CIVIL ARCHITECTURE. 



527 



History, their heads, decorated iike the other statues, have rich 

 ^T* * collars round their necks, and jewels of great size in 

 their ears. In the before mentioned recess, the Lingam 

 Saliette. divinity is represented. The Pagoda at Salsett exceeds 

 that at Elephanta ; the two colossal statues immediately 

 before the entrance of the grand temple are 27 feet high ; 

 they have caps and ear-rings. There are here two hundred 

 figures of idols ; 90 of which are in and about the great 

 pagoda. In the interior spaces which recede from the 

 apartments, the Lingam is represented. Many of the 

 sculptures in these grand temples have reference to the 

 astronomical, as well as mythological notions prevalent 

 in India. 



fcllore. At Vellore, Ellore, or Ellora, (Plates CLI. and 



fum CLII.) the sculptures, &c. are still more extraor- 



'M'l ""^ ^' nar y i ant * *M are dedicated to the Lingam or Mahdeu. 



The height of the grand pyramid is here 90 feet ; the 



smaller ones 50 feet ; the obelisks 38 feet. The elephants 



on each side of the court are larger than life ; and there 



is an apartment for the Bull Nundee. See C. W. Malet's 



paper, Asiatic ItesearcheSt vol. vi. p. 383. 



Sir W. Jones (As. Rex. vol. i. p. 253.) is of opinion, 

 that the Eswara and Isi of the Hindoos, are the Isis and 

 Osiris of Egypt. He saya, that the word Miar, the na- 

 tive appellation of Egypt, is familiar in India ; that Tir- 

 hoot was the country, asserted by a learned Bramin, to 

 be that in which an Egyptian colony of priests have 

 come from the Nile to the Ganges and Yamma (Jumna). 

 And again, in his third annual discourse, the remains of 

 architecture and sculpture in India, prove an early con- 

 nection between this country and Africa, the pyramids 

 of Egypt, the colossal statues of the Sphinx, and the 

 Hermes Canis, which last bears a great resemblance to 

 the Varahavatu, or the incarnation of Vishnu, indicate the 

 style and mythology of the same indefatigable workmen, 

 who formed the vast excavations of Canarah, the various 

 temples and images of Buddah, and the idoh which are 

 continually dug up at Gaya. 



Kempfer asserts, that the great Indian saint, Buddha, 

 was a priest of Memphis, and having fled to India, intro- 

 duced the worship of Apis. (Kempfer's Hist. Japan. 

 vol. i. p. 38, ed. 1738.) 



Athanasius Kircher is of opinion, that after Cambyses 

 had murdered Apis, the most revered of the Egyptian 

 deities, he committed wanton cruelties on the priests, and 

 destroyed their magnificent temples, as related by Hero- 

 dotus, that the priests flying into the neighbouring coun- 

 tries of Asia, propagated the superstitions of Egypt. 



The lotus was anciently in Egypt, and still in India, 

 held sacred. Herodotus calls it the lily of the Nile. The 

 Egyptian priests had a sacred language, so have the Bra- 

 mms. The Egyptians, according to Diodorus Siculus 

 were divided into five tribes, of which the first was sacer- 

 dotal. The Indians are separated into four, besides an 

 inferior one, named Buzzer Sunker. 



Father Loubere, who went ambassador from the king of 

 France to the king of Siam, in 1687, thinks the supersti- 

 tion of Boodh no other than the Sommonacodom, or stone 

 deity of the Siamese, originally from Egypt. He says, that 

 their astronomers, have fixed the death of Sommonacodom 

 to the year B. C. 545, and that it was then their first grand 

 astronomical epocha commenced. Now, by Usher, Camby- 

 e invaded Egypt in 525. Loubere adds, that the Siamese 

 priests live in convents, which consist of many cells ran- 

 ged within a large inclosure ; that in the middle of the in- 

 closure stands the temple; that pyramids stand near to 

 and quite round th<- temple, all within four walls. See 

 Loubere's Hist, of Siam, in Harris's Coll. ofVoy. vol. ii. 

 p. 482. 



Sir W. Jones think*, that the great statue of Narayen, History. 

 or the Spirit of God, who, at the beginning, floated on ^"y""' 

 the waters, as that statue is now to be seen in the great 

 reservoir of Catmander, the capital of Nipaul, is the 

 same as the Cneph of Egypt, under a different appella- 

 tion ; both statues are made of blue marble. Sec Asia- 

 tic Researches, vol. i. p. 261. 



Mr Call has published a drawing of the signs of the 

 zodiac, which he found in the ceiling of a choultry at 

 Verdapettah, in the Madurah country, viz. Brahma paint- 

 ed in pagodas, in the act of creation, floating over the 

 watery abyss, reclining upon the expanded leaf of lotus, 

 Osiris found in the same attitude, recumbent on the same 

 plant, in the Egyptian monuments. Maurice, vol. ii. p- 

 394. 



OF PERSIAN ARCHITECTURE. 



The south western districts of Asia, although the Persian ar- 

 centre from whence, we have reason to think, mankind chitectiif. 

 originally spread in all directions, has undergone such 

 frequent and complete changes, that we have scarcely 

 any vestiges of its very ancient edifices left, and even the 

 descriptions of the earliest historians convey but imper- 

 fect ideas of their magnitude or forms ; the reason of 

 this will be evident, from considering that the dominion 

 has been successively in the hands of the Assyrian*, 

 Medes, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Saracens, and Turks. 



Although there may be reason to suspect some exag- General re- 

 geration in the accounts transmitted by Herodotus and marks, 

 others, it is clear they were the results of the enquiries of 

 curious and able men ; they at least prove, that the mag- 

 nitude of the cities, palaces, and temples of Assyria and 

 Chaldea, must have been very great ; and when we con- 

 sider the population and riches of the empires of which 

 these cities were the capitals, and that to their decoration 

 every despotic monarch would apply the whole resources 

 of his empire, we should hesitate in assigning the limit . 

 of their operations, particularly when it is considered, 

 that although despotism cannot create genius, or oblige 

 it in a short period to produce fine architecture, sculp- * 



ture, and painting, yet when magnitude alone is concern- 

 ed, simple manual labour to almost any extent was per- 

 fectly within its power. Those who will take the trouble 

 of acquiring a distinct knowledge of what has been per- 

 formed during the last 50 years, in extending towns, con- 

 structing harbours, navigable canals, roads, and bridges, 

 within the island of Great Britain alone, will not be 

 astonished by the accounts given of the vast cities of the 

 east. 



Babylon and Nineveh appear both to have existed at 

 the same time, and to have been nearly of the same mag- 

 nitude, viz. from 48 to 60 miles in circumference. 



Babylon was situated in 32 34' N. Latitude, and 44 Babylon. 

 12' 30" E. Longitude, in the extensive and rich plain of 

 Shinar, at the top of the Delta, formed by the Euphra- 

 tes and the Tigris. Its original founder is said to have 

 been Nimrod, 2000 years B. C. but it was rebuilt by the 

 celebrated Assyrian queen Semiramis, 1200 B. C. and en- 

 larged and perfected by Nebuchadnezzar, about 600 B.C. 

 It was divided by the Euphrates passing through it from 

 north to south, the old city being on the east, and the 

 new on the west side of the river, both together forming a 

 square 15 miles on each side- It was divided by 25 

 streets 150 feet broad, running in each direction, and 

 crossing at eight angles, besides streets of 200 feet in 

 breadth, passing along the inside of the walls ; the 

 whole space was thus divided into 676 squares, along 

 which the houses were built at some distance from each 

 other. The intermediate spaces were occupied by gar- 



