Chapter III: Part 3

Here the recollection of an earlier expedient came to the rescue. It will be remembered that the early barrel vaults were buttressed by _half_ barrel vaults over the aisles, thus doing away with the clerestory. A continuous vault demanded a continuous abutment; but, now that the pressure was concentrated into detached planes, it became sufficient that the abutment also should be in those planes; and though the continuous semi-_vault_ would do away with clerestory windows, detached semi-_arches_ would have no such effect. The thought accordingly occurred of erecting the _arc-doubleau_ of the old semi-vault in open air as a buttress to the main vault of the groined church; and hence that much-admired, and, of course, also much-depreciated feature--_the flying buttress_. The pressure being concentrated upon points, it became also necessary to fortify those points by attached buttresses of considerable projection, such as we henceforth find to have become a leading external characteristic of Mediæval structures. The wall, in fact (where the system was carried to its extreme limits), became a mere _curtain_, needed rather for enclosure than for strength, and capable of being pierced with windows to any required extent; a liberty which the contemporaneous development of stained glass caused to be unhesitatingly taken advantage of.

I must, however, return to the vaulting, having overstepped my chronology by not yet noticing another most important invention. I mean the introduction of _groin-ribs_--those narrow arches erected under the lines of intersection of the vaults. The early groins had no ribs excepting the transverse ones, or _arcs-doubleaux_; the edges at which the vaults cut one another were left _bare_, and were the weakest parts of the construction; often but faintly marked, and not necessarily lying in _planes_. In more complicated vaults, such as now became necessary, this system could scarcely be continued; and the introduction of a stone rib, under every intersection, may be viewed as the crowning fact in the development of vaulting.

It is impossible to lay too much stress upon its importance, for it _changed the entire geometrical system_. Up to that time the construction of groining was wholly governed by the forms of the vaulting _surfaces_; the intersections being allowed to take their chance, and to present any irregularity of figure, while the wide surfaces of vaulting were apparently carried on mere _pins’ points_ at the springing--correct enough as a mathematical figure, but ill calculated for strength. Now, however, the _intersecting lines_ assumed the government of the construction, and the form of the _surface_ was made to accommodate itself to them. They were always in planes,[6] and always true figures--usually arcs of circles; but the _panels_ of vaulting became often irregular in their configuration, and could be twisted to meet contingent requirements without offending the eye; while the ribs, all meeting in a solid springer at the foot, brought down the pressure, and deposited it firmly upon the points of support.

It will be seen from the above that the pointed arch was not introduced into Mediæval structures from mere caprice--merely from seeing it elsewhere and taking a fancy to its form,--but from the necessities of construction, from its increased strength and diminished thrust. It was at first used for the main arch only of the greater vault. The same reason soon led to its introduction wherever great weight was to be carried, as under towers, etc.; but for all small arches the semicircle was long retained. I have alluded to the very beautiful theory that it was introduced for the side arches of oblong groins, simply as a means of obtaining arches of equal height with only half the span with those of the main vault. True it is, that, at a later date, it became most useful for this purpose. But a careful study of the monuments in which it is first systematically used clearly shows that its introduction was from _statical_, and neither geometrical nor merely æsthetical motives; for in the face of that theory we find the narrower arch or wall-rib remaining round long after the wider arch had become pointed (Fig. 11). Such is the case in nearly all the earlier of the French transitional churches, as at Noyon and at St. Germain des Pres, and we see the same at Canterbury. In most of these buildings the narrow arch is stilted and the crown of the cross vault raised up as before described, thus losing a part of the clerestory wall, a disadvantage obviated when the pointed arch became more frankly acknowledged.

Although, however, the pointed arch was _actually adopted_ from simple necessities of construction, its advantages in all points of view soon became apparent. In an essentially arcuated style it becomes necessary not only to have the command of a form of arch capable of carrying the greatest weights and of requiring the least abutment, but it is essential to have at command an arch of _variable_ proportions. It carries absurdity on the very face of it that, while able to give our piers a greater or a less degree of height at pleasure we should have no such power over the arch they sustain; not to mention the numerous cases in which we have to bring together arches of unequal span, and which nevertheless demand an equal height. The rules of harmony imperatively demand that the arch should be equally capable of modification in its proportions of height to width, with all other features of the architecture.

In the above outline of the history of vaulting I have, for the sake of simplicity, omitted two modes actually adopted to avoid the difficulty of oblong groining over naves. The first, which was common in German round-arched churches, was to make the vaulting of the nave simply to comprise _two_ bays of the aisles, thus bringing the main vault equally into squares with those of the aisles. The second was the use of what Dr. Whewell has entitled _sexpartite_ vaulting, and which is common both in France, Germany, and England (Fig. 12). It adopts the system last named, but subdivides the double bay by a triangular slip of vaulting (Figs. 13, 14). The real solution arose, however, from the free and simple use of the pointed arch, which gave the result which is seen at Westminster[7] and in nearly all the vaulted churches of the thirteenth century--the simple groined vault with arches of equal height, though the side arches are sometimes stilted, not from necessity, but merely to afford greater space for clerestory windows.

On this plain and practical result M. Viollet le Duc (of whose admirable essay on vaulting, together with those of Dr. Whewell and Professor Willis, I have made free use) makes the following striking remarks:--

“It had required fifty years for the architects of the end of the twelfth century to arrive, from the still Romanesque vaults of Autun and Vezelay, at this great result; and from this moment the entire construction of religious edifices was derived from the disposition of the vaults; the form and dimension of the pillars--their spacing; the window-openings--their width and height; the position and direction of the buttresses--the importance of their pinnacler; the strength, the number, and curvature of the arched buttresses; the disposing and the carrying off the rain water; the system of covering,--all proceed from the combination of the vaulting. The vaults govern the _ossature_ of the monument to a point to which it would be impossible to raise it otherwise than by commencing rigorously to plan them previously to laying the first courses of the structure. This rule is so well established that if we see a church of the thirteenth century destroyed to the level of the bases, and of which the plan alone remains, we can with certainty trace the plan of the vaults, and indicate the direction of all the arches and their thickness. At the end of the fourteenth century the rigour of the system is still more absolute; we can trace, in examining the base of an edifice, not only the number and direction of the arches of the vaults, and know their strength, but the number of their mouldings and even their profiles. In the fifteenth century it is the arches (mouldings) themselves which descend to the floor, and the pillars are only vertical _fasces_ formed of all the members of these arches. After this, we demand how is it that serious men have been able to repulse, and still do repulse, the study of the architecture of the Middle Ages as having been only produced by chance?”

It will be seen from what I have above stated that the order in which the pointed arch was successively adopted for different parts of a building, and the motives which led to its adoption, may be roughly classified under the heads of _Statical_, _Geometrical_, and _Æsthetical_, or positions in which it was demanded for soundness of construction, for the mathematical agreement of parts, and for harmony and beauty of effect.

The first head embraces all wide-spanned arches, especially those I have pointed out as the first in which it made its appearance: the transverse arches of wide vaulting, also arches carrying towers, and others bearing great weight on their crown, and all which are defective in abutment, or demand the addition of buttresses (for remember that, though buttresses were rendered sources of beauty, they originated in _necessity_, and the aim was to keep their projection within bounds, rather than unduly to increase it). The second, or geometrical class, includes, primarily, the narrower arches of oblong vaulting; for, even had the transverse section continued round, the pointed arch must soon have suggested itself for the narrow arches of the sides; and though for a time the idea did not occur, the necessity of it is only the more apparent in the want of harmony, the undue stilting, and the loss of clerestory space which arose from its neglect. Under the same head come all other cases of irregularly formed vaulting in which the sides differ in width, and arches of varied proportion are therefore needed. Of the same kind are many other cases in which arches of different widths are in the same range, and where--though the _statical_ view would demand that the widest span should have the strongest arch--_geometrical_ agreement suggests the contrary; as, for instance, in the choir of St. Germain des Pres, at Paris, and many others, where the side arches are all round; but those of the apse, being narrower, are pointed. These two pressing necessities having once established the use of the pointed arch in a large number of the most important positions, a natural feeling for harmony would come in to suggest its use in many others. First we may mention windows under the narrow compartments of groining--as in clerestories, apsidal chapels, etc.,--where, as soon as the pointed arch was used for the vaulting, the round-topped window would present a certain degree of discord, as we see at St. Cross,[8] and at St. Joseph’s Chapel[9] at Glastonbury. Then again, as windows became more elongated, the round arch became ill-proportioned to the jambs; and generally, as the architecture acquired a more aspiring tendency, the pointed arch was found more congenial with its spirit; so that, little by little, from being an exception, used from mere constructional expediency, it became the prevailing feature of the style; the semicircle being reserved for those positions only in which want of space forbade the more elevated form. Still, however, it was never abandoned, and in every period of Pointed architecture we find it occasionally making its appearance, used from motives of convenience alone, as the pointed arch had at first been by reason of its strength.

After this it will be seen of how little importance it is to inquire _whence_ the form is derived; for it was introduced _not_ as a matter of _taste_, but of _utility_--not as a change of style, but to meet the practical requirements of that already in use. The pointed arch was, in fact, as early (or thereabouts) in its invention as the round;--it is foreshadowed in the works of the Egyptians, the Pelasgi, and the Etrurians; it was used by the Romans, and, I believe, by the Byzantines and other Oriental Christians, and by the Sassanian Persians, and was from an early period the prevailing arch among the Saracens. It is absurd, then, to suppose it unknown to the inhabitants of Western Europe, who were in constant communication with the East; and the most natural thing to expect was that, as soon as they wanted it, they would make use of it; though there is nothing unreasonable in the supposition that they were especially reminded of it, in consequence of the two circumstances of the Crusades and Norman Conquest of Sicily. In the case last named, indeed, the conquerors had at once adopted it, simply because it was the prevailing arch of the country, and, as Mr. Gally Knight remarks, “with no scientific object, and without any reference to the vertical principle.”

The wonder which has been expressed at the introduction of the pointed arch reminds me of a very homely tale, which I must apologise for repeating before so grave an assembly. An unimaginative individual, on visiting the Falls of Niagara, was greatly perplexed at the astonishment expressed by his companions; and on one of them exclaiming to him--“Is it not a most wonderful fall?”--replied, “Wonderful? no! I see nothing wonderful in it. Why, what’s to hinder the water from falling?” Much the same reply is applicable to the wondering inquiries after the source of the pointed arch. When the builders of the twelfth century found they wanted it; when they had seen its form in the first proposition of Euclid; when they had actually used it hundreds of times in their intersecting arcades; when they knew that it was constantly used in the East, with which they were connected by trade, science, pilgrimage, and war; and when they knew that their brethren had used it in Sicily, and their fellow-countrymen in Provence; we may well ask, with our unsentimental friend, “What was to hinder them from using it?”

Simple, however, and obvious as were the means, the result was _magical_! It is not the _materials_ of art to which its expression is due, but the sentiment--the heart--the soul of those who use it. This particular form of arch had long been used without one hint at such expression resulting from it. It had been highly conducive to beauty, but little, if at all, to elevation of sentiment: when, however, it came into use as an aid to the upward strivings of the architects of Northern Christendom, as an element placed in the hands of men who had been labouring for centuries, with all their energy, to render their architecture expressive of the ennobling sentiments of religion--it became, in their hands, a means of perfecting that solemnity of expression which the Romanesque buildings possessed in so wonderful a degree, and of adding the most exalted sublimity to its hitherto stern and rigid grandeur; just as the simple action of gravity gives to the Niagara Falls a sublime and overwhelming majesty; such as the same cause acting under different conditions has no tendency to produce.

I must apologise for having occupied so long a time on these merely preliminary and, perhaps, not very interesting topics. I hope in my next lecture to be able to give an outline of the transition as it showed itself in the different countries, and also to point out and illustrate the changes in the decorative and more purely artistic features of architecture by which it was accompanied.

LECTURE III.

The Transition.

Gradual refinement of Romanesque--French architects the earliest to
systematise the pointed arch--The English before the Germans--The
Italians from the Germans--Fully acknowledged in France
1140--Suger’s work at St. Denis--Carving in French
churches--Corinthianesque outline of capitals--Distinctly Byzantine
capitals--A route by which Byzantine foliage may have reached
France--The importation indisputable--Its effects seen in Early
English capitals--West front of Chartres--Fluting on basement of
doorways--Cathedral of Noyon--St. Germain des Pres,
Paris--Cathedral of Sens, prototype of the Choir and Trinity Chapel
at Canterbury--Notre Dame, Paris--A new kind of foliage--The
capital “à crochet”--English transition--Incipient
specimens--Refined Norman--Pointed style, with reminiscences of
Romanesque--William of Sens--William the Englishman--Influence of
French work--Oakham Castle--Glastonbury Abbey--Cathedral of St.
David’s--Temple Church, London--Chichester Cathedral--Tynemouth
Abbey--Hexham Abbey--Unfoliated capitals--Round moulded
capitals--Characteristics of English and French transition--The
German transition--Practical lessons from studying these
changes--Principles to which the transition was pioneer.

In my last lecture it was my endeavour to illustrate the _mechanical_ and _structural_ portion of the process by which the Romanesque, or round-arched Gothic, became changed into the _Pointed_ style--a change which I showed to have resulted primarily from causes purely constructional, and arising from the mere necessities of the case, though subsequently carried on into parts, in which the change in the form of arch, though not _statically_ necessary, was demanded from reasons of _geometrical_ and æsthetic harmony. I further showed that the change was not, by any means, that abrupt revolution which it is often described as having been; that a large proportion of the distinctive characteristics of Gothic architecture are common to its round-arched and pointed-arched varieties; that these two forms of architecture are hardly to be called two styles, but rather the grand divisions of one style--the latter being the natural and logical result of the progression ever going on in the former, during every moment of its prevalence, and in every country where it prevailed.

The portion of the subject, however, on which I then treated, was only the mechanical framework of the style--its mere ossature, to use M. Viollet le Duc’s expression, or--as a celebrated palæontologist, who did me the honour of being present, said--the “_backbone_” of the subject. My object this evening is to overlay this skeleton with the muscles and sinew, and with the external expressions of its inner life; to show that those dry bones lived; or, in other words, to show the changes in the decorative features of the architecture, and in the sculptural art which accompanied it. I have further to trace out the transition as exhibited in the structures of different countries--and especially of France, England, and Germany;[10] and in a general manner to inquire both into their peculiar characteristics and into the order of their chronological precedence.

The tendency I have so often mentioned to refine and to elevate the character of the Romanesque architecture is common to all the countries where it prevailed. In all we find the severe simplicity of its earlier productions gradually and steadily relaxing throughout the whole period of its history; the rudeness of its early decorations disappearing in favour of a more artistic treatment; its ponderous massiveness becoming lightened; its low proportions changed for more lofty ones; and the general asperity of its character becoming softened down; so that in its later stages it seems often to possess nearly every feature of the succeeding style, excepting the pointed arch and the elevation and lightness which followed its introduction, though it also possessed features which its successor speedily discarded. I especially refer to those systems of ornamentation--most of them of Oriental origin--by which the Romanesque buildings may usually, irrespective of their arches, be distinguished from those of the succeeding periods.

The pointed arch having, as I have before shown, been first introduced in the vaulting,[11] where its particular statical advantages were most required, it naturally follows that the change would commence earliest in those countries in which the builders set themselves most actively about the solution of the problem--the steps of which I somewhat at length traced out in my last lecture; I mean the conversion of the basilica, with its timber roofs, into a completely vaulted structure; and I think there can be no doubt that that country was France.

This, however, would not be the only condition on which the probable precedence among the different nations, in taking the step which was necessary to generating a perfect form of arcuated architecture, would depend. It seems necessary that it should _not_ be a country already so thoroughly provided with noble churches as to preclude the probability of a great architectural movement, nor one which had already made so determined an effort in perfecting its national style as to have become too much enamoured of its successes to be in a position to strike out boldly in a new line: indeed, it should be a people of so active a spirit, and with so strong a tendency to progress and to change, as to render it improbable that they should ever settle down in quiet contentment with their own attainments. The question as to where the great stride forward was to be expected would naturally lie between France and Germany--the dominions of the two great successors of Charlemagne in his _kingly_ and his _imperial_ capacities. Neither Italy nor England were so likely: the former, from her too great proximity to Classic monuments; while the latter--though her political power was equal to that of France, her continental possessions most extensive, and her architectural strivings most vigorous--had too newly risen from the position of a conquered country to take the first place in such a movement, and was also the less likely to do so from the fact of her builders having for the most part avoided the vaulted construction (on a large scale at least), from which the first advance was largely suggested.

The matter lay, then, between France (I mean the actual centre of the Frankish monarchy, of which Paris was the focus) and Germany. The latter, however, had already made her great architectural movement, and was (and not without cause) becoming selfsatisfied with her achievements. She had generated a glorious style, and covered her land with monuments of which she might well be proud; while the part of France immediately under the royal power had not yet been able to erect structures of a magnitude worthy of her position as the great representative state of Western Europe. The immense influence gained just at this time by the French monastic establishments, as well as their schools of learning and science, and still more the increase of the regal power under the wise government of Louis VI., and by the annexation of the southern provinces through the marriage of his successor, brought about the commencement of the great building period in France, a little before the middle of the twelfth century, and the active genius of the people decided the rest. The consequence was that, though the refinement and perfecting of the Romanesque architecture went on uniformly in all the countries I have named, and though its transition into the Pointed style is as distinctly national in England and Germany as in France, the precedence as to the _time_ at which the grand advance was made must be unhesitatingly awarded, I will not say to _France_ (for some parts of it were particularly tardy), but to that district of France round Paris, the focus of the royal power--that portion of it, in fact, which was immediately under regal government, as distinguished from that of the great vassals of the Crown. We must further in justice admit that, though each country had its own transition, founded directly upon its own national and even local variety of Romanesque, each was also in some degree tinged and influenced by the early developments arrived at in the royal domain of France.

I wish to be as specific as possible on this point, for the sake of steering between two exaggerated views. The one view is this: Seeing the transitional style of each country to be distinctly national--a logical and consistent transition from their own local Romanesque--to conclude from this that the result was absolutely independently arrived at, though a considerable chronological interval may have intervened. The other is the conclusion that, as the central French architects had been the earliest in systematising the pointed-arched developments, all other countries had simply followed in their wake, and done no more than follow the fashions set at Paris. The truth lies between these contradictory views. The communication ever going on throughout Europe caused each country to know pretty perfectly what was going on in others; their Romanesque in each was about on a par as to advancement, and in each the want of the pointed arch must have been nearly equally felt. Each, then, had its national and logical transition; but the French having outstripped the others as to _time_, many of their minor developments were adopted ready-made (if I may say so): so that though each transition is clearly national, and distinct from that of other countries, we nevertheless find, both in Germany and England, features which have as clearly been borrowed from the French.

The English--though it would appear likely, from their adherence to open timber roofs, that they would have felt the want of the pointed arch less than the Germans, who more usually vaulted their naves,--nevertheless outstripped their more phlegmatic kinsmen in its adoption. This may have arisen from two causes--the constant use in England of central towers, the frequent failures of which, when supported by round arches, would have given them another reason to desire one of greater strength; and also their intimate connection with France and the vast domains in that country which came under the rule of our kings.

It is true that (with the exception of Anjou and Maine) the provinces held by Henry II. were those in which the Romanesque style held out the longest; yet the fact that the two countries were at the time almost as one--the English provinces of France being larger than, perhaps, either England itself or the independent domain of the French king--their ecclesiastical systems intimately united--the French language spoken by all the higher orders in England, who held possessions perhaps of almost equal extent in both countries--it is hardly probable that the state of architecture should be greatly different in England and in France.

The Normans, however, and the Aquitainians had both a strong affection for their own Romanesque styles, which had in each country more strongly marked characteristics than that of the royal domain of France; and this predilection seems to have kept back their strivings for a short time, and to have produced a similar effect in England--which, nevertheless, was the next country to royal France--and the parts immediately around it, to make the change towards the Pointed style, leaving Germany to come on at the close of the century, when we had already matured our Early Pointed or Early English style, and Italy to adopt it still later, and through the medium of the Germans, as a return for the Lombardic Romanesque which three centuries earlier she had imparted to Germany; “As if,” to use the eloquent words of Mr. Petit, “that mighty river, that bore the tide of Roman civilisation into the heart of Europe, had infused into the nations through which it flowed a veneration for Roman memorials; with a wish to preserve and perpetuate them, by establishing, according to the principles of their construction, a kindred and lasting style of their own:” but, as I may add, on finding at length those principles to be imperfect, desired to send back to the source of this early civilisation those more advanced developments and increased beauties which these nations had generated from them.

Having thus roughly indicated the national order in which the transition showed itself, I will proceed to describe its characteristics and its productions in these different countries, beginning with France.

I have before mentioned that in the south of France there is reason to believe that the pointed arch was used for barrel vaults from an early date; and in the celebrated domical churches of Perigord and Angoumois it is used below the pendentives of the domes, as well as in the section of the domes themselves: this, if the usually adopted opinion be correct, would bring it into the centre of France early in the eleventh century. It is certainly found in the royal domain from the commencement of the next century, but it is from about 1140 that we must date its systematic introduction as a fully acknowledged architectural element.

I will not pretend to say what is the earliest work in which it is thus admitted, nor attempt to investigate the commonly received opinion which attributes the launching of the new style (if such it should be called) to Suger, the celebrated Abbot of St. Denis. As, however, the architectural progress at this period was clearly most active within the influence of the court of Paris, and as Suger was not only one of the wisest and greatest men in the kingdom, but was a great minister of state, it is not unnatural that his personal influence upon art should be powerful. In the year 1140 he had rebuilt the nave of his church, and also the west front, as it existed previously to the wretched restorations which have rendered nearly worthless the most valuable landmark in the history of the transition. So far as we can now judge of it, it presents a very early transitional character, the round and pointed arch being almost indiscriminately used. Of the three portals, the central one has a round arch; the others are very slightly pointed. Their character is gorgeously rich, the shafts being either elaborately carved with surface ornamentation, or having full-length figures attached to them, and the arches replete with sculpture, agreeing, indeed, precisely in character with those of the west front of Chartres and some others. The parts which are original are beautifully executed, and the capitals are of that perfectly Byzantine variety of the Corinthianesque type which I shall shortly have to describe more in detail. In the interior, the arches of the vaulting, and those carrying the towers, are all pointed, but contain some strictly Romanesque features. On the whole, the work has a decidedly Romanesque appearance, but, nevertheless, has the pointed arch so freely used in it as to show that it was anything but the first essay.

In the same year (1140) Suger laid the foundations of the eastern end of the church, which, as it is said, “with stupendous celerity” he had so far completed by the year 1144, as to permit of its consecration; the king, with his capricious queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and a multitude of the great men of the country, being present at the ceremony.

Of the church of Suger the two ends with portions of the transepts are all that now remain; the whole of the intermediate portion, forming little less than the entire church, were rebuilt from the ground in the succeeding century, including even the pillars of the apse; so that we are not able to ascertain the design of an internal bay of his church. What remains of the eastern part embraces the pillars round the ambulatory of the apse, with all the apsidal chapels, including also their crypts. Of one of these chapels I exhibit an internal (Fig. 15) and external (Fig. 16) sketch. From these it will be seen that though the crypt--from want of height as much as from any other cause--has round arches, the upper chapels are purely pointed, and are very elegant in their design. The pillars are cylindrical, with Corinthianesque capitals (Fig. 17), the windows and vaulting pointed, and the whole, though obviously early, has very little of a Romanesque air, much less so than our own transitional specimens of a much later date, and, what is more remarkable, less than many French churches of twenty years later. The chapels, however, in the crypt are much more Romanesque, all their arches being round, and their vaulting without ribs, though the details agree with those of the chapels above.

The principal remnant beyond what I have here mentioned is the doorway of the north transept. This is pointed, and generally has a more advanced air than those in the west façade, though on examination the details differ but little. There are full-length figures attached to the shafts, and angels carved in the arch mouldings, as those of the western portals and as those at Chartres; and such parts of the foliage as have not been renewed are most beautifully carved in the same Byzantine style. Of the same character also are a number of capitals from the monastic buildings preserved in a neighbouring shed.[12]

I will now crave your indulgence while I make a digression on the subject of the carving in French churches of this period. No one can have failed to notice the Corinthianesque outline of the capitals which prevail in France from early in the twelfth to the end of the thirteenth century. It has, indeed, been remarked by writers on the subject, that this Corinthian character greatly increased _just before_ the period of the transition. Though the effects of importations of Byzantine taste are evinced in the Romanesque ornamentation throughout the whole period of its duration, it seems generally to have come in the form of manufactured goods, woven fabrics, jewellery, etc., etc.; and though the patterns, both of Byzantine and other

Oriental manufactures, are to be traced in the Romanesque ornaments, and were the origin of many of those most familiar to us, actual architectural features of Classic form, such as capitals, do not seem to have been very directly copied, excepting where the remains of antique buildings were at hand to offer models. The Romanesque capitals of earlier date are, in many cases, of types belonging to no other style, though in others they betray a distant descent from the Roman; and the cushion capital, and perhaps others, seem derived from Byzantium; but generally their forms differ much from the original, till we approach the period of which I am treating, when suddenly they assume an almost Classic form--the acanthus being freely used, and that of a variety resembling that of ancient Greece (Fig. 18), as distinguished from Rome (Fig. 19); and the same Greek leafage being found in cornices (Fig. 21), scroll-work (Fig. 20), and almost every other position in which it could be used. Not having travelled in the south of France, I will not venture to be very dogmatic as to the cause of this sudden change. I fancy, from such drawings as I have seen, that this Byzantine capital prevails a good deal in the south of France, but I am not able with certainty to distinguish it from the capitals directly imitated from Classic remains around.[13] M. Viollet de Duc views them all as being of this origin, calling them Gallo-Romaine, as distinguished from the Romanesque capitals found side by side with them. I view those, however, I am treating of as _distinctly Byzantine_, and the following facts suggest a route by which the purely Byzantine foliage may have reached the north of France.

The Church of St. Mark, at Venice, was erected between the years 977 and 1071, and its capitals are, many of them, precisely of the kind I am naming (Fig. 22), and are also identical with many at Constantinople (Fig. 23). No one who has had a training in drawing the Corinthian capital will fail to recognise at Venice that variety of the acanthus by which he has been accustomed to distinguish the Greek from the Roman Corinthian. According to M. de Verneill, the Church of St. Frond, at

Perigueux, was built at nearly the same time, in the centre of France, but under the influence of Venetian merchants. This church is a direct imitation of St. Mark’s at Venice; but besides the distinctly Byzantine forms which characterise this and the numerous family of churches which imitate it, it contains capitals of exactly the same kind as those at Venice (Figs. 24, 25); and from shortly after this time we find them becoming prevalent in districts

the other Byzantine features of the Perigordian churches are not followed. I give a series of capitals from Constantinople (Figs. 23, 26), Venice (Fig. 22), and Perigueux (Figs. 24, 25), which can be compared with those I exhibit from St. Denis (Figs. 20, 21), St. Germain des Pres (Fig. 27), etc., etc., to show how indisputable and how direct is the importation, though, unlike the works of Classic architects, we find no two capitals alike. They have other points of resemblance to the Corinthian capital, as the cauliculi, and a rudimental relic of the concave-planned abacus. This we find also in Pisan architecture, and in that of the Moors in Sicily, and probably in all styles which were influenced by the Byzantine; and it was, no doubt, derived from the practice, which arose when the Corinthian capital began to be used directly to bear an arch (and that _overhanging_ the column), of placing a strong square block over the more delicate abacus, to defend it against the fracture to which it would otherwise have been subject. These features will be found in nearly every church of the transitional period in the part of France of which I am speaking, and probably in nearly all parts.[14]

The Corinthianesque foliage became the originator of the magnificent capitals which pervade the finest French works of the thirteenth century, though the foliage became entirely altered; and in our own country, though the Byzantine original is seen, I believe, only in the work of William of Sens, at Canterbury,[15] the _effects_ of it are visible in the outline of many of our finest Early English capitals, though these are so distinctly national, and differ so much in treatment from those in France.

Nearly contemporaneous with Suger’s work is the west front of the Cathedral of Chartres, one of the very noblest productions of the style. It is not, I believe, exactly known when this façade was either commenced or completed, but the towers were actively progressing in 1145. The three central portals are of peculiar magnificence (Figs. 29, 30, 31, 32, 33); they are too elaborate for me to venture upon illustrating them by drawings.

The figures in the jambs are, as was usual at the period, in the same block with the shafts themselves, and their extraordinary elongation, and the long upright folds of their draperies were, no doubt, intended to harmonise with their position as parts of columns. The heads are of peculiar dignity and grace. These doorways are probably the finest remaining of the transitional period. Their excessive richness contrasts strikingly with the severe though noble simplicity of the remainder of the façade, and displays not only that tendency to lavish all the resources of art upon the doorways, which so especially characterises French art, but also illustrates, in the most striking manner, the absolute independence of the architecture of mere ornamentation, and, at the same time, the freedom with which it avails itself of it; the rich doorways and the severely plain towers being equally glorious specimens of the style, and neither suffering in the least by juxtaposition with the other.

I will just call attention to the singular ornamentation of the pedestal or basement of the doorways, by means of fluting, etc. This was common in France at that period, though I am not able to trace it to its source. It is almost identical with that of the western doorway of St. Germain des Pres,[16] and we find it carried out with still greater richness in the somewhat later doorways which flank the western façade at Rouen.

The capitals in this façade (at Chartres) are of the kind I have above described. The southern tower and spire are most noble in their composition, and are hardly exceeded in beauty by those of any subsequent period.

The next example I will allude to is the Cathedral of Noyon. The date of this cathedral is unknown; but the old church having been destroyed by fire in 1131, and the Bishop (Beaudoin), who shortly after succeeded to the see, being an intimate friend of Abbot Suger, it has been put down almost as an historical certainty that he commenced rebuilding the church not long after the erection of that of St. Denis, and that the designs were made under the advice of Suger. I am not prepared either to subscribe to this implicitly or to dispute it. On first examining the church, my impression was adverse to this theory; but St. Denis itself looks so much later than it is, and the apparent anomalies in the dates of this period are so perplexing, that one is disposed to hesitate before disputing a theory supported by such men as Viollet le Duc. If, however, the idea be correct, I should limit the early date to the _lower portion_ of the choir. The same intermixture of the round arch with the pointed obtains throughout the cathedral; but not only are the mouldings of later section in the western parts (as M. le Duc points out), but the capitals which prevail in the upper storeys of the choir itself are of a kind which I cannot think so early as the date assigned.

The capitals of the lower storey (or the aisles and apsidal chapels), are of the Corinthianesque description, intermixed with others of interwoven stalks, etc., and are eminently beautiful.

I give a sketch of one of the apsidal chapels, both within (Fig. 34) and without (Figs. 35, 36), as a parallel to those at St. Denis. The comparison will certainly tend to confirm the theory as to its date, as the prevalence of the round arch gives it an appearance of even earlier age; but we shall see from other examples that this evidence is not wholly to be relied on.

The plan of this church is exceedingly beautiful, having apsidal terminations, not only to the choir (Fig. 36), but to each transept. In this it is supposed to have been imitated from the noble transepts at Tournay, with which see Noyon was connected till the year 1153, almost the very year to which both of these works have been attributed, though the transepts at Tournay are still purely Romanesque, and that of the very grandest and boldest kind, excepting only the pointed vaulting; while those at Noyon (which, however, are somewhat later than the choir) are of very light and almost flimsy construction, and though containing many round arches, are, in their whole aspect, of the Pointed style.

The church at Noyon is of a construction to which I barely alluded in my former lecture--that in which the aisles are of two storeys, both of which are vaulted.

It is customary to call this second storey a triforium, but I should rather term it a _gallery_, for the triforium proper occupies the interval between the roof and the vaulting of the aisles, a space which occurs _over_ these galleries; so that a church of this construction has _four_ storeys--the aisle, the gallery, the triforium, and the clerestory; the triforium being, as its name seems to import, the _third_ storey, though in churches of the more customary type it is only the _second_. This construction was very common at this period in France and Germany, though in England I recollect only one instance--the choir of Gloucester--which, however, is so altered as almost to conceal its construction.[17] The vaulting at Noyon is pointed, but its side cells are, I think, in every case round. The exterior of the apsidal chapels at Noyon is not unlike those at St. Denis, though without its crypt. Like it, it has columns used for buttresses, an idea inherited from those of earlier date--as those at Nôtre Dame du Pont at Clermont, at Issoire, and many others.

There are noble portals on the east sides of the transepts in which the carved foliage is of the most gorgeous description, and which were formerly replete with sculpture, every vestige of which is now gone, having been most carefully cut out at the Revolution.

On the whole, this church is one of the best studies of the transition, though defective in one important element--a _date_.

The next example I will notice is the Church of St. Germain des Pres at Paris, an example of special value from its possessing the element which we lack at Noyon. It was dedicated in 1163, or nineteen years after St. Denis.

The comparison of St. Germain with St. Denis leads to one of the most curious questions connected with this part of architectural history; for during this interval of nearly twenty years _no progress whatever_ would appear to have been made; indeed, to judge from the buildings, one would be disposed to transpose their dates; for while the eastern part of St. Denis, in 1144, is purely pointed (the crypt alone excepted), St. Germain, in 1163, has round arches used in most prominent positions, though in other respects exactly agreeing in detail; and this in a most important church in the royal city itself.

How is this long stagnation to be explained?

I will not pretend to answer it positively, but I would suggest the following solution:--Two years after Louis VII. and Queen Eleanor attended the consecration of St. Denis, they set out on a great Crusade--the one at the head of 10,000 warriors, the other of a troop of Amazons she had levied from among the ladies of her court. The Amazons and their inordinate amount of baggage led to the destruction of the army at the battle of Laodicea. The king returned to his dominions impoverished and humbled, shortly after which his Amazonian consort, obtaining a divorce, deprived him at one stroke of half of his dominions, and transferred the rich Provençal dower to Henry II., the English king. I would suggest, then, whether this sudden stoppage in the development of architecture may not be accounted for by the equally sudden exhaustion of the resources of the French kingdom, as the early commencement of the improved style has been in a measure attributed to its previous increase in prosperity?

The sculptural art at St. Germain des Pres seems exactly on a par with that at St. Denis and Chartres. The capitals are either of the Byzantine Corinthianesque, or are filled with animals (natural and grotesque), or consist of a union of both. They are exceedingly fine examples of their style, and I have selected one[18] of them as a type of the style. The design of the interior of the choir, though severely simple, is exceedingly fine, and in some degree original. I exhibit a sketch of two of its bays (Fig. 37).

The western doorway (Fig. 38) seems to have very closely resembled those at Chartres; but the whole of the sculpture has been removed, excepting from the tympanum, which still bears the representation of the Last Supper; and the shafts, which, we are informed, bore full-length figures--alternating, in all probability, with smaller ones richly diapered, as at St. Denis, Chartres, and Bourges--have been exchanged for plain ones. The capitals are of rich Corinthianesque foliage, amongst which are represented grotesque birds, harpies, etc. The basement or pedestal is fluted exactly as at Chartres. On the whole, this church deserves much more attention than it seems generally to have received.

I now come to an example of peculiar interest to ourselves;--that cathedral which it is customary to suppose to be the parent of our own Pointed architecture; and which, though I by no means subscribe to that opinion, possesses an interest sufficiently deep as being, without question, the prototype of the glorious choir at the Trinity Chapel at Canterbury,--the metropolitan church of all England--and as having, through them, exercised a powerful influence, and given a certain degree of French colouring to the immediately succeeding developments throughout the length and breadth of our land. I need hardly say that I allude to the cathedral of Sens.

I am ashamed to say I had not seen this noble church till a short tour I have made during the present winter,[19] and with reference to the present lecture. I had unconsciously entertained a certain feeling of jealousy towards it, arising from the exaggerated opinions constantly expressed as to the entire dependence upon it of our Pointed style; but my first exclamation on entering its nave was, “Well, if our Gothic churches are all derived from this, they had, to say the least, a _glorious_ parentage!”

Though a cathedral of the second magnitude, and much injured by subsequent alterations, I know few which have a nobler or more impressive aspect. Even the soaring interior of Amiens, which I chanced to visit the day after, did not efface from my mind the sterner grandeur of Sens.

The interior is extremely simple (Fig. 39), and rather obtains its impressive effect from the magnitude of its leading features, and still more from the noble sentiment which must have pervaded the mind of its designer, than from anything which can be specifically defined in words. Its nave is of unusual width, being 49 feet from centre to centre of the pillars, which are alternately vast clustered piers of about 11 feet 6 inches diameter (a large portion of which runs up to the vaulting), and coupled columns of nearly three feet diameter each. The triforium is somewhat too small--the only

fault in the composition--and the clerestory windows have, unfortunately, been renewed at a later age. It is generally stated that the whole of the vaulting was renewed with them: this, however, is incorrect; the only parts renewed were the side cells, which, as is proved by evidence I need not here go into, were round-arched, and came low in the clerestory wall, thus diminishing the height of the windows--a defect which led to their reconstruction. Not only are the ribs of the original section, but the bosses are clearly of the same early age, which, I think, is sufficient to disprove the idea of the vaults having been rebuilt. The vaulting of the aisles has round transverse arches, and the aisle windows, as well as the wall-arcading, are round-arched (Fig. 40). The carving is of the same kind with that I have so often described, and most of it is severely simple. Some of the capitals to the wall-arcading are very rich, and many of them contain grotesque animals, birds, etc., finely carved (Figs. 41, 42).

The west portals were, probably, the latest part of the original church, and have since been altered by the substitution of tympana of later date; but the sculptured art they contain is some of the very finest of its period, many of the figures being of classic beauty, and of far more than classic expression. This church was dedicated in 1167, though (with the sole exception of the portals) its character would have led one to place it earlier than St. Denis.

Two years before the consecration of Sens was commenced the great crowning work of the French transition--Nôtre Dame at Paris.[20] Its erection occupied the remainder of the century, while that of the western façade reaches over the first quarter of the succeeding one. I will not attempt a description of what this most noble church was in its original condition: it will be found clearly particularised in M. Viollet le Duc’s Dictionary--a work which should be in the hands of every architectural student. I will rather confine myself to its influence upon sculptured foliage.

On its first commencement no advance was made upon the Byzantine carving of St. Denis; indeed, the capitals in the eastern gallery look almost more archaic than their predecessors of twenty or thirty years’ earlier date. It is curious, however, that the capitals of the large columns below these galleries are in a decidedly more advanced style. This M. le Duc ingeniously attributes to the employment of artists of different ages, and to the preference given (in an age of advancement) to the younger ones, leading to the more important capitals being committed to their hands. I should, however, be inclined to account for it differently, by supposing the smaller and more detached capitals to have been carved before they were fixed, and those of the great pillars left to the last thing before the removal of the scaffolding. I can appreciate this by my own experience, for in the church I am building at Hamburg there will be some ten years’ interval between the carving of the triforium and of the pillars which support it; during which interval I am horrified when I recollect that _all but one_ of the artists have died from the destructive effects of the stone dust, and that one has been saved only by my having requested him to relinquish carving and to content himself with making models for others to work from--a system which, under other circumstances, is one of the advisableness of which I entertain doubts.

The capitals, however, in the _nave_ are those which best display the enormous advance now being made. I should not have dwelt so long on the merely antiquarian fact of the importation of the Byzantine