517 



MACSOLECM. 



MAUSOLEUM. 



HI 



T. Newton, an assistant in the Department of Antlquitlei of the Brltis n 

 Museum, now thoroughly reinvestigated the whole subject, and pub- 

 lished the result of his inquiries in a paper which appeared in the ' Classi- 

 cal Museum,' vol. T. (1847). Later Mr. Newton visited Budrum, and 

 having submitted a propoaition for exploring the site of the Mausoleum 

 which met with the approval of the government, he was appointed vice- 

 consul at Mitylene ; a tirman was obtained from the Porte, empowering 

 him to make the requisite excavations, and the English government 

 (the Earl of Clarendon being then Foreign Secretary) supplied him 

 with a ship of-war, a body of sappers, an officer of engineers, and an 

 accomplished architect as assistants, together with every requisite for 

 the successful prosecution of the undertaking. The remarkable results 

 of the explorations, so far beyond what the most sanguine hod anti- 

 cipated, have been published in the " Papers respecting the excava- 

 tions at Budrum," presented to Parliament in 1853-59, and in various 

 literary journals and proceedings of societies; but a more ample, 

 thoroughly digested, and fully illustrated work on the subject, by 

 Mr. Newton and Mr. PulLin. the architect associated with him, is an- 

 nounced as ready for publication. To that we must refer for further infor- 

 mation. Here it will be enough to say that after one or two essays in 

 the place comnonly supposed to be the site of the Mausoleum, Mr. 

 Newton commenced working on a spot indicated by Professor Donald- 

 son, and soon found that he had come upon the actual site. The 

 explorations were necessarily long and tedious. Mr. Newton had to 

 purchase and remove several houses, to employ a large number of 

 native hands, and to exercise great caution in his dealing with the 

 Turkish authorities. But his labour was well repaid. 



He found statues, bassi-relievi, columns, and other architectural 

 features, all broken and fragmentary, and all heaped confusedly 

 together ; but all were patiently collected, sorted, and sent to England. 

 Here by the skilful experts of the British Museum they were 

 thoroughly examined, and in many instances from among the discon- 

 nected fragments whole figures have been with rare dexterity pieced 

 together. Chief of these was the master-work, a draped statue, 10 feet 

 high, of Mausolus himself, which was in more than sixty pieces, and 

 which were successively picked out, identified, and fitted together into 

 perhaps the noblest work of its class in existence ; while the relievi with 

 those already in the Museum form an entire length of upwards of 80 feet 

 of frieze, also in its way unrivalled. With these marbles thus diligently 

 classified and arranged, and the explorations of Mr. Newton on the site, 

 so much has now been discovered that not only has the actual site 

 been identified beyond possibility of dispute, but the extent, dimen- 

 sions, and character of the entire edifice have been so clearly eluci- 

 dated, that, when one or two points are agreed upon, the architect will 

 be able to restore as completely the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus as any 

 other of the great buildings of antiquity. 



A few words'will show the results actually obtained. Mr. Newton 

 having fortunately struck early upon an angle of the building was able 

 to work down to the marble floor of its original foundation, and to 

 trace the outline of its boundary walls. Hyginus mentions that the 

 Mausoleum stood within * pcriboliu, or sacred enclosure, 1340 feet in 

 circumference. This enclosure Mr. Newton found, and though, from 

 part of the ground being occupied by buildings, he could not trace 

 it throughout its extent, he was able to determine that instead of 

 being oblong, as was supposed, it was a square, the sides of which 

 were 337 feet, and that the Mausoleum occupied nearly the centre of 

 the quadrangle. The foundations of the Mausoleum which appear 

 to have been laid on the site of a quarry which had been used as a 

 cemetery proved to be 124 feet by ll)7. The basement, the interior 

 of which was built of a kind of green-ragstone, was 65 feet high and 

 112 feet long by 93 feet wide making very nearly Pliny's 411 feet 

 " tutus circuitus." Its sides were decorated with the friezes (perhaps 

 in two tiers) spoken of by Pliny. The peristyle consisted of thirty-six 

 Ionic columns, which by the drums of the shafts, or frusta, it was 

 ascertained were within an inch or two of the height named by Pliny 

 (374 '*' or 25 cubits). These columns surrounded a cella or temple (the 

 pteron of Pliny) which was 63 feet by 46 feet : on the long sides were 

 eleven columns, on the fronts nine the actual space between the 

 columns being exactly the same (T 4') "as in the Temple of Minerva 

 at Prisne, which in other respects bears a great resemblance to the 

 Mausoleum, was built about the same period, and not improbably by the 

 same architect." (Newton). As to the remarkable pyramid described as 

 rising above this pteron, Mr. Newton found a number of marble blocks 

 or tiles, 2 or 3 feet broad, but of a uniform depth of 11] inches, and 

 having on the upper side a groove, on the lower a flange, so as to joint 

 firmly into each other. Twenty-four of these, with the quadriga and 

 figures on the apex, make up almost exactly the 374 ' eet ' the ancient 

 description. These blocks, however, when protracted, as shown in the 

 restoration of Mr. Newton and Lieut. Smith, render necessary a space 

 of 224 feet from the centres of the columns to the walls of the cells in 

 order to allow adequate extension to the base of the pyramid. This, 

 besides the unusual extent to be borne without visible means of 

 support -and which presents a great constructive difficulty gave so 

 Bat a pyramid as to have a somewhat ungraceful appearance; and 

 Mr. Ferguseon has accordingly very acutely suggested that the 

 pyramid instead of having the usual flat sides was curvilinear in 

 outline, like the roofs of the Lycian tombs. This would afford a 

 better outline and stfem to suit better PUny's resemblance of the 



Pyramidal roof to a meta ; but It has its difficulties, and the point 

 must be regarded as at present unsettled : in other respects there 

 does not seem to be much difference of opinion. Mr. PulUvn, however, 

 who supposes that by the pteron Pliny intended the peristyle and not 

 the cella, believes that he shall be able, in Mr. Newton's forthcoming 

 work, to put forth a restoration that will satisfactorily meet the various 

 difficulties. The core of the basement, as we have seen, was of green- 

 ragstone ; but all that was visible of the entire building was of marble 

 coloured, however, as Mr. Newton thinks, from the traces he dis- 

 covered, with the brightest blue and vermilion. Altogether, this very 

 remarkable resuscitation has abundantly confirmed the statements of 

 ancient writers as to the surpassing beauty and splendour of this 

 unique edifice. 



The vast collection of fragments of the Mausoleum brought to this 

 country, is as present placed in a temporary enclosure under the portico 

 of the British Museum, and not yet open to the public inspection. 

 They comprise, as we said, a very Urge quantity of miscellaneous archi- 

 tectural fragments of great interest to the architect and archaeolo- 

 gist, and many valuable sculptural remains. These last include 

 portrait statues of Mausolus and Artemisia probably the most 

 ancient examples of Oreek portrait-statuary yet discovered, and very 

 admirable as works of art. There are besides a colossal seated 

 female figure, a male torso, and fragments of several other statues. 

 Of equal interest with the Mausolus, but in another way, arc the 

 portions of two of the horses of the quadriga, which are larger in 

 scale (they stood 10 feet high) than any other ancient marble h. : 

 discovered, and (allowing for the altitude at which they were placed) 

 hardly inferior in style to the famous horses of the Parthenon; 

 while the interest attached to them is not a little increased by the 

 head retaining its original bronze bridle and accoutrements the only 

 instance known of this kind of decoration (though often referred to in 

 ancient writing) which has come down to the present time. Another 

 important fragment is that of the body of a horse and the torso of 

 its rider, of colossal size, and of the most admirable design. Of 

 the frieze, altogether 80 feet in extent, it is said by Mr. Newton that 

 "no museum can show so magnificent a series of high reliefs." 

 Besides these, there are six figures of lions in very tolerable pre- 

 servation, and several fragments of lions, and broken portions of the 

 frieze. 



The Mausoleum erected at Babylon by Alexander the Great, in 

 honour of Hephsestion, appears to have been equally magnificent with 

 that at Halicarnassus, but less refined, and indeed somewhat extrava- 

 gant in its decorations, as far as can be gathered from the account 

 given of it by Diodorus (xvii. 115). It was adorned below by the 

 gilded rostra, or beaks, of two hundred and forty ships, and every suc- 

 cessive tier or story was enriched with a profusion of sculpture repre- 

 senting various animals, fighting centaurs, and other figures, all of 

 which were gilt ; and on the summit were statues of sirens, made 

 hollow, in order that the singers who chanted the funereal dirge might 

 be concealed within them. 



The Mausoleums of Augustus and Hadrian at Rome were structures 

 of great magnitude and grandeur, and resembled each other in being 

 circular in plan. The first stood in the Campus Martius, where 

 remains of it yet exist in the two concentric circles forming the first 

 and second stories of the building, and the vaulted chambers between, 

 which supported the first or lowest terrace. Of these terraces there 

 were three ; consequently four stages in the building, gradually 

 decreasing in diameter, the uppermost of which was crowned by a 

 colossal statue of the emperor. The terraces themselves were planted 

 with trees.) * 



Hadrian's Mausoleum, now converted into the Castello di S. Angela, 

 in which shape it is familiar to almost every one, is a work of massive 

 construction, and originally presented an unbroken circular mass of 

 building, erected upon a larger square basement, lofty in itself, yet of 

 moderate height in proportion to tho superstructure, the latter 

 about twice as high as the former. This nearly solid rotunda, \\lii, U 

 was originally coated with white marble, had on its summit nun: 

 fine statues, which were broken to pieces and the fragments Imrlnl 

 down by the soldiers of Bclisarius upon the Goths, who attempted to 

 take the building by storm. Neither are any remains now left of the 

 uppermost stage of the edifice, which assumed the form of a circular 

 peripteral temple, whose diameter was about one-third of the 

 circle. According to tradition, its peristyle consisted of the twenty- 

 four beautiful marble Corinthian columns which afterwards decorated 

 the Basilica of San Paolo fuori delle Mura; and its tholus or dome wan 

 surmounted by a colossal pine-apple in bronze, now placed in tho 

 gardens of the Vatican. 



Such places as Henry VII.'s Chapel and the Pantheon of the 

 Escurial may also be considered as mausoleums; but the term i-i 

 generally restricted to a detached edifice erected merely as a private 

 burying place or to contain tombs. There are several structures of 

 the kind in the parks of our nobility ; among the more remarkable is 

 that at Castle Howard, the seat of the Earl of Carlisle, and one of 

 Hawksaioor s best works, a circular edifice in the Komaii Doric style, 

 elevated upon a basement, and crowned by a dome : plans, sections, 

 &c., of this structure have been beautifully engraved by Moses. The 

 Marquis of Kockingham'a mausoleum by Carr is another ornamental 

 structure of the kind, composed of three stories, Doric, Ionic, and 



