DESIGN OF PERSIAN CAPITAL INFLUENCED BY PRIMITIVE TIMBER CONSTRUCTION
LOTUS CAPITAL, PHILÆ.
Another instance of the influence of primitive timber construction over stone may be seen in comparing the ancient Persian column with its timber prototype still in use. Persia, indeed, is another eastern country which has preserved almost unbroken traditions in design from a very remote past, and may be said to be the source of the most beautiful types of ornamental art the world has ever seen, and especially in three leading forms—coloured and glazed tiles and bricks, pottery, and textiles. To judge from the wonderful decoration of glazed bricks discovered a few years ago at Susa, forming part of the ancient forum and palace of Darius, destroyed in the reign of Xerxes, b.c. 485-465, excavated by M. and Mme. Dieulafoy,[7] the artistic skill of the Persians in this kind of work, and their sense of its value, and the treatment of colour and ornament, dates back to a very early period.
In the famous frieze of archers, which formed part of the wall decoration of this palace, the figures are frankly repeated in design though alternating in the patterns and colours of their dress, boldly relieved upon a field of turquoise blue, formed by the glazed bricks by which the frieze is constructed. The figures and ornament must have been moulded or stamped in relief upon the clay while soft, and cut up into bricks, and afterwards fired and glazed in the method of Robbia ware; the whole scheme is severely simple but very effective in its proper position upon the walls of one of the large courts of the palace, mostly in reflected light under projecting porticoes, and would be very impressive and at the same time truly mural and reposeful in feeling and colour.
Such a scheme of frank colour and fine detail could hardly have been conceived except in a country of brilliant light. Some doubt exists as to the exact position of the frieze upon the wall. Figures of similar scale in Assyrian work and also at Persepolis were placed not far, if at all, above the eye level.
Upon the dress of one set of the archers is figured, it is supposed, the fortress of Susa itself, which was built upon a mount.
There is much interesting ornamental detail in the dresses, which afford excellent authorities for the costume of Persian warriors of that period. We see also the palm-leaf border, a primitive form, type and forerunner of a whole tribe of border design. The rosette is said to resemble "the full-blown Star of Bethlehem, conspicuous among all other flowers, among the herbage clothing the stretches of Susiana and the tablelands of Iran (Persia) after the first rains in early spring." (Perrot and Chipiez, p. 137.)
We may note, too, what seems obviously the prototype of the Moorish battlement, defined in blue bricks above the figures, suggesting they are guarding the citadel.