In the Treasury of Atreus there are two points that interest architects more than any others. The first is the contrast between admirable decoration and hugely primitive stonework; and the other is the fact that the annulary courses forming the domed and circular chamber have this particular character, that the lateral joints of the stones hardly tend at all towards the centre. Moreover, again and again the stones are separated by a space, and this interval is filled up with small rubble which seems to have been pressed together with the greatest care. These irregular courses, whose inside diameter grows less and less as the circular wall grows higher and higher, forms at last a sort of pointed dome over the great tomb. M. Degrand says very well: “A vault of these proportions must count as a memorable work. Its construction here and there makes use of colossal stones, and it subsists almost intact after more than thirty centuries of existence. At a pinch its architect and workmen could have erected some masonry bridges in accord with the same technical method.” In wide arches of this sort the resistance of good mortars would have been called upon to play the leading part; but in arches of narrow span the stones could have been used dry, and such arches may well have displaced many a primitive footway of logs that rested on stone piers. The Egyptians built some real arches, not with long stones carefully shaped into segments of a circle, such as we find in some Chinese bridges (pp. 313-14), but with hewn blocks whose joints converged toward a common centre. In Ethiopia, for example, in one of the pyramids of Meroe, there is a semicircular arch composed of voussoirs; and two pyramids at Gebel Barkel have arched porticoes with voussoirs that tend to one point. Their shapes differ, one arch being pointed and the other round-headed.[62] The pyramids of Gebel Barkel are puny in style, and belong to a very late date in old Egyptian history. As we have seen, a triangular arch may be studied above the Lion Gate at Mycenae. Triangular arches are uncommon, but Brangwyn has chosen a good example of a much later date from Kashmír. The builders found it easier to set up a triangular scaffold than a rounded one. [Illustration: IN KASHMÍR: A PRIMITIVE BRIDGE WITH TRIANGULAR ARCHES]