DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.572#0042
14 ARCHITECTURE OF EGYPT. PART I.
blocks of similar dimensions, argues greater know-
ledge, than is usually attributed to the architects
of thos"e times.* Strength was the object; and the
walls of Tiryns continued to excite admiration for
their solidity, in the days of civilized Greece, as
they do to the present day. Had they been erected
by rude, and unskilful, masons, the blocks might
have been rough, and shapeless; but their size, as
in walls made by the peasantry of modern times,
would have been limited to the limited knowledge
of their builders; and an argument of their great
antiquity might have been derived from the appa-
rent primitiveness of the age. But the walls of
Tiryns are very different from the rude attempts
of an untaught people; and though old for so
"young" a people as the inhabitants of Greece,
Tiryns was not old in the history of the world;
nor, if its founders came from Asia Minor,f is there
any difficulty in accounting for the mechanical
skill, necessary for the erection of its walls.^
It was the acknowledged opinion of antiquity,
that the Egyptians preceded all other people, by
many ages, in civilization, and an acquaintance
with art. The Greeks did not conceal the fact, of
their having borrowed largely from Egypt, in reli-
* To suppose such works to have been made, before mankind had any
mechanical knowledge, is like the assertion of Diodorus Siculus, that
machines were not yet invented, when the pyramids were built. Inclined
planes (of earth or sandbags) for building the pyramids, or for raising
roofing stones of Egyptian temples, would certainly not facilitate the
work, but remove one difficulty by supplying a greater.
t Greece wasindebted to that country, for the knowledge of the first
steps towards civilization, and for much of its early colonization; the cur-
rent of which, at a later period, flowed back again from it to Asia Minor.
J They were said to have been from Lycia. Strabo, lib. 6.
blocks of similar dimensions, argues greater know-
ledge, than is usually attributed to the architects
of thos"e times.* Strength was the object; and the
walls of Tiryns continued to excite admiration for
their solidity, in the days of civilized Greece, as
they do to the present day. Had they been erected
by rude, and unskilful, masons, the blocks might
have been rough, and shapeless; but their size, as
in walls made by the peasantry of modern times,
would have been limited to the limited knowledge
of their builders; and an argument of their great
antiquity might have been derived from the appa-
rent primitiveness of the age. But the walls of
Tiryns are very different from the rude attempts
of an untaught people; and though old for so
"young" a people as the inhabitants of Greece,
Tiryns was not old in the history of the world;
nor, if its founders came from Asia Minor,f is there
any difficulty in accounting for the mechanical
skill, necessary for the erection of its walls.^
It was the acknowledged opinion of antiquity,
that the Egyptians preceded all other people, by
many ages, in civilization, and an acquaintance
with art. The Greeks did not conceal the fact, of
their having borrowed largely from Egypt, in reli-
* To suppose such works to have been made, before mankind had any
mechanical knowledge, is like the assertion of Diodorus Siculus, that
machines were not yet invented, when the pyramids were built. Inclined
planes (of earth or sandbags) for building the pyramids, or for raising
roofing stones of Egyptian temples, would certainly not facilitate the
work, but remove one difficulty by supplying a greater.
t Greece wasindebted to that country, for the knowledge of the first
steps towards civilization, and for much of its early colonization; the cur-
rent of which, at a later period, flowed back again from it to Asia Minor.
J They were said to have been from Lycia. Strabo, lib. 6.