184.9."! 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



in 



Mr. Ferg:usson's theory is that there r.re in Greece two distinct 

 and separate civilizations, one of which succeeded, and to a great 

 extent superseded, the otlier. The first he calls Pelaspc— that is, 

 Ibero-Pelaspic, which hegan with the foundation of Arpos, about 

 the year 8200 of the Decimal Era, and continued down to the 

 return of the Heraclida?, eighty years after the fall of Troy, or 

 about the year 8900. 



After a long- night of four centuries, the second Hellenic, Indo- 

 European civilization begins todawnon us, and continued to grow 

 towards perfection till the time of Alexander ; and after languish- 

 ing for about two centuries longer, at last sank beneath the star of 

 Roman influence. 



This is quite consonant with what happened elsewhere in Eu- 

 rope, in Italy, in Spain, and perhaps, as IMr. Fergusson suggests, in 

 Western Asia. 



Mr. Fergusson, as already stated, holds that those he has here 

 called Pelasgic were a race closely allied to the Etruscans, speak- 

 ing a similar language and practising the same arts; and that 

 therefore they were a people who came, like the latter, from Asia 

 Minor, and spoke a tongue having no likeness with the Indo- 

 Germanic tongue we now know as Greek. 



In the case of Greece, Mr. Fergusson does not think that the 

 Ibero-Pelasgi constituted the bulk of the population, but were 

 only settlers. We do not see any reason for this limitation, as an 

 Ibero-Pelasgic occupation in mass would not be inconsistent with 

 the historical results in Greece, any more than in Etruria. 



The writer takes the opportunity to draw attention to a dis- 

 tinction very seldom observed between the settlement of a whole 

 country and the subjection of a ruder people by a more civilised 

 race. When, as he says, in the latter days of the Roman empire, 

 whole bands moved into thinly-peo])led countries, bringing with 

 them their wives and households, they brought likewise their 

 speech, laws, and customs ; and where they were the more nume- 

 rous and more powerful body, they obliterated those of the pre- 

 vious inhabitants. But when the immigrants are only a few ad- 

 venturers, or a band of soldiers, they adopt wi\'es from among the 

 conquered races, and their children learn to speak literally their 

 mother tongue, and soon lose their own. To this may be added, 

 that this likewise takes place where the dominant caste is spread 

 over a wide district, and not concentrated in separate districts, 

 however small. Of the first case there is an example in Britain, 

 by the settlement of the English tribes — the English, Warings, 

 Saxons, Jutes, Frisians, Danes, Bructuars, Vandals, &c. Of the 

 latter cases there are examples in the settlement of the Franks in 

 France, Burgundians in Burgundy, Goths in Spain, Longbeards in 

 Lombardy ; Warings, Russians, and English in Russia ; Normans 

 in Britain, Normandy, and Sicily, — where although, except in the 

 case of the Goths and Noringens in Spain, the invading tribe was 

 strong enough to impose its own name upon the conquered coun- 

 try, it gave up in the end its language, laws, and manners for those 

 of the conquered. The settlement of the English in Ireland, and 

 of the Magyars in Hungary, is that of the partial occupation of 

 the country by a conquering tribe, the imposition of laws, and the 

 plantation of the language, though not its general adoption. The 

 settlement of the Flemings in Govver; of the English in Pembroke- 

 shire and in Wexfordshire, at Forth and Bargy ; and of the High 

 Dutch in the Sete Communi in Lombardy, are examples of the 

 preservation of a separate language by a small community. 



Mr. Fergusson's theory, however, reduces itself to this form — 

 that Greece, before the time of the Inachids in the year 8200, was 

 peopled by a race of Indo-European or Celto-Hellenic savages, the 

 forefathers of the Hellens, who were civilised and made to live in 

 towns, and taught the arts of peace by a few Ibero-Pelasgic immi- 

 grants, who had long practised those arts in Asia and Egypt ; and 

 who were, in consequence, so far in advance of their subjects as to 

 remain the dominant tribe for centuries, though too few in num- 

 ber to introduce their language — on the contrary, they were forced 

 to speak that of the subject races. Our writer allows that his 

 Pelasgi, when living by themselves, did speak a barbarous lan- 

 guage, wholly unlike the Greek, and continued to do so down to 

 the time of Herodotus. 



We think it much more consistent with historic likelihood to 

 suppose that the Ibero-Pelasgians were the dominant race, and 

 were slowly superseded, and as it were worn out, by the Celto- 

 Hellens, — as took place in Italy, Spain, Gaul, and Siluria ; a pro- 

 cess similar to that now going on on the the borders of Wales, the 

 Highlands, and in Ireland, by the advance of the English. Such 

 a process is favoured in a double form — by the immigration of the 

 predominant race among the inferior race, and by the emigration 

 of the inferior race towards the metropolis of the predominant 

 race. This took place in Etruria as regarded Rome : it does now 



in the Celtic lands as regards the English metropolitan towns; 

 and would among the Greek Pelasgi and the Hellens. 



Our writer does not think that the Inachid immigrants from 

 Egypt into Greece were Egyptians — but Pelasgi, perhai)S fugitive 

 Hy'ksos. This gets over the difficulty of the incompatibility, with 

 Egyptian habits, of such emigrations and maritime expeditions. 

 He, however, believes that Cecrops was a native of Sais in the 

 Delta, but leaves it unsettled whether he were a born Copt, or the 

 offspring of the stranger tribes. 



'We agree fully in the influence which the Pheniciau traders 

 must have had in' Greece. This is shown even in the Homeric 

 poems. He considers the Phenician traders introduced the alpha- 

 bet. We do not : we think it was the Pelasgians. 



Upon the theory he has laid down the writer says, with great 

 truth, that there is no difficulty in understanding why the arts of 

 early Greece and of Etruria should be so similar, as they really 

 are ; nor why the intercourse between Greece and Asia Minor 

 should have been so frequent as it was in those days. Mr. Fergus- 

 son holds that the Argonauts and the heroes of Troy were Pelas- 

 gians. Upon this latter hypothesis we do not feel fully satisfied. 

 Applying his principles to architecture, ISIr. Fergusson says he 

 thinks he can trace most distinctly the existence of these two 

 races " architecturally," both in Greece and Italy. He looks upon 

 it as nearly certain, that all the polygonal masonry and walls were 

 the work of the Indo-Germanic aborigines, whether Hellens or 

 Dorians; Oscans, Sabellians, or Umbrians. On the other hand, 

 the Pelasgians, Tyrrhenians, or Etruscans, always show masom-y 

 in flat courses, more or less perfect. This distinction seems to 

 harmonise the classification of what are called Cyclopean works; 

 but we see no reason therefrom to assert that the Indo-Germanic 

 works as the ruder are therefore the older. In Britain, the ^Velsh 

 and old English undoubtedly executed rude works with the Roman 

 models before them. This appears to us more confirmed from 

 what Mr. Fergusson himself says, that the Dorian races used this 

 polygonal masonry long after 'the return of the Heraclida?, and 

 mi.xed with the more perfect forms which, from their position, 

 must have been used synchronously, as in the Temple of Themis 

 at Rhamnus, or in the Bridge at Xero-Campo, or in Italy in the 

 walls of Cosa and Pompeii. In a wall in the Peloponnesus, the 

 polygonal masonry is actually raised on the top of the horizontal 

 masonry, which is to us strong proof of our position. 



To the polygonal masonry, Mr. Fei'gusson proposes to restrict 

 the term Cyclopean. Of the Pelasgic remains, Mr. Fergusson 

 has spoken at some length; and the so-called Treasury of Atreus 

 at Mycen^, he very ingeniously distinguishes as a tomb. 



In 'coming to the later works of the Hellens, our writer prepares 

 his way by asserting that the lonians were Pelasgised Hellens, 

 and the Dorians ruder Indo-Germans. Hence he distinguishes 

 between the rough Dorians of Sparta and the milder lonians of 

 Athens and Asia Minor; but we do not think his theory carries 

 conviction. He allows, however, that in the four centuries of 

 slumber, the Hellenic tribes nursed and prepared themsehes for 

 their subsequent career. 



Mr. Fergusson's sections on Homer, and on the climate and race 

 of Greece, are original and ingenious, and tempt us to make some 

 observations on tliem; but we are forced to pass them by. 



Of Dorian architecture the temples are the only remains we 

 have, but fortiinately in suflicient number to enable us to judge of 

 their condition when perfect. Their forms are always very simple; 

 and our writer asserts that this was because the buildings were the 

 mere framework for the display of the several arts ; and that any 

 novelty or complexity of design might, by attracting attention, 

 have interfered with the pre-eminence they wished to assign to the 

 more important arts. We do not think this a very happy explana- 

 tion. 



The peristylar temple, it is here suggested, was borrowed by the 

 Greeks from'the Egyptians; and it is certainly in favour of this 

 supposition, that such buildings were used on the banks of the 

 Nile before even the walls of Tyrinthus were built, and nearly a 

 thousand years before the erection of the oldest example of a 

 colonnade found in Greece. The reasons for the adaptation the 

 writer conceives to be two-fold : first, to get a beautiful external 

 framing to their temples, and to give the greatest possible value 

 to the dimensions of the building, for a peristylar temple arranged 

 as the Greeks arranged theirs, would appear nearly twice as large 

 as one of like dimensions with only plain unbroken walls. The 

 next motive was to shelter from the weather the paintings with 

 which their walls were covered, and to do this in such a way that 

 the framing of the pillars should add to the effect of the paintings; 

 and what is of no less importance, that the painting should at the 

 same time relieve and give effect to the columnar ordonnance. 



