frequently find that they sat, like the guests, on separate chairs; and a diphros was occasionally offered to visiters, both men and women. Many of the fauteuils were of the most elegant form, and were made of ebony and other rare Chairs of an ordinary description. The seat of fig. 1. is 8 inches high, and the back 1 foot 4 inches. That of fig. 2. is 14 inches, and total height 2 feet 6 inches. No. 157. No. 158. Chair in the Leyden Museum, the seat 13 inches high, and the back 17 inches. woods, inlaid with ivory, covered with rich stuffs, and very similar to some now used in Europe, to which, indeed, they have frequently served as models. None of these have yet been found in the tombs of Thebes; but chairs of more ordinary quality are occasionally met with, some of which are in the British Museum, and in the Leyden Collection. They are much smaller than the fauteuils of the sculptures, the seat being only from eight to fourteen inches high, and are deficient both in elegance of form and in the general style of their construction in some the seat is of wood, in others of interlaced string or leathern thongs, in appearance, as well as in rank, not very unlike our own rushbottomed chairs; and they probably belonged to persons of inferior station, or to those rooms which were set apart for casual visitors. Various are the forms of chairs which occur in the sculptures, representing + scenes of domestic life, and sacred subjects. Some were on the prin * Vide plate 11. †The Chinese have chairs of similar form. ciple of our camp stools, furnished with a cushion, or covered with the skin of a leopard or other animal*, which could be easily removed when the chair was folded up; and it was not unusual to make 3 2 No. 160. Fig. 1. A stool in Mr. Salt's collection, on the principle of our camp stools. other seats, and wooden head-stools or pillows, in the same manner; one of which was found by me at Thebes, and is now in the British Museum.† They were adorned in various ways: being bound with metal plates, or inlaid with ivory and foreign woods; and, even in some ordinary chairs, sycamore, or other native wood, was painted to imitate that of a more rare and valuable quality. The seat was frequently of leather, painted with flowers or fancy devices; and the figure of a captive, or a conquered foe, was frequently represented at the side, or among the ornaments, of the chair. Sometimes the seat was formed of interlaced work of string, carefully and neatly arranged, which, like our * Vide pl. 11. fig. 11. + Vide wood-cut, No.172. fig. 2. Indian cane chairs, appears to have been particularly adapted for a hot climate; but over this even they occasionally placed a leather cushion *, painted in the manner already mentioned. Most of the chairs and stools were about the ordinary height of those now used in Europe, the seat nearly in a line with the bend of the knee; but some were very low, and others offered that variety of position which we seek in the kangaroo chairs t of our own drawing room. The ordinary fashion of the legs was in imitation of those of some wild animal, as the lion, or the goat, but more usually the former, the foot raised and supported on a short pin; and, what is remarkable, the skill of their cabinet-makers, even in the early era of Joseph, had already done away with the necessity of uniting the legs with bars. Stools, however, and, more rarely, chairs, were occasionally made with these. * Conf. Theocrit. Idyl. xv. lib. iii.: 66 Ορη διφρον, Ευνοα, αυτή + Vide wood-cut, No. 161. fig. 3. strengthening members, as is still the case in our own country; but the form of the drawing-room fauteuil and of the couch was not degraded by so unseemly and so unskilful a support. The back of the chair was equally light and strong. It was occasionally concave, like some Roman chairs *, or the throne of Solomon †, and in many of the large fauteuils a lion ‡ formed an arm at either side; but the back usually consisted of a single set of upright and cross bars, or of a frame, receding gradually, and terminating at its summit in a graceful curve, supported from without by perpendicular bars §; and over this was thrown a handsome pillow of coloured cotton, painted leather, or gold and silver tissue, like the beds at the feast of Ahasuerus, mentioned in Esther; or like the feather cushions covered with stuffs, and embroidered with silk threads of gold, in the palace of Scaurus. The stools used in the saloon were of the same +1 Kings, x. 19. "The top of the throne was round behind; and there were stays on either side on the place of the seat, and two lions stood beside the stays." As the throne of Solomon. |