. The Civil engineer and architect's journal, scientific and railway gazette. Architecture; Civil engineering; Science. 1850.] THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 147 imposts, and upon the keystone. It is generally believed to have been built 600 or 700, b. o.'; but tradition gives it as early a date as 118(j, Porta air Arco, al Volterree. Mr. Dennis, in his valuable work on Etruria (speaking of the Porta air Arco), savs " I envy the stranger his first inijiression on approaching this gateway: the loftiness of the arch ; tlie boldness of its span"; the massiveness of it
. The Civil engineer and architect's journal, scientific and railway gazette. Architecture; Civil engineering; Science. 1850.] THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 147 imposts, and upon the keystone. It is generally believed to have been built 600 or 700, b. o.'; but tradition gives it as early a date as 118(j, Porta air Arco, al Volterree. Mr. Dennis, in his valuable work on Etruria (speaking of the Porta air Arco), savs " I envy the stranger his first inijiression on approaching this gateway: the loftiness of the arch ; tlie boldness of its span"; the massiveness of its blocks, dwarfing into insigni- ficance the mediaeval masonry by which it is surrounded ; the venerable, yet solid, air of tlie whole ; and, more than all, the dark, featureless, mysterious heads around it, stretching forwards as if eager to proclaim the tale of bygone races and events ; even the site of the gate, on the very verge of the steep, with a glorious map of valley, river, plain, mountain, sea, headland, and island, unrolled beneath, make it one of the most imposing, vet singular, portals conceivable, and fix it indelibly on his ; It is a double gateway ; the total depth about 27^ feet ; the span of the arch is 13 i't. 2 in.; the height to the keystone, about 21 i feet. There is a groove for a portcullis; or, as the ancients called it, a cdtaracta, which was suspended by iron chains within the gate. Similar grooves or channels are found in all the old double gate- ways in Italy. According to Mr. Dennis there is a cinerary urn, found in the' cemetery of ancient Volterra-, on which is figured Capaneus struck by lightning while scaling the gate of Thebes.^ The gate represented on the urn is an exact copy of the Porta all' Arco. with the three heads on the imposts and keystone. The three principal divinities, Tina, Talna (or Jupiter and Juno), and Minerva were the only deities to whom temples were erected within the city walls, the ground plan of the tem])le
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