A Text-Book of the History of Architecture Part 13

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 99.--PLAN OF MINSTER AT WORMS.]

+RHENISH CHURCHES.+ It was in the Rhine provinces that vaulting was first applied to the naves of German churches, nearly a half century after its general adoption in France. Cologne possesses an interesting trio of churches in which the Byzantine dome on squinches or on pendentives, with three apses or niches opening into the central area, was a.s.sociated with a long three aisled nave (+St. Mary-in-the-Capitol+, begun in 9th century; +Great St. Martin's+, 1150-70; +Apostles' Church+, 1160-99: the naves vaulted later). The double chapel at +Schwarz-Rheindorf+, near Bonn (1151), also has the crossing covered by a dome on pendentives.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 100.--ONE BAY OF CATHEDRAL AT SPIRES.]

The vaulting of the nave itself was developed in another series of edifices of imposing size, the cathedrals of +Mayence+ (1036), +Spires+ (Speyer), and +Worms+, and the +Abbey of Laach+, all built in the 11th century and vaulted early in the 12th. In the first three the main vaulting is in square bays, each covering two bays of the nave, the piers of which are alternately lighter and heavier (Figs. 99, 100). At Laach the vaulting-bays are oblong, both in nave and aisles. There was no triforium gallery, and stability was secured only by excessive thickness in the piers and clearstory walls, and by bringing down the main vault as near to the side-aisle roofs as possible.

+RHENISH EXTERIORS.+ These great churches, together with those of +Bonn+ and +Limburg-on-the-Lahn+ and the cathedral of +Treves+ (Trier, 1047), are interesting, not only by their size and dignity of plan and the somewhat rude ma.s.siveness of their construction, but even more so by the picturesqueness of their external design (Fig. 101). Especially successful is the ma.s.sing of the large and small turrets with the lofty nave-roof and with the apses at one or both ends. The systematic use of arcading to decorate the exterior walls, and the introduction of open arcaded dwarf galleries under the cornices of the apses, gables, and dome-turrets, gave to these Rhenish churches an external beauty hardly equalled in other contemporary edifices. This method of exterior design, and the system of vaulting in square bays over double bays of the nave, were probably derived from the Lombard churches of Northern Italy, with which the Hohenstauffen emperors had many political relations.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 101.--EAST END OF CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES, COLOGNE.]

The Italian influence is also encountered in a number of circular churches of early date, as at Fulda (9th-11th century), Drugelte, Bonn (baptistery, demolished), and in facades like that at Rosheim, which is a copy in little of San Zeno at Verona.

Elsewhere in Germany architecture was in a backward state, especially in the southern provinces. Outside of Saxony, Franconia, and the Rhine provinces, very few works of importance were erected until the thirteenth century.

+SECULAR ARCHITECTURE.+ Little remains to us of the secular architecture of this period in Germany, if we except the great feudal castles, especially those of the Rhine, which were, after all, rather works of military engineering than of architectural art. The palace of Charlemagne at Aix (the chapel of which was mentioned on p. 172) is known to have been a vast and splendid group of buildings, partly, at least of marble; but hardly a vestige of it remains. Of the extensive +Palace of Henry III.+ at +Goslar+ there remain well-defined ruins of an imposing hall of a.s.sembly in two aisles with triple-arched windows. At Brunswick the east wing of the +Burg Dankwargerode+ displays, in spite of modern alterations, the arrangement of the chapel, great hall, two fortified towers, and part of the residence of Henry the Lion. The +Wartburg+ palace (Ludwig III., _cir._ 1150) is more generally known--a rectangular hall in three stories, with windows effectively grouped to form arcades; while at Gelnhausen and Munzenberg are ruins of somewhat similar buildings. A few of the Romanesque monasteries of Germany have left partial remains, as at +Maulbronn+, which was almost entirely rebuilt in the Gothic period, and isolated buildings in Cologne and elsewhere. There remain also in Cologne a number of Romanesque private houses with coupled windows and stepped gables.

+GREAT BRITAIN.+ Previous to the Norman conquest (1066) there was in the British Isles little or no architecture worthy of mention. The few extant remains of Saxon and Celtic buildings reveal a singular poverty of ideas and want of technical skill. These scanty remains are mostly of towers (those in Ireland nearly all round and tapering, with conical tops, their use and date being the subjects of much controversy) and crypts. The tower of Earl's Barton is the most important and best preserved of those in England. With the Norman conquest, however, began an extraordinary activity in the building of churches and abbeys.

William the Conqueror himself founded a number of these, and his Norman ecclesiastics endeavored to surpa.s.s on British soil the contemporary churches of Normandy. The new churches differed somewhat from their French prototypes; they were narrower and lower, but much longer, especially as to the choir and transepts. The cathedrals of +Durham+ (1096-1133) and +Norwich+ (same date) are important examples (Fig. 102).

They also differed from the French churches in two important particulars externally; a huge tower rose usually over the crossing, and the western portals were small and insignificant. Lateral entrances near the west end were given greater importance and called _Galilees_. At Durham a Galilee chapel (not shown in the plan), takes the place of a porch at the west end, like the ante-churches of St. Benoit-sur-Loire and Vezelay.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 102.--PLAN OF DURHAM CATHEDRAL.]

+THE NORMAN STYLE.+ The Anglo-Norman builders employed the same general features as the Romanesque builders of Normandy, but with more of picturesqueness and less of refinement and technical elegance. Heavy walls, recessed arches, round mouldings, cubic cushion-caps, cl.u.s.tered piers, and in doorways a jamb-shaft for each stepping of the arch were common to both styles. But in England the Corinthian form of capital is rare, its place being taken by simpler forms.

+NORMAN INTERIORS.+ The interior design of the larger churches of this period shows a close general a.n.a.logy to contemporaneous French Norman churches, as appears by comparing the nave of Waltham or Peterboro' with that of Cerisy-la-Foret, in Normandy. Although the ma.s.siveness of the Anglo-Norman piers and walls plainly suggests the intention of vaulting the nave, this intention seems never to have been carried out except in small churches and crypts. All the existing abbeys and cathedrals of this period had wooden ceilings or were, like Durham, Norwich, and Gloucester, vaulted at a later date. Completed as they were with wooden nave-roofs, the clearstory was, without danger, made quite lofty and furnished with windows of considerable size. These were placed near the outside of the thick wall, and a pa.s.sage was left between them and a triple arch on the inner face of the wall--a device imitated from the abbeys at Caen. The vaulted side-aisles were low, with disproportionately wide pier-arches, above which was a high triforium gallery under the side-roofs. Thus a nearly equal height was a.s.signed to each of the three stories of the bay, disregarding that subordination of minor to major parts which gives interest to an architectural composition. The piers were quite often round, as at Gloucester, Hereford, and Bristol. Sometimes round piers alternated with cl.u.s.tered piers, as at Durham and Waltham; and in some cases cl.u.s.tered piers alone were employed, as at Peterboro' and in the transepts of Winchester (Fig.

103).

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 103.--ONE BAY OF TRANSEPT, WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL.]

+FAcADES AND DOORWAYS.+ All the details were of the simplest character, except in the doorways. These were richly adorned with cl.u.s.tered jamb-shafts and elaborately carved mouldings, but there was little variety in the details of this carving. The zigzag was the most common feature, though birds' heads with the beaks pointing toward the centre of the arch were not uncommon. In the smaller churches (Fig. 104) the doorways were better proportioned to the whole facade than in the larger ones, in which they appear as relatively insignificant features. Very few examples remain of important Norman facades in their original form, nearly all of these having been altered after the round arch was displaced by the pointed arch in the latter part of the twelfth century.

Iffley church (Fig. 104) is a good example of the style.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 104.--FRONT OF IFFLEY CHURCH.]

+SPAIN.+ During the Romanesque period a large part of Spain was under Moorish dominion. The capture of Toledo, in 1062, by the Christians, began the gradual emanc.i.p.ation of the country from Moslem rule, and in the northern provinces a number of important churches were erected under the influence of French Romanesque models. The use of domical pendentives (as in the +Panteon+ of +S. Isidoro+, at Leon, and in the _cimborio_ or dome over the choir at the intersection of nave and transepts in old Salamanca cathedral) was probably derived from the domical churches of Aquitania and Anjou. Elsewhere the northern Romanesque type prevailed under various modifications, with long nave and transepts, a short choir, and a complete _chevet_ with apsidal chapels. The church of +St. Iago+ at Compostella (1078) is the finest example of this cla.s.s. These churches nearly all had groined vaulting over the side-aisles and barrel-vaults over the nave, the constructive system being substantially that of the churches of Auvergne and the Loire Valley (p. 165). They differed, however, in the treatment of the crossing of nave and transepts, over which was usually erected a dome or cupola or pendentives or squinches, covered externally by an imposing square lantern or tower, as in the +Old Cathedral+ at +Salamanca+, already mentioned (1120-78) and the +Collegiate Church+ at +Toro+.

Occasional exceptions to these types are met with, as in the basilican wooden-roofed church of S. Millan at Segovia; in +S. Isidoro+ at Leon, with chapels and a later-added square eastern end, and the circular church of the Templars at Segovia.

The architectural details of these Spanish churches did not differ radically from contemporary French work. As in France and England, the doorways were the most ornate parts of the design, the mouldings being carved with extreme richness and the jambs frequently adorned with statues, as in +S. Vincente+ at Avila. There was no such logical and reasoned-out system of external design as in France, and there is consequently greater variety in the facades. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the architecture of this period is its apparent exemption from the influence of the Moorish monuments which abounded on every hand. This may be explained by the hatred which was felt by the Christians for the Moslems and all their works.

+MONUMENTS.+ GERMANY: Previous to 11th century: Circular churches of Holy Cross at Munster, and of Fulda; palace chapel of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle, 804; St. Stephen, Mayence, 990; primitive nave and crypt of St. Gereon, Cologne, 10th century; Lorsch.--11th century: Churches of Gernrode, Goslar, and Merseburg in Saxony; cathedral of Bremen; first restoration of cathedral of Treves (Trier), 1010, west front, 1047; Limburg-on-Hardt, 1024; St. Willibrod, Echternach, 1031; east end of Mayence Cathedral, 1036; Church of Apostles and nave St. Mary-in-Capitol at Cologne, 1036; cathedral of Spires (Speyer) begun 1040; Cathedral Hildesheim, 1061; St. Joseph, Bamberg, 1073; Abbey of Laach, 1093-1156; round churches of Bonn, Drugelte, Nimeguen; cathedrals of Paderborn and Minden.--12th century: Churches of Klus, Paulinzelle, Hamersleben, 1100-1110; Johannisberg, 1130; St.

G.o.dehard. Hildesheim, 1133; Worms, the Minster, 1118-83; Jerichau, 1144-60; Schwarz-Rheindorf, 1151; St. Michael, Hildesheim, 1162; Cathedral Brunswick, 1172-94; Lubeck, 1172; also churches of Gaudersheim, Wurzburg, St. Matthew at Treves, Limburg-on-Lahn, Sinzig, St. Castor at Coblentz, Diesdorf, Rosheim; round churches of Ottmarsheim and Rippen (Denmark); cathedral of Basle, cathedral and cloister of Zurich (Switzerland).

ENGLAND: Previous to 11th century: Scanty vestiges of Saxon church architecture, as tower of Earl's Barton, round towers and small chapels in Ireland.--11th century: Crypt of Canterbury Cathedral, 1070; chapel St. John in Tower of London, 1070; Winchester Cathedral, 1076-93 (nave and choir rebuilt later); Gloucester Cathedral nave, 1089-1100 (vaulted later); Rochester Cathedral nave, west front cloisters, and chapter-house, 1090-1130; Carlisle Cathedral nave, transepts, 1093-1130; Durham Cathedral, 1095-1133, vaulted 1233; Galilee and chapter-house, 1133-53; Norwich Cathedral, 1096, largely rebuilt 1118-93; Hereford Cathedral, nave and choir, 1099-1115.--12th century: Ely Cathedral, nave, 1107-33; St. Alban's Abbey, 1116; Peterboro' Cathedral, 1117-45; Waltham Abbey, early 12th century; Church of Holy Sepulchre, Cambridge, 1130-35; Worcester Cathedral chapter-house, 1140 (?); Oxford Cathedral (Christ Church), 1150-80; Bristol Cathedral chapter-house (square), 1155; Canterbury Cathedral, choir of present structure by William of Sens, 1175; Chichester Cathedral, 1180-1204; Romsey Abbey, late 12th century; St. Cross Hospital near Winchester, 1190 (?). Many more or less important parish churches in various parts of England.

SPAIN. For princ.i.p.al monuments of 9th-12th centuries, see text, latter part of this chapter.

CHAPTER XV.

GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

BOOKS RECOMMENDED: Adamy, _Architektonik des gotischen Stils_.

Corroyer, _L'Architecture gothique_. Enlart, _Manuel d'archeologie francaise_. Hasak, _Einzelheiten des Kirchenbaues_ (in _Hdbuch d.

Arch._). Moore, _Development and Character of Gothic Architecture_. Parker, _Introduction to Gothic Architecture._ Scott, _Mediaeval Architecture_. Viollet-le-Duc, _Discourses on Architecture_; _Dictionnaire raisonne de l'architecture francaise_.

+INTRODUCTORY.+ The architectural styles which were developed in Western Europe during the period extending from about 1150 to 1450 or 1500, received in an unscientific age the wholly erroneous and inept name of Gothic. This name has, however, become so fixed in common usage that it is hardly possible to subst.i.tute for it any more scientific designation.

In reality the architecture to which it is applied was nothing more than the sequel and outgrowth of the Romanesque, which we have already studied. Its fundamental principles were the same; it was concerned with the same problems. These it took up where the Romanesque builders left them, and worked out their solution under new conditions, until it had developed out of the simple and ma.s.sive models of the early twelfth century the splendid cathedrals of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in England, France, Germany, the Low Countries and Spain.

+THE CHURCH AND ARCHITECTURE.+ The twelfth century was an era of transition in society, as in architecture. The ideas of Church and State were becoming more clearly defined in the common mind. In the conflict between feudalism and royalty the monarchy was steadily gaining ground.

The problem of human right was beginning to present itself alongside of the problem of human might. The relations between the crown, the feudal barons, the pope, bishops, and abbots, differed widely in France, Germany, England, and other countries. The struggle among them for supremacy presented itself, therefore, in varied aspects; but the general outcome was essentially the same. The church began to appear as something behind and above abbots, bishops, kings, and barons. The supremacy of the papal authority gained increasing recognition, and the episcopacy began to overshadow the monastic inst.i.tutions; the bishops appearing generally, but especially in France, as the champions of popular rights. The prerogatives of the crown became more firmly established, and thus the Church and the State emerged from the social confusion as the two inst.i.tutions divinely appointed for the government of men.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 105.--CONSTRUCTIVE SYSTEM OF GOTHIC CHURCH, ILl.u.s.tRATING PRINCIPLES OF ISOLATED SUPPORTS AND b.u.t.tRESSING.]

Under these influences ecclesiastical architecture advanced with rapid strides. No longer hampered by monastic restrictions, it called into its service the laity, whose guilds of masons and builders carried from one diocese to another their constantly increasing stores of constructive knowledge. By a wise division of labor, each man wrought only such parts as he was specially trained to undertake. The master-builder--bishop, abbot, or mason--seems to have planned only the general arrangement and scheme of the building, leaving the precise form of each detail to be determined as the work advanced, according to the skill and fancy of the artisan to whom it was intrusted. Thus was produced that remarkable variety in unity of the Gothic cathedrals; thus, also, those singular irregularities and makeshifts, those discrepancies and alterations in the design, which are found in every great work of mediaeval architecture. Gothic architecture was constantly changing, attacking new problems or devising new solutions of old ones. In this character of constant flux and development it contrasts strongly with the cla.s.sic styles, in which the scheme and the principles were easily fixed and remained substantially unchanged for centuries.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 106.--PLAN OF SAINTE CHAPELLE, PARIS, SHOWING SUPPRESSION OF SIDE-WALLS.]

+STRUCTURAL PRINCIPLES.+ The pointed arch, so commonly regarded as the most characteristic feature of the Gothic styles, was merely an incidental feature of their development. What really distinguished them most strikingly was the systematic application of two principles which the Roman and Byzantine builders had recognized and applied, but which seem to have been afterward forgotten until they were revived by the later Romanesque architects. The first of these was the _concentration of strains_ upon isolated points of support, made possible by the subst.i.tution of groined for barrel vaults. This led to a corresponding concentration of the ma.s.ses of masonry at these points; the building was constructed as if upon legs (Fig. 105). The wall became a mere filling-in between the piers or b.u.t.tresses, and in time was, indeed, practically suppressed, immense windows filled with stained gla.s.s taking its place. This is well ill.u.s.trated in the +Sainte Chapelle+ at Paris, built 1242-47 (Figs. 106, 122). In this remarkable edifice, a series of groined vaults spring from slender shafts built against deep b.u.t.tresses which receive and resist all the thrusts. The wall-s.p.a.ces between them are wholly occupied by superb windows filled with stone tracery and stained gla.s.s. It would be impossible to combine the materials used more scientifically or effectively. The cathedrals of Gerona (Spain) and of Alby (France; Fig. 123) ill.u.s.trate the same principle, though in them the b.u.t.tresses are internal and serve to separate the flanking chapels.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 107.--EARLY GOTHIC FLYING b.u.t.tRESS.]

The second distinctive principle of Gothic architecture was that of _balanced thrusts_. In Roman buildings the thrust of the vaulting was resisted wholly by the inertia of ma.s.s in the abutments. In Gothic architecture thrusts were as far as possible resisted by counter-thrusts, and the final resultant pressure was transmitted by flying half-arches across the intervening portions of the structure to external b.u.t.tresses placed at convenient points. This combination of flying half-arches and b.u.t.tresses is called the _flying-b.u.t.tress_ (Fig.

107). It reached its highest development in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in the cathedrals of central and northern France.

+RIBBED VAULTING.+ These two principles formed the structural basis of the Gothic styles. Their application led to the introduction of two other elements, second only to them in importance, _ribbed vaulting_ and the _pointed arch_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 108.--RIBBED VAULT, ENGLISH TYPE, WITH DIVIDED GROIN-RIBS AND RIDGE-RIBS.]

The first of these resulted from the effort to overcome certain practical difficulties encountered in the building of large groined vaults. As ordinarily constructed, a groined vault like that in Fig. 47, must be built as one structure, upon wooden centrings supporting its whole extent. The Romanesque architects conceived the idea of constructing an independent skeleton of ribs. Two of these were built against the wall (_wall-ribs_), two across the nave (transverse ribs); and two others were made to coincide with the groins (Figs. 98, 108).

The _groin-ribs_, intersecting at the centre of the vault, divided each bay into four triangular portions, or _compartments_, each of which was really an independent vault which could be separately constructed upon light centrings supported by the groin-ribs themselves. This principle, though identical in essence with the Roman system of brick skeleton-ribs for concrete vaults, was, in application and detail, superior to it, both from the scientific and artistic point of view. The ribs, richly moulded, became, in the hands of the Gothic architects, important decorative features. In practice the builder gave to each set of ribs independently the curvature he desired. The vaulting-surfaces were then easily twisted or warped so as to fit the various ribs, which, being already in place, served as guides for their construction.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 109.--PENETRATIONS AND INTERSECTIONS OF VAULTS.