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 Contents

Preface xi

CHAPTER 1

Introduction 1
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Overview 2
1.2.1 A Brief History 4

CHAPTER 2

Mathematical Descriptions of Systems 6

2.1 Introduction 6
2.2 Causality, Lumpedness, and Time Invariance 7
2.2.1 Impulses 9
2.3 Linear Time-Invariant Systems 11
2.3.1 Multi-input Multi-output Case 18
2.4 Linear Time-Varying Systems 19
2.4.1 Linearization 20
2.5 RLC Circuits—Comparisons of Various Descriptions 21
2.6 Mechanical and Hydraulic Systems 30
2.7 Proper Rational Transfer Functions 38
2.8 Discrete-Time Linear Time-Invariant Systems 40
2.9 Concluding Remarks 48
Problems 49

vii
viii CONTENTS

CHAPTER 3

Linear Algebra 55
3.1 Introduction 55
3.2 Basis, Representation, and Orthonormalization 56
3.3 Linear Algebraic Equations 61
3.4 Similarity Transformation 66
3.5 Diagonal Form and Jordan Form 68
3.6 Functions of a Square Matrix 75
3.7 Lyapunov Equation 84
3.8 Some Useful Formulas 86
3.9 Quadratic Form and Positive Definiteness 87
3.10 Singular Value Decomposition 91
3.11 Norms of Matrices 93
Problems 95

CHAPTER 4

State-Space Solutions and Realizations 101

4.1 Introduction 101
4.2 General Solution of CT LTI State-Space Equations 103
4.2.1 Discretization 106
4.2.2 General Solution of DT LTI State-Space Equations 108
4.3 Computer Computation of CT State-Space Equations 110
4.3.1 Real-Time Processing 113
4.3.2 Op-Amp Circuit Implementation 114
4.4 Equivalent State-Space Equations 115
4.4.1 Canonical Forms 120
4.4.2 Magnitude Scaling in Op-Amp Circuits 122
4.5 Realizations 124
4.5.1 Multi-input Multi-output Case 128
4.6 Solution of Linear Time-Varying (LTV) Equations 133
4.6.1 Discrete-Time Case 138
4.7 Equivalent Time-Varying Equations 139
4.8 Time-Varying Realizations 143
Problems 145

CHAPTER 5

Stability 149
5.1 Introduction 149
5.2 Input–Output Stability of LTI Systems 149
5.3 Discrete-Time Case 158
 CONTENTS ix

5.4 Internal Stability 163

5.4.1 Discrete-Time Case 165
5.5 Lyapunov Theorem 166
5.5.1 Discrete-Time Case 169
5.6 Stability of LTV Systems 172
Problems 175

CHAPTER 6

Controllability and Observability 178

6.1 Introduction 178
6.2 Controllability 179
6.2.1 Controllability Indices 185
6.3 Observability 188
6.3.1 Observability Indices 192
6.4 Kalman Decomposition 194
6.5 Conditions in Jordan-Form Equations 201
6.6 Discrete-Time State-Space Equations 205
6.6.1 Controllability to the Origin and Reachability 208
6.7 Controllability after Sampling 209
6.8 LTV State-Space Equations 212
Problems 217

CHAPTER 7

Minimal Realizations and Coprime Fractions 221

7.1 Introduction 221
7.2 Implications of Coprimeness 222
7.2.1 Minimal Realizations 226
7.2.2 Complete Characterization 230
7.3 Computing Coprime Fractions 232
7.3.1 QR Decomposition 236
7.4 Balanced Realization 237
7.5 Realizations from Markov Parameters 241
7.6 Degree of Transfer Matrices 246
7.7 Minimal Realizations—Matrix Case 248
7.8 Matrix Polynomial Fractions 250
7.8.1 Column and Row Reducedness 253
7.8.2 Computing Matrix Coprime Fractions 256
7.9 Realization from Matrix Coprime Fractions 263
7.10 Realizations from Matrix Markov Parameters 269
7.11 Concluding Remarks 271
Problems 271
x CONTENTS

CHAPTER 8

State Feedback and State Estimators 274

8.1 Introduction 274
8.2 State Feedback 275
8.2.1 Solving Lyapunov Equation 282
8.3 Regulation and Tracking 285
8.3.1 Robust Tracking and Disturbance Rejection 287
8.3.2 Stabilization 291
8.4 State Estimator 291
8.4.1 Reduced-Dimensional State Estimator 295
8.5 Feedback from Estimated States 297
8.6 State Feedback—MIMO Case 299
8.6.1 Cyclic Design 300
8.6.2 Lyapunov-Equation Method 303
8.6.3 Controllable-Form Method 304
8.6.4 Effect on Transfer Matrices 306
8.7 State Estimators—MIMO Case 308
8.8 Feedback from Estimated States—MIMO Case 309
Problems 311

CHAPTER 9

Pole Placement and Model Matching 313

9.1 Introduction 313
9.2 Preliminary—Matching Coefficients 315
9.2.1 Compensator Equations—Classical Method 317
9.3 Unity-Feedback Configuration—Pole Placement 318
9.3.1 Regulation and Tracking 321
9.3.2 Robust Tracking and Disturbance Rejection 323
9.3.3 Embedding Internal Models 327
9.4 Implementable Transfer Functions 329
9.4.1 Model Matching—Two-Parameter Configuration 333
9.4.2 Implementation of Two-Parameter Compensators 338
9.5 MIMO Unity Feedback Systems 340
9.5.1 Regulation and Tracking 350
9.5.2 Robust Tracking and Disturbance Rejection 352
9.6 MIMO Model Matching—Two-Parameter Configuration 354
9.6.1 Decoupling 360
9.7 Concluding Remarks 364
Problems 365

References 369
Answers to Selected Problems 371
Index 381
Preface

T
his text is intended for use in senior/first-year graduate courses on linear systems in
electrical, mechanical, bioengineering, chemical, and aeronautical departments. It
may also be useful to practicing engineers because it contains many design proce-
dures. The mathematical background assumed is a working knowledge of linear algebra
and the Laplace transform and an elementary knowledge of differential equations. A
knowledge of the sophomore/junior subject area Signals and Systems such as the one
in Reference 10 is helpful but not essential.
Linear system theory is a vast subject area. This text studies mainly linear time-
invariant lumped systems which are describable by state-space equations and rational
transfer functions. The former is an internal description, and the latter is an external
description. We study their structures, relationships, and implications in design. As this
is an engineering text, we aim to achieve two objectives. The first one is to use simple and
efficient methods to develop results and design procedures. Thus the presentation is not
exhaustive. For example, we skip many multivariable companion-forms in state-space
equations and the Smith–McMillan form in transfer matrices. The second objective is
to enable the reader to employ the results to carry out design. Thus most results are
discussed with an eye toward numerical computation. All design procedures in the text
can be carried out using MATLAB.1 We adopt the theorem–proof format to cultivate
the reader’s ability to think critically and to develop ideas logically.

1 MATLAB is a registered trademark of the MathWorks, Inc., 24 Prime Park Way, Natick, MA 01760-1500.
http://www.mathworks.com.

xi
xii PREFACE

This text also touches upon linear time-invariant distributed systems and linear
time-varying lumped systems. We use examples to show that some results in this text
are not applicable to those systems. Even so, this text will provide a foundation and a
benchmark for studying distributed, time-varying, or nonlinear systems.
The first edition of this text, entitled Introduction to Linear System Theory, was
published in 1970. Its second edition, renamed Linear System Theory and Design, was
published in 1984. It expanded to 662 pages from 431 pages of the original edition. The
third edition, published in 1999, cut the second edition in half to 332 pages by skipping
many topics that are either of only academic interests or of limited practical use. The
third edition also introduced the two-parameter (feedforward/feedback) configuration,
which is more suitable for practical application.
Before carrying out this revision, Oxford University Press sent out the third edition
for reviews. Two reviewers suggested to drop Chapters 7 and 9 because they were
not covered in their courses. Indeed, the multi-input and multi-output (MIMO) parts
of those two chapters, which are included for completeness, should not be covered;
they are more suitable for advanced courses. It is, however, suggested to cover the
single-input single-output (SISO) parts because they relate the concept of coprimeness
in transfer functions and the concepts of controllability and observability in state-
space equations and establish the equivalence of the two descriptions. They also use
simpler mathematics to develop results that are more general than those obtained using
state-space equations.

New to the Fourth Edition

The subject area covered in this text is a mature one. Thus this new edition differs
from its preceding one, which was published more than a decade ago, mainly in its
presentation as listed in the following:
• A brief history of the subject area is added to Chapter 1.
• Instead of starting from the linear time-varying case, it starts with linear time-
invariant lumped systems. It discusses, by restructuring Chapter 2, four types of
equations and then give reasons for focusing on rational transfer functions and state-
space equations. The concepts tree, loop, and link in graph theory are dropped from
this edition.
• Chapter 4 is expanded to discuss computer computation and real-time processing of
state-space equations. A new section on SISO realizations is added.
• A new section on complete characterization is added to Chapter 7.
• Some examples are added to provide additional motivation.
• All examples using MATLAB are updated using the R2011a version.
• Many problems with numerical values at the end of each chapter are modified.
It is hoped that this new edition would be more easily accessible to wider audience.
This text discusses two essentially independent, though related, subject areas.
The first area deals with state-space equations, requires all mathematics in Chapter 3,
and is discussed in Chapters 4, 5, 6, and 8. The second area deals with rational trans-
fer functions or polynomial fractions, requires only Section 3.3 of Chapter 3, and
 PREFACE xiii

is discussed in Chapter 5, 7, and 9. A one-semester course that studies exclusively

state-space equations may cover Chapters 1 through 6 and Chapter 8. To cover both
areas, the following
Chap. 1–2; Sec. 3.1–3.7; Sec. 4.1–4.5; Sec. 5.1–5.2 and 5.4;
Sec. 6.1–6.4 excluding 6.2.1 and 6.3.1; Sec. 7.1–7.3;
Sec. 8.1–8.5 excluding 8.3.1, 8.3.2, and 8.4.1;
Sec. 9.1–9.3.1, and Sec. 9.4–9.4.2
may be enough for a one-semester course. If not, one may add the discrete-time
case and/or the time-varying case. Of course, other arrangements are also possible.
A solutions manual is available from the publisher.
I am indebted to many people in revising this and previous editions. Professor
Imin Kao and Mr. Zhi Chen helped me with MATLAB. Professor Zongli Lin and Mr.
T. Anantakrishnan read the whole manuscript and made many valuable suggestions. I
am grateful to Dean Yacov Shamash, College of Engineering and Applied Sciences,
Stony Brook University, for his encouragement. The third edition of the book was
reviewed by Professor B. Ross Barmish, Department of Electrical and Computer Engi-
neering, University of Wisconsin; Professor Harold Broberg, EET Department, Indiana
Purdue University; Professor Peyman Givi, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace
Engineering, State University of New York at Buffalo; and Professor Mustafa Kham-
mash, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Iowa State University.
Their detailed and critical comments prompted me to restructure some sections. I thank
them all.
I am indebted to Patrick Lynch, Dan Pepper, Claire Sullivan, and Carolyn
DiTullio of Oxford University Press, who were instrumental for this revision. The
people at Oxford University Press, including Pamela Hanley, Christine Mahon, and
Deborah Gross were most helpful in this undertaking.

Chi-Tsong Chen
July 2012
This page intentionally left blank
 1
CHAPTER

Introduction

1.1 Introduction
The study and design of physical systems can be carried out using empirical methods.
We can apply various signals to a physical system and measure its responses. If the
performance is not satisfactory, we can adjust some of its parameters or connect to
it a compensator to improve its performance. This approach relies heavily on past
experience and is carried out by trial and error, and it has succeeded in designing many
physical systems.
Empirical methods may become unworkable if physical systems are complex, or
they may become too expensive or too dangerous to be experimented on. In these cases,
analytical methods become indispensable. The analytical study of physical systems
consists of four parts: modeling, development of mathematical descriptions, analysis,
and design. We briefly introduce each of these tasks.
The distinction between physical systems and models is important in engineering.
For example, circuits or control systems studied in any textbook are models of physical
systems. A resistor with a constant resistance is a model; it will burn out if the applied
voltage is over a limit. This power limitation is often disregarded in its analytical study.
An inductor with a constant inductance is again a model; in reality, the inductance
may vary with the amount of current flowing through it. Modeling is a very important
problem, for the success of the design depends upon whether the physical system is
properly modeled.
A physical system may have different models, depending on the questions asked.
It may also be modeled differently in different operational ranges. For example, an
electronic amplifier is modeled differently at high and low frequencies. A spaceship
can be modeled as a particle in investigating its trajectory; however, it must be modeled
as a rigid body in maneuvering. A spaceship may even be modeled as a flexible body

1
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2 INTRODUCTION

when it is connected to a space station. In order to develop a suitable model for a

physical system, a thorough understanding of the physical system and its operational
range is essential. In this text, we will call a model of a physical systems simply a
system. Thus a physical system is a device or a collection of devices existing in the real
world; a system is a model of a physical system.
Once a system (or model) is selected for a physical system, the next step is to
apply various physical laws to develop mathematical equations to describe the system.
For example, we apply Kirchhoff’s voltage and current laws to electrical systems and
Newton’s law to mechanical systems. The equations that describe systems may assume
many forms; they may be linear equations, nonlinear equations, integral equations,
difference equations, differential equations or others. Depending on the problem under
study, one form of equation may be preferable to another in describing the same system.
In conclusion, a system may have different mathematical-equation descriptions, just as
a physical system may have many different models.
After a mathematical description is obtained, we then carry out analyses—
quantitative and qualitative. In quantitative analysis, we are interested in responses
of systems excited by certain inputs. In qualitative analysis, we are interested in
general properties of systems, such as stability, controllability, and observability. Qual-
itative analysis is very important, because design techniques may often evolve from
this study.
If the response of a system is unsatisfactory, the system must be modified. In some
cases, this can be achieved by adjusting some parameters of the system; in other cases,
compensators must be introduced. Note that the design is carried out on the model of the
physical system. If the model is properly chosen, then the performance of the physical
system should be improved by introducing the required adjustments or compensators.
If the model is poor, then the performance of the physical system may not improve and
the design is useless. Selecting a model that is close enough to a physical system and
yet simple enough to be studied analytically is the most difficult and important problem
in system design.

1.2 Overview
The study of systems consists of four parts: modeling, setting up mathematical
equations, analysis, and design. Developing models for physical systems requires
knowledge of the particular field and some measuring devices. For example, to develop
models for transistors requires a knowledge of quantum physics and some laboratory
setup. Developing models for automobile suspension systems requires actual testing
and measurements; it cannot be achieved by use of pencil and paper. Computer sim-
ulation certainly helps but cannot replace actual measurements. Thus the modeling
problem should be studied in conjunction with the specific field and cannot be properly
covered in this text. In this text, we shall assume that models of physical systems are
available to us.
The systems to be studied in this text are mostly limited to linear (L), time-
invariant (TI), and lumped. This class of systems with input u(t) and output y(t) can
be described by
 OVERVIEW 3

1. Convolution:
 t
y(t) = g(t − τ )u(τ ) dτ (1.1)
τ =0

where g(t) is called the impulse response.

2. Transfer function:
ŷ(s) = ĝ(s)û(s) (1.2)
where a variable with a circumflex is the Laplace transform of the variable. The
function ĝ(s) is called a transfer function and is a rational function of s such as
3s2 − 2s + 5
ĝ(s) =
s3 + 4s2 + 2.5s + 3
3. High-order differential equation such as

y(3) + 4ÿ(t) + 2.5ẏ(t) + 3y(t) = 3ü(t) − 2u̇(t) + 5u(t) (1.3)

where y(3) (t) := d 3 y(t)/dt 3 , ÿ(t) := d 2 y(t)/dt 2 , and ẏ(t) := dy(t)/dt.1 It is a
third-order linear differential equation with constant coefficients.
4. State-space equation:
ẋ(t) = Ax(t) + bu(t)
y(t) = cx(t) + du(t) (1.4)
where x(t) is a column vector, called the state and A, b, c, and d are constant
matrices of compatible orders.
Because all variables are functions of time, Equations (1.1), (1.3), and (1.4) are
called time-domain descriptions, whereas (1.2) is called the transform-domain descrip-
tion. The first three are called input–output or external descriptions because they relate
only the input u and output y. The state-space equation is called the internal descrip-
tion because it also describes the internal variables x of the system. These four types
of equations can be used to describe the same system.
This text will start with the introduction of convolution, because it shows explic-
itly the use of the concepts of linearity and time invariance. The convolution will be used
to develop transfer functions and a stability condition. It, however, will not be used in
analysis and design, as we will discuss in the text. Thus its discussion is not exhaustive.
We will also show why the differential equation is not studied in this text. We then con-
centrate on the transfer function, an external description, and the state-space equation,
the internal description. We discuss their solutions, properties, and relationships. We
also use them to carry out design in feedback systems. We discuss first single-input
single-output (SISO) systems and then multi-input multi-output (MIMO) systems. We

1 We use A := B to denote that A, by definition, equals B. We use A =: B to denote that B, by definition,

equals A.
4 INTRODUCTION

start with the continuous-time (CT) case because most physical systems are continuous
time and then discuss their discrete-time (DT) counterparts.
We will also touch upon LTI distributed systems described by irrational transfer
functions, as well as linear and lumped systems described by time-varying state-space
equations. We show that some results for LTI lumped systems may not be applicable to
linear time-varying or distributed systems. Thus their study is much more complicated.
The study of nonlinear systems is even more so. To study them, this text however will
provide a foundation and a benchmark.

1.2.1 A Brief History

This text studies basically rational transfer functions and state-space equations. Thus
it is appropriate to discuss the history of their uses in the electrical engineering cur-
riculum. Oliver Heaviside (1850–1925) used p to denote differentiation and introduced
resistive operators R, Lp, and 1/Cp to study electric circuits in 1887. This ushered
the concepts of impedances and transfer functions. Heaviside’s operational calculus,
however, lacked an inversion formula and was incomplete. It was recognized around
1940 that the Laplace transform, developed by Pierre-Simon Laplace in 1782, encom-
passed the Heaviside method. Because of its simplicity, the Laplace transform and the
transfer or system function had gradually crept into the EE curriculum. By 1960, trans-
fer functions are used in analog filter designs, passive-network syntheses, and circuit
analysis.
In order to explain the dancing of flyballs and jerking of machine shafts in steam
engines, James Maxwell developed in 1868 a third-order linearized differential equation
to raise the issue of stability. This earmarked the beginning of mathematical study of
control systems. In 1932, Henry Nyquist developed a graphical method of checking
the stability of a feedback system from its open-loop system. The method, however, is
fairly complex and is not suitable for design. In 1940, Hendrick Bode simplified the
method to use the phase margin and gain margin of the open-loop system to check
stability. However the method is applicable only to a small class of open-loop systems.
Moreover, the relationship between phase and gain margins and system performances
is vague. In 1948, W. R. Evans developed the root-locus method to carry out design
of feedback systems. The method is general, but the compensator used is essentially
limited to degree 0. The aforementioned methods are all based on transfer functions
and constitute the entire bulk of most texts on control systems published before 1970.
State-space equations first appeared in the engineering literature in the early
1960s. The formulation is precise: It first gives definitions, and then it develops condi-
tions and finally establishes theorems. Moreover, its formulation for SISO and MIMO
systems are the same, and all results for SISO systems can be extended to MIMO sys-
tems. The most celebrated results are: If a state-space equation is controllable, then
state feedback can achieve arbitrary eigenvalue-placement. If a state-space equation
is observable, then a state estimator with any desired eigenvalues can be constructed.
By 1980, state-space equations and designs were introduced into many undergraduate
texts on control.
With the impetus of state-space results, researchers took a fresh look in the
1970s into transfer functions. By considering a rational function as a ratio of two
 OVERVIEW 5

polynomials, the polynomial-fraction approach was born. By so doing, the results in

SISO systems can also be extended to MIMO systems. The important concept in this
approach is coprimeness. Under the coprimeness assumption, it is possible to achieve
pole-placement and model-matching designs. The method is simpler and the results are
more general than those based on state-space equations, as we will demonstrate in this
text. Even so, state-space equations are indispensable in studying systems because they
are used in computer computation and simulation, real-time processing, and op-amp
circuit implementation. Thus both rational transfer functions and state-space equations
are important in studying systems.
 CHAPTER

2
Mathematical
Descriptions of Systems

2.1 Introduction
This text models a system as a black box with one or more input terminals and one or
more output terminals as shown in Fig. 2.1. We assume that if an excitation or input is
applied to the input terminal, a unique response or output signal can be measured at the
output terminal. This unique relationship between the excitation and response, input
and output, or cause and effect is essential in defining a system. A system with only one
input terminal and only one output terminal is called a single-input single-output (SISO)
system. A system with two or more input terminals and two or more output terminals
is called a multi-input multi-output (MIMO) system. Likewise, a single-input multi-
output (SIMO) system has only one input terminal and two or more output terminals.
A MISO system has multi-input terminals and single-output terminal.
A signal is called a continuous-time (CT) signal if it is defined at every instant of
time. A system is called a CT system if it accepts CT signals as its input and generates
CT signals as its output. The input will be denoted by lowercase italic u(t) for single
input or by boldface u(t) for multiple inputs. If a system has p input terminals, then
u(t) is a p × 1 vector or u = [u1 u2 . . . up ] , where the prime denotes the transpose.
Similarly, the output will be denoted by y(t) or y(t). The time t is mostly assumed to
range from −∞ to ∞.
A signal is called a discrete-time (DT) signal if it is defined only at discrete
instants of time. A system is called a DT system if it accepts DT signals as its input and
generates DT signals as its output. All DT signals in a system will be assumed to have
the same sampling period T . The input and output will be denoted by u[k] := u(kT ) and
y[k] := y(kT ), where the integer k, ranging mostly from −∞ to ∞, is called the time
index and kT denotes discrete time instant. For multiple inputs and multiple outputs,
we use boldface u[n] and y[n].

6
 CAUSALITY, LUMPEDNESS, AND TIME INVARIANCE 7

FIGURE 2.1 System.

2.2 Causality, Lumpedness, and Time Invariance

A system is called a memoryless system if its output y(t0 ) depends only on the input
applied at t0 ; it is independent of the input applied before or after t0 . This will be stated
succinctly as: Current output of a memoryless system depends only on current input;
it is independent of past and future inputs. A circuit that consists of only resistors is
a memoryless system. Operational amplifiers are often modeled as memoryless. See
Reference 10.
Most systems, however, have memory. By this, we mean that the output at t0
depends on u(t) for t < t0 , t = t0 , and t > t0 . That is, current output of a system with
memory may depend on past, current, and future inputs.
A system is called a causal or nonanticipatory system if its current output depends
on past and current inputs but not on future input. If a system is not causal, then its
current output will depend on future input. In other words, a noncausal system can
predict or anticipate what will be applied in the future. No physical system has such
capability. Therefore, every physical system is causal, and causality is a necessary
condition for a system to be built or implemented in the real world. This text studies
only causal systems.
Current output of a causal system is affected by past input. How far back in time
will the past input affect the current output? Generally, the time should go all the way
back to minus infinity. In other words, the input from −∞ to time t0 has an effect on
y(t0 ). Tracking u(t) from t = −∞ onward is, if not impossible, very inconvenient. The
concept of state can deal this problem.

Definition 2.1 The state x(t0 ) of a system at time t0 is the information at t0 that,
together with the input u(t), for t ≥ t0 , determines uniquely the output y(t) for
all t ≥ t0 .

By definition, if we know the state at t0 , there is no more need to know the input
u(t) applied before t0 in determining the output y(t) after t0 . Thus in some sense, the
state summarizes the effect of past input on future output. For the circuit shown in
Fig. 2.2, if we know the voltages x1 (t0 ) and x2 (t0 ) across the two capacitors and the
current x3 (t0 ) passing through the inductor, then for any input applied on and after t0
8 MATHEMATICAL DESCRIPTIONS OF SYSTEMS

FIGURE 2.2 Circuit with three state variables.

we can determine uniquely the output for t ≥ t0 . Thus the state of the circuit at time t0 is
⎡ ⎤
x1 (t0 )
x(t0 ) = ⎣ x2 (t0 ) ⎦
x3 (t0 )

It is a 3 × 1 vector. The entries of x are called state variables. Thus, in general, we may
consider the state simply as a set of initial conditions. We call x(t0 ) the initial state.
Using the initial state at t0 , we can express the input and output of a system as

x(t0 )
→ y(t), t ≥ t0 (2.1)
u(t), t ≥ t0

It means that the output is partly excited by the initial state at t0 and partly by the input
applied at and after t0 . In using (2.1), there is no more need to know the input applied
before t0 all the way back to −∞. Thus (2.1) is easier to track and will be called a
state-input–output pair.
A system is said to be lumped if its number of state variables is finite or its state
is a finite vector. The circuit in Fig. 2.2 is clearly a lumped system; its state consists of
three numbers. A system is called a distributed system if its state has infinitely many
state variables. The transmission line is the most well known distributed system. We
give one more example.

Example 2.2.1 Consider the unit-time delay system defined by

y(t) = u(t − 1)

The output is simply the input delayed by one second. In order to determine {y(t), t ≥ t0 }
from {u(t), t ≥ t0 }, we need the information {u(t), t0 − 1 ≤ t < t0 }. Therefore, the
initial state of the system is {u(t), t0 − 1 ≤ t < t0 }. There are infinitely many points in
{t0 − 1 ≤ t < t0 }. Thus the unit-time delay system is a distributed system.

A system is said to be time invariant if its characteristics do not change with

time. For example, the circuit in Fig. 2.2 is time invariant if Ri , Ci and Li are constants,
independent of time. For such a system, no matter at what time we apply an input,
the output waveform will always be the same. This property can be expressed using
 CAUSALITY, LUMPEDNESS, AND TIME INVARIANCE 9

state-input–output pairs as follows. Let


x(t0 )
→ y(t), t ≥ t0
u(t), t ≥ t0

be any pair of a system. If the system is time invariant, then we have, for any t1 ,

x(t0 + t1 )
→ y(t − t1 ), t ≥ t0 + t1 (time shifting)
u(t − t1 ), t ≥ t0 + t1

where u(t − t1 ) and y(t − t1 ) are shifting, respectively, of u(t) and y(t) from t0 to
t0 + t1 . The equation means that if the initial state is shifted to time t0 + t1 and the same
input waveform is applied from t0 + t1 instead of from t0 , then the output waveform
will be the same except that it starts to appear from time t0 + t1 . In other words, if the
initial state and the input are the same, no matter at what time they are applied, the
output waveform will always be the same. Therefore, for time-invariant systems, we
can always assume, without loss of generality, that t0 = 0. Note that the initial time
t0 = 0 is not absolute; it can be selected by us. It may be the instant we start to study a
system. If we select t0 = 0, then the time interval of interest will be [0, ∞). If a system
is not time invariant, it is said to be time varying.
Some physical systems must be modeled as time-varying systems. For example,
a burning rocket is a time-varying system, because its mass decreases rapidly with
time. Although the performance of an automobile or a TV set may deteriorate over a
long period of time, its characteristics do not change appreciable in the first couple of
years. Thus a large number of physical systems can be modeled as time invariant over
a limited time period.

2.2.1 Impulses
We need the concept of impulses to develop some mathematical equations. Consider
the pulse defined by

1/ t1 ≤ t < t0 + 
δa (t − t1 ) :=
0 t < t1 and t ≥ t1 + 

and shown in Fig. 2.3. It is located at time t1 and has width  and height 1/. Its area
or any integration covering the pulse equals 1 for any  > 0. The impulse at t = t1 is

FIGURE 2.3 Pulse at t1 .

10 MATHEMATICAL DESCRIPTIONS OF SYSTEMS

then defined as

δ(t − t1 ) := lim δ (t − t1 )
→0

It equals 0 for all t = t1 and ∞ at t = t1 . Its area or any integration covers the impulse
equals 1 such as
 ∞  t1 +  t1
δ(t − t1 ) dt = δ(t − t1 ) dt = δ(t − t1 ) dt = 1
t=−∞ t=t1 t=t1

where t1 + is infinitesimally larger than t1 . For convenience, we drop the use of t1 + as

in the last integration and assume that whenever an integration touches an impulse, the
integration covers the entire impulse. Note that if an integration interval does not cover
nor touch an impulse, then the integration is zero such as
 2  ∞
δ(t − 2.5) dt = 0 and δ(t − 2.5) dt = 0
t=−∞ t=2.501

where the impulse is located at t = 2.5. The impulse has the following sifting property
 ∞  t1
f (t)δ(t − t1 ) dt = f (t)δ(t − t1 ) dt
t=−∞ t=t1
= f (t)|t−t1 =0 = f (t)|t=t1 = f (t1 )

for any function f (t) that is continuous at t1 . The impulse at t1 sifts out the value of f (t)
at t = t1 . In general, whenever a function is multiplied by an impulse in an integration,
we simply move the function outside the integration and then replace the integration
variable by the variable obtained by equating the argument of the impulse to zero.
We discuss an application. Consider the signal shown in Fig. 2.4. It can be approx-
imated by a staircase function formed from a sequence of pulses as shown. We call 
the step size. The pulse in Fig. 2.3 has height 1/; its multiplication by  or δ (t − ti )
has height 1. The leftmost pulse in Fig. 2.4 has height u(ti ), thus it can be expressed as

FIGURE 2.4 Approximation of input signal.

Other documents randomly have
different content
 All this is as wrong-headed as it can be. While he is filling his museum
he does not seem to understand that he is denuding every necropolis in
Egypt. I will give one or two instances of the destruction wrought by western
museums. I take them at random from my memory.
In the year 1900 the then Inspector-General of Antiquities in Upper Egypt
discovered a tomb at Thebes in which there was a beautiful relief sculptured
on one of the walls, representing Queen Tiy. This he photographed, and the
tomb was once more buried. In 1908 I chanced upon this monument, and
proposed to open it up as a show place for visitors; but alas!—the relief of
the queen had disappeared, and only a gaping hole in the wall remained. It
appears that robbers had entered the tomb at about the time of the change of
inspectors; and, realising that this relief would make a valuable exhibit for
some western museum, they had cut out of the wall as much as they could
conveniently carry away—namely, the head and upper part of the figure of
Tiy. The hieroglyphic inscription which was sculptured near the head was
carefully erased, in case it should contain some reference to the name of the
tomb from which they were taking the fragment; and over the face some
false inscriptions were scribbled in Greek characters, so as to give the stone
an unrecognisable appearance. In this condition it was conveyed to a dealer’s
shop, and it now forms one of the exhibits in the Royal Museum at Brussels.
In the same museum, and in others also, there are fragments of beautiful
sculpture hacked out of the walls of the famous tomb of Khaemhet at
Thebes. In the British Museum there are large pieces of wall-paintings
broken out of Theban tombs. The famous inscription in the tomb of Anena at
Thebes, which was one of the most important texts of the early Eighteenth
Dynasty, was smashed to pieces several years ago to be sold in small
sections to museums; and a certain scholar was instrumental in purchasing
back for us eleven of the fragments, which have now been replaced in the
tomb, and with certain fragments in Europe, form the sole remnant of the
once imposing stela.
One of the most important scenes out of the famous reliefs of the
Expedition to Pount, at Dêr el Bahri, found its way into the hands of the
dealers, and was ultimately purchased by the museum in Cairo. The
beautiful and important reliefs which decorated the tomb of Horemheb at
Sakkâra, hacked out of the walls by robbers, are now exhibited in six
different museums; London, Leyden, Vienna, Bologna, Alexandria, and
Cairo. Of the two hundred tombs of the nobles now to be seen at Thebes, I
cannot, at the moment, recall a single one which had not suffered in this
manner at some time previous to the organisation of the present strict
supervision which was instituted by Mr. Carter and myself.
The curators of western museums will argue that had they not purchased
these fragments they would have fallen into the hands of less desirable
owners. This is quite true, and, indeed, it forms the nearest approach to
justification that can be discovered. Nevertheless, it has to be remembered
that this purchasing of antiquities is the best stimulus to the robber, who is
well aware that a market is always to be found for his stolen goods. It may
seem difficult to censure the purchaser, for certainly the fragments were
“stray” when the bargain was struck, and it is the business of the curator to
collect stray antiquities. But why were they stray? Why were they ever cut
from the walls of the Egyptian monuments? Assuredly because the robbers
knew that museums would purchase them. If there had been no demand
there would have been no supply.
To ask the curators to change their policy, and to purchase only those
objects which are legitimately on sale, would, of course, be as futile as to ask
the nations to disarm. The rivalry between museum and museum would
alone prevent a cessation of this indiscriminate traffic. I can see only one
way in which a more sane and moral attitude can be introduced, and that is
by the development of the habit of visiting Egypt and of working upon
archæological subjects in the shadow of the actual monuments. Only the
person who is familiar with Egypt can know the cost of supplying the stay-
at-home scholar with exhibits for his museums. Only one who has resided in
Egypt can understand the fact that Egypt itself is the real place for Egyptian
monuments. He alone can appreciate the work of the Egyptian Government
in preserving the remains of ancient days.
The resident in Egypt, interested in archæology, comes to look with a
kind of horror upon museums, and to feel extraordinary hostility to what
may be called the museum spirit. He sees with his own eyes the half-
destroyed tombs, which to the museum curator are things far off and not
visualised. While the curator is blandly saying to his visitor: “See, I will now
show you a beautiful fragment of sculpture from a distant and little-known
Theban tomb,” the white resident in Egypt, with black murder in his heart, is
saying: “See, I will show you a beautiful tomb of which the best part of one
wall is utterly destroyed that a fragment might be hacked out for a distant
and little-known European or American museum.”
 To a resident in Europe, Egypt seems to be a strange and barbaric land,
far, far away beyond the hills and seas; and her monuments are thought to be
at the mercy of wild Bedouin Arabs. In the less recent travel books there is
not a published drawing of a temple in the Nile Valley but has its
complement of Arab figures grouped in picturesque attitudes. Here a fire is
being lit at the base of a column, and the black smoke curls upwards to
destroy the paintings thereon; here a group of children sport upon the lap of
a colossal statue; and here an Arab tethers his camel at the steps of the high
altar. It is felt, thus, that the objects exhibited in European museums have
been rescued from Egypt and recovered from a distant land. This is not so.
They have been snatched from Egypt and lost to the country of their origin.
He who is well acquainted with Egypt knows that hundreds of watchmen,
and a small army of inspectors, engineers, draughtsmen, surveyors, and other
officials now guard these monuments, that strong iron gates bar the
doorways against unauthorised visitors, that hourly patrols pass from
monument to monument, and that any damage done is punished by long
terms of imprisonment; he knows that the Egyptian Government spends
hundreds of thousands of pounds upon safeguarding the ancient remains; he
is aware that the organisation of the Department of Antiquities is an
extremely important branch of the Ministry of Public Works. He has seen the
temples swept and garnished, the tombs lit by electric light and the
sanctuaries carefully rebuilt. He has spun out to the Pyramids in the electric
tramcar or in a taxi-cab; has strolled in evening dress through the halls of
Karnak, after dinner at the hotel; and has rung up the Theban Necropolis on
the telephone.
A few seasons’ residence in Egypt shifts the point of view in a startling
manner. No longer is the country either distant or insecure; and, realising
this, the student becomes more balanced, and he sees both sides of the
question with equal clearness. The archæologist may complain that it is too
expensive a matter to travel to Egypt. But why, then, are not the expenses of
such a journey met by the various museums? Quite a small sum will pay for
a student’s winter in Egypt and his journey to and from that country. Such a
sum is given readily enough for the purchase of an antiquity; but surely
right-minded students are a better investment than wrongly-acquired
antiquities.
It must be now pointed out, as a third argument,
The author standing upon the cliffs between the Temple of Dêr el Bahri and the Valley of the Tombs of
the KingsThe author standing upon the cliffs between the Temple of Dêr el Bahri and the Valley of the
Tombs of the Kings

that an Egyptologist cannot study his subject properly unless he be

thoroughly familiar with Egypt and modern Egyptians.
A student who is accustomed to sit at home, working in his library or
museum, and who has never resided in Egypt, or has but travelled for a short
time in that country, may do extremely useful work in one way or another,
but that work will not be faultless. It will be, as it were, lop-sided; it will be
coloured with hues of the west, unknown to the land of the Pharaohs and
antithetical thereto. A London architect may design an apparently charming
villa for a client in Jerusalem, but unless he know by actual and prolonged
experience the exigencies of the climate of Palestine, he will be liable to
make a sad mess of his job. By bitter experience the military commanders
learnt in the late war that a plan of campaign prepared at home was of little
use to them. The cricketer may play a very good game upon the home
ground, but upon a foreign pitch the first straight ball will send his bails
flying into the clear blue sky.
An archæologist who attempts to record the material relating to the
manners and customs of the ancient Egyptians cannot complete his task, or
even assure himself of the accuracy of his statements, unless he has studied
the modern customs and made himself acquainted with the permanent
conditions of the country. The modern Egyptians are the same people as
those who bowed the knee to Pharaoh, and many of their customs still
survive. A student can no more hope to understand the story of Pharaonic
times without an acquaintance with Egypt as she now is than a modern
statesman can hope to understand his own times solely from a study of the
past.
Nothing is more paralysing to a student of archæology than continuous
book-work. A collection of hard facts is an extremely beneficial mental
exercise, but the deductions drawn from such a collection should be regarded
as an integral part of the work. The road-maker must also walk upon his road
to the land whither it leads him; the ship-builder must ride the seas in his
vessel, though they be uncharted and unfathomed. Too often the professor
will set his students to a compilation which leads them no farther than the
final fair copy. They will be asked to make for him, with infinite labour, a
list of the High Priests of Amon; but unless he has encouraged them to put
such life into those figures that each one shall seem to step from the page to
confront his recorder, unless the name of each shall call to mind the very
scenes amidst which he worshipped, then is the work uninspired and
deadening to the student.
A catalogue of ancient scarabs is required, let us suppose, and the
students are set to work upon it. They examine hundreds of specimens, they
record the variations in design, they note the differences in the glaze or
material. But can they picture the man who wore the scarab?—can they
reconstruct in their minds the scene in the workshop wherein the scarab was
made?—can they hear the song of the workmen or their laughter when the
overseer was not nigh? In a word, does the scarab mean history to them, the
history of a period, of a dynasty, of a craft? Assuredly not, unless the
students know Egypt and the Egyptians, have heard their songs and their
laughter, have watched their modern arts and crafts. Only then are they in a
position to reconstruct the picture.
The late Theodore Roosevelt, in his Romanes lecture at Oxford, gave it as
his opinion that the industrious collector of facts occupied an honourable but
not an exalted position; and he added that the merely scientific historian
must rest content with the honour, substantial, but not of the highest type,
that belongs to him who gathers material which some time some master shall
arise to use. Now every student should aim to be a master, to use the material
which he has so laboriously collected; and though at the beginning of his
career, and indeed throughout his life, the gathering of material is a most
important part of his work, he should never compile solely for the sake of
compilation, unless he be content to serve simply as a clerk of archæology.
An archæologist must be a historian. He must conjure up the past; he
must play the Witch of Endor. His lists and indices, his catalogues and note-
books, must be but the spells which he uses to invoke the dead. The spells
have no potency until they are pronounced: the lists of Kings of Egypt have
no more than an accidental value until they call before the curtain of the
mind those monarchs themselves. It is the business of the archæologist to
wake the dreaming dead: not to send the living to sleep. It is his business to
make the stones tell their tale: not to petrify the listener. It is his business to
put motion and commotion into the past that the present may see and hear:
not to pin it down, spatchcocked, like a dead thing. In a word, the
archæologist must be in command of that faculty which is known as the
historic imagination, without which Dean Stanley was of opinion that the
story of the past could not be told. “Trust Nature,” said Dryden. “Do not
labour to be dull!”
But how can that imagination be at once exerted and controlled as it
needs must be, unless the archæologist be so well acquainted with the
conditions of the country about which he writes that his pictures of it can be
said to be accurate? The student must allow himself to be saturated by the
very waters of the Nile before he can permit himself to write of Egypt. He
must know the modern Egyptians before he can construct his model of
Pharaoh and his court.
When the mummy of Akhnaton was discovered and was proved to be that
of a man of only thirty years of age, many persons doubted the identification
on the grounds that the king was known to have been married at the time
when he came to the throne, seventeen years before his death, and it was
freely stated that a marriage at the age of eleven or twelve was impossible
and out of the question. Thus it actually remained for the present writer to
point out that the fact of the king’s death occurring seventeen years after his
marriage practically fixed his age at his decease at not much above twenty-
nine years, so unlikely was it that his marriage would have been delayed
beyond his twelfth year. Those who doubted the identification on such
grounds were showing all too clearly that the manners and customs of the
Egyptians of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, so many of which have
come down intact from olden times, were unknown to them.
Here we come to the root of the trouble. The Egyptologist who has not
resided for some time in Egypt, is inclined to allow his ideas regarding the
ancient customs of the land to be influenced by his unconsciously-acquired
knowledge of the habits of the west. But is he blind that he sees not the great
gulf fixed between the ways of the east and those of his accustomed west? It
is of no value to science to record the life of Thutmosis III with Napoleon as
our model for it, nor to describe the daily life of the Pharaoh with the person
of an English king before our mind’s eye. Our western experience will not
give us material for the imagination to work upon in dealing with Egypt. The
setting for our Pharaonic pictures must be derived from Egypt alone; and no
Egyptologist’s work that is more than a simple compilation is of value unless
the sunlight and the sandy glare of Egypt have burnt into his eyes, and have
been reflected on to the pages under his pen.
The archæologist must possess the historic imagination, but it must be
confined to its proper channels. It is impossible to exert this imagination
without, as a consequence, a figure rising up before the mind partially
furnished with the details of a personality and fully endowed with the broad
character of an individual. The first lesson, thus, which we must learn is that
of allowing no incongruity to appear in our figures. In ancient history there
can seldom be sufficient data at the Egyptologist’s disposal with which to
build up a complete figure; and his puppets must come upon the stage sadly
deficient, as it were, in arms, legs, and apparel suitable to them, unless he
know from an experience of modern Egyptians how to restore them and to
clothe them in good taste. The substance upon which the imagination works
must be no less than a collective knowledge of the people of the nation in
question. Rameses must be constructed from an acquaintance with many a
Pasha of modern Egypt, and his Chief Butler must reflect the known
characteristics of a hundred Beys and Effendis. Without such “padding” the
figures will remain but names, and with names Egyptology is already over-
stocked.
It is remarkable to notice how little is known regarding the great
personalities in history. Taking three characters at random: we know
extremely little that is authentic regarding King Arthur; our knowledge of
the actual history of Boadicea is extremely meagre; and the precise historian
would have to dismiss Pontius Pilate in a few paragraphs. But let the
archæologist know so well the manners and customs of the period with
which he is dealing that he will not, like the author of the stories of the Holy
Grail, dress Arthur in the armour of the thirteenth century, nor fill the mind
of Pilate with the thoughts of a modern Colonial Governor; let him be so
well trained in scientific cautiousness that he will not give unquestioned
credence to the legends of the past; let him have sufficient knowledge of the
nation to which his hero or heroine belonged to be able to fill up the lacunæ
with a kind of collective appreciation and estimate of the national
characteristics—and I do not doubt that his interpretations will hold good till
the end of all history.
The Egyptologist to whom Egypt is not a living reality is handicapped in
his labours more unfairly than is realised by him. Avoid Egypt, and though
your brains be of vast capacity, though your eyes be never raised from your
books, you will yet remain in many ways an ignoramus, liable to be
corrected by the merest tourist in the Nile valley. But come with me to a
Theban garden that I know, where, on some still evening, the dark palms are
reflected in the placid Nile, and the acacias are mellowed by the last light of
the sunset; where, in leafy bowers, the grapes cluster overhead, and the fig-
tree is burdened with fruit. Beyond the broad sheet of the river rise those
unchanging hills which encompass the Valley of the Tombs of the Kings;
and at their foot, dimly seen in the evening haze, sit the twin colossi, as they
have sat since the days of Amenophis the Magnificent. The stars begin to be
seen through the leaves now that the daylight dies, and presently the Milky
Way becomes apparent, stretching across the vault of the night, as when it
was believed to be the Nile of the Heavens.
The owls hoot to one another through the garden; and at the edge of the
alabaster tank wherein the dusk is mirrored, a frog croaks unseen amidst the
lilies. Even so croaked he on this very ground in those days when, typifying
eternity, he seemed to utter the endless refrain, “I am the resurrection, I am
the resurrection,” into the ears of men and maidens beneath these self-same
stars.
And now a boat floats past, on its way to Karnak, silhouetted against the
last-left light of the sky. There is music and song on board. The sound of the
pipes is carried over the water and pulses to the ears, inflaming the
imagination with the sorcery of its cadences and stirring the blood by its
bold rhythm. The gentle breeze brings the scent of many flowers to the
nostrils, and with these come drifting thoughts and undefined fancies, so that
presently the busy considerations of the day are lulled and forgotten. The
twilight seems to cloak the extent of the years, and in the gathering darkness
the procession of the centuries is hidden. Yesterday and to-day are mingled
together, and there is nothing to distinguish to the eye the one age from the
other. An immortal, brought suddenly to the garden at this hour, could not
say from direct observation whether he had descended from the clouds into
the twentieth century before or the twentieth century after Christ; and the
sound of the festal pipes in the passing boat would but serve to confuse him
the more.
In such a garden as this the student will learn more Egyptology than he
could assimilate in many an hour’s study at home; for here his five senses
play the student and Egypt herself is his teacher. While he may read in his
books how this Pharaoh or that feasted o’ nights in his palace beside the
river, here, not in fallible imagination but in actual fact, he may see Nilus
and the Lybian desert to which the royal eyes were turned, may smell the
very perfume of the palace garden, and may hearken to the self-same sounds
that lulled a king to sleep in Hundred-gated Thebes.
Not in the west, but only by the waters of the Nile will he learn how best
to be an historian of ancient Egypt, and in what manner to make his studies
of interest, as well as of technical value, to his readers, for he will here
discover the great secret of his profession. Suddenly the veil will be lifted
from his understanding, and he will become aware that Past and Present are
so indissoluble as to be incapable of separate interpretation or single study.
He will learn that there is no such thing as a distinct Past or a defined
Present. “Yesterday this day’s madness did prepare,” and the affairs of
bygone times must be interpreted in the light of recent events. The Past is
alive to-day and all the deeds of man in all the ages are living at this hour in
offspring. There is no real death. The earthly grave will not hide, nor the
mountain tomb imprison, the actions of the men of old Egypt, so consequent
and fruitful are all human affairs. This is the knowledge which will make the
Egyptologist’s work of lasting value; and nowhere else save in Egypt can he
acquire it. This, indeed, for him is the secret of the Sphinx; and only at the
lips of the Sphinx itself can he learn it.
 CHAPTER II

THE NECESSITY OF ARCHÆOLOGY TO THE GAIETY OF THE WORLD

When a great man puts a period to his existence upon earth by dying, he is
carefully buried in a tomb and a monument is set up to his glory in the
neighbouring church. He may then be said to begin his second life, his life in
the memory of the chronicler and historian. After the lapse of an æon or two
the works of the historian, and perhaps the tomb itself, are rediscovered; and
the great man begins his third life, now as a subject of discussion and
controversy amongst archæologists in the pages of a scientific journal. It
may be supposed that the spirit of the great man, not a little pleased with his
second life, has an extreme distaste for his third. There is a dead atmosphere
about it which sets him yawning as only his grave yawned before. The
charm has been taken from his deeds; there is no longer any spring in them.
He must feel towards the archæologist much as a young man feels towards
his cold-blooded parent by whom his love affair has just been found out. The
public, too, if by chance it comes upon this archæological journal, finds the
discussion nothing more than a mental gymnastic, which, as the reader drops
off to sleep, gives him the impression that the writer is a man of profound
brain capacity, but, like the remains of the great man of olden times, as dry
as dust.
There is one thing, however, which has been overlooked. This scientific
journal does not contain the ultimate results of the archæologist’s researches.
It contains the researches themselves. The public, so to speak, has been
listening to the pianist playing his morning scales, has been watching the
artist mixing his colours, has been examining the unshaped block of marble
and the chisels in the sculptor’s studio. It must be confessed, of course, that
the archæologist has so enjoyed his researches that often the ultimate result
has been overlooked by him. In the case of Egyptian archæology, for
example, there are only two or three Egyptologists who have ever set
themselves to write a readable history, whereas the number of books which
record the facts of the science is legion.
The archæologist not infrequently lives, for a large part of his time, in a
museum. However clean it may be, he is surrounded by rotting tapestries,
decaying bones, crumbling stones, and rusted or corroded metal objects. His
indoor work has paled his cheek, and his muscles are not like iron bands. He
stands, often, in the contiguity to an ancient broadsword most fitted to
demonstrate the fact that he could never use it. He would probably be
dismissed his curatorship were he to tell of any dreams which might run in
his head—dreams of the time when those tapestries hung upon the walls of
barons’ banquet-halls, or when those stones rose high above the streets of
Camelot.
Moreover, those who make researches independently must needs
contribute their results to scientific journals, written in the jargon of the
learned. I came across a now forgotten journal, a short time ago, in which an
English gentleman, believing that he had made a discovery in the province
of Egyptian hieroglyphs, announced it in ancient Greek. There would be no
supply of such pedantic swagger were there not a demand for it.
Small wonder, then, that the archæologist is often represented as
partaking somewhat of the quality of the dust amidst which he works. It is
not necessary here to discuss whether this estimate is just or not: I only wish
to point out its paradoxical nature.
More than any other science, archæology might be expected to supply its
exponents with stuff that, like old wine, would fire the blood and stimulate
the senses. The stirring events of the Past must often be reconstructed by the
archæologist with such precision that his prejudices are aroused, and his
sympathies are so enlisted as to set him fighting with a will under this banner
or under that. The noise of the hardy strife of young nations is not yet
silenced for him, nor have the flags and the pennants faded from sight. He
has knowledge of the state secrets of kings, and, all along the line, is an
intimate spectator of the crowded pageant of history. The caravan-masters of
the past, the admirals of the “great green sea,” the captains of archers, have
related their adventures to him; and he might repeat to you their stories.
Indeed, he has such a tale to tell that, looking at it in this light, one might
expect his listeners all to be good sturdy men and noble women. It might be
supposed that the archæologist would gather round him only men who have
pleasure in the road that leads over the hills, and women who have known
the delight of the open. One has heard so often of the “brave days of old”
that the archæologist might well be expected to have his head stuffed with
brave tales and little else.
His range, however, may be wider than this. To him, perhaps, it has been
given to listen to the voice of the ancient poet, heard as a far-off whisper; to
breathe in forgotten gardens the perfume of long dead flowers; to
contemplate the love of women whose beauty is perished in the dust; to
hearken to the sound of the harp and the sistra; to be the possessor of the
riches of historical romance. Dim armies have battled around him for the
love of Helen; shadowy captains of sea-going ships have sung to him
through the storm the song of the sweethearts left behind them; he has
feasted with sultans, and kings’ goblets have been held to his lips; he has
watched Uriah the Hittite sent to the forefront of the battle.
Thus, were he to offer a story, one might now suppose that there would
gather around him, not the men of muscle, but a throng of sallow listeners,
as improperly expectant as were those who hearkened under the moon to the
narrations of Boccaccio, or, in old Baghdad, gave ear to the tales of the
thousand and one nights. One might suppose that his audience would be
drawn from those classes most fondly addicted to pleasure, or most nearly
representative, in their land and in their time, of the light-hearted and not
unwanton races of whom he had to tell.
Who could better arrest the attention of the coxcomb than the
archæologist who has knowledge of silks and scents now lost to the living
world? To the gourmet who could more appeal than the archæologist who
has made abundant acquaintance with the forgotten dishes of the East? Who
could more surely thrill the senses of the courtesan than the archæologist
who can relate that which was whispered by Antony in the ear of Cleopatra?
To the gambler who could be more enticing than the archæologist who has
seen kings play at dice for their kingdoms? The imaginative, truly, might
well collect the most highly disreputable audience to listen to the tales of the
archæologist.
But no, these are not the people who are anxious to catch the pearls which
drop from his mouth. Do statesmen and diplomatists, then, listen to him who
can unravel for them the policies of the Past? Do business men hasten from
Threadneedle Street and Wall Street to sit at his feet, that they may have
instilled into them a little of the romance of ancient money? I fear not.
Come with me to some provincial town, where this day Professor Blank
is to deliver one of his archæological lectures at the Town Hall. We are met
at the door by the secretary of the local archæological society: a melancholy
lady in green plush, who suffers from St. Vitus’s dance. Gloomily we enter
the hall and silently accept the seats which are indicated to us by an
unfortunate gentleman with a club-foot. In front of us an elderly female with
short hair is chatting to a very plain young woman draped like a lay figure.
On the right an emaciated man with a very bad cough shuffles on his chair;
on the left two old grey-beards grumble to one another about the weather, a
subject which leads up to the familiar “Mine catches me in the small of the
back”; while behind us the inevitable curate, of whose appearance it would
be trite to speak, describes to an astonished old lady the recent discovery of
the pelvis of a mastodon.
The professor and the aged chairman step on to the platform; and, amidst
the profoundest gloom, the latter rises to pronounce the prefatory rigmarole.
“Archæology,” he says, in a voice of brass, “is a science which bars its doors
to all but the most erudite; for, to the layman who has not been vouchsafed
the opportunity of studying the dusty volumes of the learned, the bones of
the dead will not reveal their secrets, nor will the crumbling pediments of
naos and cenotaph, the obliterated tombstones, or the worm-eaten
parchments, tell us their story. To-night, however, we are privileged! for
Professor Blank will open the doors for us that we may gaze for a moment
upon that solemn charnel-house of the Past in which he has sat for so many
long hours of inductive meditation.”
And the professor by his side, whose head, perhaps, was filled with the
martial music of the long-lost hosts of the Lord, or before whose eyes there
swayed the entrancing forms of the dancing-girls of Babylon, stares horrified
from chairman to audience. He sees crabbed old men and barren old women
before him, afflicted youths and fatuous maidens; and he realises at once that
the golden keys which he possesses to the gates of the treasury of the
jewelled Past will not open the doors of that charnel-house which they desire
to be shown. The scent of the king’s roses fades from his nostrils, the
Egyptian music which throbbed in his ears is hushed, the glorious
illumination of the Palace of a Thousand Columns is extinguished; and in the
gathering gloom we leave him fumbling with a rusty key at the mildewed
door of the Place of Bones.
Why is it, one asks, that archæology is a thing so misunderstood? Can it
be that both lecturer and audience have crushed down that which was in
reality uppermost in their minds: that a shy search for romance has led these
people to the Town Hall? Or perchance archæology has become to them
something not unlike a vice, and to listen to an archæological lecture is their
remaining chance of being naughty. It may be that, having one foot in the
grave, they take pleasure in kicking the moss from the surrounding
tombstones with the other; or that, being denied, for one reason or another,
the jovial society of the living, like Robert Southey’s “Scholar” their hopes
are with the dead.
Be the explanation what it may, the fact is indisputable that archæology is
patronised by those who know not its real meaning. A man has no more right
to think of the people of old as dust and dead bones than he has to think of
his contemporaries as lumps of meat. The true archæologist does not take
pleasure in skeletons as skeletons, for his whole effort is to cover them
decently with flesh and skin once more and to put some thoughts back into
the empty skulls. Nor does he delight in ruined buildings: rather he deplores
that they are ruined. Coleridge wrote like the true archaeologist when he
composed that most magical poem “Khubla Khan”——

“In Xanadu did Khubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.”

And those who would have the pleasure-domes of the gorgeous Past
reconstructed for them must turn to the archæologist; those who would see
the damsel with the dulcimer in the gardens of Xanadu must ask of him the
secret, and of none other. It is true that, before he can refashion the dome or
the damsel, he will have to grub his way through old refuse heaps till he
shall lay bare the ruins of the walls and expose the bones of the lady. But this
is the “dirty work”; and the mistake which is made lies here: that this
preliminary dirty work is confused with the final clean result. An artist will
sometimes build up his picture of Venus from a skeleton bought from an old
Jew round the corner; and the smooth white paper which he uses will have
been made from putrid rags and bones. Amongst painters themselves these
facts are not hidden, but by the public they are most carefully obscured. In
the case of archæology, however, the tedious details of construction are so
placed in the foreground that the final picture is hardly noticed at all. As well
might one go to an aerodrome to see men fly, and be shown nothing else but
screws and nuts, steel rods and woodwork. Originally the fault, perhaps, lay
with the archæologist; now it lies both with him and with the public. The
public has learnt to ask to be shown the works, and the archæologist is often
so proud of them that he forgets to mention the purpose of the machine.
 A Roman statue of bronze, let us suppose, is discovered in the Thames
valley. It is so corroded and eaten away that only an expert could recognise
that it represents a reclining goddess. In this condition it is placed in the
museum, and a photograph of it is published in the daily paper. Those who
come to look at it in its glass case think it is a bunch of grapes, or possibly a
monkey; those who see its photograph say that it is more probably an
irregular catapult-stone or a fish in convulsions.
The archæologist alone holds its secret, and only he can see it as it was.
He alone can know the mind of the artist who made it, or interpret the full
meaning of the conception. It might have been expected, then, that the public
would demand, and the archæologist delightedly furnish, a model of the
figure as near to the original as possible; or, failing that, a restoration in
drawing, or even a worded description of its original beauty. But no: the
public, if it wants anything, wants to see the shapeless object in all its
corrosion; and the archæologist forgets that it is blind to aught else but that
corrosion. One of the main duties of the archæologist is thus lost sight of: his
duty as Interpreter and Remembrancer of the Past.
All the riches of olden times, all the majesty, all the power, are the
inheritance of the present day; and the archæologist is the recorder of this
fortune. He must deal in dead bones only so far as the keeper of a financial
fortune must deal in dry documents. Behind those documents glitters the
gold, and behind those bones shines the wonder of the things that were. And
when an object once beautiful has by age become unsightly one might
suppose that he would wish to show it to none save his colleagues or the
reasonably curious layman. When a man makes a statement that his
grandmother, now in her ninety-ninth year, was once a beautiful woman, he
does not go and find her to prove his words and bring her tottering into the
room: he shows a picture of her as she was; or, if he cannot find one, he
describes what good evidence tells him was her probable appearance. In
allowing his controlled and sober imagination thus to perform its natural
functions, though it would never do to tell his grandmother so, he becomes
an archæologist, a Remembrancer of the Past.
In the case of archæology, however, the public does not permit itself to be
convinced. In the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford excellent facsimile
electrotypes of early Greek weapons are exhibited; and these have far more
value in bringing the Past before us than the actual weapons of that period,
corroded and broken, would have. But the visitor says “These are shams,”
and passes on.
It will be seen, then, that the business of archæology is often
misunderstood both by archæologists and by the public; and that there is
really no reason to believe, with Thomas Earle, that the real antiquarian
loves a thing the better for that it is rotten and stinketh. That the impression
has gone about is his own fault, for he has exposed too much to view the
mechanism of his work; but it is also the fault of the public for not asking of
him a picture of things as they were.
Man is by nature a creature of the present. It is only by an effort that he
can consider the future, and it is often quite impossible for him to give any
heed at all to the past. The days of old are so blurred and remote that it
seems right to him that any relic from them should, by the maltreatment of
Time, be unrecognisable. The finding of an old sword, half-eaten by rust,
will only please him in so far as it shows him once more by its sad condition
the great gap between those days and these, and convinces him again of the
sole importance of the present. The archæologist, he will tell you, is a fool if
he expects him to be interested in a wretched old bit of scrapiron. He is right.
It would be as rash to suppose that he would find interest in an ancient sword
in its rusted condition as it would be to expect the spectator at the aerodrome
to find fascination in the nuts and screws. The true archæologist would hide
that corroded weapon in his work-shop, where his fellow-workers alone
could see it. For he recognises that it is only the sword which is as good as
new that impresses the public; it is only the Present that counts. That is the
real reason why he is an archæologist. He has turned to the Past because he
is in love with the Present. He, more than any man, worships at the altar of
the goddess of To-day; and he is so desirous of extending her dominion that
he has adventured, like a crusader, into the lands of the Past, in order to
subject them to her. Adoring the Now, he would resent the publicity of
anything which so obviously suggested the Then as a rust-eaten old blade.
His whole business is to hide the gap between Yesterday and To-day; and,
unless a man be initiate, he would have him either see the perfect sword as it
was when it sought the foeman’s bowels, or see nothing. The Present is too
small for him; and it is therefore that he calls so insistently to the Past to
come forth from the darkness to augment it. The ordinary man lives in the
Present, and he will tell one that the archæologist lives in the Past. This is
not so. The layman, in the manner of the little Nationalist, lives in a small
and confined Present; but the archæologist, like a true Imperialist, ranges
through all time, and calls it not the Past but the Greater Present.
The archæologist is not, or ought not to be, lacking in vivacity. One might
say that he is so sensible to the charms of society that, finding his
companions too few in number, he has drawn the olden times to him to
search them for jovial men and agreeable women. It might be added that he
has so laughed at jest and joke that, fearing lest the funds of humour run dry,
he has gathered the laughter of all the years to his enrichment. Certainly he
has so delighted in noble adventure and stirring action that he finds his
newspaper insufficient to his needs, and fetches to his aid the tales of old
heroes. In fact, the archæologist is so enamoured of life that he would raise
all the dead from their graves. He will not have it that the men of old are
dust: he would bring them forth to share with him the sunlight which he
finds so precious. He is so much an enemy of Death and Decay that he
would rob them of their harvest; and, for every life that the foe has claimed,
he would raise up, if he could, a memory that would continue to live.
The meaning of the heading which has been given to this chapter is now
becoming clear, and the direction of the argument is already apparent. So far
it has been my purpose to show that the archæologist is not a rag-and-bone
man, though the public generally thinks he is, and he often thinks he is
himself. The attempt has been made to suggest that archæology ought not to
consist in sitting in a charnel-house amongst the dead, but rather in ignoring
that place and taking the bones into the light of day, decently clad in flesh
and finery. It has now to be shown in what manner this parading of the Past
is needful to the gaiety of the Present.
Amongst cultured people whose social position makes it difficult for
them to dance in circles on the grass in order to express or to stimulate their
gaiety, and whose school of deportment will not permit them to sing a merry
song of sixpence as they trip down the streets, there is some danger of the
fire of merriment dying for want of fuel. Vivacity in printed books, therefore,
has been encouraged, so that the mind at least, if not the body, may skip
about and clap its hands. A portly gentleman with a solemn face, reading his
“Punch” or his “Life” in the club, is, after all, giving play to precisely those
same humours which in ancient days might have led him, like Georgy Porgy,
to kiss the girls or to perform any other merry joke. It is necessary, therefore,
ever to enlarge the stock of things humorous, vivacious, or rousing, if the
thoughts are to be kept young and eyes bright in this age of restraint. What
would Yuletide be without the olden times to bolster it up? What would the
Christmas numbers do without the pictures of our great-grand-parents’
coaches snowbound, of huntsmen of the eighteenth century, of jesters at the
courts of the barons? What should we do without the “Vicar of Wakefield,”
the “Compleat Angler,” “Pepys’ Diary,” and all the rest of the ancient
books? And, going back a few centuries, what an amount we should miss
had we not “Æsop’s Fables,” the “Odyssey,” the tales of the Trojan War, and
so on. It is from the archæologist that one must expect the augmentation of
this supply; and just in that degree in which the existing supply is really a
necessary part of our equipment, so archæology, which looks for more, is
necessary to our gaiety.
In order to keep his intellect undulled by the routine of his dreary work,
Matthew Arnold was wont to write a few lines of poetry each day. Poetry,
like music and song, is an effective dispeller of care; and those who find
Omar Khayyam or “In Memoriam” incapable of removing the burden of
their woes, will no doubt appreciate the “Owl and the Pussy-cat,” or the Bab
Ballads. In some form or other verse and song are closely linked with
happiness; and a ditty from any age has its interest and its charm.

“She gazes at the stars above:

I would I were the skies,
That I might gaze upon my love
With such a thousand eyes!”

That is from the Greek of a writer who is not much read by the public at
large, and whose works are the legitimate property of the antiquarian. It
suffices to show that it is not only to the moderns that we have to look for
dainty verse that is conducive to a light heart. The following lines are from
the ancient Egyptian:—

“While in my room I lie all day

In pain that will not pass away,
The neighbours come and go.
Ah, if with them my darling came
The doctors would be put to shame:
She understands my woe.”

Such examples might be multiplied indefinitely; and the reader will admit
that there is as much of a lilt about those which are here quoted as there is
about the majority of the ditties which he has hummed to himself in his hour
of contentment. Here is Philodemus’ description of his mistress’s charms:—

“My lady-love is small and brown;

My lady’s skin is soft as down;
Her hair like parsley twists and turns;
Her voice with magic passion burns....”

And here is an ancient Egyptian’s description of not very dissimilar

phenomena:—

“A damsel sweet unto the sight,

A maid of whom no like there is;
Black are her tresses as the night,
And blacker than the blackberries.”

Does not the archæologist perform a service to his contemporaries by

searching out such rhymes and delving for more? They bring with them,
moreover, so subtle a suggestion of bygone romance, they are backed by so
fair a scene of Athenian luxury or Theban splendour, that they possess a
charm not often felt in modern verse. If it is argued that there is no need to
increase the present supply of such ditties, since they are really quite
unessential to our gaiety, the answer may be given that no nation and no
period has ever found them unessential; and a light heart has been expressed
in this manner since man came down from the trees.
Let us turn now to another consideration. For a man to be light of heart he
must have confidence in humanity. He cannot greet the morn with a smiling
countenance if he believe that he and his fellows are slipping down the broad
path which leads to destruction. The archæologist never despairs of
mankind; for he has seen nations rise and fall till he is almost giddy, but he
knows that there has never been a general deterioration. He realises that
though a great nation may suffer defeat and annihilation, it is possible for it
to go down in such a thunder that the talk of it stimulates other nations for all
time. He sees, if any man can, that all things work together for happiness. He
has observed the cycle of events, the good years and the bad; and in an evil
time he is comforted by the knowledge that the good will presently roll
round again. Thus the lesson which he can teach is a very real necessity to
that contentment of mind which lies at the root of all gaiety.
 Again, a man cannot be permanently happy unless he has a just sense of
proportion. He who is too big for his boots must needs limp; and he who has
a swollen head is in perpetual discomfort. The history of the lives of men,
the history of the nations, gives one a fairer sense of proportion than does
almost any other study. In the great company of the men of old he cannot fail
to assess his true value: if he has any conceit there is a greater than he to
snub him; if he has a poor opinion of his powers there is many a fool with
whom to contrast himself favourably. If he would risk his fortune on the
spinning of a coin, being aware of the prevalence of his good-luck,
archæology will tell him that the best luck will change; or if, when in sore
straits, he ask whether ever a man was so unlucky, archæology will answer
him that many millions of men have been more unfavoured than he.
Archæology provides a precedent for almost every event or occurrence
where modern inventions are not involved; and, in this manner, one may
reckon their value and determine their trend. Thus many of the small worries
which cause so leaden a weight to lie upon the heart and mind are by the
archæologist ignored; and many of the larger calamities by him are met with
serenity.
But not only does the archæologist learn to estimate himself and his
actions; he learns also to see the relationship in which his life stands to the
course of Time. Without archæology a man may be disturbed lest the world
be about to come to an end: after a study of history he knows that it has only
just begun; and that gaiety which is said to have obtained “when the world
was young” is to him, therefore, a present condition. By studying the ages
the archæologist learns to reckon in units of a thousand years; and it is only
then that that little unit of threescore-and-ten falls into its proper proportion.
“A thousand ages in Thy sight are like an evening gone,” says the hymn, but
it is only the archæologist who knows the meaning of the words; and it is
only he who can explain that great discrepancy in the Christian faith between
the statement “Behold, I come quickly” and the actual fact. A man who
knows where he is in regard to his fellows, and realises where he stands in
regard to Time, has learnt a lesson of archæology which is as necessary to
his peace of mind as his peace of mind is necessary to his gaiety.
It is not needful, however, to continue to point out the many ways in
which archæology may be shown to be necessary to happiness. The reader
will have comprehended the trend of the argument, and, if he be in sympathy
with it, he will not be unwilling to develop the theme for himself. Only one