" It is perhaps of little consequence to whom we
owe this mighty tomb, for it is absolutely, and in any case, Roman
work, and might seem to have been modelled upon the far larger and
more tremendous mausoleum of Hadrian.[1]
[Footnote 1: Choisy points out that the mausoleum of Theodoric has
stylistic affinities with Syrian work, and Strzygowski, who reminds us
that several bishops of Ravenna were Syrians, thinks that Ravenna in
much derived from Syria especially from Antioch.]
The mausoleum is built in two stories of block after block of hewn and
squared stone. The lower of the two stories is decagonal and has in
every side a vast archway or niche, one of which forms the gateway.
Within we find a huge cruciform chamber lighted by six square
openings. The upper story, now reached by two stairways, built with
ancient materials in 1774, is circular, having about it eighteen blind
arches and over it a vast circular roof hewn out of a single block of
Istrian stone that weighs, it is said, two hundred tons. It may be
that this upper story, smaller as it is than the lower, was of old
surrounded by a colonnade, and it may be that the twelve projections
upon the vast monolith of the roof once upheld statutes of the twelve
Apostles.
Pages:
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313