A Text-Book of the History of Architecture Part 20

By many writers the name Renaissance is confined to the first period.

This is correct from the etymological point of view; but it is impossible to dissociate the first period historically from those which followed it, down to the final exhaustion of the artistic movement to which it gave birth, in the heavy extravagances of the Rococo.

Another division is made by the Italians, who give the name of the _Quattrocento_ to the period which closed with the end of the fifteenth century, _Cinquecento_ to the sixteenth century, and _Seicento_ to the seventeenth century or Rococo. It has, however, become common to confine the use of the term Cinquecento to the first half of the sixteenth century.

+CONSTRUCTION AND DETAIL.+ The architects of the Renaissance occupied themselves more with form than with construction, and rarely set themselves constructive problems of great difficulty. Although the new architecture began with the colossal dome of the cathedral of Florence, and culminated in the stupendous church of St. Peter at Rome, it was pre-eminently an architecture of palaces and villas, of facades and of decorative display. Constructive difficulties were reduced to their lowest terms, and the constructive framework was concealed, not emphasized, by the decorative apparel of the design. Among the masterpieces of the early Renaissance are many buildings of small dimensions, such as gates, chapels, tombs and fountains. In these the individual fancy had full sway, and produced surprising results by the beauty of enriched mouldings, of carved friezes with infant genii, wreaths of fruit, griffins, masks and scrolls; by pilasters covered with arabesques as delicate in modelling as if wrought in silver; by inlays of marble, panels of glazed terra-cotta, marvellously carved doors, fine stucco-work in relief, capitals and cornices of wonderful richness and variety. The Roman orders appeared only in free imitations, with panelled and carved pilasters for the most part instead of columns, and capitals of fanciful design, recalling remotely the Corinthian by their volutes and leaves (Fig. 158). Instead of the low-pitched cla.s.sic pediments, there appears frequently an arched cornice enclosing a sculptured lunette. Doors and windows were enclosed in richly carved frames, sometimes arched and sometimes square. Facades were flat and unbroken, depending mainly for effect upon the distribution and adornment of the openings, and the design of doorways, courtyards and cornices. Internally vaults and flat ceilings of wood and plaster were about equally common, the barrel vault and dome occurring far more frequently than the groined vault. Many of the ceilings of this period are of remarkable richness and beauty.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 158.--EARLY RENAISSANCE CAPITAL, PAL. ZORZI, VENICE.]

+THE EARLY RENAISSANCE IN FLORENCE: THE DUOMO.+ In the year 1417 a public compet.i.tion was held for completing the cathedral of Florence by a dome over the immense octagon, 143 feet in diameter. _Filippo Brunelleschi_, sculptor and architect (1377-1446), who with Donatello had journeyed to Rome to study there the masterworks of ancient art, after demonstrating the inadequacy of all the solutions proposed by the compet.i.tors, was finally permitted to undertake the gigantic task according to his own plans. These provided for an octagonal dome in two sh.e.l.ls, connected by eight major and sixteen minor ribs, and crowned by a lantern at the top (Fig. 159). This wholly original conception, by which for the first time (outside of Moslem art) the dome was made an external feature fitly terminating in the light forms and upward movement of a lantern, was carried out between the years 1420 and 1464.

Though in no wise an imitation of Roman forms, it was cla.s.sic in its spirit, in its vastness and its simplicity of line, and was made possible solely by Brunelleschi's studies of Roman design and construction (Fig. 160).

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 159.--SECTION OF DOME OF DUOMO, FLORENCE.]

+OTHER CHURCHES.+ From Brunelleschi's designs were also erected the +Pazzi Chapel+ in Sta. Croce, a charming design of a Greek cross covered with a dome at the intersection, and preceded by a vestibule with a richly decorated vault; and the two great churches of +S. Lorenzo+ (1425) and +S. Spirito+ (1433-1476, Fig. 161). Both reproduced in a measure the plan of the Pisa Cathedral, having a three-aisled nave and transepts, with a low dome over the crossing. The side aisles were covered with domical vaults and the central aisles with flat wooden or plaster ceilings. All the details of columns, arches and mouldings were imitated from Roman models, and yet the result was something entirely new. Consciously or unconsciously, Brunelleschi was reviving Byzantine rather than Roman conceptions in the planning and structural design of these domical churches, but the garb in which he clothed them was Roman, at least in detail. The +Old Sacristy+ of S. Lorenzo was another domical design of great beauty.

From this time on the new style was in general use for church designs.

_L. B. Alberti_ (1404-73), who had in Rome mastered cla.s.sic details more thoroughly than Brunelleschi, remodelled the church of +S. Francesco+ at +Rimini+ with Roman pilasters and arches, and with engaged orders in the facade, which, however, was never completed. His great work was the church of +S. Andrea+ at +Mantua+, a Latin cross in plan, with a dome at the intersection (the present high dome dating however, only from the 18th century) and a facade to which the conception of a Roman triumphal arch was skilfully adapted. His facade of incrusted marbles for the church of S. M. Novella at Florence was a less successful work, though its flaring consoles over the side aisles established an unfortunate precedent frequently imitated in later churches.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 160.--EXTERIOR OF DOME OF DUOMO, FLORENCE.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 161.--INTERIOR OF S. SPIRITO, FLORENCE.]

A great activity in church-building marked the period between 1475 and 1490. The plans of the churches erected about this time throughout north Italy display an interesting variety of arrangements, in nearly all of which the dome is combined with the three-aisled cruciform plan, either as a central feature at the crossing or as a domical vault over each bay. Bologna and Ferrara possess a number of churches of this kind.

Occasionally the basilican arrangement was followed, with columnar arcades separating the aisles. More often, however, the pier-arches were of the Roman type, with engaged columns or pilasters between them. The interiors, presumably intended to receive painted decorations, were in most cases somewhat bare of ornament, pleasing rather by happy proportions and effective vaulting or rich flat ceilings, panelled, painted and gilded, than by elaborate architectural detail. A similar scantiness of ornament is to be remarked in the exteriors, excepting the facades, which were sometimes highly ornate; the doorways, with columns, pediments, sculpture and carving, receiving especial attention. High external domes did not come into general use until the next period. In Milan, Pavia, and some other Lombard cities, the internal cupola over the crossing was, however, covered externally by a lofty structure in diminishing stages, like that of the Certosa at Pavia (Fig. 152), or that erected by Bramante for the church of S. M. delle Grazie at Milan.

At Prato, in the church of the +Madonna delle Carceri+ (1495-1516), by _Giuliano da S. Gallo_, the type of the Pazzi chapel reappears in a larger scale; the plan is cruciform, with equal or nearly equal arms covered by barrel vaults, at whose intersection rises a dome of moderate height on pendentives. This charming edifice, with its unfinished exterior of white marble, its simple and dignified lines, and internal embellishments in della-Robbia ware, is one of the masterpieces of the period.

In the designing of chapels and oratories the architects of the early Renaissance attained conspicuous success, these edifices presenting fewer structural limitations and being more purely decorative in character than the larger churches. Such facades as that of +S. Bernardino+ at Perugia and of the +Frati di S. Spirito+ at Bologna are among the most delightful products of the decorative fancy of the 15th century.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 162.--COURTYARD OF RICCARDI PALACE, FLORENCE.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 163.--FAcADE OF STROZZI PALACE, FLORENCE.]

+FLORENTINE PALACES.+ While the architects of this period failed to develop any new and thoroughly satisfactory ecclesiastical type, they attained conspicuous success in palace-architecture. The +Riccardi+ palace in Florence (1430) marks the first step of the Renaissance in this direction. It was built for the great Cosimo di Medici by _Michelozzi_ (1397-1473), a contemporary of Brunelleschi and Alberti, and a man of great talent. Its imposing rectangular facade, with widely s.p.a.ced mullioned windows in two stories over a ma.s.sive bas.e.m.e.nt, is crowned with a cla.s.sic cornice of unusual and perhaps excessive size. In spite of the bold and fortress-like character of the rusticated masonry of these facades, and the mediaeval look they seem to present to modern eyes, they marked a revolution in style and established a type frequently imitated in later years. The courtyard, in contrast with this stern exterior, appears light and cheerful (Fig. 162). Its wall is carried on round arches borne by columns with Corinthianesque capitals, and the arcade is enriched with sculptured medallions. +The Pitti Palace+, by Brunelleschi (1435), embodies the same ideas on a more colossal scale, but lacks the grace of an adequate cornice. A lighter and more ornate style appeared in 1460 in the +P. Rucellai+, by Alberti, in which for the first time cla.s.sical pilasters in superposed stages were applied to a street facade. To avoid the dilemma of either insufficiently crowning the edifice or making the cornice too heavy for the upper range of pilasters, Alberti made use of brackets, occupying the width of the upper frieze, and converting the whole upper entablature into a cornice. But this compromise was not quite successful, and it remained for later architects in Venice, Verona, and Rome to work out more satisfactory methods of applying the orders to many-storied palace facades. In the great +P. Strozzi+ (Fig. 163), erected in 1490 by _Benedetto da Majano_ and _Cronaca_, the architects reverted to the earlier type of the P. Riccardi, treating it with greater refinement and producing one of the n.o.blest palaces of Italy.

+COURTYARDS; ARCADES.+ These palaces were all built around interior courts, whose walls rested on columnar arcades, as in the P. Riccardi (Fig. 162). The origin of these arcades may be found in the arcaded cloisters of mediaeval monastic churches, which often suggest cla.s.sic models, as in those of St. Paul-beyond-the-Walls and St. John Lateran at Rome. Brunelleschi not only introduced columnar arcades into a number of cloisters and palace courts, but also used them effectively as exterior features in the +Loggia S. Paolo+ and the Foundling Hospital (+Ospedale degli Innocenti+) at Florence. The chief drawback in these light arcades was their inability to withstand the thrust of the vaulting over the s.p.a.ce behind them, and the consequent recourse to iron tie-rods where vaulting was used. The Italians, however, seemed to care little about this disfigurement.

+MINOR WORKS.+ The details of the new style were developed quite as rapidly in purely decorative works as in monumental buildings. Altars, mural monuments, tabernacles, pulpits and _ciboria_ afforded scope for the genius of the most distinguished artists. Among those who were specially celebrated in works of this kind should be named _Lucca della Robbia_ (1400-82) and his successors, _Mino da Fiesole_ (1431-84) and _Benedetto da Majano_ (1442-97). Possessed of a wonderful fertility of invention, they and their pupils multiplied their works in extraordinary number and variety, not only throughout north Italy, but also in Rome and Naples. Among the most famous examples of this branch of design may be mentioned a pulpit in Sta. Croce by B. da Majano; a terra-cotta fountain in the sacristy of S. M. Novella, by the della Robbias; the Marsupini tomb in Sta. Croce, by _Desiderio da Settignano_ (all in Florence); the della Rovere tomb in S. M. del Popolo, Rome, by Mino da Fiesole, and in the Cathedral at Lucca the Noceto tomb and the Tempietto, by _Matteo Civitali_. It was in works of this character that the Renaissance oftenest made its first appearance in a new centre, as was the case in Sienna, Pisa, Lucca, Naples, etc.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 164.--TOMB OF PIETRO DI NOCETO, LUCCA.]

+NORTH ITALY.+ Between 1450 and 1490 the Renaissance presented in Sienna, in a number of important palaces, a sharp contrast to the prevalent Gothic style of that city. The +P. Piccolomini+--a somewhat crude imitation of the P. Riccardi in Florence--dates from 1463; the +P. del Governo+ was built 1469, and the +Spannocchi Palace+ in 1470. In 1463 _Ant. Federighi_ built there the +Loggia del Papa+. About the same time _Bernardo di Lorenzo_ was building for Pope Pius II. (aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini) an entirely new city, +Pienza+, with a cathedral, archbishop's palace, town hall and Papal residence (the +P. Piccolomini+), which are interesting if not strikingly original works. Pisa possesses few early Renaissance structures, owing to the utter prostration of her fortunes in the 15th century, and the dominance of Pisan Gothic traditions. In Lucca, besides a wealth of minor monuments (largely the work of Matteo Civitali, 1435-1501) in various churches, a number of palaces date from this period, the most important being the +P. Pretorio+ and P. Bernardini. To Milan the Renaissance was carried by the Florentine masters _Michelozzi_ and _Filarete_, to whom are respectively due the +Portinari Chapel+ in S. Eustorgio (1462) and the earlier part of the great +Ospedale Maggiore+ (1457). In the latter, an edifice of brick with terra-cotta enrichments, the windows were Gothic in outline--an unusual mixture of styles, even in Italy. The munificence of the Sforzas, the hereditary tyrants of the province, embellished the semi-Gothic +Certosa+ of Pavia with a new marble facade, begun 1476 or 1491, which in its fanciful and exuberant decoration, and the small scale of its parts, belongs properly to the early Renaissance.

Exquisitely beautiful in detail, it resembles rather a magnified altar-piece than a work of architecture, properly speaking. Bologna and Ferrara developed somewhat late in the century a strong local school of architecture, remarkable especially for the beauty of its courtyards, its graceful street arcades, and its artistic treatment of brick and terra-cotta (+P. Bevilacqua+, +P. Fava+, at Bologna; +P. Scrofa+, +P. Roverella+, at Ferrara). About the same time palaces with interior arcades and details in the new style were erected in Verona, Vicenza, Mantua, and other cities.

+VENICE.+ In this city of merchant princes and a wealthy _bourgeoisie_, the architecture of the Renaissance took on a new aspect of splendor and display. It was late in appearing, the Gothic style with its tinge of Byzantine decorative traditions having here developed into a style well suited to the needs of a rich and relatively tranquil community. These traditions the architects of the new style appropriated in a measure, as in the marble incrustations of the exquisite little church of +S. M. dei Miracoli+ (1480-89), and the facade of the +Scuola di S. Marco+ (1485-1533), both by _Pietro Lombardo_. Nowhere else, unless on the contemporary facade of the Certosa at Pavia, were marble inlays and delicate carving, combined with a framework of thin pilasters, finely profiled entablatures and arched pediments, so lavishly bestowed upon the street fronts of churches and palaces. The family of the _Lombardi_ (Martino, his sons Moro and Pietro, and grandsons Antonio and Tullio), with _Ant. Bregno_ and _Bart. Buon_, were the leaders in the architectural Renaissance of this period, and to them Venice owes her choicest masterpieces in the new style. Its first appearance is noted in the later portions of the church of +S. Zaccaria+ (1456-1515), partly Gothic internally, with a facade whose semicircular pediment and small decorative arcades show a somewhat timid but interesting application of cla.s.sic details. In this church, and still more so in S. Giobbe (1451-93) and the Miracoli above mentioned, the decorative element predominates throughout. It is hard to imagine details more graceful in design, more effective in the swing of their movement, or more delicate in execution than the mouldings, reliefs, wreaths, scrolls, and capitals one encounters in these buildings. Yet in structural interest, in scale and breadth of planning, these early Renaissance Venetian buildings hold a relatively inferior rank.

+PALACES.+ The great +Court+ of the +Doge's Palace+, begun 1483 by _Ant.

Rizzio_, belongs only in part to the first period. It shows, however, the lack of constructive principle and of largeness of composition just mentioned, but its decorative effect and picturesque variety elicit almost universal admiration. Like the neighboring facade of St. Mark's, it violates nearly every principle of correct composition, and yet in a measure atones for this capital defect by its charm of detail. Far more satisfactory from the purely architectural point of view is the facade of the +P. Vendramini+ (Vendramin-Calergi), by Pietro Lombardo (1481).

The simple, stately lines of its composition, the dignity of its broad arched and mullioned windows, separated by engaged columns--the earliest example in Venice of this feature, and one of the earliest in Italy--its well-proportioned bas.e.m.e.nt and upper stories, crowned by an adequate but somewhat heavy entablature, make this one of the finest palaces in Italy (Fig. 165) It established a type of large-windowed, vigorously modelled facades which later architects developed, but hardly surpa.s.sed. In the smaller contemporary, P. Dario, another type appears, better suited for small buildings, depending for effect mainly upon well-ordered openings and incrusted panelling of colored marble.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 165.--VENDRAMINI PALACE, VENICE.]

+ROME.+ Internal disorders and the long exile of the popes had by the end of the fourteenth century reduced Rome to utter insignificance. Not until the second half of the fifteenth century did returning prosperity and wealth afford the Renaissance its opportunity in the Eternal City.

Pope Nicholas V. had, indeed, begun the rebuilding of St. Peter's from designs by B. Rossellini, in 1450, but the project lapsed shortly after with the death of the pope. The earliest Renaissance building in Rome was the +P. di Venezia+, begun in 1455, together with the adjoining porch of S. Marco. In this palace and the adjoining unfinished Palazzetto we find the influence of the old Roman monuments clearly manifested in the court arcades, built like those of the Colosseum, with superposed stages of ma.s.sive piers and engaged columns carrying entablatures. The proportions are awkward, the details coa.r.s.e; but the spirit of Roman cla.s.sicism is here seen in the germ. The exterior of this palace is, however, still Gothic in spirit. The architects are unknown; _Giuliano da Majano_ (1452-90), _Giacomo di Pietrasanta_, and _Meo del Caprino_ (1430-1501) are known to have worked upon it, but it is not certain in what capacity.

The new style, reaching, and in time overcoming, the conservatism of the Church, overthrew the old basilican traditions. In +S. Agostino+ (1479-83), by _Pietrasanta_, and +S. M. del Popolo+, by Pintelli (?), piers with pilasters or half-columns and ma.s.sive arches separate the aisles, and the crossing is crowned with a dome. To the same period belong the Sistine chapel and parts of the Vatican palace, but the interest of these lies rather in their later decorations than in their somewhat scanty architectural merit.

The architectural renewal of Rome, thus begun, reached its culmination in the following period.

+OTHER MONUMENTS.+ The complete enumeration of even the most important Early Renaissance monuments of Italy is impossible within our limits.

Two or three only can here be singled out as suggesting types. Among town halls of this period the first place belongs to the +P. del Consiglio+ at Verona, by _Fra Giocondo_ (1435-1515). In this beautiful edifice the facade consists of a light and graceful arcade supporting a wall pierced with four windows, and covered with elaborate frescoed arabesques (recently restored). Its unfortunate division by pilasters into four bays, with a pier in the centre, is a blemish avoided in the contemporary +P. del Consiglio+ at Padua. The +Ducal Palace+ at Urbino, by _Luciano da Laurano_ (1468), is noteworthy for its fine arcaded court, and was highly famed in its day. At Brescia +S. M. dei Miracoli+ is a remarkable example of a cruciform domical church dating from the close of this period, and is especially celebrated for the exuberant decoration of its porch and its elaborate detail. Few campaniles were built in this period; the best of them are at Venice. Naples possesses several interesting Early Renaissance monuments, chief among which are the +Porta Capuana+ (1484), by _Giul. da Majano_, the triumphal +Arch of Alphonso+ of Arragon, by _Pietro di Martino_, and the +P. Gravina+, by _Gab. d'Agnolo_. Naples is also very rich in minor works of the early Renaissance, in which it ranks with Florence, Venice, and Rome.

CHAPTER XXI.

RENAISSANCE ARCHITECTURE IN ITALY--_Continued_.

THE ADVANCED RENAISSANCE AND DECLINE.

BOOKS RECOMMENDED: As before, Burckhardt, Cicognara, Fergusson, Pal.u.s.tre. Also, Gauthier, _Les plus beaux edifices de Genes_.

Geymuller, _Les projets primitifs pour la basilique de St. Pierre de Rome_. Gurlitt, _Geschichte des Barockstiles in Italien_.

Letarouilly, _edifices de Rome Moderne_; _Le Vatican_. Palladio, _The Works of A. Palladio_.

+CHARACTER OF THE ADVANCED RENAISSANCE.+ It was inevitable that the study and imitation of Roman architecture should lead to an increasingly literal rendering of cla.s.sic details and a closer copying of antique compositions. Toward the close of the fifteenth century the symptoms began to multiply of the approaching reign of formal cla.s.sicism.

Correctness in the reproduction of old Roman forms came in time to be esteemed as one of the chief of architectural virtues, and in the following period the orders became the princ.i.p.al resource of the architect. During the so-called Cinquecento, that is, from the close of the fifteenth century to nearly or quite 1550, architecture still retained much of the freedom and refinement of the Quattrocento. There was meanwhile a notable advance in dignity and amplitude of design, especially in the internal distribution of buildings. Externally the orders were freely used as subordinate features in the decoration of doors and windows, and in court arcades of the Roman type. The lantern-crowned dome upon a high drum was developed into one of the n.o.blest of architectural forms. Great attention was bestowed upon all subordinate features; doors and windows were treated with frames and pediments of extreme elegance and refinement; all the cornices and mouldings were proportioned and profiled with the utmost care, and the bal.u.s.trade was elaborated into a feature at once useful and highly ornate. Interior decoration was even more splendid than before, if somewhat less delicate and subtle; relief enrichments in stucco were used with admirable effect, and the greatest artists exercised their talents in the painting of vaults and ceilings, as in P. del Te at Mantua, by _Giulio Romano_ (1492-1546), and the Sistine Chapel at Rome, by Michael Angelo. This period is distinguished by an exceptional number of great architects and buildings. It was ushered in by _Bramante Lazzari_, of Urbino (1444-1514), and closed during the career of _Michael Angelo Buonarotti_ (1475-1564); two names worthy to rank with that of Brunelleschi. Inferior only to these in architectural genius were _Raphael_ (1483-1520), _Balda.s.sare Peruzzi_ (1481-1536), _Antonio da San Gallo the Younger_ (1485-1546), and _G. Barozzi da Vignola_ (1507-1572), in Rome; _Giacopo Tatti Sansovino_ (1479-1570), in Venice, and others almost equally ill.u.s.trious. This period witnessed the erection of an extraordinary series of palaces, villas, and churches, the beginning and much of the construction of St. Peter's at Rome, and a complete transformation in the aspect of that city.

+BRAMANTE'S WORKS.+ While precise time limits cannot be set to architectural styles, it is not irrational to date this period from the maturing of Bramante's genius. While his earlier works in Milan belong to the Quattrocento (S. M. delle Grazie, the sacristy of San Satiro, the extension of the Great Hospital), his later designs show the cla.s.sic tendency very clearly. The charming +Tempietto+ in the court of S. Pietro in Montorio at Rome, a circular temple-like chapel (1502), is composed of purely cla.s.sic elements. In the +P. Giraud+ (Fig. 166) and the great +Cancelleria+ Palace, pilasters appear in the external composition, and all the details of doors and windows betray the results of cla.s.sic study, as well as the refined taste of their designer.[24]

The beautiful courtyard of the Cancelleria combines the Florentine system of arches on columns with the Roman system of superposed arcades independent of the court wall. In 1506 Bramante began the rebuilding of St. Peter's for Julius II. (see p. 294) and the construction of a new and imposing papal palace adjoining it on the Vatican hill. Of this colossal group of edifices, commonly known as the +Vatican+, he executed the greater Belvedere court (afterward divided in two by the Library and the Braccio Nuovo), the lesser octagonal court of the Belvedere, and the court of San Damaso, with its arcades afterward frescoed by Raphael and his school. Besides these, the cloister of S. M. della Pace, and many other works in and out of Rome, reveal the impress of Bramante's genius, alike in their admirable plans and in the harmony and beauty of their details.

[Footnote 24: See Appendix C.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 166.--FAcADE OF THE GIRAUD PALACE, ROME.]