359 



ON THE RESULTS OF THE AUCH. 



The early history of the arch, which has engaged the judicious 

 notice of your correspondent in former numbers, opens for exantli- 

 nation a subject of remarkably varied and extensive interest, and 

 one which lies within the range of popular apprehension apart 

 from the existence of much architectural judgment, or the exercise 

 of much antiquarian research. The invention of the arch, itideed, 

 surpasses every other discovery of the ancient or modern art 

 of building in the variety and magnitude of its results ; and has 

 been the means of effecting such a revolution in the principles 

 of construction, and of eliciting such beauties in the materials of 

 design, as are without a parallel in the productions of the ages 

 which preceded its introduction, and must remain unrivalled 

 in importance by the performances of all subsequent periods* 

 Though this is to affirm much, yet the statement is capable of 

 demonstration from a comparison of the remains of antiquity, and 

 a consideration of the nature and properties of those materials 

 in which architectural compositions are embodied. 



Before, however, I proceed to the further notice of the results 

 alluded to, allow me to make one or two remarks with reference id 

 the particular Athenian example on which your correspondent 

 dilates in your first number. The Arch of Adrian, if it possess any 

 claim to be designated, also that of -5Lgeus or of Theseus, can 

 be supported in such a claim only upon the supposition of its 

 having been dedicated to the memory of either of those heroes, as 

 in the case of the Temple of Theseus in Lower Athens, or the 

 Erectheum in the Acropolis, and not upon any pretension to a 

 remoteness of antiquity extending to the reign of ^Egeus or his 

 son. Whether or not, on the other hand, that structure were the 

 work of so late a period as the reign of Adrian may not be affirmed 

 as a matter of absolute certainty. One of the inscriptions which 

 it bears would seem to imply that it was primarily erected to the 

 honour of Theseus, but that the people of Athens were willing to 

 merge that honour in their respect for the Roman Emperor in 

 whose reign the inscription itself was formed. However, that this 

 example belongs to a period subsequent not only to the triumphs 

 of art under the administration of Pericles, but also to the mixture 

 of taste which followed the subjugation of Greece to the Roman 

 power, is a^ evident from the style of its whole composition, both 

 in mass and in detail, as is any principal point in the architectural 

 chronology of our own country from the era of the Norman 

 conquest down to this imitative age. Indeed it were an attempt 

 fruitless as curious to ascertain what were the characteristics 

 of Athenian architecture at a period so remote as the reign of 

 ^geus. Occupying a middle position between the immigration 

 of Cecrops from Egypt and the era of the recorded performances 



