hypostyle halls of Egypt. And yet we cannot say that they
showed any lack of originality or invention in their choice of decorations
for the bases and capitals of their columns. Their favourite motive seems
to have been the volute, to which, however, they gave an endless variety.
They used it, no doubt, in many ways that now escape us, and by applying it
now to this purpose and now to that, and sometimes with the happiest
results, they accumulated an amount of experience as to the value of those
graceful curves which was of great value to their successors. Who those
successors were and how they carried to perfection a form which had its
origin on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates, will be shown in the
course of our history.

NOTES:

[251] See above, p. 118, note 1.

[252] TAYLOR, _Notes on Abou-Sharein, and Tell-el-Lahm_, (_Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society_, vol. xv. p. 404).--ED.

[253] This inscription is published in full in the _Cuneiform Inscriptions
of Western Asia_, vol. v. part ii.

[254] The names of these three deities are furnished by the inscription
which runs beneath the canopy of the pavilion (see Fig. 71).

[255] The disk upon the table is enough by itself to betray the identity of
the god, but as if to render assurance doubly sure, the artist has taken
the trouble to cut on the bed of the relief under the three small figures,
an inscription which has been thus translated by MM. OPPERT and MENANT:
"Image of the Sun, the Great Lord, who dwells in the temple of Bit-para, in
the city of Sippara."

[256] See our _History of Art in Ancient Egypt_, vol. ii. chap. 1, Sec. 1.

[257] PLACE, _Ninive_, vol. i. pp. 120-122, and vol. iii. plate 73.

[258] In this connection Sir H. LAYARD makes an observation to which the
attention of the artist should be drawn. Whenever pictures of _Belshazzar's
Feast_ and the _Last Night of Babylon_ are painted massive Egyptian pillars
are introduced: nothing could be more contrary to the facts (_Discoveries_,
p. 581).

[259] M. PLACE, indeed, encountered an octagonal column on the mound of
Karamles, but the general character of the objects found in that excavation
led him to conclude positively that the column in question was a relic from
the Parthian or Sassanide epoch (_Ninive_, vol. ii. pp. 169, 170).

[260] _History of Art in Ancient Egypt_, vol. ii. p. 95.

[261] _Ibid._ vol. i. p. 397, fig. 230; and vol. ii. p. 105, fig. 84.

[262] The profiles of the c