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The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, in Lonia, has given its name to all subsequent tomb monuments. Mausolus, satrap of Caria, was honored with this tomb by his queen, Artemisia (350 B.C.) Architects Satyros and Pythios designed a temple-like marble tomb with an Ionic colonnade on a high base surrounded by lions; the roof was a 24-step pyramid on the peak of which stood a chariot. Famous sculptors Timotheus, Bryaxis, Leochares, and Scopas created the Frieze--depicting Amazons battling heroes--which is now in the British Museum Site on which the Mausoleum stood. It was excavated in 1857 and now the medieval castle at Bodrum, Turkey contains many fragments from it. Mausolus decided to build a new capitol, a city as hard to capture as it was magnificent to look at. He chose the town Halicarnassus. If Mausolus' ships blocked a small channel, they could keep all enemy warships out. Mausolus started making Halicarnassus a fit capitol for a warrior prince. His workmen deepened the city's harbor and used the dredged up sand to make protecting arms in front of the channel. On land, they laid out paved squares, streets, and houses for ordinary citizens, and on one side of the harbor they built a massive fortress-palace for Mausolus, positioned so that there were clear views out to sea and inland to the hills--the places that enemies might attack. The workmen built walls and watch towers on the land ward side and put up a Greek style theater and a temple to Ares, the Greek god of war. Mausolus and his queen Artemisia spent their huge amount of tax money on beautifying the city. They bought statues, temples, and buildings of gleaming marble. In the center of the city Mausolus planned to place a resting place for his body after he was dead. It would be a tomb that would forever show how rich he and his queen were. Mausolus hired people to get marble and build the tomb out of it. He died before the tomb was finished, but Artimesia wanted the architects to continue. The architects who designed the Mausoleum (after Mausolus) were used to designing buildings for gods but they built for Mausolus and Artemisia on the same scale.The workmen began with an underground tomb carved out of stone. The royal couple's ashes would lie there forever in their gold caskets. Above it was a huge rectangular stone base. On top of that was a building the size and shape of a Greek temple, surrounded by thirty-six columns and thirty-six statues. The building's roof was like a stone pyramid with twenty-four steps, and on its flat top was a statue-group of a chariot pulled by four horses. It had three different styles (Carian, Greek, Egyptian) the three civilizations he wanted to bring together in his new city. The architects did every thing that they could to make to Mausoleum more stunning. The Mausoleum was probably solid all the way through. Shortly after it was done, Artemisia died and was put in it after her husband. They laid undisturbed for 1800 years until an earthquake destroyed the Mausoleum. People used the stones for buildings and the tomb was finally discovered. Pirates stole the gold and now only few pieces exist. Now they use the word Mausoleum as a tomb for someone important.
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