There were three kinds of pavements or flooring in the Assyrian palaces—beaten earth, brick pave- ments, and limestone slabs (Place, Ninive, i. 295). In the palace of Sargon nearly every chamber except those of the harem had a floor of beaten earth, like those in a modern fellah’s house. Even in the most sumptuous hall there was no exception to this rule. These floors were probably covered with mats or cloth carpets. In the harem cham- bers at Khorsabad, as well as in the open courts and terraces, a very carefully laid pavement is found, composed of two layers of large bricks with a thick bed of sand between them, the lower course of bricks being set in a bed of bitumen which separates it from the earth and prevents any dampness passing either up or down. In some of the harem rooms, courts, and vestibules, before the gates of the city, and in paths across wide open spaces, & limestone pavement has been found.
hus stones are often seen there 3 feet square and 2 feet 6 inches thick; but they are not cubical, but rather of the shape of a reversed pyramid, roughly hewn on all sides except the base, which is uppermost. They are laid without mortar or cement, and are singularly durable (Perrot and Chipiez, i. 239).
As bitumen was obtainable at Jerusalem, it is possible that it may have been used in the con- struction of floors of palaces and large houses. Josephus (BJ Iv. viii. 4) tells us that the Dead Sea casts up black clods of bitumen which float on the water and are drawn into the ships, and then used for caulking ships and for medicine. At the present day bitumen is now and then cast up and brought to Jerusalem.
In Egypt, where stone was plentiful, the temple courts were reef paved with flagging. Strabo, in describing the plans of temples of Egypt gener- ally (XVI. i. 25), says that at the entrance into the temenos is a paved floor, in breadth about a plethrum or even less, its length three or four times as great. In front of the Great ‘amid of Gizeh is still a great pavement, which is thus described by Petrie (Great Pyramid, 14): ‘This basalt pavement is 8 magnificent work, which
covered more than a third of an acre. The blocks of basalt are all sawn and fitted together! Round the pyramid itself, and extending some distance, about 500 feet on each side, was a limestone pave- ment about 21 inches thick.’
Wilkinson (Anc. ELgypt. ii. 115) says that the floors of houses in Egypt were sometimes made of stone, or a composition of lime and other materials.
The references to pavements and floors in the Bible are not numerous, and refer generally to the temple. The floor of the temple of Solomon was ads of ‘boards of fir’ or cypress (1 K 6%: 16. 80) overlaid with gold. King Ahaz took down the sea from off the brazen oxen, and put it on a pave- ment (n392) of stone, 2 Καὶ 16. At the dedication of the temple at Jerusalem by king Solomon, ‘ they bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement (n>¥9), and worshipped,’ 2 Ch 7%.
e pavement (7p¥7) in the bedroom of the palace of the king of Persia was of red, white, yellow, and black marble, Est 1°. There was a pavement (By) in the temple of Ezekiel (Ezk 40!” 18 423, and see Davidson on 415),
The dust of the floor of the tabernacle is spoken of as though the floor was of beaten earth (Nu 51”). The very beautiful pavements found all over Pales- tine in recent years are nearly all of a compara- tively late period, i.e. since the Roman occupation. See also GATE, HousE, Roor, WALLS.
For the ‘pavement’ (λιθόστρωτον) of Jn 19" see GABBATHA. C. WARREN.
PAYILION is formed (through Fr. pavillon) from Lat. papilio, which meant a ‘butterfly,’ and also (from the resemblance to a butterfly’s outspread wings)atent. Tindale, in his ‘ Prologe to Exodus,’ explains TABERNACLE as ‘ an house made tent wise, or as a pavelion.’ Pavilion is the tr. in AV of τὸ sok in Ps 275, and of πϑῷ sukkah in 2S 22", 1 Καὶ 9013. 16. Ps 184 3139 (to which RV adds Job 36% and Is 48 for AV ‘tabernacle’). Elsewhere sdk occurs in Ps 10° (n503, AV and RV ‘in his den’), 762 (AV and RV ‘tabernacle,’ RVm ‘ covert’), and Jer 25% (AV and RV ‘covert’). Sukkah is of frequent oc- currence, and is rendered ‘ booth’ or ‘ tabernacle,’ once ‘tent’(2S 11"). Besides these, way shaphrir (Keré 15%) in its single occurrence, Jer 43", is tr. ‘royal pavilion’ (RVm ‘glittering pavilion’). RV has also given ‘ pavilion’ in Nu 25°, with m. ‘alcove’ for AV ‘tent’ (Heb. 32). See BooTu, TABER- NACLE, TENT. J. HASTINGS.
PE (5).—The seventeenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and as such employed in the 119th Psalm to designate the 17th part, each verse of which begins with this letter. It is transliterated in this Dictionary by p or ph.
PEACE, the tr" in OT of the Heb. n'y shalém (from the root 52% ‘to be whole’)=‘ wholeness,’ ‘soundness,’ hence health, wellbeing, prosperity ; more particularly, peace as a8 ae to war, con- cord as of Baer to strife ; in it is tr® of the Gr. εἰρήνη (which in LXX ordinarily translates 015;), ‘peace,’ ‘quiet,’ as opposed to war or strife, hence menus πέσ prosperity.