OF GROINED RIBBED VAULTS.

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Christ,) before either the Greeks or Romans knewhow to turn any other kind of arch : for, as this maybe constructed without any centre, by advancing thestones in gradual projections over each other, andthen cutting off the projecting angles, its inventionwas obvious, and naturally preceded those constructedupon mechanical principles, of which, I believe, thereare no examples anterior to the Macedonian con-quest. 5 ’* The account of this pointed arch is mani-festly copied without thought from the work of someignorant person ; an emissarium may be conceived tobe an arch. The first covering of an enclosed space,whether by wood or stone (not a lintel), was, andmust have been in the form of a pediment; the roofsof the Queen’s chamber, and of the passage to thetomb in the pyramid of Egypt , are an unnecessaryconfirmation. This pyramid, we are told, was builtsoon after the Trojan war 5 about twelve centuriesbefore the Birth of Christ .

Were it admitted that this emissarium had beenhollowed out in a form like that of a pointed arch,nothing could be gained from this solitary fact inanswer to the question: When were arches firstknown ? What were the forms of these arches ?Seneca Epis. 90. denies to Democritus the inventionof an arch, “ ut lapidum curvatura paulatim inclina-torum medio saxo allegaretursuch an arch as thismust have required a center. Democritus flourishedsixty years before the siege of Veii. The questionto be agitated, if any enquiry upon the subject wereworth the labour, is j When were the arches (composedof voussoirs) first in use ? to which a satisfactory an*

R. P. Knight’s An. Inq. Prin. Taste.

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