Fig. 135.—The lion frieze; restoration by M. Dieulafoy (Louvre).
adopted it, and seem to have brought it to perfection; the same is true, as it seems, of that ingenious and delicate process which consisted of stamping scenes in relief upon bricks, a number of which thus formed an enamelled frieze, intended to replace the sculptured slabs of Nineveh. It was at Susa that this system of decoration seems to have reached its ideal perfection; at any rate, it is only among the ruins of this capital that we can study it in detail, thanks to the discoveries of M. Dieulafoy, which add a new chapter to the history of art. It has been possible to reconstruct at the Louvre two entire friezes disinterred at Susa before the façade of the apadâna of the palace of Artaxerxes Mnemon. That of the lions ([fig. 135]) is composed of bricks in relief, 1 ft. 2 in. long by 7 in. high and 9 in. thick. The lions, nine in number, are each 11 ft. 3 in. long by 5 ft. 6 in. high. The ground, on which the figures stand out, is a flat surface of a turquoise-blue colour; the lions, which are, for the most part, of a greyish-white colour, have certain parts of their body, for instance the mane, of a watery greenish blue; and others, for instance the swell of the muscles, of a deep yellow. They are treated in the Assyrian manner, to such an extent that, if it were not for the relief, they would exactly resemble the enamelled lions on flat bricks at Khorsabad. As at Nineveh, the muscles are exaggerated, the head and forepart of the lion too small. The procession of wild beasts is framed in several lines of elegant symmetrical designs: rows of chevrons, of Egyptian palmettes, and of Assyrian daisies.
Fig. 136.—Susian archer (Louvre).
The frieze of the archers ([fig. 136]) represents a procession of warriors in relief, like those on the marble slabs of Persepolis; this is the most wonderful specimen of polychrome Persian enamelling. The materials of which the composition is formed, instead of being, as in the lion frieze, baked bricks in the form of elongated parallelopipeds, are little squares, of which each side is 1 ft. 1 in. long, and 3 in. thick, made of artificial concrete, which combines the whiteness of plaster with the resistance of limestone. The soldiers are represented in profile and on the march. They carry on the left shoulder a bow coloured yellow, and a quiver of reddish brown. They hold in their hands a pike, the shaft of which ends in a silver knob. Their tunics, the colour of which alternates from one figure to another, is golden yellow or white; the shape of it is the same for all,—narrow, open at the side, with very broad gathered sleeves; it falls to the ankles and shows a certain variety of ornament; the stuff is spangled sometimes with green or blue daisies, sometimes with designs in the form of lozenges; the border is embroidered. A greenish turban, twisted into rolls, is placed on the head of these oriental soldiers, who wear bracelets, ear-rings, and yellow or sky-blue leather boots; their beard and hair are dressed in ringlets, in the Assyrian fashion. This is doubtless the rich costume which provoked the declamations of Greek rhetoricians against the effeminacy and corruption of the Persians. According to the testimony of Herodotus (vii. 83), the twisted turban on the hair, the golden ornaments, and the silver knob on the javelin, were the distinctive marks of the thousand knights and the ten thousand immortals who formed the escort of the “king of kings.” There can be no doubt, then, that we are in presence of a group of this famous troop of janissaries, whom the Achæmenpi monarchs recruited in great part from among the blacks of India; a certain number of the figures on the frieze acquired by M. Dieulafoy actually have a skin coloured of a deep brown.