TEKRA-COTTA KOOFING-TILI-:S. 5 



memoir to be referred to later on, descril)es what ho be- 

 lieves to be the earliest known terra-cotta roofing-tiles. 

 These were found in the ruins of the Temple of Hera, at 

 Olynipia, dating nearly a thousand years before Christ. 

 This ancient tile consists of two elements, a wide under 



piece (tegula) slightly 

 curved, and a narrow, 

 semi-cylindrical piece 

 (imbrex) which was 

 placed in an inverted 

 position so as to cover 

 the junction of two adja- 

 FiG. 5. cent tegulse (fig. 5). 



Of significance, also, is the statement that the open end 

 of the imbrex, where it bordered the eaves, is closed by a 

 circular disk, ornamented in rosette pattern. To iind the 

 counterpart of this we have to go to Korea and Japan and, 

 presumably, China. Fortunately, the varied tastes of the 

 Japanese collector have led to the treasuring-up of old roof- 

 ing-tiles, either for their antiquity or because they were 

 associated with some famous temple. In Japan, one may 

 often see an old tile that has been dug up utilized for 

 an ink-stone. Ninagawa, the famous Japanese antiqua- 

 rian, contemplated the publication of an illustrated work 

 on ancient roofing-tiles, to form one of the numbers of his 

 ^^Kwan ko dzu setsu." The lithographic plates were pre- 

 pared for this number ; Avhether the text was ever published 

 I cannot say. Fortunately securing a set of these plates, 

 I managed to get from the author, some years before his 

 death, the names and dates of the tiles figured. As to the 

 ages attributed to these there may be some doubt, but that 

 some are Korean is a matter easily established by an ex- 

 pert in pottei'y, as the clay at once reveals the origin of 

 the piece. Some of these were believed by Ninagawa to 



