Origin of the architecture in rock dwellings--Second style,
a combination of the native rock with the ordinary wall--
Later on, the use of the native rock, discarded--Employment
of huge blocks of stone in the early walls--Absence of
cement--Bevelling--Occurrence of Cyclopian walls--Several
architectural members comprised in one block--Phoenician
shrines--The Maabed and other shrines at Amrith--Phoenician
temples--Temple of Paphos--Adjuncts to temples--Museum of
Golgi--Treasure chambers of Curium--Walls of Phoenician
towns--Phoenician tombs--Excavated chambers--Chambers built
of masonry--Groups of chambers--Colonnaded tomb--Sepulchral
monuments--The Burdj-el-Bezzâk--The Kabr Hiram--The two
Méghâzil--Tomb with protected entrance--Phoenician
ornamentation--Pillars and their capitals--Cornices and
mouldings--Pavements in mosaic and alabaster--False arches--
Summary.
The architecture of the Phoenicians began with the fashioning of the
native rock--so abundant in all parts of the country where they had
settled themselves--into dwellings, temples, and tombs. The calcareous
limestone, which is the chief geological formation along the Syrian
coast, is worked with great ease; and it contains numerous fissures and
caverns,[61] which a very moderate amount of labour and skill is capable
of converting into fairly comfortable dwelling-places. It is probable
that the first settlers found a refuge for a time in these natural
grottos, which after a while they proceeded to improve and enlarge,
thus obtaining a practical power of dealing with the material, and an
experimental knowledge of its advantages and defects. But it was not
long before these simple dwellings ceased to content them, and they were
seized with an ambition to construct more elaborate edifices--edifices
such as they must have seen in the lands through which they had passed
on their way from the shores of the Persian Gulf to the seaboard of the
Mediterranean. They could not at once, however, divest themselves
of their acquired habits, and consequently, their earliest buildings
continued to have, in part, the character of rock dwellings, while in
part they were constructions of the more ordinary and regular type. The
remains of a dwelling-house at Amrith,[62] the ancient Marathus, offer a
remarkable example of this intermixture of styles. The rock has been cut
away so as to leave standing two parallel walls 33 yards long, 19 feet
high, and 2 1/2 feet thick, which are united by transverse party-walls
formed in the same way.[63] Windows and doorways are cut in the walls,
some square at top, some arched. At the two ends the main walls were
united partly by the native rock, partly by masonry. The northern wall
was built of masonry from the very foundation, the southern consisted
for a portion of its height of the native rock, while above that were
several courses of stones carrying it up further. At Aradus and at
Sidon, similarly, the town walls are formed in many places of native
rock, squared and smoothed, up to a certain height, after which courses
of stone succeed each other in the ordinary fashion. It is as if the
Phoenician builders could not break themselves of an inveterate habit,
and rather than disuse it entirely submitted to an intermixture which
was not without a certain amount of awkwardness.
Another striking example of the mixed system is found at a little
distance from Amrith, in the case of a building which appears to have
been a shrine, tabernacle, or sanctuary. The site is a rocky platform,
about a mile from the shore. Here the rock has been cut away to a
depth varying from three to six yards, and a rectangular court has been
formed, 180 feet long by 156 feet wide, in the centre of which has been
left a single block of the stone, still of one piece with the court,
which rises to a height of ten feet, and forms the basis or pedestal of
the shrine itself.[64] The shrine is built of a certain number of large
blocks, which have been quarried and brought to the spot; it has a stone
roof with an entablature, and attains an elevation above the court of
not less than twenty-seven feet. The dimensions of the shrine are small,
not much exceeding seventeen feet each way.[65]
From constructions of this mixed character the transition was easy
to buildings composed entirely of detached stones put together in the
ordinary manner. Here, what is chiefly remarkable in the Phoenician
architecture is the tendency to employ, especially for the foundations
and lower courses of buildings, enormous blocks. When the immovable
native rock is no longer available, the resource is to make use of vast
masses of stone, as nearly immovable as possible. The most noted example
is that of the substructions which supported the platform whereon stood
the Temple of Jerusalem, which was the work of the Phoenician builders
whom Hiram lent to Solomon.[66] These substructions, laid bare at their
base by the excavations of the Palestine Exploration Fund, are found to
consist of blocks measuring from fifteen to twenty-five feet in length,
and from ten to twelve feet in height. The width of the blocks at the
angles of the wall, where alone it can be measured, is from twelve to
eighteen feet. At the south-west angle no fewer than thirty-one courses
of this massive character have been counted by the recent explorers, who
estimate the weight of the largest block at something above a hundred
tons![67]
A similar method of construction is found to have prevailed at Tyre,
at Sidon, at Aradus, at Byblus, at Leptis Major, at Eryx, at Motya, at
Gaulos, and at Lixus on the West African coast. The blocks employed do
not reach the size of the largest discovered at Jerusalem, but still are
of dimensions greatly exceeding those of most builders, varying, as they
do, from six feet to twenty feet in length, and being often as much as
seven or eight feet in breadth and height. As the building rises, the
stones diminish in size, and the upper courses are often in no way
remarkable. Stones of various sizes are used, and often the courses are
not regular, but one runs into another. A tower in the wall of Eryx is a
good specimen of this kind of construction.[68]
Where the stones are small, mortar has been employed by the builders,
but where they are of a large size, they are merely laid side by side
in rows or courses, without mortar or cement of any kind, and remain
in place through their own mass and weight. In the earliest style of
building the blocks are simply squared,[69] and the wall composed of
them presents a flat and level surface, or one only broken by small and
casual irregularities; but, when their ideas became more advanced, the
Phoenicians preferred that style of masonry which is commonly regarded
as peculiarly, if not exclusively, theirs[610]--the employment of large
blocks with deeply bevelled edges. The bevel is a depression round the
entire side of the stone, which faces outwards, and may be effected
either by a sloping cut which removes the right-angle from the edge, or
by two cuts, one perpendicular and the other horizontal, which take out
from the edge a rectangular bar or plinth. The Phoenician bevelling
is of this latter kind, and is generally accompanied by an artificial
roughening of the surface inside the bevel, which offers a strong
contrast to the smooth and even surface of the bevel itself.[611] The
style is highly ornamental and effective, particularly where a large
space of wall has to be presented to the eye, unbroken by door or
window.[612]
Occasionally, but very rarely, and only (so far as appears) in their
remoter dependencies, the Phoenicians constructed their buildings in
the rude and irregular way, which has been called Cyclopian, employing
unhewn polygonal blocks of various sizes, and fitting them roughly
together. The temples discovered in Malta and Gozzo have masonry of this
description.[613]
A peculiarity in Phoenician architecture, connected with the preference
for enormous blocks over stones of a moderate size, is the frequent
combination in a single mass of distinct architectural members; for
instance, of the shaft and capital of pillars, of entire pediments with
a portion of the wall below them, and of the walls of monuments with the
cornice and architrave. M. Renan has made some strong remarks on this
idiosyncrasy. “In the Grecian style,” he says, “the beauty of the wall
is a main object with the architect, and the wall derives its beauty
from the divisions between the stones, which observe symmetrical laws,
and are in agreement with the general lines of the edifice. In a style
of this kind the stones of a wall have, all of them, the same dimension,
and this dimension is determined by the general plan of the building; or
else, as in the kind of work which is called ‘pseud-isodomic,’ the very
irregularity of the courses is governed by a law of symmetry. The
stones of the architrave, the metopes, the triglyphs, are, all of them,
separate blocks, even when it would have been perfectly easy to have
included in a single block all these various members. Such facts, as one
observes frequently in Syria, where three or four architectural members
are brought out from a single block, would have appeared to the Greeks
monstrous, since they are the negation of all logic.”[614]
In cannot be denied that the habit of preferring large to small blocks,
even in monuments of a very moderate size, involved the Phoenician
architects in awkwardnesses and anomalies, which offend a cultivated
taste; but it should be remembered, on the other hand, that massiveness
in the material conduces greatly to stability, and that, in lands
where earthquakes are frequent, as they are along all the Mediterranean
shores, not many monuments would have survived the lapse of three
thousand years had the material employed been of a less substantial and
solid character.
Among the Phoenician constructions, of which it is possible to give some
account at the present day, without drawing greatly on the imagination,
are their shrines, their temples, the walls of their towns, and, above
all, their tombs. Recent researches in Phoenicia Proper, in Cyprus,
Sicily, Africa, and the smaller Mediterranean islands, have brought
to light numerous remains previously unknown; the few previously known
remains have been carefully examined, measured, and in some cases
photographed; and the results have been made accessible to the student
in numerous well-illustrated publications. When Movers and Kenrick
published their valuable works on the history of Phoenicia, and
the general characteristics of the Phoenician people, it was
quite impossible to do more than form conjectures concerning their
architecture from a few coins, and a few descriptions in ancient
writers. It is now a matter of comparatively little difficulty to set
before the public descriptions and representations which, if they still
leave something to be desired in the way of completeness, are
accurate, so far as they go, and will give a tolerably fair idea of the
architectural genius of the people.
One very complete and two ruined shrines have been found in Phoenicia
Proper, in positions and of a character which, in the judgment of the
best antiquaries, mark them as the work of the ancient people. All
these are situated on the mainland, near the site of Marathus, which lay
nearly opposite the island of Ruad, the ancient Aradus. The shrine
which is complete, or almost complete, bears the name of “the Maabed” or
“Temple.” Its central position, in the middle of an excavated court,
and its mixed construction, partly of native rock and partly of quarried
stone, have been already described. It remains to give an account of the
shrine or tabernacle itself.[615] This is emplaced upon the mass of rock
left to receive it midway in the court, and is a sort of cell, closed
in on three sides by walls, and open on one side, towards the north.
The cell is formed of four quarried blocks, which are laid one over the
other. These are nearly of the same size, and similarly shaped, each of
them enclosing the cell on three sides, towards the east, the south,
and the west. The fourth, which is larger than any of the others,
constitutes the roof. It is a massive stone, carefully cut, which
projects considerably in front of the rest of the building, and is
ornamented towards the top with a cornice and string-course, extending
along the four sides.[616] Internally the roof is scooped into a sort of
shallow vault. The height of the shrine proper is about seventeen feet,
and the elevation of the entire structure above the court in which it
stands appears to be about twenty-seven feet. M. Renan conjectures that
the projecting portion of the roof had originally the support of two
pillars, which may have been either of wood, of stone, or of metal, and
notes that there are two holes in the basement stone, into which the
bottoms of the pillars were probably inserted.[617] He imagines that the
court was once enclosed completely by the construction of a wall at its
northern end, and that the water from a spring, which still rises within
the enclosure, was allowed to overflow the entire space, so that the
shrine looked down upon a basin or shallow lake and glassed itself in
the waters.[618] An image of a deity may have stood in the cell under
the roof, dimly visible to the worshipper between the two porch pillars.
The two ruined tabernacles lie at no great distance from the complete
one, which has just been described. One of them is so injured that its
plan is irrecoverable; but M. Renan carefully collected and measured
the fragments of the other, and thus obtained sufficient data for its
restoration.[619] It was, he believes, a monolithic chamber, with a roof
slightly vaulted, like that of the _Maabed_, having a length of eight
feet, a breadth of five, and a height of about ten feet, and ornamented
externally with a very peculiar cornice. This consisted of a series of
carvings, representing the fore part of an uræus or basilisk serpent,
uprearing itself against the wall of the shrine, which were continued
along the entire front of the chamber. There was also an internal
ornamentation of the roof, consisting of a winged circle of an Egyptian
character--a favourite subject with the Phoenician artists[620]--the
circle having an uræus erect on either side of it, and also of another
winged figure which appeared to represent an eagle.[621] The monolithic
chamber was emplaced upon a block of stone, ten feet in length and
breadth, and six feet in height, which itself stood upon a much smaller
stone, and overhung it on all sides. A flight of six steps, cut in the
upper block at either side, gave access to the chamber, which, however,
as it stood in a pool of water, must have been approached by a boat.
The entire height of the shrine above the water must have been about
eighteen feet.
Some other ruined shrines have been found in the more distant of the
Phoenician settlements, and representations of them are common upon the
_stelæ_, set up in temples as votive offerings. On these last the uræus
cornice is frequently repeated, and the figure of a goddess sometimes
appears, standing between the pillars which support the front of the
shrine.[622] There is a decided resemblance between the Phoenician
shrines and the small Egyptian temples, which have been called
_mammeisi_, the chief difference being that the latter are for the most
part peristylar.[623] M. Renan says of the _Maabed_, or main shrine
at Amrith:--“L’aspect général de l’édifice est Egyptian, mais avec une
certaine part d’originalité. Le bandeau et la corniche sur les quatre
côtés de la stalle supériere en sont le seul ornement. Cette simplicité,
cette sévérité de style, jointes à l’idée de force et de puissance
qu’éveillent les dimensions énormes des matériaux employés, sont des
caractères que nous avons déjà signalés dans les monumens funéraires
d’Amrith.”[624]
From the shrines of the Phoenicians we may now pass to their temples, of
which, however, the remains are, unfortunately, exceedingly scanty.
Of real temples, as distinct from shrines, Phoenicia Proper does not
present to us so much as a single specimen. To obtain any idea of them,
we must quit the mother country, and betake ourselves to the colonies,
especially to those island colonies which have been less subjected than
the mainland to the destructive ravages of barbarous conquerors, and the
iconoclasm of fanatical populations. It is especially in Cyprus that we
meet with extensive remains, which, if not so instructive as might have
been wished, yet give us some important and interesting information.
The temple of Paphos, according to the measurements of General Di
Cesnola,[625] was a rectangular building, 221 feet long by 167 feet
wide, built along its lower corners of large blocks of stone, but
probably continued above in an inferior material, either wood or unbaked
brick.[626] The four corner-stones are still standing in their proper
places, and give the dimensions without a possibility of mistake.
Nothing is known of the internal arrangements, unless we attach credit
to the views of the savant Gerhard, who, in the early years of the
present century, constructed a plan from the reports of travellers,
in which he divided the building into a nave and two aisles, with an
ante-chapel in front, and a sacrarium at the further extremity.[627] M.
Gerhard also added, beyond the sacrarium, an apse, of which General Di
Cesnola found no traces, but which may possibly have disappeared in
the course of the sixty years which separated the observations of M.
Gerhard’s informants from the researches of the later traveller.
The arrangement into a nave and two aisles is, to a certain extent,
confirmed by some of the later Cyprian coins, which certainly represent
Cyprian temples, and probably the temple of Paphos.[628] The floor of
the temple was, in part at any rate, covered with mosaic.[629]
This large building, which extended over an area of 36,800 square feet,
was emplaced within a sacred court, surrounded by a _peribolus_, or wall
of enclosure, built of even larger blocks than the temple itself,
and entered by at least one huge doorway. The width of this entrance,
situated near a corner of the western wall, was nearly eighteen
feet.[630] On one side of it were found still fixed in the wall the
sockets for the bolts on which the door swung, in length six inches, and
of proportionate width and depth. The peribolus was rectangular, like
the temple, and was built in lines parallel to it. The longer sides
measured 690 and the shorter 530 feet. One block, which was of blue
granite and must have come either from Asia Minor or from Egypt,
measured fifteen feet ten inches in length, with a width of seven feet
eleven inches, and a depth of two feet five inches.[631] It is thought
that the court was probably surrounded by a colonnade or cloister,[632]
though no traces have been at present observed either of the pillars
which must have supported such a cloister or of the rafters which must
have formed its roof. Ponds,[633] fountains, shrubberies, gardens,
groves of trees, probably covered the open space between the cloister
and the temple, while well-shaded walks led across it from the gates of
the enclosure to those of the sanctuary.
If we allow ourselves to indulge our fancy for a brief space, and
to complete the temple according to the idea which the coins above
represented naturally suggest, we may suppose that it did, in fact,
consist of a nave, two aisles, and a cell, or “holy of holies,” the
nave being of superior height to the aisles, and rising in front into a
handsome façade, like the western end of a cathedral flanked by towers.
Through the open doorway between the towers might be seen dimly the
sacred cone or pillar which was emblematic of deity; on either side the
eye caught the ends of the aisles, not more than half the height of the
towers, and each crowned with a strongly projecting cornice, perhaps
ornamented with a row of uræi. In front of the two aisles, standing by
themselves, were twin columns, like Jachin and Boaz before the Temple
of Solomon. The aisles were certainly roofed: whether the nave also was
covered in, or whether, like the Greek hypæthral temples, it lay open
to the blue vault of heaven, is perhaps doubtful. The walls of the
buildings, after a few courses of hewn stone, were probably of wood,
perhaps of cedar, enriched with the precious metals, and the pavement
was adorned with a mosaic of many colours, “white, yellow, red, brown,
and rose.”[634] Outside the temple was a mass of verdure. “In the sacred
precinct, and in its dependencies, all breathed of voluptuousness, all
spoke to the senses. The air of the place was full of perfumes, full of
soft and caressing sounds. There was the murmur of rills which flowed
over a carpet of flowers; there was, in the foliage above, the song of
the nightingale, and the prolonged and tender cooing of the dove; there
were, in the groves around, the tones of the flute, the instrument which
sounds the call to pleasure, and summons to the banquet chamber the
festive procession and the bridal train. Beneath the shelter of tents,
or of light booths with walls formed by the skilful interlacing of a
green mass of boughs, through which the myrtle and the laurel spread
their odours, dwelt the fair slaves of the goddess, those whom Pindar
called, in the drinking-song which he composed for Theoxenus of Corinth,
‘the handmaids of persuasion.’”[635] Here and there in the precincts,
sacred processions took their prescribed way; ablutions were performed;
victims led up to the temple; votive offerings hung on the trees; festal
dances, it may be, performed; while in the cloister which skirted the
peribolus, dealers in shrines and images chaffered with their customers,
erotic poets sang their lays, lovers whispered, fortune-tellers plied
their trade, and a throng of pilgrims walked lazily along, or sat on the
ground, breathing in the soft, moist air, feasting their eyes upon the
beauty of upspringing fountain and flowering shrub, and lofty tree,
while their ears drank in the cadences of the falling waters, the song
of the birds, and the gay music which floated lightly on the summer
breeze.
Phoenician temples had sometimes adjuncts, as cathedrals have their
chapter-houses and muniment rooms, which were at once interesting and
important. There has been discovered at Athiénau in Cyprus--the
supposed site of Golgi--a ruined edifice, which some have taken for
a temple,[636] but which appears to have been rather a repository for
votive offerings, a sort of ecclesiastical museum. A picture of the
edifice, as he conceives it to have stood in its original condition,
has been drawn by one of its earliest visitants. “The building,” he
says,[637] “was constructed of sun-dried bricks, forming four walls, the
base of which rested upon a substruction of solid stone-work. The walls
were covered, as are the houses of the Cypriot peasants of to-day, with
a stucco which was either white or coloured, and which was impenetrable
by rain. Wooden pillars with stone capitals supported internally a
pointed roof, which sloped at a low angle. It formed thus a sort of
terrace, like the roofs that we see in Cyprus at the present day. This
roof was composed of a number of wooden rafters placed very near each
other, above which was spread a layer of rushes and coarse mats, covered
with a thick bed of earth well pressed together, equally effective
against the entrance of moisture and against the sun’s rays. Externally
the building must have presented a very simple appearance. In the
interior, which received no light except from the wide doorways in the
walls, an immovable and silent crowd of figures in stone, with features
and garments made more striking by the employment of paint, surrounded,
as with a perpetual worship, the mystic cone. Stone lamps, shaped like
diminutive temples, illumined in the corners the grinning _ex-votos_
which hung upon the walls, and the curious pictures with which they were
accompanied. Grotesque bas-reliefs adorned the circuit of the edifice,
where the slanting light was reflected from the white and polished
pavement-stones.”[638] In length and breadth the chamber measured sixty
feet by thirty; the thickness of the basement wall was three feet.[639]
Midway between the side walls stood three rows of large square
pedestals--regularly spaced, and dividing the interior into four vistas
or avenues, which some critics regard as bases for statues, and some
as supports for the pillars which sustained the roof.[640] Two stone
capitals of pillars were found within the area of the chamber; and it is
conjectured that the entire disappearance of the shafts may be accounted
for by their having been of wood,[641] the employment of wooden shafts
with stone bases and capitals being common in Cyprus at the present
time.[642] Against each of the four walls was a row of pedestals
touching each other, which had certainly been bases for statues, since
the statues were found lying, mostly broken, in front of them. The
figures varied greatly in size, some being colossal, others mere
statuettes. Most probably all were votive offerings, presented by those
who imagined that they had been helped by the god of the temple to which
the chamber belonged, as an indication of their gratitude. The number
of pedestals found along one of the walls was seventy-two,[643] and the
original number must have been at least three times as great.
Another Cyprian temple, situated at Curium, not far from Paphos,
contained a very remarkable crypt, which appears to have been used as a
treasure-house.[644] It was entered by means of a flight of steps which
conducted to a low and narrow passage cut in the rock, and giving access
to a set of three similar semi-circular chambers, excavated side by
side, and separated one from another by doors. Beyond the third of
these, and at right angles to it, was a fourth somewhat smaller chamber,
which gave upon a second passage that it was found impossible to
explore.[645] The three principal chambers were fourteen feet six inches
in height, twenty-three feet long, and twenty-one feet broad. The
fourth was a little smaller,[646] and shaped somewhat irregularly. All
contained plate and jewels of extraordinary richness, and often of
rare workmanship. “The treasure found,” says M. Perrot, “surpassed all
expectation, and even all hope. Never had such a discovery been made of
such a collection of precious articles, where the material was of the
richest, and the specimens of different styles most curious. There were
many bracelets of massive gold, and among them two which weighed a pound
apiece, and several others of a weight not much short of this. Gold
was met with in profusion under all manner of forms--finger-rings,
ear-rings, amulets, flasks, small bottles, hair-pins, heavy necklaces.
Silver was found in even greater abundance, both in ornaments and in
vessels; besides which there were articles in electrum, which is
an amalgam of silver with gold. Among the stones met with were
rock-crystals, carnelians, onyxes, agates, and other hard stones of
every variety; and further there were paste jewels, cylinders in soft
stone, statuettes in burnt clay, earthen vases, and also many objects
in bronze, as lamps, tripods, candelabra, chairs, vases, arms, &c. &c. A
certain amount of order reigned in the repository. The precious objects
in gold were collected together principally in the first chamber. The
second contained the silver vessels, which were arranged along a sort
of shelf cut in the rock, at the height of about eight inches above the
floor. Unfortunately the oxydation of these vessels had proceeded to
such lengths, that only a very small number could be extracted from
the mass, which for the most part crumbled into dust at the touch of
a finger. The third chamber held lamps and fibulæ in bronze, vases in
alabaster, and, above all, the groups and vessels modelled in clay;
while the fourth was the repository of the utensils in bronze, and of
a certain number which were either in copper or in iron. In the further
passage, which was not completely explored, there were nevertheless
found seven kettles in bronze.”[647]
In the construction of the walls of their towns, especially of those
which were the most ancient, the feature which is most striking at
first sight is that on which some remarks have already been made, the
attachment of the lower portion of the wall to the soil from which the
wall springs. At Sidon, at Aradus, and at Semar-Gebeil, the _enceinte_
which protected the town consisted, up to the height of ten or twelve
feet, of native rock, cut to a perpendicular face, upon which were
emplaced several courses of hewn stone. The principle adopted was to
utilise the rock as far as possible, and then to supplement what was
wanting by a superstructure of masonry. Large blocks of stone, shaped to
fit the upper surface of the rock, were laid upon it, generally endways,
that is, with their smallest surface outwards, their length forming the
thickness of the wall, which was sometimes as much as fifteen or twenty
feet.[648] The massive blocks, once placed, were almost immovable, and
it was considered enough to lay them side by side, without clamps or
mortar, since their own weight kept them in place. It was not thought
of much consequence whether the joints of the courses coincided or not;
though care was taken that, if a coincidence occurred in two courses,
it should not be repeated in the third.[649] The elevation of walls
does not seem to have often exceeded from thirty to forty feet, though
Diodorus makes the walls of Carthage sixty feet high,[650] and Arrian
gives to the wall of Tyre which faced the continent the extraordinary
height of a hundred and fifty feet.[651]
If we may generalise from the most perfect specimens of Phoenician
town-walls that are still fairly traceable, as those of Eryx and
Lixus,[652] we may lay it down, that such walls were usually flanked,
at irregular intervals, by square or rectangular towers, which projected
considerably beyond the line of the curtain. The towers were of a more
massive construction than the wall itself, especially in the lower
portion, where vast blocks were common. The wall was also broken at
intervals by gates, some of which were posterns, either arched or
covered in by flat stones,[653] while others were of larger dimensions,
and were protected, on one side or on both, by bastions. The sites of
towns were commonly eminences, and the line of the walls followed
the irregularities of the ground, crowning the slopes where they were
steepest. Sometimes, as at Carthage and Thapsus, where the wall had to
be carried across a flat space, the wall of defence was doubled, or even
tripled. The restorations of Daux[654] contain, no doubt, a good deal
that is fanciful; but they give, probably, a fair idea of the general
character of the so-called “triple wall” of certain Phoenician cities.
The outer line, or {proteikhisma}, was little more than an earthwork,
consisting of a ditch, with the earth from it thrown up inwards, crowned
perhaps at top with a breastwork of masonry. The second line was far
more elaborate. There was first a ditch deeper than the outer one, while
behind this rose a perpendicular battlemented wall to the height, from
the bottom of the ditch, of nearly forty feet. In the thickness of
the wall, which was not much less than the height, were chambers for
magazines and cisterns, while along the top, behind the parapet, ran
a platform, from which the defenders discharged their arrows and other
missiles against the enemy. Further back, at the distance of about
thirty yards, came the main line of defence, which in general character
resembled the second, but was loftier and stronger. There was, first,
a third ditch (or moat, if water could be introduced), and behind it a
wall thirty-five feet thick and sixty feet high, pierced by two rows of
embrasures from which arrows could be discharged, and having a triple
platform for the defenders. This wall was kept entirely clear of the
houses of the town, and the different storeys could be reached by
sloping ascents or internal staircases. It was flanked at intervals
by square towers, somewhat higher than the walls, which projected
sufficiently for the defenders to enfilade the assailants when they
approached the base of the curtain.
The tombs of the Phoenicians were, most usually, underground
constructions, either simple excavations in the rock, or subterranean
chambers, built of hewn stone, at the bottom of sloping passages, or
perpendicular shafts, which gave access to them. The simpler kinds bear
a close resemblance to the sepulchres of the Jews. A chamber is opened
in the rock, in the sides of which are hollowed out, horizontally,
a number of caverns or _loculi_, each one intended to receive a
corpse.[655] If more space is needed, a passage is made from one of the
sides of the chamber to a certain distance, and then a second chamber is
excavated, and more _loculi_ are formed; and the process is repeated as
often as necessary. But chambers thus excavated were apt to collapse,
especially if the rock was of the soft and friable nature so common in
Phoenicia Proper and in Cyprus; on which account, in such soils, the
second kind of tomb was preferred, sepulchural chambers being solidly
built,[656] either singly or in groups, each made to hold a certain
number of sarcophagi. The most remarkable tombs of this class are those
found at Amathus, on the south coast of Cyprus, by General Di Cesnola.
They lie at the depth of from forty to fifty-five feet below the
surface of the soil,[657] and are square chambers, built of huge stones,
carefully squared, some of them twenty feet in length, nine in breadth,
and three in thickness, and even averaging a length of fourteen
feet.[658] Two shapes occur. Some of the tombs are almost perfect cubes,
the upright walls rising to a height of twelve or fifteen feet, and
being then covered in by three or four long slabs of stone. Others
resemble huts, having a gable at either end, and a sloping roof formed
of slabs which meet and support each other. A squared doorway, from five
to six feet in height, gives entrance to the tombs at one end, and
has for ornament a fourfold fillet, which surrounds it on three sides.
Otherwise, ornamentation is absent, the stonework of both walls and
roofs being absolutely plain and bare. Internally the chambers present
the same naked appearance, walls and roofs being equally plain, and
the floor paved with oblong slabs of stone, about a foot and a half in
length.
The grouped chambers are of several kinds. Sometimes there are two
chambers only, one opening directly into the other, and not always
similarly roofed. Occasionally, groups of three are found, and there are
examples of groups of four. In these instances, the exact symmetry is
remarkable. A single doorway of the usual character gives entrance to a
nearly square chamber, the exact dimensions of which are thirteen feet
four inches by twelve feet two inches. Midway in the side and opposite
walls are three other doorways, each of them three foot six inches in
width, which lead into exactly similar square chambers, having a length
of twelve feet two inches, and a width of ten feet nine.[659]
Chambers of the character here described contain in almost every
instance stone sarcophagi. These are ranged along the walls, at a little
distance from them. The chambers commonly contain two or three; but
sometimes one sarcophagus is superimposed upon another, and in this way
the number occasionally reaches to six.[660] Mostly, the sarcophagi are
plain, or nearly so, but are covered over with a sloping lid. Sometimes,
however, they are elaborately carved, and constitute works of art,
which are of the highest value. An account will be given of the most
remarkable of these objects in the chapter on Phoenician Æsthetic Art.
Another distinct type of Phoenician tomb is that which is peculiar
to Nea-Paphos, and which is thought by some to have been employed
exclusively by the High Priests of the great temple there.[661] The
peculiarity of these burial-places is, that the sepulchral chambers are
adjuncts of a quadrangular court open to the sky, and surrounded by
a colonnade supported on pillars.[662] The court, the colonnade, the
pillars, the entablature, and the chambers, with their niches for the
dead, are all equally cut out of the rock, as well as the passage by
which the court is entered, at one corner of the quadrangle. The
columns are either square or rounded, the rounded ones having capitals
resembling those of the Doric order; and the entablature is also a
rough imitation of the Doric triglyphs, and guttæ. The entrances to the
sepulchral chambers are under the colonnade, behind the pillars;[663]
and the chambers contain, beside niches, a certain number of bases for
sarcophagi, but no sarcophagi have been found in them. The quadrangle is
of a small size, not more than about eighteen feet each way.
Thus far we have described that portion of the sepulchral architecture
of the Phoenicians which is most hidden from sight, lying, as it does,
beneath the surface of the soil. With tombs of this quiet character the
Phoenicians were ordinarily contented. They were not, however, wholly
devoid of those feelings with respect to their dead which have caused
the erection, in most parts of the world, of sepulchral monuments
intended to attract the eye, and to hand on to later ages the memory of
the departed. Well acquainted with Egypt, they could not but have been
aware from the earliest times of those massive piles which the vanity
of Egyptian monarchs had raised up for their own glorification on the
western side of the valley of the Nile; nor in later days could
such monuments have escaped their notice as the Mausoleum of
Halicarnassus[664] or the Tomb of the Maccabees.[665] Accordingly, we
find them, at a very remote period, not merely anxious to inter their
dead decently and carefully in rock tombs or subterranean chambers of
massive stone, but also wishful upon occasions to attract attention
to the last resting-places of their great men, by constructions
which showed themselves above the ground, and had some architectural
pretensions. One of these, situated near Amrith, the ancient Marathus,
is a very curious and peculiar structure. It is known at the present day
as the Burdj-el-Bezzâk,[666] and was evidently constructed to be, like
the pyramids, at once a monument and a tomb. It is an edifice, built of
large blocks of stone, and rising to a height of thirty-two feet
above the plain at its base, so contrived as to contain two sepulchral
chambers, the one over the other. Externally, the monument is plain
almost to rudeness, being little more than a cubic mass, broken only by
two doorways, and having for its sole ornament a projecting cornice in
front. Internally, there is more art and contrivance. The chambers are
very carefully constructed, and contain a number of niches intended to
receive sarcophagi, the lower having accommodation for three and the
upper for twelve bodies.[667] It is thought that originally the cubic
mass, which is all that now remains, was surmounted by a pyramidical
roof, many stones from which were found by M. Renan among the débris
that were scattered around. The height of the monument was thus
increased by perhaps one-half, and did not fall much short of sixty-five
feet.[668] The cornice, which is now seen on one side only, and which is
there imperfect, originally, no doubt, encircled the entire edifice.
The other constructions erected by the Phoenicians to mark the
resting-places of their dead are simple monuments erected near, and
generally over, the tombs in which the bodies are interred. The best
known is probably that in the vicinity of Tyre, which the natives call
the Kabr-Hiram, or “Tomb of Hiram.”[669] No great importance can be
attached to this name, which appears to be a purely modern one;[670] but
the monument is undoubtedly ancient, perhaps as ancient as any other
in Phoenicia.[671] It is composed of eight courses of huge stones
superimposed one upon another,[672] the blocks having in some cases a
length of eleven or twelve feet, with a breadth of seven or eight, and a
depth of three feet. The courses retreat slightly, with the exception of
the fifth, which projects considerably beyond the line of the fourth and
still more beyond that of the sixth. The whole effect is less that of a
pyramid than of a stelé or pillar, the width at top being not very much
smaller than that at the base. The monument is a solid mass, and is not
a square but a rectangular oblong, the broader sides measuring fourteen
feet and the narrower about eight feet six inches. Two out of the eight
courses are of the nature of substructions, being supplemental to the
rock, which supplies their place in part; and it is only recently
that they have been brought to light by means of excavation. Hence the
earlier travellers speak of the monument as having no more than
six courses. The present height above the soil is a little short of
twenty-five feet. A flight of steps cut in the rock leads down from
the monument to a sepulchral chamber, which, however, contains neither
sepulchral niche nor sarcophagus.
But the most striking of the Phoenician sepulchral monuments are to
be found in the north of Phoenicia, and not in the south, in the
neighbourhood, not of Tyre and Sidon, but of Marathus and Aradus. Two of
them, known as the Méghâzil,[673] form a group which is very remarkable,
and which, if we may trust the restoration of M. Thobois,[674] must have
had considerable architectural merit. Situated very near each other,
on the culminating point of a great plateau of rock, they dominate the
country far and wide, and attract the eye from a long distance. One
seems to have been in much simpler and better taste than the other.
M. Renan calls it “a real masterpiece, in respect of proportion, of
elegance, and of majesty.”[675] It is built altogether in three stages.
First, there is a circular basement story flanked by four figures of
lions, attached to the wall behind them, and only showing in front of it
their heads, their shoulders, and their fore paws. This basement,
which has a height of between seven and eight feet, is surmounted by a
cylindrical tower in two stages, the lower stage measuring fourteen and
the upper, which is domed, ten feet. The basement is composed of four
great stones, the entire tower above it is one huge monolith. An unusual
and very effective ornamentation crowns both stages of the tower,
consisting of a series of gradines at top with square machicolations
below.
The other monument of the pair, distant about twenty feet from the one
already described, is architecturally far less happy. It is composed
of four members, viz. a low plinth for base, above this a rectangular
pedestal, surmounted by a strong band or cornice; next, a monolithic
cylinder, without ornaments, which contracts slightly as it ascends;
and, lastly, a pentagonal pyramid at the top. The pedestal is
exceedingly rough and unfinished; generally, the workmanship is rude,
and the different members do not assort well one with another. Still it
would seem that the two monuments belong to the same age and are parts
of the same plan.[676] Their lines are parallel, as are those of the
subterranean apartments which they cover, and they stand within a
single enclosure. Whether the same architect designed them both it is
impossible to determine, but if so he must have been one of the class of
artists who have sometimes happy and sometimes unhappy inspirations.
Both the Méghâzil are superimposed upon subterranean chambers,
containing niches for bodies, and reached by a flight of steps cut in
the rock, the entrance to which is at some little distance from the
monuments.[677] But there is nothing at all striking or peculiar in the
chambers, which are without ornament of any kind.
Another tomb, in the vicinity of the Méghâzil, is remarkable chiefly
for the care taken to shelter and protect the entrance to the set of
chambers which it covers.[678] The monument is a simple one. A square
monolith, crowned by a strong cornice, stands upon a base consisting of
two steps. Above the cornice is another monolith, the lower part squared
and the upper shaped into a pyramid. The upper part of the pyramid has
crumbled away, but enough remains to show the angle of the slope, and to
indicate for the original erection a height of about twenty feet. At the
distance of about ten yards from the base of the monument is a second
erection, consisting of two tiers of large stones, which roof in the
entrance to a flight of eighteen steps. These steps lead downwards to
a sloping passage, in which are sepulchral niches, and thence into
two chambers, the inner one of which is almost directly under the
main monument. Probably, a block of stone, movable but removed with
difficulty, originally closed the entrance at the point where the steps
begin. This stone ordinarily prevented ingress, but when a fresh corpse
was to be admitted, or funeral ceremonies were to be performed in one of
the chambers, it could be “rolled”[679] or dragged away.
Phoenician architects were, as a general rule, exceedingly sparing in
the use of ornament. Neither the pillar, nor the arch, much less the
vault, was a feature in their principal buildings, which affected
straight lines, right-angles, and a massive construction, based upon the
Egyptian. The pillar came ultimately to be adopted, to a certain extent,
from the Greeks; but only the simplest forms, the Doric and Ionic, were
in use, if we except certain barbarous types which the people invented
for themselves. The true arch was scarcely known in Phoenicia, at any
rate till Roman times, though false arches were not infrequent in
the gateways of towns and the doors of houses.[680] The external
ornamentation of buildings was chiefly by cornices of various kinds, by
basement mouldings, by carvings about doorways,[681] by hemispherical or
pyramidical roofs, and by the use of bevelled stones in the walls. The
employment of animal forms in external decoration was exceedingly rare;
and the half lions of the circular Méghâzil of Amrith are almost unique.
In internal ornamentation there was greater variety. Pavements were
sometimes of mosaic, and glowed with various colours;[682] sometimes
they were of alabaster slabs elaborately patterned. Alabaster slabs
also, it is probable, adorned the walls of temples and houses, excepting
where woodwork was employed, as in the Temple of Solomon. There is
much richness and beauty in many of the slabs now in the Phoenician
collection of the Louvre,[683] especially in those which exhibit the
forms of sphinxes or griffins. Many of the patterns most affected are
markedly Assyrian in character, as the rosette, the palm-head, the
intertwined ribbons, and the rows of gradines which occur so frequently.
Even the Sphinxes are rather Assyrian than Egyptian in character; and
exhibit the recurved wings, which are never found in the valley of the
Nile. In almost all the forms employed there is a modification of the
original type, sufficient to show that the Phoenician artist did not
care merely to reproduce.
On the whole the architecture must be pronounced wanting in originality
and in a refined taste. What M. Renan says of Phoenician art in
general[684] is especially true of Phoenician architecture. “Phoenician
art, which issued, as it would seem, originally from mere troglodytism,
was, from the time when it arrived at the need of ornament, essentially
an art of imitation. That art was, above all, industrial; that art never
raised itself for its great public monuments to a style that was at
once elegant and durable. The origin of Phoenician architecture was the
excavated rock, not the column, as was the case with the Greeks. The
wall replaced the excavated rock after a time, but without wholly
losing its character. There is nothing that leads us to believe that
the Phoenicians knew how to construct a keyed vault. The monolithic
principle which dominated the Phoenician and Syrian art, even after it
had taken Greek art for its model, is the exact contrary of the Hellenic
style. Greek architecture starts from the principle of employing small
stones, and proclaims the principal loudly. At no time did the Greeks
extract from Pentelicus blocks at all comparable for size with those of
Baalbek or of Egypt; they saw no use in doing so; on the contrary, with
masses of such enormity, which it is desired to use in their entirety,
the architect is himself dominated; the material, instead of being
subordinate to the design of the edifice, runs counter to the design
and contradicts it. The monuments on the Acropolis of Athens would be
impossible with blocks of the size usual in Syria.”[685] Thus there is
always something heavy, rude, and coarse in the Phoenician buildings,
which betray their troglodyte origin by an over-massive and unfinished
appearance.
There is also a want of originality, more especially in the
ornamentation. Egypt, Assyria, and Greece have furnished the “motives”
which lie at the root of almost all the decorative art that is to be
met with, either in the mother country or in the colonies. Winged disks,
uræi, scarabs, sphinxes, have been adopted from Egypt; Assyria has
furnished gradines, lotus blossoms, rosettes, the palm-tree ornament,
the ribbon ornament, and the form of the lion; Greece has supplied
pillars, pediments, festoons, and chimæras. Native talent has
contributed little or nothing to the ornamentation of buildings, if
we except the modification of the types which have been derived from
foreign sources.
Finally, there is a want of combination and general plan in the
Phoenician constructions where they fall into groups. “This is sensibly
felt,” according to M. Renan, “at Amrith, at Kabr-Hiram, and at
Um-el-Awamid. In the remains still visible in these localities there are
many fine ideas, many beautiful details; but they do not fall under any
general dominant plan, as do the buildings on the Acropolis of Athens.
One seems to see a set of people who are fond of working in stone for
its own sake, but who do not care to arrive at a mutual understanding in
order to produce in common a single work, since they do not know that it
is the conception of a grand whole which constitutes greatness in art.
Hence the incompleteness of the monuments; there is not a tomb to
which the relations of the deceased have deemed it fitting to give the
finishing touches; there is everywhere a certain egotism, like that
which in later times prevented the Mussulman monuments from enduring. A
passing pleasure in art does not induce men to finish, since finishing
requires a certain stiffness of will. In general, the ancient
Phoenicians appear to have had the spirit of sculptors rather than
of architects. They did not construct in great masses, but every one
laboured on his own account. Hence there was no exact measurement, and
no symmetry. Even the capitals of the columns at Um-el-Awamid are not
alike; in the portions which most evidently correspond the details are
different.”[686]