THE DORIC TEMPLE.

The sixth and last lecture in Professor Doerpfeld's course was given last evening in the Lecture Room of the Fogg Museum. As on former occasions, the room was crowded to overflowing with an interested audience.

As an introduction Professor Doerpfeld showed on the screen a number of the best preserved Doric temples-including the Parthenon and the so-called Theseum-edifices which exhibit the order in its perfection; and then raised the question as to the origin of the Doric temple. According to the traditional belief, the Doric temple in its finest forms was a spontaneous creation, springing complete and perfect from the brain of Greek architects, as Athena, with helmet and spear, darted into life from the head of Zeus. Numerous excavations conducted in recent years have demonstrated the incorrectness of this view. They have shown that the Roman architect Vitruvius was in the main right in deriving the Doric temple from structures in wood. Evidences for the theory were found in the ground plans of such buildings as the Megaron and in the palace at Mycenae and Tiryns, in Solomon's Temple at Jerusalem, and also in Egyptian buildings. By the aid of numerous photographs, the lecturer showed further that the forms of the columns and the entablature were derived from earlier wooden forms in use in the palaces of the heroic age. The well-known column between the two lions in the Lion's Gate differs but slightly from the earliest extant Doric columns; and in fact quite recently a column with flutings has actually been discovered in one of the ancient beehive tombs in Mycenae.

Writers who have been led by the solidity of the earlier Doric forms to deny their derivation from a wooden technic, overlook the fact that these oldest buildings were by no means constructed wholly of wood, their walls and roof being largely made of clay, a material which required great compactness. Professor Doerpfeld then showed how these ancient, close-built temples, when transferred into stone, became even more solid and heavy; whereas later they assumed slenderer forms and more graceful proportions.

In conclusion, he remarked that although in its elements the Doric temple was of foreign origin, it was to the genius of Greek architects that we owe this most perfect of all creations of art.

Dr. Doerpfeld leaves Cambridge this evening to attend the sesquicentennial celebration of Princeton University. In December he will be back at his post in Athens, as secretary of the German School. His lectures in Cambridge have been remarkably successful. Many persons, often coming from a great distance, have embraced the opportunity to see and hear the man who has made larger original contributions to his favorite subjects than has any other archaeologist of the time.