Leo 



V. A. Smith — Crneco-Boman influence 



[No. 3, 



To the list of countries above enumerated as having adopted the 

 Roman system of design and decoration, the Lower Kabul Valley, 

 though it never formed part of the Roman empire, must be added. 



So far as I understand the published plans and elevations, the 

 Gandhara buildings show little Roman influence in their construction, 

 though I should not venture to affirm that careful study might not 

 reveal the existence of Roman elements in their plan aud construction. 

 However this may be, these buildings, like those of the provinces of 

 the empire, were " Roman in moulding, ornament, details, and the very 

 style of carving," and were characterized, like better known examples 

 of Roman work, by excess of ornament, and by the lavish use for 

 decorative purposes of crowded realistic compositions in high and low 

 relief. 



Almost every frieze or panel from Gandhara is decorated with florid 

 Corinthian pilasters, and numerous fragments of similar Corinthian 

 capitals belonging to structural pillars have been found. No one can 

 give the most cursory glance at a collection of Gandhara sculptures 

 without being struck by the free employment of the Corinthian capital 

 as an ornament. No other Grreco-Roman form of capital is used, though 

 for a time the Indo-Persian form continued to dispute the field with its 

 newly introduced rival. 



Such extensive and exclusive use of the Corinthian form of pillar is 

 in itself decisive proof that the school characterized by it was dominated 

 by Roman influence, and was not a direct descendant of Greek art. 



The case of Palmyra offers an exact parallel to what we see in 

 Gandhara. " It is remarkable," observes Wood, " that, except four Ionic 

 half-columns in the temple of the sun, and two in one of the mausoleums, 

 the whole is Corinthian, richly ornamented, with some striking beauties, 

 and some as visible faults."* 



We find the same state of facts at the other great Syrian city of 

 Baalbec, or Heliopolis, " which, so far as it has been known to modern 

 travellers, is a Roman city of the second century A. D. The Corinthian 

 order of architecture — the favourite order of the Romans — prevails 

 with few exceptions in its edifices. A Doric column, the supposed 

 clepsydra, is, indeed, mentioned by Wood and Dawkins, and the Ionic 

 style is found in the interior of the circular temple j" but all else is 

 Corinthian. 



The style of the great temples at Palmyra is later and more debased 

 than that of the corresponding edifices at Baalbec. No building of impor- 

 tance was erected at Palmyra after the sack of the city by Aureliau in 

 A. D. 273, and the temples may be referred to the third century A. D., 



* Wood, Palmyru, p. 15. 



