Chapter VIII: Part 8

My illustrations have hitherto, perhaps, for the most part, been taken from churches, but the same principle of common sense applies equally to secular structures. Each is treated in a manner suited to its class and purpose. Those classes and purposes differ, as a matter of course, in a majority of cases, from their correlatives at the present day, as they did in different periods of the Middle Ages themselves, and in the different countries of Europe, at any given period; so that the mere fact of such differences existing is no argument against any lesson we may learn from them. I presume, for example, that no great analogy can be established between a Roman villa and one of the nineteenth century in England, and not much between an Italian Renaissance palace of the fifteenth century and a London mansion of the nineteenth. Even in Germany and in France at the present day the houses differ greatly from those in England. The question of the _rationale_ of a style is rather whether it is so flexible and so essentially founded on common sense and reason that it will readily shape itself to meet practical demands, however varied they may be.

Now, it is scarcely possible for a building of the Middle Ages and one for a kindred purpose at the present day to differ more widely in their requirements than did different buildings of the same age; and if the most varied demands of one period are equally met by a given style, why should we fear that the same style would fail to meet variations proceeding from a change of manners and habits?

Take, for example, a Gothic fortification and a Gothic town hall. Can any requirements be more totally different? In one the great object was to shut off all communication from without: external windows must be either wholly avoided or reduced to mere eyelet-holes. In the other the walls are perforated with windows to the greatest extent which the strength of the structure would admit. In one the entrance must be guarded by all possible contrivances; in the other it must, as it were, open its arms widely to invite the incoming citizens. In the one the whole expression is one of stern exclusion and frowning defiance; in the other of busy concourse and festive hilarity. Now, is it possible for these widely differing demands and contrary expressions to have been more perfectly embodied than they are in the feudal castle, and in the halls of the manufacturing cities of Flanders and Germany?

Take, again, the domestic buildings of a convent, and those of the citizens of a great commercial town. Both, it is true, were human residences, and must provide for the common wants of our nature. Yet in one the great principle of the foundation was ascetic gravity and religious mortification; in the other the objects aimed at were hospitality, cheerfulness, and family enjoyment: and in each case the objects were perfectly provided for, as well as expressed in the aspect of the building. Why, then, should we imagine that because our ideas of family comfort are more perfect than in the days of our forefathers, the style of architecture which they so successfully applied to purposes differing so widely one from another will refuse to accommodate itself to a more complete form of one of the same purposes? Yet people continually tell us that Gothic architecture is feudal and monkish! Of course the castle was feudal and the convent monkish: it would have been strange if they had not, seeing that one was built for the feudal lord and the other for monks. But was the town hall or the city residence monkish? Were the warehouses of Nuremberg or the market-halls of Flanders feudal? The idea carries absurdity on the face of it. They were, in fact, built by those very communities who had used their utmost endeavours to overthrow feudalism, and were ever most strenuously opposing its authority and influence.

I have in this, and more especially in my last lecture shown you that the development of Gothic architecture itself was founded, step by step, upon common sense and upon practical considerations. In like manner were these made the great principles which guided its application.

In all classes of building, whether ecclesiastical, military, monastic, civic, domestic, commercial, or rustic, though the architecture was in reality one and the same, the treatment was absolutely and imperatively commanded by the purpose, and the expression followed by instinct. As I have said on other occasions, a Mediæval barn is as good and as true in its architecture as a cathedral; both are essentially in the same style, yet one is as obviously a barn and as absolutely subservient to the requirements of a barn, as the other is a church. One has no windows, but slits of some 4 inches wide, and yet looks as Gothic as the other, which has more window than wall.

Take, again, two commercial buildings--as the great Cloth Market at Yprès and the huge warehouses at Nuremburg--one for exhibiting manufactures, the other for stowing away goods. The first is, internally, a continuous room or gallery some 30 or 40 feet wide, and (measuring along its several ranges) about 600 or 700 feet long; its entire sides occupied by continuous and uniform ranges of large windows, and the exterior unbroken to express the unity of the interior, and its

lower storey subdivided into rooms of a small size for more varied uses; and with all this unbroken uniformity, it would be hard to find a more wonderfully striking building. The other, being for stowage, demanded multitudinous storeys and numerous supports. The storeys within are not, perhaps, more than 8 or 10 feet high, and the floors are carried on oaken pillars. The windows, being more for ventilation than light, are small and square, and closed by shutters instead of glass. The crane houses are made noble structures of timber, but no ornament is admitted, excepting to the doorways and perhaps the gables. The whole speaks its purpose so unmistakably that I do not suppose any one ever yet asked what it was; and though a mere unmasked and almost unadorned warehouse, it stands forth and asserts--and not in vain--its claims upon public admiration amongst the admired monuments of that truly interesting city.

To go into the various classes of secular buildings, and to show the consistency of their treatment, each with its own proper requirements, would fill a volume, and a volume, if it did any justice to the subject, well worth reading. I must not now go farther. I will, however, point out a few developments demanding our notice. I have before alluded to several points of difference between the windows of secular and ecclesiastical buildings. These differences were carried farther and farther according to the demands of the particular building in hand. The windows were wide or narrow, more or less numerous, subdivided or undivided, arched or square-headed, and, if arched, had high or low arches, strictly according to the demands of the rooms within; and whatever those demands were, the architecture was subordinated to them. Some buildings had windows few and far between; others were nearly all window; and of course there were all intermediate varieties. Some buildings were vaulted in every storey, giving good examples of really fireproof construction; others were fireproof through one or two storeys, and timbered above; and others, again, had timber floors throughout. In secular structures we find trabeated architecture in its truest form--not stone beams, which, when extended beyond very narrow limits, go against the nature of the material, but real beams of wood, used in a thoroughly sensible and constructive manner. I would particularly call attention to the fact that beams were not merely run into walls--where, the moment the ends so immured decay, down comes the floor; but they were aided by stone corbels, and not only so, but by timber corbels, lying on them; or if the bearings were very great, braces were added, which will carry the beams even when the ends are rotted off.

This is trabeated architecture in a very genuine form. I dare say both Greeks and Romans may have used it so, too; but as their timbers have gone to dust, the Renaissance has lost its precedents, and has too often imitated stone construction in wood, or in more modern works, in lath and plaster; for wood, having disappeared from among the precedents, has of late been to a great extent eschewed as a visible architectural material.

Then, again, we have another common-sense development--the fireplace. The Romans had a number of good methods of warming their buildings; but the straightforward, honest fireplace--the social palladium of the Englishman--we owe, I believe, to the Mediæval builders--the men who are said to have known nothing of modern comforts. There are fireplaces in old Norman castles--Conisborough, for instance--as good as in a Belgravian house, and the chimney-pieces were often a great deal handsomer. With the fireplace came that other modern feature, the chimney-shaft. Look how consistently with common sense, and with the principle of decorating what was demanded by utility, that was treated!

The oriel window or bay window was another Mediæval invention, and it would be difficult to find a feature more conducive to comfort and cheerfulness. It is often very sensibly translated into other styles; but, like the fireplace and the chimney, it belongs to the style of those “_comfortless_” ages of which we are treating.

The dormer window is another invention of this _window_ age. The high roof was not to be thrown away--it must be utilised by being formed into attic storeys; windows, therefore, must be contrived wholly or in part in the roofs. Hence that highly picturesque and useful feature, which, though like the oriel, now translated into other styles, was invented in the middle ages, and, like all their inventions, originated in common sense.

I have spoken of the construction of floors, but omitted to notice the ceilings. Great scope was given to variety in their treatment. Sometimes all the timbers were shown, and, perhaps, decorated with colour, the wood-work being more or less ornamented, as the character of the building demanded. For lofty rooms this often gives a noble covering; in other cases, the beams and binding joists are shown, and the intervening spaces panelled; in others, again, the whole is panelled, and in each case any amount of decorative painting used which might be desired. There is no doubt that the ceilings in Gothic buildings were, in many cases, the types which suggested those of the earlier Renaissance buildings before people began to imitate stone construction in plaster, and to make quasi-constructive features in hollow cradling. In the middle ages, either constructive parts were exposed to view, or the decorations which concealed them were designed simply _as decorations_, without in any degree professing to be constructive--plain honest common sense being the ruling principle, as it ought to be, and once was in other styles.

One of the most striking ways in which this principle of common sense is displayed is in the absolute freedom exercised in planning, or, more correctly speaking, the absolute subordination of external design to the practical requirements of the interior. There was no love of irregularity for its own sake among the Mediæval builders; on the contrary, they had no objection at all to general uniformity where the circumstances of the case did not suggest a departure from it; and where irregularity was demanded for use, they did not carry it beyond what the demand required; but when the practical requirements naturally led to irregularity, they fearlessly followed them, without any of that morbid striving after forced uniformity which characterises--I will not say Classic works, for the ancients also acted on more natural principles--the great majority of modern buildings. That they did not capriciously strive after irregularity is proved by such buildings as the great market halls of Bruges and Yprès, the latter of which has a front of 450 feet long, without one deviation from uniformity, simply because the practical requirements in each wing were identical. That, when the internal requirements but slightly differed, they carried irregularity no farther than the demands of reason suggested, is proved by such fronts as that of the ducal palace at Venice, and of a very great number of street houses and palaces in different countries, where the normal idea is uniform, but the windows placed to suit rooms of varying size; but that, when the practical requirements had no reference to uniformity, they fearlessly acted on them, without any of those sickly repinings which would so sadly disturb the peace of the modern architect, still more without any torturing of the internal arrangements to make them fit to a preconceived elevation (which is the usual practice in these more enlightened days), is abundantly proved by many of the noblest works which our forefathers have bequeathed to us.

Now, far be it from me to say that this honesty of treatment belongs exclusively to Gothic architecture. It does not. It is the leading principle of all true architecture; and I have no doubt, indeed we have indisputable proof, that it was acted on by the Greeks and Romans, as well as by our own forefathers. The contrary practice seems to be an error rather of our own age than of the genuine periods of Classic art; but when the defenders of the revived Classic art use it as an objection against Mediæval architecture, we then have a full right to point out its true principles, and to show that it is an exercise of common sense so obvious and reasonable, that any style of art which refused it would stand self-condemned, as rejecting the plain demands of reason; and, though I do not hold that Classic architecture stands so condemned, it would be so if we were to admit against it the accusations of some of its own advocates. At any rate, it is fair on the part of Gothic architecture to say that in this great principle of the subordination of external design to internal requirement, it not only follows the great styles of architecture which preceded it, but that, in the opinion of its opponents, it carries out the great utilitarian principle even to an excess.

There can be no doubt that the principle is pre-eminently in harmony with the genius of Gothic architecture; more so, probably, than with any other; and if those who think it a vice desire to saddle it exclusively on our style, they cannot complain if we, who hold it to be a virtue, at the least, claim for that style the lion’s share of the credit.

I do not for a moment dispute that there is room for excess, even in acting on a principle so reasonable. If we were to make it an excuse for careless planning; if we were so affected as to seek excuses for irregularity when the arrangement, if carefully considered, offered none; or if we neglect reasonable means of avoiding them when it can be done without any injury to the arrangement, we are clearly open to the charge of excess; but, on the other hand, if we were to avoid irregularity by making two essentially different parts look alike, at the sacrifice of their practical demands; if we place windows in inconvenient or unsightly positions in the interiors of our rooms, for the sake of making them match some windows in an opposite wing, or to form a regular range, disagreeing with internal divisions; if we make sham windows where none are wanted, or omit real ones where they would be useful; or if we torture and displace our rooms to obtain uniformity; or play any of the thousand tricks which are too current amongst us to make our exteriors uniform where our interiors are the contrary; surely we are guilty of a far more culpable excess in the opposite direction, for the exaggeration of common sense is unquestionably a more venial sin than its renunciation. However this may be, Gothic architecture, whether rightly or wrongly, looks to internal requirements as paramount to external regularity; places its windows rather with reference to the rooms within than to the elevations without; and rejoices in making the exterior express in some degree the changes of purpose in the internal arrangement: but it does not reject uniformity where compatible with truth and utility, nor refuse to admit of careful artistic combinations of parts, so long as they are made subservient to, or at least do not militate against, practical requirements. As I have said before, I believe that in this it only reflects, and carries out more perfectly, the principles of true Classic art; and that, if these principles are often forgotten or rejected, it is in the main an abuse of modern date. It is, however beyond all question inherent upon that form of revived Classic art with which we are surrounded.

The same may, in fact, be said of truthfulness in minor things. It would be unjust to father the contemptible and endless fallacies of our own day upon Classic architecture. It is true that they pervade and saturate many of the modern productions of that style, and that the revival of Gothic architecture has somehow led to their exposure; but the truthfulness which we are proud to claim as one of its great and leading stars, we freely yield as the property, not of one style, but of all noble architecture.[62]

Did time permit, I might follow up the _rationale_ of the style under consideration as evinced in the judicious employment, treatment of, and the mode of workmanship applied to, different materials as well as different branches of artistic decoration. The Mediæval architect adopted the material he could most readily obtain, and adapted his design to suit its peculiar qualities.

If he used block-stone throughout his work, or united it with rough walling-stone or rubble, or if his building were of brick, or flint, or pebbles, he studied to use them so as to look well and to aid the effect by their variety; as instances of this I will refer to the exquisite stone and flint structures in the eastern counties, and the interstratification of block stone with the thinnest rubble in some of the oolitic districts; to the domestic brick architecture of Norfolk, or Northern Germany, and of Lombardy, to the timber structures of innumerable districts and cities; to the variously-coloured stones in the buildings in Auvergne; and last, but not least, to the magnificent marble structures, with their inlayings and mosaics, which delight us when in Italy. The great principle was how best to utilise the materials which Nature had provided: where Nature had been chary in her gifts, even external plaster was not despised, but truthfully made use of; where she had been lavish, even precious stones were used as building materials, as at Prague, where there is a chapel whose interior is faced with a kind of rubble-work of polished amethyst, the stones being cut through, but otherwise unshaped, the irregular jointings being covered with embossed gilding.

In metal-work each metal was treated on its own merits and its own natural characteristics.

In decoration--frescoes, mosaics, tapestry, needlework, embossed leather, metal-work, enamels, etc., were profusely used when funds permitted. Indeed, nothing was rejected, either on the score of homeliness or expense, provided it suited the work in hand and the means at command.

But what, I may be asked, is the utility of tracing out evidences of a fact so probable on the face of it as that our forefathers acted upon reason when engaged on so practical a thing as architecture? I would reply that its utility is twofold. In the first place, we have too much lost sight of the _rationale_ of architecture, and of the necessity of acting upon it. I do not wish to rip open old sores, or to object against other errors of which we are all of us guilty. Let us each examine ourselves, and ask ourselves how far we act upon truth and reason in our designs; and if compelled to admit our derelictions, a review like that on which we have been engaged may not be otherwise than useful--quite apart from any question about what style we are working in.

In the second place, it is an undoubted fact, that we are at a transitional period of our art, that we are dissatisfied with the present and aiming at an altered future, and that some of us are following up that aim on the basis of a revival of the style of which I have been treating, while there is a _vis inertiæ_ in art which is not easily overcome, but yields reluctantly to change; how important, then, is it to us to know that the style we are reviving was itself based, as all good architecture must be, on the firm rock of common sense, and how essential to our success that we should place our revival on the same basis! Shall we, then, secure this object by doing only _what_ our forefathers did? By no means; rather, as I have urged in a former lecture, let us do _as_ they did: that is, _act upon reason_. They thoroughly suited all their works to their varied objects. Let us do the same, how much soever more varied our requirements may be. They made their houses comfortable to the extent of their habits; let us make ours so to the greatly increased extent of our own habits. They welcomed every invention as it arose: let us do the same by the inventions of our own prolific age. They utilised every material which presented itself to them: let us do so by all the materials which modern science or ingenuity has placed at our command; only let us do all this truthfully and consistently with reason; for example, if we meet with an invention suited to the surface decoration of rooms but devoid of constructive strength, let us use it _as_ a surface decoration, and not, as is too commonly done, make troughs and pipes of it, and pass them off for beams and columns! If we admire a vaulted construction, by all means let us use it, but do not let us emulate the vaulting of Diocletian’s Baths and Westminster Abbey or the domes of the Pantheon or St. Sophia in lath and plaster! If we want plaster casts of ancient monuments, let us place them in our museums, but, for goodness sake, let our buildings themselves be real!

The conditions to be demanded of our future architecture, whether destined to be based upon the Classic or the Gothic Renaissance, or whether they are to continue ever, as now, to assert side by side their rival claims, are:--a perfect and unhesitating fulfilment of practical demands, whether of construction, convenience, or comfort; an equally unhesitating adoption of the materials, inventions, and mechanical and constructive appliances of the age; a capability of reasonable economy or of judicious magnificence in all degrees and proportion; a character at once noble and in harmony with the country and climate, and with national associations; a perfect freedom of treatment, united with perfect truthfulness; and a free admission of the sister arts in their highest and most perfected forms. How happy would it be for art if we could proclaim an armistice between rival styles, while the advocates of each devote heart and soul to the realisation of these conditions, so obviously demanded by reason and common sense!

That Gothic architecture is in its spirit well fitted to unite these conditions, I think may be judged by much that I have shown you in this and the preceding lecture. It lays claim in a pre-eminent degree to the character of _Freedom_. Free in its use of arcuated or trabeated construction, as may best suit each particular case; free in the form of its arches, which, in addition to those used in other styles, take other and excellent forms, which enable them to assume all possible proportions of height to span; free in its vaulting, which has peculiar facilities for adapting itself to every possible space and span; free in the proportions, as well as infinite in the varieties, of its columns; free as air in the sculpture it applies to their capitals, as well as to other architectural uses; free in the pitch of its roofs; in the size, number, form, and grouping of its windows; and, above all, absolutely free in its planning, in which the practical requirements of the interior have undisputed sway irrespective of external design--it seems as if it could not be otherwise than suited to an age in which freedom is the great point to be aimed at in all we undertake. Convinced that such is the case, let us devote ourselves, heart and hand, to the task; let us bring all our energies to rendering the style we select as our groundwork really and absolutely subservient to the wants and to the spirit (so far as it is a healthful and a truthful spirit) of our age; let us apply to the work all our reasoning powers, and ground all we do upon common sense. But let me not be mistaken: this cannot be done by a mere abstract effort of the mind: let me, therefore, urge upon you who are students to exercise your reason and common sense in another way, and to be assured of this, that you cannot succeed in the practice of art, unless, in addition to all the practical considerations I have had occasion to allude to, you make yourselves, in the strictest sense of the word, ARTISTS.

A Digression concerning Windows.

In the foregoing Lectures, having only brought the history of our Architecture down to the close of the thirteenth century, I have neglected that of the later styles, and, consequently in great measure, the development and progressive changes in window-tracery. This has, however, been so amply treated of in many books and essays that it is not a matter with me of much regret. I confess I _had_ intended to have supplied the omission in subsequent lectures, but circumstances prevented.

It would have been an agreeable task to have followed up the history of window-tracery and the many details which accompanied it, through the remaining two and a half centuries of the reign of Gothic architecture--to have shown how it grew from the purely geometrical system of Westminster, Newstead, and the “Angel choir” at Lincoln into the sweeter tracery of the “Easter aisle” at St. Albans, and of St. Etheldreda’s Chapel in Holborn; and on again into the yet softer loveliness of the Lady Chapel at Chichester, the halls at Penshurst, Mayfield, the gatehouses of Battle Abbey and of St. Augustine’s at Canterbury, and the Chapel of St. Anselm and De Estria’s work at the cathedral there; and then again into the more flowing tracery of Alan de Walsingham’s work, till it fell into debility by its too sensuous ramifications, and was brought back again to vigour by the stern perpendicular work of Wykeham; and how that, in its turn, became softened down, into such works as Crosby and Eltham Halls, and again into the exuberance of the Tudor style. All this would be very pleasant, but would necessitate the treating of all contemporary variations of detail, and would swell my lectures out into another volume: more than this, _I have given no such lectures_. It has been _my_ task to show the principles on which Gothic architecture _was founded_, and on which it attained its leading developments, rather than to follow them out to their ultimate results, on attaining which much which led to them was thrown aside, as scaffolding is taken down when a structure is completed.

I feel it necessary, however, while neglecting the more usual course of chronicling the history of window-tracery, to supplement my lectures at this point with some remarks on the general construction of windows--applicable more or less to all periods of Mediæval architecture.

The most normal form of a window in an arched style is simply an opening straight through the wall covered by a barrel arch. This is, however, obviously defective in its fitness for diffusing light in the interior, a deficiency which, though slight in the case of a large window in a thin wall, becomes serious when the window is narrow and the wall thick. The simplest method of meeting this is to splay the jambs and arch of the window, at, for example, an angle of forty-five degrees, so as to allow for the spreading of the rays of light within.

In English architecture of pre-Norman days, this was most frequently done, both within and without, by placing the glass a long way from the outer face, or perhaps in the mid-thickness of the wall (Fig. 154). This had the advantage of splaying the head or arch as well as the jamb, which allowed more high light to enter; an advantage often increased by splaying the exterior of the arch _more_ than the jambs, giving it a bonnet-like shape, and so obtaining still higher light (Fig. 155). Windows thus splayed inside and out, may be seen in the Castle Church at Dover--some few of these are not arched but had oak lintels, splaying upwards at about forty-five degrees (Fig. 156). The bonnet-headed window may be seen at Holy Trinity Church, Colchester; Clapham Church, Bedfordshire and many other buildings.

The deeply splayed window may also be seen in part of St. Pantaleon’s Church at Cologne (Fig. 157), which is a work of the tenth century, and in the aisles of the Basse-œuvre at Beauvais, a church of at least as early a date, so that it may be viewed as a feature common during these early periods of Romanesque which preceded that from which our Mediæval styles were developed. During the rise of the Norman style, a different system was more usually adopted, the splay of the jambs and arch being mainly internal. A series of humble village churches at the back of Dover Cliffs have windows in which the glass was flush with the exterior, and all the splay put inside; many both in Normandy and in this country differ from this only in having a very small external splay, and even when the exterior is shafted the inner splay often comes close to the face of the recessed order.

This excessive flushness is less frequent as the style advances, and in Early English, though sometimes, as in the beautiful chancel at Burgh in Norfolk, (Fig. 158) the glass is sometimes brought extremely close to the outside: it is usual to have at least a few inches of splay around it.

In transitional work, as in Norman, the internal splay, often of very great width, usually runs round the arch concentrically; but in developed Early English,

and in subsequent styles, a special variety of internal arch is introduced suited to those numerous cases in which the glass-plane is far nearer (as it is in a majority of instances) to the outer than the inner face of the walls. The simplest form of this internal window-arch takes the form of a barrel (pointed) arch, springing so much lower than the spring of the outside arch as to allow it to span the increased internal width without rising unduly higher than the outside arch, as was the case when the splay was continued round the inner arch. This arch of necessity formed an intersection with the inside splays. Its edge was usually in the plainest specimens, relieved by a chamfer (Fig. 159), which was often exchanged for a moulding (Fig. 160); but a far more agreeable finish was a rib dropping down a little from the arched soffite, its edges being either chamfered or moulded with or without a label over it (Fig. 161). This, if the arch were made slightly segmental, would die into the jamb-splay, or it might be carried on a corbel (Fig. 162) or a shaft (Figs. 163, 164), thus forming a very agreeable and picturesque internal finish to the window.

This rib is usually termed a rere-arch.

Professor Willis, in his paper on the _Architectural Nomenclature of the Middle Ages_, calls it a “Scoinson Arch,” from a French word “_escoinsons_.” He also quotes the term “_arrière voussure_,” probably meaning the arch behind the rib.

Professor Willis’s general description, which I had not referred to when I wrote the above, is as follows:--“An arch is placed so as to carry the inner surface of the wall. In simple examples, like the present, this rib is plain, and dies against the jambs, but in superior buildings is richly moulded, and a shaft, with base and capital and side-mouldings, are added to the edges of the jamb. But this arrangement is mostly distinct from the window-tracery. This arch is of different and larger span from that of the window-head, because the spreading or embrasure of the jambs increases the opening inwards. It is also of a different curvature, and the decoration of the two disconnected and separated by the plain splayed sides of the window-opening, connecting the two, and resting at one end on the tracery, and at the other on the rib, is a narrow vault or _voussure_, which again is not necessarily of the same curvature as the sustaining arches, but which carries the core of the wall above.”

He says farther on:--“We may therefore call the said vault, rib, and shaft; the rere-vault, rere-rib, and rere-shaft of the window.” He also remarks that, “in the thick walls of Mediæval structure, the tracery and its glazing are commonly placed much nearer to the outer surface of the wall than to the inner.” This last observation calls our attention to a great and important distinction by which nearly all Mediæval windows may be classified--viz., those which have their glass-plane at or near the mid-thickness of the wall, and those which, as the Professor says, have it “much nearer to the outer surface than to the inner.”

This distinction was, as I have shown, of early date; being in its earlier ages rather distinctive of “Saxon” from Norman windows. The class, however, in which the glass was nearer the outer than the inner side had, up to about the year 1200, its inner arch concentric with its outer one; but the invention of the rere-arch and its accompaniments obviated this, and established a hard and obvious distinction between these two great classes of windows.

The custom of sometimes placing the glass at the mid-thickness of the wall was in no degree given up, but, on the contrary, was continued through all styles; but, when adopted, the older system of making the inner concentric with the outer arch was nearly always continued, marking more distinctly the great difference between the two classes of window. The choice between them became a mere matter of taste and of outlay; all styles acknowledging both as equally admissible and correct.

The two systems may be distinguished as _rere-arch_ windows and _through-arch_ windows--_i.e._, those in which the inner is distinct from the outer arch, and those in which the same arch runs _through_ the wall, showing itself more or less similarly on its outer and inner faces.

In thick walls and rich work there is often another order of through-arch within the tracery order, or rather the outer order re-appears within. The rere-arch is occasionally cusped, as in a window at Broughton, Oxfordshire (Fig. 165), and the intervening space is sometimes groined, as in some windows at Salisbury and Christchurch (Fig. 166), or richly panelled, as in some at Westminster. In some instances the place of the rere-arch is occupied by distinct tracery, like a second window in advance of the real one. This consists in most instances of perfect bar tracery, while the window itself is of plate tracery; as may be seen in some of the windows at Stone Church, Kent (Fig. 167), and as once existed on a much larger scale in the chapter-house at Tintern. I may here mention that the tracery of a window is always viewed as an _arch-order_; and, though the corresponding order in the jamb is in the solid with the jamb up to the springing, the tracery, like other arch-orders, is severed by a continuous joint from the order above it.

The most normal type of the through-arch window is that in which the glass is placed in the middle of the thickness of the wall, and the interior of the window is a mere repetition of its exterior. This is not, however, by any means necessary or constant; for the glass is often either less or more recessed, and the inner mouldings, etc., are not always similar to the external ones, so that the existence or non-existence of a separate internal arch is the more clear distinction. Some, however, of an intermediate character, are to be found in which an inner arch, separate in design, is nevertheless concentric with the outer arch. In others the separate existence of the inner arch arises from the existence of a triforium passage, which in clerestory windows leads to some changes of design from the normal type. In others the rere-arch is not only concentric, but is so close upon the outer arch as to be almost one with it. The two classes are, however, for the most part easily distinguished.

One of the earliest instances which I recollect of the rere-arch is in the eastern part of Tynemouth Priory.[63] This is in the transitional style, and the strongly-marked separation of the inner from the outer arch is largely owing to the vast thickness of the walls. The glass plane is perhaps four times as far from the inside as from the outside.

A fine series of specimens is in the chancel of Brecon Priory (Fig. 168), where the separation between the outer and inner arch, and the depth of the glass from the inner face are also very great. Most of the early English windows found in churches of an ordinary type are of this class. Among Early English buildings in which the windows are mostly of the “rere-arch” variety, may be mentioned Salisbury Cathedral, Whitby Abbey, the Temple Church (eastern part), the Chapel of the Nine Altars at Durham,[64] Trumpington’s work at St. Alban’s, the choir of Brecon Priory, the eastern Chapels at Winchester (Fig. 169), the chapter-house at Oxford, the choir of Fountains Abbey, etc. Among those of the same style in which the “through-arch” window prevails, may be mentioned the transepts at York, the choir aisles at Carlisle, Rievaulx Abbey, the chapter-house at Furness Abbey (Fig. 170), much of the work at Lincoln, Kirkham Abbey, etc.

Among buildings transitional between Early English and Decorated, or very early Decorated, may be named as having mainly rere-arch windows, Westminster Abbey (excepting the chapter-house), Tintern Abbey, the eastern parts

of St. Alban’s Abbey, the beautiful Templars’ Church at Temple Balsal, the Chapel of the Palace of the Bishops of Ely in Holborn (Figs. 171, 172), the choir of Dorchester Abbey, the Bishops’ Hall at Wells, the choir of Merton Chapel at Oxford, etc.

Among those of a like period in which the through-arch window prevails, may be named the chapter-houses at Westminster and Salisbury (Fig. 173), the later parts of Lincoln, the choir aisles at Selby and Guisborough, the choir of St. Mary’s Abbey at York, most of the Decorated work at York Minster, Exeter, etc. In later Decorated work the same freedom of choice prevails, as it does also in “Perpendicular” buildings, though, as we come down to later dates, the “through-arch” becomes, on the whole, more prevalent.

Taking all styles together, the rere-arch, or in earlier works the wider internal splay, is greatly more frequent, probably because less costly than the other form; and though, when the “through-arch” is used, the glass is usually set deeper from the external face than when there is a rere-arch, and is frequently near the centre of the wall, such is often not the case, as in the eastern windows at Kirkham, where the internal depth is much the greater, and, in a few instances, where it is less, than the external. On the whole, it may be said that the rere-arch system tells most internally, while the other offers greater freedom for external depth of jamb and arch mouldings. Both are equally at the choice and command of the architect, who can use both, if he pleases, in the same building, and to condemn either would be like blotting out an essential element of architecture.

LECTURE VIII.

On the Practical Study of Gothic Architecture.

Evident ignorance or neglect of those who practise Gothic
architecture--Faithfulness of others--The styles should be learned
from ancient buildings--Our knowledge to be continually revived and
added to--Hints to students--The study of Lincoln Cathedral,
Canterbury Cathedral, and examples in London--Libraries and museums
in London--Foreign travel--Examples in Paris, and other parts of
France--Germany, Italy, Spain, etc. etc.

As it is six years since I last delivered a lecture in this place, and nine years since the first of the short series which I gave, it is in the highest degree improbable that any one of the students whom I have the pleasure of addressing was present on any of those occasions. Had that series been a complete one, I might possibly have done better by, in some degree, repeating it; but as it was not so, and as there is an inconsistency in offering supplementary lectures to a new audience, I have adopted the expedient of printing my former lectures, and distributing them to the architectural students, and of re-exhibiting the illustrations which accompanied them; so that, knowing that those who have thought it worth while may have read what I have already said, I am free to proceed as if my audience were unchanged.

I will here mention that I only come before you at all owing to my friend Mr. Smirke (who for five years has so ably and indefatigably fulfilled the duties of Professor of Architecture), having felt it necessary, for this year at least, to retire from those duties, and to my having been asked to do something--be it ever so little--to prevent the class of architecture from falling into abeyance for the year. I have, therefore, undertaken two lectures, as a mere apology during the interregnum for the more onerous duties of a professor, and I must beg to be excused if the manner in which I perform this temporary duty is of the same dubious kind with the duty itself.

In my former lectures I endeavoured, first, to state the claims of Gothic architecture upon our special study and attention; I next, in a series of four lectures, traced out with some minuteness the history of its development from the earlier and ruder forms of Romanesque--through the various processes of refinement which brought that style to its highest state of perfection--and, through the great process of transition by which it became gradually and systematically changed into the Pointed style: not, as I showed, from a mere change of taste or fashion, but from strictly logical and practical causes, accompanied by an ardent unresting determination to raise the art to the highest perfection which the circumstances of the age would permit; and I then showed how the Pointed style--when once generated--developed itself into the perfected and glorious architecture of the middle of the thirteenth century.

I did not follow out the history of Gothic architecture in its succeeding stages, as my object was rather _moral_ than merely _historical_, and I desired rather to exhibit the glorious earnestness of a people, who, while developing a new civilisation, pressed ardently forward, side by side with it, the generation of a new style of architecture, than to give a history of the successive changes through which that architecture passed. When, therefore, I had traced out the style to its culminating point, I quitted mere history, and closed with two lectures on the _rationale_ of the style, showing how every form which characterised it in its best days was dictated, not by fashion or caprice, but by _reason_.

Being now, after a lengthened interval, called upon to add two lectures to my series, I take for my subjects the practical study of Gothic architecture, and its actual practice and adaptation to the requirements of our own day.

Commencing, then, with the _study_ of the style, nothing seems at first sight so obvious as how to gain knowledge of such a subject; indeed, you may feel puzzled to think what there is to say on so simple a matter. “Surely,” you might say, “if a person wants to obtain a knowledge of a subject so thoroughly investigated, so popular, and brought so prominently before the public as for many years past has been the case with Gothic architecture, there is no difficulty in the world about it, nor is it worth while to waste an hour in listening to a lecture on so patent a question.” How is it, then, we may ask in return, that such a multitude of architects erect Gothic buildings, one glance at which is sufficient to show that they are ignorant of the style in which they are pretending to work?--that we see at every turn attempts at advanced development of the style which betray an utter innocence of all acquaintance with its A B C?--and that worst of all, we find the precious remnants of Mediæval art _restored_--Oh, shame on the misnomer!--by men who have never given thought enough to the subject to enable them to appreciate, even in the faintest degree, the value of the treasures committed in such false confidence to their keeping, or to form the most distant idea of their own ignorance? Surely, this is enough to prove that the study of Gothic architecture is not understood, or is grievously neglected by those who assume a knowledge of and presume to practise it.

And the converse is equally true: that the success, more or less perfect, of many others proves that the true road is known, and by a certain number is faithfully followed. My object in what I have to say is more, perhaps, to urge upon each of you to be of that number than to make any but what will appear most trite and self-evident suggestions as to what the true road is in which I ask you to walk.

In the first place, it is self-evident that Gothic architecture is only to be learned from the _old examples_. I notice, absurd as it may seem, that many young architects appear to think that it may be learned from books and by looking at modern buildings, and really pay little attention to the original sources of all our information. True, it is the part of every student to make use of _all_ the resources within his reach, and it would be absurd to undervalue the aid of books; it is also wise to look at the works of such modern architects as are worthy of confidence; but there is no source from which the style can be _really learned_ but the _ancient examples_, and to these it is impossible to devote too great an amount of study.

I would next observe that this study of old examples must be _continuous_. It is not a course of study to be followed up for a certain time and then brought to a close, but must be continued indefinitely throughout your whole course, so as to be ever _reviving_ and ever _adding to_ your knowledge. In the study of Classic architecture, though it is from the original examples that knowledge and inspiration are drawn, these examples are so far removed from us, in this country at least, that it is as a rule only possible to study from them once or twice during a whole life. The case is, happily, very different with the examples of Mediæval art: we are surrounded by them wherever we go;--they are the early monuments of our own country, the works of our forefathers, and our study of them is not the work of one strong effort at a single period of our lives, but a constantly renewing study, a fountain to which we may return again and again whenever we feel to need its refreshing influences. This, though an inestimable advantage, _may_ prove a temptation to negligence, as we are apt to let go opportunities which are ever at hand, so that we must not trust to these desultory sippings for our main supply, but must _drink deep and long_ when we have the opportunity; and more especially I would urge upon _you_ to do so _now_--in the days of your youth, while yet unencumbered by the cares of business, while your feelings are fresh and your thoughts unshackled. _This_ is the time for laying in the great stores of knowledge which must be the main supply of your future lives, and _without_ which the scant and hasty draughts obtained on chance opportunities will be of no avail, but _after_ which they will be the means of constantly refreshing and adding ever new life to the knowledge already possessed. We may say of this as of other branches of study,

“A little learning is a dangerous thing.
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.”

The conditions under which the study has to be pursued seem in some degree to preclude its being followed in a strictly _systematic_ manner. We are obliged to study buildings, of whatever date, as they may come in our way; and every building we visit is likely to be of many periods and to have undergone alterations more or less radical; so that we are almost forbidden to systematise our studies on any principle, chronological or otherwise. We must, in fact, take our examples pretty much as we happen to find them; and the best method when we set out on a sketching tour is, probably, to devote our attention to a particular district, and to follow it up, town by town and village by village, as convenience or previous information may suggest, visiting and thoroughly studying _all_ objects worthy of it which come in our way.

Nothing can be more delightful than these excursions. If you know beforehand what you are likely to meet with, the very anticipation of what each day will bring before you will add zest to your appetite for architectural enjoyment; while if you do not know what objects of interest may lie in your course, the very speculation will give relish to the search.

Here, perhaps, you come to the site of some famous monastery, less happy in its days of ruin and desertion than some which have become the favourite haunts of the artist. It has, perhaps, been for ages the stone-quarry of the district, and now only some one gable-end with its lofty lancets shows the noble scale of the ancient church. Here, it may be, nothing stands aboveground but the bases of the pillars; farther on the wall rises to the height of the window-jambs, and shows the arcading of the walls; and there the aisle wall retains the doorways leading through into the cloister--now a farm-yard--on the eastern side of which you find the three beautiful arches, the central one of which formed the approach to the chapter-house, and round this cloister you still trace the plan of the refectory and other monastic buildings. But, scanty and now humble as are the ruins, you find the details to be of the highest order of artistic refinement. The bases of the lost columns are profiled with the most studied delicacy, the few remaining doorways are perfect models of rich though unostentatious detail, the archways, perhaps, of the chapter-house entrances are of the most elegant and studied beauty. On tracing out and measuring the plan, you find its arrangement and proportions to be of the most perfect kind; and, though so little comparatively stands _in situ_, the ground is strewn here and there with masses from the superstructure, from which you may trace out the design of much which has fallen down, while the fences and agricultural buildings around are perfect storehouses of mouldings, capitals, and fragments of tracery or of groining, from which you can study the detail almost as profitably as from a perfect building.