(Perrot and Chipiez.)
20.—CIRCULAR PILLAR-BASE.
14. It has been asked: how were those halls roofed and how were they lighted? questions which have given rise to much discussion and which can scarcely ever be answered in a positive way, since in no single instance has the upper part of the walls or any part whatever of the roofing been preserved. Still, the peculiar shape and dimensions of the principal palace halls goes far towards establishing a sort of circumstantial evidence in the case. They are invariably long and narrow, the proportions in some being so striking as to have made them more like corridors than apartments—a feature, by the by, which must have greatly impaired their architectural beauty: they were three or four times as long as they were wide, and even more. The great hall of the palace of Asshur-nazir-pal on the platform of the Nimrud mound (excavated by Layard, who calls it, from its position, "the North-West palace") is 160 feet long by not quite 40 wide. Of the five halls in the Khorsabad palace the largest measures 116 ft. by 33, the smallest 87 by 25, while the most imposing in size of all yet laid open, the great hall of Sennacherib at Koyunjik, shows a length of fully 180 ft. with a width of 40. It is scarcely probable that the old builders, who in other points have shown so much artistic taste, should have selected this uniform and unsatisfactory shape for their state apartments, unless they were forcibly held to it by some insuperable imperfection in the means at their disposal. That they knew how to use proportions more pleasing in their general effect, we see from the inner open courts, of which there were several in every palace, and which, in shape and dimensions are very much like those in our own castles and palaces,—nearly square, (about 180 ft. or 120 ft. each way) or slightly oblong: 93 ft. by 84, 124 ft. by 90, 150 ft. by 125. Only two courts have been found to lean towards the long-and-narrow shape, one being 250 ft. by 150, and the other 220 by 100. But even this is very different from those passage-like galleries. The only thing which entirely explains this awkward feature of all the royal halls, is the difficulty of providing them with a roof. It is impossible to make a flat roof of nothing but bricks, and although the Assyrians knew how to construct arches, they used them only for very narrow vaults or over gateways and doors, and could not have carried out the principle on any very extensive scale. The only obvious expedient consisted in simply spanning the width of the hall with wooden beams or rafters. Now no tree, not even the lofty cedar of Lebanon or the tall cypress of the East, will give a rafter, of equal thickness from end to end, more than 40 ft. in length, few even that. There was no getting over or around this necessity, and so the matter was settled for the artists quite aside from their own wishes. This also explains the great value which was attached by all the Assyrian conquerors to fine timber. It was often demanded as tribute, nothing could be more acceptable as a gift, and expeditions were frequently undertaken into the distant mountainous regions of the Lebanon on purpose to cut some. The difficulty about roofing would naturally fall away in the smaller rooms, used probably as sleeping and dwelling apartments, and accordingly they vary freely from oblong to square; the latter being generally about 25 ft. each way, sometimes less, but never more. There were a great many such chambers in a palace; as many as sixty-eight have been discovered in Sennacherib's palace at Koyunjik, and a large portion of the building, be it remembered, is not yet fully explored. Some were as highly decorated as the great halls, some faced with plain slabs or plastered, and some had no ornaments at all and showed the crude brick. These differences probably indicate the difference of rank in the royal household of the persons to whom the apartments were assigned.
21.—INTERIOR VIEW OF ONE OF THE CHAMBERS OF THE HAREM AT KHORSABAD. (RESTORED.)
(Perrot and Chipiez.)
15. The question of light has been discussed by eminent explorers—Layard, Botta, Fergusson—at even greater length and with a greater display of ingenuity than that of roofing. The results of the learned discussion may be shortly summed up as follows: We may take it for granted that the halls were sufficiently lighted, for the builders would not have bestowed on them such lavish artistic labor had they not meant their work to be seen in all its details and to the best advantage. This could be effected only in one of three ways, or in two combined: either by means of numerous small windows pierced at regular intervals above the frieze of enamelled bricks, between that and the roof,—or by means of one large opening in the roof of woodwork, as proposed by Layard in his own restoration, or by smaller openings placed at more frequent intervals. This latter contrivance is in general use now in Armenian houses, and Botta, who calls it a louvre, gives a drawing of it.[O] It is very ingenious, and would have the advantage of not admitting too great a mass of sunlight and heat, and of being easily covered with carpets or thick felt rugs to exclude the rain. The second method, though much the grandest in point of effect, would present none of these advantages and would be objectionable chiefly on account of the rain, which, pouring down in torrents—as it does, for weeks at a time, in those countries—must very soon damage the flooring where it is of brick, and eventually convert it into mud, not to speak of the inconvenience of making the state apartments unfit for use for an indefinite period. The small side windows just below the roof would scarcely give sufficient light by themselves. Who knows but they may have been combined with the louvre system, and thus something very satisfactory finally obtained.
22.—COLORED FRIEZE IN ENAMELLED TILES.