42 
CEDRUS LIBANI 
If this is sound doctrine, there must be some reason why the Cedar is so generally accepted as the 
handmaid of architecture. Why do we recognise its introduction as beautiful, harmonious, and effective, 
in Martin’s great pictures of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, or of the Fall of Nineveh? where Cedar 
never grew, nor ever could grow. It is, we believe, because there is a certain degree of similarity between 
the scenery of its native mountains and the solemn architectural features introduced by that great artist. 
Mr. Tristram, in his “ Land of Israel,” says of the scenery of Lebanon: “ Nothing could be more 
lovely than the scenery. All mountain ranges seem to have a type of scenery peculiar to themselves—the 
Alps, the Pyrenees, the Dovrefjeld, have theirs; nor is that of the Lebanon inferior to others, consisting 
of a peculiar combination of grand precipices, with delicate cultivation.” Our sketch of Hazar (fig. 31) 
illustrates this. Curiously enough, too, the very same character of scenery reappears in, or is prolonged 
into, the range of Anti-Taurus, also a habitat of the Cedar, as will be seen from the illustrations 
in Tchihatcheff’s “Asie Mineure.” 
This character of the scenery of the homes of the Cedar is the very character of the architecture in the 
pictures, with which the Cedar seems to associate so grandly. 
It may be that this is more fanciful than real; but at all events, the opinion is almost universal, that 
the Cedar harmonises well with man and his dwelling, his houses and his garden, and that it is especially 
adapted for an appanage to large and massive country mansions. Loudon, in his “ Arboretum,” quotes 
some very judicious remarks made by Mr. Thomson, an artist (Gard. Mag. i. 122), on the character of the 
buildings which best corresponds with it, condemning it as unsuitable for small villas, and commending it 
it as an accompaniment to stately architecture. This is true, but it is also true that it is an ornament and 
decoration to every place where it grows well, and where there is space to hold it. 
A writer in the Garden (December 6, 1879), says that Mr. Marnock, the Curator of the Royal 
Botanic Gardens, told him that he had planted no fewer than twelve thousand Cedars of Lebanon in his 
various landscape gardening operations—that is to say, exclusively for ornamental purposes. 
Loudon has ransacked the writings of antient authors for notices of the Cedar and the uses to which 
it has been put; but as the term Cedar was applied indiscriminately to the Cedar, the Cypress, and 
Juniper, and probably to other trees, the information thus obtained is somewhat uncertain. 
Great durability has always been one of the chief characteristics ascribed to the Cedar. 
The statue of Diana at Saguntum is a case in point, which was carved out of Cedar, which had 
formerly been brought from Zante by the inhabitants when they colonised Saguntum. Hannibal, it is 
said, found and preserved the statue after the siege of Saguntum, it having escaped destruction through 
being in the temple beyond the walls when the city was burned by the inhabitants. 
Pliny speaks of a temple of Apollo at Utica in Africa, in which was found Cedar timber that, although 
nearly 2000 years old, was still quite sound. 
The ceiling of the church of Helena at Bethlehem is reported by the late Dean Stanley, in his 
“ Sinai and Palestine,” p. 435 (1857), to be made of Cedar. This, however, is doubted by M. Salle, who 
considers it to be made of wood of larger dimensions than he thinks the Cedar can reach. 
It is said to have been the timber that was used to fix the Elgin marbles into the temples from which 
they were removed : at least it was said so at the time they were brought over, although others have since 
thought it might be the Olive, which appears more probable. 
Loudon questions its great durability. He says, “ The wood of the Cedar is of a reddish white, light 
and spongy, easily worked, but very apt to shrink and warp, and by no means durable,” and he quotes, 
apparently with approval, some objections taken by Varennes de Fenille to the Cedar of Lebanon having 
been the tree out of which the statue of Diana at Saguntum, formerly mentioned, had been formed. He 
cannot believe it to have been sculptured of so soft a wood, and one the grain of which was so unequal and 
subject to crack. But in our own times it has been applied with success to the same purpose, and there¬ 
fore that objection will not hold. The late Dr. Lindley gave in the Gardeners Chronicle (i. p. 733, 1840) a 
favourable 
