RENAISSANCE ARCHITECTURE IN GREAT BRITAIN
It was only by very slow degrees that the Renaissance style was
introduced into England, native architects and those for whom they
worked having clung with almost pathetic devotion to the traditions of
the past. At the end of the 15th century the Gothic style was still in
full vigour on this side of the Channel, and although early in the 16th
century it was to a great extent modified by the influence of the
foreign artists who were attracted to the court of Henry VIII by the
lavish patronage of the young monarch, it continued to the end of the
century to check the development of pure Renaissance, the two styles to
a great extent neutralising each other.
It is significant of the change of the attitude of rulers and ruled
towards religion that took place in England during the 16th and 17th
centuries, that it was no longer in churches and cathedrals that
architecture achieved its greatest triumphs, but in palaces,
manor-houses, colleges, and places of public entertainment. No longer
was the soaring Gothic style to voice in stone the aspirations of
worshippers for closer intercourse with the divine; the best energies of
architects were henceforth to be directed to the promotion of comfort
and luxury in private life, and for the realisation of this
comparatively ignoble aim the revived classic style was peculiarly
adapted. True, the spirit of the Renaissance did not display itself so
fully in architecture as in other branches of human endeavour, but for
all that its working was very apparent, assuming a certain character of
its own in England.
[Illustration: Portion of Lilford Hall, Northants]
First Italians, amongst whom the most distinguished were Torregiano,
designer of the tomb of Henry VII in Westminster Abbey, Giovanni da
Majano, and Giovanni da Padua, the architect of Longleat in Wiltshire,
then Flemings and Germans, none of whom, however, except John of Cleves,
designer of Caius College, Cambridge, rose to any special eminence,
endeavoured to graft their own upon English methods, succeeding with
rare exceptions only so far as the minor details of ornamentation were
concerned.
It is not to these men of alien birth but to the builders and masons of
rural England that the country owes the many noble residences, dating
from the late 16th and early 17th centuries, that, Gothic so far as
their principles of construction are concerned, are enriched or spoiled,
according to the point of view from which they are considered, by
Renaissance ornamentation. Amongst these builders Thomas Holt, author of
the Divinity School of Oxford, and Robert Smithson and John Thorpe,
joint designers of Wollaton Hall, Northamptonshire, were especially
distinguished. To the last named many critics also attribute Holland
House, London, Rushton, Kirkby and Apethorpe Halls in Northamptonshire,
and Knowle House in Kent, all of which are truly typical examples of
English 16th or early 17th domestic or academic architecture at its
best. To about the same period belong Lilford Hall, Northants, Westwood,
Bolsover, Charlton, and Hatfield Houses, all somewhat wanting in the
dignified simplicity of plan of the work of the men quoted above, but
with an undoubted charm of their own.
The master-builders who alike designed and executed the many beautiful
mansions and colleges of the Elizabethan age--with whom must be
associated the later John Abel, designer of several fine market-halls,
including those of Kingston, Hereford, and Leominster--may justly be
said to have paved the way for Inigo Jones, the first Englishman to
introduce pure Renaissance architecture into his native land. Already
before his advent these humble predecessors had partly evolved, out of
the mediaeval castle and the mediaeval cottage, what was to become the
typical English home, bringing about something like a revolution in
planning by the innovations introduced by them with a view to admitting
more air and light, and rendering access to the upper floors easier by
the substitution of an internal staircase, for the external flight of
steps leading up to each separate room hitherto the fashion.
Gifted with a vivid imagination and a rare faculty of design, Inigo
Jones succeeded in so adapting Italian ideals, especially those of
Palladio, to English needs, that he may justly be said to have founded
something approaching to a national style. Unfortunately few of the many
schemes evolved by him were carried out in their entirety, but his plans
and drawings prove him to have been the equal and, in some respects,
even the superior of his great successor, Sir Christopher Wren. Of his
grand design for the new Palace of Whitehall after the fire of 1619, the
Banqueting Hall, considered his masterpiece, alone was completed, but he
was the real architect of the equally successful Greenwich Hospital, for
it was his plan that was followed after his death by Wren.
Although it is the custom to dwell much on the unique opportunity
afforded to Sir Christopher Wren by the great fire of 1666, there is no
doubt that even without it he would have set his seal on the period
during which he lived. His additions to Hampton Court Palace are most
dignified and appropriate, his semi-Gothic Tom Tower at Oxford well
illustrates his keen sense of environment, and his design for a Royal
Palace at Winchester, had it been carried out, would have given to that
city a building worthy to rank with its cathedral. As it is, his fame
rests chiefly on his work in London, although the masterly scheme he
drew up for the rebuilding of the whole town had to be considerably
modified.
[Illustration: Portion of Greenwich Hospital]
S. Paul's Cathedral, that dominates the vast agglomeration making up the
modern capital, reflects, in its solemn and dignified beauty, almost as
clearly as did a mediaeval ecclesiastical Gothic edifice, the spirit of
its age, during which the Puritan replaced the Roman Catholic ideal, and
a rigid Protestantism became the religion of the people. Of noble and
most harmonious proportions, S. Paul's is cruciform in plan, every
portion of its exterior and interior subordinated to the great central
dome, that, consisting as it does of an outer and inner vault, is
equally impressive whether seen from within or from without. From
whatever point of view, the dome, with its graceful lantern surmounted
by a cross, remains the central feature of a structure at unity with
itself, consistent in every detail, the western towers and the great
central portico with their appropriate classic pilasters and columns all
being in complete and satisfying accord.
The Churches of S. Stephen, Walbrook, S. Andrew, Holborn, S. James,
Piccadilly, S. Clements Danes, S. Bride's, Fleet Street, and Bow are
amongst the finest designed by Wren. The steeples of the last three are
especially noteworthy as the earliest examples in England of the use of
that feature in Renaissance buildings.
Sir Christopher did not pass away until the 18th century, which was to
witness a rapid decline of architecture in England. His influence had
begun to wane even before his death, and few of his immediate
successors, with the exceptions of his pupils, Nicholas Hawkesmoor,
architect of S. George's, Bloomsbury, and other London churches of
similar design, and Sir John Vanburgh, who designed Castle Howard and
Blenheim Palace, rose to eminence. James Gibbs, designer of the
Ratcliffe Library at Oxford, also did some good work; the brothers Adam
successfully imitated classic forms in certain London and Edinburgh
buildings, and Sir Robert Taylor won some distinction by the Halls
erected by him in Herefordshire and Essex.
Towards the close of the century a classic revival inaugurated by Sir
William Chambers, designer of Somerset House, took place in England, and
it became the fashion to add a Greek portico to every important public
or private building. Typical examples of the new departure are S.
Pancras Church, London, that is a kind of compilation from the
Parthenon, the Erectheum, and the Temple of the Winds at Athens, and S.
George's Hall, Liverpool, a skilful adaptation of the design of a hall
of one of the great Thermae of Rome.
Early in the 19th century a reaction took place against the classic
style, which was not really adapted to the English climate, and
architects began to show a desire to revert to Gothic traditions. In
this new movement Sir Charles Barry took the lead. The Houses of
Parliament, in the latest phase of the style, considered his
masterpiece, is specially successful in its general plan and in the
picturesqueness of its exterior. With Sir Charles Barry must be
associated Augustine Pugin, a man of fine genius and originality, with a
genuine feeling for mediaeval Gothic, Norman Shaw, and Bodley, all of
whom have done much to leaven the utilitarian tendencies of modern
times.
INDEX
Alhambra, the, 42
Amiens Cathedral, 65
Amphitheatres, Roman, 28
Anglo-Norman style, 54
Anglo-Saxon style, 53
Arch, vi
Arches, Roman, 30
Architecture, definition of, v
Asiatic architecture, 9
Assyrian architecture, 9
Babylonian architecture, 9
Baptisteries, 35
Basilicas, Roman, 26
Baths, Roman, 27
Buddhist architecture, 12
Buvards, v
Byzantine architecture, 24, 36
Caryatid Porch, 21
Castles, Norman, 59
Cathedrals. _See_ Churches
Chaityas, 11
Chartres Cathedral, 64
Chinese architecture, 13
Christian architecture, Early, 31
Churches, Anglo-Norman, 54
Anglo-Saxon, 53
Byzantine, 37
Early Christian, 31
Gothic, 62, 68, 76
Renaissance, 84
Romanesque, 47
Coliseum, 29
Cologne Cathedral, 70
Coptic architecture, 35
Corinthian style, 16, 18, 21
Doric style, 16, 18-21
Durham Cathedral, 58
Egyptian architecture, 7
Etruscan architecture, 22
Flamboyant Gothic style, 62, 65, 67
Gothic style, 50, 60
British, 72
Decorated, 73, 74, 78, 79, 80
Early English, 73, 78, 79
French, 62
German, 70
Italian, 69
Perpendicular, 73, 75, 80, 81
Spanish, 68
Greek architecture, 13
Hindu architecture, 12
Indian architecture, 11
Ionic style, 16, 18, 21
Jones, Inigo, 90
Keystone, vi
Lats, 11
Lintel, vi
Mansions, English Renaissance, 90
Mastabas, 7, 10
Materials employed, v, 9, 23
Mosques, 40
Nineveh, 10
Norman style, 54
Notre Dame of Paris, 63
Palaces, Greek, 14
Persian, 10
Palaces, Renaissance, 86
Roman, 29
Pantheon, 26
Parthenon, 19
Persian architecture, 9, 10
Peruvian architecture, 13
Pyramids, 7
Rayonnant Gothic style, 62, 67
Renaissance style British, 88
European, 83
French, 87
Italian, 83
Rococo style, 88
Roman architecture, 22
Romanesque style, 45
Roofing, arcuated and trabeated, vi
S. Ambrogio, Milan, 48
S. Marco, Venice, 39
S. Paul's Cathedral, 91
S. Peter's Cathedral, Rome, 84
S. Sophia, Constantinople, 38
Saracenic architecture, 40
Stambhas, 11
Stupas, 11
Taj Mahal, 44
Temples, Babylonian, 10
Egyptian, 8
Greek, 15, 18
Indian, 11
Tombs, Egyptian, 7
Greek, 21
Persian, 10
Topes, 11
Tudor style, 73, 76
Tuscan style, 24
Vaulting, Gothic, 61
Roman, 24
Romanesque, 45
Viharas, 11
Voussoirs, vi
Westminster Abbey, 76, 78, 81
Wren, Sir Christopher, 90
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