The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture Part 7

A. The Norman and Early English roofs were high and acutely pointed. The original roofs of most of our old churches, from their exposure to the weather, have long since fallen to decay, and been replaced by others of a more obtuse shape; but in general the height and angular form of the original roof may be ascertained by the weather moulding still remaining on the side of the tower or steeple. The interior vaulting of stone roofs was composed of fewer parts and ribs, which were often not more numerous than those of Norman vaulting, and does not present that complexity of arrangement which occurs in the vaulting-ribs of subsequent styles. In the cathedral of Salisbury also in the nave of Wells Cathedral are simple and good examples of Early English vaulting. A curious groined roof, in which the ribs are of wood--plain, cut with chamfered edges--and the cells of the vaulting are covered with boards, is to be met with in the church of Warmington, Northamptonshire, a very rich, perfect, and interesting specimen of this style.

Q. Was not the spire introduced at this period?

A. Yes, many spires were then built; among which was that of old St.

Paul's Cathedral, more than five hundred feet high, and which was destroyed by fire, A. D. 1561. The spire of Oxford Cathedral is also of this style. Early English spires are generally what are called Broach spires, and spring at once from the external face of the walls of the tower, without any intervening parapet.

Q. Whence did the spire take its origin?

A. It appears to have been suggested by the Norman pinnacle, which, at first a conical capping, afterwards became polygonal, and ribbed at the angles, thus presenting the prototype of the spire.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Q. What ornament is peculiar, or nearly so, to this style?

A. That called the tooth or dog-tooth ornament, a kind of pyramidal-shaped flower of four leaves, which is generally inserted in a hollow moulding, and, when seen in profile, presents a zig-zag or serrated appearance. The tooth moulding appears to have been introduced towards the close of the twelfth century; and an early instance where it occurs is on a late Norman doorway, at Whitwell Church, Rutlandshire: we do not, however, meet with it in buildings of a later style than that of the thirteenth century. It is sometimes found used in great profusion in doorways, windows, and other ornamental details; but many churches of this style are entirely devoid of this ornament. The ball-flower, though introduced in the thirteenth century, is not a common ornament until the fourteenth, to which era it may be said more particularly to belong; we find it in cornice mouldings, and sometimes on capitals.

Q. What may be observed of the sculptured foliage of this style?

A. As applied to capitals, bases, crockets, and other ornamental detail, we find the general design and appearance of the sculptured foliage of this style to be stiff and formal compared with that of the succeeding style, when the arrangement of the foliage more closely approximated nature, and a greater freedom both in conception and execution was evinced.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Boss of Sculptured Foliage, Warmington Church, Northamptonshire.]

Q. How are the parapets distinguished?

A. They are often plain and embattled; but sometimes a simple horizontal parapet is used, supported by a corbel table, as in the tower of Haddenham Church, Buckinghamshire, and on that of Brize Norton Church, Oxfordshire.

At Salisbury Cathedral the parapet is relieved by a series of blank trefoil headed pannels,[TN-4] sunk in the face.

Q. What may be said in general terms of the style of the thirteenth century, in comparing it with the styles which immediately preceded and followed it?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Parapet, Salisbury Cathedral.]

A. In comparison with the Norman style, with its heavy concomitants and enrichments, the style of the thirteenth century is light and simple, and the details possess much elegance of contour. These, in small buildings, are generally plain; but in large buildings they exhibit numerous mouldings, combined with a certain degree of decorative embellishment.

This style is, however, far from presenting that extreme beauty of outline and tasteful conception, combined with the pure and chaste ornamental accessories, which prevail in the designs of the fourteenth century.

Q. What particular structures may be noticed as belonging to this style?

A. Salisbury Cathedral, built by Bishop Poore between A. D. 1220 and 1260, is perhaps the most perfect specimen, on a large scale, of this style in its early state, with narrow lancet windows; the nave and transepts of Westminster Abbey, commenced in 1245, exhibit this style in a more advanced stage; whilst Lincoln Cathedral is, for the most part, a rich specimen of this style in its late or transition state. The west front of Wells Cathedral, erected by the munificence of Bishop Joceline, between A. D. 1213 and A. D. 1239, is covered with blank arcades and a number of trefoil-headed niches, surmounted by plain pedimental canopies, which contain specimens of statuary remarkable for their extreme beauty and freedom of design.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Corbel, Wells Cathedral.]

FOOTNOTES:

[86-*] From the economic principles on which our modern churches are, with few exceptions, planned, they are mostly designed after and are intended to resemble in style those of the thirteenth century, in which more detail can be dispensed with than in any other style. Hence it follows that the just proportions and adaptation of the different parts and the minutest details and mouldings in ancient churches of this style required to be carefully studied, more so perhaps for practical purposes than in churches of any other style.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Dunchurch Church, Warwickshire.]

CHAPTER VII.

OF THE DECORATED ENGLISH STYLE.

Q. When did the Decorated English style commence, and how long did it prevail?

A. It may be said to have commenced in the latter part of the thirteenth century, or reign of Edward the First, and to have prevailed about a century. The transition from the Early English style to this, and again from this to the succeeding style, was however so extremely gradual, that it is difficult to affix any precise date for the termination of one style, or the introduction of another.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Bracket, York Cathedral.]

Q. Whence does it derive its appellation?

A. From there being a greater redundancy of chaste ornament in this than in the preceding style; and though it does not exhibit that extreme multiplicity of decorative detail as the style of the fifteenth century, the general contours and forms which this style presents, and the princ.i.p.al lines of composition, which verge pyramidically rather than vertically or horizontally, are infinitely more pleasing; and it is justly considered as the most beautiful style of English ecclesiastical architecture.

Q. What difference is there between the arches of this style, which support the clerestory, and those of an earlier period?

A. The lancet arch is seldom seen; the equilateral arch is generally, though not always, used. Both this and the obtuse-angled arch are, taken exclusively, difficult to be distinguished from those of an earlier period. In small buildings the edges of the pier arches are plain and chamfered. In large churches a series of quarter-round or roll-mouldings, which have often a square-edged fillet attached, are applied to the sub-arch, edges, and facing.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Section of Piers rom[TN-5] Grendon Church, Warwickshire, and Austrey Church, Warwickshire.]

Q. What difference occurs in the piers from which these arches spring?

A. In large buildings piers of this style were composed of a cl.u.s.ter of slender cylindrical shafts, not standing detached from each other, as in the Early English style, but closely united. A common pier of this kind is formed of four shafts thus united, without bands, with a square-edged fillet running vertically up the face of each shaft. Sometimes a simple cylindrical pier is found. The octagonal pier, with plain sides, is very prevalent in small churches, and does not differ materially from the Early English pier of the same kind. The capitals are either bell-shaped, cl.u.s.tered, or octagonal, to correspond with the shape of the piers; but the cap mouldings are more numerous than in the earlier style. Sometimes the capitals are sculptured. In the churches of Monkskirby, Warwickshire, and of Cropredy, Oxfordshire, the arches which support the clerestory spring at once from the piers, without any intervening capitals, a practice not uncommon in the style of the fifteenth century, but very rare in this.

Q. How are the vaulted roofs of this style distinguished?

A. Of the large stone vaulted roofs each bay is intersected by longitudinal, transverse, and diagonal ribs, with shorter ribs springing from the bearing shafts intervening; thus forming a series of vaulting cells more numerous than are to be met with in the Early English style, though not subdivided to the excess observable in the vaulted roofs of the fifteenth century. Sculptured bosses often occur at the intersections. In the nave of York Cathedral, finished about A. D. 1330, the groining of the roof is less complicated than that of the choir of the same cathedral, constructed between A. D. 1360 and A. D. 1370[106-*]. Small structures are more simply vaulted. In a chantry chapel adjoining the north side of the chancel of Willingham Church, Cambridgeshire, is a very acute-pointed angular-shaped stone roof, the plain surface of the vaulting of which is supported by two pointed arches springing from corbels projecting from the walls; and these sustain straight-sided stone vaulting ribs, obliquely disposed to conform with the angle of the roof, and which act as princ.i.p.als; and above each arch, and between that and the ridge-line of the oblique ribs or princ.i.p.als, the s.p.a.ce is filled with an open quatrefoil and other tracery. The north transept of Limington Church, Somersetshire, has a high pitched stone roof supported by groined ribs.

Q. Are there many wooden roofs of this style remaining?

A. We find comparatively few original wooden roofs in structures of the fourteenth century, for such have generally been superseded by roofs of a later date and of a more obtuse form. The high and acute pitch of the original roof is, however, still generally discernible by the weather moulding on the east wall of the tower. In the nave of Higham Ferrars Church, Northamptonshire, is a wooden roof which apparently belongs to this style: the roof is angular-pointed and open to the ridge-line, the walls are connected by tie-beams, and under each of these is a wooden arch formed of two ribs or beams springing from stone corbels.

Q. In what respect do the doors of this style differ?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Window, Dunchurch Church, Warwickshire.]

A. Large doorways of this style have lateral shafts, with capitals, and between the shafts architrave mouldings intervene, which run without stop into the base tablet: of such the south doorway of St. Martin's Church, Leicester, is an instance. Small doorways are generally without shafts, but have a series of quarter-round, semicylindrical, and tripart.i.te roll mouldings at the sides, which are continuous with the architrave mouldings; and these have sometimes a square-edged fillet on the face. The doorways of this style are frequently enriched with pedimental and ogee-shaped canopies, ornamented with crockets and finials; of which the north doorway of Exeter Cathedral and the south doorway of Everdon Church, Northamptonshire, may be cited as examples. Large doorways have sometimes a double opening, divided by a cl.u.s.tered shaft, as in the entrance to the Chapter House, York Cathedral. In some instances the head of the doorway is foliated, and we observe in detail an approximation to the succeeding style. The west doorway of Dunchurch Church, Warwickshire, is in this stage of transition.

Q. How are the windows of this style known?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Square-headed Decorated Window, Ashby Folville, Leicestershire.]

A. In the later stage of the Early English style the windows became enlarged, and the heads were filled with foliated circles. To these succeeded, in the fourteenth century, windows ornamented with geometrical and flowing tracery, peculiarities which exclusively pertain to this style, and by which it is most easily known. The windows are of good proportions, and are divided into two or more princ.i.p.al lights by mullions, which at the spring of the arch form designs of regular geometrical construction, or branch out into flowing ramifications composing flame-like compartments, which are foliated[109-*]. The variety of tracery in windows of this style is very great, and they frequently have pedimental and ogee canopies over them, ornamented in the same manner as those over doors: examples of this kind may be found at York Cathedral. In the south transept of Chichester, and west front of Exeter Cathedrals, are two exceeding large and beautiful windows of this style; the first filled with geometrical, the other with flowing, tracery. In some windows of this style the mullions simply cross in the head, as in a later style, but the lights are commonly foliated, and the difference may in general be discerned by the mouldings: such windows occur in Stoneleigh Church, Warwickshire. There are also many square-headed windows in this style, distinguished by the flowing tracery in the heads, and by other characteristic marks: of such a window in Ashby Folville Church, Leicestershire, is a rich and good example. Circular windows, filled with tracery, are not uncommon in large buildings; and we also meet with triangular spherical-shaped windows, as in the clerestory of Barton Segrave Church, Northamptonshire[111-*].

[Ill.u.s.tration: Window, Barton Segrave Church.]

Q. Of what description are the mouldings which pertain to this style?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Moulding, Dunchurch Church, Warwickshire.]