184 BUTLER— ARC H.EO LOGICAL EXPEDITION TO SYRIA. 



April 19, 



These parts of Syria have been but Httle explored ; few of the 

 sites visited by our expedition appear upon any map. The pioneer 

 explorer was the ^Marquis de Vogiie, who published maps of two 

 small sections of the country, together with one hundred and fifty 

 drawings of architecture, as the result of his journey in 1860-61. 

 Since that time no systematic explorations have been carried on 

 here, though occasional travellers have crossed the region at one 

 point or another. And, though the great high-road between Da- 

 mascus and Aleppo passes through the northern district, there are 

 important sites within a few miles of it, on either side, that have 

 never been recorded, and probably never visited, by Europeans since 

 the Roman legions were withdrawn. The maps made by our sur- 

 veyors will add the names of forty ancient towns and a far larger 

 number of smaller sites to the map of Syria, will show the courses 

 of ancient streams and roads, and will thus contribute to Syrian 

 cartography. 



A great body of monuments of architecture is being published 

 from the measured drawings, notes and photographs made by our 

 expedition. The earliest building with a definite date belongs to 

 the second century, B. C, though there are undoubtedly some of 

 the structures that are of greater antiquity. From the first cen- 

 tury, B. C, to the beginning of the seventh, A. D., there is a great 

 number of definitely dated monuments — buildings of all kinds, 

 temples, palaces, public baths, theatres, fortresses, churches, private 

 residences and tombs of greater or less architectural importance. 

 The great periods represented are the Nabataean of the first cen- 

 tury B.C.-A. D., the Roman of the second and third centuries, 

 A. D., and the- Christian of the fourth to the seventh century. The 

 most important of these are the Nabatsean and the Christian, the 

 former as representing the earliest pre-Christian Arabic civilization. 

 The monuments of this period show great dignity of design, grand- 

 eur of scale, richness of decoration and fineness of execution, both 

 in the art of building and of carving. This architectural style has 

 been, hitherto, practically unknown. The buildings of the Chris- 

 tian period also present a style of architecture that stands by itself. 

 They illustrate, in well preserved examples, every variety of struc- 

 ture required by a highly civilized people. We have found here the 



