The Cathedrals and Churches of the Rhine Part 7

During the sixteenth century Basel enjoyed a glorious era with respect to science and art.

Its university, the oldest in Switzerland, founded by Pius II., shone brilliantly with the reflected light of the philosopher Erasmus, the alchemist Paracelsus, and many theologians and geographers. Hans Holbein was born here in the seventeenth century.

The Rhine divides the city into two unequal parts, which are connected by a bridge which was originally constructed in 1220.

Although Basel bears even yet, in its architecture, the stamp of an imperial city of the middle ages, it must be counted as somewhat modern.

Nevertheless, of all the cities of the first rank in Switzerland it resisted the march of innovation the longest. For instance, there was a time when all the clocks of the city were an hour behind those of their neighbours. In 1778, however, the Swiss government decreed that on the first of the following January all the clocks of the city must be regulated by solar time. The innovation excited the indignation of the people exceedingly; but, fifteen days after the date originally set, the city fell in with the new regulation, and took up anew the routine of its life.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CATHEDRAL CLOCK BaLE]

"The most magnificent of the Swiss women," says a gallant French writer, "are those of Basel, but they know too much (at all times and all places)," he continued, somewhat dulling the effect of his praises.

"They have an elegance of carriage and dress, which, added to their naturally agreeable qualities, gives them a preeminence over all other women of Switzerland."

All this is as flowery a compliment as the fair s.e.x of any country could receive, and, judging from appearances, as one lingers a few hours or a few days in Basel, it is all true.

The most remarkable of all the edifices of Basel is its cathedral, or munster, dedicated to the Virgin.

In certain of its features one finds a distinct Lombard influence,--in its sculptures and carvings, notably the two carved lions in the crypt, which are the counterparts of others at Modena and Verona in Italy,--though in general it is a Gothic structure.

The cathedral was founded by the Emperor Henry II. of Bavaria in 1010, and was dedicated in 1019.

It is constructed of red sandstone, as are the chief of the architectural monuments along the Rhine, and is an imposing example of the Gothic of that time.

The great portal on the west is richly decorated in the archivolt. It is flanked on either side by an arcade whose b.u.t.tress pillars are each surmounted by a statue in a canopied niche or _baldaquin_.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

At the foot of the north tower is an equestrian statue of St. George and the Dragon, and at the angle of the southern tower is another of St.

Martin.

Two small doorways, each entering the side aisles, flank the arcade of the portal. Above the princ.i.p.al doorway of this facade is a _balcon a jour_ before the great window which lights the main nave.

The towers rise beside this great window, and are of themselves perhaps the most remarkable features of the church.

They are not exactly alike, but they reflect more than any other part of the edifice the characteristics of the Gothic of these parts. The northern tower was completed in 1500, and is sixty-six metres in height.

The southern tower is perhaps more ornate, and resembles, if somewhat faintly, Texier's beautiful spire at Chartres.

The ogival windows of the side walls are strong and of ample proportions.

At the extremity of the north transept is a doorway known as the Porte de St. Gall, decorated with statues of the four evangelists. Above is a great round window of the variety so commonly seen in France. It is here known as the "Wheel of Fortune." It is not a particularly graceful design, the rays or spokes being formed of tiny _colonnettes_, but is interesting nevertheless and quite unusual along the Rhine.

The coping of the roof of the nave is formed of party-coloured tiles, which give it a singular bizarre effect when viewed from near by.

The interior divides itself in the conventional manner into three naves, which are bare and with no ornamentation whatever.

The pulpit is a real work of art, and there are some sculptured capitals in the choir which are quite excellent.

The baptismal fonts are elaborately carved. One of these, bearing the date of 1465, is shaped something like a gigantic egg-cup. Its bowl springs from the stem in eight facets, sculptured to ill.u.s.trate the baptism of Christ in the waters of the Jordan, with figures of St.

Lawrence, St. Jacques, St. Paul, St. Pierre, and St. Martin.

Holbein once made a series of decorations for the organ-case of this church, but they exist no longer.

Beneath the edifice, with its entrance from the choir, is a crypt nearly as large as the nave itself, with a series of ma.s.sive pillars supporting its vault and the pavement of the church proper.

There are numerous monuments within the church, including one to Erasmus, the ill.u.s.trious Hollander who had made Basel his second home.

A stairway leads from the church to the chamber where was held, from 1431 to 1444, the famous Council of Basel. It is a vast, bare room, with no furniture whatever, except the benches upon which sat the prelates a.s.sembled at the council.

The cloister attached to the cathedral is daintily planned and contains a number of tombs of celebrated persons.

Behind the church is a magnificent terrace known as the Pfalz. It is planted with chestnut-trees, and its elevation, high above the level of the Rhine waters, makes it a magnificent promenade.

The Hotel of the Three Kings--though it is to-day a modern structure that one sees--was, in the ninth century, the meeting-place of Conrad III., Henry III., and Rudolph III., the last King of Burgundy. Following another tradition, the house derived its nomenclature from the _reliques_ of "the Three Magi," which were lodged here when on their journey, in 1161, from Milan to Cologne.

In the museum at Basel are two of Holbein's, sketches made from statues in the Sainte Chapelle at Bourges in France. They represent the Duke Jean de Berry and his wife, Jeanne de Boulogne. It seems rather curious that a great draughtsman like Holbein should deliberately have set himself to copying from a cast, which is practically what it amounted to in this case, charming though these drawings be.

_Colmar_

Colmar, the chief town of the "circle of Colmar," was once strongly fortified. It still has something more than fragments left of its seven towered and turreted gates.

Formerly it was the capital of Upper Alsace, and later it was the capital of the Departement du Haut-Rhin. As a result of the war of 1871 it became a German city.

To Americans and Frenchmen it will perhaps be most revered as being the birthplace of Auguste Bartholdi, the designer of the celebrated Statue of Liberty at New York. (There is a smaller counterpart at Paris, on the Ile des Cygnes in the Seine, which is often overlooked by visitors to the capital.)

The church of St. Martin is a thirteenth-century Gothic church of more than usual splendour. Its fine foundations date from 1237, and its choir from 1315. It is of the conventional Latin cross form, with two imposing towers and a really grand portal. It is built of red sandstone, and is surmounted with a wonderfully ma.s.sive steeple, which looks more like an adjunct to a fortification than a dependency of a Christian edifice.

There is a counterpart of this feature in the cathedral at Dol in Brittany, but there it has the added detail of a crenelated parapet, which gives it a still more military air.

In other days this great tower on St. Martin's at Colmar served the purposes of a civic belfry as well as that of a Christian campanile.

In the sacristy of this rather grim church is an admirable fifteenth-century work of art, a Virgin surrounded by garlands of roses, executed by Schongauer, a native of Colmar (1450-88) and one of the greatest painters and sculptors of the fifteenth century.

There is the restored fabric of the famous convent of the Dominicans, known as Unterlinden, which is to be considered as one of the chief curiosities of the town. It was built in 1232, before even the church of St. Martin, and its history was exceedingly prominent in the records of mysticism in Germany.

The conventual establishment was suppressed at the time of the Revolution, but in the mid-nineteenth century it was rebuilt with a great deal of thought for the reproduction of the Gothic architecture of the era of its inception.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

VIII

FREIBURG

The steeple of Freiburg is quite the rival of that of Strasburg; some even may think it more beautiful.