BOOK XI. 495 



and wide, is erected on a rock foundation, and is distant thirteen feet from 

 the second long wall. On that upright post, and in the second transverse 

 wall, which has at that point a square hole two feet high and wide, is placed 

 a beam thirty-four feet and a palm long. Another beam, of the same length, 

 width, and thickness, is fixed on the same upright post and in the third 

 transverse wall. The heads of those two beams, where they meet, are joined 

 together with iron staples. In a similar manner another post is erected, at a 

 distance of ten feet from the first upright post in the direction of the fourth 

 wall, and two beams are laid upon it and into the same walls in a similar 

 way to those I have just now described. On these two beams and on the 

 fourth long wall are fixed seventeen cross-beams, forty-three feet and three 

 pahns long, a foot wide, and three palms thick ; the first of these is laid upon 

 the second transverse wall, the last lies along the third and fourth transverse 

 walls ; the rest are set in the space between them. These cross-beams are 

 three feet apart one from the other. 



In the ends of these cross-beams, facing the second long wall, are mortised 

 the ends of the same number of rafters reaching to those timbers which 

 stand upright on the second long wall, and in this manner is made the incUned 

 side of the hood in a similar way to the one described in Book IX. To prevent 

 this from falling toward the vertical wall of the hood, there are iron rods 

 securing it, but only a few, because the four brick chimneys which have 

 to be built in that space partly support it. Twelve feet back are likewise 

 mortised into the cross-beams, which lie upon the two longitudinal beams 

 and the fourth long wall, the lower ends of as many rafters, whose upper ends 

 are mortised into the upper ends of an equal number of similar rafters, whose 

 lower ends are mortised to the ends of the beams at the fourth long wall. 

 From the first set of rafters* to the second set of rafters is a distance of twelve 

 feet, in order that a gutter may be well placed in the middle space. Between 

 these two are again erected two sets of rafters, the lower ends of which are like- 

 wise mortised into the beams, which he on the two longitudinal beams and the 

 fourth long wall, and are interdistant a cubit. The upper ends of the ones 

 fifteen feet long rest on the backs of the rafters of the first set ; the ends of the 

 others, which are eighteen feet long, rest on the backs of the rafters of the 

 second set, which are longer ; in this manner, in the middle of the rafters, is 

 a sub-structure. Upon each alternate cross-beam which is placed upon the 

 two longitudinal beams and the fourth long wall is erected an upright post, 

 and that it may be sufficiently firm it is strengthened by means of a slanting 

 timber. Upon these posts is laid a long beam, upon which rests one set of 

 middle rafters. In a similar manner the other set of middle rafters rests on a 

 long beam which is placed upon other posts. Besides this, two feet above 

 every cross-beam, which is placed on the two longitudinal beams and the 



*From this point on, the construction of the roofs, in the absence of illustration, is 

 hopeless of intelligent translation. The constant repetition of " iignum," " tigillum," 

 " trabs," for at least fifteen different construction members becomes most hopelessly involved, 

 especially as the author attempts to distinguish between them in a sort of " House- that- Jack- 

 built " arrangement of explanatory clauses. 



