second order of columns used in the Basilicks of the Romans; the two branches of the cross only have a ceiling; the nave is only covered with a sloping roof, of which the naked timbers are seen from below. Upon this occasion, it may be remarked, that none of the first Roman churches were vaulted, for among all that remain there is not one with such a roof to be found, and in those which have ceilings, the ceiling appears manifestly to have been added in later times; for it was not common, even in the 16th century, for any part of the church to be ceiled but the chancel. This defect might have been imputed to the timid ignorance of the builders, if it was not certain that those who vaulted the baths of Constantine, might, if they had thought fit, have vaulted a church; and it might have been imputed to a servile imitation of the Pagan Basilicks, if we had not been told by Vitruvius, that some of them were covered with vaulted roofs. As to the front of the Basilick of St. Paul, there is a modern portico about 20 feet high, and the rest is a brick wall, having on the point at top a Greek cross, decorated with some rude Mosaic. To this general description many particulars may be added, which will shew in a still stronger light the stupidity and ill taste of the time; some of the columns have no base at all; others are all base, being one great square block; in one place a column of the Corinthian order is placed opposite to one of the Composite; in another the Tuscan is contrasted with the Ionic, yet the whole appears to have been the painful effort of long labour, and unremitted diligence; nor must it be forgotten that the 24 columns, which were already exquisitely finished, are, by an ingenious contrivance, made to share in the general impropriety, for, instead of being equally divided in opposite rows, thirteen of them are placed on one side, and eleven on the other.

Thus it appears, that all which the magnificence of Constantine, who erected the edifice, and of Theodosius, who added some ornaments, could effect, was to raise a vast structure, and to decorate it with the spoils of those buildings that had been erected when the arts were in their perfection. After the persecutions against Christianity had entirely ceased, more churches abounded at Rome than at any other place; they were erected over the tombs of martyrs, and even formed out of the houses, which they had inhabited; little obscure oratories were enlarged into public temples, and the edicts that were published from the time of Constantine to that of Theodosius, for the de-* struction of Pagan temples, furnished the pious founders with

spoils of inestimable value, of which, however, they made a very bad use; for the plan of Constantine's Basilicks was universally followed, whether the church to be built was little or great, except that sometimes the building at the end, which gave the whole the figure of the cross, was omitted: they are all filled with columns, taken from adjacent buildings, and set up without the least regard to their height or their diameter, to the kind of marble, the order, or the decorations by which they are distinguished; from those which were too long the base is taken away, and to those that were too short a supplemental base was added, so that some columns in the same row have two bases, and some have none. Entablatures were quite out of fashion, and neither frize nor moulding of the cornice was to be attempted: such are all the churches that are at this time to be found in Rome, except two or three rotundas, and those which have beer. erected or modernised since the revival of the arts. Such are the principal productions of twelve successive ages, and when they are beheld and considered it is easy to make a just estimation of the magnificence which has been attributed to them by the authors of the lives of the popes, such as Anastasius, the library keeper, Platina, and some others. There are, however, seven or eight ancient buildings that have been converted into Christian churches, but they are neither great nor beautiful, the Pantheon excepted; and so diligent were the saints, in the first ardour of their zeal, to fulfil the edicts of the emperor, for the abolition of Pagan ingenuity, that of 2000 temples, which were standing within the walls of Rome, in the meridian of her glory, these are all that remain. The temple of Faustina serves at this hour for a chapel to a religious house, and the temple of Remus is become a kind of vestibule to a conventual church.

1759, July and Aug.

XLV. Description of the first Theatre at Athens.

ANCIENT authors have treated of the construction of theatres but obscurely and imperfectly. Vitruvius has given us no account either of their dimensions, or of the number of their principal and constituting parts; presuming, I suppose, that they had been well enough known, or could never have

perished; for example, he does not determine the dimen sions of the rows of benches. Among the more modern writers, the learned Scaliger has omitted the most essential parts; and the citations of Bulingerus from Athenæus, Hesychius, Eustathius, Suidas, and others, throw but a weak and imperfect light on the real construction of ancient theatres.

An exact description of the theatre of Bacchus in Athens, whose circumference is still visible, and whose ruins are a monument of its ancient magnificence, will give us a true idea of these structures. The famous architect Philos built this theatre in the time of Pericles, above two thousand years ago: it consisted without of three rows of porticos or galleries, one above the other, and was of a circular form; the diameter was one hundred Athenian feet, nearly the same in English measure, for which reason it was called by the Athenians, Hecatompedon. A part of the area, which comprehended fourteen feet of the diameter, did not belong precisely to the theatre, being behind the scene.

The theatre itself was divided into two principal partitions, one for the spectators, and the other for the representations. The parts designed for the spectators were the conistra, which the Romans call arena: the rows or benches, the little stairs, and the gallery called circys. The parts appropriated to the actors were the orchestra, the logcon, or thymele, the proscenion and the scene. In that part of the edifice allotted to the spectators were twenty-four rows of seats, or benches, ascending gradually one above the other, and proceeding round the conistra or arena, in an arch of a circle, to the stage, which the Greeks called proscenion. These benches were distinguished eight and eight, by three corridors, or passages, which were called diazoma. They were of the same figure with the rows of seats, and were contrived for the passage of the spectators from one story to another, without incommoding those who were already placed. For the same convenience there were stairs that passed from one corridor to another across the several rows; and near those stairs there were doors, by which the people entered from the galleries on the outside, and took their places according to their rank and distinction. The best places were in the middle division, containing eight rows of seats, between the eighth and seventeenth this division was called bouleuticon, and designed for the magistrates: the other rows were called ephebicon, and were for the citizens, after they were eighteen years of age.

The height of each of these rows of benches was about

thirteen inches; their breadth about twenty-two inches: the lowest bench was near four feet high from the level of the floor; the height and breadth of the corridors and passages was double the height and breadth of the benches. The sides of the stairs passing from the body of the edifice towards the stage were not parallel; for the space betwixt them grew sharper as they came near the conístra or arena, and ended in the figure of a wedge, whence the Romans called them cunei; to prevent the falling down of the rain upon those steps, there were penthouses set up to carry off the water.

Above the upper corridor there was a gallery, called circys, for the women, where those who were infamous, or irregu lar in their lives, were not permitted to enter.

This theatre was not so capacious as that which was built in Rome by Marcus Scaurus, the Edilis; for in that there was room for seventy-nine thousand persons; in this there was room for six thousand; it could not contain less, for the suffrages of the people were taken in it, and by the Athenian laws six thousand suffrages were requisite to make a decree of the people authentic.

Thus much for the place appointed for the spectators: as to that which was designed for the actors (which comprehended the orchestra, the logeon or thymele, the proscenion, and the scene) the orchestra was about four feet from the ground; its figure was an oblong square, thirty-six feet in length, extending from the stage to the rows of benches; its breadth is not mentioned in the memoirs I have of the dimensions of this theatre, which were taken on the spot about one hundred years since, by Mons. de la Guillatiere, an ingenious traveller. In certain places of it the music, the chorus, and the mimics were conveniently disposed. Among the Romans it was put to a more honourable use, for the emperor and senate had places upon it. Upon the flat of the orchestra, towards the place of the actors, was an elevation or platform, called logeon or thymele, which among the Romans was called pulpitum; it was higher than the orchestra; its figure was square, being six feet every side; and in this place the principal part of the chorus made their recitations, and in comical interludes the mimics used to perform in it.

The proscenion, or stage, was raised above the logeon. That great architect, Philos, contrived the edifice in such a manner as that the representations might be seen, and the voices of the actors and the music heard, with the greatest advantage. The proscenion was eighteen feet in breadth, and its length extended from one side of the edifice to the

opposite side, but not diametrically, being eighteen feet distant from the centre.

The scene, properly speaking, was the columns and ornaments in architecture, raised from the foundation, and upon the sides of the proscenion, for its beauty and decoration. Agatarchus was the first architect who found out the way of adorning scenes by the rules of perspective, and Æschylus assisted him.

Parascenion signified the entire space before and behind the scene; and the same name was given to all the avenues and passages from the music room to the place where the actors performed.

The theatre of Regilla, not far from the temple of Theseus in Athens, was covered magnificently, having a fair roof of cedar. The odeon, or theatre for music, was covered likewise; but no part of the theatre of Bacchus, which we have described, was covered, except the proscenion and circys. The Athenians, being exposed to the weather, came usually with great cloaks, to secure them from the rain or the cold; and for defence against the sun, they had the sciadion, a kind of parasol, which the Romans used also in their theatres by the name of umbrella; but when a sudden storm arose, the play was interrupted, and the spectators dispersed.

A sort of tent-work over the entire area of the edifice, might have been contrived as a shelter from the rain, and a shade from the sun. Such a covering would have obviated the inconveniences of roofed theatres, which obstruct the free communication of the air, and of unroofed theatres, which do not keep out the weather. At Athens the plays were always represented in the day-time, which made the unroofed theatres less inconvenient.

In that now described, Philos has preserved a just symmetry of architecture, and shewed great judgment in assisting the communication of sounds; for the voice being extenuated in an open and spacious place, where the distant walls, though of marble, could give little or no repercussion to make it audible; he contrived cells in the thickness of the corridors, in which he placed brass vessels, supported by wedges of iron, that they might not touch the wall. The voice proceeding from the stage to the corridors, and striking upon the concavity of those vessels, was reverberated with niore clearness and force: their number in all were twentyeight, and were called echea, because they gave an augmentation, or an echo, to the sound.

Outwardly there was a portico, consisting of a double gallery, divided by rows of pillars, called the portico of