Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/450

434 BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE. Part II. of their classical pui-ity and elegance, but combined with something of media'val variety and richness ; and the effect produced by the whole is quite unrivalled by any other known building of its class. It has not of course the splendor and magnificence arising from the vastness and constructive beauty of such a church as Sta. Sopliia at Constantinople, but for its dimensions there is probably no church in the whole world the design of which is at the same time so beau- tiful and so appropriate for the purposes for which it is erected. There is a grace about its propoi'tions and a richness combined with solemnity about its decorations which the Saracens did not even dream of imitating till late in the 10th century, and have in fact never reached even to the pi'esent day, but which the age of Constantine was capable of producing, and has produced in such perfection that no church since built with the same di- mensions has surpassed, or even equalled, this most sacred church of Christendom. To the archaeologist its prin- cipal interest lies in the number of transitional features it pre- sents. The old trabeate style of the Romans was yielding un- willingly to the arcuate style that was so soon to supersede it. The former is still retained as an ornament ; the latter — as in the palace of Diocletian at Spalatro (vol, i. p. 304) — was fast becoming the essential con- structive expedient.! Though the shafts of the columns seem to have been generally borrowed from older buildings, the capitals were apparently carved for the nonce. They are nearly 869. View in Aisle of Dome of Rock. (From a Drawing by Gatherwood.) ^ During the present year, in execut- ing some repairs to the Dome of the Rock, the tiles that covered the whole of the iipper part have been strip])ed off and revealed the original architecture of Constantine in all its purity and sim- plicity. The windows in the middle story are all shown to he round-arched, and above these is an arcade of 13 small circular arches, separated each by two small columns with square capitals, iden- tical with those in the cistern of Philox- enus, built in Constantine's time at Constantinople. An elevation of the mosque as now revealed has just been published in the Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund for July, from drawings by M. Le Comte.