Page 48 - Arabiab Studies (IV)

38 Arabian Studies IV
followed by the base-line of the rooms of the lost upper storey.
Within each round-headed blind arch between the piers, the
surface is divided into two unequal halves, the lower part
decorated with a very shallow blind arch motif on the same plane
as the row of piers. The upper part of each blind niche is set
further back in the wall surface and is without decoration. The
transition between the two planes within the round-arched niche is
accomplished by a sloping panel of coral aggregate and plaster
resting on a rectangular wooden frame. Above the rectangular
entrance to the enclosure arc two small round-headed blind arches.
Remnants of the upper storey rooms survive above the ground-
floor rooms C and F and although illustrated (Plate 4) with a view
taken from the courtyard of Bayt al-Mu’ayyad, present the same
surface decoration to the outside world. The rooms above ground-
floor room C have wall-surfaces similar to those already described
on the lower storey: thus the rooms have rectangular window
openings,4 a horizontal coral-aggregate beam and a deeply recessed
round-arched blind niche, with a level roof above. The room above
lower storey room F is far more badly damaged, but it appears
(Plate 4) to have been somewhat simpler than the upper storey
room just discussed, having rectangular piers supporting horizontal
members and the wall area so framed, inasmuch as I have been
able to estimate, formerly filled with a thin coral-aggregate panel,
coated on its outer and inner surfaces with plaster. I presume that
the lost upper-storey rooms followed the design of one or other of
these remaining upper storey rooms, and the existence of similar
upper-storey decoration on the walls of the nearby Samahlj houses
seems to confirm that Bayt al-Mu’ayyad followed a similar pattern.
The exterior wail-surfaces of Bayt al-Mu’ayyad giving on to the
courtyard (Plates 3, 4 and 5) have decoration which is broadly the
same as that already described articulating the wall-surfaces giving
on to the public street and sea-shore, but with certain variations.
The wall-surfaces of rooms A, E, F and J (Plates 3, 4 and 5) are
like those already described on the outer surfaces of the building,
with rectangular piers supporting round-headed, deeply recessed
blind niches, once again divided into two unequal halves, although
most of the lower panels are lost, for the most part wantonly
destroyed by children. Nevertheless, simple shallowly recessed
round-headed blind arches decorate the lower panels to left and
right of the round-headed arched entrance to the courtyard, set in
the centre of the north side of the enclosure (Plate 3). Rooms B
and I (Plates 4 and 5) are rather different, however, having two
great arches piercing the upper wall of each, the arches reinforced
by a central vertical member, lost in the case of the arches of room