392 style in architf.cture. 



Egypt. 



In beginning my historical sketch I must, for the reasons 

 already given, take the granite buildings of Egypt rather than 

 the brick ruins of the country of the Tigris and Euphrates. 



Mud, or wattle and daub, and the cave, are the origin of 

 all Egyptian architecture. From a mud hut to the Temple of 

 Karnac, one of the wonders of the world, is a strange but 

 true process of evolution. The thick battering w^alls, the 

 shapes and very decoration of the columns and cornices show 

 a direct copy, magnified in granite, of the humble mud and 

 reed prototype. The Egyptian column and cornice were 

 originally, it is well known, bundles of reeds or papyrus tied 

 together and plastered with mud. One can understand the 

 process of evolution — indeed, it is going on around us in a less 

 degree — the mud hut got washed away in the rare rains of 

 Egypt, or in the high floods of the Nile; next the mud build- 

 ing was copied in stone; tTien it was enlarged, and finally rich 

 and ambitious Pharoahs built the colossal copies in everlasting 

 granite, surviving to this day. It never seemed to have 

 occurred to these builders that it was possible to depart from 

 the pattern of the mud hut or the rock cut temple. But 

 curiouslv enough they knew of the arch. An existing wine 

 cellar of a Pharoah at Thebes is vaulted with clay arched 

 bricks; yet the architects of those days did not apparently 

 realise the potentialities of the means so nearly within their 

 grasp. There was little development, because none was 

 needed. To keep out the heat and to give size and an ex- 

 pression of immutable power were the chief problems that had 

 to be solved bv the architects of the Pharoahs. Their temples 

 were little more than dark caves, ventilated and lit by the doors 

 only, without: windows or with mere slits in the upper walls. 

 Nothing" more was demanded by their torrid, rainless climate. 

 Except as a lesson in natural evolution we "shall have little to 

 learn from Egyptian architecture, until through the discovery 

 of some gold mine in the Kalahari we may be called upon to 

 colonise that hot and desert country. 



( iREECI-:. 



Greek architecture, developed in a climate like our own, has 

 more of interest for our present study. Its origin, as Dr. 

 Dorpveld, the great Greek antiquarian, has proved, was the 

 mud hut. But a wet climate necessitated a sloping roof, first 

 thatch, then tiles and widely projecting" eaves, carried on 

 wooden poles or tree trunks, to keep the driving" rain off the 

 soft walls. This seems very familiar to us as the South African 

 rondavel. or the square hovel of our outlying" suburbs. If we 

 recognise the parallel, we might now call the stoep the " peri- 

 style," the stone foundation the " orthostatae." In the mud 

 rondavel we must see the prototype of the circular temple, and 

 in the dagga and stoep surrounded thatched square hut, the 

 origin of the Doric Temple and the Parthenon. With evolu- 

 tion " in the air." our minds. I hope, can the more readilv 

 grasp these seeming paradoxes. 



