THE RENAISSANCE IN ENGLAND, FLANDERS, FRANCE, GERMANY, AND SPAIN.
In the foregoing sketch of the furniture, designs, and manufactures
of central Italy, we have described the history of contemporaneous
furniture throughout Europe. Pope Leo the tenth gave every
encouragement to the reviving arts in Rome, and left that capital the
great nursery of art down to our day. To Italy the great princes
of Europe sent the most promising artists of their dominions,
or encouraged such resort. Most of these men were architects and
sculptors.
Classical learning and splendid living were both encouraged by Henry
the eighth. He is, probably, to be credited with the impulse given
to the court and the country in the direction of the arts and
accomplishments of Italy. If Jean de Mabuse had been patronised by
Henry the seventh, his successor offered tempting terms to Primaticcio
to exchange the service of his brother king, Francis, for his own.
Other artists, contemporaries of Raphael and his scholars, found their
way to England; to these we must add the great master of the German or
Swiss school, Holbein. That the artists both of Holbein's and of the
Italian schools designed furniture in this country we have proofs in
the drawing for a panelled chimney-piece now in the British museum,
and the woodwork of King's college chapel in Cambridge. Another piece
of furniture of this date, showing the mixed character of Italian
and Holbeinesque design, is the very fine "Tudor" cabinet at South
Kensington.
Though the court of Henry and the palaces of his wives were furnished
with splendour, and works of art, especially those of the gold and
silversmith, and jewellery, found their way from foreign parts to such
great houses, the general manners of the country changed less in these
respects than was the case in France and the more wealthy states and
courts of Germany. In the portrait pictures of Henry and his family we
see furniture of a renaissance character, but in the great monuments
of the woodwork of the day the old style prevailed throughout the
reign. The roofs, magnificent specimens of wood construction, were
still subdivided, and supported by king posts, queen posts, hammer
beams, arches connecting these portions and tracery panels in the
spandrels, as in the two previous centuries. All parts were carved and
coloured. The architecture of country houses began to change from
the old form of a castle or a fortress to that of the beautiful and
characteristic style to which we give the name of Tudor. Moats were
retained, but still the principal features of the building were the
depressed arches and perpendicular window mullions that had been
long familiar in England, and were suggested by the wooden houses so
general in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. The
woodwork also and the panelling of halls and chambers retained the
upright lines and mouldings forming the various "linen" patterns.
Leafwork and heads, busts of the reigning princes, or of heroes
such as the Cæsars, filled up the more ornamental sections, giving a
certain classical element which was not fully developed till later:
and most of the renaissance ornamentation of this reign has a Flemish
rather than an Italian character. The woodcuts on the next page show a
series of panels of different countries, many of which are to be found
introduced with slight variations in English work of about the same
period.
Flanders was in advance of this country in renaissance art. This
remark extends to ornament of all kinds, whether of church woodwork,
glass-painting, or domestic furniture. Still the Flemish work of this
renaissance, or (speaking of England) this early Tudor period retains
a mixture of details of the pointed style that makes us sometimes
doubtful how to characterise the style of individual pieces. We may
point to sideboards and chests in illustration. Belgium abounds in
examples of this transition period.
[Illustration: English, 15th century.]
[Illustration: Flemish, 16th century.]
[Illustration: French, 16th century.]
[Illustration: German, 15th century.]
[Illustration: Italian, 16th century.]
In France, the most advanced and most luxurious and cultivated of the
transalpine courts, the renaissance art had advanced far beyond that
of England. Not only had Francis the first and the Medici princesses
invited famous artists out of Italy, but they aimed at imitating
Florentine luxuries and refinements as completely as they could.
Admirable schools of ornamental art, such as that of the Limoges
enamellers and carvers in ivory, were and had been long established
in France. Classic sculpture was produced of great merit in all
materials. Primaticcio and Cellini founded new schools of architects,
painters, and sculptors in France. They employed pupils, and the most
promising found their way to Rome and Florence, associated themselves
with the great masters then practising, and brought back all the
instruction they could obtain.
[Illustration]
Jean Goujon stands at the head of these French masters. Besides being
a sculptor and architect, there is little doubt of his having designed
and even sculptured wood furniture. Probably the carved woodwork of
the king's bedroom and adjoining rooms in the old Louvre are by his
hand. Bachelier, of Toulouse, did the same, and pieces are attributed
to him now in the Kensington Museum. Philibert de L'Orme was another
artist in a similar field. Both Goujon and Bachelier showed the
influence of the great Italian masters in their work. The table
engraved (p. 81) is a very elegant example of French sixteenth century
furniture.
[Illustration] [SEMPER FESTINA LENTE 1577 A. REID. DEL.]
The woodwork in the renaissance houses--the panelling and fittings
of the rooms--was designed by the architect, and was full of quaint,
sometimes extravagant imagery. For example, the architectural and
decorative plates of Jacques Androuet du Cerceau will give some idea
of the dependence of all these details on the architects of the day.
This author published designs for marquetry or wood mosaics, as well
as for all sorts of woodwork. A glance at the heavy cabinets of the
later sixteenth century, of French origin, will show how completely
great pieces of furniture fell into the same character of forms.
Shelves are supported on grotesque figures, while in the mouldings,
instead of simple running lines worked with the plane, as in fifteenth
century woodwork, we see the egg and tongue, acanthus leaves, dentils
and other members of classical architecture, constantly recurring. The
ornaments of French woodworkers show a fondness for conventional bands
or straps interspersed with figures and other ornaments. The panel,
of which we give a woodcut, is French, and dated 1577. It contains
armorial bearings and a monogram, said to be of the Aldine family. In
1577, however, Aldus Manutius the elder was dead, and his son did not
live in France.
Germany and Spain took up the renaissance art in a still more Italian
spirit than England or France. Parts of Italy as well as Spain were
under the same ruler; they both, as far as regards art, felt the
influence of powerful imperial patronage. We are only concerned with
their art here as it refers to woodwork. German wood carvers were
more quaint, minute, and redundant as to decoration. Something of the
vigour, manliness, and inexhaustible sense of humour of the Germans
characterises their woodwork, as it does other art, of which ornament
forms the main feature. The well-known "Triumph of Maximilian," though
a woodcut only, may be taken as a type of German treatment. The great
cities of the empire are full of carved woodwork, house fronts, and
gables. Timber was abundant. The imagery of the period, in wood as
in stone, is intentionally quaint, contorted, humorous. It would
be essentially ugly but for the inexhaustible fecundity of thought,
allegory, and satire that pervades it. It should be added also that
designers and architects had an immense sense of dignity, which we
recognise immediately when we see their architectural compositions as
a whole. Depths and hollows, points of light, prominences and relative
retirement of parts in their arrangements of carved ornament, were
matters thoroughly understood; and they succeed in imparting that
general agreeableness which we call "effect" to the mind of the
observers.
As regards Spanish art we cannot do better than adopt the statements
of Señor J. F. Riaño, who says that "the brilliant epoch of sculpture
in wood belongs to the sixteenth century, and was due to the great
impulse it received from the works of Berruguete and Felipe de
Borgoña. He was the chief promoter of the Italian style, and the choir
of the cathedral of Toledo, where he worked so much, is the finest
specimen of the kind in Spain. Toledo, Seville, and Valladolid were at
that time great productive and artistic centres. As a specimen of wood
carving of the Italian renaissance period, applied to an object of
furniture, the magnificent wardrobe by Gregorio Pardo (1549) outside
the chapter house at Toledo may be mentioned as one of the most
beautiful things of its kind. These various styles of ornamentation
were applied to the cabinets 'Bufetes' of such varied form and
materials which were so much the fashion in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. The most characteristic of Spain are such as
are called 'Vargueños.' These cabinets are decorated outside with fine
ironwork, and inside with columns of bone painted and gilt. The
other cabinets or escritoires belonging to that period, which are so
frequently met with in Spain, were to a large extent imported from
Germany and Italy, _while others were made in Spain in imitation of
these_" (the italics are ours), "and as the copies were very similar
it is difficult to classify them. It may be asserted, however, that
cabinets of inlaid wood were made in great perfection in Spain at the
end of the sixteenth century, for in a memorial written by a maker
of tapestry, Pedro Gretierez, who worked for queen Isabella, he says,
'The escritoires and cabinets brought from Germany are worth 500,
600, and 700 reales each, and those of the same kind made in Spain by
Spaniards are to be had for 250 and 300 reales.' Besides these inlaid
cabinets others must have been made in the sixteenth century inlaid
with silver. An edict was issued in 1594 prohibiting, with the utmost
rigour, the making and selling of this kind of merchandise, in order
not to increase the scarcity of silver. The edict says that 'no
cabinets, desks, coffers, brasiers, shoes, tables, or other articles
decorated with stamped, raised, carved, or plain silver, should be
manufactured.'"