88 History of Art in Antiquity. a frank clear aspect when viewed at that distance. To obviate so untoward a contingency, the Persian sculptor modified the form, as the Greeks often did in similar cases. The flutes that everywhere else adorn the shaft are tangential, and have no peculiarity of their own, save that they are found here in greater number than in any other column known to us, whether Egy ptian or even Grecian. All the columns have a base, which differs from one building to another. That of the Palace of Cyrus is a disc, or re- versed quarter round, very simple and not un- like the Egyptian base ; its diameter, as well as the black colour of the marble, bring it out from the shaft, which is of white limestone (Fig. ii). A more compli- cated shape, composed of a rectangular plinth and a torus seamed by horizontal channellings, is seen side by side with it in one of the porticoes of the Gabre, which forms part of this same group of monuments (Fig. 29) ; and again in the lower portion of the base in the porch (Plate I.), save that the rectangular form is doubled and the torus above it quite plain. This last variety occurs in the central colonnade of the great Palace of Xerxes, but in the lateral porticoes or wings of the building (Plates IV, and v., and Fig. 31), as also in the Hall of a Hundred Columns (Plates VI., VH.), and the Propylsea (Plate III. and Fig. 32), we find a base somewhat richer in detail and of very different profile. It again reappears at Susa (Figs. 12, 30), but Fig. 29.— Pasarga<ljc. Elevation and plan <if ba^e ol column in the Gabre. Dieulafoy, iiti/iyuc, torn. i. Figs. 46, 47.
