been the usual method of fortification, as it
seems to have served as a type for conventional
representation, and was sometimes used to denote cities
which had fortifications of another kind. For instance,
Dapur-Tabor is represented in this way, while a picture on
another monument, which is reproduced in the illustration on
page 185, represents what seems to have been the particular
form of its encompassing walls.

The building was strong enough not only to defy the bands of adventurers
who roamed the country, but was able to resist for an indefinite time
the operations of a regular siege. Sometimes, however, the inhabitants
when constructing their defences did not confine themselves to this
rudimentary plan, but threw up earthworks round the selected site. On
the most exposed side they raised an advance wall, not exceeding twelve
or fifteen feet in height, at the left extremity of which the entrance
was so placed that the assailants, in endeavouring to force their way
through, were obliged to expose an unprotected flank to the defenders.
By this arrangement it was necessary to break through two lines of
fortification before the place could be entered. Supposing the enemy to
have overcome these first obstacles, they would find themselves at
their next point of attack confronted with a citadel which contained,
in addition to the sanctuary of the principal god, the palace of the
sovereign himself. This also had a double enclosing wall and massively
built gates, which could be forced only at the expense of fresh losses,
unless the cowardice or treason of the garrison made the assault an easy
one.*

* The type of town described in the text is based on a
representation on the walls of Karnak, where the siege of
Dapur-Tabor by Ramses II. is depicted. Another type is given
in the case of Ascalon.

[Illustration: 187.jpg THE MIGDOL OF RAMSES III. AT THEBES, IN THE
TEMPLE OF MEDINET-ABUL]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph taken by Deveria
in 1865.

Of these bulwarks of Canaanite civilization, which had been thrown up by
hundreds on the route of the invading hosts, not a trace is to be seen
to-day. They may have been razed to the ground during one of those
destructive revolutions to which the country was often exposed, or
their remains may lie hidden underneath the heaps of ruins which thirty
centuries of change have raised over them.*

* The