(_From Pugin’s principles of Pointed Architecture._)
We now come to the consideration of works in metal; and I shall be able
to shew that the same principles of suiting the design to the material
and decorating construction, were strictly adhered to by the artists of
the middle ages, in all their productions in metal, whether precious or
common.
In the first place, hinges, locks, bolts, nails, &c., which are always
_concealed in modern designs_, were rendered in Pointed Architecture,
_rich and beautiful decorations_; and this, not only in the doors and
fittings of buildings, but in cabinet and small articles of furniture.
The early hinges covered the whole face of the door with varied and
flowing scroll-work. Of this description are those of Notre Dame at
Paris, St. Elizabeth’s church at Marburg, the western doors of Litchfield
cathedral, the Chapter House at York, and hundreds of other churches,
both in England and on the Continent.
Hinges of this kind are not only beautiful in design, but they are
_practically good_. We all know that on the principle of a lever, a door
may be easily torn off its modern hinges, by a strain applied at its
outward edge. This could not be the case with the ancient hinges, which
extended the whole width of the door, and were bolted through in various
places. In barn doors and gates these hinges are still used, although
devoid of any elegance of form; but they have been most religiously
banished from all public edifices as unsightly, merely on account of our
present race of artists not exercising the same ingenuity as those of
ancient times, in rendering the _useful_ a vehicle for the beautiful. The
same remarks will apply to locks which are now concealed, and let into
the styles of doors, which are often more than half cut away to receive
them.
A lock was a subject on which the ancient smiths delighted to exercise
the utmost resources of their art. The locks of chests were generally of
a most elaborate and beautiful description. A splendid example of an old
lock still remains at Beddington Manor House, Surrey, and is engraved in
my father’s work of examples. In churches we not unfrequently find locks
with sacred subjects chased upon them, with the most ingenious mechanical
contrivances to conceal the keyhole. Keys were also highly ornamented
with appropriate decorations referring to the locks to which they
belonged; and even the wards turned into beautiful devices and initial
letters. Railings were not _casts of meagre stone tracery_, but elegant
combinations of metal bars, adjusted with a due regard to strength and
resistance.
There were many fine specimens of this style of railing round tombs,
and Westminster Abbey was rich in such examples, but they were actually
pulled down and sold for old iron by the order of the then dean, and even
the exquisite scroll-work belonging to the tomb of Queen Eleanor was
not respected. The iron screen of King Edward the Fourth’s tomb, at St.
George’s Chapel, Windsor, is a splendid example of ancient iron-work.
The fire-dogs or Andirons, as they were called, which supported either
the fuel-logs where wood was burnt, or grates for coal, were frequently
of splendid design. The ornaments were generally heraldic, and it was
not unusual to work the finer parts in brass, for relief of colour
and richness of effect. These form a striking contrast with the
inconsistencies of modern grates, which are not unfrequently made to
represent diminutive fronts of castellated or ecclesiastical buildings
with turrets, loopholes, windows, and doorways, all in the space of forty
inches. The fender is a sort of embattled parapet, with a lodge-gate at
each end; the end of the poker is a sharp pointed finial; and at the
summit of the tongs is a saint. It is impossible to enumerate half the
absurdities of modern metal-workers; but all these proceed from the false
notion of _disguising_ instead of _beautifying_ articles of utility.
How many objects of ordinary use are rendered monstrous and ridiculous
because the artist, instead of seeking the _most convenient form and
then decorating it_, has embodied some extravagancies _to conceal the
real purpose for which the article was made_! If a clock is required it
is not unusual to cast a Roman warrior in a flying chariot, round one of
the wheels of which, on close inspection, the hours may be descried; or
the whole of a cathedral church reduced to a few inches in height, with
the clock-face occupying the position of a magnificent rose window.
Surely the inventor of this patent clock-case could never have reflected
that according to the scale on which the edifice was reduced, his clock
would be about 200 feet in circumference, and that such a monster of a
dial would crush the proportions of any building that could be raised.
But this is nothing when compared to what we see continually produced
from those inexhaustible mines of bad taste, Birmingham and Sheffield;
staircase turrets for inkstands, monumental crosses for light shades,
gable ends hung on handles for door porters, and four doorways and a
cluster of pillars to support a French lamp; while a pair of _pinnacles_
supporting an arch is called a Gothic-pattern scraper, and a wiry
compound of quatrefoils and fan tracery an abbey garden seat. Neither
relative scale, form, purpose, nor unity of style, is ever considered by
those who design these abominations; if they only introduce a quatrefoil
or an acute arch, be the outline and style of the article ever so modern
and debased, it is at once denominated and sold as Gothic.