church of the great abbey of S. Jean des Vignes. The west front of
this church is exactly in a line with that of the cathedral, at a
distance of about a furlong; and standing on higher ground, and still
retaining its two towers and spires, it produces a greater effect in
the general views of the city. It is now the centre of the arsenal,
with powder-stores, piles of shot, and various other preparations all
around it, which afford subject for rather gloomy forebodings, in case
Soissons should again suffer (as it has so often already suffered)
the danger of a siege. The remains of the church are almost confined
to the steeples and west front. The lower portions of these date from
the thirteenth century, but the upper portion is all of a very ornate
and rather late middle-pointed style; they are very pyramidal in their
outline, and have a rather heavy arrangement of pinnacles at the base
of the spires. The belfry-window of the north-west tower has a very
large stone crucifix contrived against its monial and tracery; there
is a canopy in the tympanum over the head of our Lord, and the tracery
seems to have been designed with a special view to the introduction of
the figure. The spires are crocketed on the angles, scalloped on the
face, and pierced with alternate slits and quatrefoils. The sculpture
of this front is not of very good character. From the south of the
south-west tower extends a remarkably fine portion of the domestic
buildings of the abbey, two stages in height, and eight bays in length.
Its south end has the favourite French arrangement of a central
buttress between two large circular windows, with two lancet windows in
the gable. On the west side each bay has a fine simple pointed window:
whilst on the east side the lower part is concealed by the cloister,
and the upper stage has a row of plain circular windows, similar to
those at the south end. The steep-pitched roof still remains, and
the whole building is a very fine relic, even among the relics of
this kind in which France is so peculiarly rich. The remains of the
cloister are in a very dilapidated state. Drawings which I had seen of
it had prepared me for earlier and better work than I found. I imagine
that it is not earlier than _circa_ A.D. 1300. The sculptured foliage
is in exact imitation of nature, very pretty, and no more. It is,
however, singularly instructive, as it illustrates just the kind of
work which our English carvers are most prone to introduce just now,
and which is generally (as it is here) very ineffective for want of
due architectural subordination. The windows of this cloister are of
four lights, with geometrical tracery; but the chief peculiarity is
the treatment of the buttresses, which are angular on the face, and
above the springing of the windows crocketed on the angles. Had the
sculpture been fifty years earlier in date, it would, I have no doubt,
have been a singularly beautiful cloister. A doorway which opened from
the cloister to the church is peculiarly flat in its mouldings and
sculpture, but remarkable for the still existing traces of painting
over its whole surface. The foundations of the east wall show that the
church was not of any great length from east to west.
The church of S. Léger is the finest edifice after these of which
the city can now boast. Anywhere its transepts and choir would be of
great interest for their early thirteenth-century date, and their good
architectural character. The church consists of a nave and aisles of
six bays (of which the four western are Renaissance), transepts of
two bays in depth, and a choir without aisles, which has one bay of
sexpartite groining, and an apse of seven sides. The detail is very
much the same as in the cathedral. The clerestory windows in the apse
are lancets, and in the rest of the church of two lights with tracery,
consisting of a cusped circle within an enclosing arch. In these
Soissonnais churches the label generally has a ball or four-leaved
flower at intervals. There is a procession path or passage, with
openings in the buttresses, round the church outside the clerestory
windows, dividing the church very markedly into two divisions in
height, and recalling to memory the very similar arrangement in
the church of S. Elizabeth at Marburg. The transept has fine angle
pinnacles and a large three-light window with early tracery, whilst the
cloister is somewhat similar to that of S. Jean des Vignes. Stepped
gables are a favourite feature here even in early work. The aisles of
S. Léger are so finished, as is also an early building by the side of
the cathedral.
The church of S. Pierre, which is desecrated, has a west front of much
interest. It has a nave and aisles, three western doorways (whereof the
central is pointed, the others round), and a single wide, round-arched
window over each door. The detail is peculiar,--of late Romanesque
character, and effective. Only two bays of the nave remain. The labels
and string-courses have a dogtooth enrichment, whilst the cornice
above them is adorned with a regular acanthus-leaf. The shafts of the
west door are fluted; and in this, as in the quadruple arrangement in
height, which I have already noticed as a frequent characteristic of
the Soissonnais churches, I suspect we may trace the influence of the
grand church of S. Remi at Rheims.
Of domestic buildings there are but few traces in Soissons. The best
are: a building near the west front of the cathedral, with stepped
gables, central buttresses in the end, and good simple three-light
windows in each bay;--a house in the Cloître S. Gervais, near the north
transept of the cathedral, with a steep unpierced gable and three
two-light windows in the stage just below it, and an unpierced ground
story;--and an old hospital near the cathedral, of good early-pointed
work, without groining, but with transverse arches from column to
column,--the capitals being carved, and the arches quite square in
section.
From Soissons, an excursion ought to be made to the abbey of
Longpont.[25] I was not aware at the time I was there that it was in
this neighbourhood, but I believe that it is only some eight or ten
miles distant, and that the church is of rare interest and grandeur. I
regret extremely my inability to give any notes of it.
A walk of a mile across meadows took me to the remains of the great
abbey of S. Médard. These are very slight and consist of some remains
of crypts, in which are preserved portions of buildings or monuments
which have been dug up from time to time. An old view of S. Médard
shows it surrounded by fortified walls, enclosing a vast range of
buildings and two or three churches. Of all this nothing now remains,
beyond a modern house, converted into an asylum for deaf and dumb, in
one portion of which remains an old vaulted apartment, now used as the
chapel of the institution.
From Soissons, I made my way across country to Château Coucy ...
and from Coucy, I made a considerable détour to visit the abbey of
Prémontré. The situation is very striking, in a narrow valley, closed
in on all sides with steep, thickly-wooded hills, and with only a few
dependent cottages leading up to the gate of the abbey. This was the
chief house of the Premonstratensian Order, which established as many
as thirty-five houses in England. The abbots of the order were bound to
meet once a year at Prémontré, and as there were as many as a thousand
abbeys belonging to them, the wild valley must then have presented
a singular contrast to its present deserted state. Until lately the
buildings have been used as a glass manufactory: but they have just
been purchased by the Bishop of Soissons (who seems to have a great
character for piety and liberality among the people) for an orphanage.
I saw the nun who holds the post of superior of the institution, and
obtained permission to search for remains of the old buildings: she
seemed much surprised at my demand, and with some reason, as the only
traces left of them are a portion of (I think) a crypt under the
church, which has fallen with its groining, and is left a confused mass
of stones, just as it fell. On my way from Prémontré, I passed, between
Anizy-le-Château and Laon, a very interesting example of a village
church at (I believe) Chalvour. It is cruciform, with a good central
gabled tower. The chancel has single lancet windows to the east and
south, and the south transept a large boldly-cusped circular window,
and a small projection on the east for the altar, also lighted with
a circular window. The chancel, tower, and transepts, are groined:
the nave (with its aisles) is of inferior work. Altogether, this is a
very characteristic thirteenth century church, of bold and vigorous
character, and severely simple in all its details.
An ascent of about two miles leads up the side of the mountain, on
which Laon is perched, to the western extremity of the city. And here I
must pause, trusting another time to say somewhat of the architectural
glories of the place, upon which I suppose I can scarcely descant too
enthusiastically.
IV
The two great architectural attractions of Laon are the cathedral and
its subordinate buildings, and the fine church of S. Martin. They are
situated at the two extremities of the long narrow ridge on which
the town is built, which towards the east falls precipitously on
three sides almost from the very walls of the cathedral down to the
broad vast plain which extends as far as the eye can reach, and from
all parts of which the grand mass of the building, with its almost
unrivalled cluster of steeples, is seen standing--just as our own
glorious Lincoln--on the very spot of all others fitted for a diocesan
throne.
I know no church which is altogether more calculated to leave a lasting
impression on the mind than the cathedral. What is wanting in grace and
delicacy is amply atoned for in force and majesty; and the completeness
of the plan, the short period which seems to have elapsed between
its commencement and completion, and the almost entire absence of
later additions or alterations, combine to make it in every respect
of the utmost value to the architectural student. The stern, solemn
majesty of its art is just what we modern men ought to endeavour to
impress ourselves with; but whilst I believe that all students would be
enormously benefited, they must not come here under the impression that
they are to see work which is pretty and attractive in the same sense
or degree as S. Ouen at Rouen, or Cologne cathedral.
In plan this church has the remarkable peculiarity of a square east
end, and consists of a nave and choir respectively of eleven and ten
bays in length, transepts with an eastern apsidal chapel to each, a
small cloister on the south side of the nave, and sacristies formed in
the angles between the transepts and choir. The groining is sexpartite
in the principal vaults, and quadripartite in the aisles; there is a
large vaulted triforium, and the fourfold division in height to which
I have already referred as a characteristic of many of the churches
of this district. But the most noteworthy feature is that the three
principal façades--on the west, north, and south--were each intended
to have two towers and spires, whilst a lantern crowned the crossing.
No less than four of these towers and the lantern still remain (though
without their spires, shown in an engraving by du Sommerard), as well
as the lower portion of the others. On the east and north the cathedral
is enclosed with extensive ranges of coeval buildings belonging to the
bishop’s palace, including the small private chapel, to which I must
recur again.
Let us hear what M. Viollet-le-Duc says about the characteristics of
this cathedral of Laon:[26]--“La cathédrale de Laon conserve quelque
chose de son origine démocratique; elle n’a pas l’aspect religieux
des églises de Chartres, d’Amiens ou de Reims. De loin, elle paraît
un château plutôt qu’une église; sa nef est, comparativement aux nefs
ogivales et même a celle de Noyon, basse; sa physionomie extérieure est
quelque peu brutale et sauvage; et jusqu’à ces sculptures colossales
d’animaux, bœufs, chevaux, qui semblent garder les sommets des tours
de la façade, tout concourt à produire une impression d’effroi plutôt
qu’un sentiment religieux, lorsqu’on gravit le plateau sur lequel elle
s’élève. On ne sent pas, en voyant Notre Dame de Laon, l’empreinte
d’une civilisation avancée et policée comme à Paris ou à Amiens; là,
tout est rude, hardi: c’est le monument d’un peuple entreprenant,
énergique et plein d’un mâle grandeur. Ce sont les mêmes hommes que
l’on retrouve à Coucy-le-Château--c’est une race de géants.”
I am disposed to think that M. le-Duc scarcely values the architecture
of Laon sufficiently highly, and that he is mistaken in his idea of the
democratic character imparted to it by the turbulence of the citizens
at the time of its erection. It appears to me that the peculiarity of
its character is derived much more from some connection with German
art, and I believe that the churches throughout this part of France
show many evidences of such a connection. The planning of the towers
of Laon is very German; I need hardly adduce examples from the Rhine
district, where, as we all know, the steeples are treated as so many
great turrets, nearly similar in size, height, and design, whilst the
crossing is often marked by a low lantern. The grand cathedral at
Tournai in this respect resembles very strongly that of Laon; and if we
were coming from Germany into France, we might at Andernach, Coblentz,
Trèves, and Châlons-sur-Marne (in the church of Notre Dame), see a
regular sequence of buildings by which we should arrive without any
very great or sensible break at Laon. The groined triforium is another
well known German feature, and though the apse is a very general
termination to German churches, it is yet not impossible that its
absence at Laon may be an evidence of Germanic origin, as we do meet
there with some examples of the same kind. In one particular feature I
am able to trace a most singular coincidence with a German example, to
which, however, I do not wish to attach very much weight, though it is
undoubtedly curious. The steeples at Laon are very fine compositions--I
should hardly speak too strongly of the steeple of the south transept,
were I to say that it is the best-designed steeple in France,--marked
by turrets at the angles, which are either octagonal or square in plan
with shafts at their angles, and very beautiful in their effect. In the
west front one of the stages has, in these open turrets, large figures
of oxen and other animals looking out from between the shafts on the
city roofs far away below,--a quaint conceit, which one would suppose
to be a purely personal and peculiar device, and of which nevertheless
there is an almost exact repetition in the very similar steeples of the
grand cathedral at Bamberg.
My belief is, that as we can trace a stream of Italian art coming
to the south and south-west of France, and thence working on to the
north in gradual and steady development, so we may also see the same
thing here. Italian art first spread down the Rhine, and thence spread
right and left, and in these border provinces of France influenced to
a greater extent than is generally supposed the French architects. On
their part there was a peculiar skill and art displayed which soon
enabled them to develop from the germ which they received; but the
Romanesque work out of which they developed their buildings was of
a different order from that which was the ground-work on which the
architects of Poitiers, Bourges, and Chartres had to work; the latter
having in Italy a Byzantine origin, whilst that of the Rhine churches
was rather Romanesque. Something therefore of the magnificent character
of the best early French Gothic is owing to Germany, and it was the
situation of the Île de France, the meeting point as it were of these
two developments, which made it the centre from which the best Gothic
architecture of the world naturally sprang. But whatever was the
history of Laon cathedral, no one can doubt the excessive grandeur of
the result. No doubt the magnificence of the situation, which recalls
forcibly some of the most interesting of Italian cities, such as Siena
and Perugia, has something to do with the colouring of memories of
Laon; but in the church itself there is but one point on which it is
possible to feel that there is any serious shortcoming, and this, as
an Englishman, I am almost afraid to say is the absence of an eastern
apse. It is only when one travels from church to church finished with
apsidal choirs, that the eye sees the whole evil of the square east
end as the termination of the vista in a large church. But there can
be no doubt that there is less completeness and unity of effect,
fewer fine effects of light and shade, and altogether less skill and
architectural ingenuity in the English plan than in the other: and
though I should be sorry to see the apse commonly introduced in small
churches, yet I think it fortunate that attention has been a good deal
drawn to this matter of late years, and that men have not been slow
to recognize the advantage of importing this one foreign practice at
any rate into our own country. Both externally and internally the east
end of Laon is deficient in effect, and gives the impression of being
low and awkward in proportion. There is an eastern triplet which comes
down very near to the floor, and a large rose window over it; an arcade
of open arches, flanked on either side by a pinnacle, conceals the
lower part of the gable. This elevation is indeed the worst thing in
the whole church, and contrasts unfavourably with that of the north
transept. This is perhaps a little later in date and owes much to the
irregularity of outline caused by the completion of one only of its
steeples. It has the peculiarity of two double doors; and the large
rose window composed of eight octofoiled circles surrounding a ninth,
is of rare beauty. It is to be prized the more, too, because in the
fourteenth century there was a plan for its removal, of which we have
curious evidence: one of the side jambs and part of the arch of a large
middle-pointed window having been inserted by cutting away the wall
close to a buttress in such a way as to disturb very little of the
original work, and yet to afford us a very curious evidence of the way
in which alterations of this kind were made by the mediaeval masons,
without the introduction of a single shore or support of any kind.
Fortunately the alteration was stopped just where it ought to have
been, after it had afforded evidence of the customs of the masons, but
before it had destroyed a perfect first-pointed façade; and I suppose
that by this time we have outlived the rage for middle-pointed work so
far that it would be difficult indeed to find any one so wrong-headed
as not to be grateful for the stoppage of the alteration at the point
at which we see it now. Of the western façade I can say but little. It
has been my fortune to see it twice, but an evil fate has so covered
it with scaffolding at one time, and taken down and rebuilt so much at
another, that I have only been able to guess at its general effect.
The western doorways are adorned with sculpture, and this is almost
the only place in the church in which figure sculpture still remains;
but the whole exterior of the church is remarkable for the fine
architectural character of the sculpture of foliage, which is used with
special lavishness along almost all the string courses. I hardly know
any finer work of its kind, but it is altogether conventional in its
treatment, and arranged with very particular reference to architectural
effect, the foliage in each bay being very nearly identical in its
design. A peculiarity in the external effect of the church is the
lighting of the triforium with separate windows, so that we have three
heights of windows in the elevation belonging to the aisle, triforium,
and clerestory.
Of the various steeples which adorn the church, and whose character is
generally very similar, the most beautiful is, I think, that of the
south transept. The lower stages are lighted with couplets of lancets,
and have buttresses at their angles; above the roof line square
pinnacles are set diagonally at the angles, and in the topmost stage
the tower is an octagon in plan with octagonal angle pinnacles resting
on the square pinnacles below, and lighted by lancet windows of very
light proportions. The octagonal pinnacles are composed entirely of
shafts supporting arches, and are of two stages in height; and within
them are contrived some newel staircases of exquisite design. They
consist of a series of delicate shafts--one on each step, supporting
another above; the capitals of these shafts are all well carved and
with great variety; the effect of this winding cluster of shafts, seen
through and behind the shafts of the pinnacles, is a great lesson in
the beauty of shafts and the value of scientific construction. Much of
the beauty of the design is owing to the very light and airy character
of these angle pinnacles, and it is much to be deplored that the spires
shown in du Sommerard’s view no longer exist.
The small cloister on the south side of the nave is one of the features
to which it would be unpardonable not to refer. It forms only one side
of the enclosure, the east and west ends being occupied by the chapter
room and a groined chapel projecting from the south wall of the nave,
whilst the wall of the aisle forms the north side. The merit of this
cloister is, therefore, not its extent, but the beauty of its design.
The windows are of two lights, and above these is a quatrefoil opening
enclosed within a circular moulding, round which are pierced sixteen
small circles. The tracery was glazed, though the lower part of the
windows appears to have been always open as it is at present. The whole
design is a very good example of plate tracery. The outer wall of the
cloister abuts on the street, and though only pierced with small square
windows, is yet so skilfully buttressed and finished with a cornice so
finely sculptured, as to be a very successful architectural feature. At
the angle of this wall near the south transept doorway, a buttress is
brought out from the transept, and against it is placed, standing on
a corbel under a canopy, a grand angel which now holds a sundial; and
though the dial is not old, I suppose, to judge by the position of the
hand, that it takes the place of one coeval with the fabric. The angle
of this buttress, coming forward rather awkwardly in front of the door,
is cut back in a very skilful manner, and has two recessed shafts with
capitals and bases, affording a capital example of angle decoration.
There is not much of which I need make special mention in the interior.
The main columns are generally plain cylinders, with very large
capitals from which the groining shafts rise; these are banded very
frequently in their height with bad effect. There is the fourfold
division in height to which I have already adverted, and considerable
matter of study in the sculpture of the capitals, which is however in
some cases rather too rude and early in its character.
There is some very fine early glass in the eastern windows of the
choir. In the transept there are two arches across next the wall,
supporting a floor on a level with and connecting the triforia, the
spaciousness of which is quite wonderful. They are groined throughout,
and the views of the church obtained from them are very good. I found
some middle-pointed screens dividing the several bays of the triforium
in the nave, and there was a good deal of thirteenth century glass
lying on boards, and about to undergo restoration. Considerable
alterations were made in the last century by the insertion of chapels
between the buttresses of the choir, but these do not detract much from
the general effect of the church, which exhibits a degree of general
uniformity hardly to be paralleled save at our own Salisbury.
I think it admits of a fair doubt whether such a cluster of similar
great steeples at regular intervals around one building, as we have
here, could ever be perfectly satisfactory; but of the beauty of their
design, taken separately, there cannot be two opinions. It is possible
that if the central lantern had been carried up to a great height,
whatever defect there is might have been rectified, but there is no
sign of any such intention.
To the east and north of the cathedral are very large remains of
buildings of the same date as the cathedral, and fairly perfect in
their external effect. Towards the interior they all rest on open
arcades, whilst on the exterior the outline is well and picturesquely
broken by a series of turrets projecting from the walls of the great
hall of the palace, said to have been built by Bishop Garnier in A.D.
1242.
The bishop’s chapel, a groined building with nave and aisles, and of
two stages in height, still remains. It is of slightly earlier date
than the cathedral, is covered with a roof of one span, and has a very
small apse at the east end.
There seems to have been a communication directly from the bishop’s
palace to the eastern part of the cathedral; and if the people of Laon
were as turbulent as they are said to have been, the bishops were wise
so to place their palace, and so to connect it with the cathedral as
to enable themselves to stand a siege if need be.