life.

Art was at a low ebb in Egypt during the centuries of Libyan and
Ethiopian domination which succeeded the New Empire. There was a
revival under the Saite monarchy in the seventh and sixth
centuries B.C. To this period is assigned a superb head of dark
green stone (Fig. 14), recently acquired by the Berlin Museum. It
has been broken from a standing or kneeling statue. The form of
the closely-shaven skull and the features of the strong face,
wrinkled by age, have been reproduced by the sculptor with
unsurpassable fidelity. The number of works emanating from the
same school as this is very small, but in quality they represent
the highest development of Egyptian sculpture. It is fit that we
should take our leave of Egyptian art with such a work as this
before us, a work which gives us the quintessence of the artistic
genius of the race.

Babylonia was the seat of a civilization perhaps more hoary than
that of Egypt. The known remains of Babylonian art, however, are
at present far fewer than those of Egypt and will probably always
be so. There being practically no stone in the country and wood
being very scarce, buildings were constructed entirely of bricks,
some of them merely sun-dried, others kiln-baked. The natural
wells of bitumen supplied a tenacious mortar. [Footnote: Compare
Genesis XI 3: "And they had brick for stone and slime had they for
mortar."] The ruins that have been explored at Tello, Nippur, and
elsewhere, belong to city walls, houses, and temples. The most
peculiar and conspicuous feature of the temple was a lofty
rectangular tower of several stages, each stage smaller than the
one below it. The arch was known and used in Babylonia from time