96 ON COLOUR. Paet I. 



blue and yellow for architectural decoration ; and gold was 

 added in highly ornamented mouldings. This did not, how- 

 ever, exclude some other colours, which were occasionally 

 used on the interior walls, as any one may see at the Par- 

 thenon; and, according to Mr. Gr. Semper, "all the flat 

 ground members, as the walls — often decorated with paint- 

 ings and ornaments — the tympana, the lacunaria, and per- 

 haps the metopes, were of a blue-black." " The prevailing 

 colours of the mouldings and ornaments were red, blue, and 

 green .... the green very delicate, of a bright moss colour. 

 The details of the ornaments alternated regularly, and were 

 united together by many delicate and projecting fillets of 

 white, black, and gold;" and in the temples of Athens he 

 believes "them to have been of gold." According to M. 

 Hittorff, the principle generally followed in the Sicilian 

 temples was found to be "the colouring of the body of the 

 wall a pale yellow, or golden colour; the triglyphs and 

 mutules blue; the metopes and tympanum red, and some 

 other portions of the building green ;" the same being varied, 

 or used "of greater or less intensity, as the judgment of the 

 artist dictated." 



In the museum of Palermo too are the remains of a 

 small Gfreek building, from Selinus in Sicily, in which the 

 colours are blue, red, and yellow. 



Much is also learnt respecting the colouring of architectural 

 details from the ash-chests of the Etruscans, where the mould- 

 ings, and even the columns, are coloured, as I have shown 

 in another place*; where I have also made some remarks 

 on the use of colours by the Gfreeks.f And though Dr. Kugler 

 may be disposed to limit the colour to particular buildings 

 in Greece, or parts of them, or to those of certain periods, 

 the investigations of M. Hittorff have enabled him to prove 



* Part II. § 64. f Part II. 8 59 to 61. 



