All these were of costly stones, according to the measures of hewed stones, sawed with saws, within and without, even from the foundation unto the coping, and so on the outside toward the great court.
Sawed with saws. Some have averred that saws for cutting stones were not invented earlier than the fourth century B.C. But this opinion is erroneous, being contradicted by the present passage. It may be noticed that Eastern saws differ from those used by European nation in this remarkable feature, that the point of the teeth is inclined toward, not from, the handle, so that the sawyer makes his impression upon the wood, not in thrusting the instrument from him, but in pulling it toward him.