buildings, and the most elegant capitals those of 
 the temples of Minerva Polias, and Erectheus, at Athens, 
 (some tine fragments of the entablature of one of the above 
 are to be seen at the British Museum ;) the temple formerly 
 on the banks of the Ilyssus ; that of Bacchus, at Teos ; 
 Minerva Polias, at Pryene ; Apollo Dedymaeus, near M iletus ; 
 and Fortuna Virilis, (at a very humble distance,) at Rome: 
 all of which may be found delineated in Stuart's Antiquities 
 of Athens; the Ionian antiquities, published by the Dilet- 
 tanti Society of London ; Desgodetz Antiquities ; the works 
 of Palladio, &c. &c. 
 
214 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 Our next and last step in the description of 
 the orders is to the Corinthian. The origin 
 and reputed origin of this splendid order has 
 been related before. It is the richest and most 
 embellished, and is as it were the seal and 
 completion of them all. 
 
 The capital consists of two annular rows of 
 leaves, each leaf of the upper row growing 
 between and behind those of the lower row, 
 in such manner that a leaf of the upper row 
 may be in the middle of each of the four faces 
 of the capital. Between each space of the 
 upper leaves spring stalks ending in volutes, 
 two of which meet at each angle of the abacus, 
 and two in the middle of each face of the 
 capital, sometimes touching and sometimes 
 interwoven with each other, as in the beautiful 
 specimen from the temple of Jupiter Stator, 
 at Rome, copied by Mr. Holland in the portico 
 of Carlton Palace. 
 
 This order, though the most embellished, is 
 yet the most simple and easy to use in either 
 colonnades or porticos, having neither the 
 difficulty of the triglyphs of the Doric nor the 
 dissimilar faces of the Ionic, which require 
 much skill to adapt in angle columns. 
 
 The principal examples of the Corinthian 
 order now remaining in Italy and Greece do 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 21.') 
 
 not differ from each other so essentially in 
 character as either the Doric or the Ionic. 
 
 The Corinthian order, as used in the Pan- 
 theon, at Rome, is, although rather plain, of 
 beautiful proportions : it is chaste, correct, and 
 an excellent model for imitation and study. 
 Another very fine example is found in the three 
 columns of the Campo Vaccino, at Rome, 
 supposed to be the remains of the temple of 
 Jupiter Stator. The elegance and beauty of 
 this example, which is executed with much 
 taste in the portico of Carlton House, particu- 
 larly the capital, its graceful form, and the 
 delif'acy of its ornaments, render it one of 
 the most complete examples now existing of 
 the Corinthian order. 
 
 Another tine specimen of this order is that 
 of the temple of Vesta, or the Sybil, at 
 Tivoli, near Rome ; of which an imperfect 
 delineation may be found in Piranisa. This 
 order has also been transplanted to this country 
 and executed in the north or new front of the 
 Bank of England. Yet no less to be admired 
 is the order of the Choragic monument of 
 Lysicrates, near Athens, called by some tra- 
 vellers the lantern of Demosthenes ; a most 
 faithful representation of which may be found 
 in Stuart's Antiquities of Athens. 
 
216 ELMLS'S LECTURES 
 
 Having thus briefly described the three pri- 
 mary orders or elements of Grecian architec- 
 ture; namely, the Doric, the Ionic, and the 
 Corinthian, I shall now proceed to the second 
 division of my subject, their several orders of 
 Temples or Sacred Edifices, as laid down by 
 Yitruvius, after the best examples of Grecian 
 splendour existing in his days. 
 
 The orders of sacred buildings or temples of 
 the Greeks are seven : 1st. the Antis ; 2d. the 
 Prostyle ; 3d. the Amphiprostyle ; 4th. the 
 Peripteral ; 5th. the Dipteral ; 6th. the Pseudo- 
 Dipteral ; 7th. and last, the Hypaethral. 
 
 The order of temples called Antis is that 
 wherein the end of the wall finishes in pilasters, 
 or antae, and has two columns between them ; 
 such is Inigo Jones's fine Tuscan portico of 
 St. Paul's Church, Covent Garden. 
 
 2. The second order, called ProstyUy differs 
 from the Antis by having columns added oppo- 
 site the pilasters, or antae, of each corner. The 
 foregoing two orders have only porticos at 
 one end. 
 
 3. The Amphiprostyle is the same as the 
 Prostyle ; but, as its name imports, with a 
 posticum, or rear front, the same as the prin- 
 cipal front. 
 
 4. The Peripteral has also porticos at both 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 2\7 
 
 ends, of six columns each, and eleven, count- 
 ing the angle columns, at each side. It has, as 
 its name shows, columns all round about the 
 cell, as in the temple of Theseus, which, by the 
 way, has two more columns in flank than the 
 rules of Vitruvius prescribe. 
 
 6. The Dipteral, which Vitruvius places 
 after the Pseudo-Dipteral, is octastyle, or eight- 
 columned, like the portico of the Parthenon, 
 but has a double row of columns all round the 
 cell. 
 
 6. In the Pseudo Dipteral, or false dipteral, 
 the porticos are octastyle, or eight-columned, 
 in front, and on each side fifteen columns, 
 counting those at the angles. The Parthenon 
 is of this order of temples, but has seventeen 
 columns on the sides ; for the ancient architects 
 of Greece did not servilely follow every dog- 
 matical rule of the critics, yet in their variations 
 never lost the true spirit of the original. 
 
 7. The Hypcetliral order of temples is deca- 
 style, or ten columned, both in front and rear; 
 the other parts are distributed the same as the 
 dipteral, but it has in its interior a double row 
 of columns, one higher than the other, con- 
 tinued on all sides, and resembling an interior 
 porch, and is called, from its situation, a peri- 
 style. The middle part has no roof. A fine 
 
218 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 example of this order of temples is to be found 
 in that of Jupiter Olympus, at Athens. In 
 Rome there is no example of it. 
 
 There are also circular temples, not classing 
 under either of these orders ; some of which 
 are called Monoptoral, having one row of 
 columns round about them, and no cell. Others 
 are called Peripteral, having a cell, round 
 which the columns are arranged, standing on 
 a continued pedestal, called a stylebate, like 
 the Temple of the Sybil at Tivoli, the choragic 
 monument of Lysicrates, at Athens, and the 
 Temple of Vesta, at Rome. 
 
 The third and last division of the elements 
 of Grecian architecture is the manner of dis- 
 tributing the columns, which are all settled 
 according to laws founded on good taste, rea- 
 son, beauty, and strength. This is called in- 
 tercolumniating, or arranging the distance of 
 columns. Columns are placed at various 
 distances from each other, not by chance or 
 caprice, but according to rule ; and the vacuity, 
 or interval, between one column and another is 
 called the intercolumniation. These intervals, 
 or intercolumniations, differ in the different 
 orders ; and the style of porticos or colonnades 
 is named from them. As thus : — 
 
 The first style or manner of intercolumnia- 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 219 
 
 tion is called Pycnostyle, or columns thickset. 
 The space between each column, in this mode 
 or style, is one diameter and a half. Of this 
 style are the Parthenon and the Temple of 
 Theseus. 
 
 The second is called Si/style, and has two 
 diameters between the columns. 
 
 The third is named Eustyle, and is, accord- 
 ing to Vitruvius, the most pleasing and eligible 
 for general use ; the space between the columns, 
 or intercolumniation of the eustyle mode of 
 distributing columns, is two diameters and a 
 quarter. I here take leave to observe, that (as 
 it strikes me) the most eligible mode of inter- 
 columniating, or distributing the distances of 
 columns in a design, is according to the specific 
 dimensions of th^ building, and the number 
 of columns to be used. 
 
 The fourth mode or style of intercolumni- 
 atinga building is C2i\\eA Diastyle, and its width 
 is three diameters. 
 
 The fifth is called Areostyle, or columns 
 thinly set, and its width is four diameters. 
 
 Besides these orders or styles of interco- 
 lumniations, porticos are also named from 
 the number of columns of which they are com- 
 posed, and are called tetrastyle, hexastyle, 
 octastyle, and decastyle, according as they 
 
220 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 consist of four, six, eight, or ten columns in 
 front. 
 
 Before leaving the purer architecture of 
 Greece, a few mon>ents must be devoted to 
 \ the consideration of that of its colonies and dis- 
 tant parts. 
 
 The ancient temple at Corinth is an archi- 
 tectural monument of unknown antiquity. Its 
 character is simple, pure, and bold, inferior to 
 the three principal examples found at Athens, 
 but still partaking of the purest characteristics 
 of the order. 
 
 Among other curious and interesting ruins 
 are the three ancient temples of Paestum. One 
 of them differs from every other temple in 
 existence, having nine columns in the front, 
 with a central range down the middle of the 
 cell, the use of which appears to have been to 
 support the roof. 
 
 The situation of these central columns has 
 led to many conjectures as to what purpose 
 this singular edifice had iieen applied. Paoli 
 designates it as a basilica, in which conjecture 
 he is followed by Delagardette; but Major 
 observes, with more probability, that it does 
 not present the form of a basilica, because its 
 portico is on the outside, whereas, those de- 
 scribed by Vitruvius were on the inside ; nor 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 221 
 
 can he suppose it simply to have been a por- 
 tico, as portions of the wall of the cell are 
 still in existence. All its other parts, the odd 
 number of columns in front excepted, and the 
 above-mentioned central row of columns, bear 
 every other mark and characteristic of a 
 temple. 
 
 The centre or hypaethral temple is generally 
 supposed to have been dedicated to Neptune, 
 the tutelary divinity of Paestum, or Posidoniae. 
 Wilkins thinks it to have been a temple of 
 Jupiter, from the circumstance of its being 
 hypaethral, which is a class of buildings that 
 appears to have been generally confined to the 
 temples of Jupiter. Its columns possess, in 
 common with all its other parts, the Grecian 
 character in the highest degree ; and there is 
 no doubt of its being coeval with the earliest 
 migration of the Greeks to the south of Italy. 
 These examples, with that of Corinth, possess 
 the characteristic energy of the early style 
 of the Greeks in an eminent degree, which 
 may be discriminated from their later and 
 more finished style by the following defi- 
 nition ; namely, a shaft of great diminution 
 and of low stature, a large and massy capital, 
 with a very bold projection of the abacus, a 
 
222 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 necking composed of three grooves, and an ex- 
 tremely massive entablature of nearly one half 
 the height of the columns. 
 
 Mr. Forsyth, who visited this mysterious 
 city with the feelings of a poet, says, that on 
 entering its walls he felt all the religion of the 
 place. "I stood," says this inspiring writer, 
 " as on sacred ground. I stood amazed at the 
 long obscurity of its mighty ruins." With re- 
 gard to its great antiquity, he differs from other 
 authors and antiquaries, and does not conclude 
 that because the Paestan Doric differs in all its 
 proportions from that of the Parthenon, that the 
 Paestan temples are at all older than the 
 Athenian. The proportions of an order, he 
 justly observes, are but a matter of convention. 
 They often vary in the same country, nay in the 
 same edifice; and surely a Phidias, working 
 in the metropolis of Grecian art, with its two 
 best architects, and the Pentelican quarry at 
 his command, might well produce more pure 
 elegance than cotemporary, or even later, astists, 
 who were confined to the ruder materials and 
 taste of a remote colony.* 
 
 The author of the " Pleasures of Memory," 
 
 * Forsyth's Italy, p. .312. 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 223 
 
 in some lines of characteristic energy, written 
 at Paestum, in March, 1815, says of these 
 temples, 
 
 " They stand between the mountains and the sea. 
 Awful memorials, but of whom we know not. 
 
 Time was they stood along the crowded street. 
 
 Temples of Gods ! and on their ample steps 
 
 What various habits, various tongues, beset 
 
 The brazen gates, for prayer and sacrifice ! 
 
 Time was perhaps, the third was sought for justice; 
 
 And here the accuser stood, and there the accused ; 
 
 And here the judges sat, and heard, and judged ; 
 
 All silent now! as in the ages past, 
 
 Trodden under foot and mingled dust with dust." 
 
 They are indeed silent, yet speaking me- 
 mentos of time and eternity. Of Paestum and 
 its violets, and its twice-blowing roses, what 
 lover of poetry has not heard ? — of those 
 lovely flowers which 
 
 " Now a Virgil, now an Ovid, sung ; 
 Paestum's twice-blowing roses." 
 
 These temples are said to have been dis- 
 covered by accident so recently as about the 
 middle of the last century. The most authentic 
 accounts of them are to be found in Major's 
 Travels ; and in Wilkins's Magna Graecia, who 
 has dilated, with a true architectural feeling, 
 npon their drear ruins. 
 
224 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 The next division of my subject is the analy- 
 sis of the Etruscan school of architecture, 
 which is, however, so lost in the lapse of ages, 
 that it leaves but little room for architectural 
 research. 
 
 The Etruscans are generally reported to 
 have been equally distinguished in architecture 
 as in the other arts of design. The Romans 
 employed Etruscan architects in the building 
 of the Capitol, of the temple of Jupiter, and 
 many other large and splendid edifices, the 
 examination of which will come more properly 
 in the next Lecture, The walls of Etruscan 
 cities were generally very lofty, and construct- 
 ed with huge masses of masonry, remains of 
 which have been discovered at Volaterra, Cor- 
 lona, Fsesula, and other parts of ancient Etru- 
 ria. The gates of their cities were of a simple 
 construction and built with squared stones The 
 largest entrance into Volaterra is called the 
 gate of Hercules, and is composed of a mag- 
 nificent arch, built with nineteen large voussoirs. 
 There are also others at the same place, and 
 a smaller one of Etruscan architecture at 
 Faesula. 
 
 The earliest temples of Etruria were small 
 in size, being, in many instances, not able 
 to contain more than a statue of the divinity to 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 225 
 
 whom it was dedicated, and with sometimes 
 an altar; but they increased in size as the 
 people increased in number and in power. 
 Vitruvins, who mentions having seen some of 
 them at Rome, has left a description of them 
 worth referring to as a matter of archaiology. 
 " The plan of the temple was a parallelogram 
 divided into three cells, of which the centre 
 one was the largest. Such was the middle cell 
 of the temple of Jupiter at the capitol ; the two 
 others were dedicated to Juno and Minerva. 
 The two ends of the temple were ornamented 
 with pediments, which arose originally from 
 necessity, and afterwards became so orna- 
 mental, that Cicero* says, if there were to be 
 erected a capitol in heaven, where it never 
 rains, it would be finished with pediments 
 and a roof. On the top of the pediment were 
 placed ornaments in bronze and terra cotta. 
 The number of these temples was consider- 
 able, but there are now hardly any remains 
 
 * Capitolii fastigium illud, et ceterarum aedium, non ve- 
 nustas, sed neccssitas ipsa fabricata est. Nam cum esset habi- 
 ta ratio, quemadmodum ex utraque parte tecti aqua delabe- 
 retur, utilitatem templi, fastigii dignitas consequita est: ut, 
 etiam si in coelo capitoliuni statueretur, ubi imber esse non 
 posset, nuUam sine fastigio dignitatem habiturum fuisse vide- 
 atnr. Cicero ih- oratore, lib. iii. rap. 4G. 
 
•226 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 left. Next to the temples were their theatres, 
 the Etruscans being great lovers of the drama, 
 which formed even part of their worship. They 
 built several large and magnificent theatres, of 
 which there are now no remains, except at 
 Adrea. The Etruscans are said also to have 
 erected circuses ; from which the Romans, 
 under the government of kings, appeared to 
 have borrowed them, but of which there are no 
 remains. At Volaterra are to be seen the ruins 
 of a fragment of Etruscan architecture, a pub- 
 lic reservoir built under ground, twenty-four 
 feet from the pavement to the crown of the 
 arch, fifty-six feet long, and thirty-nine wide. 
 Several remains of ancient Etruscan tombs 
 have also been found, the greatest part of which 
 are under ground. The interior of that near 
 Crotona is in the form of a cross, the walls 
 having several niches, destined probably for 
 the reception of urns. This one is built with 
 twenty-seven stones of an equal size, and very 
 exactly jointed; but several consist of only 
 five. 
 
 Near Perusiura is another in very good pre- 
 servation, built with large wrought stones. 
 Others are built with a species of sand stone ; 
 such are those found near Clusium, Corneto 
 or the ancient Tarquinium, Volaterra, and 
 
IV] ^ ON ARCHITECTURfi. 227 
 
 Talaris ; the interiors of which are not arched, 
 and are decorated with a variety of colours 
 and figures. Of this description of build- 
 ing was the labyrinth of Porsenna, which 
 Pliny describes, and which appears to have 
 been the tomb of that monarch. It is a square 
 building, thirty feet on each side, and fifty feet 
 high. At each angle was a pyramid, and a 
 fifth in the centre ; and upon the top of each 
 pyramid was a bronze circle, and a kind of 
 cap, to which bells were suspended by chains. 
 This ancient monument is engraved in the 
 memoirs of the academy of Cortona. The 
 Etruscan modes of construction were both of 
 brick and of stone, the latter a species of 
 sand stone without cement. In their earliest 
 days they formed their building stones of poly- 
 gonal or of irregular figures, but arranged and 
 shaped them so as to touch in every part. A 
 wall of this construction* .was discovered in 
 the ruins of Cora near Veletri. 
 
 The architecture of the Etruscans is pecu- 
 liarly distinguished by the invention of Atriae, 
 or fore-courts to the house, by arches, and by 
 a species of column which has been adapted 
 by the Roman and Italian architects as a dis- 
 
 * Millin. 
 
 q2 
 
•228 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 tinct order, under the name of Tuscan, which 
 will be discussed and analyzed in my next 
 Lecture. 
 
 The Atrisc are said 4^0 have derived their 
 name from the Etruscan colony, Adria, or 
 Atria, where they were first used. 
 
 These courts were appropriated for the resi- 
 dence of slaves and servants, whom they were 
 desirous to place at a distance from the apart- 
 ments of the master, that he might not be dis- 
 turbed by the noise of such a crowd. Their 
 plan was simple, consisting of a parallelogram, 
 surrounded by a portico, and supported by 
 rough columns. 
 
 The Etruscan buildings in which arches are 
 found are among the most ancient examples 
 of their architecture ; and several of them, but 
 especially their subterraneous reservoirs, prove 
 that their architects were well acquainted with 
 the construction of the arch. The columns 
 used by this people are distinguished by their 
 form and proportion from those of any other 
 nation of their time; profiting, as they did, 
 from the Greeks, and yet obtaining the honours 
 of the invention of an order from Vitruvius and 
 his followers. Vitruvius gives a description of 
 this order, and relates that in his time there 
 were several Etruscan temples in Rome. 
 
IV] ON ARCHITECTURE. 229 
 
 The other, or later portions of the history of 
 Etruscan architecture, belong, more properly, 
 to that of Rome, which will be the subject of 
 the next and succeeding Lectures. 
 
 Having now, as far as the nature of this 
 work has permitted, and without trespassing I 
 hope too much upon the patience of the reader, 
 explained and detailed the various elements of 
 ancient architecture, down to the decadence 
 of the pure Greek style, in the most popular 
 and instructive manner which the subject and 
 my abilities permitted, it remains with the stu- 
 dent to make the application. 
 
 The orders and styles of architecture are 
 but the means : to build with good sense, 
 propriety, and taste, is the ertd. 
 
 Ancient examples, selected with judgement 
 and pure taste; adapted, with the latitude 
 of genius, to modern necessities ; combined 
 with the scientitic inventions of modern con- 
 struction; and perfected by study and practice; 
 are the best schools of true architecture. 
 
230 
 
 ELMES S LECTURES. 
 
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 LECTURE V. 
 
 The Etruscan School of Architecture continued 
 to the Period of the Conquest of Greece by the 
 Romans^ the First Epoch of Roman Archi- 
 tecture. Early Etruscan Buildings in Rome. 
 Roman Architecture, from the Conquest of 
 Greece to the beginning of the Reign of Au- 
 gustus. Second Epoch. From Augustus on- 
 wards. Characteristics of the Roman style and 
 Ruildings. The Roman System of the Orders 
 defined and illustrated, and their Variations 
 described. Their Buildings and Methods of 
 constructing Temples, Triumphal Arches, Co- 
 lumns, Sfc. The elementary Principles of Roman 
 Architecture elucidated, and its History carried 
 on to the end of the Reign of Hadrian. The 
 close of Roman greatness in Architecture. 
 
I 
 
LECTURE V. 
 
 The architecture of the ancient Romans, 
 under their first kings, lias been already shown 
 to have been derived from that of the Etrus- 
 cans. This people, a colony from Greece, 
 were antecedent to all the rest of the Italian 
 peninsula in cultivating the arts, which they 
 had practised even before the reputed time of 
 Cadmus. All their arts were derived from 
 Greece, by the migration of the Pelasgi. The 
 architecture of Etruria should be consider- 
 ed more as a style, and as a school of 
 art, than as a name given to the works of 
 Etruscan artists. In its earliest period, that 
 is before and about the time of Cadmus, it 
 partook of the Egyptian and earliest Grecian 
 styles ; became afterwards refined through its 
 connexion with Greece, and, finally, the imme- 
 diate parent of the Roman. 
 
 Having, in my preceding Lectures, extolled 
 the architecture of the Greeks above that of 
 the Romans, in a manner beyond what the 
 admirers of the Roman style may approve, 
 
234 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 permit me to repeat, by way of explanation, 
 that it was not in costliness or magnitude that 
 the mighty genius of the Greeks developed 
 itself so much as in invention, in taste, in beauti/y 
 in refinement, and in leaving to posterity the best 
 models for imitation. These qualities have 
 given this gifted people their deserved pre- 
 eminence over all their imitators or compe- 
 titors. 
 
 No remains of architecture or sculpture are 
 to be found in Greece but what are canons of 
 art, while Rome possesses more to corrupt the 
 taste of the young architect than all its excel- 
 lencies can counterbalance. It is, therefore, 
 to the rules, the forms, the proportions, the 
 taste of the former that the attention of the 
 student should be perpetually recalled. 
 
 " Hear ! how learu'd Greece her useful rules indites. 
 When to repress and when indulge our flights." 
 
 Pope. 
 
 Greece, even in its state of decay, should 
 attract the student, during his travels through 
 the elements of the art, as, in the decline of lite- 
 rature and fine taste, a city in the Asiatic de- 
 sert ilid Longinus, who retired thither, as to an 
 asylum whence he might contemplate the set- 
 ting sun of Attic splendour. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 235 
 
 The three essential and rlistinct qualities in 
 architecture are strength, grace, and richness. 
 The three orders of the Greeks possess all 
 these requisites, and the five anomalous orders 
 of the Romans possess no more. The afore- 
 said qualities are the landmarks, the boun* 
 daries, the north and south poles of the art. 
 The Doric displays the first-mentioned quality 
 of strength ; the Ionic, the second, of grace ; 
 and the Corinthian, the third, of richness. 
 The Corinthian is the maximum, uniting beau- 
 tiful simplicity and florid decoration; while the 
 Doric possesses pure simplicity, plainness, and 
 robust strength ; and the Ionic is the connect- 
 ing link between the two. 
 
 Yet in these three simple elements what an 
 endless variety ! We no more need a new 
 order in our architecture than a new letter in 
 our alphabet. The architect of talent will as 
 little think of bewildering himself in the search 
 of a new order, as the illustrious discoverer of 
 the safety-lamp, who now, for the interests of 
 science, presides over the Royal Society, would 
 of searching after the far-famed philosopher's 
 stone. 
 
 Every style of architecture, to be complete, 
 must possess these three tlementavy principles, 
 
236 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and no style requires more. That affectedly 
 called by the " gnawers at the thrice-picked 
 bare l)one of antiquity," the English, but which 
 is better known by the untrue name of the 
 Gothic, possesses them : and this style, 1 think, 
 may easily be arranged, and a grammar formed 
 of its romantic, but erratic elements, which, 
 under the hand of a scientific architect, may 
 arise into a pure and orthodox system. Sup- 
 posing, for instance, now I am upon the 
 subject — (which I will endeavour to improve 
 upon in its proper place) — supposing, I say, 
 that under the first class, or that of strength, 
 we venture to put the Norman and the 
 Saxon; under the second, or that oi grace, the 
 architecture of the period of Edward the 
 Third, and its kind ; and, under the third, or 
 that of richness, we collect the styles called 
 florid. 
 
 Not that I would, with that instance of 
 bathos in architecture, Batty Langley, whose 
 paragons of ugliness are of late reviving in our 
 metropolis, make the five orders of Gothic 
 architecture complete,'^ or attempt to speak of 
 his Tuscan-Gothic (they are his own nomen- 
 
 * In his not-enough-known treatise on Gothic Architec- 
 ture. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 237 
 
 clature) ; bis Doric-Gothic ; his Ionic-Gothic ; 
 his Corinthian-Gothic ; or, that acme of absur- 
 dity, his Composite-Gothic. 
 
 1 have intruded this digression for the pur- 
 pose of impressing more and more deeply upon 
 the minds of the younger inquirers into the 
 beauties of architecture, the superiority of the 
 Grecian arrangement, or system of the orders, 
 over that of the Romans, for simplicity, ease 
 of remembrance, utility, and for giving freer 
 scope to fancy, invention, and genius ; and 
 also that it can be applied as a system to other 
 styles. 
 
 From Egypt, as I have endeavoured to prove 
 in my former Lectures, architecture, with the 
 rest of the arts, visited Greece ; and, after the 
 decline of the renowned states of that empire, 
 settled for ages in Rome ; — " a city," says the 
 learned De Goguet, in his Origine des Loix* 
 " which seems to have been destined to swal- 
 low up and absorb all the kingdoms of the 
 universe. Her feeble beginnings presaged no 
 such degree of power as she aftervi^ards at- 
 tained. It was by steady policy and unshaken 
 courage that Rome triumphed over all the 
 
 * Introduction to vol. iii. 
 
238 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 obstacles that appeared to oppose her enlarge-' 
 ment." 
 
 Greece, sunk into obscurity, and ruined by 
 luxury and corruption, the deadly dry-rot of 
 national greatness, paralysed by indolence 
 and submission to her conquerors, gave up, 
 supinely, her riches, her arts, her artists, to a 
 people blessed with the rougher powers of in- 
 dustry and arras. 
 
 Far be it from me, however, to insinuate, by 
 these observations, that the cuUivalion of the 
 arts enervates a people; for history affords 
 abundant proofs to the contrary, of which a 
 very few instances will suffice. 
 
 When arts and literature were at their zenith 
 in Athens, so were public virtue, strength of 
 arms, and industry : all grew together and 
 flourished abundantly side by side : they lan- 
 guished, they sickened, and they died together. 
 So it was with other ancient nations, and so it 
 will be with every people present and to come : 
 and it is only inasmuch as literature and the 
 fine arts are the seal, as it were, the crown, the 
 capital of greatness, that the error has sprung 
 up. 
 
 Before the introduction of pure taste, and 
 the importation of Grecian art and artists into 
 
V] > ON ARCHITECTURE. 239 
 
 Rome, we have the authority of all historians 
 to show that its architecture was as rude as 
 that of any other nation of antiquity. Their 
 Etruscan neighbours led them to copy Greek 
 originals, and one of their earliest kings, Tar- 
 quinius Priscus, was a native of Greece: 
 hence the origin of the Roman style. Nor 
 was it Grecian architecture alone that the 
 Romans imitated ; but their literature, their 
 eloquence, their manners, and customs, were 
 all borrowed from their illustrious prede- 
 cessors. Vitruvius founded his code of archi- 
 tectural laws upon the Greeks ; Virgil imitated 
 Homer; Cicero, Demosthenes. The early 
 Roman plays were translations from the Greek, 
 and their latter ones imitations. 
 
 The natural tendency of the ancient Romans 
 was to the grand and wonderful, the colossal, 
 the showy, and even the prodigality of extra- 
 vagance. Hence, the temporary theatre of 
 Marcus Scaurus, erected while he was edile ; 
 which he adorned with three hundred and 
 sixty marble columns, and three thousand 
 bronze statues ; and it was capable of con- 
 taining eighty thousand persons. The shafts 
 of the lower range of columns were thirty-eight 
 feet long, and their weight was such that Scau- 
 rus was obliged to give security for the repara- 
 
240 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tion of the great sewers over which they were 
 to pass, if they should be damaged by their 
 conveyance : and this, be it remembered, was 
 for an occasional temporary amusement. 
 
 Such also in character was the wooden 
 edifice erected by Curio, for the celebration of 
 the funeral games in honour of his father; 
 which was so contrived as to form, according 
 to the nature of the exhibition, either a theatre 
 or an amphitheatre. When to be used in the 
 former way, the circular backs were placed 
 against each other, thus becoming two separate 
 theatres, so that the declamations, music, and 
 applauding acclamations of the one, were not 
 heard in the other. After the theatrical perform- 
 ances were concluded, the two edifices, turning 
 on pivots, were rolled round by machinery, with 
 all the audience within them, and the circle or 
 amphitheatre was completed : — the pits, clear- 
 ed of the populace, formed the arena. These 
 accounts, however improbable they may ap- 
 pear, are quoted on the authority of the elder 
 Pliny.* 
 
 The elements or constituent principles of Ro- 
 man architecture, like those of the Grecian, are 
 the orders; which, as we have seen, consist 
 
 . * Plin. lib. XXXV. 15. 
 
V] 
 
 ON ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 241 
 
 in the former code of five ; namely, the Tuscan, 
 the Doric, the Ionic, the Corinthian, and the 
 Composite. 
 
 The Tuscan order, the first in rotation ac- 
 cording to the Roman system, is, as may be 
 perceived by inspection and comparing its 
 
 V 
 
 •^ 
 
 i 
 
 component elements, almost the same with 
 the Doric, and is evidently derived from it. 
 Having no complete example remaining of this 
 order, all that we at present know of its use 
 among the ancients is from the descriptions of 
 Vitruvius, whose authority is the only rule for 
 those who wish to use it ; yet the Doric, divest- 
 ed of a few mouldings, and its triglyphs, and 
 of a diameter or so of its height, will answer 
 every purpose for which the Tuscan can be re- 
 
242 
 
 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 quired. As an historical evidence alone is it 
 valuable. The purest specimen of this order 
 in England, and perhaps in the world, is the 
 church of St. Paul, Covent Garden, which 
 some critics have cried up as a prodigy of art, 
 while others have debased it to a merely deco- 
 rated barn ; but, as Sir Roger de Coverley says, 
 " Much may be said on both sides." It is 
 unique in itself, a fine specimen of the order, 
 and reflects credit both on its architect and on 
 his patron, the illustrious predecessor of the 
 Duke of Bedford. 
 
 This order, as described by Vitruvius, and 
 as practised by our able countryman, Inigo 
 Jones, with its great projection of the crown 
 members over the long cantalivers, as shown in 
 the cut, may be applied with the greatest pro- 
 
 priety to market-places ; the simplicity of its 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 243 
 
 elements and the extraordinary projection of 
 its cornice rendering it peculiarly suitable to 
 such purposes. 
 
 The column is seven diameters high ; the 
 base and capital are each half a diameter; the 
 base is divided into tvro equal parts, one of 
 which is given to the plinth, the other to the 
 torus and fillet; the capital is divided into 
 three equal parts, one of which is given to the 
 neck of the capital, one to the ovolo and fillet, 
 and the upper one to the abacus. 
 
 Palladio asserts that he found some ancient 
 remains of this order in Italy, and gives an ex- 
 ample restored from the fragments ;* but it is so 
 different from that described by Vitruvius 
 that it is not so much a genuine Tuscan as a 
 fancy order, founded upon a spoliation of the 
 Doric. 
 
 Scamozzi and other Italian architects have 
 also tried their hands on a Tuscan order, but 
 with little success. Their abortions may be 
 seen in Evelyn's parallel. 
 
 The next Roman order is their Doric, whicli 
 has been so altered and abused by various 
 architects since the decline of Grecian purity, 
 that some examples hardly appear to belong to 
 the same order. For instance, compare the 
 
 * Palladio, vol. i.-'C.:t4, pi. xii. 
 
 R 2 
 
244 
 
 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 portico of Shoreditch church, by the late Mr. 
 Dance, the finest example of the Roman Doric 
 in England, with that of Covent Garden 
 Theatre, the finest of the Greek we have, 
 though grievously misapplied, and it will re- 
 quire no prophet to predict the result in the 
 mind of any person of taste. 
 
 This order is by Palladio restored and com- 
 pounded from all the best antique specimens 
 found by him in Rome : his column is purer in 
 style than any single ancient remain ; and in- 
 deed has been elevated to the rank of a canon 
 of the order. Let us, however, oft'er it to the 
 test of criticism and try how it will bear that 
 test. The bed moulding, (see cut,) or under 
 
 part of the cornice, is too complex and en- A 
 
VJ ON ARCHITECTURE. 245 
 
 riched for the simplicity and manly character 
 of the order. The frieze is divided as he 
 found the best remains in ancient Rome, and 
 thetriglyphs are consequently misdivided; the 
 frieze has two faces, and the whole entablature 
 too small a proportion of height. The capital 
 is also overloaded with ornament, the abacus 
 is destroyed by the acj^dition of mouldings; the 
 echinus is converted to a quadrant ; the annu- 
 lets are stuck out of sight; and the graceful chan- 
 nelling of the Greek hypotrachelion is omitted, 
 to make room for a clumsy necking, ^Yhich he 
 calls colarino, belonging to any order but the 
 Doric. He has also added a base to the shaft, 
 and omitted the beautiful mutules which sup- 
 port the corona over every triglyph and metope 
 of the Greek original. I need but add, "look 
 on this picture and on this!* 
 
 The next order in the Roman system is their 
 Ionic, which differs almost as much in detail 
 as the Doric, as may be seen in the compara- 
 tive view of two of the best specimens, No. 1, 
 from the Greek temple, near the river Ilyssus 
 at Athens ; and No. 2, from the Theatre of 
 Marcellus, at Rome. 
 
 * The Doric of Palladio and that of the Parthenon, &c, — 
 See wood-cuts in page 207. 
 
246 
 
 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 In its leading character, the volutes, however, 
 it has not been so violated as the Doric. 
 
 The first specimen to which I beg leave to 
 call your attention is from the temple of For- 
 tuna Virilis at Rome, an excellent restoration 
 of which, in all its details, may be found in 
 Palladio's work on the ancient temples of 
 Rome. 
 
 This temple, now used as the church of 
 Santa Maria Egiziaca, stands near the Sena- 
 torian bridge. Its order of architecture is 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 247 
 
 Ionic, of temples Prostyle, and its interco- 
 luniniations Systyle.* The Roman antiquary, 
 Vasi, supposes it to have been built by Servius 
 TuUius VI. king of Rome, out of gratitude to 
 Fortune, he having been born a slave. Palla- 
 diot relates a miracle concerning it ; that all its 
 interior being consumed by fire, the gilt wooden 
 statue of the god Manly Fortune escaped un- 
 damaged, while every thing else was burnt. 
 About the year A.D. 872 this ancient temple 
 was converted into a church, and dedicated to 
 the Virgin, under Pope John VI II. The great 
 altar-picture, representing St. Mary of Egypt, 
 is one of the finest works of Federigo Zuc- 
 chero ; and it also contains a model of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, at Jerusalem. In construc- 
 tion, it has half columns at the sides and a 
 detached portico in front. Its order is un- 
 doubtedly the best to be found in Rome, and 
 resembles the one of the Theatre of Marcellus 
 in page 246, but will not bear comparison with 
 the beautiful Greek original, whose name it 
 usurps. Compare the two, and judge for 
 yourselves. Look at the small size of the 
 
 * Refer to the former Lecture for explauation of these 
 terms. 
 
 t Palladio, vol. ii. c. 13. 
 
248 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 volutes coming down scarcely below the 
 sculptured echinus, which is as hioh as the 
 first spiral of the volute, by which means the 
 entire of the beautiful hem which hangs so 
 tastefully over the Greek example is omitted. 
 Its abacus is also altered from a simple to 
 a compound moulding. Yet the builder of 
 Waterloo Place, in front of the King's palace 
 of Carlton House, with Mr. Holland's taste- 
 ful Greek screen in his eye, has rejected 
 the orthodoxy of the one for the heresy of 
 the other. 
 
 I will instance only one more example of 
 this order after the manner of the Romans ; — 
 the very singular one of the Temple of Con- 
 cord, which I much wonder has not yet been 
 copied in neiv London. The cornice has 
 mutules, or raodillions, like the Doric ; dentels 
 like the Ionic ; and three faciae to the frieze 
 like the Corinthian, thus stealing from all its 
 neighbours. The capital has angular volutes, 
 and an angular abacus, like the Corinthian, 
 with a necking and a row of leaves like no 
 order whatever. 
 
 The temple itself stands at the entrance of 
 the Roman Forum,* near the arch of Sep- 
 
 * Pallod. vol. ii. c. xxx. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 249 
 
 timius Severus, and is supposed to have been 
 the Temple of Concord, built by Livia, and 
 dedicated by Tiberius to Concord, in remem- 
 brance of the harmony subsisting between 
 Livia and her husband Augustus. Palladio 
 thinks it was built by Favius Camillus, in con- 
 sequence of a vow.* It was burnt in the reign 
 of Yitellius, and restored l)y the senate and 
 people of Rome, accord iug to an inscription"]" 
 on the frieze. Of this edifice nothing is now 
 standing but its portico, which consists of eight 
 stupendous columns, twelve feet in circum- 
 ference, and forty in height. The shafts are 
 of oriental granite. 
 
 Such are the leading features or charac- 
 teristics of the Roman Ionic ; and it remains 
 for the student to inquire from which source, 
 Roman or Greek, he can draw the most grace- 
 ful proportions of this beautiful and useful 
 order. In the Roman specimens, their over- 
 loaded cornices, their ill-proportioned entabla- 
 tures, their vulgar profiles, and the broken 
 spiral lines of their volutes, render them, in 
 my opinion, utterly unfit for models. 
 
 There is little in the Roman specimens of 
 
 * Pallad. vol.ii. c. xxx. 
 
 t S.P. Q.R. Incendis consumptum restituit. 
 
250 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the Ionic to entitle it to notice, till the time of 
 the compositions of Palladio, Scamozzi, AI- 
 berti, Serlio, De Lorme, and others of that 
 school, which certainly are in better taste, as 
 they approach more nearly to the legitimate 
 standards of the order. 
 
 Our next step in the Roman system of the 
 orders is to the Corinthian. 
 
 The origin and description of this splendid 
 order were given in the preceding lecture on 
 the Grecian system: and the principal ex- 
 amples now remaining in Italy and Greece do 
 not differ so much as the other orders. 
 
 The Corinthian order, as exemplitied in the 
 portico of the building called the Pantheon, at 
 Rome, although rather coy in ornament, is of 
 beautiful proportions, is chaste, correct, and 
 a scood model for imitation. The entablature 
 bears a just proportion to the column ; the 
 architrave, frieze, and cornice are in perfect 
 harmony with each other ; and the ornaments, 
 though sparingly, are judiciously introduced. 
 Sir Christopher Wren has used it with judge- 
 ment in the lower order of the cathedral of 
 St. Paul, and Mr. Hardwick in the portico of 
 Mary-le-bone church, in the New Road ; but 
 I think both these architects might have carved 
 the dentel faciae of the bed mould into dentels, 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 251 
 
 without violating; the character of their ori- 
 ginal ; particularly the latter, whose portico, 
 faciiiii the north, receives only the declining 
 rays of the sun, which, entering the bed mould, 
 makes this member appear like a second 
 corona, destroying the harmony of its light and 
 shade, and producing spottiness rather than 
 breadth. In St. Paul's the shade is deeper, 
 and the defect not so conspicuous, particularly 
 since the friendly soot of the city has formed 
 an artificial shade over the portion of which 1 
 complain. 
 
 Of all the antique temples now remaining in 
 Rome, the Pantheon is at once the most cele- 
 In'attd and most beautiful, and may be consi- 
 dered the master-piece of Roman architecture, 
 whether we estimate it as when entire, or, as at 
 present, stripped of all its statues and other 
 ornaments. It is supposed to have been built 
 by Marcus Agrippa, son-in-law of Octavius 
 Augustus, in his third consulship before the 
 Christian era, and dedicated to Mars and 
 .Jupiter the Avenger, in memory of the victory 
 obtained by Augustus over Mark Anthony and 
 Cleopatra; but I am inclined to think, with 
 Palladio*, that the body of the temple was 
 
 * Pallad. V. ii. c.xx. 
 
252 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 built in the time of the republic, and that 
 Agrippa added the portico, and perhaps some 
 other decorations, as the two pediments seem 
 to prove. It was repaired by Septimius Severus 
 and Caracalla. The interior was decorated 
 with bronze ornaments in the panelling of the 
 cupola, and contained the statues of all the 
 Gods. The interior is no less fine and striking 
 than the outside, and from its circular form is 
 called by the Italians Rotonda, as, from con- 
 taining statues of all the Gods, it was named 
 by the ancients Pantheon, from riAN 0EOI. 
 The diameter, exclusive of the large niches, is 
 one hundred and thirty-two feet, being nearly 
 thirty feet more than the cupola of St. Paul's, 
 and the height from the pavement to the sum- 
 mit the same as the diameter. The thickness 
 of the walls is nineteen feet, which is relieved 
 by the beautiful Corinthian niches now used 
 as chajjels and altars. 
 
 This superb temple, " this most noble and 
 perfect specimen of Roman art and magnifi- 
 cence that time has spared, or that the an- 
 cients could have wished* to transmit to pos- 
 terity," after various repairs and changes, was 
 given by the Emperor Phocus, in the year d09,t 
 
 * Eustace. t Vasi. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 253 
 
 to Pope Boniface IV. who converted it into a 
 church, dedicated it to the Virgin and the 
 Holy Martyrs of the earliest Christian ages, a 
 quantity of whose relics he placed under the 
 great altar, and named it Santa Maria ad 
 Martyres. In 830 Gregory IV. dedicated it to 
 All the Saints, whose festival he then instituted. 
 It underwent many other repairs, and Alex- 
 ander VII. reinstated the two columns, which 
 were long wanting on the right side of the 
 portico, made new capitals to them, and 
 sculptured his arms (the Chigi) upon them. 
 These columns were discovered near the 
 piazza St. Luigi de Francesi, and are almost 
 of the same proportion with the others. 
 
 Belonging to this church is a society of paint- 
 ers, sculptors, architects, and other persons of 
 intellectual merit, who have raised in it several 
 monuments to celebrated men. Here repose 
 the remains of the inimitable Raftaelle : 
 
 " Ye radiant beam», the sacred spot illume, 
 
 And sport, in mingled tints, o'er Raffaelle's tomb."* 
 
 Among the busts are those of Raffaelle ; 
 Metastasio ; Pikler, the gem sculptor; Bracci, 
 the sculptor ; Venuti, the antiquary ; Rapini, 
 
 * Hawkins' Oxford prize poem, 1813. 
 
254 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the architect; and other eminent artists and 
 literati. 
 
 Among other fine examples of this order 
 found in Rome, are the beautiful columns of 
 the Campo Vaccino, supposed to be the re- 
 mains of the temple of Jupiter Stator.* The 
 capital and entablature of this temple have 
 been well adapted by Mr. Holland to the 
 portico of his Majesty's palace of Carlton 
 House ; and a complete set of moulds and casts 
 have been recently brought to England by my 
 friend Mr. Joseph Gwilt. 
 
 Another curious, bold, and elegant exam- 
 ple must not be omitted, that of the temple of 
 Vesta at Tivoli, the half of which is adapted 
 to the round corner of the new buildings by 
 Mr. Soane at the Bank of England ; and com- 
 plete casts have also been brought over by 
 Mr. Gwilt, for his museum. 
 
 There only remains to be described one 
 more of the orders of columns. The technical 
 nature of this part of my subject has, I fear, al- 
 most exhausted your patience ; but, like the 
 description of the bones and muscles in ana- 
 tomical science, it has been necessary to the 
 dev elopement of the art. The Composite 
 
 ^ Pallad, vol. ii. chap, xviii. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 2-55 
 
 order is the fifth in the Roman system, 
 and proves in itself the restless desire 
 which this innovating and ambitious people 
 had of altering and converting" to their own 
 use the materials, the arts, the science, and 
 the customs of the countries which they van- 
 quished. 
 
 This order is evidently derived from those 
 of the Ionic and Corinthian, but can in no case 
 be applied with superior effect to the lat- 
 ter. It was first used by the Romans in 
 the triumphal arches which they erected to 
 show to posterity their dominion over their 
 conquered provinces. Of this order there are 
 many existing remains ; but the best is that 
 from the arch of Titus, fine casts of every part 
 of which have recently arrived in this country, 
 made by order of the same gentleman whose 
 name I have before mentioned as possessing 
 the casts from Tivoli and the Campo Vaccino. 
 
 This triinnphal arch was erected by the 
 senate and people of Rome, in honour of Titus, 
 after his conquest of Jerusalem, and will be 
 spoken of more fully in its proper place. The 
 example here quoted may be selected as a very 
 proper model of this order. Its appearance is 
 grand and imposing, but differs only in its capi- 
 
266 ELMES'S LECTl'RES 
 
 tal and greater height of shaft from the Corin- 
 thian. 
 
 1 have thus endeavoured briefly to describe 
 the constituent elements of the two leading or 
 classical systems of civil architecture, the 
 Grecian and the Roman ; and will proceed to 
 an elucidation of the general characteristics of 
 Roman architecture, as displayed in their 
 aqueducts, their temples, their bridges, and 
 their theatres ; of which Mr. Eustace says — 
 " all the powers of architecture, of sculpture, 
 and of painting, were employed to decorate 
 their cities." One of the principal temples 
 erected by the ancient Romans was the Capitol, 
 built on the Tarpeian or Capitoline hill, by 
 Tarquin the Proud, in accomplishment of a 
 vow made by his uncle, the elder Tarquin. 
 The original edifice was formed in the year of 
 the city, 670, rebuilt by Sylla, and, dedicated 
 five years afterwards. It was again destroyed 
 by fire in the year A.D. 70, and was rebuilt by 
 Vespasian, burned a third time, and re-edified 
 by Domitian with great splendour. The build- 
 ings comprising the edifice called the capitol, 
 consisted of three temples, consecrated seve- 
 rally to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva. On the 
 capitol were also the temples of Terminus, 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 257 
 
 Jupiter Feretrius, and the cottage of Romulus, 
 which was long preserved with religious vene- 
 ration. 
 
 Doubts have been entertained as to the situ- 
 ation of this building, and whether there were 
 more than one. " Do you remember/' asks 
 Mr. Spence,* of Pope, ** any thing of two 
 capitoliums at Rome ?" To which Pope an- 
 swered, '* yes, there certainly were two ;" 
 more readily than Holdsworth, a well known 
 and celebrated antiquary of Roman affairs^ 
 who was present. " The former of these 
 capitols,*' continued the poet, *' was built by 
 Tarquinius Priscus, near the place where the 
 Barberini palace stands, and was called 
 Capitolium vetus ; the other by the second 
 Tarquin, on the hill, which was thence called 
 the Capitoline hill. 
 
 The temple of all the Gods, called the Pan- 
 theon, and the temple of Concord, have been 
 spoken of before ; they erected, besides, those 
 of Janus and of Romulus, of the sun and 
 moouj Fortuna Virilis, Vesta, Minerva, Me- 
 dica, Neptune, Antoninus and Faustina, Ju- 
 piter Stator, and the temple of Peace : the 
 
 * Spence's Anecdotes, Singer's edition, p. 204. 
 
 s 
 
258 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 three magniiicent arches now standing of the 
 latter edifice, which have been finely adapted 
 by Sir Christopher Wren in the choir of St. 
 Paul's cathedral, give but a faint idea of its 
 pristine splendour. 
 
 The temple of Fortuna Virilis and that of 
 Vesta are fine remains of ancient Roman splen- 
 dour. The circular ruin, now the clmrch of 
 Santa Maria del Sole, is supposed to have been 
 the temple of Vesta. The external wall of the 
 circular cell is entirely of Grecian marble, so 
 finely joined together that the joints are hardly 
 perceptible. The nineteen fluted columns of 
 the Corinthian order are of Parian marble, and 
 form a perystyle or portico of one hundred and 
 fifty-six feet in circumference. One column, 
 the whole of the entablature, and some of the 
 sculptures are wanting ; the diameter of the cell 
 is twenty-six feet ; that of the columns nearly 
 three feet, and their height, including base 
 and capital, thirty-two feet English measure. 
 
 Among the grander beauties of Rome were 
 the Forums ; and above all, in size, splen- 
 dour, and architectural beauty, was the Roman 
 Forum, which was the most renowned place in 
 all the ancient city. It was here that the 
 assemblies of the senate and people were held. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 259 
 
 surrounded by the most splendid temples, 
 basilicas, triumphal arches, porticos, and 
 other public and private edifices, which were 
 adorned by columns, statues, and various 
 other embellishments. 
 
 " But," says Eustace, one of the most en- 
 lightened of our recent travellers, " the glories 
 of the Forum are now fled for ever ; its tem- 
 ples are fallen ; its sanctuaries have crumbled 
 into dust ; its colonnades encumber its pave- 
 ments now buried under their remains. The 
 walls of the Rostra are stripped of their orna- 
 ments, and doomed to eternal silence : a few 
 scattered porticos, and here and there an in- 
 sulated column, standing in the midst of broken 
 shafts, vast fragments of marble capitals, and 
 cornices heaped together in masses, remind 
 the traveller that the field which he now 
 traverses was once the Roman Forum." Few 
 sadder or more faithful pictures have been 
 drawn than this sublime view of the Roman 
 Forum : it forcibly reminds one of Salvator's 
 picture of Caius Marius among the ruins of 
 Carthage. This splendid structure is now 
 converted into a beast-market, and called by 
 the contemptible name of Campo Vaccino. 
 
 Of the other Forums, that of Trajan ranks 
 first for splendour and magnificence. Of this 
 
 s2 
 
260 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Forum, Ammianus Marcellinus relates, that 
 when Constantius visited Rome he fixed his 
 attention on the equestrian statue of Trajan, 
 which stood in the centre of the Forum before 
 the Basihca, and intimated his intention of 
 erecting such a horse and such a statue of him- 
 self ; when a Persian prince, who accompanied 
 him, replied, " before you procure such a 
 horse it would be as well that you should pre- 
 viously erect such a stable." The Trajan 
 column also forms one of the ornaments of this 
 once splendid building. 
 
 Of the extent of ancient Roman splendour 
 yet remaining, and of the grandeur of their 
 ancient architecture, the following instance 
 from the work before alluded to* may serve as 
 an example : — 
 
 " A hall of an immense size was discovered 
 about the beginning of the last century con- 
 cealed under the ruins of its own massive roof. 
 The pillars of verde antico that supported its 
 vaults, the statues that ornamented its niches, 
 and the rich marbles that formed its pavement, 
 were found buried in rubbish, and were imme- 
 diately carried away by the Farnesian family, 
 the proprietors of the soil, to adorn their palaces 
 
 * Eustace's Classical Tour 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 201 
 
 and furnish their galleries." " This hall is 
 now cleared of its incumbrances, and presents 
 to the eye a vast length of naked walls, and 
 an area covered with weeds. As we stood 
 contemplating its extent and proportions, a fox 
 started from an aperture, once a window, at 
 one end, and crossing the open space scrambled 
 up the ruins at the other and disappeared in 
 the rubbish. This scene of desolation reminded 
 me of Ossian s beautiful description : ' The 
 thistle shook there its lonely head ; the moss 
 whistled to the gale ; the fox looked out from 
 the windows ; the rank grass waved around 
 his head,' and almost seemed the accomplish- 
 ment of that awful prediction, * There the wild 
 beasts of the desert shall lodge, and howling 
 monsters shall fill the houses, and wolves shall 
 howl to one another in their palaces, and 
 dragons in their voluptuous pavilions.'" 
 
 The triumphal arches of the Romans may be 
 reckoned among the architectural luxuries or 
 superfluities of this magnificent people. No- 
 thing which could tend to perpetuate the fame 
 of the conquerors was omitted in the design. 
 Some were constructed with two ^nd others 
 with three openings ; and the most magnificent 
 were built on the triumphal way. On a triumph 
 
262 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 being decreed, the senate received the conque- 
 ror at the Porta Capena, near the Tiber, which 
 was the entrance to the city from the Appian 
 way. A very brief description of them is all 
 my limits will allow. 
 
 The Arch of Augustus, at Rimini, has but a 
 single opening,* about thirty-three feet in 
 width, crowned with a pediment, contrary to 
 the usual practice. It is a beautiful specimen 
 of construction, but is much mutilated. 
 
 That called the Aick of the Goldsmiths, at 
 Rome, is a curious example : it is small in 
 dimensions, has but a single aperture, is covered 
 with a flat lintol, and is much embellished w ith 
 sculpture. 
 
 The arches of Titus, at Rome, and of Tra- 
 jan, at Benevento, bear a striking resemblance 
 to each other. The former is of that Composite 
 order which I have dilated upon in the preceding 
 part of this Lecture, and is said to have been 
 the first constructed of this order : it was 
 erected for the triumph of Titus over Jerusalem, 
 on which account no Jew will pass under it. 
 The bassi-relievi represent, on one side, the ark 
 and the golden candlesticks ; on the other the 
 
 * Gwill's Notitia Architectonica Italiaua. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 263 
 
 emperor in his qiiatlriga. In the attic is repre- 
 sented tlie apotheosis of Titus, whence it is 
 inferred that it was finished after his death. 
 
 The triumphal arch of Gavicisy at Verona, 
 called " Del Castel Vecchio" no longer exists : 
 I mention it, however, on account of Vitru- 
 viiis having been charged by some with vio- 
 lating his own precepts in the construction 
 of this arch ; but its builder was Vitruvius 
 CerdOy not Vitruvius Pollio^ the legislator of 
 architecture. 
 
 The arches of Septimius Severus and of 
 Constantine are with three openings. The 
 latter is embellished with ornaments, shame- 
 lessly stripped from the arch of Trajan; and 
 from their absurd application we are the 
 more disgusted with the barbarism of the de- 
 spoilers. The former is in fine preservation, 
 and serves as a portico to the church of St. 
 George, in Vellario. 
 
 Arches were among the constituent and pe- 
 culiar elements of Roman architecture ; the 
 principal merit of which, indeed, was that 
 of construction, a distinction in which the 
 ancient Romans and modern Italians have 
 never been surpassed ; and I have, therefore, 
 reserved my observations upon this great ex- 
 cellency in the more mechanical part of archi- 
 
264 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 lecture for the present Lecture. This portion 
 of my duties, I must premise, may appear 
 heavy ; but to those who honour me with their 
 attention, more for such information as 1 can 
 give than for mere amusement, no apology for 
 this most necessary inquiry is needful. 
 
 The science of construction, or Slereotomi/, 
 as it is termed by the French, who have aca- 
 demies for studying it, is the art of executing 
 buildings from drawings or models, pre-sup- 
 posing the design to have no stereometrical 
 frror in itself. This subject demands the 
 deepest attention, from its importance to the 
 stability of public works. It is the knowledge 
 of this science, added to that of design, which 
 elevates the architect above the architectural 
 draftsman. Without it he vyould become a 
 mere decorator, who can only servilely copy 
 others, or continually run the risk of designing 
 impossibilities, and of surviving his own totter- 
 ing fabrics. The knowledge of construction 
 connects the art with the science of architec- 
 ture ; and, giving proper effect to their united 
 energies, adds to their beauties and necessities 
 the mathematical and arithmetical sciences, 
 and the knowledge of calculation. 
 
 It was a want of this important knowledge 
 in the Architect of the Ratcliffe Library, Ox- 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 265 
 
 ford, that obliged him to abandon the stone 
 cupola which he had begun to construct over 
 that building, and which caused dreadful frac- 
 tures in the substructure, threatening final 
 ruin, although encircled with buttresses almost 
 colossal. He finally substituted the present 
 wooden cupola, which evidently does not re- 
 quire those immense contreforts, originally 
 destined to supply the stone cupola with that 
 strength which a correct knowledge of the 
 principles of construction could alone have 
 furnished. 
 
 The same causes produced, though at a more 
 distant period from its first erection, the tre- 
 mendous fissures in the cupola of St. Peter's, 
 at Rome, which have been recently admirably 
 and scientifically remedied by the celebrat- 
 ed mechanician Zabaglia. This artist encir- 
 cled the whole cupola, after the example of 
 Sir Christopher Wren, at St. Paul's, with a 
 stupendous iron chain, which should have been 
 inserted on its first erection, as its construc- 
 tion was on such principles as evidently re- 
 quired it. 
 
 JSven if the design sliould come more perfect 
 from the architect than those just mentioned, 
 yet a want of constructive knowledge in the 
 wprkman would be no less decisive of insta- 
 
266 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 bility. Ignorance of this in the workmen oc- 
 casioned some of the arcades in the river front 
 of Somerset House to fall on improperly 
 striking the centres, and in consequence of the 
 unfinished abutments having been left without 
 temporary support. More of the dilapidations 
 of modern buildings are occasioned by these 
 deficiencies of knowledge, than by the slower 
 operation of the insidious enemy — Time. 
 
 On the other hand, it is a well-grounded 
 knowledge of this important branch of our art 
 which elevates Sir Christopher Wren so much 
 above his compeers and rivals. It is in this 
 respect that his works so eminently excel. St. 
 Paul's cathedral may perhaps strike some cri- 
 tics to be faulty in design ; but, as a perfect 
 piece of scientific construction^ it stands with- 
 out a rival. I speak with some confidence; 
 for, by the advice of the late Mr. Milne, who 
 was architectural conservator of this grand 
 structure, I occupied myself considerably, 
 during the space of three years, in measuring, 
 delineating, and investigating its stereometri- 
 cal qualities.* The church of St. Stephen, 
 Wai brook, a work also of Sir Christopher 
 Wren's, is no less admirable in this respect, al- 
 
 * Engraved and published in l&ll. 
 
V] ON ARCHITFXTURE. 267 
 
 though other beauties of a more apparent kind 
 have raised it to a deservedly high rank among 
 ecclesiastical edifices. The theatre at Oxford, 
 also, is excellent in point of construction, al- 
 though censurable as a work of taste. The 
 same may be said of the incomparable spire of 
 Bow church, Cheapside ; an architectural 
 monster, as far as taste is concerned, but an in- 
 imitable specimen of scientific construction. 
 
 The Greeks and Romans were both admirable 
 in this department of architecture. Tliere are 
 no false bearings in any of their stupendous 
 edifices. In them we see no masonry depend- 
 ing on carpentry for its support ; no enormous 
 cumbrous piers bowing down the arched lintol 
 of a subjacent aperture ; no cupolas or arches 
 vaulted over a threatened space, on tottering 
 pinnacles, strutted up by flying buttresses or 
 temporary shores, disgrace their scientific and 
 well-digested works. In allusion to the nice 
 balancing and excellent stereotomy of the 
 Greeks, it has been said that the weight of a 
 bird alighting on one end of an architrave 
 Avould be felt at the other. It would be no 
 miracle of strength in another Sampson to 
 pull down on his devoted head many a mo- 
 dern temple. 
 
 It would be an invaluable acquisition could 
 
268 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 
 
 we now obtain a journal or account of the 
 methods used in constructing some of the most 
 celebrated edifices of antiquity, or indeed of 
 some of later times, where the principles of con- 
 struction are neither so simple nor apparent as 
 in the generality of the Greek temples. Such 
 an account of his proceedings, of his difficul- 
 ties, of their elucidation, correction and com- 
 pletion, from the pen of the architect of the 
 Pantheon, at Rome ; of the Cathedral of St. 
 Peter, in the same city ; of St. Paul's, Lon- 
 don; the church of the Invalids, at Paris; Sta. 
 Sofia, at Constantinople ; or other equally cele- 
 brated and excellent buildings, would effect 
 more for the attainment of canons of construc- 
 tion, than a thousand theoretical treatises un- 
 connected with such just data and incontro- 
 vertible facts. The world lies under great ob- 
 ligations to the scientific Smeaton for his details 
 of the Eddeystone Light-House. 
 
 Does the cupola of the Pantheon, at Rome, 
 contain within its masonry any artificial links 
 or ties of iron ? If not, \a that of St. Peter's, 
 in the same city, erroneous in its construction 
 from standing in need of their late insertion? 
 or were those fractures occasioned by cutting 
 away and weakening the substructure by 
 an equally lamentable want of knowledge? 
 
V] ON ARCHITJECTURE. 269 
 
 Are the chains which are inserted in the cone 
 and inner dome of St. Paul's, London, essentia 
 ally necessary to its present stability ? or are 
 they only wise preventives, in the too-certain 
 event of decay, or the decomposition of the 
 materials of the edifice? These are im- 
 portant questions and so essentially necessary 
 are they to the perfection of architectural 
 knowledge, that correct answers to them would 
 be a public benefit and deserve the thanks of 
 the whole world. 
 
 To illustrate the best modes of construction 
 in all the various materials would occupy too 
 great a space for a popular Lecture. To point 
 out errors is easier and shorter ; therefore I shall 
 first mention a few, so prevalent as scarcely to 
 be thought errors, from the many precedents 
 that can be produced as authorities. 
 
 The Act of Parliament of the 14th Geors:e 
 III. enacts many excellent regulations in con- 
 struction that are often voluntarily adopted, 
 even where the Act has no power. Yet many 
 additions and amendments could easily be in- 
 grafted on the present stock. One of the 
 most formidable errors lies in its permitting 
 brick or stone fronts to be erected on timber 
 breastsoraers and story-posts, which are in 
 such imminent danger from accidents by fire, 
 
270 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 that an expensive, new, and (otherwise) well- 
 built house, would be inevitably destroyed 
 through the defects only of this eiToneous mode 
 of construction. The remedy, too, is easy and 
 obvious : brick, or stone arches, upon iron piers 
 or standards, or bars of iron laid longitudinally 
 as in the best mode of constructing kitchen 
 fire-places, would be an infallible and unex- 
 pensive preventive. The materials of modem 
 construction are timber, brick, stone, slate, 
 tile, iron, &c. 
 
 Buildings constructed of timber are both fre- 
 quent and useful ; and construction in timber, 
 or carpentry, is a most important study. Floors, 
 roofs, partitions, and bridges, are the principal 
 objects of this branch of construction.* From 
 the dependance of Great Britain on foreign aid 
 for the best fir timber, and its insuflSciency in 
 the case of fire, a more sparing use of it in build- 
 ing is not only desirable but necessary; there- 
 fore the following substitutes for construction 
 in timber may be recommended. Basement 
 stories can be arched : other floors, where that 
 mode of construction is inapplicable, can be 
 
 * Mr. Tredgolcl's recently-publislied book on Carpentry 
 is the best which has yet appeared, and leaves little to be de- 
 sired by the student. 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. .271 
 
 formed in the manner called bridged, which 
 uses timber of much smaller dimensions, and 
 affords the best means of applying Lord Stan- 
 hope's cheap and efficacious mode of prevent- 
 ing fires, called by workmen pugging and 
 sound-hoarding. Thus it appears that of all 
 the modes of construction, that in timber is the 
 least desirable. 
 
 Different nations of antiquity used different 
 materials in construction ; and their erections 
 were the types and figures of the different 
 orders. In those countries which abound- 
 ed in forests, trunks of trees and their 
 branches interwoven together served to 
 construct the earliest dwellings; and when 
 the first wants of the inhabitants were 
 supplied, they were led to seek comfort 
 and decoration; hence the origin of car- 
 pentry. 
 
 The inhabitants of mountamous countries 
 sought for shelter in caverns ; and when these 
 were too iew, or otherwise insufficient for their 
 uses, they soon formed others, still imitating 
 their prototype, the naturally-formed cavern. 
 Others erected huts from rude stones and 
 other excavated materials, still imitating the 
 sheltering cavern. Industry, the hardy son of 
 
272 ELM£S's LECTUftES 
 
 ^vant, and experience, soon taught them td 
 square their materials, and more neatly fit theii* 
 joints. 
 
 In those countries where the stone was ex- 
 tremely hard and difficult to work, the builders 
 were led to use blocks of an amazing size and 
 weight; and in other countries, where it was 
 of a softer quality, smaller blocks, and more 
 decorative workmanship ; giving masonry and 
 sculpture as helpmates to the science of con- 
 struction. 
 
 Again, where stone and wood were scarce^ 
 the inhabitants applied to the ever-useful earth 
 for relief. First, they used clods heaped to* 
 gether round a certain area, and brought to an 
 apex. Improved knowledge next led them 
 to form artificial cubes, now called bricks, 
 which were first dried in the shade, and then 
 used in construction. They afterwards dis- 
 covered the art of burning them by fire, and 
 rendering them by vitrification as hard and as 
 durable as the most solid stone ; and hence 
 arose that other branch of construction called 
 bricklaying. Thus sprung the three dif- 
 ferent branches of the science of construc- 
 tion, — timber, stone, and brick. Sometimes 
 they are all three employed in the same build- 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 273 
 
 ing, sometimes only two, and occasionally, 
 though but rarely, only one. 
 
 I know not whether it is that the principle 
 of the grand and marvellous, which always 
 pervades the infancy of architecture, arises from 
 the contiguity man in his more uncivilized state 
 bears to nature's awful works, his mind being 
 filled with those vast impressions they never 
 fail to communicate, or whether our forefathers 
 aimed to astonish by magnitude, when they 
 could not charm by beauty. Certain it is that 
 many of their stupendous edifices were erected 
 but as remembrances of some event, and were 
 of an unemployable nature for dwellings, and 
 that their private huts went but httle beyond 
 the supplying of the wants of nature, as may be 
 conjectured from their fragile structures, which 
 have scarcely left a vestige or 
 
 " A wreck behind." 
 
 Thus we perceive that the construction of most 
 of the earliest buildings bears testimony to a 
 love for, and affectation of, immensity of size, 
 in their builders, and evinces remarkable faci- 
 lity in the execution of the most vast and mag- 
 nificent enterprises. 
 
 x\ccording to ancient historians, the Egyp- 
 
 T 
 
274 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tians are reckoned to be the first people who 
 constructed edifices of hewn stone ; and, from 
 scriptural evidence, were among the first who 
 used bricks of burnt clay. This indefatigable 
 people, who feared no difficulties, appear 
 to have been actuated by a love of the 
 vast and sublime beyond any other of the 
 ancient world, scarcely excepting even the un- 
 known excavators of Elephanta: aided by the 
 immense quarries with which their country 
 abounds, they set no limit to their love of mag- 
 nitude, each succeeding building differing but 
 in size from its predecessor. 
 
 Such were those eternal monuments of pride 
 and ability — the pyramids ; constructed, as has 
 been supposed, for the burying-places of their 
 kings. These edifices are perhaps the most 
 ancient, and are certainly the most stupendous 
 works ever constructed by the hands of men. 
 The earliest of them were probably built up- 
 wards of a thousand years before the temple of 
 Solomon, and about eight hundred years before 
 the walls of Babylon.* The greater part have 
 braved the devouring tooth of time nearly three 
 thousand eight hundred years, and still are to 
 
 * Sol. Tem. 1015 B.C. vide Newton's Chrouology. 
 
V] O^ ARCHITECTURE. 275 
 
 this day almost entire, although built of a 
 stone but moderately* hard. The blocks of 
 stone used in the construction inside as well as 
 outside of these architectural monsters are of 
 a most prodigious size, placed on each other 
 without cement, but so well jointed (say those 
 who have had ocular demonstration of the 
 fact) that the edge of a knife can scarcely be 
 inserted between them. 
 
 From these specimens it appears that the 
 science of construction consisted only in 
 transporting and squaring stones of an ex- 
 traordinary size, and that architectural merit 
 was alone to be judged of from the magnitude 
 of the work. 
 
 The immense size of manv of the coverings 
 of apertures, and whole roofs of temples formed 
 of one entire stone, still extant in Egypt, would 
 stagger belief, if the truth were not so well 
 authenticated. One important fact is hereby 
 proved; namely, that the principal of the arch 
 was then unknown, or they certainly would not 
 have transported the roof of the temple of 
 Latona, at Butis, from the island of Philoe, as 
 Herodotus testifies, a distance of nearly two 
 hundred leagues. It was the most enormous 
 
 * Vide Dr. Pococke, Capt. Norden, and Mons. Deiiotii 
 
 T 2 
 
276 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 block of stone ever moved by human power, 
 and contained above one hundred and forty- 
 four thousand cubic feet, weighinj^ above 
 twenty miUions of pounds avoirdupois. 
 
 All modern mechanical powers must vanish 
 before these wonderful exploits of ancient skill. 
 Those of more recent date which have been 
 most extolled are as nothing in the com- 
 parison. The moving and raising the obelisk 
 in the front of St. Peter's at Rome, by Pope 
 Sextus the Fifth, only equals its first erection 
 in Egypt, and falls infinitely short of the power 
 required to separate it from its solid bed in the 
 quarry, together with the labour of bringing it 
 to its present form. Yet what an affair of 
 wonder and admiration was this work of Pope 
 Sextus at the time; delineations of the ma- 
 chines, and of the manner of using them, were 
 thought worthy of publication, and certainly do 
 honour to the memory of that illustrious pontiff 
 and his mechanist. Another modern marvel is 
 the rock serving for the pedestal of the statue 
 of Peter the Great, which was brought to the 
 situation it now occupies by command of the 
 late Empress Catharine ; it scarcely weighs a 
 seventh part so much as the before-cited 
 Egyptian block, and was not brought 
 above four leagues and a half from the 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 277 
 
 place where it was found to that whereon it 
 now stands. 
 
 With all our resources, with all our mecha- 
 nical and other sciences, we must, I fear, de- 
 spair of equalling the means by which these 
 great works were constructed. 
 
 It would be as useless as tedious to pursue 
 the comparison further ; deprived of a portion 
 of their faculty of strength, we have advan- 
 tages more than counterbalancing this depri- 
 vation. The invention of the arch, and the 
 use of calcareous cements, render stone more 
 htting for ornament and sculpture, and afford 
 more space for genius to operate. Our care, 
 then, should be to excel in the departments of 
 the art most suitable to our present purposes 
 rather than idly to lament the ignorance of 
 those powers which were used to remove 
 blocks of stone, of a size such as these islands 
 can never produce. 
 
 The Assyrians, who disputed the palm of 
 antiquity with the Egyptians, were formidable 
 rivals also in the glory of erecting stupendous 
 buildings ; but, as their country possessed no 
 stone, they had recourse to brick, of which 
 material the Temple of Belus and the walls of 
 Babylon were constructed — works that are 
 
278 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 reckoned among the seven wonders of the 
 world. Historians inform us that they used 
 bitumen, a sort of vegetable tar, to cement 
 their bricks together; from which we may 
 conclude, that they were unacquainted with 
 the means of converting calcareous stones and 
 earth into lime, — a most important discovery 
 in the art of construction ; for bitumen, when 
 used as a cement, is subject to evaporation, 
 from which calcareous cements, when properly 
 indurated, are entirely free, as we know they 
 have often acquired a hardness and solidity 
 equal to that of the material cemented. 
 
 The period of the invention of calcareous 
 cements is not precisely known ; but was most 
 probably posterior to the art of brick-making. 
 Moulding earth, drying it in the sun, and burn- 
 ing it with fire, are more simple operations, 
 and more likely to have been first discovered, 
 than burning stones and then adding to them 
 sand and water to make an artificial cement. 
 Accident, the fruitfiil parent of our most bril- 
 liant discoveries, may have thrown this inven- 
 tion into the hands of man; the idea might 
 have been given by a building consumed by 
 fire, in which calcareous stones had been used, 
 pome of wliich had formed into a powder or 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 279 
 
 a paste by the operation of the water employed, 
 but when facts are hidden conjecture maj' 
 furnish many plausible causes. 
 
 It has already been said, that it is well 
 known the Egyptians used no cement in the 
 construction of their edifices. Diodorus Sicn- 
 lus relates that the Persians in their build- 
 ings followed the same mode after tba con- 
 quest of Egypt, constructing them according 
 to the manner of the Egyptians; and he 
 farther adds, that the celebrated palace at 
 Persepolis was thus constructed, and by an 
 Egyptian architect. 
 
 The same taste for gigantic edifices, and 
 probably for the same reasons, seems to have 
 pervaded the earlier architecture of other 
 countries. Mexico, Peru, Elephanta, and, I 
 may add, England, in her Stonehenge, Avebury, 
 &c. are among many proofs of the assertion: 
 the antiquity of these structures is proved 
 by the fact of their being executed without 
 cement of stones well squared and exactly 
 fitted. 
 
 The earliest mode of construction among 
 the Greeks was with wood and tempered clay ; 
 yet their proportions were so exact and beauti- 
 ful, that they have given rise to the orders or 
 canons of architecture deduced from them. 
 
280 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 They continued the imitations of their original 
 wooden prototypes so closely, even after they be- 
 gan to build with marble, that it has been said 
 that their tutelary goddess Minerva converted 
 all their wooden temples into marble, by the 
 waving of her spear, to render the edifices of 
 her favourite people more durable and magni- 
 ficent. The Greeks, favoured equally by 
 nature as the Egyptians with a beautiful and 
 enduring material, at least equalled them in 
 the science of construction, and left them be- 
 hind, at a fearful distance, in the art of archi- 
 tecture. Their latter buildings were construct- 
 ed of enormous blocks of marble, squared, 
 carved, and polished, with the utmost care, 
 and were truly the triumphs of the art. 
 
 If the Egyptians have praise for patient in- 
 dustry in removing stupendous masses of stone, 
 the Greeks deserve no less a share of panegyric 
 for the manner by which Ctesiphon removed 
 the columns of the celebrated temple of Diana, 
 at Ephesus, the shaft of each column being 
 sixty feet in height and of one single piece of 
 marble. His son, Metagenes, signalized him- 
 self no less in removing and raising to their 
 situations their immense architraves, which 
 reached from one column to the other in an 
 entire piece. 
 
V] ON ARCHITFXTURE. 281 
 
 The Etruscans have left some specimens of 
 very ancient methods of construction; and to 
 them has been attributed the invention of 
 building with small pieces of stone joined to- 
 gether by calcareous cements, because in their 
 country are found the earliest examples of this 
 method of construction. But it is to the 
 Romans that the greatest praise is tiue for 
 construction in this way ; for to them must be 
 attributed at least the earliest use, if not the in- 
 vention, of the arch and the cupola, together 
 with the building of walls and arches of small 
 stones and bricks cemented together, of bridges, 
 of aqueducts, and of sewers. 
 
 The earliest buildings of the Romans were 
 without columns, and the greater part of their 
 temples circular, and covered with cupolas ; as 
 those of Romulus, of Cybele, of Vesta, of the 
 Sybils, of Mars, and others. Cossutius, who 
 flourished about two hundred years before 
 Christ, was the first Roman architect who in- 
 troduced the Greek manner of building temples 
 in Rome. Although the Romans had adopted 
 Greek proportions of the orders, yet they still 
 preserved their old methods of construction; 
 they employed the orders, columns, pediments, 
 and cornices merely as ornaments ; whereas 
 the Greeks used them as principal and neces- 
 
282 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 sary parts. The architecture of Rome pos- 
 sesses, in its various and superabundant rami- 
 fications, heaps of affectations and conceits, 
 solely arising from this error. The architec- 
 ture of Greece, on the contrary, inculcates a 
 noble simplicity ; every ornament is so ex- 
 actly in its place that it appears as if there 
 necessarily, and that the work would be im- 
 perfect without it. Art is, with them, so con- 
 cealed by easy simplicity, that although the 
 eye is never surprised, or struck at first with 
 wonder, as in more complex structures, it is 
 always satisfied and never satiated, always de- 
 lighted with the harmony of proportion and 
 the simplicity of grandeur. 
 
 The Romans differed essentially from the 
 Greeks in their manner of construction ; the 
 body and other principal parts of most of their 
 temples, and even the columns themselves, 
 were constructed of small stones and bricks 
 connected together with an almost indissoluble 
 cement, and cased on all sides with various 
 marbles, and those impenetrable stuccoes 
 which their important discoveries in the art of 
 making calcareous cements had given them. 
 
 The order of pilastei^ and panels in the 
 second story of the interior of the Pantheon is 
 entirely encrusted in this manner with coloured 
 
V] ON ARCHITECTURE. 283 
 
 marbles opposed to each other without any 
 projections, to which the Italians have given 
 the name of umhratile. These incrustations 
 they embellished with all that art and labour 
 could bestow upon them. This manner of 
 construction is certainly more simple and less 
 costly than that of large blocks, especially 
 where they have to be procured from a great 
 distance ; and, if the cement be good, it is in 
 every respect equal, and in some respects supe- 
 rior. Many considerable edifices, including 
 most of the gothic cathedrals of England 
 and the Continent, together with the Temple 
 of Peace, the Pantheon, the Palaces, Thea- 
 tres, Circuses, Baths, and Aqueducts of Rome 
 are thus built. 
 
 To architectural knowledge and taste, as a 
 fine art, must constructive knowledge be add- 
 ed, or all we shall build will be worthless. 
 Half- burnt bricks, half-rotten timber, stucco 
 and mastic will never make London an " eter- 
 nal city ;" and till the constructive errors of 
 modern builders, I had almost said architects, 
 be eradicated, like the dry rot or the leprosy, 
 the more we build after the prevailing fashion 
 of the day, the more food are we providing for 
 the contempt of posterity. 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 Roman Architecture continued from the Death 
 of Hadrian to the removal of the Seat of Em- 
 pire and the Arts to Constantinople. Their 
 Aqueducts, Amphitheatres, Saths, and Bridges 
 described and illustrated. The History of the 
 Art continued till its Immersion in the Dark 
 Ages, and its Revival in the Grceco-Gothic, Sa- 
 racenic, Moorish, the Style generally called 
 Gothic, and the Italian or Modern Architec- 
 ture. Characteristics in Style of the Age. 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 The Romans, in their architecture, possess- 
 ed a greater variety of style and buildings than 
 the Greeks. Tliey had also a more extended 
 dominion, more personal pride, and were 
 more partial to show and magnificence than 
 the graver and more philosophical Greeks. 
 From these causes arose the number and 
 grandeur* of their architectural achievements. 
 
 They also erected edifices to commemorate 
 every great event: — hence much of their archi- 
 tecture must be classed as rnonumental. 
 When the Romansf wished to perpetuate the 
 remembrance of a singular event, they raised 
 an altar and engraved thereon the particulars 
 of the transaction. Tacitus relates, in his 
 account of the public discussions which ensued 
 in Rome after the death of Augustus, that the 
 objectors to the honours paid to that Emperor 
 complained^ that " the honours due to the gods 
 
 * Murphy's Tacitus, vol. i. p. 399 — notes. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 374— notes. % Ibid. lib. i. sec. x. 
 
288 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 were no longer sacred. Temples were built and 
 edifices were erected to him: — a mortal man was 
 adored, and priests and pontiffs were appointed 
 to pay him impious homage." The homage of 
 temples was one that Augustus declined in his 
 life; for Suetonius says, — " Augustus, though 
 he knew that temples were often raised in the 
 provinces in honour of the proconsuls, allowed 
 none to be raised to himself, unless they were, 
 at the same time, dedicated to the Roman peo- 
 ple. In the city, he absolutely refused all ho- 
 nours of that kind." These facts prove that the 
 raising and dedicating a temple was a common, 
 nay, almost an every-day occurrence. 
 
 Tacitus, who deservedly ranks the highest 
 among the historians of Greece or Rome, is 
 perpetually adverting to the numerous archi- 
 tectural works of his public-spirited country- 
 men. But, alas ! their character in taste was 
 inferior both to their wealth and their vanity. 
 They cultivated few things supremely but elo- 
 quence and the sword: — and oratory and suc- 
 cessful war were the only steps to power and to 
 greatness. Greece was fallen into a state of 
 degeneracy. Point, antithesis, and conceit were 
 the delight of vain preceptors, who filled the 
 city of Rome, and held schools of declania- 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 289 
 
 tion, by Cicero called " Indus imjmdetUia:''* 
 and novelty, ornament, and bad taste crowded 
 their monuments. 
 
 This great historian (Tacitus) says that, 
 *' towards the end of the year A.D. 16, A.U.C. 
 760, a triumphal arch was erected, near the 
 temple of Saturn, in memory of the various 
 eagles retaken under the conduct of Germani- 
 cus and the auspices of Tiberius." AVhere, 
 it was recently asked me by a foreigner of 
 distinction in science, are the British temples in 
 memory of the eagles captured at Waterloo? 
 " Several other public monuments," continues 
 Tacitus, " were dedicated at the same time; a 
 temple to Fortune, in the gardens on the banks 
 of the Tiber, which Julius Caesar had bequeath- 
 ed to the Roman people; a chapel, sacred to 
 the Julian family; and a statue of Augustus, 
 in the suburbs called JBovillw.Y 
 
 With such a people, architecture could not 
 but flourish ; and had they, like the Greeks, 
 ennobled the profession of the architect as 
 they did that of the orator, as fine a taste in 
 the one country would doubtlessly have pre- 
 vailed as in the other. Their very wars, as 
 
 * Murphy's Essay, p. 15. 
 t Tacitus, lib. ii. sec. 41. 
 
290 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 we have seen, encouraged the arts. Statues ^ 
 and triumphal arches followed victory ; and j 
 the spoils of the conquered, prisoners of war, 
 with Yar'ious pic tu7'es of battles, mountains, and 
 rivers, were displayed with great pomp. 
 
 Another instance of the architectural gran- 
 deur of the Romans, on the authority of 
 Suetonius,* is worth reciting: — Augustus, to 
 perpetuate the glory of his victory at Actium, 
 built the city of Nicopolis, near the bay ; es- 
 tablished quinquennial games ; and, having 
 enlarged an old temple of Apollo, adorned 
 it with naval spoils, and dedicated it to 
 Neptune and Mars. 
 
 Where are our memorials of our late splen- 
 did naval and military victories? Victories 
 equal in generalship and personal valour to 
 any in the page of history. Waterloo has not 
 yet produced a single grand picture; nor has 
 Nelson received any public national honours but 
 a statue among the sculptures of St. PauVs 
 Cathedral. Nelson,! a name equal to anv in 
 
 * In Aug. 8, 18. 
 
 t There are, to be sure, Matthew Wyatt's fine groupe at 
 Liverpool; the monumental column erected by his fellow- 
 countymenat Yarmouth; and Westmacott's bronze statue at 
 Birmingham, executed by subscription of the inhabitants : i 
 but 1 speak of national honours. i 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 291 
 
 history ; a man who hved and died in the 
 service and for the good of his country. Had 
 he })een a Roman, the metropoUs and pro- 
 vinces would have abounded with his triumphal 
 arches and his statues. Germanicus, like 
 Nelson, died in the service of his country, but 
 not, like Nelson, in the hour of battle and of 
 hard-earned victory, which always excites en- 
 thusiastic feelings. But how differently were 
 they honoured. When the news of the death 
 of Germanicus reached Rome,* *' In a moment 
 the passions of men knew no bounds ; with- 
 out waiting for an edict of tlie magistrates, or 
 a decree of the senate, a cessation of all busi- 
 ness took place ; the courts of justice were 
 deserted ; houses were shut up ; shrieks and 
 groans burst out, and at intervals a deep and 
 awful silence followed. A general mourning 
 covered the face of the city." So far the 
 parallel runs equally with regard to these illus- 
 trious men: — Britain rivalled Rome in that 
 anguish of the heart, which surpasses outward 
 shew, at the death of her hero ; — but it can 
 be carried no farther. Our government is 
 surely culpable in the want of instances of 
 monumental gratitude to the great warriors, 
 
 * Tacitus, lib. ii. s. 83. 
 
 u2 
 
292 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 statesmen, and orators, who have embeUished 
 their days. Our Trafalgar monument, our 
 Wellington trophy, our public mansion to the 
 memory of the hero of the Nile, or palace to 
 the hero of Waterloo, are " like tales told by 
 an idiot, full of sound" and " signifying 
 nothing ; " while, on the death of Germanicus,* 
 the senate met to decree honours lo his 
 memory. Friendship put itself to the stretch, 
 and men of talents exhausted their invention. 
 It was voted that the name of Germanicus 
 should be inserted in the Salian hymn ; that a 
 curule chair, adorned with a civic crown, 
 should be placed in the college of Augustan 
 priests ; that his statue, wrought in ivory, 
 should be carried in the procession of the Cir- 
 censian games ; and that the vacancy made by 
 his death in the list of tlamens and augurs 
 should be filled from the Julian family only. 
 Triumphal arches were ordered to be erected 
 at Rome, on the Rhine, and Mount Amanus, 
 in Syria, with inscriptions setting forth the 
 splendour of his actions, and in direct terms 
 declaring that he died in the service of his 
 country. At Antioch, where his remains Avere 
 burnt, a mausoleum was ordered ; and at 
 
 * Tac. lib. ii. s. 83. 
 
Vf] ON ARCHITECTURE. 293 
 
 Epidaphiie, where he died, a tribunal in honour 
 of his memory. Of the several statues, and 
 the places where they were to be worshipped, 
 " it would be difficult," says Tacitus, " to give a 
 regular catalogue. It was farther proposed 
 that a shield of pure gold, exceeding the ordi- 
 nary size, should be dedicated to him in the 
 place allotted to orators of distinguished elo- 
 quence.'" These marks of respect were not so 
 nnich for the dead as for the living, and those 
 who witnessed such grateful remembrances of 
 heroic actions, acquired thereby an additional 
 stimulus towards rivalling them. " Victory 
 and Westminster Abbey" was a sentiment 
 uppermost in the mind of Nelson, and they 
 who are benefited by the victories of heroes, or 
 the services of statesmen, should not be sparing 
 of lasting monuments of gratitude, even if it 
 be only with the view of exciting the aspira- 
 tions of contemporaries. 
 
 The monumental column* erected to Nelson 
 at Yarmouth is a Grecian Doric column, rais- 
 ed on a pedestal, and surmounted by a statue 
 
 * This memorial was erected by subscription of the Nor- 
 folk men to their fellow Norvicensian, after the design of 
 Mr. Wilkins, the architect of Downing College, Cambridge. 
 
294 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 of Britannia ; being in the whole one hundred 
 and forty-four feet high, overlooking the sea 
 from a small eminence on a beach. It is thus 
 beautifully described by a friend, in imitation 
 of an ancient Greek poet, in the A7inals of tlie 
 Fine Arts: — 
 
 " Thy tomb, thus proudly o'er the ocean gazing, 
 Shall view each passing sail, — to deeds of might 
 Exhort the seamen, — and when fires, war-blazing, 
 Burst from embattled ships, shall stand spectator of the 
 fight." Leeds. 
 
 To return : — The causeway called the Long 
 Bridge, in Germany, was constructed in the days 
 of Tacitus by Lucius Domitius; it stretched a 
 great length between two prodigious marshes. 
 The country round it was one vast fen, in 
 some parts covered \yith a deep and slimy 
 mud, in others with a tenacious heavy clay, in- 
 tersected frequently with rapid torrents. But 
 neither fens, nor torrents, nor hills, nor moun- 
 tains, presented obstacles insurmountable by 
 this energetic race. Temples, theatres, cir- 
 cuses, useful and ornamental structures, com- 
 bining the magnificence of architecture, of sculp- 
 ture, and of painting, decorated not only the 
 capital but even the minor cities and towns of 
 the most distant provinces (as their mighty 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 295 
 
 ruins testifj'^) wherever the Roman name was 
 known. 
 
 Our country exhibits them in every part, 
 and in conquering they civilized our barba- 
 rian ancestors. A map of the Roman roads 
 in England alone is a magnificent monu- 
 ment of their greatness. Roads and military 
 ways, the very ruins of which excite as- 
 tonishment, were carried from the Roman 
 forum, the centre of their vast empire, to its 
 utmost boundaries. In a similar manner 
 they also constructed roads from the various 
 metropolitan to the provincial towns of the 
 countries which they subjugated. These 
 connected the extremities of the empire with 
 its heart, and linked all the nations com- 
 posing it by connecting ties, which were 
 cemented by the same laws, by similar 
 governments, and by all the facilities of 
 commodious intercourse and of frequent 
 communication. 
 
 " Their fortifications, their aqueducts, their 
 theatres, their fountains, all their public works, 
 bear the grave, solid, and majestic character 
 of their language; and our modem labours, 
 like our modern tongues, seem but constructed 
 out of their fragments."* Yet, with all these 
 
 * Guy Mannering, vol. ii. p. 7. 
 
296 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 advantages, the Roman character was far from 
 amiable, and their government from being 
 beloved by its dependants. Plutarch, who 
 was well acquainted with the antiquities and 
 customs of the Romans, says that, " full of 
 arms taken from barbarous nations, and of 
 bloody spoils, and crowned as she was with 
 trophies and other monuments of her triumphs, 
 she afforded a most severe and awful spectacle. 
 One might have styled her (to use an expres- 
 sion of Pindar) the temple of the frowning 
 Mars." He also, in allusion to their natural 
 want of taste in works of art, says, in his life 
 of Marcellus, " Rome neither had nor knew 
 any curiosities, but was a stranger to the 
 charms of taste and elegance unto the time of 
 Marcellus."* 
 
 The earliest architectural works of the Ro- 
 mans were, to a certain degree, grand, sim- 
 ple, and useful. Their great sewers, existing 
 to this day, are wonders of mechanicalf skill. 
 
 * Plut. in vita Marcelli. 
 
 t Tarquinius Priscus was the first who constructed these 
 sewers for the reception of the waters from the Vclahrum and 
 the mounts. After traversing the city, they united at the 
 Forum Romanum, whence, by means of two canals, the 
 waters and filth were discharged into the Tiber; the hirgest 
 canal was called Cloaca Maxima, the other Cloaca Minor. 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 297 
 
 Their theatres, amphitheatres, catacombs, aque- 
 ducts, bridges, batlis, roads, palaces, triumphal 
 arches, columns, villas, temples, forums, are 
 generally surprising from immenseness of size. 
 This produced an unnatural exaggeration 
 in their style of architecture, which extend- 
 ed to other things. Their architecture gave to 
 posterity the swoln Composite ; their sculp- 
 ture, the exaggerated style of the Gladiator; 
 and their poetry, t!ie hyperboles of Lucan and 
 Statius. The Colosseum alone consumed more 
 materials, and cost more money, than, perhaps, 
 all the temples of Athens put together; and 
 the Roman Foruui would possibly iiave con- 
 tained them all. It is to be lamented that the 
 passion for architecture among the Greeks 
 vented itself in public buildings alone. Their 
 stern public spirit would not suffer one of their 
 chief magistrates to boast of a structure worthy 
 of the name of a palace. The Quarterly Re- 
 view, of a few numbers back, ably charac- 
 terizes the far-famed city of Athens, as posess- 
 ing naiional edifices surpassingly magnificent, 
 and private ones despicably mean; temples and 
 statues in profusion, and no supply of one of 
 
 Tarquiiiius Superbus enlarged the great sewer ; because, as 
 Rome increased, it was not sufficient to contain so much 
 water. — Vasi. 
 
298 ELMES'S LECTURES. 
 
 the most necessary conveniences of common 
 life — water : porticoes crowded with paintings, 
 and a stream which the citizens were obliged 
 daily to wade through for want of a bridge.* 
 Exterior modesty, by the bye, was esteemed a 
 primary virtue among the ancient Greeks. 
 
 A contrary feeling pervaded the Romans, 
 even in the sternest days of their republic,! 
 when every great man vied with another in the 
 magnificence of his villa or palace. Pompey 
 had a palace of superlative grandeur; the 
 villa of Caius Marius, at Misenum, was so vast 
 and grand that the republican spirit of his 
 contemporaries began to feel offended ; and 
 yet, that of Lucullus, afterwards built on the 
 same site, left the former a mere cabin in com- 
 parison.]: Pliny informs us that there were, at 
 one time, in Rome§ above an hundred palaces, 
 the habitations of private individuals, equal in 
 splendour to that of Lepidus, in its first state, 
 which covered the ground occupied by an 
 hundred ordinary houses. 
 
 Imperial Rome, we may be certain, was not 
 behind republican Rome in this respect. Ju- 
 
 * Quarterly Review, No. 43, Art. IX. 
 t Bromley, vol. ii. p. 105 
 + Swinburne's Two Sicilies, vol. iii. p. 36. 
 § Pliny, lib. xxxvi. c. 15. 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 299 
 
 lius Caesar commenced a career of architec- 
 tural magnificence in the provinces ; and his 
 nephew Augustus led the way among the Em- 
 perors ; justly boasting that, having found 
 Rome of brick he left it of marble. Oh, that 
 some Augustus could arise to convert the half- 
 bur n ! r cks of London to marble ! or that a 
 British Minerva, in imitation of the Athenian, 
 would, by her lance, change our compo and 
 mastic into even decent stone. 
 
 Greece, as we have before seen, happily 
 perfected the arts to which Egypt gave birth : 
 — Rome, Prometheus-like, stole the fire of 
 architecture from her, and laid her glories low, 
 by pulling down and removing to Italy her sta- 
 tues, and columns, and treasures. The Ro- 
 mans hoped thus to confine the art to their own 
 dominions, and to raise a name whereby to 
 immortalize themselves and their posterity. 
 Possessed of such a glorious prize, and being, 
 at the same time, masters of so vast an empire, 
 they selected and assembled the finest artists 
 of the day ; and, by unwearied perseve- 
 rance, traced the most difficult paths of the 
 Greeks in literature, art, and government. 
 
 Athens furnished them with rules, which they 
 applied with an ambitious and aspiring mind in 
 erecting the splendid buildings just enume- 
 
300 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 rated. Marcellus, happy in victory, and pos- 
 sessing a cultivated mind, brought from Greece 
 the materials and artists which he employed in 
 erecting the magnificent theatre which is called 
 by his name. Pompey the Great is reported 
 by Tacitus to have built the first permanent 
 Amphitheatre at Rome. 
 
 Among the most useful and at the same 
 time stupendous works constructed by the 
 Romans were their aqueducts. It must be 
 owned that they possessed the art of embel- 
 lishing the necessaries of life and of rendering 
 luxury subservient to utility beyond any other 
 nation of ancient or modern times. 
 
 " From blue hills. 
 Dim ill the clouds, the rudiiuit aqueducts 
 Turu their innumerable arches o'er 
 Tiieir spacious desert," Dykr, '' 
 
 An aqueduct, as its name imports, is a con- 
 veyance of any kind for the purpose of con- 
 ducting water. Although any pipe or conduit 
 is, properly speaking, an aqueduct, yet the 
 word is generally appHed to a canal, constructed 
 on brick or stone arches, for conducting water 
 through an irregular country to a city or town, 
 with a regular necessary descent. Aqueducts 
 may be constructed either below or above 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 301 
 
 i^round, and are sometimes elevated on high 
 piers and arches, forming a regular arcade. 
 
 Aqueducts are divided into two sorts or 
 species, visible and subterranean. The tirst are 
 such as are carried across plains or valleys, 
 and are formed of piers and arches, like those 
 of the Romans in various parts of Italy and 
 France. Subterraneous aqueducts are such as 
 are excavated through mountains, or carried 
 under ground, as j)ractised in modern times 
 in various parts of England, France, and other 
 countries. 
 
 Visible or architectural aqueducts are sin- 
 gle, double, and treble, and are constructed 
 of one, two, or three tiers of arches, one above 
 the other. They are a species of construction 
 quite unknown to the Greeks, and are among 
 the noblest inventions of the Romans. Sextus 
 Julius Frontinus, a Roman author of consular 
 dignity, and sole director of aqueducts under 
 the Em})eror Nerva, wrote a treatise upon their 
 construction, speaking of them as among the 
 clearest evidences of the grandeurof the empire. 
 
 The tirst invention of aqueducts is attributed 
 to Appius Claudius, (about the year of Rome, 
 A.U.C. 441.) who by these means brought the 
 water into the city, by a channel of eleven 
 miles in length. But this was very inconsi- 
 
302 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 derable when compared with those which were 
 afterwards carried into Rome by various Em- 
 perors and other eminent persons. Several of 
 these were cut through mountains and other 
 difficult hindrances, for the distance of thirty, 
 forty, and even sixty miles, and of such a 
 width that, according to Procopius, a man 
 might ride through them without the least diffi- 
 culty. Many of their vaults and arches were 
 one hundred and nine feet high above the level 
 of the valley through which they passed.* The 
 number of aqueducts in the time of Procopius, 
 the year 530, A.XJ.C. he states to be four- 
 teen. 
 
 The Roman aqueducts were named eacii 
 from the place whence its waters were brought, 
 or from the name of its founder, joined to the 
 word Aqua, as Aqua Blarciq, supposed to 
 have been constructed by Ancus Marcius, 
 Aqtm AJexandrina, &c. The grandest and 
 most celebrated is the Aqua Claudia, whose 
 source is about eight miles to the south of the 
 city, and which was constructed by Appius 
 Claudius. It is partly above ground on arches, 
 and partly subterraneous, being carried through 
 the mountain near the Valerian way at Tivoli. 
 
 * Procopius de bello Gotli. lib, i. 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 303 
 
 Tlie Romans, inspired by a noble spirit of 
 magnificence and improvement, constructed 
 aqueducts in almost every place which fell un- 
 der their dominion, as at Catanea, at Salona, 
 at Smyrna, at Ephesus, at Alexandria Troas, 
 at Evora, and at Athens. Among the most 
 celebrated are those at Segovia and Mentz, 
 and that at Nismes, a Roman province in the 
 south of France, which is known by the name 
 of the Pont clu Garcl. 
 
 The latter noble structure is situated three 
 leagues north of Nismes, an ancient, large, 
 and flourishing town in the department of Gard, 
 in the south of France. It is supposed to have 
 been erected by Agrippa, (although the letters 
 A.E.A. w^ould rather indicate Aquaeductus Elii 
 Adriani,) in order to convey to Nismes the 
 water of the spring of Eure, which rises near 
 Uzes. It is one hundred and sixty feet in 
 height, and consists of three bridges, (if they 
 may be so called,) reared one upon another, 
 so as to unite two craggy mountains. The up- 
 permost of these arcades has thirty-six arches 
 of about fourteen feet wide and eighteen high, 
 formed with huge blocks of stone, admirably 
 put together without cement ; the centre bridge, 
 or arcade, on which this stands, has eleven, 
 sixty feet wide and nearly seventy high ; and 
 
304 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the lowest (^iinder vhich runs the Gard, an 
 inconsiderable but rapid river) has six arches 
 of nearly the same dimensions. Louis XIV. 
 when he repaired in 1609 the damages which 
 this stupendous work had sustained by time, 
 caused a real bridge, over which travellers 
 now pass, to be constructed by the side of the 
 lower range of arches. 
 
 In the " Voyages en France et autres Pays,' 
 by Racine, La Fontaine, and others, are the 
 following descriptive lines, by Chappelle, whose 
 travels with his friend De Bachaumont, who 
 married the mother of the celebrated Madame 
 de Lambert, are the grace of the first volume. 
 *' Nous ne pumes, etant si proche de Nismes, 
 refuser a notre curiosite de nous detourner 
 pour aller voir 
 
 Ces grands et fameux batimens 
 Du pofit du Gard et des Areiies, 
 Qui noils restent pour moniimens 
 Des magnitiqiies Romaines. 
 
 lis sunt plus eutiers et plus sains 
 Que lant d'autres restes si rares, 
 Echappes aux brutales mains 
 De ce deluge de barbares. 
 Qui fut le fleau des humaines." 
 
 In Nismes also are other celebrated and 
 beautiful monuments of Roman antiquity, 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 305 
 
 affording more proofs, were more wanting, of 
 the splendour of this extraordinary people, 
 Nismes being but a provincial town. Among 
 others are a public fountaiji, a mausoleum, 
 and an amphitheatre. The amphitheatre is 
 situated between the gates of St. Gilles and St. 
 Antoine. Its sliape is a complete elipsis, four 
 hundred feet long, and three hundred and 
 seven wide. It is divided, horizontally, into 
 two stories of orders, is about sixty-four 
 feet high, and supposed to have been erected 
 by Antoninus Pius. The Maison Quarree, or 
 square house, as it is called by the French 
 antiquaries, is a temple of the Corinthian order, 
 in exquisite taste, proportion, and preservation. 
 It was erected by the inhabitants of Nismes, 
 in the year of Rome, A.U.C. 754, to the me- 
 mory of Caius and Lucius, sons of Agrippa. 
 
 The aqueducts of modern times suffer in 
 comparison with these which have been alluded 
 to. The largest modern work of this descrip- 
 tion is the aqueduct of Caserta, called the 
 Aquedotto Carolino, built by Luigi Vanvitelli. 
 It conducts the water from a distance of nine 
 leagues to the splendid palace (built also by the 
 same architect) and gaidens of the King of 
 Naples. The aqueduct of Maintenon,in France, 
 if it had been finished, wouhl have been one 
 
30ti ELMEs's LECTURES 
 
 of the grandest modern ettorts in this depart- 
 ment of architecture, and a creditable rival of 
 the ancients. It is already seven thousand 
 fathoms long, and contains two hundred and 
 forty-two arcades. 
 
 Among other architectural works of the 
 ancient Romans are their bridges, of which 
 most serviceable constructions they are not 
 the earliest builders on record. 
 
 Their aqueducts, amphitheatres, triumphal 
 arches, and baths, are exclusively their own ; 
 but other and more ancient nations dispute the 
 palm of superiority for bridges with the Romans. 
 Herodotus mentions one built by the Queen 
 INicotris over the Euphrates, at Babylon, which, 
 according to Diodorus Siculus, was live fur- 
 longs in length. 
 
 In comparison with the Greeks,indeed, the Ro- 
 mans have the precedence; but, with the excep- 
 tion of the bridge of Trajan over the Danube, 
 tliey must yield, in size of arches and other 
 essentials of Pontine architecture, to the mo- 
 derns. The Romans are not celebrated for 
 any extraordinary span in the construction 
 of their bridge-arches, which seldom exceeded 
 sixty or seventy feet; only half of those of our 
 Waterloo Bridge. The forui of their arches 
 was the most simple of all curves, being either 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. :}07 
 
 that of a semicircle, or a large segment ; solid 
 piers, at least a fifth, often a fourth, and some- 
 times a third of the aperture, support them. 
 The greater part of their bridges were used as 
 basements to support trophies, colossal figures, 
 heroic or rostral columns, or triumphal arches. 
 Such was the triumphal bridge of iElius, at 
 Rome, and such was the bridge of Augustus, 
 near Rimini. 
 
 The bridges of ancient Rome were eight in 
 number. Tiie earliest built was that called 
 Sublicius, from being constructed of woo<i. 
 It was situated at the foot of the Aventine hill, 
 united the va.lley at the bottom of the Janicu- 
 lum to the Aventine, and was the same bridge 
 that was defended with so much courage by 
 Heratius Codes. It was rebuilt of stone by 
 Emilius Lepidus, from whom it took the name 
 of Pons Emilianus, the Emilian Bridge. Ti- 
 berius repaired it, and afterwards, having gone 
 to ruin, it was rebuilt by Antoninus Pius, of 
 marble, whence it was called Pons Marmo- 
 ratus: at present there are hardly any remains 
 of it. 
 
 Another of the celebrated bridges of an- 
 cient Rome is the Triumphal Bridge, w liich is 
 called Pons Vaticanus, and leads from tiie 
 Campus Martins to the Vatican. Over this 
 
 X 2 
 
308 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 bridge, the generals who had obtained honours 
 for victories gained in Spain and Gaul were 
 accustomed to make their triumphal entries 
 into the city. 
 
 The Senatorial Bridge was between the 
 Forum and the Janiculum hill, and was so 
 named because the solemn processions or en- 
 trances of the senate passed over it. The piers 
 were built by Marcus Fulvius, and the arches 
 were turned during the censorship of Publius 
 Scipio and S. Mumunis. This bridge is now 
 called by the name of Santa Maria» but is nearly 
 in ruins. The other bridges over the Tiber are 
 numerous, but descriptions of them may be 
 found in any of the accounts- of ancient Rome. 
 . We must not dmit mentionine: the cele- 
 brated bridge built by Trajan over the Danube 
 to facilitate his irruptions into I^acia. Accor- 
 ding to the descriptions of Dio Cassius it had 
 twenty piers, which, without reckoning the 
 foundations, were one hundred and fifty feet 
 high, and sixty wide, united by arches one hun- 
 dred and seventy feet in span, which are fifty feet 
 wider than thoseof the Waterloo Bridge. Paulus 
 Jovius, Count Manigli, and other able antiqua- 
 ries, have written on this celebrated structure, 
 which, however, did not exist for any great 
 length of time. Hadrian caused it to be / 
 
 « • 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 309 
 
 demolished ; and when he unjustifiably put 
 ApoUodorus, its architect, to death, he assert- 
 ed, among- other reasons, that' the bridge had 
 facilitated the irruptions of the barbarians into 
 the Roman territory. But the real cause is 
 better understood, upon the authority of Dio 
 Cassius, to have been as follows : — 
 
 In a conversation which took place between 
 the Emperor Trajan and his architect, ApoUo- 
 dorus, Hadrian was present, and, as an ama- 
 teur, offered his opinion upon the subject; 
 ApoUodorus turned round to him, and, with 
 an imprudent bluntness, pardonable, however, 
 in an eminent professor to a superficial amateur, 
 told him to go and paint his Pompions, a picture 
 uponwhicJi Hadrian was at that time employed, 
 and of which he was very proud. Hadrian 
 concealed his displeasure, not only during the 
 life of Trajan, but for some time after his own 
 succession to the empire, avaihng himself of 
 the talents of ApoUodorus in some of the 
 earliest works of his reign. But the offence 
 was neither forgotten nor forgiven; its punish- 
 ment being only suspended till he could find 
 a Roman architect capable of executing his 
 works. On finding Detrianus fit for his pur- 
 pose he banished ApoUodorus. Some time 
 afterwards the ill-fated architect was consulted 
 
310 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 by the emperor upon a design of his own for 
 a temple of Venus, which he expected, from its 
 excellencies, would have mortified the vanity 
 of the sturdy old Grecian. On seeing it, the 
 architect said at once that the temple was too 
 scanty and too low : and that the statues, al- 
 though they were sitting, were too high ; for, 
 if they should attempt to rise, they would 
 knock off the flimsy roof with their heads. 
 
 The ridicule was more insupportable than 
 the reproof; and on the same year which saw 
 that temple of Venus dedicated, (the one hun- 
 dred and thirty-sixth year of the Christian ajra,) 
 was the great Apollodorus made a sacrifice to 
 his love of truth. The bridge of Trajan, over 
 the Danube, so wantonly destroyed by Ha- 
 drian, was one of the greatest works of this 
 eminent architect. 
 
 The bridge of Alcantara, over the Tagus, 
 is mentioned as one of the most beautiful re- 
 mains of Roman splendour. From an inscrip- 
 tion we are informed that it was the work of a 
 Roman governor of the country, in honour of 
 the Emperor Trajan. This great monument 
 of architectural grandeur is six hundred and 
 seventy feet in length, formed of six arches, 
 and two hundred feet high from the surface 
 of the water. 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 311 
 
 It is impossible even to enumerate, in the 
 course of these Lectures, all the great works 
 that honour the Roman name : but we must 
 not omit their amphitheatres. An amphitheatre, 
 according to the Roman definition, is a build- 
 ing of a circular or oval form, having its area 
 encompassed by rows of seats, one above the 
 other, that the spectators, sitting all round, may 
 see what passes in the area, arena, or pit. The 
 w^ord, as its etymon imports, means a build- 
 ing formed of two theatres, each part facing 
 the other. The centre was called the arena, 
 from the sand which was strewed over its sur- 
 face to absorb the blood of the combatants. 
 In the arena were presented or performed the 
 different sorts of games, shows, or combats, 
 with which the Roman Emperors were wont 
 to amuse their people, particularly combats 
 of gladiators and wild beasts. The. nature of 
 these contests obliging the combatants occa- 
 sionally to fly and pursue the architects were 
 led to use an eliptical form. Round the arena 
 were vaults, called cavice, or carcerce, in which 
 were confined the wild beasts appointed for 
 these bloody exhibitions. Immediately over 
 these vaults, or dens, was a peristyle, or por- 
 tico of columns, called thejooc/mm, in whirh 
 
312 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the emperor, the senators, and other distin- 
 guished personages were accommodated. 
 • Above and around this portico, or gallery, 
 were rows of bei^ches as high as, the upper 
 part of the walls, from every part of which 
 the entire arena might be s.een. The avenues 
 and passages by which this public part was 
 entered were called vomitaricc. The lowest 
 lows of these public seats were appropriated 
 to the highest classes of the citizens, and those 
 abo\e them, progressively, for the inferior 
 orders of the people. The whole building- 
 was unroofed ; the exterior face of the build- 
 ing, as in the Colosseum, was divided into 
 several stories, ornamented by arcades, columns 
 of pilasters, and > oftentimes with niches and 
 statues. They were calculated to hold from 
 thirty, to sixty thousand persons. Amphi- 
 theatres a.r.e buildings exclusively Roman ; the 
 Greeks never cultivating the barbarous exhibi- 
 tions performed in them. Ancient writers have 
 said but little on their construction ; Vitruvius 
 mentions them, but not in detail. The first 
 amphitheatre on record is that which was 
 erected by Caius Scribonius Curio in the cele- 
 'brations which he gave the peo])le on the oc- 
 casion of his father's obsequies. He deter- 
 mined to smpass all others, if not by mag- 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 313 
 
 nificence, which his fortune would not allow% 
 at least by novelty. With this intention, there- 
 fore, he constructed those two theatres, back 
 to back, alluded to in a former part of this 
 work, which, after the theatrical representa- 
 tions were closed, turned round, with the spec- 
 tators within them, leaving the stages and 
 scenery behind, and formed an amphitheatre, 
 in which he again gratified the people with 
 gladiatorial combats.* 
 
 Pliny gives an account of these moveable 
 amphitheatres, which has somewhat puzzled 
 the laborious antiquary, Count Caylus ; but of 
 which M. Weinbrenner, a German architect, 
 has given a very satisfactory explanation in 
 a memoir translated into French by M. C. 
 Winckler, and published in the Magazin E71- 
 cyclopecUque. 
 
 In the first ages of the Roman republic, the 
 amphitheatres were only temporary buildings 
 composed of wood, which, according to 
 Pliny, sometimes fell down with great des- 
 truction of lives. Their next mode was to 
 construct them for a permanency, but still of 
 timber. They were mostly erected in the 
 Campus Martins, or some spacious place 
 
 * Casalius de Urb. Rom. et imp. splen. lib. xxxvi. cap. 15» ^ 
 
314 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 without the city. When Julius Caesar per- 
 formed the grand ceremony of the inaugura- 
 tion of his new forum, and the temple of 
 Venus, which he built and dedicated, he gave 
 the people, among other public shows, gladi- 
 atorial combats, for which he constructed 
 an edifice of a circular form, with seats all 
 round the arena ; this still was of timber, 
 and demolished at the end of the games; 
 From these temporary wooden structures were 
 derived the permanent and magnificent ones 
 of later times. 
 
 The first amphitheatre of stone was built 
 in the reign of Augustus Caesar, by Statilius 
 Taurus, in the Campus Martius. A portion 
 of this building must have been of timber, 
 for it was partly consumed by fire in the reign 
 of Nero. The celebrated palace of Monte 
 Citorio, built by Bernini in 1650, is erected on 
 its ruins, and with some of its materials. 
 
 Caligula afterwards proposed erecting a noble 
 amphitheatre of stone, but neither he nor his 
 successors, Claudius and Nero, all lovers of 
 gladiatorial display, ever completed the de- 
 sign. Nero erected one of timber for tempo- 
 rary purposes, iij which, as Pliny relates, was 
 an immense beam, or girder, one hundred and 
 twenty feet in length, and two feet in thick- 
 
 i 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 315 
 
 ness. Tiberius is said to have brought this 
 fine piece of timber from Rhaetia to Rome, for 
 the purpose of being used in a naumachia ; 
 and it was preserved as a national curiosity 
 till it was thus employed by Nero. 
 
 At this period the Romans also erected 
 amphitheatres, and introduced the spectacles 
 commonly exhibited therein, in their principal 
 provinces. 
 
 The Colosseum, or, as it was formerly called, 
 the Flavian amphitheatre, was the most cele- 
 brated structure of this description ; but it is 
 now, with centuries on its head, fallen into a 
 heap of ruins. 
 
 This stupendous edifice, 
 
 " Which in its public shows unpeopled Rome, 
 And held, uncrowded, nations in its wond:>," — 
 
 was known to the Romans by the name of the 
 Amphitheatre, by way of eminence, and is 
 called Colosseum, from its magnitude. It was 
 erected by the Emperor Flavius Vespasian, in 
 the year A.D. 7*2, after his return from his wars 
 agaiust the Jews, in the place where Nero's 
 lakes and gardens had been, which is almost 
 in the middle of ancient Rome. It is said to 
 have been finished in five years ; to have cost 
 ten millions of crowns ; and to have employed 
 twelve thousand Jewish captives. Titus com- 
 
316 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 pletely finished it, and solemnly dedicated it 
 to his father. — The dedication of a theatre was 
 celebrated by a drama; of a circus by a chariot 
 race ; of a naumachia by naval combats ; and of 
 an amphitheatre by gladiatorial combats and the 
 hunting of wild beasts. It is related that, on 
 the dedication day of this superb edifice, Titus 
 had five thousand animals of various species 
 brought here, which were all killed. 
 
 This building is almost entirely composed 
 of large pieces of travertine marble, and is 
 raised on two bases, on which the exterior 
 arches rest ; the whole structure was surround- 
 ed by three rows of arches raised one above 
 the other, intermixed with half columns of the 
 Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian orders. The 
 form of this vast edifice is eliptical; the ex- 
 terior circumference one thousand six hundred 
 and forty-one feet, and the height one hundred 
 and fifty-seven. 
 
 The greater part of this, the most wonder- 
 ful monument of ancient Rome, has been 
 injured by the united inroads of time, of earth- 
 quakes, and of the rapacity of man. Its mass 
 of materials has served as a quarry for the 
 Chancery, the Venetian, and the Farnese 
 palaces. 
 
 Among the insulated or triumphal columns 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 317 
 
 of ancient Rome is that of the Emperor 
 Phocas, near the Temple of Concord. It is 
 of Greek marble, fluted, and of the Corinthian 
 order, four feet diameter, and fifty-four high, in- 
 cluding the pedestal. Another worthy of notice is 
 that of Marcus Aurelius, erected by the Roman 
 senate in honour of that emperor, for his vic- 
 tories over the Marcomans. Aurelius after- 
 wards dedicated it to his father-in-law, Anto- 
 ninus Pius, as is expressed on the pedestal ; 
 hence it is mostly called the column of Anto- 
 ninus. It is of the Doric order, eleven feet 
 six inches in diameter, and one hundred and 
 forty-eight feet high. 
 
 The loftiest, however, in Rome is 
 
 " Trajan's column, tall, 
 From whose low base the sculptures wind aloft, 
 And lead, through various toils, up the rough steep. 
 Its hero to the skies."* 
 
 This column is one of the most celebrated mo- 
 numents of antiquity, and has endured the 
 stormy waste of time upwards of seventeen 
 centuries. The column at Alexandria, com- 
 monly called Pompey's Pillar, is about ninety- 
 five feet in height; Trajan's, including the base 
 
 * Dyer. 
 
318 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and statue, one hundred and thirty-two ; and 
 the Monument, near London Bridge, incUiding 
 the base and vase of flames, two liundred and 
 two. Trajan's column was erected in the 
 middle of his forum, and dedicated to him by 
 the senate and people of Rome for his victory 
 over the Dacians, as the inscription on the 
 pedestal shows. It is of the Doric order, com- 
 posed of thirty-four pieces (only) of Grecian 
 mai'ble, joined with bronze cramps. This 
 column, for beauty of sculpture, and for*«im- 
 plicity and dexterity of construction, is de- 
 servedly reckoned the finest in the world. 
 
 The baths of the Romans were on a similar 
 scale of grandeur, and surpass every building- 
 of the kind before or since. My necessary 
 limits will scarcely permit me to do more than 
 allude to them, and to refer the investigating 
 inquirer to the works of Palladio, and of our 
 ingenious countryman Cameron, on tiie baths 
 of the ancients, as well as to Ammianus Mar- 
 cellinus, who reports that some of his time 
 were as large (they are his own words) as cities, 
 and that thousands could bathe at one time. 
 
 To afford my readers an idea of the extent 
 of Roman magnificence I will give a brief 
 description of the celebrated edifice of Ha- 
 drian, at Tivoli, near Rome, known lo anti- 
 
VIJ ON ARCHITECTURE. 319 
 
 quaries by the name of Hadrians Villa, of 
 which the circuit was nearly ten Italian miles. 
 To form an idea of the immensity of this im- 
 perial villa, we must imagine to ourselves a 
 town, or rather a city, composed of temples, 
 palestiae, gymnasiae, baths, pleasure-houses, 
 lodgings for officers, friends, slaves, and sol- 
 diers, and an infinity of other buildings, both 
 of utility and show. The theatre is still partly 
 remaining as a witness of its foimer splendour. 
 In this villa, Hadrian, with much good taste, 
 imitated all the best buildings of Greece ; such 
 as the Lyceum, the Academy, the Prytaneun, 
 the Portico, the beautiful Temple at Thessaly, 
 and the Poikilc or painted portico of Athens. 
 He had also, among the gardens and pleasure- 
 grounds, representations of the Elysian fields 
 and of the realms of Pluto. 
 
 The statues and other remains of ancient 
 sculpture which have been discovered among 
 the ruins of this mass, during the last two 
 hundred and fifty years, have enriched the 
 cabinets of all Europe, and there are con- 
 siderable excavations yet to be made. This 
 villa of Hadrian appears, from all descriptions, 
 to have excelled even the specimens of Asiatic 
 magnificence. The liberality of the Emperor 
 to the cities of Greece, which were reviving in 
 
.320 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 his time, and particularly to Athens, induced 
 the Athenians to name after him the new part 
 of their city, Hadrianopolis. 
 
 At this juncture the Greek style of architec- 
 ture was well understood by the Romans, and 
 more chastely employed than in any other 
 period of their history, the florid style of deco- 
 ration being mostly confined to the interior of 
 their buildings. This epoch of Roman archi- 
 tecture being thus the most pure and important, 
 I have thought the following summary might 
 be here usefully employed in fixing the dates 
 of their styles upon the memory. 
 
 After the burning of Rome in the reign of 
 the Emperor Nero, he employed the architects 
 Celer and Severus in the re-building of several 
 edifices, and principally his golden palace, 
 which surpassed in richness and decoration all 
 that had pre^ iously existed. Infinite decora- 
 tion and crowded ornament flourished, and 
 true taste in architecture declined till the time 
 of Vespasian, when a better style began to 
 prevail. The purest days in architecture and 
 the other arts among the Romans were from 
 the time of Augustus to Hadrian ; they retro- 
 graded a little to that of Septimius Severus ; 
 but from his date the declination became rapid 
 and decisive. 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 321 
 
 The principal work of the Emperor Flavius 
 Vespasian was his grand amphitheatre. Among 
 those of his successors are : — First, the arch 
 of Titus, the order of which is the finest spe- 
 cimen of the Composite we are acquainted with, 
 and which, by the bye, is the order mostly 
 used in their triumpliai arches. Second, the 
 arch of Septimius Severus, erected by the senate 
 and people of Rome, in honour of that emperor 
 and his sons Caracalla and Geta, for their 
 victories over the Parthians and other barba- 
 rous nations. This arch is of marble and has 
 three openings, decorated with eight fluted 
 columns of the Composite order, and with 
 bassi rilievi in an indifferent style, representing 
 the expeditions of this Prince against the 
 Parthians, the Arabs, and Adiabenians, after 
 the murder of Pescenius and Albinus. Al- 
 though the decadence of the art is very per- 
 ceptible in this arch, yet, being in imitation of 
 other works of the same nature, it serves to 
 give an idea of the taste for splendour manifest- 
 ed at the period. 
 
 Other buildings of the period to which I 
 now desire to call your attention are the 
 Stadium; the Naumachia ; the Forum, began 
 by Domitiiin and finished by Nerva; the splen- 
 
 Y 
 
322 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 did Palace of Domitian, erected under the 
 direction of the architect Rabirius ; and the 
 Aqueduct of Nerva, by Frontinius. In the 
 reign of Nerva were built the forum, the 
 column, and the triumphal arch, which bear 
 his name. None of the Roman Emperors en- 
 couraged architecture more than Hadrian, who 
 not only employed the ablest architects and 
 erected the most splendid buildings, but 
 studied the art himself with the warmth and 
 enthusiasm of a professor. Among the best 
 works of Hadrian are the splendid Corinthian 
 temple at Nismes, called the Maison Quarree; 
 the iElian bridge ; and the entire rebuilding of 
 Jerusalem, whicli he ordered to be called JElia 
 CapitoUna. He continued the building of the 
 temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, at Athens. 
 This emperor was a fine judge of architecture ; 
 and the names of the artists whom he em- 
 ployed, and the works which they built, are 
 proofs of his good taste. 
 
 Under the Antonines were built the temple 
 of Antoninus and Faustina, a work replete 
 both with the merits and defects of the Roman 
 style of arcliitecture ; the column of Anto- 
 ninus, and that of Marcus Aurelius ; there 
 were also numerous public edifices erected in 
 
 i 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 323 
 
 other parts of the empire ; nor must we forget 
 the re-building of Smyrna, Laodicea, and 
 other towns in Asia Minor. 
 
 From this period architecture rapidly de- 
 clined, as the debased style of the arch of the 
 Goldsmiths' and that of Septimius Severus, 
 erected by himself, fidly proves. Under Alex- 
 ander Severus architecture and architects met 
 with much encouragement, but the purer taste 
 of former days existed no longer. 
 
 Under Constantine the art fell still lower; 
 as is abundantly shown by the style of the 
 many temples and Christian churches built in 
 his reign. His artists even descended to the 
 meanness of despoiling the ancient structures 
 of Rome (through despair of equalling them) 
 to decorate their new buildings. 
 
 But it was when Constantine established the 
 seat of his empire at Byzantium (which he 
 wished to have called Neiv Rome, the Goths 
 and Vandals having made their dreadful incur- 
 sions into the sacred Rom.an empire) tiiat pure 
 architecture was finally lost ; and, instead of 
 embellishing their cities with temples, theatres, 
 and works of peace, — castles, towers, fortifi- 
 cations, and other specimens of military art, 
 were all the architecture of the time. 
 
 Constantine stripped Rome of all that he 
 
 Y 2 
 
324 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 could remove to grace his new capital. He 
 was attended by all her best artists, both Greek 
 and Roman. Three hundred years afterwards, 
 when Rome had been sacked by Alaric, Gen- 
 seric, and Totila, Constantius II. went thither, 
 and carried away whatever was left of much 
 value, with which he loaded several vessels. 
 These were driven by a tempest into Sicily, 
 where he was killed ; and the Saracens, then 
 masters of the country, took these valuable 
 spoils, and carried them to Alexandria. A 
 similar disappointment had occurred to the 
 hopes and plunder of Genericus, whose vessels, 
 laden with statues, were lost on his return to 
 Africa. Thus was terminated all the elegance 
 and splendour which Rome had been accumu- 
 lating for more than a thousand years. 
 
 This brings us to the hybrid system, called 
 the Greco-gothic, under which may be classed 
 that early style which predominated about this 
 time in the lower empire, and is little more 
 than a degeneration of the Roman adaptation 
 of the Greek styles. It comprises those build- 
 ings which were erected with the fragments of 
 the Grecian and Roman edifices, such as 
 columns, cornices, friezes, statues, and other 
 architectural and sculptural remains, of marble 
 and granite, used with some portion of pic- 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 325 
 
 turesque effect; such are the portals and tower 
 of St. Mark, at Venice;* the cathedral of 
 
 * This noble structure is three hundred and thirty feet 
 liigb, forty feet square, and its walls five feet thick, Vene- 
 tian measure. N.B. The Venetian foot is 1.137 English. 
 It was erected by Buono, a celebrated architect and sculptor 
 of the twelfth century, whose works embellish the cities of 
 Naples, Pistoia, Florence, and Arezzo. Its foundations 
 were laid in the time of Pielro Tribuno, the seventeenth 
 doge of Venice, A.D. 888; and completed, after various 
 alterations in its design, by the aforesaid Bruno, in the 
 dogeship of Domenico Morosnni, the thirty-seventh doge, 
 from 1148 to 1154. In 1329 it was repaired by the archi- 
 tect Montagnana, in the reign of Francesco Dandojo, called 
 il Cave, the fifty-second doge. In 1400 it was damaged by 
 fire at the celebration of the creation of Michael Steno, 
 the sixty-third doge ; the roof, which was of timber, was 
 burned by a thunderbolt, and rebuilt of stone in its former 
 shape. The tower contains a second one in the inside, with 
 a vaulted ascending plane between the external surface of 
 the walls of the inside tower and the internal surface of 
 the walls of the outer tower, so spacious that a man on 
 horseback may ascend with ease from the bottom to the top. 
 On the apex of the roof is the figure of an angel in bronze, 
 fourteen feet high, working, as a weather-cock, on a spindle 
 and pivot of iron ; which was added under the goverment 
 of Lionardo da Loredano, the seventy-fifth doge. 
 
 An ancient manuscript in the sacristy of St. Marco, at 
 Venice, recounts a miracle that occurred to a workman en- 
 gaged on it — as follows, " Dum consumandae procerae 
 turris campanarix, juxt^ ecclesiam sancti Marci in altum 
 erectae, quidam operarius operam daret, ejusque vertice 
 
326 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Pisa, built by a Greek architect of the name 
 of Biischetto da Dulichio in the eleventh 
 century ; the baptistery of Pisa ; and many 
 similar buildings ; constructed with a mixture 
 of antique fragments and the natural materials 
 of the country. Nicolo da Pisa, with his pupils, 
 and Arnolfo da Lapo, are names celebrated 
 with regard to this peculiar province of Italian 
 architecture. 
 
 Our next inquiry refers to that dark and 
 barbarous period called the Saracenic, on 
 which 1 will not detain the reader long. 
 
 Egypt and Syria present many specimens of 
 Saracenic architecture, which form a striking 
 contrast with the ancient Egyptian and Greek 
 styles. The Saracens, in Egypt, have bor- 
 rowed but little (if any) of their style from the 
 
 perficiendae diligentius inseruiret. Delapsus exteriils, in 
 przeceps forebatiir. Sicque ad itna descendeudo, inter ipsa 
 praecipitia votum vovit Deo, et B. Marco, se mansuram 
 perpetuo inferuitio St. Marci, si eum de instanti periculo 
 liberaret. Cumque cadens haec flemitur proniisisset, ligno 
 cuideni, quod extra endeam turrim sub ejus medio promine- 
 bat ipsi turri propter operara exteriorem injunctum, sine 
 aliqua corporis hesione adhesit, ibique tandiii absque labore 
 se tenuit, donee fuae submisso, incolumis in terram veniret. 
 Promissionem autem, et votum, quod fecerat, devote im- 
 plevit, et assidue in sancti opetibus : lial^orans, ^nberrim^ 
 diem clausit extremum. >([o a^ji'ifn-xp miilifiip ,-vl 
 
 i 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 327 
 
 aborigines of the country. The style called 
 Saracenic, which is justly supposed to have 
 been tlie parent of the Gothic, is distinguished 
 by the boldness and loftiness of its vaultings ; 
 the peculiar mixed form of its curves ; the 
 slenderness of its columns ; the variety of its 
 capitals ; the prodigious multiplicity of its 
 mouldings and ornaments; presenting a showy 
 assemblage of friezes, mosaics, foliage, and 
 arabesques, interlaced with flowers, and dis- 
 posed altogether with much skill. 
 
 The Egyptian Saracenic differs from the 
 Spanish principally in the form of the arch, 
 as may be seen by comparing the gate of Cairo 
 with that of the Alhambra, in Grenada, or the 
 great church at Cordova. Among the principal 
 remains of the former style are the walls of 
 Alexandria, built, in 878, by the caliph Motah- 
 wakkel ; several arcades of the aqueduct of 
 Alexandria, which are distinguished by the 
 medley of the capitals; the greater and the 
 smaller pharos, the mosque and the ancient 
 palace of the sultans, in the same city : there 
 are also several buildings of the sultan Saladin, 
 whose real name was Joseph, or Jussuf, which 
 bear his latter appellation, as the wells at 
 Cairo, the Granaries, &c. 
 
 The Moorish, or Mauresque, is but a varia- 
 
328 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tion upon the Saracenic ; yet as Mullin, in his 
 Antiquites Nationales, uses the term, I have, 
 in deference to his authority, preserved it. Its 
 examples are not numerous, and may be found 
 in his Dictionaire des Beux Arts. 
 
 These several styles, though of various dates, 
 are either of the period of, or have emanated 
 from, the immersion of architecture in the dark 
 or middle ages. 
 
 The revival of classical architecture is of 
 too much importance to be considered at the 
 close of a Lecture, yet I may be permitted 
 to characterise the style of the earlier part 
 of this period, which was debased in taste by 
 the pictorial vagaries of Michelangiolo and of 
 Raffaelle, whose twisted columns were better 
 suited to accommodate, by their spiral lines, 
 the composition of his celebrated Cartoon of 
 the Beautiful Gate, than to adorn or sup- 
 port a portico. His relation, Bramante, was 
 little better ; together with the fantastic Borro- 
 mini, whose vagaries in the church of St. 
 Giovanni Laterani, with his broken and com- 
 pound pediments, his grotesque columns, car- 
 touches, &c. are huddled together in that 
 expensive compound of absurdity. 
 
 The character of the time immediately al- 
 luded to was, indeed, a conceited affectation 
 
VI] ON ARCHITECTURE. 329 
 
 of novelty and invention, — adding embel- 
 lishments to the already embellished ancient 
 Roman style, decorating the shafts of the 
 columns with rustics, blocks, and bossages; 
 making grotesque orders; twisted and double- 
 shafted columns ; entablatures without friezes, 
 friezes without architraves, and architraves 
 without friezes ; — all used and omitted by turns. 
 Dorics with Corinthian foliage to their capi- 
 tals and bases ; Corinthians with Doric tri- 
 glyphs ; and arches springing from columns, 
 as in the church of St. Paul without the walls, 
 at Rome, the fine marble columns of which 
 were stolen from the mausoleum of Hadrian, 
 and which the appropriators had not ability to 
 cover with architraves. This is among the 
 many errors which have arisen from the beau- 
 tiful invention of the arch. 
 
 Many of these tasteless innovations have 
 sprung up in our metropolis, and are daily 
 excluding the classical introductions of Wyatt, 
 Stewart, Chambers, and Revett. 
 
LECTURE VII. 
 
 The Origin and History of Architecture in 
 Great JBritain and Ireland. Ancient JBritish 
 or Druidical; Stonehenge; Avehury, 6fC. the 
 round Towers and Excavations in Ireland. 
 Conjectures thereon. Gothic Architecture brief- 
 ly considered and traced to its elementary Prin- 
 ciples. Introduction of Italian Architecture 
 into England, and the History and Progress of 
 the Art, from Inigo Jones to the Death of 
 Sir Christopher Wren. Its Torpor duri?ig 
 the Reigns of George I. and II. and Revival, 
 with the other Arts, under George III. Archi- 
 tectural Characteristics of this Period to the 
 Introduction of the pure Greek Style. 
 
LECTURE VII. 
 
 The commencement of architecture in Eng- 
 land was similar to its commencement in 
 every other country. The caverns and huts of 
 the aborigines of the island were gradually 
 improved from mere necessaries of life to com- 
 forts and luxuries. 
 
 There exist in this country the most indis- 
 putable proofs of an aboriginal style of archi- 
 tecture, and of successive introductions of fo- 
 reign styles at various periods of our annals : 
 and here again, as I have more than once taken 
 leave to observe, does architecture prove the 
 truth of history. 
 
 Egypt may boast of its pyramids, India of 
 its excavated temples, Italy of its Pccstum, 
 and Greece of its cyclopean works, alike defy- 
 ing history and conjecture, — England and Ire- 
 land possess antiquities as aboriginal and as 
 remote from accurate date in the Avebury, the 
 Cromlechs, the Stonehenge of England, the 
 round towers, the excavations, the ruins of the 
 
334 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 seven churches, and St. Kieven's bed of Ire- 
 land. 
 
 The origin of its architecture is so intimately 
 connected with that of the nation itself that 
 an inquiry into the one necessarily involves 
 the other ; therefore, rejecting the accounts 
 evidently fabulous of our earliest chronicles, I 
 will venture to form a conjecture respecting 
 our most remote ancestry. 
 
 Sir William Jones, in his luminous discourse 
 on the origin and families of nations, says : — 
 With our great Newton, " we must not admit 
 more causes of natural things than those which 
 are true and sufficiently account for natural 
 phenomena;'' and that one pair at least of every 
 living species must at first have been created, 
 and that one human pair* was sufficient for 
 the population of our globe, in a period of no 
 considerable length, (on the very moderate sup- 
 position of lawyers and political arithmeticians, 
 that every pair of individuals left on an average 
 two children, and each of them two more,) is 
 evident, from the rapid increase of numbers in 
 geometrical progression, so well known to 
 those who have ever taken the trouble to sum 
 
 * Ninth Discourse. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 335 
 
 a series of as many terms as they suppose ge- 
 nerations of men in two or three thousand 
 years. 
 
 This profound philosopher then proceeds, 
 with all the learning and scepticism of a genu- 
 ine searcher after truth, to compare the Mosa- 
 ic account of the peopling of our globe with 
 probability and with history ; and comes, after 
 a series of incontrovertible arguments, to the 
 supposition that the children of Jafet seem, 
 from the traces of Sklavonian names, and the 
 mention of their having been enlarged, to have 
 spread themselves far and wide and to have 
 produced the race which, for want of a correct 
 appellation, we call Tartarian ; the colonies 
 formed by the sons of Ham and Shem appear 
 to have been nearly simultaneous ; and among 
 those of the latter branch he found so many 
 names preserved to his day in Arabia, that he 
 hesitated not in pronouncing them to be the 
 same people whom hitherto we have denomi- 
 nated Arabs ; while the former branch, the 
 most powerful and adventurous of whom were 
 the progeny of Cush, Misr, and Rama, names 
 remaining unchanged in Sanscrit, and highly 
 revered by the Hindus, were, in all probability, 
 the race denominated Indian. 
 
 From tours which I have recently made 
 
336 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 through some of the most interesting parts of 
 Ireland for architectural antiquities, and from 
 considerable investigation into its history, 1 
 conceive that country to have been peopled 
 originally from the east ; the ancient archi- 
 tecture, the ancient religion, the ancient lan- 
 guage of Ireland, and those of the inhabitants of 
 Hindustan and other oriental countries coinci- 
 ding in a wonderful manner. In corroboration 
 of this hypothesis I take leave to cite the 
 opinion of Mr. Robert Fraser, in his " Statistical 
 Survey of the county of Wexford," which he 
 drew up for the consideration and by order of 
 the Dublin Society. " On these great argu- 
 ments," he says, " we rest ; for, if they, the 
 ancient inhabitants of Ireland, had not had an 
 intercourse in former days with the Phcenicians, 
 Egyptians, and Persians, ho^^ is it possible 
 that so many hundreds of words, so many 
 idioms of speech, so many technical terms in 
 the arts, of those ages, could have been intro- 
 duced into the old Irish dialect? terms not 
 to be met with in the dialect of any other 
 northern or western nation. What people, the 
 Egyptians and Irish excepted, named the harp 
 or music ouini; Irish, aine^. i. e. oirjideadh, i.e. 
 music, a musical instrument; oirpJiideadh, or 
 oirfideadhy expresses the action of pi ay in i:. 
 
VIJ] ON ARCHITECTURE. 337 
 
 What people in the world, the Orientalists and 
 the Irish excepted, call the copy of a book the 
 sou of a hook, and echo the daughter of a voice? 
 With what northern nation, the Irish excepted, 
 are the oriental names of the tools and imple- 
 ments of the stone-cutter, the ship-builder, and 
 the weaver to be found ?"* 
 
 Now I am upon the similarity of words, 
 the similarity of the names of letters is no less 
 striking ; the first letter of the Irish alphabet 
 is called nilim; that of the Hebrew, aleph; 
 the second Irish, heith ; the second Hebrew, 
 heth; m in Irish is muin; in Hebrew, mem; n 
 in the former nidn; and in the latter, nun; ris 
 ruis^ and rus; and other similarities, almost as 
 striking, occur in the two alphabets. Mr. 
 Lynch, the learned secretary to the Gaelic 
 Society of Dublin, says, in his Grammar, that 
 the names of the Irish letters are very ancient, 
 and seem to have been originally derived from 
 the Noachic language, from which they were 
 adopted by the Chaldeans, Egyptians, and 
 Canaanites, or Phoenicians, and by these intro- 
 duced into Greece and the south-west of 
 Europe. This also is the opinion of Eupole- 
 
 * Statistical Survey of the county of Wexford, by Robert 
 Eraser, Esq. p. 140, Dublin, 8vo. 1807. 
 
 Z 
 
338 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 mus, Eusebius, St. Jerome, St. Augustine, 
 and Bellarmine, with most of our modem 
 philosophers. 
 
 Beth signifies, both in Hebrew and in Irish, 
 a house; coph, a curve; daUlh in Hebrew, 
 and durras in Irish, a door. Many other 
 equally-striking coincidences might be cited. 
 
 The pyramids of Egypt have narrow pas- 
 sages and dark chambers.* At Benares, the 
 most ancient seat of Braminical learning, there 
 are also pyramids, on a small scale, with sub- 
 terraneous passages which are said to extend 
 many miles. These narrow passages leading 
 to the cell, or adytum, of the temple, appear to 
 render the holy apartment less accessible, and 
 to inspire the votaries with more awe. Here 
 we have a perfect resemblance between the 
 worship of the ancient Egyptians and the 
 ancient inhabitants of Hindustan. The caves 
 of the oracle at Delphos, of Trophonius, and 
 of New Grange, in Ireland, had narrow pas- 
 sages answering the purposes of those in 
 Egypt and in India; " nor is it unreasonable to 
 suppose," says Captain Wilford, in his learned 
 Dissertation on Egypt, from the ancient books 
 of the Hindus, " that the fabulous relations of 
 
 * Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 439. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 339 
 
 the Grot of the Sybil in Italy and of the pur- 
 gatory of St. Patrick in Ireland were derived 
 from a similar practice and motive, which seem 
 to have prevailed over the whole pagan world, 
 and are often alluded to in scripture." 
 
 New Grange, which is one among many 
 singular caverns in Ireland, is a large mount, 
 or pyramid, surrounded by a circle of stones, 
 near the county town of Drogheda, about 
 twenty-five miles north of Dublin. A Mr. 
 Campell, who resided there about the beginning 
 of the last century, observing stones under the 
 turf, removed some for purposes of building, and 
 perceived an aperture, which overhead was 
 covered by a large flat stone. A person enter- 
 ing it must stoop for a considerable distance, 
 when the upper part increases in height until 
 the entrance of the temple, which is formed in 
 shape like a bee-hive, rising in height above twen- 
 ty feet. The gallery is sixty-two feet long ; and 
 the arms of the cross, or transepts, twenty feet. 
 The cupola is formed of long flat stones, the 
 upper ones projecting over the lower, and 
 closed and capped with a flag-stone, which is 
 precisely the manner of constructing the Egyp- 
 tian arch in the great pyramid. The sides are 
 made up of large hewn stones, ornament- 
 ed with sculptures ; and there are two altar- 
 
 z 2 
 
340 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 stones in the transepts. Wormius describes 
 such crypts among the ancient Skandinavians, 
 and adds, that they were both sepulchres and 
 temples. Such was the pyramid and excava- 
 tion of New Grange,* for the skeletons of two 
 human bodies were found in it, with the bones 
 of deer and other animals, and two boat- 
 shaped urns. 
 
 I doubt not but that this interesting work is 
 of as great antiquity as any in Europe, and 
 was a burying-place of the ancient Irish, al- 
 though its cross-like shape has induced some 
 
 * The Firbolgs, or Belgic colonies, who succeeded the 
 Celtes, were a different and more improved people. Like 
 their brethien in Germany, they dwelt a great part of the 
 year either in natural or artificial caverns : the number 
 of the latter discovered in Ireland evinces that they well knew 
 how to form antrile chambers of dry stones, and cover them 
 with long projecting flags. In these the Firbolgian priests 
 instructed their disciples, and practised divination; and 
 they always adjoined their stone temples, as at Roscarbury, 
 Killossy, and many other places. At length they became 
 the cemeteries of illustrious chiefs and warriors, and, as at 
 New Grange, had conical mounts raised over them, sur- 
 rounded at top and bottom by circles of ponderous uprights. 
 Skilled in the manipulation of metals, the Firbolgs could 
 easily have squared and polished wood and stone, and erect- 
 ed neat and convenient houses, but the rude state of 
 society prevented the proper application of their know- 
 ledge. — Grose's Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 3. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 341 
 
 to think it of the time of Christianity. On its 
 first discovery a gold coin of the Emperor 
 Valentinian was found in it, which Dr. 
 Llhwyd ohserves mi»ht hespeak it Roman, 
 but that the rude carving at the entry of the 
 caAie* seems to denote it to be a barbarous 
 monument. 
 
 Odin, the leader and legislator of the 
 Goths, who has been described as of Asiatic 
 origin, commanded great mounts and huge up- 
 rights to be raised over illustrious men, after 
 their bodies were burnt and collected into 
 urns : and this cavern, the mound of stones, 
 with the bones and horns of the deer, and the 
 urns, remind us forcibly of the ordinance of 
 this great Gothic legislator. 
 
 The external base of the mount was encircled 
 by a number of enormous unhewn upright 
 stones, ten of which were remaining in 1770. 
 They are from seven to nine feet above ground, 
 and weigh from eight to ten tons each. One 
 stood on the summit of the mount, like that 
 near Hadjipoor, in Hindustan, described in a 
 former Lecture, and the obelisk represented 
 as having been on the top of one of the Egyp- 
 tian pyramids, — where, in conformity to the 
 northern practice, sacrifices were annually per- 
 
342 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 formed in memory of tin* deceased. In the 
 cave, or excavated temple, are two oval rock 
 basins, one in each arm of the transept. On 
 one of the stones was a sculptured volute, 
 which may indicate that it was dedicated to 
 Woden or Jupiter Ammon. On another lintel 
 was a delineation of lightning, as if sacred to 
 Tlior. 
 
 I will say nothing of the similarity of names 
 between Erin, Ireland, and Iran, Persia; con- 
 jectural etymologies being too vague for his- 
 torical research. But I think no objection 
 can be raised to the proofs which Sir William 
 Jones gives us in his discourse on the Persians, 
 *' that the writing at Persepolis bears a strong 
 resemblance to that which the Irish call 
 ogham." The word agam, in Sanscrit, also 
 means " mysterious knowledge ;" they may not 
 have had a common origin, but it appears very 
 likely from what I have adduced : and if the 
 characters in question be really alphabetical, 
 they were probably secret and sacerdotal, or 
 a; cypher perhaps of which the priests only 
 had the key. JBooilh also in Irish, and 
 hoodli or bood/ia in Sanscrit, mean the same 
 upright unhewn stone of worship. These 
 resemblances are forcible ; and I will no- 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 34.3 
 
 tice, in addition, the similarity apparent be- 
 tween some of their buildings: for instance, no 
 one acquainted with the subject could avoid 
 being struck with the likeness of one of the 
 round towers of Ireland, that of Kilkenny, 
 measured by myself, to one of the ancient 
 towers or pillars of India — that near Alla- 
 habad. 
 
 Sir William Jones observes, that the three 
 races whom he had already mentioned, and 
 more than three he could not find, migrated 
 from Iran as from their common country ; and 
 thus the Saxon Chronicle, I presume from good 
 authority, brings the first inhabitants of Britain 
 from Armenia ; while a late very learned writer 
 concludes, after all his laborious researches, 
 that the Goths or Scythians came from Persia ; 
 and another contends, with great force, that 
 both the Irish and the ancient Britons pro- 
 ceeded severally from the borders of the Cas- 
 pian sea; — a coincidence of conclusions from 
 different media, by persons wholly unconnected, 
 which could scarcely have happened if they 
 were not grounded on solid principles. 
 
 Where chronology fails we can no longer 
 follow chronological order ; therefore, as the 
 much-disputed subject of the round towers of 
 
344 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Ireland is now before us, I will take them 
 prior to some of the ruder antiquities of this 
 country. 
 
 The round towers of Ireland, of which I 
 have a list of nearly seventy now remaining, 
 are among the most singular and disputed 
 buildings of antiquity. They resemble one ano- 
 ther in general appearance, and vary from 
 thirty to one hundred and thirty feet in height, 
 and from thirteen to nineteen or twenty feet in 
 diameter. Their resemblance to the pillars or 
 round towers of the east cannot but be re- 
 marked. These structures have opened to 
 men of leisure and erudition a spacious field 
 for conjecture. Giraldus Cambrensis men- 
 tions them as early as 1 1 85 ; John Lynch al- 
 ludes to them in 1662, and says the Danes 
 who entered Ireland, according to Giraldus, 
 in 838, are reported to be the authors of our 
 orbicular narrow towers. " They were called," 
 he says, *' clock theach, or the house of the 
 bell." Peter Walsh wrote of them^ in 1684, 
 and Dr. Molyneux in 1727. Since these. Dr. 
 Ledwich and Mr. Grose are the most satis- 
 factory. Some writers think that they were 
 watch-towers or beacons to observe the approach 
 of an enemy, and others that they were merely 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 345 
 
 belfries to warn the country round of danger 
 or to call the people to worship, because they 
 are mostly found near their ancient churches. 
 To me this hypothesis appears quite unsatisfac- 
 tory : the tower at Kilkenny, which I measured 
 and investigated last spring, is, indeed, evi- 
 dently older than the cathedral, the south 
 transept of which appears to have been shorten- 
 ed in its original building on account of the 
 round tower, which is within a very few feet of 
 it. Other antiquarian writers suppose them to 
 have been the residences of anchorite monks, in 
 imitation of eastern pillars similar to that of 
 Allahabad. Some few imagine them to have 
 been places of penance, or purgatorial pillars, 
 in which the penitent was elevated according 
 to his crime, and descended as his offences 
 were expiated. 
 
 A description of one may serve for the whole; 
 and I will take that at Monasterboice, three 
 miles from Drogheda. This fine tower is one 
 hundred and ten feet high, and fifty-one feet 
 in circumference, beautifully diminishing like 
 the shaft of an antique Doric column. Its di- 
 ameter is seventeen feet, and the thickness of 
 the walls, which are built of a blue stone found 
 in the neighbourhood, three feet six inches; 
 
346 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 the door is five feet six inches high, twenty- 
 two inches wide, and six feet above the pre- 
 sent level of the ground. The ancient church, 
 which is close to it, is now in ruins. In the 
 church-yard are two very old and curious 
 crosses ; one, about eighteen feet high, co^ ered 
 with sculpture, is called St. Boyne's cross, and 
 is esteemed the most ancient religious relic 
 now in Ireland. It is of one stone, and is said 
 to have been sent from Rome and erected by 
 order of the Pope. Among the sculptures on 
 it, there is an inscription in Irish characters in 
 which is plainly legible the name of Muredach, 
 who was for some time king of Ireland, and 
 died in 534, about a hundred years before the 
 arrival of St. Patrick in that kingdom. 
 
 This, however, is by no means the loftiest 
 round tower ; that of Drumiskin, in the county 
 of Louth, being one hundred and thirty feet high, 
 and that of Kildare, or Chilled aire, being one 
 hundred and thirty-three feet high, and only 
 eighteen feet in diameter. The latter extra- 
 ordinary building, the walls of which are but 
 three feet six inches in thickness, is built of fine 
 white granite to about twelve feet from the 
 ground, and the rest of the blue stone of the 
 country ; the door is fourteen feet from the 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 347 
 
 ground, Chilledaire sisjnifies the ivood of oaJcSy 
 and was a larjje ancient forest, comprehending: 
 the middle part of the present county of Kildare. 
 In the centre of this wood was a large plain sa- 
 cred to druidical worship, and now called the 
 Curragh of Kildare, celebrated as a race- 
 course. 
 
 My next subject will be those very ancient 
 and rude structures in both kingdoms, com- 
 monly understood to be druidical remains; 
 and first, though briefly, of cromlechs. These 
 monuments are called by the Welch crwm 
 lechetv, or bowing-stones, because they bowed 
 before them in their ceremonials of religious 
 worship. Both the northern and eastern an- 
 cient superstitions ascribed divine qualities to 
 monstrous unhewn stones, which they adored 
 as Gods.* A circle of twelve, with one in the 
 centre representing the prime deity, became a 
 temple, within which they performed sacrifices 
 and other religious ceremonies, elected and 
 inaugurated their kings, and held their courts 
 of justice. 
 
 Cairns, or immense conical heaps of stones 
 raised as a rude monument, are numerous in 
 
 * Grose, vol. i. p. 6. 
 
348 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 Ireland ; and one can travel but little in the 
 interior without frequently meeting them. 
 
 Dr. Macpherson is doubtful whether the 
 Cairns in the Scottish isles were reared by the 
 Norwegians or Old Britons of Caledonia ; 
 adding, that there are Cairns in Aberdeen and 
 Inverness, and in Caernarvonshire, where the 
 northerns never penetrated. 
 
 Near the town of Naas, in the county of 
 Kildare, I saw, last spring, among some an- 
 cient ruins of a round tower, and other relics, 
 several under-ground caves beneath the circles, 
 such as are alluded to in Ossian. " Go, 
 Ferchios," says the poet, in his Fingal,* " go 
 to Allad, the gray-haired son of the rock ; his 
 dwelling is in the circle of stones." This 
 Allad was a druid, and is called the son of 
 the rock, evidently, from his dwelling in a cave; 
 and the circle of stones is the pale of a 
 druidical temple. The hero then visits the 
 druid, and Allad gives him his answer; the 
 hero's reply to the priest proves the druid's 
 dwelling place to be in the cave. " Allad," said 
 the chief of Cromla, " peace to thy dreams in 
 thy cave." The holiness of caves was as firmly 
 
 * Bookv. p. 43. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 349 
 
 believed in as tliat of groves, and therein the 
 druids performed divine offices, and taiiglit 
 their disciples. ^ 
 
 The architectural antiquities of Ireland pre- 
 sent a fine unexplored field, to which I trust 1 
 may have leisure to turn more of my attention. 
 There are ruins of between thirty and forty abbeys 
 of splendid architecture. Those of Jerpoint and 
 of the Black Abbey, in the county of Kilkenny, 
 are finer than any I ever witnessed in England, 
 not even exceptingthe far-famed Netley- Abbey, 
 in Hampshire. Then there are their mounts, 
 their cairns, and their caves ; their round tow- 
 jBrs ; their ancient cathedrals ; and the modern 
 Baalbeck, the deserted city of Killmalloch, 
 in the county of Limerick ; likewise the re- 
 mains of the seven churches at Glendaloch, in 
 the county of Wicklow ; and the bed of St. 
 Keiven, immortalized by the muse of the Irish 
 melodist ; together with their cromlechs, which 
 rival any in England. 
 
 The cromlech at Tobin's Town, in the 
 county of Carlow, forms a sort of rude temple. 
 On the west end is a porch, or portico, formed 
 \)Y two upright pillars, somewhat round but 
 irregular, each eight feet high, terminated be- 
 hind by a broad flat stone, eight feet high and 
 nine feet broad, which, being set on the edge, 
 
350 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 makes a portico of six feet wide and four feet 
 deep. This is covered by the large sloping 
 stone, or cromlech, which is twenty-three feet 
 long, eighteen broad at the upper end over the 
 portico, and six feet at the lower or back part, 
 where it rests on small stones about a foot 
 high. Its thickness at the upjjer end is four 
 feet, and at the lower two. The imder sur- 
 face is plain, and the upper convex. The 
 upper surface has a large channel, from which 
 branches a number of smaller ones : some an- 
 tiquaries think these natural, others (with more 
 probability) artificial, and intended for sacri- 
 ficial purposes. The sides are enclosed and 
 supported by several upright stones from three 
 to six feet high, thus forming a room or cell 
 not unlike the Monopteral temples of the 
 Egyptians, eighteen feet long, eight feet wide 
 at the upper or west end, and five at the oppo- 
 site one ; eight feet high in front, and two be- 
 hind ; perfectly secure from every inconveni- 
 ence of weather. From the portico, westward, 
 is a sort of avenue nearly one hundred and 
 twenty feet long, formed of small irregular 
 artificial hillocks. This curious remain of 
 ancient Irish architecture is situated in a low 
 plain field, near a rivulet, on the road from 
 TuUow to Hachetstown. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 351 
 
 The other cromlech, at Brown's Town, is in 
 a field about a mile and a half from Carlow ; 
 it consists of an immense rock stone, raised on 
 edge from its native bed, and supported at its 
 east end by three rude columns. At a small 
 distance is another pillar by itself, nearly 
 round, and five feet in height. The covering- 
 stone, or cromlech, is twenty-two feet ten 
 inches long, eighteen feet nine inches wide, 
 and four feet six inches thick at the upper part, 
 having nearly two thousand cubic feet of stone, 
 weighing ninety tons, and making, with the 
 horizon, an angle of thirty-four degrees. 
 
 A very singular specimen of ancient Irish 
 architecture, which is certainly one of the most 
 curious fabrics in these kingdoms, must be 
 noticed, — the stone-roofed chapel of the an- 
 cient king Cormac, at Cashel, who was, after 
 the patriarchal mode, both king and bishop, 
 and flourished about the year 908.* It is sup- 
 posed to have been erected about the year 
 1134, and dedicated to that celebrated royal 
 priest ; and yet Ware, in his Antiquities, says, 
 that when Roderick O'Connor, King of Con- 
 naught, in the year 1161, built a stone castle at 
 Tuam, it was considered such an extraordinary 
 
 * Ware's Ant, of Ireland, p. 52. 
 
352 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 work that the natives called it tlie Wonderful 
 Castle. The aforesaid chapel of St. Cormac, 
 at Cashel, is a regular ecclesiastical edifice, 
 divided into a nave and choir, the latter nar- 
 rowing* in breadth, and separated from the 
 nave by a wide arch. Under the altar tradi- 
 tion reports the remams of St. Cormac to be 
 deposited. There is a striking resemblance 
 between this chapel and the church of St. 
 Peter, at Oxford, with Grimbauld's crypt 
 beneath it. Its dimensions, plan, and sec- 
 tion, may be found in Grose's Antiquities, 
 and are well deserving the attention of the 
 student. 
 
 I shall now proceed to a notice of English 
 architecture of about the same date. 
 
 In those early periods of our history which 
 are before the invasion by the Romans, our 
 ancestors appear to have had scarcely any 
 other dwellings than thickets, dens, and ca- 
 verns ; and, according to Tacitus and Caesar, 
 could have been little better in point of civi- 
 lization than many of the recently-discovered 
 inhabitants of the South Seas. Specimens of 
 these ancient caverns are still to be seen in the 
 western isles of Scotland and in parts of Corn- 
 wall. In some parts of southern England, 
 however, particularly in Kent, the inhabitants 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 35.3 
 
 appear to have acquired a sufficient knowledge 
 to build houses somewhat more substantial 
 and convenient. 
 
 The earliest style of architecture practised 
 in Britain appears to have been similar to that 
 which is still used in the smaller hamlets of 
 England, technically called by village architects 
 " wattle and dab ;"' being a daubing or rude 
 plastering over the chinks and crevises of the 
 wattled walls of their wicker- worked cabins 
 with clay, and filling up the interstices with 
 moss. The roofs were formed, much after 
 the present mode, with boughs of trees 
 thatched with straw as a security against the 
 weather. 
 
 The best authorities relate that the form of 
 the wooden houses, or huts, of the ancient 
 Britons and Gauls was circular, with lofty 
 conical roofs ; at the top or centre of which 
 was an aperture for the admission of light and 
 the emission of the smoke. This description 
 of structure seems to have been the original 
 house, and the early periods of the history of 
 most countries exhibit it as the type and origin 
 of their architecture. We can trace it from 
 the ancestors of the polished Greeks to the 
 aborisyinal Britons ; and the villages of the 
 
 A a 
 
354 ELMEy's LECTURES 
 
 Hottentots and Caffres of Africa exhibit it to 
 this day. 
 
 The foundations of some of the largest of 
 these ancient British mansions were of stone, 
 of which there are yet vestiges in the island of 
 Anglesey, and other thinly-populated parts of 
 these islands. It is probably in imitation of 
 these primeval wooden huts that the oldest 
 stone buildings, of which there are remains in 
 the western isles of Scotland and parts of 
 Ireland, were built circular on their plan, and 
 conical in their elevation, with circular aper- 
 tures at the top ; so that what was a mansion 
 among the ancient Britons, and served the 
 noblest of our ancestors for withdrawing- 
 rooms, boudoirs, parlours, &c. would make an 
 excellent though small-sized tile-kiln of the 
 present day. 
 
 When the Romans first invaded this country, 
 they found nothing according with modern 
 ideas of towns or cities, but merely scattered 
 assemblages of huts ; for, according to Strabo, 
 what the Britons called a town was a tract 
 of woody country, surrounded by a mound and 
 a ditch for the security of themselves and their 
 cattle from the ravages of their enemies. 
 
 The palaces of their cliiefs resembled those 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 355 
 
 of the common people in construction, and 
 differed only in the size and solidity of their 
 workmanship. From the expression of Carac- 
 tacus, who, when taken captive and sent in 
 triumph to Rome, wondered, in passing through 
 its streets of palaces, how it was possible 
 that a people possessed of such magnificence 
 at home could envy his humble cottage in 
 Britain, I should infer, as coming from the 
 mouth of a primeval British monarch, that his 
 subjects had made no considerable improve- 
 ment in their architecture for at least an 
 hundred years after the first invasion of the 
 Romans. 
 
 Among the most ancient regular works of 
 architecture in Britain (about A.D. 82) were 
 the chain of forts between the Firths of Clyde 
 and the Forth, which were built by Julius Agri- 
 cola, and the wall of Antoninus, called the 
 Picts' wall. Agricola is supposed also to have 
 erected several temples, and as he is well 
 known, on the authority of Suetonius, to have 
 encouraged the arts of peace, we may be 
 assured he did not neglect private conve- 
 niences and domestic comforts. 
 
 Other ancient architectural ruins, no less re- 
 markable for their history and manner of con- 
 
 A a 2 
 
•356 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 struction than those just mentioned, are the 
 vitrified forts of the ancient Britons, several of 
 which have been found in the highlands of 
 Scotland, and on which many opinions and 
 conjectures have been offered. Their anti- 
 quity is indisputable, their singularity from 
 vitrification worthy of inquiry in a scientific 
 point of view ; but neither their construction 
 nor their design, taken architecturally, render 
 them worthy of detail in Lectures so limited 
 as the present. Some authors think they must 
 have been erected before the use of calcareous 
 cements was known in Britain ; because, as the 
 country where they are found abounds with 
 lime-stone, and as the builders would certainly 
 have exerted all their powers to give them a 
 proper degree of strength, mortar would cer- 
 tainly have been used by them had they been 
 acquainted with lime-stone and its fitness for 
 cements. In admitting the premises, I must 
 take leave to deny the consequences ; because 
 the art of connecting stones by vitrification 
 exhibits much more knowledge and a greater 
 care for durability than the more common 
 method of building and jointing with mortar. 
 
 Architects, sculptors, painters, and other 
 artists and artisans, always accompanied a 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 3.'S7 
 
 Roman legion ; and splendid marks of their 
 footsteps are visible wherever they obtained 
 admission. The first Roman colony was 
 planted at Camolodum, the first city on the 
 site of the present London, as early as the 
 fiftieth year of the Christian era; and when it 
 was destroyed by the Britons, in revenge for 
 the cruel treatment of Boadicea, queen of the 
 Iceni, about eleven years afterwards, it was a 
 large and well-built town, embellished with 
 statues, temples, theatres, and other public 
 structures. From many circumstances it is 
 apparent that these, like the early and provin- 
 cial theatres and amphitheatres of Rome, 
 were mostly of wood, till the time of Julius 
 Agricola, who finally established the dominion 
 of the Romans in Britain, and g-overned it 
 during the reigns of Vespasian, Titus, and 
 Domitian, with equal courage and humanity. 
 I wish to lay some stress upon these points, 
 as conclusive of the Roman style of architec- 
 ture having preceded all others in this island, 
 the hut and cabin alone excepted. The Romans 
 not only constructed a great number of solid, 
 convenient, and magnificent edifices for their 
 own accommodation, but instructed, exhorted, 
 and encouraged the Britons to imitate them. 
 Previously to going farther into the history 
 
358 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of the Roman or earliest style of architecture 
 known in Britain, it is necessary that we should 
 devote a portion of oiir attention to the ancient 
 British or druidical architecture of the coun- 
 try, lest we should, in our admiration of foreign 
 art, render ourselves obnoxious to the retort 
 given to one whom an old English writer, in 
 Peter Langtoft's Chronicle, calls a wandering 
 wit of Wiltshire ; who rambling, like many of 
 our wandering wits of the present day, to 
 Rome, to gaze at antiquities, and there screwing 
 himself into the company of antiquaries, they 
 in treated him to illustrate to them that famous 
 monument in his own country called Stone- 
 henge. His answer was, that he had never 
 seen and scarcely ever heard of it. Where- 
 upon, says our ancient chronicler, they kicked 
 him out of doors, and bade him go home and 
 see Stonehenge before he sought for curious 
 antiquities abroad. *' And 1 wish," continues 
 he, *' that all such aesopical cocks as slight 
 these admired gems, and other our domestic 
 monuments, (by which they may be admo- 
 nished to eschew some evil or to do some 
 good,) and scrape for barley-corns of vanity out 
 of foreign dunghills, might be handled, or 
 rather footed, as he was." 
 
 There are various and contradictory hypo- 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 359 
 
 theses respecting this mysterious edifice, (Stone- 
 henge,) whose ruins may be denominated, in 
 the words of the poet, as 
 
 " Awful memorials, but of whom we know not." 
 
 *»»***»»♦ 
 
 Which " want no written history ; their's a voice 
 For ever speaking to the heart of man."* 
 
 1 will offer a summary of these hypotheses. 
 
 Geoffry of Monmouth says, in a sort of le- 
 gendary tale, that the stones were brought by 
 giants from Africa to Quildare, in Ireland ; 
 and by some legerdemain of Merlin, the great 
 British enchanter, conveyed to the place where 
 they now stand. 
 
 Camden describes them as they were in his 
 days, and calls them so huge and monstrous a 
 piece of work, that our oldest historians termed 
 it, for its greatness, Chorea Gigantum, the 
 giant's dance. " For my own part," says this 
 venerable antiquary, " about these points I 
 am not curious to argue and dispute, but 
 rather to lament, with much grief, that the 
 authors of so notable a monument are thus 
 buried in oblivion. Yet some there are that 
 think them to be no natural stones hewn out 
 
 * Rogers. 
 
3(10 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 of the rock, but artificially made of pure sand, 
 and by some gluey and unctuous matter knit 
 and incorporate together, like as those ancient 
 trophies and monuments of victory which I 
 have seen in Yorkshire. And what marvel? 
 Read we not, 1 pray you, in Pliny, that the 
 sand and dust of Puteoli, being covered over 
 with water, becometh forthwith a very stone? 
 That the cisterns in Rome, of sand digged 
 out of the ground and the strongest kind of 
 lime wrought together, grow so hard that they 
 seem very stones indeed ?" 
 
 The marvel, I would reply to this ingenious 
 writer, who would reduce our grandest monu- 
 ment of ancient British art to mere conjpo and 
 mastic, is, that if they were so composed, how 
 come the mortices and tenons in the upright 
 pieces and beams, which he speaks of, and 
 which are well known to be there? These 
 facts, together with scientific examinations, 
 have long ago proved them to be a species of 
 native rock, mixed with silicious grit and veins 
 of iron. 
 
 ** The common saying," concludes Camden, 
 " is, that Ambrosius Aurelianus, or his bro- 
 ther Uther, did rear them up by the art of 
 xMerlin." 
 
 Inigo Jones fancied he found in these stu- 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 36^1 
 
 pendous ruins an hypaethral Tuscan temple^ 
 and offered many arguments to that effect in 
 what I believe is a posthumous work, and was 
 not intended by the eminent architect for pub- 
 lication ; but there is no end to conjecture 
 when a peculiar and favourite study occupies 
 the entire mind. So did a living architect 
 conceive that he found a temple of the pure 
 Doric order in the biblical account of the tem- 
 ple of Solomon which speaks of chapiters embel- 
 lished with lilies, net-work, and pomegranates. 
 
 Dr. Charlton, one of the physicians to 
 Charles the Second, wrote a refutation of 
 Jones's theory, which was by no means a diffi- 
 cult undertaking, and believed the pile to have 
 been erected by the Danes for the election 
 and inauguration of their monarchs. 
 
 In a manuscript, collected by Hearne, the 
 antiquary, and printed in Peter Langtoft's 
 Chronicle,"* entitled, " A FooVs Bolt soon shot 
 at Stonehenge,'' the author, or, as I presume 
 he wishes to be called, the fool, says it was 
 " some heathenish temple, demolished by the 
 immediate hand of God, as an intolerable abo- 
 mination unto him ; yet with so much of it lefl 
 standing as may declare what the whole was, 
 
 * Vol. ii. p. 483. 
 
362 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 and how and wliy destroyed. And since," 
 continues he, "- all that have as yet written 
 on this subject have contradicted and con- 
 futed each other, and never any has as yet 
 revealed this misterie of iniquitie to this pur- 
 pose, and that pedlars and tinkers, vamping on 
 London way near it, may and do freely spend 
 their mouths on it, I know not to the contrary 
 but that I also may shoot my bolt a little fur- 
 ther into it: however, I will adventure, were it 
 for nothing else but to recreate myself some- 
 times after other studies, and to provoke my 
 friends, which so much importune me to it, to 
 shoot their acute shafts into it also, hoping that 
 one or other of us, by art or accident, shall hit 
 the mark." 
 
 It has also been asserted that it is not of so 
 great antiquity as many have supposed, be- 
 cause Gildas Badonicas, of Bath, (which is 
 within thirty-five miles of Stonehenge,) who 
 wrote in A.D. 543, does not mention it ; nor 
 the venerable Bede, who wrote in A.D. 727 
 of many extraordinary curiosities of the coun- 
 try ; nor William of Malmsbury, a Wiltshire 
 man, who wrote in A.D. 1142 ; nor those cele- 
 brated ancient writers, Ethelwred, Hoveden, 
 and Ingulphus ; nor Matthew Paris, nor West- 
 monasteriensis, nor Florentius Wigorniensis. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 363 
 
 Yet a writer of the same period, Henry of 
 Huntingdon, in speaking of Stonehenge, says 
 that this Stonage did astonish them ; this did 
 amaze tliem ; that they durst not labour lest 
 they should lose theirlabourand themselves also. 
 
 Sammes, an antiquary, who published his 
 opinions in his Britannia, conceives it to have 
 been a work of Phaenicians. 
 
 Aubrey, in his Mojiumenta Britannica, en- 
 deavours to prove it to have been a temple of 
 the druids, erected long before the Roman 
 invasion of Britain, 
 
 An anonymous writer, cited by Gibson in 
 Camden s JBritannia as the author of " Nero- 
 Caesar," supposes it to have been a monument 
 raised by the Britons in memory of Queen 
 Boadicea, and that the barrows surrounding it 
 were the graves of the slain. But many of 
 these barrows have been found to contain the 
 bodies of females and youths ; — hence it ma} 
 have been a cemetery round the temple, with 
 graves like modern church-yards. 
 
 Webb, the son-in-law of luigo Jones, in his 
 " Vindication of Stonehenge restored,'' endea- 
 voured, with much misapplied learning, to de- 
 fend his father-in-law's hypothesis of its having 
 been a Roman temple of the Tuscan order. 
 
364 ELMESS LECTURES 
 
 Dr. Stukeley, a learned antiquary of the last 
 century, published a very interesting and faitli- 
 ful description of this mysterious structure. — 
 It is enclosed within a circular ditch. After 
 passing this ditch there is an ascent of between 
 thirty and forty yards. The diameter ©f the 
 circle which stands thereon is about a hun- 
 dred and ten feet. " When you enter the 
 building," says Dr. Stukeley, " and cast your 
 eyes around upon the yawning ruins, you are 
 struck into an extatic reverie which none can 
 describe, and they only can be sensible of who 
 feel it. Other buildings fall by piecemeal, but 
 here a single stone is a ruin, and lies like the 
 haughty carcass of a Goliah." " If you look 
 upon the perfect part, you fancy entire quarries 
 mounted up into the air : if upon the rude 
 havoc below, you see, as it were, the bowels of 
 a mountain turned inside outwards." The 
 material is described by the Doctor as being 
 of a very durable kind of English marble. 
 
 The outer circle consisted of sixty colossal 
 cubes of stone, thirty of them being perpen- 
 dicular or jambs, and thirty imposts or lintels. 
 At present there are about seventeen left stand- 
 ing. The upright stones of the trilithons, or 
 central masses of three stones each, are above 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 36'") 
 
 thirty feet high, well chiselled, finely tapered, 
 and well proportioned in their dimensions. 
 The whole number of cubes amounted to just 
 one hundred and forty, according to Dr. 
 Stukeley's computation. 
 
 Mr. Wood, an architect of Bath, made the 
 diameter one hundred and sixty-four feet, and 
 the number of stones one hundred and twenty- 
 eight. The area of the temple is calculated 
 to contain an English acre and a quarter of 
 land ; which, allowing eighteen inches square for 
 every person, would render it capable of contain- 
 ing from twenty to thirty thousand individuals. 
 
 Dr. Smith, one of the last writers who has 
 formed a conjecture upon this extraordinary 
 relic of antiquity, published, in 1771, an hypo- 
 thesis, wherein, improving upon that of his 
 predecessor, Dr. Stukeley, he thinks it was not 
 only a druidical temple, but also a building 
 for astronomical observations, which he sup- 
 ports with great ingenuity. 
 
 In January, 1797, one of the trilithons fell 
 with a concussion which was felt by some men 
 at plough full half a mile off. An interesting 
 account of this fall is related in the trans- 
 actions of the Royal Society by Dr. Maton. 
 The impost he conceives, by calculation, to 
 
366 ELMES S LECTCliES 
 
 weigh upwards of 11 tons, and the weight of 
 the entire trilithon to be nearly 70 tons. 
 
 How these colossal jambs and lintels were 
 raised is a question of serious moment, and 
 on a first glance it would appear only to have 
 been compassed by a people who possessed 
 the completest knowledge of mechanical pow- 
 ers. But, on further consideration, and by a 
 reference to the account related by Herodotus 
 of the very simple mode of building the pyra- 
 mids, where the complicated labour of thou- 
 sands of hands compensated for mechanical 
 skill; — so may it have been in the days of the 
 builders of Stonehenge, under the instruction 
 of the druids, their priests. Mounds of earth 
 may have been raised between and around the 
 jambs, or uprights, and the lintel-stone have 
 been rolled up by the power of innumerable 
 hands ; and when on its summit, and properly 
 fixed on its perpendicular bearing-stones, the 
 earth might have been removed by the hands 
 which raised it. 
 
 Avebury, or Abury, about five miles from 
 Marlborough, in Wiltshire, another similar 
 circle to Stonehenge, is of larger dimensions, 
 but much less perfect, to which similar obser- 
 vations may apply. 
 
 i 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 367 
 
 Respecting these stupendous remains of 
 ancient skill, namely, the druidical temples of 
 Stonehenge and Avebury in England, New 
 Grange in Ireland, and the various other monu- 
 ments of primeval British workmanship, with 
 which the islands of the united kingdoms 
 abound, hypothesis is all we can at present 
 venture. 
 
 Returning from these visionary days to more 
 authentic dates, and more established facts: — 
 the art of building, from the time of Agricola, 
 in A.D. 80, to the middle of the fourth cen- 
 tury, flourished abundantly in our island ; and 
 the same taste for convenient, beautiful, and 
 solid buildings, which had long prevailed in 
 Italy, was introduced into Britain. The coun- 
 try abounded with well-built villages, towns, 
 forts, and stations ; and the whole was defend- 
 ed by that high and strong wall, with its many 
 towers and intervening castles, which reached 
 from the mouth of the river Tyne on the east, 
 to the Sol way firth on the west. This spirit of 
 building, which was introduced and en- 
 couraged by the Romans, so much improved 
 the taste and increased the number of the 
 British artists, that in the third century this 
 island was celebrated in that respect. When 
 the Emperor Constautius, father of Coustan- 
 
368 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 tine the Great, rebuilt the city of Autuii, in 
 Gaul, A.D. 296, he was chiefly furnished with 
 workmen from Britain, which (says Eumenius) 
 very much abounded with the best artificers. 
 
 Not very long after this enlightened period, 
 architecture and the other arts declined; and 
 soon after the final departure of the Romans 
 from Britain the pure taste in architecture 
 was entirely superseded by new and de- 
 praved styles. 
 
 In the times of the Saxons, previous to the 
 disturbed period of Hengist and Horsa, pub- 
 lic and private edifices are related to have been 
 constructed with much splendour. In the 
 year A.D. 480 Ambrosius, a British com- 
 mander of Roman descent, who had assumed 
 the regal government of Kent, built a palace 
 at Canterbury. 
 
 During the Heptarchy, or, as Mr. Sharon 
 Turner, tlie historian of the Anglo Saxons, 
 more aptly calls it, the Octarchy, churches and 
 other ecclesiastical buildings began to be mul- 
 tiplied. The monks, the only architects of 
 those days, erected these buildings, and form- 
 ed that style now called Saxon, which, from 
 its similarity in parts to the worst Roman, 
 may warrant a conclusion which I am inclined 
 to draw, that thev designed them from the 
 
VTl] ON ARCHITECTURE. 369 
 
 help of memory alone. Tlie elements of this 
 style (the Saxon) are heavy ronnrl coluiims, 
 and seniicirciilar arches, bad resemblances of 
 the worst Tuscan, covered with the round arch 
 of the middle ages. 
 
 As a proof that the decline of the Roman 
 style produced the Saxon, which was called 
 by ihe monks, after the Norman invasion, 
 " Opus Romanum ;" let us imagine a country 
 mason, ignorant of art but skilful willi his 
 chisel, to have observed a Composite capital of 
 the depraved style of those of the temple of 
 Bacchus, on the Mons Viminalis at Rome; or 
 the Ionic capitals of the temple of Concord ; or 
 even a decent Corinthian ; and to be desired 
 at some considerable interval to carve some 
 capitals as nearly resembling them as possible, 
 from memory. Imagine this, and I would ask 
 whether it be not more than probable that they 
 would resemble the Saxon capitals of St Bar- 
 tholomew the Great in Smithfield, London, or 
 those of the crypt of Lastingham-Priory, &c. 
 
 Hence, 1 think, the origin of the Saxon 
 style may be fairly traced to the decadenco of 
 the Roman: and the introduction of the Sara- 
 cenic. Arabesque, ajul Grotesque styles, aided 
 by the pracliral ami scientific improvement of 
 the workmen, and the knowledge of the society 
 
 Eb 
 
370 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of travelling architects, the early freemasons, 
 produced that singularly romantic style called 
 the Gothic. 
 
 A Doric temple diflers from a Gothic cathe- 
 dral, as Sophocles does from Shakspeare. 
 " The principle of the one is simplicity and 
 harmony, that of the other richness and power. 
 The one relies on form and proportion ; the 
 other on quantity and variety, and prominence 
 of parts. The one owes its charm to a certain 
 union and regularity of feeling, the other adds 
 to its effect from complexity and the combina- 
 tion of the greatest extremes. The classical 
 appeals to sense and habit, the gothic, or 
 romantic, strikes from novelty, strangeness, 
 and contrast. Both are founded in essential 
 and indestructible principles of human nature."* 
 
 As excellence is never stationary, the vicis- 
 situdes of architecture in England may thus 
 be arranged into classes or epochs, namely : — 
 from the splendour of the Augustine age, an 
 emanation of which reached us under the 
 administration of Claudius, Antoninus, and 
 Agricola, to the decline and hatred of Roman 
 art and customs on the expulsion of the 
 Romans from the island, and the establish- 
 
 * Hazlitt. 
 
Vll] ON ARCHITECTURE. 371 
 
 ment of the style called Saxon. Next arose 
 another style, that called Gothic, with all its 
 varieties, from the plainness of the Norman to 
 the gaudy embellishments of the tlorid style; 
 which latter tlomished resplendently to its 
 meridian in the time of the Henrys and Ed- 
 wards, and declined with the revival of 
 classical literature, in the reign of Elizabeth ; 
 when Roman, or rather Italian architecture 
 began to mix itself with our native English, 
 as did its words with our language; and we 
 were then (Shakspeare excepted) pedants in 
 both. 
 
 Palladio, who was the father of that style of 
 Roman architecture which was introduced 
 into England by Inigo Jones, and the disciples 
 of his school, read Vitruvius's works in the 
 true spirit of their author; and restored the ac- 
 tual ruins of ancient Rome in a purer style 
 and with greater gusto than were most of their 
 originals. - Had Palladio engaged himself in 
 a similar examination of the splendid ruins of 
 ancient Greece, as they were in his days, still 
 acquainting himself with the opinions of Vitru- 
 vius, he might have founded a school of 
 architecture as much superior to that now 
 called after him as are the works of Ictinus, 
 
 Hb2 
 
.37*2 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Callicrates, and Phidias, to the Colosseum 
 and the Theatre of Marcelliis. 
 
 Classical architecture shone forth in the 
 Roman style in the beginning of the reign of 
 Charles the First; perished with the Icono- 
 clasts and roundheads of the commonwealth : 
 rose again under Charles the Second with a 
 momentary lustre, soon eclipsed by ignorance 
 and bigotry in the reign of James the Second ; 
 and from that period till the commencement of 
 the reign of George the Third, a mere blank is 
 presented in the history of the art. 
 
 But to return to the introduction of the style 
 called generically, and perhaps prejudicially, 
 the Gothic; which is one of the most important 
 although heretical inventions of a style in the 
 annals of architecture. 
 
 The style called Gothic (let not the learned 
 antiquary or amateur of our ancient English 
 architecture start at the epithet ; but, on the 
 contrary, recollect that the originally oppro- 
 brious name for the members of the respectable 
 Society of Friends is now become an honour- 
 able distinction ;) I have heard sweepingly de- 
 signated, by an eminent professor of the pre- 
 sent day, as being any thing that is not Grecian ; 
 but whether this affected antithesis proceed 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 373 
 
 from humour or contempt I am not prepared 
 to determine. 
 
 Our illustrious countryman,Wren, also, whose 
 mechanical and mathematical skill elevates him 
 above all other modern builders, called the 
 Gothic a gross concameration of heavy, melan- 
 choly, and monkish piles. Now I will venture 
 to assert that it is the very reverse of this defi- 
 nition, and not quite so opposed to Grecian 
 art as was thought by the professor before 
 quoted ; but that the Gothic is a style of archi- 
 tecture pure, grand, impressive, and charac- 
 teristic. The elements of it are spires, pin- 
 nacles, lofty-pointed windows, and elevation, 
 as opposed to the horizontal line of the Greeks. 
 Its character somewhat resembles that of the old 
 German school of painting ; and a fine Gothic 
 edifice, with its elaborate and carefully-marked 
 details, its gaudy colours, its vermilion, and its 
 leaf-gold, reminds one of Albert Durer, and 
 his hard but correct school. 
 
 England is the classic soil for this style of 
 architecture, as ancient Greece is for that of 
 the orders, and here the student must come to 
 measure and to study it. York Minster is the 
 Parthenon of Gothic architecture, Westminster 
 Abbey the Theseum, and the chapel of Henry 
 the Seventh the monument of Lysicrates. 
 
374 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 Among the finest specimens is the venerable 
 Abbey chinch of St. Alban's, in Hertfordshire, 
 which is also one of the most valuable docu- 
 ments in the archaiological history of the 
 country, as it embraces most of the successive 
 styles in great variety from the Saxon to the 
 pointed style. 
 
 Gothic architecture disdains the trammels 
 and the systems of the schools ; nevertheless it 
 has its own laws, its genera and their species, 
 although they have not yet been arranged in 
 a grammatical form. Batty Langley endea- 
 voured, it is true, to reduce it to a system, and 
 to engraft on it the five orders of the Palladian 
 school, instead of a more natural and philoso- 
 phical arrangement ; but this effort was alto- 
 gether nugatory. 
 
 The elements of this style seem to be derived 
 in every instance from its type — the cone or 
 pyramid. Hence all we see in it is pyramidal. 
 Its shafts shoot upwards; its arches are shaped 
 like points of lancets ; its windows form them- 
 selves into pyramidal tracery ; and it has been 
 not inaptly compared to a grove of trees. 
 The origin and antiquity of the various-shaped 
 pointed arches are elucidated in many able 
 works on the subject : and an excellent illus- 
 tration of the hypothesis of the pointed arch being 
 
YII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 375 
 
 formed by the intersection of two Roman 
 or semicircular arches, is to be found in 
 the Abbey church of Malmsbury, in Wiltshire 
 — an ecclesiastical fabric of great antiquity 
 and beauty. 
 
 The epithet " Gothic"' was not originally 
 given to this style of architecture because it 
 was the invention of the Goths, but because, 
 in the opinion of those who so named it, it was 
 a barbarous innovation upon true taste arising 
 from the decline of art ; which decline was, 
 however, perceptible before the invasion of 
 Rome by the Goths, the Roman architects ha- 
 ving, after abandoning the style of the Greeks, 
 fallen into the depraved taste of the eleventh 
 and twelfth centuries. 
 
 Gothic architecture in Italy approaches the 
 Roman more nearly than elsewhere, and par- 
 ticularly in the church of St. Paul, built at 
 Rome by Constantine ; the Cathedral of 
 Pisa, built by a Greek named Buschetto of 
 Dulichium ; those of Orvietto, Sienna, and the 
 grea<t church at Florence, built by Arnolfo, in 
 1290. This latter style is sometimes called 
 arahate desche, being a mixture of Moorish, 
 Greek, or Roman, with the German-Gothic. 
 In Spain, where this style was probably in- 
 troduced by the Moors and Saracens, it is 
 
376 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 found, in the earliest examples, to be heavy, 
 gigantic, and coarse; but, in later times, they 
 have imitated the excessive delicacy and light- 
 ness of the Moorish, which has given birth to 
 the Arabesque or Saracenic. The Moors, ene- 
 mies by religion to representations of human 
 beings or animals, introduced, on the contrary, 
 in great profusion, stalks, fruits, and foliage ; 
 while at the same time the Franks, being 
 Christians, have equally overloaded their style 
 with grotesque figures of dwarfs, giants, grif- 
 fins, sphinxes, &c. 
 
 The origin and progress of Gothic architecture 
 in England is so well known, and so ably de- 
 veloped by many scientific writers, that it would 
 be superfluous to mention it here ; but of its 
 rise and progress in France so much is not 
 yet understood. It appears to have commenced 
 in that country under Clovis ; Clotaire I. built 
 the church of St.Medard de Soissons : Childer- 
 bert I. that of St. Vincent, at Paris, now called 
 St. Germain de Pres. At the commencement 
 of the second century was built, by the order 
 of Dagobert I. the Abbey church of St. 
 Denys ; Charlemagne contributed more than 
 any preceding monarch to the national archi- 
 tecture of France, and, among other instances, 
 built a grand ch-.rch and a superb palace at 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 377 
 
 Aix-la-Chapelle. Under Charles the Bald 
 was finished the Cathedral of Rheims, which 
 was began by Louis le Debonnaire; and under 
 Robert, the tine Cathedral of Chartres. The 
 Abbey church of Beauvais is supposed to be 
 of the time of Philip I. and the Cathedral of 
 Annecy, of that of Philip Augustus, who 
 also finished the grand entrance of the 
 church of Paris, begun under king Robert ; 
 the church belonging to the Abbey of St. 
 Denys was rebuilt and much enlarged by 
 Suger, the abbot of St. Denys, in the begin- 
 ning of the twelfth century (a work which histo- 
 rians assure us was finished in the space of 
 three years and three months). In the same 
 century was built the Cathedrals of Verdun, 
 of Laon, Lirieux, St. Remy of Rheims, St, 
 Nicaise, in the same city, the latter by Hugo 
 Lebengeois, who built many others, and died 
 in 1263. S . Louis and his mother Blanche 
 erected a number of churches; and many 
 courtiers, wishing to please them, imitated their 
 example. 
 
 The greater part of the churches of this 
 latter monarch's reign were built by Eudes de 
 Montreuil, an architect and engineer of much 
 estimation in his time; he was in high favour 
 with the King, whom he accompanied in his 
 
378 EI^ftJES's LECTURES 
 
 expedition to the Holy Land, where he forti- 
 fied the fort and city of Jaffa. On his return 
 to Paris he built many noble edifices, particu- 
 larly the church of St. Catharine-du-val-des- 
 Ecoliers ; the Hotel de Dieu ; those of St. 
 Croix de la Bretonnerie, of the Blanc Man- 
 teaux, of the Mathurins, the Cordeliers, the 
 Chartreux; the Holy Chapel of Paris, and 
 those of Royaumont and Maubuisson. 
 
 To continue the history of this important 
 style of the art in Italy, it is necessary to go 
 back to the destruction of the Imperial city of 
 Rome; which was commenced, A.D. 412, bjf 
 Alaric, king of the Goths, carried on with 
 barbarously mutilating all the works of art, by 
 Oadoacer, and completed by Gensericus, king 
 of the Vandals, about A.D. 456. 
 
 Ignorance and brutality so infatuated them 
 that they left scarcely any vestiges of all the 
 stately structures and sacred edifices of these 
 fallen masters of the world; and in the year 
 596, the Saracens destroyed the beautiful 
 cities of Messina and Cuma, where are the 
 remains of the first triumphal arch, called A7'co 
 Felice. At Naples was the gate of Castor and 
 Pollux, the proportions of which are preserved 
 to us by the indefatigable industry of Palladio. 
 
 Architecture continued in a depressed state 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 379 
 
 nearly eight hundred years, until, about the 
 year 1388 or 1400 an academy was founded 
 at Florence, in which were many great and 
 noble men of genius, who, by inspecting 
 those magnificent ruins, once more restored 
 the art. 
 
 " Mean time dread fanes and palaces around 
 Rear'd the niagnifie front." 
 
 Thomson's Liberty, part 4. v. 245. 
 
 It would be needless to mention the names, 
 even if they could be found, of all the illustri- 
 ous individuals of which this academy was 
 composed, or who flourished in this and the 
 succeeding century, since their works suffici- 
 ently prove their unremitting assiduity to pre- 
 serve the beauties of the ancient styles. 
 
 One of the first works of this academy was 
 the celebrated church of Sa. Maria da Fiori, at 
 Florence, an edifice which is held in high 
 esteem by the admirers of the style, and is not 
 inferior to any of the productions of the cele- 
 brated Palladio. It was originally designed 
 by Arnolfo, assisted by Laurehtio Ghiberto, a 
 goldsmith and sculptor by profession, who 
 leaving it unfinished, it was taken in hand by 
 Fillipo Brunelleschi, born in 1377, who may 
 
"SaO ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 be looked upon as the restorer of ancient 
 architecture and the founder of the modern 
 classical style. After having prepared his 
 mind by studying the writings of ancient au- 
 thors, and the ruins of Roman edifices, which 
 he carefully measured, he discovered the pro- 
 portions of the orders, and recognizinir the 
 simple gracefulness of the ancients, founded 
 a system upon lasting principles, whereby 
 he was enabled to construct with beauty and 
 solidity. 
 
 This architect erected the cupola of Sa. 
 Maria da Fiori, at Florence; an undertaking 
 beyond the abilities of any other individual 
 then living; Arnolfo, the original architect of 
 this vast Cathedral, having been two years 
 dead. This cupola, rising from an octangular 
 plan, is of great elevation, and only inferior in 
 size to that of St. Peter's, at Rome. It is con- 
 structed by two vaults with a cavity between 
 them, and was erected without centring. It is 
 the only elevated dome supported by a wall 
 without buttresses. In consequence of this 
 and many other works of Brunelleschi, the 
 learned commenced a study of the writings of 
 Vitruvius, and a general taste for the prin- 
 ciples of the art began to show itself amongst 
 the Italians. Leo Batista Alberti, born A.D. 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 381 
 
 1.398, was the first modern author who pub- 
 lished a treatise on architecture, from which 
 he has acquired great reputation, and is justly 
 stiled the modern Vitruvius. Following the 
 steps of Brunelleschi, he reformed, by his 
 precepts and designs, many of the abuses and 
 barbarous practices which then prevailed 
 among his countrymen. Bramante had his 
 share in the restoration of ancient art, and 
 built many superb edifices. Pope Julius II. 
 having projected the rebuilding of St. Peter's 
 upon a scale of unparalleled magnificence, 
 entrusted the execution of the design to Bra- 
 mante, who conceived the idea of erecting the 
 lofty cupola upon that immense structure. 
 This vast work was carried on successively 
 by Raffaelle; SanGallo; and Michel angiolo, 
 to whom its final design and completion are 
 principally due. Architecture continued to 
 flourish in the sixteenth century under the 
 great masters Vignola, Serlio, Palladio, and 
 Scamozzi; whose palaces and villas are, and 
 will continue to be, the admiration of the 
 connoisseur. To the unremitted assiduity of 
 these distinguished artists in the study of 
 the Roman edifices, and to their invaluable 
 publications, the world has been much in- 
 
382 ELMES's LECTUltES 
 
 debted for the elucidation of the principles of 
 ancient art. 
 
 Tlie list of the celebrated Italian architects 
 may be almost said to close with Bernini, who 
 flourished in the seventeenth century. 
 
 Roman or Italian architecture was brought 
 into England under Inigo Jones, who was 
 born in 1572, and whose distinguished works 
 at Greenwich, Whitehall, and Co vent-Garden, 
 will ever secure him a place among names of 
 the highest reputation. 
 
 Sir Christopher Wren, an eminent mathe- 
 matician and philosopher, as well as archi- 
 tect, executed many of the finest buildings in 
 London and other parts of England, in the 
 modern style. St. Paul's Cathedral, inferior 
 to none but St. Peter's in point of magnitude, 
 and undoubtedly superior even to that both 
 in skilful construction and design, will perpe- 
 tuate his name to the latest posterity. The 
 exterior cupola of St.Paul's is constructed of oak 
 timber, and is sustained by a cone of eighteen- 
 inch brick-work, which has a course of stone, 
 the whole thickness, every five feet ; and the 
 intermediate parts are two bricks in length in 
 thickness. This cupola was turned upon 
 a centre, which supported itself without any 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 383 
 
 standard from below. From the inclined posi- 
 tion of its supporting walls it has little or no 
 transverse pressure ; yet, for greater security, 
 it is hooped with iron at the bottom. 
 
 Of the great English masters who flourished 
 about this period, Jones was grand but unequal; 
 as may be seen in his celebrated work, the 
 Chapel at Whitehall, the conception of which, 
 as a part, and but a small part, of an im- 
 mense palace, is certainly noble ; its primary 
 divisions few and simple, its openings large 
 and handsome, but it is unequal in compo- 
 sition and in style. The play of light and 
 shade produced by the breaks over each 
 column is in a minute taste, the very opposite 
 to grand. The Ionic specimen is one of the 
 worst and most impure he could have chosen ; 
 the modillions do not belong to the order and 
 approach too nearly to those of the Corin- 
 thian. If one order upon another be admis- 
 sible, at all events the Corinthian should 
 not have been excluded for the purpose of 
 introducing the Comj)osite. 
 
 Wren was more equal and consistent than 
 Jones; was possessed of more mathematical 
 and general knowledge ; was a man of a more 
 expanded mind; but less of an architect by 
 education, and had, generally speaking, less 
 
384 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 taste. Perhaps nothing of Wren's is equal in 
 taste to Jones's water-gate at York-buildings, 
 and nothing of Jones's equals in scientific con- 
 struction any thi?ig oi Wrens. Jones's Gothic, 
 as shown in Lincoln's Inn Hall and Chapel, is 
 decidedly bad : Wren's in St. Mary Aldermary, 
 Bow Lane, is bold, if not quite pure; in the 
 tower and pinnacles of St. Michael's, Cornhill, 
 still better ; and in the spire of St, Dunstan'?* 
 in the East, unexceptionably fine ; perhaps this 
 is the finest thing of its kind in Europe. St. 
 Stephen's, Walbrook, has, 1 think, been ex- 
 tolled beyond its merits; although novel in 
 principle it is faulty both in construction and 
 taste. His spire of Bow would alone immor- 
 talize any man ; so beautiful is it in form, so 
 novel in design, and so dexterous in con- 
 struction. 
 
 The works of Vanbrugh are solid and judi- 
 cious ; but he neglected the lighter graces of 
 his art, and is, with all his picturesque beauties, 
 cumbrous and inelegant in detail. Swift's 
 epigram on this artist is pretty generally 
 known: — 
 
 ** Lie heavy on hira, earth ! for he 
 Laid many a heavy load on thee." 
 
 Yet Castle Howard and Blenheim will keep ' 
 
VII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 385 
 
 alive the name and memory of Vanbrugh 
 among those of our greatest architects. 
 
 Wyatt, who belongs more to our own times, 
 and will be spoken of in my concluding 
 Lecture, was richer and more learned in his 
 art than either Jones, Wren, or Vanbrugh. 
 Equally inventive, and with as fine a taste as 
 Jones ; less scientific perhaps than Wren, but 
 more admirable in his details than any pre- 
 ceding English architect; he is at the head of 
 our best school, from w^hich has emanated all 
 the finest works of the present day. 
 
 c c 
 
i 
 
 J 
 
LECTURE VIII. 
 
 Consideration of the Subject from the Time 
 of Chambers, Wyatt, and Stuart, to the 
 present Day. Critical Examination of the prin- 
 cipal Architects and. JBuildings of this Period. 
 The Character of English Architecture, as pre- 
 sented in our Public Buildings, investigated 
 and compared with that of other Countries. 
 The Progress of the Art compared with the 
 Progress of Painting and Sculpture. Hints 
 on Domestic Architecture. Erief Recapitula- 
 tion or Summaii/ of the Course; and Conclusion. 
 
 r c 2 
 
LECTURE VIII. 
 
 The state of architecture at the end of the 
 reign of George II. and for some time previous 
 thereunto, had been as low as at almost any 
 period of English history. From the death of 
 Kent and the great Earl of Burlington, two 
 accomplished architects of the Anglo- Palladian 
 school, to the commencement of the reign of 
 George III. we have no record or account of 
 any one deserving notice, l^he profession 
 seems to have been almost abandoned, and 
 buildings, repairs, and alterations to have been 
 performed by that anomalous being, that sort 
 of uno-dual mixture of artist and artisan, the 
 surveyor and builder. 
 
 Kent, Gibbs, and Burlington were gone, and 
 had left no disciples ; so was Hawksmoor, (the 
 pupil of Wren,) who erected those cumbrous 
 churches near the post-office, in Lombard Street, 
 Limehouse, and St. George's in the East; and 
 Archer, the groom-porter, as Walpole justly calls 
 him, who built that of St. John's, Westminster, 
 which looks like the four clumsy ill-carved legs 
 
390 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of a butcher's block, or an elephant on his 
 back. The elder Dance, whose Mansion- 
 house, in the city, was preferred to a design of 
 Palladio's, from a motive of encouragement to 
 native talent, was a man of some taste, as is 
 proved by his Shoreditch church, the spire of 
 which is a free and not unhandsome imitation 
 of Bow. He was not a regulaily educated 
 architect, but the best and nearly the only 
 one of his day. 
 
 Batty Langley, it is true, had a school or 
 academy, but his disciples were all carpenters; 
 a few of them, caUing themselves surveyors 
 and builders, and practising carpentry and hox- 
 making, were alive in my remembrance ; — 
 hating the " new-fangled Doric," (as they 
 termed it,) without a base, as much as they did 
 a shirt without ruffles, or a wig witliout two 
 good portly curls over each ear, and half a 
 yard of tail behind ; scorning its simple dutes 
 without fillets, which they compared to ribbed 
 stockings; and sincere in their admiration of 
 the swelling shaft, the rusticated ami twisted 
 columns of Batty Langley. The schools at 
 Oxford and the Royal Exchange were their 
 schools ; they lamented the shocking innova- 
 tions of Wyatt and Soane, the more dreadful im- 
 portations of Stuart, and were nearly going into 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 391 
 
 a fever when the portico of Covent Garden 
 theatre was opened. Is it not dreadful, said one 
 of these worthies to me, to see young men going 
 back to the old Grecians, upon whom the Ro- 
 mans had so much improved? Had the poor 
 man but lived to have seen his master's taste 
 revived, it might have added a year or two to 
 his existence. Although the taste of Batty 
 Langley has been deservedly censured, he yet 
 formed a class of clever workmen in a certain 
 humble line of the art. 
 
 Such was the state of architecture when our 
 late monarch ascended the throne ; and it was 
 fortunate for the arts that he was endowed with 
 a love for, as well as a considerable acquaint- 
 ance with, them all. In his grandfather's reign, 
 when he was Prince of Wales, he studied 
 architecture, and was taught to delineate its 
 proportions from the rules of Palladio by the 
 late Sir William Chambers, who was then a 
 naval officer, fond of the art, and wlio had 
 travelled. His Majesty also studied perspec- 
 tive under the late Mr. Kirby ; and his draw- 
 ings, some of which I have seen, were correct, 
 and, for their day and style of art, tasteful and 
 elegant. 
 
 Chambers became the royal architect, but 
 threw no new lights on the profession. In its 
 
392 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 practice, and in the more scientific part of con- 
 struction, his knowledge was very Umited, and 
 his taste impure ; yet hisworks have a chastened 
 correctness of detail in the best style of Italian 
 art. 
 
 In the course of his travels Chambers had 
 visited parts of China, and published a treatise 
 on the gardening and architecture of that 
 strange people ; and to him we owe the intro- 
 duction of their fantastic and inelegant style. 
 We do not observe this out of disrespect to the 
 memory of Sir William ; but the existence of 
 these whim-whams demands reprobation from 
 such as have a sense of the importance of a 
 pure taste to the fame of our country ; which 
 feeling is of the more consequence in our 
 noble art than in any other, it being more 
 durable, and tlius perpetuating the fame or 
 disgrace of a good or bad taste in a greater 
 degree. Tlie public expected much from one 
 whose official situation rendered him a S(U't of 
 leader in art; who, as the successor of Wren 
 and Wyatt, should have elevated architectural 
 taste; for if the fountain-head be pure so will 
 be the streams which flow from it. The beauty 
 of the Parthenon and the Poikile, of the tem- 
 ple of llieseus and the Erectheum, gave birth 
 to the unequalled sculptures of the one \m\ 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 393 
 
 the pictures of the other, in. the same style of 
 high art, producing fruit after their kind ; for 
 the pure, the divine taste of the architect and 
 his patron refined that of the painter and of 
 the sculptor. Can we expect such fruit from 
 the style which is now unhappily reviving? 
 " An Ionic," said a defender of this modern 
 antique, " is an Ionic, and a Doric a Doric, 
 whether from the Parthenon or the Temple of 
 Concord." Be it so : but those who can see 
 no difference between the one and the other 
 are unfit to be directors of public taste. 
 
 Chambers, and Wren, and Perrault, and 
 Palladio, it has been said, all used, beautified, 
 and simplified the Roman style. Granted : — 
 but they had neither seen nor known the 
 Grecian. They selected the most beautiful of 
 the known specimens ; they divested them of 
 the extraneous ornaments of the Colosseum, of 
 the Theatre of Marcellus, and of the Temple 
 of Concord ; and made them approach the 
 simplicity though they missed the genuine 
 character of the Greeks. Few things, alike in 
 nature, can differ more than do the Greek and 
 Roman creeds of the orders : — beautiful spi- 
 rals ; lovely contours composed from elipses, 
 parabolas, hyperbolas, and other conic sec- 
 tions, selected from the lii«her mathematics by 
 
394 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 the greatest mathematicians, compose all the 
 profiles of the one: clumsy quarter-rounds, cir- 
 cular and bolstered cima rectus and reversas, 
 struck by a pair of carpenter's compasses, are 
 characteristic of the other. The geometry of 
 Euclid was not less likely to be improved by 
 any of his successors than the architecture of 
 the days of Pericles by the practicers of the 
 time of Marcellus, of Constantino, or of Dio- 
 clesian. Yet the style of these latter periods 
 is reviving in the nineteenth century, and in 
 the metropolis which boasts the possession of 
 the Elgin Marbles. 
 
 What matter is here for reflection ? It vvas 
 bad enough to be thus misled in taste in the 
 days of Jones and Wren. Had the highly-gifted 
 Wren visited and studied the Parthenon, with 
 Phidias for his guide, with Stone the master- 
 mason of St. Pauls for his buihler, and Gibbons 
 for his carver, of what might not our metropo- 
 lis have boasted now? What would not St. 
 Paul's, with all its present excellencies of 
 design and execution, have been, had he ac- 
 quired the severe yet enchanting purity of 
 Athenian taste ? I feel no hesitation in saying 
 that Sir Christopher Wren would have become, 
 in that case, one of the greatest architects 
 whom the world ever knew : — but what may 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 395 
 
 be excused in him, and in his day, cannot be 
 excused at the era of 1821. The eye of re- 
 finement should not now rest satisfied with the 
 clumsy ponderosities of the Roman school, or 
 even with the better taste of Chambers, who 
 may be called the Palladio rijormato of his 
 time ; nor should designs which would scarce- 
 ly admit their author as a probationer, much 
 less as a student, in our ill-constructed and 
 worse-governed Royal Academy, be found is- 
 suing from the office, and backed with the 
 authority of the Surveyor-General of George 
 the Fourth. 
 
 Now I am upon the subject of the Royal 
 Academy, miscalled of Architecture, I will 
 take the liberty of saying a few words upon 
 a matter connected therewith. It is my firm 
 conviction, in which I am joined by some of 
 ihe ablest professors of this day, that the 
 want of a proper establishment for the instruc- 
 tion of architectural students is one great cause 
 of the retrograding of art in this country. I 
 mean such an institution as would have an in- 
 fluence on the public in the direction of its 
 taste ; an institution to which those who have 
 patronage to bestow would be glad to recur for 
 the choice of an architect, instead of applying 
 to the paper-hanger and upholsterer, the brick- 
 
396 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 layer or the carpenter. To call the Royal 
 Academy an academy of Architecture is so 
 absurd that 1 am convinced the academicians 
 themselves, particularly those few who are 
 architects, could not hear of such an epi- 
 thet without a smile. Four out of the forty 
 academicians are architects ; a short period 
 must, I fear, reduce even that number ; and 
 the policy of the Academy appears to be 
 against increasing its strength from architec- 
 ture. 
 
 What does this academy for the architectural 
 student? Common students are admitted when 
 they can copy plaster-casts indifferently well ; 
 whilst the young architect not only is required 
 to copy and to draiv well, but he must present 
 two designs of his own invention ; one on 
 being admitted a probationer and one when 
 admitted a student. All this is well enough, 
 if, when he was so admitted, he was not de- 
 graded, at the public distribution of their 
 medals, beneath the plaster-drawing boys and 
 the dirty modellers. Next, he has the privilege 
 of attending six lectures on his art in the 
 course of twelve months. Let us draw a little 
 comparison between these advantages and 
 those afforded in the capital of our ancient rival 
 — France. There the youth has the power of 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 397 
 
 attending lectures twice a week. The English 
 student can visit a library twice a week 
 during a short period of the year, and such a 
 library of architectural works is it, that some 
 of its own students possess a better. In Paris 
 two excellent libraries are constantly open to 
 him. At our Royal Academy there are neither 
 models of ancient buildings, nor their details, 
 nor of curious pieces of construction or machi- 
 nery. — In the French metropolis he has all 
 these. The Royal Academy sends a student 
 to Italy, alternately from the classes of paint- 
 ing, sculpture, and architecture, once in three 
 years ; and I believe maintain him, on a small 
 allowance, during two or at most three years. 
 The French government send a student in 
 each class to Rome every year, and maintain 
 him there in their own academy, under able 
 instructors, for five years. 
 
 I am at a loss to conceive why these things 
 should be so ; or why the most useful of the 
 three arts should have the fewest representa- 
 tives, if I may thus term them, in an academy 
 supported by the public. I would gladly learn 
 why models are not provided for the use of 
 the architectural students, and lectures of 
 such a nature as may be of solid utility to 
 them. 1 should be most blame-worthy and 
 
398 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 ungrateful did I not acknowledge, as a stu- 
 dent of the Academy, the obligations we have 
 all been under to the present able professor 
 of architecture. His liberality is too well 
 known in all matters of art to need ray 
 eulogium. But six lectures on such an art as 
 architecture, in the course of a year, do little 
 more than whet the appetite — not satisfy it. I 
 will lastly venture to ask, on public grounds, 
 whether the funds of the Academy, on the 
 distribution of which the public have some 
 right to be informed, are not sufficient to sup- 
 port as many students as are sent from Paris? 
 
 To return. — The Somerset-place of Cham- 
 ])ers has many and great beauties ; and his 
 work on civil architecture, in spite of his bad 
 taste in reviling as he does the architecture of 
 ancient Greece, which he did not compre- 
 hend, abounds with sound remarks, and is 
 such an elementary book as we are still in 
 want of upon the Grecian system. He read 
 his Vitruvius in English, and, I fear, from a 
 bad translation. 
 
 The first instance, in the late reign, of a 
 regularly -bred and genuine architect was the 
 classical and scientific Wyatt. The son of an 
 eminent builder, he acquired the soundest 
 elements of his art at home, and, as it 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 399 
 
 were, from his very infancy. His taste was 
 subsequently refined in a journey to Italy 
 and Greece, from the best sources. On his 
 return, he astonished the connoisseurs and 
 travelled patricians by his Pantheon, which 
 has been unfortunately destroyed by fire ; by 
 various designs ; and by general knowledge of 
 his art, presenting qualifications till then un- 
 known since the days of Jones and Wren: 
 owing to which, Italian architects had been 
 usually employed when any affair of conse- 
 quence was required. Possessed of genuine 
 taste and feeling, Wyatt introduced into this 
 country a style approaching more nearly to 
 the standard of excellence than any which had 
 preceded it. 
 
 The ancient architecture of England — the 
 venerable, the ill-used, the spoiled, the 
 pampered Gothic, came also under his obser- 
 vation ; and, in the majestic Castle of Wind- 
 sor, the Abbey at Fonthill, and the fine Cathe- 
 dral of Salisbury, he designed and restored, 
 with a refinement and skill equal to the several 
 originals. His houses, villas and mansions, 
 are among the most convenient, splendid, and 
 tasteful in the country, and bear upon their 
 faces proof that the builders were not theii 
 own architects. 
 
400 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 In a similar school, and with like advantages, 
 did Milne, at scarcely the age of manhood, 
 carry away the first prize in the first class of 
 architecture at Rome ; and had the honour of 
 being the first Briton who obtained a premium 
 for art in that city. Before he had completed his 
 studies, he sent over in competition, and con- 
 quered all his opponents, his design for Black- 
 friars bridge, a work of skill and of originality. 
 Milne's style was too decidedly Roman for his 
 day ; but to his honour be it spoken, and to 
 which I bear most willing testimony, his love 
 was such for our great metropolitan structure 
 St. Paul's, at which he long held the place of 
 superintending surveyor of the works, that he 
 never would see it defaced, or altered, or 
 spoiled in any way; and scarcely a week 
 passed of his protracted life without his giving 
 it a personal survey. 
 
 The encouragement bestowed in those days 
 upon architecture, and upon regular architects, 
 by the Sovereign and nobility of the country ; 
 the establishment of the Royal Academy ; the 
 titles conferred on Sir Wm. Chambers, and on 
 Sir Robert Taylor one of the architects of the 
 Bank of England, whose beautiful little Tus- 
 can villa at Richmond is not only his master- 
 piece, but one of the most original composi- 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 401 
 
 tions in modern architecture ; and the biennial 
 premiums for architecture ; founded a school 
 from which emanated many able and tasteful 
 men. Holland ; Dance, whose simple and 
 effective elevation of St. Luke's Hospital for 
 lunatics shows what genius can do even with 
 what is called the poorest of material, brick ; 
 Soane; Harrison, of Chester; Wilkins; Smirke; 
 and other eminent living architects, are among 
 the scions of this school, and their works 
 bear testimony to their talents. 
 
 The front of Carlton-House, by Holland, 
 and many of the apartments in that palace, by 
 the same architect, have a harmony of pro- 
 portion and greatness of style which, consider- 
 ing the difficulty of patching up an old house, 
 are quite admirable. 
 
 The new part of the Bank of England, by Mr. 
 Soane, possesses many noble and tasteful halls. 
 Its exterior is massive and in good style ; its 
 construction of genuine stone, brick, and iron, 
 by which the opulent and munificent directors 
 of that great establishment have proved them- 
 selves to be the most economical as well as 
 the best builders. When London is fallen, 
 
 "And such as Memphis is shall London be!" 
 
 Old Plai/. 
 
 D d 
 
402 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 this building, with those of Wren, and the 
 bridges, will be almost the only ruins left to 
 indicate its present greatness, unless more of 
 a similar description shall be permitted to be 
 built, and an edict issued against the Mary-le- 
 bone and St. Georges Fields school of temple- 
 builders. 
 
 *' A little stronger than strong enough is 
 the best maxim in building," said the anony- 
 mous author of OIKIAIA* and should be writ- 
 ten over the desk of every architect's office; 
 but this is flat heresy in the new school. 
 Strong enough to last till it he sold is all that is 
 now required, and great ingenuity is certainly 
 called forth i«i its professors to accomplish it, 
 and to avoid all needless extravagance. 
 
 The new Custom-House of London is a very 
 useful strong building, not remarkable for its 
 taste nor for much propriety of adaptation in 
 its ornamental detail. Furnival's Inn is con- 
 temptible as a work of art, possessing no one 
 fine quality ; and the excellency of its work- 
 manship renders it more grievous that it should 
 be designed with so little taste. 
 
 The new street now in formation from Pall- 
 
 * The late James Peacock, Esq, one of the architects to 
 the city of London. 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 403 
 
 Mall to Portland-Place is a great and useful 
 undertaking; possessing, as a whole, a grand 
 and commanding character, with more archi- 
 tectural features and variety than any large 
 work that we have seen since the rebuilding of 
 London after the great fire. Yet it has many 
 blemishes ; some of the architectural speci- 
 mens being in a taste absolutely barbarous, and 
 mixed with others equally pure and refined. Its 
 masses, great parts, and divisions, are grand 
 and effective ; and its breaks and general out- 
 line productive of an agreeable variety of light 
 and shade, while at the same time it is free 
 from that dull monotony of elevation which 
 is so wearisome in many of our new streets. 
 It is also the finest work now in process, and 
 has given an architectural feature to the metro- 
 polis, much wanted as a relief from the eternal 
 two windotvSy iron railing, and a door — two win- 
 dows, iron railing, and a door, — of the new 
 squares and streets of St. Mary-le-bone. 
 
 Until this undertaking, our architecture 
 seemed selfish and internal. Windows un- 
 decorated externally, and made solely to give 
 light and air to the interior; and doors placed 
 in square brick holes, whose only service 
 seemed to be to exclude strangers, were the 
 prevalent features of modern English domes- 
 
 Dd 2 
 
404 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 tic buildings: whereas architecture, on the 
 contrary, should exhibit the taste and wealth 
 of the master of the mansion, by its exterior, 
 to the observing stranger, as well as contribute 
 to the internal comfort and splendour of the 
 family and its immediate friends. 
 
 Other works which add to the architectural 
 beauty and service of the metropolis are the 
 bridges recently thrown over the Thames. 
 The best are Waterloo,* Westminster, and 
 Blackfriars, which are all built of stone, and 
 with architectural elevations. The Southwark, 
 or Trafalgar, as it is named, and that at Vaux- 
 hall, are of iron on stone piers. Westminster 
 bridge is a fine, handsome, and unpretending 
 structure, built by a Swiss architect of the 
 
 * Waterloo bridge is 1250 feet long, Westminster 1220 
 feet, and Blackfriars 995 feet. Waterloo bridge has nine 
 eliptical arches of 120 feet span over the river, with piers 
 of 20 feet thick, built entirely of granite, and 40 brick 
 arches for a causeway on the Surrey side, and the entire 
 length of its land and water arches is 2890 feet. West- 
 minster has thirteen lai^e and two small semicircular arches, 
 with fourteen intermediate piers. The arches of this 
 bridge all spring about two feet below low water; it was 
 commenced in 1738, and opened to the public in 1750. 
 Blackfriars bridge has nine large eliptical arciies, was be- 
 gan in 1760, by Mr. Milne, and finished in ten years and 
 three quarters. 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 405 
 
 name of Labelie. Blackfriars bridge is novel 
 and handsome in design, its eliptical arches 
 well suited to its situation ; but its material is 
 bad and perishing, and the curved line of its 
 surface ill agrees with its architectural decora- 
 tion. London bridge is an ugly ruin, and I 
 hope will soon be removed. On the subject 
 of that called Waterloo, the latest and the 
 grandest of the stone bridges, I must detain 
 you a little. Waterloo bridge is one of the 
 most stupendous architectural monuments of 
 late years, and one which might have conferred 
 lasting honour on this country, had it been 
 designed by an architect. But, with its pseudo- 
 architectural decorations, it is now a fabric 
 in which several acknowledged principles of 
 good taste are utterly violated. Its mathe- 
 matical principles being copied from the Pont 
 de Neuilly^ it has given opportunity to the 
 French to revile us for want of originality in 
 our architects; and its clumsy columns and 
 inelegant and unnecessary balustrade, instead 
 of a simple parapet, have nearly spoiled what 
 otherwise would have been a magnificent 
 although not original design. Canova has 
 denied, to a gentleman of my acquaintance 
 who asked him the question at Rome, that he 
 pronounced the eulogium upon this bridge 
 
406 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 which has been attributed to him; indeed, I 
 should have wondered much had not that illus- 
 trious sculptor been anxious to excuse himself 
 fi*om audi unqualified praise as has been put, 
 into his mouth concerning it. 
 
 To enter a little further into this subject ; I 
 confidently ask, without intending the least 
 offence to the very ingenious contriver of the 
 work in question, whether the habits and edu- 
 cation of a mechanic are likely to qualify a 
 person for designing a bridge? I am willing 
 to admit, that extensive practice in the con- 
 struction of harbours, and in the cutting of ca- 
 nals, may give a man greater facility in executing 
 works under water ; but, unfortunately, these 
 are the parts by which the eye of taste cannot 
 be annoyed ; and even this branch of architec- 
 ture, by the way, was by the Italians always 
 confided to their architects and painters, the 
 custom of those days being to qualify students 
 alike for eitlier profession or both. Leonardo 
 da Vinci, under the orders of Ludovico Sforza, 
 conveyed the waters of the Adda to Milan. 
 The same artist made the canal of Mortesana 
 navigable as far as the valleys of Chiavenna 
 and Valtellina, a distance of two hundred 
 miles. 
 V It is to be hoped, if another occasion of this 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 407 
 
 nature should offer, that an architect or archi- 
 tects may be at least consulted on any design 
 proposed. If it be considered advisable for 
 the pubHc to employ an engineer, his assistance 
 might surely be restricted to matters within the 
 reach of his information ; — namely, the found- 
 ing of the piers and the abutments, though I 
 confess that I myself should feel no misgiving 
 should I see such a work confided altogether 
 to an experienced architect. It was not by the 
 employment of milwrights that Florence be- 
 came possessed of its beautiful bridge of the 
 Holy Trinity, nor did Napoleon omit to employ 
 those who understood the arts of design when 
 he projected that of Jena. Neither was Per- 
 ronet, the architect of the Pont de Neuilly, of 
 which Waterloo bridge is a bad copy, a steam- 
 engine maker. Moreover, when it is consi- 
 dered that a truly elegant structure of this 
 kind would occasion no additional expense 
 above one less tasteful, it is to be hoped that, 
 in any future specimen, the hand of genuine 
 taste and of real architectural skill may be 
 discernible in its ensemble and details. 
 
 Among the most ancient bridges in England, 
 and indeed by some esteemed altogether the 
 oldest, is the Gothic triangular bridge at Crow- 
 land, in Lincolnshire, which was erected in 
 
408 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 860. London bridge is an old Gothic struc- 
 ture, originally built with twenty small arches 
 of twenty feet wide each ; but it has under- 
 gone various successive alterations till it arrived 
 at its present state of consummate ugliness, and 
 perfection of all that is improper in a work of 
 the kind. The longest bridge in this country 
 is that over the Trent, at Burton, built in the 
 twelfth century, of squared freestone. It 
 consists of thirty-four arches, and is one thou- 
 sand five hundred and forty-five feet in length. 
 Another curious specimen is the bridge built 
 over the Taaf, in Glamorganshire, by William 
 Edwards, a country mason, in the year 1756. 
 This remarkable structure consists of one stu- 
 pendous arch, which, though only eight feet 
 broad and thirty-five high, is no less than one 
 hundred and forty feet span, being a segment 
 of a circle of one hundred and seventy-five 
 feet in diameter. 
 
 In France the construction of roads and 
 bridges has been committed for a length of 
 time to a corps of architectural engineers, for 
 whose instruction an academy has long been 
 instituted, which has acquired great and de- 
 served celebrity, particularly since it was under 
 the direction of Perronet and De Chezi 
 who may be considered in some measure as 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 409 
 
 its founders. These eminent architects intro- 
 duced a new system in the mode of construct- 
 ing bridges, and have left many Hue examples 
 in the bridges of Mantes, Melun, St. Mayence, 
 Neuilly, and the Pont de la Concord^ at Paris, 
 which unites the Champs Elyshs to the Palace 
 of the Legislature. One leading principle of 
 these architects was to render the piers as light, 
 and the arches as extended and lofty as pos- 
 sible. 
 
 Among other bridges worthy of mention is 
 that at Rimini ; of which Temanza, a Venetian 
 architect, who jmblished an account of it, says, 
 that the voussoirs and other stones have their 
 joints so exactly filled that a hair could 
 scarcely enter between them. This fine joint- 
 ing is an excellence in construction to which 
 the moderns pay too little attention. The 
 same author also believes that there were par- 
 ticular artificers among the ancients whose 
 business it was to smooth the joints of the 
 stones, and quotes an ancient writer as men- 
 tioning this by the title of Quadratorii. The 
 Ponte St. Angiolo, at Rome, and the Ponte 
 Rialto, at Venice, are also deserving of no- 
 tice; the latter consists of one very flat and 
 bold arch, nearly a hundred feet span, and 
 only twenty-three feet high above the water. 
 
410 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 There is, however, a bridge in the city of 
 Munster, in Bothnia, in a yet bolder style than 
 the Rialto. Kircher mentions a bridge in 
 China three hundred and sixty perches long, 
 without any arch, but supported by three hun- 
 dred pillars and beams. In the Philosophical 
 Transactions is a representation of a bridge 
 in the same country, built from one mountain 
 to another, consisting of a single arch four 
 hundred cubits long and live hundred cubits 
 high, from which circumstance it is called the 
 fying bridge. 
 
 I should merit censure did 1 omit the intro- 
 duction of iron bridges, which are the exclu- 
 sive invention of British artists. The first 
 erected was that over the Severn, at Colebrook- 
 Dale, in Shropshire, constructed by Mr. Abra- 
 ham Daly, iron-master, of that place ; and is 
 composed of five ribs, each of which has three 
 concentric arcs connected by radiating pieces. 
 The interior arc forms a semicircle, but the 
 others extend only to the sills under the road- 
 way. Upon the tops of the ribs are laid 
 cast-iron plates, which support the road- 
 way. The arch of this bridge is one hundred 
 feet in span. The second bridge of this 
 material was designed by Thomas Paine, the 
 celebrated political writer, and was construct- 
 
VlJl] ON ARCHITECTURE. 411' 
 
 ed, after his directions, by Messrs. Walker, at 
 Rotherham, in Yorkshire, and brought to 
 London, where it was erected and exhibit- 
 ed for some time in a bowling-green, in 
 the New Road. It was originally intended 
 for America ; but the materials were after- 
 wards used in constructing the bridge over the 
 river Wear, at Bishop's Wearmouth, Sunder- 
 land. It consists of one arch of two hundred 
 and thirty-six feet span, being a segment of a 
 circle of four hundred and forty-four feet dia- 
 meter ; and the whole height from low w ater 
 is about one hundred feet, admitting vessels of 
 from two to three hundred tons burden to pass 
 under without striking their masts. A series 
 of one hundred and five blocks form a rib, and 
 six of these ribs form the width of the bridge, 
 which is thirty-two feet. The spandrils are 
 filled by cast-iron circles, which touch the 
 outer extremity of the arch, and support the 
 road-way ; which is formed by a strong frame 
 of timber, planked over and covered with a 
 cement of tar, chalk, then layers of marl, 
 lime-stone, and gravel. The abutments are 
 masses of solid masonry, twenty-four feet in 
 thickness, forty-two feet in breadth at bottom, 
 and thirty-seven at top. There is a beautiful 
 model of this bridge in the ante-room of the 
 
412 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 great room of the Society of Arts, &c. at the 
 Adelphi, to which I take leave to refer the 
 inquirer after this novel species of pontine 
 architecture. 
 
 Among recent English works, the portico of 
 Covent-Garden Theatre, imitated in form from 
 the Tetrastyle portico of the Agora, at Athens, 
 but copied in detail from the Temple of Mi- 
 nerva Parthenon, is, perhaps, the most chaste 
 in style, although its application would more 
 become a town-hall than a dramatic theatre. 
 The exterior of Dnary-Lane Theatre appears 
 to me more characteristic in its application; 
 and we should not forget, in examining this 
 edifice, that an Ionic portico, the antae of 
 which are only executed, originally completed 
 the design. Of its new porch, though I am 
 told that it was approved by the Professor of 
 Architecture to the Royal Academy, I am 
 really ashamed to speak, so disgraceful does it 
 appear to all concerned. 
 
 The columns of the portico of the College 
 of Surgeons, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, from the 
 ionic of the Ilyssus, are, in themselves, fine 
 and well executed, but belong no more to the 
 front to which they are attached than a hussar's 
 cap does to a bishop in his pulpit. The beau- 
 tiful Ionic portico to the house of the Board of 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 413 
 
 Control, Cannon-Row, Westminster, one of 
 the purest, finest, and best applied in London, 
 also taken from the same exquisite original, is 
 worthy of examination ; and would af^brd a 
 far better example for a prize-subject for the 
 junior students of the Royal Academy, than 
 Greenwich church, Shoreditch, or St. John's, 
 Westminster, all of which have unaccountably 
 been given by that learned body ; as if they 
 meant to undo in the council-room the dictates 
 of their masters in their otlices. 
 
 Another very beautiful example of this order 
 is in a chapel, near Grosvenor-Place, by 
 Hyde-Park-Corner, designed, I believe, by 
 Mr. Smirke ; wherein the portico, according 
 to the best examples of the Greeks, and to the 
 natural fitness of the thing, is not a mere ap- 
 plique stuck on as an after-thought, but a na- 
 tural continuation of the roof supported by 
 necessary columns for shelter and for shade. 
 
 I have thus touched upon the principal mo- 
 dern buildings that I at present remember : and 
 have endeavoured to speak of them with can- 
 dour, regardless of any feeling but the charac- 
 ter of the country as exemplified in its archi- 
 tecture. 
 
 No one can deny that, before either of the 
 decorative arts of paintuig and sculpture can 
 
414 ELMES's LECTURES 
 
 flourish generally, architecture must of neces- 
 sity be understood and cultivated : their well- 
 being depends upon each other, like the 
 voussoirs and keystone of an arch, and they 
 must stand or fall together. 
 
 There is, however, reason to hope that the 
 state of the fine arts is even now undergoing a 
 great, though silent revolution ; and that the 
 scene of this revolution, I feel proud while I 
 speak it, is England. Canova, a glorious 
 name for Italy in this her period of debase- 
 ment, acknowledged that England would be 
 worth visiting were it for the sake of the Elgin 
 marbles alone. These, the immortal cartoons, 
 and the works of the restorers of Grecian beau- 
 ty, render London now a complete school of 
 art for either painting, sculpture, or architecture. 
 The revolution 1 allude to may be said to have 
 commenced with the introduction of the works 
 of Phidias from the Parthenon ; and we must 
 not neglect to observe that it has received high 
 encouragement from the determination of our 
 present most gmcious Sovereign to patronize 
 and advance the arts ; a determination made 
 known to the public by the most active minis- 
 ter of the crown in his place in the House of 
 Commons. Pupils from Canova, and other 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 415 
 
 eminent Italian artists, as well as from Paris, 
 Madrid, and America, now visit London in 
 order to complete their studies. Casts from 
 our works of art are sent to various parts of 
 the continent ; and bur examples and our 
 studies are actually purifying the continental 
 schools from the affectation of French and 
 modem Italian mannerists. 
 
 Meanwhile, there is no society in England 
 where architecture is regularly taught, or by 
 which its professors and its practice are fairly 
 patronized. The Dilettanti Society offer some 
 pretension to a patronage of our profession; 
 but their acts have rather tended to the impor- 
 tation of architectural knowledge by missions, 
 than to the cultivation of originality at home ; 
 and of the pretensions of the Royal Academy 
 in this department I have already spoken. 
 It is true it bestows honorary medals, pays a 
 Professor of Architecture, and pretends to 
 send students abroad ; but, during sixty years 
 of its establishment, it has not given more 
 than some twenty meagre lectures to the stu- 
 dents and exhibitors at large, and has sent 
 about a dozen students to Rome. The archi- 
 tectural student is indebted for his education 
 to his private studies ; for a mason or a plas- 
 terer stands as good a chance as an architect. 
 
416 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 at the Academy, for the paltry dole of instruc- 
 tion they offer, or the rewards they bestow. 
 They indeed give the title of R.A. to two or 
 three leading architects, whose names reflect 
 more honour upon the Academy than do these 
 initials upon themselves. 
 
 Great Britain possesses at this time many 
 able architects ; but their places, as has been 
 before observed, are permitted by our nobility 
 and opulent commoners to be taken from 
 them ; our public boards, (in many instances,) 
 and our private companies, employing mere 
 executive builders as their architects, whose 
 connection with their work, as well as their 
 ignorance of architecture as a fine art, must 
 ever be a bar to their success. 
 
 Our present Professor of Architecture in the 
 Royal Academy, whose zeal in supporting the 
 dignity of the art deserves the highest praise, 
 has said, that *' before the state of architecture 
 can be improved, and the professors excited to 
 that species of emulation which only can ren- 
 der them eminent, strong and marked distinc- 
 tion must take place; those ivho have patronage 
 must consider it as a sacred trust and deposit, 
 the meed only of science and genius. The claims 
 of the untaught, ignorant, and presumptuous, 
 must not only be disallowed, but repelled with 
 
VIll] ON ARCHITECTURE. 417 
 
 indignation and contempt, till at length tliey 
 are consigned to that obscurity whence they 
 ought never to have been suffered to emerge/' 
 
 I will now call the attention of" my readers 
 to a few brief observations on domestic archi- 
 tecture, as distinct from those classes whicli 
 may be denominated monumental or sacred. 
 This generic division of the art could make 
 but little progress till the discovery of cer- 
 tain other arts necessary for its perfection ; 
 such as making machines for raising and trans- 
 porting heavy bodies ; the taming of animals 
 and training them for carrying materials ; and, 
 last of all, the art of working metals, particularly 
 iron. 
 
 The study of domestic architecture, properly 
 so called, that is the art of house-building, is 
 the most useful and not the least difficult part 
 of an architect's education; and here we will 
 take occasion, though perhaps not quite ger- 
 man to the subject, to introduce a favourite 
 passage from Sir Henry Wootton, who says : 
 " Every man's proper mansion-house and 
 home, being the theatre of his hospitality, the 
 seat of self-fruition, the comfortable part of 
 his own life, the noblest of his son's inheritance, 
 a kind of private princedom ; nay, to the pos- 
 sessors thereof, an epitome of the whole world 
 
 E e 
 
4)8 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 may well deserve, by these attributes, accord- 
 ing to the degree of the masters, to be decently 
 and delightfully adorned. For which end 
 there are two arts attending on architecture, 
 like two of her principal gentlewomen, to dress 
 and trim their mistress — picture and sculpture ; 
 between whom, before I proceed any farther, I 
 will venture to determine an ancient quarrel 
 about their precedency, with this distinction; 
 that, in the garnishing of fabrics, sculpture no 
 doubt must have the pre-eminence, as being 
 indeed of nearer affinity to architecture itself, 
 and consequently the more natural and more 
 suitable ornament. But, on the other side, (to 
 consider these two arts, as I shall do, philoso- 
 phically and not mechanically,) an excellent 
 piece of painting is to my judgement the more 
 admirable object, because it comes near an 
 artificial miracle to make divers distinct emi- 
 nences appear upon a flat by force of shadows, 
 and yet the shadows themselves not to appear, 
 which I conceive to be the uttermost value and 
 virtue of a painter, and to which very few have 
 arrived in all ages." What our painters and 
 sculptors may say to this employment of their 
 arts as dressing-maids to architecture is not 
 for me to determine. 
 
 Cities in ancient times were mostly walled ; 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 41P 
 
 and the inhabitants being principally shep- 
 herds or husbandmen, were obliged to go out 
 at the gates every morning, not returning from 
 their occupations till the evening. The gate 
 of the city, therefore, was the place of the 
 most public concourse and resort. The Greeks 
 and Romans assembled in their market-places 
 or squares for the purposes of commercial 
 intercourse or for pleading. Our ancestors 
 assembled in the courts of their several baro- 
 nial castles, whence arose the courts of sove- 
 reign princes. In eastern countries, where the 
 monarchs are generally secluded in their 
 palaces from public gaze, the populace assem- 
 bled at the gates of the seraglio. This custom 
 of attending at the gates of the palace is as old 
 as the times of the first kings of Persia, as we 
 read in the book of Esther. 
 
 1 WILL now proceed to a brief summary of 
 this course of lectures, in which I have endea- 
 voured to show a connecting link, or derivative 
 tie between the several countries which have 
 given a name to architecture, not unlike the 
 philological connexion of languages with their 
 roots and parent stock. 
 
 Among the earliest examples of a style to 
 
 E e 2 
 
420 ELMES S LECTURES 
 
 which 1 called the attention of the reader was 
 the Egyptian, which is generally characterized 
 by a remarkable solidity of construction, bold- 
 ness of form, and colossal size. — Its elements 
 are the pyramid, the obelisk, and the multi- 
 formed column. Its ornaments, sculpture in 
 mere outline, or only the shadow of relief ; and 
 hieroglyphics of men, women, birds, with 
 sphinxes and other fabulous animals. Its 
 materials, granite, porphyry, and other hard 
 and durable substances. Its grandest relics are 
 the pyramids, the obelisk removed from Egypt 
 to Rome, the Temple of Tentyra, and the ruins 
 of Memphis. Fragments of its architecture 
 most useful to the student are to be found in 
 the Egyptian room at the British Museum ; 
 these, aided by the magnificent works of 
 Denon — the French savant who accompanied 
 Buonaparte to Egpyt, Mr. Hamilton sEgyptiaca, 
 and Belzoni's travels, may be said to form a 
 complete school of Egyptian architecture. 
 
 The style which prevailed among the ancient 
 Hindus appears to be derived from the same 
 original ideas with the Egyptian: and their ex- 
 cavated temples bear witness to their inde- 
 fatiiiable labour, skill, and industry. The 
 Hindu style is generally dark, heavy, and 
 monotonous ; its type is the cave ; and its ma- 
 
VIll] ON ARCHITECTURE. 421 
 
 terial a coarse and consequently friable stone. 
 Yet it sometimes approached the beauty of 
 Greciau architecture, after the invasion of their 
 country by the Greeks under Alexander, as the 
 singular and beautiful column of which I spoke 
 in my second Lecture proves. Hodges and 
 other Indian travellers, but more especially 
 Thomas Daniells, and Sir Charles Doyley in 
 his Antiquities of Dacca, have thrown all the 
 light that can possibly be required by the 
 student on this very remote style of the art. 
 
 Architecture then proceeded to a state of 
 grandeur among the Assyrians. The finest 
 works of this epoch were in Mesopotamia, 
 Carthage, Tyre, Babylon, Persia, and China. 
 The style of this latter people I have presumed 
 to be derived from the tent, and as much as is 
 requisite may be learned respecting it in 
 Chambers's works, at Kew, and in other recent 
 constructions. I have described some of its 
 best and most substantial buildings, which have 
 been unaccountably neglected for its bamboo 
 work, its fosses, and fragile pagodas. 
 
 I next called your attention to the glorious 
 period of Grecian elegance, refinement, and 
 grandeur. The first material of this people 
 was timber, and its construction gave rise to 
 the Doric order. Its next, its last and best, 
 
422 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 was marble. The earlier examples are shown 
 in the various Dorics of Pcestum, of Corinth, 
 and of Athens ; at which latter place, indeed, 
 the most beautiful of the Grecian specimens 
 were to be found. Their orders — the Doric, 
 the Ionic, and the Corinthian are the elements 
 of this style; and will recal by association 
 the subjects of the preceding Lectures on the 
 architecture of the Greeks. Its epochs were 
 the emigration from Egypt, the founding of 
 Athens, Thebes, and other ancient cities, to the 
 time of the enlightened and tasteful Pericles, 
 who formed an epoch not only in the history 
 of Greece, but in that of the world. The next 
 was from his time to that of the colonies, and 
 its decline and ruin took place in the middle 
 ages.* 
 
 The portico of Covent-Garden Theatre for 
 its columns, and the capitals from Athens in 
 the court-yard of the British Museum ; the ex- 
 cellent work on the Doric order by my late 
 friend and able coadjutor Mr. Edmund Aikin, 
 who has recently departed from us in the com- 
 mencement of a brilliant career; with the 
 works of Stuart, Revett, and Wilkins, are 
 
 * Be it remembered, however, that the Greeks never, 
 like the Romans, contributed to the spoliation of their own 
 architectural beauties. 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 423 
 
 ample schools for this order, which Aikin pro- 
 perly named the Grecian order par excelletice. 
 
 Of the Ionic, the columns at the College of 
 Surgeons ; the porticoes of the Board of Con- 
 trol ; the chapel in Grosvenor-Place, before 
 mentioned at the commencement of this Lec- 
 ture, as an imitation of the simple and grand 
 Ilyssus ; the capitals and portions of the 
 shafts from the Erectheum and Temple of 
 Minerva Polias, with their beautiful fragments 
 of frieze and cornice, in the Elgin room at the 
 British Museum ; together with the before- 
 mentioned works of Stuart and Revett, and 
 the Ionian antiquities published by the Dilet- 
 tanti Society, are the best existing schools for 
 the amateur or student. 
 
 For the Corinthian, I would refer to the 
 portico of Carlton-House ; the lower range of 
 St. Paul's Cathedral ; the portico of St. Mar- 
 tin's-in-the-fields; the round end of the Bank; 
 and the columns lately removed from the 
 Proscenium of Drury-Lane Theatre ; with re- 
 ference to casts lately arrived in this country 
 from the columns of the Campo Vaccino and 
 the temple of Tivoli, belonging to Mr. Joseph 
 Gwilt, who may some day, I hope, be induced 
 to permit their general inspection. They are 
 next in value to the originals, having been 
 
424 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 moulded upon them ; and exhibit, in comparison 
 with the imitation of the latter at the Bank, a 
 highly orig;inal character and taste. Stuart 
 and Revett again, with a little of Palladio, and 
 reference to fine casts, or the originals, must 
 be attended to for the Corinthian. Of this 
 order, and of this alone, has Rome any really 
 fine examples. 
 
 From Greece I traced the art into Etruria, 
 where the Doric was used, and whence the 
 Tuscan is said to have arisen. The Tuscan, as 
 seen in Roman buildings, as used by the 
 restorers of the art, Palladio, Scamozzi, Wren, 
 Chambers, and Wyatt, does not differ enough 
 from the Doric to be denominated a new order; 
 but, as described by Vitruvius and as used by 
 Jones in the portico of St. Paul's, Covent- 
 Garden, is really a characteristic and beautiful 
 innovation. 
 
 The orders of architecture according to the 
 Grecian system are, as I then proceeded to 
 observe, three: the Doric ; ihelotiic; and the 
 Corinthian. In the Roman and modern Italian 
 system they are five: the Tuscan; a non- 
 descript calleid the Doric ; another but little 
 better, or more like the original, called the 
 Ionic; the Corinthian; and the Composite. 
 The Grecian orders of sacred, buildings or 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 425 
 
 temples were seven ; and their modes of inter- 
 columniation regulated by rule, so as to admit 
 the proper distinction of triglyph and metope 
 in the Doric, and modillions in the Corinthian. 
 
 From Etruria the arts, with architecture at 
 their head, found their way into Rome, of which 
 the principal works were derived from the 
 Greco-Italian school of Etruria. Among the 
 earliest was the Cloaca Maxima, or great sewer 
 of Rome, a work grand, imposing, and emi- 
 nently useful. Temples almost innumerable fol- 
 lowed, theatres, and amphitheatres. 
 
 The elements of the Roman style are borrow- 
 ed and varied freely from those of the Greeks, 
 and consist of their live orders — the Tuscan, the 
 Doric, the Ionic, the Corinthian, and the Com- 
 posite. Of the Tuscan there are no remains. 
 Of the Doric their best examples are in the 
 Theatre of Marcellus at Rome, and that at 
 Vicenza ; the Colosseum ; the baths of Dio- 
 clesian, at Rome ; and the triumphal arch 
 at Verona. Their finest Ionics are those at 
 the temple of Fortuna Virilis, at Rome ; the 
 theatre of Marcellus ; and the baths of Dio- 
 clesian. Of the Corinthian, which they have 
 best used, we may particulanze, among many 
 others, the portico of Agrippa at the Pan- 
 theon ; the frontispiece of Nero ; the baths 
 
426 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 of Dioclesian ; the temples of Jupiter, of 
 Mars, of Vesta, at Rome ; and of the Sybil, 
 at Tivoli. Of their Composite, the Arco da 
 Leoni, at Verona, which by the way has 
 a Corinthian entablature and an Ionic base, 
 with a Composite capital ; the arch of Titus, 
 at Rome, displaying nearly the same incon- 
 gruities, and many more recent works. 
 
 The scholar is recommended to the various 
 books on Roman antiquities ; as Vasi, Des- 
 godetz, Palladio, Piranesi, &c. ; and to the 
 amateur, who wishes to see examples in Lon- 
 don, we beg to point out as the best Tuscan, 
 St. Paul's, Covent-garden ; and the best Ro- 
 man Doric portico, that of Shoreditch church. 
 Of Ionics we have nothing better than 
 Jones's Shaftsbury-house, Aid ersgate- street • 
 his Whitehall, and part of Lincoln's Inn Fields. 
 For the Corinthian we refer him to St. Martin's- 
 in-the-Fields, and St. Paul's Cathedral ; and 
 for the Composite, to Jones's upper order at 
 Whitehall, and Wren's at St. Paul's. 
 
 These observations will, I trust, recall and 
 fix the substance of the preceding Lectures, 
 and render them clear and connected. 
 
 I next adverted to the second epoch of 
 Roman architecture, from the time of the con- 
 quest of Greece by the Romans to that of 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 427 
 
 Julius Caesar, during whose sway the art did 
 not reach that splendour which it attained 
 under the succeeding emperors. 
 
 In the Lecture upon this period of Roman 
 art, I called your attention to stereotomy, or 
 co9istruciion, which was a part of the profession 
 m which the Romans eminently excelled, and 
 described the fatal consequences of a want of 
 its knowledge, pointing out many errors in 
 modeni construction, and endeavouring to 
 offer remedies. 
 
 This led on to the next epoch, which cora- 
 inenced in the reign of Hadrian, when V des- 
 cribed the prevailing character of Roman 
 architecture as differing from that of the 
 Greeks in the greater variety and number of 
 their public edifices. I also noticed the inven- 
 tion of amphitheatres and other structures 
 exclusively Roman, as aqueducts, bridges, 
 baths, triumphal columns and arches, forums, 
 basilicas, &c. all astonishing from their colos- 
 sal grandeur. The principal amphitheatre 
 of Rome was that whose ruins stand as a 
 mighty rock confounding the calculations and 
 fhe powers of modern days, now known by its 
 appropriate name the Colosseum. 
 
 The villa of Hadrian, at Tivoli, next came 
 under consideration ; that immense and com- 
 
428 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 plete royal edifice which embraced an entire 
 city in its circuit, with temples, theatres, courses, 
 baths, and other Roman luxuries. 
 
 From this period the art gradually declined ; 
 Rome was dilapidated as much by its own 
 emperors as by its enemies. Constantine, 
 for instance, and his successors of the Greek 
 families, successively plundered it to enrich 
 Constantinople ; and the Goths and Vandals 
 completed this triumph over the fallen great- 
 ness of ancient Rome : the arts then sank for 
 centuries, and rose not till the revival of litera- 
 ture, when the architecture of the times sprang 
 up in all the varieties of pseudo-Roman, 
 Greco-Gothic, Saracenic, Moorish, and the 
 pointed styles. Borromini and his school 
 plundered the ancients, and bastardized their 
 style : Michelangiolo and Raffaelle somewhat 
 improved the taste of the times; but the 
 church of St. Paul, without the walls of 
 Rome, built with the marble columns of the 
 Mausoleum of Hadrian, over which petty arches 
 are turned, cannot but be regarded as a speci- 
 men either of very depraved taste, or of a 
 singular want of skill. The church of St. 
 John the lateran, by Borromini, is one of the 
 most curious instances of the blunderings of 
 bad taste now in existence : the niches with 
 
VllT] ON ARCHITECTURE. 429 
 
 compound and broken pediments, the colossal 
 figures, the wretched imitations of capitals, all 
 proclaim this building to be worthy of its 
 school, and of being held up as an example to 
 be carefully avoided. The errors of this 
 school were described to consist, among other 
 things, in columns broken with rustics, twisted 
 in their shafts, spirally fluted, and otherwise 
 departing from the beauty of their originals ; 
 in entablatures without architraves, without 
 friezes, and other important features by turns ; 
 tryglyphs without mutules — mutules without 
 tryglyphs or even friezes to protect, as may 
 be seen, I am sorry to say, in many of our 
 ne\vest buildings. 
 
 Our next stepV as to the ancient architecture 
 of England, commencing with a notice of the 
 barrows, round towers, excavations, cromlechs, 
 and similar works, partly no doubt druidical, 
 of the ancient British and Irish. Respecting 
 these stupendous and wonder-exciting monu- 
 ments of remote time, conjecture can afford 
 no satisfactory hypothesis. 
 
 1 next adverted to the early settlement of 
 the Romans in England, and adduced proofs 
 sufficient, I hope, to render it evident that the 
 Saxon style was immediately derived from 
 that of those accomplished conquerors : this 
 
430 ELMES'S LECTURES 
 
 led us to the consideration of the style called 
 Gothic, whose essentials were represented to 
 be pyramidal, foliated, and embellished. The 
 arches shoot upwards ; the pillars, clustered 
 and banded together, do the same ; the pinna- 
 cles and turrets rear themselves aloft; all 
 exhibiting their elementary principles as de- 
 duced from the groves of our forefathers. 
 
 A connexion with the continent, where 
 arts and literature were rising with prodigious 
 rapidity, introduced the Roman style again 
 into England, although a good deal modified 
 by its Italian restorers. The first specimens 
 exhibited a barbarous mixture of Gothic 
 and Italian ; in the next place, as if to show 
 the learning of the artists, all the five orders 
 were piled one over the other, as in the build- 
 ing called the Schools, at Oxford, and in 
 the leaning tower of Pisa. Now, however, 
 arrived the day of the highly-gifted Inigo 
 Jones, who introduced a purer style : his 
 Whitehall and other buildings have been allu- 
 ded to, and his comparative rank endeavoured 
 to be ascertained. Jones was succeeded by 
 Sir Christopher Wren: to whose talents and 
 exertions the fire of London opened a larger 
 field than was ever, perhaps, at the command 
 of any other individual in the art. For want 
 
VIII] ON ARCHITECTURE. 431 
 
 of reofularlv-ediicated architects, Charles II. 
 commissioned Wren, at that period the great- 
 est mathematician and general scholar of his 
 day, to be his architect, and to superintend the 
 repairs of St. Paul's Cathedral. To qualify 
 himself for the task, and to illustrate his 
 Vitruvius by examples, this enlightened and 
 modest scholar proceeded on a tour through 
 France to Rome and Greece. He had reached 
 only France : the fire consumed the English me- 
 tropolis, and he returned with principles of taste 
 deteriorated, perhaps, rather than improved. 
 
 I have thus endeavoured, in a brief way, to 
 recapitulate and to connect the historical 
 system of architecture, which it has been my 
 object to establish in this course of Lectures : 
 and will farther, before I lay down my pen 
 and bid farewell to the reader, sum up what 
 appear to me to be the principal divisions or 
 epochs of the art. 
 
 FIRST EPOCH. 
 
 From the creation of the world to the flood, a lapse of 
 1656 years. In this interval we read of Tubal Cain as an 
 artificer in brass and silver, and of the building of the Ark 
 by Noah, &c. &c. 
 
 This epoch includes also the period from the erection of 
 the Tower of Babel, by the posterity of Noah after the 
 flood, to the founding of Athens, by Cecrops, A.C. 1536; 
 and to the founding of Troy, by Scamauder, about tlic 
 same date, at which period likewise Moses and Aaron livrd, 
 and Cadmus is said to have invented Iclters. 
 
432 ZLM.ES S LECTUKES. 
 
 SECOND EPOCH. 
 From the founding of Athens by Cecrops to Pericles, 
 about this time (between 400 and 500 years before Christ) 
 lived Phidias and his eminent associates ; in Italy, Coriola- 
 nus, Cincinatus, and Camilius ; among the Jews, Ezra the 
 Scribe ; in Persia, Artaxerxes Longimanus ; in China, Con- 
 fucius. About this time, also, the architecture of Egypt 
 uiet with a final blow from the devastations of Cambyses. 
 
 THIRD EPOCH. 
 
 From Pericles and Phidias to Alexander the Great, Lysip- 
 pus, Dinocrates, and their contemporaries. 
 
 FOURTH EPOCH. 
 
 From Alexander the Great, Lysippus, and Dinocrates, to 
 Hadrian and ApoUodorus. 
 
 FIFTH EPOCH. 
 
 From Hadrian to Theodoric, called the Goth. 
 
 SIXTH EPOCH. 
 
 From Theodoric to the rebuilding of St. Peter's, at Rome, 
 and the period oi Leo X. 
 
 SEVENTH EPOCH. 
 
 From Leo X. to the end of the reign of George H. 
 
 EIGHTH OR PRESENT EPOCH. 
 
 From the beginning of the reign of Gorge HL under 
 whom the revival of Grecian architecture first took place in 
 any part of the world, to the present day. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 AIarchant, Printer, Ingram-Court, Fenchurth-Slrect. 
 
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