Identifier: ruinsofdesertcat01stei (find matches)
Title: Ruins of desert Cathay : personal narrative of explorations in Central Asia and westernmost China
Year: 1912 (1910s)
Authors: Stein, Aurel, Sir, 1862-1943 Archaeological Survey of India
Subjects:
Publisher: London : Macmillan
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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e high antiquity.They showed an average thickness of sixteen feet, and,apart from large rough slabs used in the foundations,consisted of remarkably regular and closely laid brick-work. The bricks, sun-dried yet solid enough, were aboutfive inches thick and measured on the average fifteen bytwelve inches. Neither the material, a fine clay plenti-fully mixed with pebbles, nor adequate water for makingthem could have been obtained on the spot, and theirtransport to this height must have greatly increased thetrouble of construction. Both here and at Kansir theconjecture suggested Itself that the insertion of thin layersof twigs and brushwood (here from the juniper growthwhich is still to be met with in some of the neighbour-ing side valleys) was primarily intended as a substitutefor an adequate supply of wet plaster to set the bricks ;want of water at such a height must have renderedthis difficult to obtain. And the observations subse-quently gathered along the ancient Chinese border wall
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34- CHINESE FORT OF TASH-KURGHAN SEEN FROM NEAR LEFT BANK OF RIVER.

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