Fig. 120.—Platform of the palace of Cyrus (after Dieulafoy).
The monument called by the modern Persians Takht-i-Madar-i-Soleiman (“throne of the mother of Solomon”) is nothing more than the platform of Cyrus’ palace ([fig. 120]). It is a structure built of large stones, in which mortar is replaced by iron clamps. The facings are seldom trimmed, but only rough hewn, and surrounded by a double moulding like rusticated stonework with marginal draftings. The courses are alternate rows of headers and stretchers. The nucleus of the structure is a mass of blocks arranged in horizontal layers, always level with the facing courses. M. Dieulafoy[54] observes that the Lydians practised this method of building from the eighth century before our era. The Assyrians did not proceed in the same manner. At Khorsabad, for instance, no clamps bind the stones of the facing to one another; the wall is straight and absolutely vertical, while in the Takht-i-Madar-i-Soleiman the upper courses recede from one another like steps, in order to give greater thickness to the base. Over the greater part of the facing, position marks have been detected, carved upon them by the stone-cutters, in order to know the place of each hewn stone. These marks are conventional signs, which do not belong, it is true, to any alphabet, but which—a matter worthy of remark—are the same as those discovered in Greek buildings.
Fig. 121.—Basement at Persepolis (after Flandin and Coste, Perse ancienne).
The palaces of Persepolis were erected by Darius and Xerxes only fifty years after those at Pasargadæ; but in this short interval Egypt had been conquered by Cambyses; and after that event the monuments of the Pharaohs were destined, for the same reason as those of Assyria and Asia Minor, to exercise a direct influence upon Persian art. The latter, however, could never fuse these heterogeneous elements together and assimilate them to its own character, but could only group them in a hybrid style. The buildings of Persepolis are still standing to a considerable extent, and its ruins, rising in the midst of a vast amphitheatre of grey marble rocks, are an object of enthusiastic admiration to all travellers. The palaces rest upon a platform built on the model of that of Takht-i-Madar-i-Soleiman. The outer coating of this basement is formed of carefully trimmed ashlar, and the blocks, fitted together without mortar, are fixed by iron clamps. Better preserved
