Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/134

CHAPTER II. THE PRINCIPLES AXI) GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF ASSYRO CIIALD.EAN ARCHITECTURE. i. ^Materials. CHALD.KA was the cradle of the civilization, and consequently of the art, whose characteristics we have to define. Now the soil of Chaldaea to a great depth beneath the surface is a fine loose earth, similar to that of the Nile Delta. At a few points only on the plain, and that near the Persian Gulf, are there some rocky eminences, the remains of ancient islands which the gradual encroachment of the two great rivers has joined to the mainland of Asia. Their importance is so slight that we may fairly ignore their existence and assert generally that Chalda^a has no stone. Like all great rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates in the upper and middle parts of their courses carry down pieces of rock from their native mountains, but after they enter upon the alluvial ground near the boundary between Assyria and Chaldsea their streams become sluggish, and these heavy bodies sink to the bottom and become embedded in the soil ; the w 7 ater no longer carries on with o it anything but the minute particles which with the passage of cen- turies form immense banks of clay. In the whole distance between Bagdad and the sea you may take a spade, and, turn up the soil wherever you please, you will not find a stone as big as a nut. In this absence of a natural stone something had to be found to take its place, and the artificial material we call brick was invented. The human intellect refuses to give up the contest with nature before the first obstacles that seem to bar its progress ; if it cannot brush them aside it turns their flank. The least accident is often enough to suggest the desired expedient. The origin of almost all the great discoveries that are studded over the