OF ARTS AND SCIENCES. 245 



greatest profusion, with here and there one partially adorned with paint- 

 ings or bas-reliefs ; * and on the other, columns representing a quar- 

 tette of buds, without a trace of any connection with square piers, or 

 of any preparatory stage of development. In the second place, some 

 features found in the perfected forms must at least have been added 

 after the entire emancipation of the bunch from its supposed early 

 union with the pier. Such characteristics are the astragal, the astra- 

 gal pieces, and the general form of the whole as related to the remainder 

 of the building. To bring out the latter point, a comparison may be 

 made between the southern and northern tombs at Benihassan. The 

 former contain our principal examples of lotus-bud columns ; the latter, 

 only the fluted prisms of which so much was said in Essay I. In 

 both cases there are instances of pilasters projecting from the side- 

 walls in line with the columns or piers, but mark the difference: with 

 the latter, the width of the pilasters exactly equals the diameter of the 

 bottom of the pier, and, indeed, the pilaster is carried over by the 

 architrave, and its width directly conferred upon the abacus ; while with 

 the former, the width of the pilaster is 8 cm. less than the lower diam- 

 eter of the shaft, 9 cm. less than the greatest diameter of the capital, 

 and about as much greater than the top and bottom diameters of the 

 capital. (Figs. 2 and 5.) As these two forms are probably of the 

 same period, the conclusion is inevitable that the pier was properly con- 

 ceived to be a remnant, somewhat altered, of the wall indicated by the 

 pilasters and architrave, wdiile at the same time the column was as 

 properly conceived to be undetermined except in position by the pilas- 

 ters, an importation from another style of building, and hence really 

 exempt from any limitation of dimension that the pilasters could im- 

 pose, f These facts combined, though not absolutely disproving Wil- 

 kinson's theory, seem to render it quite doubtful. 



For my own part, until some adequate proof of another derivation 

 is advanced, I think it more reasonable to consider this lotus group a 

 free and altogether creditable invention of early Egyptian fancy, the 

 origin or occasion of which was the abundance of lotus-flowers in> 



for the substantiation of any theory. The point here is simply that there is no 

 satisfactory evidence in the actual forms that the conceptions of the Egyptians 

 took the route suggested by Wilkinson to reach the lotus-bud column. 



* As for example at Zauiet-el-Meitin (Lepsius, i. 57 ; Reber, Kunstgescfr., fig. 

 9, p. 14, etc.), which example proves only that plants were depicted fn has* 

 reliefs. As it represents open lotus-flowers, it really adds nothing to the probab- 

 ility of Wilkinson's theory. 



t Compare Essay I., § 7. 



