Wilkinson, John Gardner: The Architecture Of Ancient Egypt: In Which The Columns Are Arranged In Orders, And The Temples Classified; With Remarks On The Early Progress Of Architecture, Etc.; With A Large Volume Of Plates Ilustrative Of The Subject, And Containing The Various Columns And details, From Actual Measurement (Text) (London, 1850)

PART II. VARIETY OF COLUMNS. 61

neither the Greeks, nor even the Romans, ever ob-
tained any influence in Egypt over sacred matters;
and of all people, those two were the least likely to
introduce a deviation from symmetry, unequalled
anywhere except in Gothic churches. But it was per-
fectly compatible with Egyptian taste; the outer area
of Medeenet Haboo has columns with capitals of the
full-blown papyrus on one side, and on the other
Osiride pillars; and if carried to a greater length
in late buildings, it was only the extension of an
early Egyptian caprice. As the love of variety
increased, they were not satisfied to make opposite
columns of a different order; at length no one was
permitted to be like its neighbour; and this led
them to add so many new varities to the composite
column.*

Like the other parts of an Egyptian building,
the columns Avere not finished, till after they were
put up; and the unfinished capitals were frequently
seen, with no nearer approach to their intended
form than in three sets of stones, projecting one
beyond the other; which differed slightly, accord-
ing to the variety to which they were to belong.f

In this same order may be classed some fanci-
ful columns at Karnak, of the early time of
Thothmes III; wdrich present the singular novelty
of capitals placed upside down, and a shaft thicker
at the upper than the lower end;% the cornice
projecting beneath the windows, in the same build-

* I have given the most common varieties ; they amounted, in Roman
times, to more than twenty. Vide supra, p. 29.
t Vide Plate xii, fig. 5. % Vide Plate xv, figs. 1, 2.