Vaulted Struciures. brackets to these semi-bulls at the summit of their walls ? It is impossible to say ; but there is no doubt that by the use they made of the form in question, they broke its unity, or at Fig. 9c.— Shapflr. Monument in the centre of the ruins. Section. Flandin and Coste, P<rs< annenne, Plate XLVII. least put it at the mercy of accidents easily foreseen, in that the least settling of the masonry must have severed it in twain. Moreover, the fact that the windows are full centred, whilst it helps to date the monument, militates against its being taken as a work of the Achaemenid period, the terminal stone which was to play the part of lintel having been chiselled into an arch — an arrange- ment that speaks volumes in favour of an epoch when it was in common use, and the ordinary ending to the bays of the edifice (Fig. 90). Finally, surrounding a beautiful fountain south of these ruins, appears a moulding with quite a Greek profile ; but a double band of godroons, cut on the external face of the cavetto, reminds us of the cor- nices in the Persepjolitan gateways.* The prince, then, who built the edifices of Shapur would seem to have been solicitous of recalling, even though only in certain features, the style and • Flandin and Coste, l(x. cit.^ Plale XLVI. Fig. 91. — Shapur. Monument in the centre ol the ruins. Profile restored. Ibid., Plate XLVII.
