626 
CASTLE OF TIRIDATES. 
mense fragments of the rock, beautifully hewn, and put together 
with all the nicety of Roman workmen; and such are under¬ 
stood to have been the architects. Its northern line of protection 
consisted of a semicircular range of walls and towers, meeting 
the steeps to the east and west. We could trace only one gate 
of entrance to the whole, and it is probable there never was 
another; it stands not far from the second or eastern tower. 
Within the walls were situated the royal palace ; much of the 
ruins of which are still visible amongst the humbler heaps of 
several minor buildings. But the slow dilapidating hand of 
passing ages, aided in the work by the convulsions of nature, 
has now reduced that boasted edifice to a confused pile of 
beautiful fragments; columns, architraves, capitals, friezes, all 
mingled together in broken disorder. The remains of a magni¬ 
ficent and finely executed pediment, particularly engaged my 
attention ; and sufficient was left, to give me a pretty fair idea 
of the whole. With some pains, I partially traced the general 
dimensions of the ground on which the structure to which it 
had belonged must have stood; and I found it to have been a 
square of twenty-eight feet, forming a solid platform of polished 
stones nicely put together, and raised eight feet above the com¬ 
mon level of the rock. From the numerous capitals, and 
broken shafts of columns lying on all sides of it, I should con¬ 
clude that a colonnade had stood round the whole; or rather, 
perhaps, that they may have composed four pedimented places 
of entrance to the quadrangle described: their remains, indeed, 
are traceable on all the sides. The columns measure in diameter 
about twenty-seven inches, are without flutings, and of a very 
elegant composite order, in some instances fancifully enriched in 
their details, with a variety in almost every column. Sometimes 
