[60] M. Degrand, in his “Ponts en Maçonnerie,” draws attention to the fact that arches of this elementary sort have been discovered in Mexico where they represent a dead civilization to which no date can be assigned. Degrand draws his information from two books; “Histoire du Royaume de Quito,” par Don Juan de Velasco, Paris, 1840, and “Monuments anciens du Mexique,” par de Waldeck et Brasseur de Bourbourg, Paris, 1866. At Palanqué, in a building supposed to be a temple of the sun, a large bay that opens into the sanctuary has an elliptic arch formed with courses of dressed stone that project one beyond the other: “un arc surbaissé formé d’assises de pierres de taille posées avec une forte saillie les unes par rapport aux autres.”
[61] “Encyclopædia Britannica,” article “Mycenae”; see also Sir William Smith, “Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography”; and note what M. Degrand says in his “Ponts en Maçonnerie.”
[62] See E. Degrand, Vol. II, p. 124; and see also the “Traité d’Architecture,” by Léonce Reynaud.
SMYRNA: ROMAN BRIDGE AND AQUEDUCT—THE POINTED ARCHES ARE EASTERN RESTORATIONS
CHAPTER THE THIRD
A FEW WORDS ON THE ROMAN GENIUS
I
What are we to think of the Roman bridges and aqueducts? Are we to be men in our attitude toward them? or shall we try to see them with the unfriendly eyes of Grecian supermen?