323. Interior of the Golden Gateway. (From a Drawing by Catherwood. Originally published in Fisher’s ‘Oriental Album.’)
Of similar style and character are the arch-moulds of the double gate on the south wall of the Haram, and the cupolas of the interior vestibule, the columns carrying them however being probably of earlier date and possibly part of the substructure of Herod’s temple. The surface decoration of these cupolas is similar to that found in Central Syria.
324. Golden Gateway (west side). (From a Photograph.)
The sepulchral remains of Syria, both structural and rock-cut, seem nearly as numerous as the dwellings of the living, and are full of interest, not only from their frequently bearing dates, but from their presenting new types of tombs, or old types in such new forms as scarcely to be recognizable.
325. Roof of one of the Compartments of the Gate Huldah. (From De Vogüé.)
The oldest example, that of Hamrath in Souideh, dates from the 1st century B.C., and consists of a tomb 28 ft. square decorated with semi-detached Doric columns; the roof is gone, but it was probably covered with one of pyramidal form like the tomb of Zechariah (Woodcut No. [238]).
The tomb of Diogenes at Hass (Woodcut No. [326]), also square, consisted of two storeys, with a portico on the ground storey on one side, and a peristyle on all four sides of the upper storey, above which rose the central walls carrying a pyramidal roof, not stepped, as in the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, but with projecting bosses on each stone. The same class of roof is found on other tombs, being adopted probably as the simplest method of covering over the tomb; these tombs date from the 4th and 5th centuries, and in all cases the sepulchral chambers within them are vaulted with large slabs of stone carried on stone ribs.
