It is, therefore, only possible to note the general laws of change;

every scale of pillar, and every weight laid upon it admitting, within

certain limits, a variety out of which the architect has his choice; but

yet fixing limits which the proportion becomes ugly when it approaches,

and dangerous when it exceeds. But the inquiry into this subject is too

difficult for the general reader, and I shall content myself with

proving four laws, easily understood and generally applicable; for proof

of which if the said reader care not, he may miss the next four

paragraphs without harm.

§ XIV. 1. _The more slender the shaft, the greater, proportionally, may

be the projection of the abacus._ For, looking back to Fig. XXIII., let

the height _a b_ be fixed, the length _d b_, the angle _d b c_, and the

depth _d e_. Let the single quantity _b c_ be variable, let B be a

capital and shaft which are found to be perfectly safe in proportion to

the weight they bear, and let the weight be equally distributed over the

whole of the abacus. Then this weight may be represented by any number

of equal divisions, suppose four, as _l_, _m_, _n_, _r_, of brickwork

above, of which each division is one fourth of the whole weight; and let

this weight be placed in the most trying way on the abacus, that is to

say, let the masses _l_ and _r_ be detached from _m_ and _n_, and bear

with their full weight on the outside of the capital. We assume, in B,

that the width of abacus _e f_ is twice as great as that of the shaft,

_b c_, and on these conditions we assume the capital to be safe.

But _b c_ is allowed to be variable. Let it become _b2 c2_ at C, which

is a length representing about the diameter of a shaft containing half

the substance of the shaft B, and, therefore, able to sustain not more

than half the weight sustained by B. But the slope _b d_ and depth _d

e_ remaining unchanged, we have the capital of C, which we are to load

with only half the weight of _l_, _m_, _n_, _r_, i.e., with _l_ and _r_

alone. Therefore the weight of _l_ and _r_, now represented by the

masses _l2_, _r2_, is distributed over the whole of the capital. But the

weight _r_ was adequately supported by the projecting piece of the first

capital _h f c_: much more is it now adequately supported by _i h_, _f2

c2_. Therefore, if the capital of B was safe, that of C is more than

safe. Now in B the length _e f_ was only twice _b c_; but in C, _e2 f2_

will be found more than twice that of _b2_ _c2_. Therefore, the more

slender the shaft, the greater may be the proportional excess of the

abacus over its diameter.

[Illustration: Fig. XXIV.]

§ XV. 2. _The smaller the scale of the building, the greater may be the

excess of the abacus over the diameter of the shaft._ This principle

requires, I think, no very lengthy proof: the reader can understand at

once that the cohesion and strength of stone which can sustain a small

projecting mass, will not sustain a vast one overhanging in the same

proportion. A bank even of loose earth, six feet high, will sometimes

overhang its base a foot or two, as you may see any day in the gravelly

banks of the lanes of Hampstead: but make the bank of gravel, equally

loose, six hundred feet high, and see if you can get it to overhang a

hundred or two! much more if there be weight above it increased in the

same proportion. Hence, let any capital be given, whose projection is

just safe, and no more, on its existing scale; increase its proportions

every way equally, though ever so little, and it is unsafe; diminish

them equally, and it becomes safe in the exact degree of the diminution.

Let, then, the quantity _e d_, and angle _d b c_, at A of Fig. XXIII.,

be invariable, and let the length _d b_ vary: then we shall have such a

series of forms as may be represented by _a_, _b_, _c_, Fig. XXIV., of

which _a_ is a proportion for a colossal building, _b_ for a moderately

sized building, while _c_ could only be admitted on a very small scale

indeed.

§ XVI. 3. _The greater the excess of abacus, the steeper must be the

slope of the bell, the shaft diameter being constant._

This will evidently follow from the considerations in the last

paragraph; supposing only that, instead of the scale of shaft and

capital varying together, the scale of the capital varies alone. For it

will then still be true, that, if the projection of the capital be just

safe on a given scale, as its excess over the shaft diameter increases,

the projection will be unsafe, if the slope of the bell remain constant.

But it may be rendered safe by making this slope steeper, and so

increasing its supporting power.

[Illustration: Fig. XXV.]

Thus let the capital _a_, Fig. XXV., be just safe. Then the capital _b_,

in which the slope is the same but the excess greater, is unsafe. But

the capital _c_, in which, though the excess equals that of _b_, the

steepness of the supporting slope is increased, will be as safe as _b_,

and probably as strong as _a_.[48]

§ XVII. 4. _The steeper the slope of the bell, the thinner may be the

abacus._

The use of the abacus is eminently to equalise the pressure over the

surface of the bell, so that the weight may not by any accident be

directed exclusively upon its edges. In proportion to the strength of

these edges, this function of the abacus is superseded, and these edges

are strong in proportion to the steepness of the slope. Thus in Fig.

XXVI., the bell at _a_ would carry weight safely enough without any

abacus, but that at _c_ would not: it would probably have its edges

broken off. The abacus superimposed might be on _a_ very thin, little

more than formal, as at _b_; but on _c_ must be thick, as at _d_.

[Illustration: Fig. XXVI.]

§ XVIII. These four rules are all that are necessary for general

criticism; and observe that these are only semi-imperative,--rules of

permission, not of compulsion. Thus Law 1 asserts that the slender shaft

_may_ have greater excess of capital than the thick shaft; but it need

not, unless the architect chooses; his thick shafts _must_ have small

excess, but his slender ones need not have large. So Law 2 says, that as

the building is smaller, the excess _may_ be greater; but it need not,

for the excess which is safe in the large is still safer in the small.

So Law 3 says that capitals of great excess must have steep slopes; but

it does not say that capitals of small excess may not have steep slopes

also, if we choose. And lastly, Law 4 asserts the necessity of the thick

abacus for the shallow bell; but the steep bell may have a thick abacus

also.

§ XIX. It will be found, however, that in practice some confession of

these laws will always be useful, and especially of the two first. The

eye always requires, on a slender shaft, a more spreading capital than

it does on a massy one, and a bolder mass of capital on a small scale

than on a large. And, in the application of the first rule, it is to be

noted that a shaft becomes slender either by diminution of diameter or

increase of height; that either mode of change presupposes the weight

above it diminished, and requires an expansion of abacus. I know no mode

of spoiling a noble building more frequent in actual practice than the

imposition of flat and slightly expanded capitals on tall shafts.

§ XX. The reader must observe, also, that, in the demonstration of the

four laws, I always assumed the weight above to be given. By the

alteration of this weight, therefore, the architect has it in his power

to relieve, and therefore alter, the forms of his capitals. By its

various distribution on their centres or edges, the slope of their bells

and thickness of abaci will be affected also; so that he has countless

expedients at his command for the various treatment of his design. He

can divide his weights among more shafts; he can throw them in different

places and different directions on the abaci; he can alter slope of

bells or diameter of shafts; he can use spurred or plain bells, thin or

thick abaci; and all these changes admitting of infinity in their

degrees, and infinity a thousand times told in their relations: and all

this without reference to decoration, merely with the five forms of

block capital!

§ XXI. In the harmony of these arrangements, in their fitness, unity,

and accuracy, lies the true proportion of every building,--proportion

utterly endless in its infinities of change, with unchanged beauty. And

yet this connexion of the frame of their building into one harmony has,

I believe, never been so much as dreamed of by architects. It has been

instinctively done in some degree by many, empirically in some degree by

many more; thoughtfully and thoroughly, I believe, by none.

§ XXII. We have hitherto considered the abacus as necessarily a separate

stone from the bell: evidently, however, the strength of the capital

will be undiminished if both are cut out of one block. This is actually

the case in many capitals, especially those on a small scale; and in

others the detached upper stone is a mere representative of the abacus,

and is much thinner than the form of the capital requires, while the

true abacus is united with the bell, and concealed by its decoration, or

made part of it.

§ XXIII. Farther. We have hitherto considered bell and abacus as both

derived from the concentration of the cornice. But it must at once occur

to the reader, that the projection of the under stone and the thickness

of the upper, which are quite enough for the work of the continuous

cornice, may not be enough always, or rather are seldom likely to be so,

for the harder work of the capital. Both may have to be deepened and

expanded: but as this would cause a want of harmony in the parts, when

they occur on the same level, it is better in such case to let the

_entire_ cornice form the abacus of the capital, and put a deep capital

bell beneath it.

§ XXIV. The reader will understand both arrangements instantly by two

examples. Fig. XXVII. represents two windows, more than usually

beautiful examples of a very frequent Venetian form. Here the deep

cornice or string course which runs along the wall of the house is quite

strong enough for the work of the capitals of the slender shafts: its

own upper stone is therefore also theirs; its own lower stone, by its

revolution or concentration, forms their bells: but to mark the

increased importance of its function in so doing, it receives

decoration, as the bell of the capital, which it did not receive as the

under stone of the cornice.

[Illustration: Fig. XXVII.]

In Fig. XXVIII., a little bit of the church of Santa Fosca at Torcello,

the cornice or string course, which goes round every part of the church,

is not strong enough to form the capitals of the shafts. It therefore

forms their abaci only; and in order to mark the diminished importance

of its function, it ceases to receive, as the abacus of the capital, the

decoration which it received as the string course of the wall.

This last arrangement is of great frequency in Venice, occurring most

characteristically in St. Mark's: and in the Gothic of St. John and Paul

we find the two arrangements beautifully united, though in great

simplicity; the string courses of the walls form the capitals of the

shafts of the traceries; and the abaci of the vaulting shafts of the

apse.

[Illustration: Fig. XXVIII.]

§ XXV. We have hitherto spoken of capitals of circular shafts only:

those of square piers are more frequently formed by the cornice only;

otherwise they are like those of circular piers, without the difficulty

of reconciling the base of the bell with its head.

§ XXVI. When two or more shafts are grouped together, their capitals are

usually treated as separate, until they come into actual contact. If

there be any awkwardness in the junction, it is concealed by the

decoration, and one abacus serves, in most cases, for all. The double

group, Fig. XXVII., is the simplest possible type of the arrangement. In

the richer Northern Gothic groups of eighteen or twenty shafts cluster

together, and sometimes the smaller shafts crouch under the capitals of

the larger, and hide their heads in the crannies, with small nominal

abaci of their own, while the larger shafts carry the serviceable abacus

of the whole pier, as in the nave of Rouen. There is, however, evident

sacrifice of sound principle in this system, the smaller abaci being of

no use. They are the exact contrary of the rude early abacus at Milan,

given in Plate XVII. There one poor abacus stretched itself out to do

all the work: here there are idle abaci getting up into corners and

doing none.

§ XXVII. Finally, we have considered the capital hitherto entirely as an

expansion of the bearing power of the shaft, supposing the shaft

composed of a single stone. But, evidently, the capital has a function,

if possible, yet more important, when the shaft is composed of small

masonry. It enables all that masonry to act together, and to receive the

pressure from above collectively and with a single strength. And thus,

considered merely as a large stone set on the top of the shaft, it is a

feature of the highest architectural importance, irrespective of its

expansion, which indeed is, in some very noble capitals, exceedingly

small. And thus every large stone set at any important point to

reassemble the force of smaller masonry and prepare it for the

sustaining of weight, is a capital or "head" stone (the true meaning of

the word) whether it project or not. Thus at 6, in Plate IV., the stones

which support the thrust of the brickwork are capitals, which have no

projection at all; and the large stones in the window above are capitals

projecting in one direction only.

§ XXVIII. The reader is now master of all he need know respecting

construction of capitals; and from what has been laid before him, must

assuredly feel that there can never be any new system of architectural

forms invented; but that all vertical support must be, to the end of

time, best obtained by shafts and capitals. It has been so obtained by

nearly every nation of builders, with more or less refinement in the

management of the details; and the later Gothic builders of the North

stand almost alone in their effort to dispense with the natural

development of the shaft, and banish the capital from their

compositions.

They were gradually led into this error through a series of steps which

it is not here our business to trace. But they may be generalised in a

few words.

§ XXIX. All classical architecture, and the Romanesque which is

legitimately descended from it, is composed of bold independent shafts,

plain or fluted, with bold detached capitals, forming arcades or

colonnades where they are needed; and of walls whose apertures are

surrounded by courses of parallel lines called mouldings, which are

continuous round the apertures, and have neither shafts nor capitals.

The shaft system and moulding system are entirely separate.

The Gothic architects confounded the two. They clustered the shafts till

they looked like a group of mouldings. They shod and capitaled the

mouldings till they looked like a group of shafts. So that a pier became

merely the side of a door or window rolled up, and the side of the

window a pier unrolled (vide last Chapter, § XXX.), both being composed

of a series of small shafts, each with base and capital. The architect

seemed to have whole mats of shafts at his disposal, like the rush mats

which one puts under cream cheese. If he wanted a great pier he rolled

up the mat; if he wanted the side of a door he spread out the mat: and

now the reader has to add to the other distinctions between the Egyptian

and the Gothic shaft, already noted in § XXVI. of Chap. VIII., this one

more--the most important of all--that while the Egyptian rush cluster

has only one massive capital altogether, the Gothic rush mat has a

separate tiny capital to every several rush.

§ XXX. The mats were gradually made of finer rushes, until it became

troublesome to give each rush its capital. In fact, when the groups of

shafts became excessively complicated, the expansion of their small

abaci was of no use: it was dispensed with altogether, and the mouldings

of pier and jamb ran up continuously into the arches.

This condition, though in many respects faulty and false, is yet the

eminently characteristic state of Gothic: it is the definite formation

of it as a distinct style, owing no farther aid to classical models; and

its lightness and complexity render it, when well treated, and enriched

with Flamboyant decoration, a very glorious means of picturesque effect.

It is, in fact, this form of Gothic which commends itself most easily to

the general mind, and which has suggested the innumerable foolish

theories about the derivation of Gothic from tree trunks and avenues,

which have from time to time been brought forward by persons ignorant of

the history of architecture.

§ XXXI. When the sense of picturesqueness, as well as that of justness

and dignity, had been lost, the spring of the continuous mouldings was

replaced by what Professor Willis calls the Discontinuous impost; which,

being a barbarism of the basest and most painful kind, and being to

architecture what the setting of a saw is to music, I shall not trouble

the reader to examine. For it is not in my plan to note for him all the

various conditions of error, but only to guide him to the appreciation

of the right; and I only note even the true Continuous or Flamboyant

Gothic because this is redeemed by its beautiful decoration, afterwards

to be considered. For, as far as structure is concerned, the moment the

capital vanishes from the shaft, that moment we are in error: all good

Gothic has true capitals to the shafts of its jambs and traceries, and

all Gothic is debased the instant the shaft vanishes. It matters not how

slender, or how small, or how low, the shaft may be: wherever there is

indication of concentrated vertical support, then the capital is a

necessary termination. I know how much Gothic, otherwise beautiful, this

sweeping principle condemns; but it condemns not altogether. We may

still take delight in its lovely proportions, its rich decoration, or

its elastic and reedy moulding; but be assured, wherever shafts, or any

approximations to the forms of shafts, are employed, for whatever

office, or on whatever scale, be it in jambs or piers, or balustrades,

or traceries, without capitals, there is a defiance of the natural laws

of construction; and that, wherever such examples are found in ancient

buildings, they are either the experiments of barbarism, or the

commencements of decline.

FOOTNOTES:

[47] Appendix 19, "Early English Capitals."

[48] In this case the weight borne is supposed to increase as the

abacus widens; the illustration would have been clearer if I had

assumed the breadth of abacus to be constant, and that of the shaft

to vary.

CHAPTER X.

THE ARCH LINE.

§ I. We have seen in the last section how our means of vertical support

may, for the sake of economy both of space and material, be gathered

into piers or shafts, and directed to the sustaining of particular

points. The next question is how to connect these points or tops of

shafts with each other, so as to be able to lay on them a continuous

roof. This the reader, as before, is to favor me by finding out for

himself, under these following conditions.

Let _s_, _s_, Fig. XXIX. opposite, be two shafts, with their capitals

ready prepared for their work; and _a_, _b_, _b_, and _c_, _c_, _c_, be

six stones of different sizes, one very long and large, and two smaller,

and three smaller still, of which the reader is to choose which he likes

best, in order to connect the tops of the shafts.

I suppose he will first try if he can lift the great stone _a_, and if he

can, he will put it very simply on the tops of the two pillars, as at A.

Very well indeed: he has done already what a number of Greek architects

have been thought very clever for having done. But suppose he _cannot_

lift the great stone _a_, or suppose I will not give it to him, but only

the two smaller stones at _b_, _b_; he will doubtless try to put them

up, tilted against each other, as at _d_. Very awkward this; worse than

card-house building. But if he cuts off the corners of the stones, so as

to make each of them of the form _e_, they will stand up very securely,

as at B.

But suppose he cannot lift even these less stones, but can raise those

at _c_, _c_, _c_. Then, cutting each of them into the form at _e_, he

will doubtless set them up as at _f_.

[Illustration: Fig. XXIX.]

§ II. This last arrangement looks a little dangerous. Is there not a

chance of the stone in the middle pushing the others out, or tilting

them up and aside, and slipping down itself between them? There is such

a chance: and if by somewhat altering the form of the stones, we can

diminish this chance, all the better. I must say "we" now, for perhaps I

may have to help the reader a little.

The danger is, observe, that the midmost stone at _f_ pushes out the

side ones: then if we can give the side ones such a shape as that, left

to themselves, they would fall heavily forward, they will resist this

push _out_ by their weight, exactly in proportion to their own

particular inclination or desire to tumble _in_. Take one of them

separately, standing up as at _g_; it is just possible it may stand up

as it is, like the Tower of Pisa: but we want it to fall forward.

Suppose we cut away the parts that are shaded at _h_ and leave it as at

_i_, it is very certain it cannot stand alone now, but will fall forward

to our entire satisfaction.

Farther: the midmost stone at _f_ is likely to be troublesome chiefly by

its weight, pushing down between the others; the more we lighten it the

better: so we will cut it into exactly the same shape as the side ones,

chiselling away the shaded parts, as at _h_. We shall then have all the

three stones _k_, _l_, _m_, of the same shape; and now putting them

together, we have, at C, what the reader, I doubt not, will perceive at

once to be a much more satisfactory arrangement than that at _f_.

§ III. We have now got three arrangements; in one using only one piece

of stone, in the second two, and in the third three. The first

arrangement has no particular name, except the "horizontal:" but the

single stone (or beam, it may be,) is called a lintel; the second

arrangement is called a "Gable;" the third an "Arch."

We might have used pieces of wood instead of stone in all these

arrangements, with no difference in plan, so long as the beams were kept

loose, like the stones; but as beams can be securely nailed together at

the ends, we need not trouble ourselves so much about their shape or

balance, and therefore the plan at _f_ is a peculiarly wooden

construction (the reader will doubtless recognise in it the profile of

many a farm-house roof): and again, because beams are tough, and light,

and long, as compared with stones, they are admirably adapted for the

constructions at A and B, the plain lintel and gable, while that at C

is, for the most part, left to brick and stone.

§ IV. But farther. The constructions, A, B, and C, though very

conveniently to be first considered as composed of one, two, and three

pieces, are by no means necessarily so. When we have once cut the stones

of the arch into a shape like that of _k_, _l_, and _m_, they will hold

together, whatever their number, place, or size, as at _n_; and the

great value of the arch is, that it permits small stones to be used with

safety instead of large ones, which are not always to be had. Stones cut

into the shape of _k_, _l_, and _m_, whether they be short or long (I

have drawn them all sizes at _n_ on purpose), are called Voussoirs; this

is a hard, ugly French name; but the reader will perhaps be kind enough

to recollect it; it will save us both some trouble: and to make amends

for this infliction, I will relieve him of the term _keystone_. One

voussoir is as much a keystone as another; only people usually call the

stone which is last put in the keystone; and that one happens generally

to be at the top or middle of the arch.

§ V. Not only the arch, but even the lintel, may be built of many stones

or bricks. The reader may see lintels built in this way over most of the

windows of our brick London houses, and so also the gable: there are,

therefore, two distinct questions respecting each arrangement;--First,

what is the line or direction of it, which gives it its strength? and,

secondly, what is the manner of masonry of it, which gives it its

consistence? The first of these I shall consider in this Chapter under

the head of the Arch Line, using the term arch as including all manner

of construction (though we shall have no trouble except about curves);

and in the next Chapter I shall consider the second, under the head,

Arch Masonry.

§ VI. Now the arch line is the ghost or skeleton of the arch; or rather

it is the spinal marrow of the arch, and the voussoirs are the vertebræ,

which keep it safe and sound, and clothe it. This arch line the

architect has first to conceive and shape in his mind, as opposed to, or

having to bear, certain forces which will try to distort it this way and

that; and against which he is first to direct and bend the line itself

into as strong resistance as he may, and then, with his voussoirs and

what else he can, to guard it, and help it, and keep it to its duty and

in its shape. So the arch line is the moral character of the arch, and

the adverse forces are its temptations; and the voussoirs, and what else

we may help it with, are its armor and its motives to good conduct.

§ VII. This moral character of the arch is called by architects its

"Line of Resistance." There is a great deal of nicety in calculating it

with precision, just as there is sometimes in finding out very precisely

what is a man's true line of moral conduct; but this, in arch morality

and in man morality, is a very simple and easily to be understood

principle,--that if either arch or man expose themselves to their

special temptations or adverse forces, _outside_ of the voussoirs or

proper and appointed armor, both will fall. An arch whose line of

resistance is in the middle of its voussoirs is perfectly safe: in

proportion as the said line runs near the edge of its voussoirs, the

arch is in danger, as the man is who nears temptation; and the moment

the line of resistance emerges out of the voussoirs the arch falls.

§ VIII. There are, therefore, properly speaking, two arch lines. One is

the visible direction or curve of the arch, which may generally be

considered as the under edge of its voussoirs, and which has often no

more to do with the real stability of the arch, than a man's apparent

conduct has with his heart. The other line, which is the line of

resistance, or line of good behavior, may or may not be consistent with

the outward and apparent curves of the arch; but if not, then the

security of the arch depends simply upon this, whether the voussoirs

which assume or pretend to the one line are wide enough to include the

other.

§ IX. Now when the reader is told that the line of resistance varies

with every change either in place or quantity of the weight above the

arch, he will see at once that we have no chance of arranging arches by

their moral characters: we can only take the apparent arch line, or

visible direction, as a ground of arrangement. We shall consider the

possible or probable forms or contours of arches in the present Chapter,

and in the succeeding one the forms of voussoir and other help which

may best fortify these visible lines against every temptation to lose

their consistency.

[Illustration: Fig. XXX.]

§ X. Look back to Fig. XXIX. Evidently the abstract or ghost line of the

arrangement at A is a plain horizontal line, as here at _a_, Fig. XXX.

The abstract line of the arrangement at B, Fig. XXIX., is composed of

two straight lines, set against each other, as here at _b_. The abstract

line of C, Fig. XXIX., is a curve of some kind, not at present

determined, suppose _c_, Fig. XXX. Then, as _b_ is two of the straight

lines at _a_, set up against each other, we may conceive an arrangement,

_d_, made up of two of the curved lines at _c_, set against each other.

This is called a pointed arch, which is a contradiction in terms: it

ought to be called a curved gable; but it must keep the name it has got.

Now _a_, _b_, _c_, _d_, Fig. XXX., are the ghosts of the lintel, the

gable, the arch, and the pointed arch. With the poor lintel ghost we

need trouble ourselves no farther; there are no changes in him: but

there is much variety in the other three, and the method of their

variety will be best discerned by studying _b_ and _d_, as subordinate

to and connected with the simple arch at _c_.

§ XI. Many architects, especially the worst, have been very curious in

designing out of the way arches,--elliptical arches, and four-centred

arches, so called, and other singularities. The good architects have

generally been content, and we for the present will be so, with God's

arch, the arch of the rainbow and of the apparent heaven, and which the

sun shapes for us as it sets and rises. Let us watch the sun for a

moment as it climbs: when it is a quarter up, it will give us the arch

_a_, Fig. XXXI.; when it is half up, _b_, and when three quarters up,

_c_. There will be an infinite number of arches between these, but we

will take these as sufficient representatives of all. Then _a_ is the

low arch, _b_ the central or pure arch, _c_ the high arch, and the rays

of the sun would have drawn for us their voussoirs.

§ XII. We will take these several arches successively, and fixing the

top of each accurately, draw two right lines thence to its base, _d_,

_e_, _f_, Fig. XXXI. Then these lines give us the relative gables of

each of the arches; _d_ is the Italian or southern gable, _e_ the

central gable, _f_ the Gothic gable.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXI.]

§ XIII. We will again take the three arches with their gables in

succession, and on each of the sides of the gable, between it and the

arch, we will describe another arch, as at _g_, _h_, _i_. Then the

curves so described give the pointed arches belonging to each of the

round arches; _g_, the flat pointed arch, _h_, the central pointed arch,

and _i_, the lancet pointed arch.

§ XIV. If the radius with which these intermediate curves are drawn be

the base of _f_, the last is the equilateral pointed arch, one of great

importance in Gothic work. But between the gable and circle, in all the

three figures, there are an infinite number of pointed arches,

describable with different radii; and the three round arches, be it

remembered, are themselves representatives of an infinite number,

passing from the flattest conceivable curve, through the semicircle and

horseshoe, up to the full circle.

The central and the last group are the most important. The central

round, or semicircle, is the Roman, the Byzantine, and Norman arch; and

its relative pointed includes one wide branch of Gothic. The horseshoe

round is the Arabic and Moorish arch, and its relative pointed includes

the whole range of Arabic and lancet, or Early English and French

Gothics. I mean of course by the relative pointed, the entire group of

which the equilateral arch is the representative. Between it and the

outer horseshoe, as this latter rises higher, the reader will find, on

experiment, the great families of what may be called the horseshoe

pointed,--curves of the highest importance, but which are all included,

with English lancet, under the term, relative pointed of the horseshoe

arch.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXII.]

§ XV. The groups above described are all formed of circular arcs, and

include all truly useful and beautiful arches for ordinary work. I

believe that singular and complicated curves are made use of in modern

engineering, but with these the general reader can have no concern: the

Ponte della Trinita at Florence is the most graceful instance I know of

such structure; the arch made use of being very subtle, and

approximating to the low ellipse; for which, in common work, a barbarous

pointed arch, called four-centred, and composed of bits of circles, is

substituted by the English builders. The high ellipse, I believe, exists

in eastern architecture. I have never myself met with it on a large

scale; but it occurs in the niches of the later portions of the Ducal

palace at Venice, together with a singular hyperbolic arch, _a_ in Fig.

XXXIII., to be described hereafter: with such caprices we are not here

concerned.

§ XVI. We are, however, concerned to notice the absurdity of another

form of arch, which, with the four-centred, belongs to the English

perpendicular Gothic.

Taking the gable of any of the groups in Fig. XXXI. (suppose the

equilateral), here at _b_, in Fig. XXXIII., the dotted line representing

the relative pointed arch, we may evidently conceive an arch formed by

reversed curves on the inside of the gable, as here shown by the inner

curved lines. I imagine the reader by this time knows enough of the

nature of arches to understand that, whatever strength or stability was

gained by the curve on the _outside_ of the gable, exactly so much is

lost by curves on the _inside_. The natural tendency of such an arch to

dissolution by its own mere weight renders it a feature of detestable

ugliness, wherever it occurs on a large scale. It is eminently

characteristic of Tudor work, and it is the profile of the Chinese roof

(I say on a large scale, because this as well as all other capricious

arches, may be made secure by their masonry when small, but not

otherwise). Some allowable modifications of it will be noticed in the

chapter on Roofs.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXIII.]

§ XVII. There is only one more form of arch which we have to notice.

When the last described arch is used, not as the principal arrangement,

but as a mere heading to a common pointed arch, we have the form _c_,

Fig. XXXIII. Now this is better than the entirely reversed arch for two

reasons; first, less of the line is weakened by reversing; secondly, the

double curve has a very high æsthetic value, not existing in the mere

segments of circles. For these reasons arches of this kind are not only

admissible, but even of great desirableness, when their scale and

masonry render them secure, but above a certain scale they are

altogether barbarous; and, with the reversed Tudor arch, wantonly

employed, are the characteristics of the worst and meanest schools of

architecture, past or present.

This double curve is called the Ogee; it is the profile of many German

leaden roofs, of many Turkish domes (there more excusable, because

associated and in sympathy with exquisitely managed arches of the same

line in the walls below), of Tudor turrets, as in Henry the Seventh's

Chapel, and it is at the bottom or top of sundry other blunders all over

the world.

§ XVIII. The varieties of the ogee curve are infinite, as the reversed

portion of it may be engrafted on every other form of arch, horseshoe,

round, or pointed. Whatever is generally worthy of note in these

varieties, and in other arches of caprice, we shall best discover by

examining their masonry; for it is by their good masonry only that they

are rendered either stable or beautiful. To this question, then, let us

address ourselves.

CHAPTER XI.

THE ARCH MASONRY.

§ I. On the subject of the stability of arches, volumes have been

written and volumes more are required. The reader will not, therefore,

expect from me any very complete explanation of its conditions within

the limits of a single chapter. But that which is necessary for him to

know is very simple and very easy; and yet, I believe, some part of it

is very little known, or noticed.

We must first have a clear idea of what is meant by an arch. It is a

curved _shell_ of firm materials, on whose back a burden is to be laid

of _loose_ materials. So far as the materials above it are _not loose_,

but themselves hold together, the opening below is not an arch, but an

_excavation_. Note this difference very carefully. If the King of

Sardinia tunnels through the Mont Cenis, as he proposes, he will not

require to build a brick arch under his tunnel to carry the weight of

the Mont Cenis: that would need scientific masonry indeed. The Mont

Cenis will carry itself, by its own cohesion, and a succession of

invisible granite arches, rather larger than the tunnel. But when Mr.

Brunel tunnelled the Thames bottom, he needed to build a brick arch to

carry the six or seven feet of mud and the weight of water above. That

is a type of all arches proper.

§ II. Now arches, in practice, partake of the nature of the two. So far

as their masonry above is Mont-Cenisian, that is to say, colossal in

comparison of them, and granitic, so that the arch is a mere hole in the

rock substance of it, the form of the arch is of no consequence

whatever: it may be rounded, or lozenged, or ogee'd, or anything else;

and in the noblest architecture there is always _some_ character of this

kind given to the masonry. It is independent enough not to care about

the holes cut in it, and does not subside into them like sand. But the

theory of arches does not presume on any such condition of things; it

allows itself only the shell of the arch proper; the vertebræ, carrying

their marrow of resistance; and, above this shell, it assumes the wall

to be in a state of flux, bearing down on the arch, like water or sand,

with its whole weight. And farther, the problem which is to be solved by

the arch builder is not merely to carry this weight, but to carry it

with the least thickness of shell. It is easy to carry it by continually

thickening your voussoirs: if you have six feet depth of sand or gravel

to carry, and you choose to employ granite voussoirs six feet thick, no

question but your arch is safe enough. But it is perhaps somewhat too

costly: the thing to be done is to carry the sand or gravel with brick

voussoirs, six inches thick, or, at any rate, with the least thickness

of voussoir which will be safe; and to do this requires peculiar

arrangement of the lines of the arch. There are many arrangements,

useful all in their way, but we have only to do, in the best

architecture, with the simplest and most easily understood. We have

first to note those which regard the actual shell of the arch, and then

we shall give a few examples of the superseding of such expedients by

Mont-Cenisian masonry.

§ III. What we have to say will apply to all arches, but the central

pointed arch is the best for general illustration. Let _a_, Plate III.,

be the shell of a pointed arch with loose loading above; and suppose you

find that shell not quite thick enough; and that the weight bears too

heavily on the top of the arch, and is likely to break it in: you

proceed to thicken your shell, but need you thicken it all equally? Not

so; you would only waste your good voussoirs. If you have any common

sense you will thicken it at the top, where a Mylodon's skull is

thickened for the same purpose (and some human skulls, I fancy), as at

_b_. The pebbles and gravel above will now shoot off it right and left,

as the bullets do off a cuirassier's breastplate, and will have no

chance of beating it in.

If still it be not strong enough, a farther addition may be made, as at

_c_, now thickening the voussoirs a little at the base also. But as this

may perhaps throw the arch inconveniently high, or occasion a waste of

voussoirs at the top, we may employ another expedient.

§ IV. I imagine the reader's common sense, if not his previous

knowledge, will enable him to understand that if the arch at _a_, Plate

III., burst _in_ at the top, it must burst _out_ at the sides. Set up

two pieces of pasteboard, edge to edge, and press them down with your

hand, and you will see them bend out at the sides. Therefore, if you can

keep the arch from starting out at the points _p_, _p_, it _cannot_

curve in at the top, put what weight on it you will, unless by sheer

crushing of the stones to fragments.

§ V. Now you may keep the arch from starting out at _p_ by loading it at

_p_, putting more weight upon it and against it at that point; and this,

in practice, is the way it is usually done. But we assume at present

that the weight above is sand or water, quite unmanageable, not to be

directed to the points we choose; and in practice, it may sometimes

happen that we cannot put weight upon the arch at _p_. We may perhaps

want an opening above it, or it may be at the side of the building, and

many other circumstances may occur to hinder us.

§ VI. But if we are not sure that we can put weight above it, we are

perfectly sure that we can hang weight under it. You may always thicken

your shell inside, and put the weight upon it as at _x x_, in _d_, Plate

III. Not much chance of its bursting out at _p_, now, is there?

§ VII. Whenever, therefore, an arch has to bear vertical pressure, it

will bear it better when its shell is shaped as at _b_ or _d_, than as

at _a_: _b_ and _d_ are, therefore, the types of arches built to resist

vertical pressure, all over the world, and from the beginning of

architecture to its end. None others can be compared with them: all are

imperfect except these.

[Illustration: Plate III.

ARCH MASONRY.]

The added projections at _x x_, in _d_, are called CUSPS, and they are

the very soul and life of the best northern Gothic; yet never thoroughly

understood nor found in perfection, except in Italy, the northern

builders working often, even in the best times, with the vulgar form at

_a_.

The form at _b_ is rarely found in the north: its perfection is in the

Lombardic Gothic; and branches of it, good and bad according to their

use, occur in Saracenic work.

§ VIII. The true and perfect cusp is single only. But it was probably

invented (by the Arabs?) not as a constructive, but a decorative

feature, in pure fantasy; and in early northern work it is only the

application to the arch of the foliation, so called, of penetrated

spaces in stone surfaces, already enough explained in the "Seven Lamps,"

Chap. III., p. 85 _et seq._ It is degraded in dignity, and loses its

usefulness, exactly in proportion to its multiplication on the arch. In

later architecture, especially English Tudor, it is sunk into dotage,

and becomes a simple excrescence, a bit of stone pinched up out of the

arch, as a cook pinches the paste at the edge of a pie.

§ IX. The depth and place of the cusp, that is to say, its exact

application to the shoulder of the curve of the arch, varies with the

direction of the weight to be sustained. I have spent more than a month,

and that in hard work too, in merely trying to get the forms of cusps

into perfect order: whereby the reader may guess that I have not space

to go into the subject now; but I shall hereafter give a few of the

leading and most perfect examples, with their measures and masonry.

§ X. The reader now understands all that he need about the shell of the

arch, considered as an united piece of stone.

He has next to consider the shape of the voussoirs. This, as much as is

required, he will be able best to comprehend by a few examples; by which

I shall be able also to illustrate, or rather which will force me to

illustrate, some of the methods of Mont-Cenisian masonry, which were to

be the second part of our subject.

§ XI. 1 and 2, Plate IV., are two cornices; 1 from St. Antonio, Padua;

2, from the Cathedral of Sens. I want them for cornices; but I have put

them in this plate because, though their arches are filled up behind,

and are in fact mere blocks of stone with arches cut into their faces,

they illustrate the constant masonry of small arches, both in Italian

and Northern Romanesque, but especially Italian, each arch being cut out

of its own proper block of stone: this is Mont-Cenisian enough, on a

small scale.

3 is a window from Carnarvon Castle, and very primitive and interesting

in manner,--one of its arches being of one stone, the other of two. And

here we have an instance of a form of arch which would be barbarous

enough on a large scale, and of many pieces; but quaint and agreeable

thus massively built.

4 is from a little belfry in a Swiss village above Vevay; one fancies

the window of an absurd form, seen in the distance, but one is pleased

with it on seeing its masonry. It could hardly be stronger.

§ XII. These then are arches cut of one block. The next step is to form

them of two pieces, set together at the head of the arch. 6, from the

Eremitani, Padua, is very quaint and primitive in manner: it is a

curious church altogether, and has some strange traceries cut out of

single blocks. One is given in the "Seven Lamps," Plate VII., in the

left-hand corner at the bottom.

7, from the Frari, Venice, very firm and fine, and admirably decorated,

as we shall see hereafter. 5, the simple two-pieced construction,

wrought with the most exquisite proportion and precision of workmanship,

as is everything else in the glorious church to which it belongs, San

Fermo of Verona. The addition of the top piece, which completes the

circle, does not affect the plan of the beautiful arches, with their

simple and perfect cusps; but it is highly curious, and serves to show

how the idea of the cusp rose out of mere foliation. The whole of the

architecture of this church may be characterised as exhibiting the

maxima of simplicity in construction, and perfection in workmanship,--a

rare unison: for, in general, simple designs are rudely worked, and as

the builder perfects his execution, he complicates his plan. Nearly

all the arches of San Fermo are two-pieced.

[Illustration: Plate IV.

ARCH MASONRY.]

§ XIII. We have seen the construction with one and two pieces: _a_ and

_b_, Fig. 8, Plate IV., are the general types of the construction with

three pieces, uncusped and cusped; _c_ and _d_ with five pieces,

uncusped and cusped. Of these the three-pieced construction is of

enormous importance, and must detain us some time. The five-pieced is

the three-pieced with a joint added on each side, and is also of great

importance. The four-pieced, which is the two-pieced with added joints,

rarely occurs, and need not detain us.

§ XIV. It will be remembered that in first working out the principle of

the arch, we composed the arch of three pieces. Three is the smallest

number which can exhibit the real _principle_ of arch masonry, and it

may be considered as representative of all arches built on that

principle; the one and two-pieced arches being microscopic

Mont-Cenisian, mere caves in blocks of stone, or gaps between two rocks

leaning together.

But the three-pieced arch is properly representative of all; and the

larger and more complicated constructions are merely produced by keeping

the central piece for what is called a keystone, and putting additional

joints at the sides. Now so long as an arch is pure circular or pointed,

it does not matter how many joints or voussoirs you have, nor where the

joints are; nay, you may joint your keystone itself, and make it

two-pieced. But if the arch be of any bizarre form, especially ogee, the

joints must be in particular places, and the masonry simple, or it will

not be thoroughly good and secure; and the fine schools of the ogee arch

have only arisen in countries where it was the custom to build arches of

few pieces.

§ XV. The typical pure pointed arch of Venice is a five-pieced arch,

with its stones in three orders of magnitude, the longest being the

lowest, as at _b2_, Plate III. If the arch be very large, a fourth order

of magnitude is added, as at _a2_. The portals of the palaces of Venice

have one or other of these masonries, almost without exception. Now, as

one piece is added to make a larger door, one piece is taken away to

make a smaller one, or a window, and the masonry type of the Venetian

Gothic window is consequently three-pieced, _c2_.

§ XVI. The reader knows already where a cusp is useful. It is wanted, he

will remember, to give weight to those side stones, and draw them

inwards against the thrust of the top stone. Take one of the side stones

of _c2_ out for a moment, as at _d_. Now the _proper_ place of the cusp

upon it varies with the weight which it bears or requires; but in

practice this nicety is rarely observed; the place of the cusp is almost

always determined by æsthetic considerations, and it is evident that the

variations in its place may be infinite. Consider the cusp as a wave

passing up the side stone from its bottom to its top; then you will have

the succession of forms from _e_ to _g_ (Plate III.), with infinite

degrees of transition from each to each; but of which you may take _e_,

_f_, and _g_, as representing three great families of cusped arches. Use

_e_ for your side stones, and you have an arch as that at _h_ below,

which may be called a down-cusped arch. Use _f_ for the side stone, and

you have _i_, which may be called a mid-cusped arch. Use _g_, and you

have _k_, an up-cusped arch.

§ XVII. The reader will observe that I call the arch mid-cusped, not

when the cusped point is in the middle of the curve of the arch, but

when it is in the middle of the _side piece_, and also that where the

side pieces join the keystone there will be a change, perhaps somewhat

abrupt, in the curvature.

I have preferred to call the arch mid-cusped with respect to its side

piece than with respect to its own curve, because the most beautiful

Gothic arches in the world, those of the Lombard Gothic, have, in all

the instances I have examined, a form more or less approximating to this

mid-cusped one at _i_ (Plate III.), but having the curvature of the cusp

carried up into the keystone, as we shall see presently: where, however,

the arch is built of many voussoirs, a mid-cusped arch will mean one

which has the point of the cusp midway between its own base and apex.

The Gothic arch of Venice is almost invariably up-cusped, as at _k_.

The reader may note that, in both down-cusped and up-cusped arches, the

piece of stone, added to form the cusp, is of the shape of a scymitar,

held down in the one case and up in the other.

§ XVIII. Now, in the arches _h_, _i_, _k_, a slight modification has

been made in the form of the central piece, in order that it may

continue the curve of the cusp. This modification is not to be given to

it in practice without considerable nicety of workmanship; and some

curious results took place in Venice from this difficulty.

At _l_ (Plate III.) is the shape of the Venetian side stone, with its

cusp detached from the arch. Nothing can possibly be better or more

graceful, or have the weight better disposed in order to cause it to nod

forwards against the keystone, as above explained, Ch. X. § II., where I

developed the whole system of the arch from three pieces, in order that

the reader might now clearly see the use of the weight of the cusp.

Now a Venetian Gothic palace has usually at least three stories; with

perhaps ten or twelve windows in each story, and this on two or three of

its sides, requiring altogether some hundred to a hundred and fifty side

pieces.

I have no doubt, from observation of the way the windows are set

together, that the side pieces were carved in pairs, like hooks, of

which the keystones were to be the eyes; that these side pieces were

ordered by the architect in the gross, and were used by him sometimes

for wider, sometimes for narrower windows; bevelling the two ends as

required, fitting in keystones as he best could, and now and then

varying the arrangement by turning the side pieces _upside down_.

There were various conveniences in this way of working, one of the

principal being that the side pieces with their cusps were always cut to

their complete form, and that no part of the cusp was carried out into

the keystone, which followed the curve of the outer arch itself. The

ornaments of the cusp might thus be worked without any troublesome

reference to the rest of the arch.

§ XIX. Now let us take a pair of side pieces, made to order, like that

at _l_, and see what we can make of them. We will try to fit them first

with a keystone which continues the curve of the outer arch, as at _m_.

This the reader assuredly thinks an ugly arch. There are a great many of

them in Venice, the ugliest things there, and the Venetian builders

quickly began to feel them so. What could they do to better them? The

arch at _m_ has a central piece of the form _r_. Substitute for it a

piece of the form _s_, and we have the arch at _n_.

§ XX. This arch at _n_ is not so strong as that at _m_; but, built of

good marble, and with its pieces of proper thickness, it is quite strong

enough for all practical purposes on a small scale. I have examined at

least two thousand windows of this kind and of the other Venetian ogees,

of which that at _y_ (in which the plain side-piece _d_ is used instead

of the cusped one) is the simplest; and I never found _one_, even in the

most ruinous palaces (in which they had had to sustain the distorted

weight of falling walls) in which the central piece was fissured; and

this is the only danger to which the window is exposed; in other

respects it is as strong an arch as can be built.

It is not to be supposed that the change from the _r_ keystone to the

_s_ keystone was instantaneous. It was a change wrought out by many

curious experiments, which we shall have to trace hereafter, and to

throw the resultant varieties of form into their proper groups.

§ XXI. One step more: I take a mid-cusped side piece in its block form

at _t_, with the bricks which load the back of it. Now, as these bricks

support it behind, and since, as far as the use of the cusp is

concerned, it matters not whether its weight be in marble or bricks,

there is nothing to hinder us from cutting out some of the marble, as at

_u_, and filling up the space with bricks. (_Why_ we should take a fancy

to do this, I do not pretend to guess at present; all I have to assert

is, that, if the fancy should strike us, there would be no harm in it).

Substituting this side piece for the other in the window _n_, we have

that at _w_, which may, perhaps, be of some service to us afterwards;

here we have nothing more to do with it than to note that, thus built,

and properly backed by brickwork, it is just as strong and safe a

form as that at _n_; but that this, as well as every variety of ogee

arch, depends entirely for its safety, fitness, and beauty, on the

masonry which we have just analysed; and that, built on a large scale,

and with many voussoirs, all such arches would be unsafe and absurd in

general architecture. Yet they may be used occasionally for the sake of

the exquisite beauty of which their rich and fantastic varieties admit,

and sometimes for the sake of another merit, exactly the opposite of the

constructional ones we are at present examining, that they seem to stand

by enchantment.

[Illustration: Plate V.

Arch Masonry.

BRULETTO OF COMO.]

§ XXII. In the above reasonings, the inclination of the joints of the

voussoirs to the curves of the arch has not been considered. It is a

question of much nicety, and which I have not been able as yet fully to

investigate: but the natural idea of the arrangement of these lines

(which in round arches are of course perpendicular to the curve) would

be that every voussoir should have the lengths of its outer and inner

arched surface in the same proportion to each other. Either this actual

law, or a close approximation to it, is assuredly enforced in the best

Gothic buildings.

§ XXIII. I may sum up all that it is necessary for the reader to keep in

mind of the general laws connected with this subject, by giving him an

example of each of the two forms of the perfect Gothic arch, uncusped

and cusped, treated with the most simple and magnificent masonry, and

partly, in both cases, Mont-Cenisian.

The first, Plate V., is a window from the Broletto of Como. It shows, in

its filling, first, the single-pieced arch, carried on groups of four

shafts, and a single slab of marble filling the space above, and pierced

with a quatrefoil (Mont-Cenisian, this), while the mouldings above are

each constructed with a separate system of voussoirs, all of them

shaped, I think, on the principle above stated, § XXII., in alternate

serpentine and marble; the outer arch being a noble example of the pure

uncusped Gothic construction, _b_ of Plate III.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXIV.]

§ XXIV. Fig. XXXIV. is the masonry of the side arch of, as far as I know

or am able to judge, the most perfect Gothic sepulchral monument in the

world, the foursquare canopy of the (nameless?)[49] tomb standing over

the small cemetery gate of the Church of St. Anastasia at Verona. I

shall have frequent occasion to recur to this monument, and, I believe,

shall be able sufficiently to justify the terms in which I speak of it:

meanwhile, I desire only that the reader should observe the severity

and simplicity of the arch lines, the exquisitely delicate suggestion of

the ogee curve in the apex, and chiefly the use of the cusp in giving

_inward_ weight to the great pieces of stone on the flanks of the arch,

and preventing their thrust outwards from being severely thrown on the

lowermost stones. The effect of this arrangement is, that the whole

massy canopy is sustained safely by four slender pillars (as will be

seen hereafter in the careful plate I hope to give of it), these pillars

being rather steadied than materially assisted against the thrust, by

iron bars, about an inch thick, connecting them at the heads of the

abaci; a feature of peculiar importance in this monument, inasmuch as we

know it to be part of the original construction, by a beautiful little

Gothic wreathed pattern, like one of the hems of garments of Fra

Angelico, running along the iron bar itself. So carefully, and so far,

is the system of decoration carried out in this pure and lovely

monument, my most beloved throughout all the length and breadth of

Italy;--chief, as I think, among all the sepulchral marbles of a land of

mourning.

FOOTNOTES:

[49] At least I cannot find any account of it in Maffei's "Verona,"

nor anywhere else, to be depended upon. It is, I doubt not, a work

of the beginning of the thirteenth century. Vide Appendix 19, "Tombs

at St. Anastasia."

CHAPTER XII.

THE ARCH LOAD.

§ I. In the preceding enquiry we have always supposed either that the

load upon the arch was perfectly loose, as of gravel or sand, or that it

was Mont-Cenisian, and formed one mass with the arch voussoirs, of more

or less compactness.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXV.]

In practice, the state is usually something between the two. Over

bridges and tunnels it sometimes approaches to the condition of mere

dust or yielding earth; but in architecture it is mostly firm masonry,

not altogether acting with the voussoirs, yet by no means bearing on

them with perfectly dead weight, but locking itself together above them,

and capable of being thrown into forms which relieve them, in some

degree, from its pressure.

§ II. It is evident that if we are to place a continuous roof above the

line of arches, we must fill up the intervals between them on the tops

of the columns. We have at present nothing granted us but the bare

masonry, as here at _a_, Fig. XXXV., and we must fill up the intervals

between the semicircle so as to obtain a level line of support. We may

first do this simply as at _b_, with plain mass of wall; so laying the

roof on the top, which is the method of the pure Byzantine and Italian

Romanesque. But if we find too much stress is thus laid on the arches,

we may introduce small second shafts on the top of the great shaft, _a_,

Fig. XXXVI., which may assist in carrying the roof, conveying great part

of its weight at once to the heads of the main shafts, and relieving

from its pressure the centres of the arches.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXVI.]

§ III. The new shaft thus introduced may either remain lifted on the

head of the great shaft, or may be carried to the ground in front of it,

or through it, _b_, Fig. XXXVI.; in which latter case the main shaft

divides into two or more minor shafts, and forms a group with the shaft

brought down from above.

§ IV. When this shaft, brought from roof to ground, is subordinate to

the main pier, and either is carried down the face of it, or forms no

large part of the group, the principle is Romanesque or Gothic, _b_,

Fig. XXXVI. When it becomes a bold central shaft, and the main pier

splits into two minor shafts on its sides, the principle is Classical or

Palladian, _c_, Fig. XXXVI. Which latter arrangement becomes absurd or

unsatisfactory in proportion to the sufficiency of the main shaft to

carry the roof without the help of the minor shafts or arch, which in

many instances of Palladian work look as if they might be removed

without danger to the building.

§ V. The form _a_ is a more pure Northern Gothic type than even _b_,

which is the connecting link between it and the classical type. It is

found chiefly in English and other northern Gothic, and in early

Lombardic, and is, I doubt not, derived as above explained, Chap. I. §

XXVII. _b_ is a general French Gothic and French Romanesque form, as in

great purity at Valence.

The small shafts of the form _a_ and _b_, as being northern, are

generally connected with steep vaulted roofs, and receive for that

reason the name of vaulting shafts.

§ VI. Of these forms _b_, Fig. XXXV., is the purest and most sublime,

expressing the power of the arch most distinctly. All the others have

some appearance of dovetailing and morticing of timber rather than

stonework; nor have I ever yet seen a single instance, quite

satisfactory, of the management of the capital of the main shaft, when

it had either to sustain the base of the vaulting shaft, as in _a_, or

to suffer it to pass through it, as in _b_, Fig. XXXVI. Nor is the

bracket which frequently carries the vaulting shaft in English work a

fitting support for a portion of the fabric which is at all events

presumed to carry a considerable part of the weight of the roof.

§ VII. The triangular spaces on the flanks of the arch are called

Spandrils, and if the masonry of these should be found, in any of its

forms, too heavy for the arch, their weight may be diminished, while

their strength remains the same, by piercing them with circular holes or

lights. This is rarely necessary in ordinary architecture, though

sometimes of great use in bridges and iron roofs (a succession of such

circles may be seen, for instance, in the spandrils at the Euston Square

station); but, from its constructional value, it becomes the best form

in which to arrange spandril decorations, as we shall see hereafter.

§ VIII. The height of the load above the arch is determined by the needs

of the building and possible length of the shaft; but with this we have

at present nothing to do, for we have performed the task which was set

us. We have ascertained, as it was required that we should in § VI. of

Chap. III. (A), the construction of walls; (B), that of piers; (C), that

of piers with lintels or arches prepared for roofing. We have next,

therefore, to examine (D) the structure of the roof.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE ROOF.

§ I. Hitherto our enquiry has been unembarrassed by any considerations

relating exclusively either to the exterior or interior of buildings.

But it can remain so no longer. As far as the architect is concerned,

one side of a wall is generally the same as another; but in the roof

there are usually two distinct divisions of the structure; one, a shell,

vault, or flat ceiling, internally visible, the other, an upper

structure, built of timber, to protect the lower; or of some different

form, to support it. Sometimes, indeed, the internally visible structure

is the real roof, and sometimes there are more than two divisions, as in

St. Paul's, where we have a central shell with a mask below and above.

Still it will be convenient to remember the distinction between the part

of the roof which is usually visible from within, and whose only

business is to stand strongly, and not fall in, which I shall call the

Roof Proper; and, secondly, the upper roof, which, being often partly

supported by the lower, is not so much concerned with its own stability

as with the weather, and is appointed to throw off snow, and get rid of

rain, as fast as possible, which I shall call the Roof Mask.

§ II. It is, however, needless for me to engage the reader in the

discussion of the various methods of construction of Roofs Proper, for

this simple reason, that no person without long experience can tell

whether a roof be wisely constructed or not; nor tell at all, even with

help of any amount of experience, without examination of the several

parts and bearings of it, very different from any observation possible

to the general critic: and more than this, the enquiry would be useless

to us in our Venetian studies, where the roofs are either not

contemporary with the buildings, or flat, or else vaults of the simplest

possible constructions, which have been admirably explained by Willis in

his "Architecture of the Middle Ages," Chap. VII., to which I may refer

the reader for all that it would be well for him to know respecting the

connexion of the different parts of the vault with the shafts. He would

also do well to read the passages on Tudor vaulting, pp. 185-193, in Mr.

Garbett's rudimentary Treatise on Design, before alluded to.[50] I shall

content myself therefore with noting one or two points on which neither

writer has had occasion to touch, respecting the Roof Mask.

§ III. It was said in § V. of Chapter III. that we should not have

occasion, in speaking of roof construction, to add materially to the

forms then suggested. The forms which we have to add are only those

resulting from the other curves of the arch developed in the last

chapter; that is to say, the various eastern domes and cupolas arising

out of the revolution of the horseshoe and ogee curves, together with

the well-known Chinese concave roof. All these forms are of course

purely decorative, the bulging outline, or concave surface, being of no

more use, or rather of less, in throwing off snow or rain, than the

ordinary spire and gable; and it is rather curious, therefore, that all

of them, on a small scale, should have obtained so extensive use in

Germany and Switzerland, their native climate being that of the east,

where their purpose seems rather to concentrate light upon their orbed

surfaces. I much doubt their applicability, on a large scale, to

architecture of any admirable dignity; their chief charm is, to the

European eye, that of strangeness; and it seems to me possible that in

the east the bulging form may be also delightful, from the idea of its

enclosing a volume of cool air. I enjoy them in St. Mark's, chiefly

because they increase the fantastic and unreal character of St. Mark's

Place; and because they appear to sympathise with an expression,

common, I think, to all the buildings of that group, of a natural

buoyancy, as if they floated in the air or on the surface of the sea.

But, assuredly, they are not features to be recommended for

imitation.[51]

§ IV. One form, closely connected with the Chinese concave, is, however,

often constructively right,--the gable with an inward angle, occurring

with exquisitely picturesque effect throughout the domestic architecture

of the north, especially Germany and Switzerland; the lower slope being

either an attached external penthouse roof, for protection of the wall,

as in Fig. XXXVII., or else a kind of buttress set on the angle of the

tower; and in either case the roof itself being a simple gable,

continuous beneath it.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXVII.]

§ V. The true gable, as it is the simplest and most natural, so I esteem

it the grandest of roofs; whether rising in ridgy darkness, like a grey

slope of slaty mountains, over the precipitous walls of the northern

cathedrals, or stretched in burning breadth above the white and

square-set groups of the southern architecture. But this difference

between its slope in the northern and southern structure is a matter of

far greater importance than is commonly supposed, and it is this to

which I would especially direct the reader's attention.

§ VI. One main cause of it, the necessity of throwing off snow in the

north, has been a thousand times alluded to: another I do not remember

having seen noticed, namely, that rooms in a roof are comfortably

habitable in the north, which are painful _sotto piombi_ in Italy; and

that there is in wet climates a natural tendency in all men to live as

high as possible, out of the damp and mist. These two causes, together

with accessible quantities of good timber, have induced in the north a

general steep pitch of gable, which, when rounded or squared above a

tower, becomes a spire or turret; and this feature, worked out with

elaborate decoration, is the key-note of the whole system of aspiration,

so called, which the German critics have so ingeniously and falsely

ascribed to a devotional sentiment pervading the Northern Gothic: I

entirely and boldly deny the whole theory; our cathedrals were for the

most part built by worldly people, who loved the world, and would have

gladly staid in it for ever; whose best hope was the escaping hell,

which they thought to do by building cathedrals, but who had very vague

conceptions of Heaven in general, and very feeble desires respecting

their entrance therein; and the form of the spired cathedral has no more

intentional reference to Heaven, as distinguished from the flattened

slope of the Greek pediment, than the steep gable of a Norman house has,

as distinguished from the flat roof of a Syrian one. We may now, with

ingenious pleasure, trace such symbolic characters in the form; we may

now use it with such definite meaning; but we only prevent ourselves

from all right understanding of history, by attributing much influence

to these poetical symbolisms in the formation of a national style. The

human race are, for the most part, not to be moved by such silken cords;

and the chances of damp in the cellar, or of loose tiles in the roof,

have, unhappily, much more to do with the fashions of a man's house

building than his ideas of celestial happiness or angelic virtue.

Associations of affection have far higher power, and forms which can be

no otherwise accounted for may often be explained by reference to the

natural features of the country, or to anything which habit must have

rendered familiar, and therefore delightful; but the direct

symbolisation of a sentiment is a weak motive with all men, and far

more so in the practical minds of the north than among the early

Christians, who were assuredly quite as heavenly-minded, when they built

basilicas, or cut conchas out of the catacombs, as were ever the Norman

barons or monks.

§ VII. There is, however, in the north an animal activity which

materially aided the system of building begun in mere utility,--an

animal life, naturally expressed in erect work, as the languor of the

south in reclining or level work. Imagine the difference between the

action of a man urging himself to his work in a snow storm, and the

inaction of one laid at his length on a sunny bank among cicadas and

fallen olives, and you will have the key to a whole group of sympathies

which were forcefully expressed in the architecture of both; remembering

always that sleep would be to the one luxury, to the other death.

§ VIII. And to the force of this vital instinct we have farther to add

the influence of natural scenery; and chiefly of the groups and

wildernesses of the tree which is to the German mind what the olive or

palm is to the southern, the spruce fir. The eye which has once been

habituated to the continual serration of the pine forest, and to the

multiplication of its infinite pinnacles, is not easily offended by the

repetition of similar forms, nor easily satisfied by the simplicity of

flat or massive outlines. Add to the influence of the pine, that of the

poplar, more especially in the valleys of France; but think of the

spruce chiefly, and meditate on the difference of feeling with which the

Northman would be inspired by the frostwork wreathed upon its glittering

point, and the Italian by the dark green depth of sunshine on the broad

table of the stone-pine[52] (and consider by the way whether the spruce

fir be a more heavenly-minded tree than those dark canopies of the

Mediterranean isles).

§ IX. Circumstance and sentiment, therefore, aiding each other, the

steep roof becomes generally adopted, and delighted in, throughout the

north; and then, with the gradual exaggeration with which every pleasant

idea is pursued by the human mind, it is raised into all manner of

peaks, and points, and ridges; and pinnacle after pinnacle is added on

its flanks, and the walls increased in height, in proportion, until we

get indeed a very sublime mass, but one which has no more principle of

religious aspiration in it than a child's tower of cards. What is more,

the desire to build high is complicated with the peculiar love of the

grotesque[53] which is characteristic of the north, together with

especial delight in multiplication of small forms, as well as in

exaggerated points of shade and energy, and a certain degree of

consequent insensibility to perfect grace and quiet truthfulness; so

that a northern architect could not feel the beauty of the Elgin

marbles, and there will always be (in those who have devoted themselves

to this particular school) a certain incapacity to taste the finer

characters of Greek art, or to understand Titian, Tintoret, or Raphael:

whereas among the Italian Gothic workmen, this capacity was never lost,

and Nino Pisano and Orcagna could have understood the Theseus in an

instant, and would have received from it new life. There can be no

question that theirs was the greatest school, and carried out by the

greatest men; and that while those who began with this school could

perfectly well feel Rouen Cathedral, those who study the Northern Gothic

remain in a narrowed field--one of small pinnacles, and dots, and

crockets, and twitched faces--and cannot comprehend the meaning of a

broad surface or a grand line. Nevertheless the northern school is an

admirable and delightful thing, but a lower thing than the southern. The

Gothic of the Ducal Palace of Venice is in harmony with all that is

grand in all the world: that of the north is in harmony with the

grotesque northern spirit only.

§ X. We are, however, beginning to lose sight of our roof structure in

its spirit, and must return to our text. As the height of the walls

increased, in sympathy with the rise of the roof, while their thickness

remained the same, it became more and more necessary to support them by

buttresses; but--and this is another point that the reader must

specially note--it is not the steep roof mask which requires the

buttress, but the vaulting beneath it; the roof mask being a mere wooden

frame tied together by cross timbers, and in small buildings often put

together on the ground, raised afterwards, and set on the walls like a

hat, bearing vertically upon them; and farther, I believe in most cases

the northern vaulting requires its great array of external buttress, not

so much from any peculiar boldness in its own forms, as from the greater

comparative thinness and height of the walls, and more determined

throwing of the whole weight of the roof on particular points. Now the

connexion of the interior frame-work (or true roof) with the buttress,

at such points, is not visible to the spectators from without; but the

relation of the roof mask to the top of the wall which it protects, or

from which it springs, is perfectly visible; and it is a point of so

great importance in the effect of the building, that it will be well to

make it a subject of distinct consideration in the following Chapter.

FOOTNOTES:

[50] Appendix 17

[51] I do not speak of the true dome, because I have not studied its

construction enough to know at what largeness of scale it begins to

be rather a _tour de force_ than a convenient or natural form of

roof, and because the ordinary spectator's choice among its various

outlines must always be dependent on æsthetic considerations only,

and can in no wise be grounded on any conception of its infinitely

complicated structural principles.

[52] I shall not be thought to have overrated the effect of forest

scenery on the _northern_ mind; but I was glad to hear a Spanish

gentleman, the other day, describing, together with his own, the

regret which the peasants in his neighborhood had testified for the

loss of a noble stone-pine, one of the grandest in Spain, which its

proprietor had suffered to be cut down for small gain. He said that

the mere spot where it had grown was still popularly known as "El

Pino."

[53] Appendix 8.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE ROOF CORNICE.

§ I. It will be remembered that in the Sixth Chapter we paused (§ X.) at

the point where the addition of brackets to the ordinary wall cornice

would have converted it into a structure proper for sustaining a roof.

Now the wall cornice was treated throughout our enquiry (compare Chapter

VII. § V.) as the capital of the wall, and as forming, by its

concentration, the capital of the shaft. But we must not reason _back_

from the capital to the cornice, and suppose that an extension of the

principles of the capital to the whole length of the wall, will serve

for the roof cornice; for all our conclusions respecting the capital

were based on the supposition of its being adapted to carry considerable

weight condensed on its abacus: but the roof cornice is, in most cases,

required rather to project boldly than to carry weight; and arrangements

are therefore to be adopted for it which will secure the projection of

large surfaces without being calculated to resist extraordinary

pressure. This object is obtained by the use of brackets at intervals,

which are the peculiar distinction of the roof cornice.

§ II. Roof cornices are generally to be divided into two great families:

the first and simplest, those which are composed merely by the

projection of the edge of the roof mask over the wall, sustained by such

brackets or spurs as may be necessary; the second, those which provide a

walk round the edge of the roof, and which require, therefore, some

stronger support, as well as a considerable mass of building above or

beside the roof mask, and a parapet. These two families we shall

consider in succession.

§ III. 1. The Eaved Cornice. We may give it this name, as represented in

the simplest form by cottage eaves. It is used, however, in bold

projection, both in north, and south, and east; its use being, in the

north, to throw the rain well away from the wall of the building; in the

south to give it shade; and it is ordinarily constructed of the ends of

the timbers of the roof mask (with their tiles or shingles continued to

the edge of the cornice), and sustained by spurs of timber. This is its

most picturesque and natural form; not inconsistent with great splendor

of architecture in the mediæval Italian domestic buildings, superb in

its mass of cast shadow, and giving rich effect to the streets of Swiss

towns, even when they have no other claim to interest. A farther value

is given to it by its waterspouts, for in order to avoid loading it with

weight of water in the gutter at the edge, where it would be a strain on

the fastenings of the pipe, it has spouts of discharge at intervals of

three or four feet,--rows of magnificent leaden or iron dragons' heads,

full of delightful character, except to any person passing along the

middle of the street in a heavy shower. I have had my share of their

kindness in my time, but owe them no grudge; on the contrary, much

gratitude for the delight of their fantastic outline on the calm blue

sky, when they had no work to do but to open their iron mouths and pant

in the sunshine.

§ IV. When, however, light is more valuable than shadow, or when the

architecture of the wall is too fair to be concealed, it becomes

necessary to draw the cornice into narrower limits; a change of

considerable importance, in that it permits the gutter, instead of being

of lead and hung to the edge of the cornice, to be of stone, and

supported by brackets in the wall, these brackets becoming proper

recipients of after decoration (and sometimes associated with the stone

channels of discharge, called gargoyles, which belong, however, more

properly to the other family of cornices). The most perfect and

beautiful example of this kind of cornice is the Venetian, in which the

rain from the tiles is received in a stone gutter supported by small

brackets, delicately moulded, and having its outer lower edge decorated

with the English dogtooth moulding, whose sharp zigzag mingles richly

with the curved edges of the tiling. I know no cornice more beautiful in

its extreme simplicity and serviceableness.

§ V. The cornice of the Greek Doric is a condition of the same kind, in

which, however, there are no brackets, but useless appendages hung to

the bottom of the gutter (giving, however, some impression of support as

seen from a distance), and decorated with stone symbolisms of raindrops.

The brackets are not allowed, because they would interfere with the

sculpture, which in this architecture is put beneath the cornice; and

the overhanging form of the gutter is nothing more than a vast dripstone

moulding, to keep the rain from such sculpture: its decoration of guttæ,

seen in silver points against the shadow, is pretty in feeling, with a

kind of continual refreshment and remembrance of rain in it; but the

whole arrangement is awkward and meagre, and is only endurable when the

eye is quickly drawn away from it to sculpture.

§ VI. In later cornices, invented for the Greek orders, and farther

developed by the Romans, the bracket appears in true importance, though

of barbarous and effeminate outline: and gorgeous decorations are

applied to it, and to the various horizontal mouldings which it carries,

some of them of great beauty, and of the highest value to the mediæval

architects who imitated them. But a singularly gross mistake was made in

the distribution of decoration on these rich cornices (I do not know

when first, nor does it matter to me or to the reader), namely, the

charging with ornament the under surface of the cornice between the

brackets, that is to say, the exact piece of the whole edifice, from top

to bottom, where ornament is least visible. I need hardly say much

respecting the wisdom of this procedure, excusable only if the whole

building were covered with ornament; but it is curious to see the way in

which modern architects have copied it, even when they had little enough

ornament to spare. For instance, I suppose few persons look at the

Athenæum Club-house without feeling vexed at the meagreness and

meanness of the windows of the ground floor: if, however, they look up

under the cornice, and have good eyes, they will perceive that the

architect has reserved his decorations to put between the brackets; and

by going up to the first floor, and out on the gallery, they may succeed

in obtaining some glimpses of the designs of the said decorations.

§ VII. Such as they are, or were, these cornices were soon considered

essential parts of the "order" to which they belonged; and the same

wisdom which endeavored to fix the proportions of the orders, appointed

also that no order should go without its cornice. The reader has

probably heard of the architectural division of superstructure into

architrave, frieze, and cornice; parts which have been appointed by

great architects to all their work, in the same spirit in which great

rhetoricians have ordained that every speech shall have an exordium, and

narration, and peroration. The reader will do well to consider that it

may be sometimes just as possible to carry a roof, and get rid of rain,

without such an arrangement, as it is to tell a plain fact without an

exordium or peroration; but he must very absolutely consider that the

architectural peroration or cornice is strictly and sternly limited to

the end of the wall's speech,--that is, to the edge of the roof; and

that it has nothing whatever to do with shafts nor the orders of them.

And he will then be able fully to enjoy the farther ordinance of the

late Roman and Renaissance architects, who, attaching it to the shaft as

if it were part of its shadow, and having to employ their shafts often

in places where they came not near the roof, forthwith cut the

roof-cornice to pieces and attached a bit of it to every column;

thenceforward to be carried by the unhappy shaft wherever it went, in

addition to any other work on which it might happen to be employed. I do

not recollect among any living beings, except Renaissance architects,

any instance of a parallel or comparable stupidity: but one can imagine

a savage getting hold of a piece of one of our iron wire ropes, with its

rings upon it at intervals to bind it together, and pulling the wires

asunder to apply them to separate purposes; but imagining there was

magic in the ring that bound them, and so cutting that to pieces also,

and fastening a little bit of it to every wire.

§ VIII. Thus much may serve us to know respecting the first family of

wall cornices. The second is immeasurably more important, and includes

the cornices of all the best buildings in the world. It has derived its

best form from mediæval military architecture, which imperatively

required two things; first, a parapet which should permit sight and

offence, and afford defence at the same time; and secondly, a projection

bold enough to enable the defenders to rake the bottom of the wall with

falling bodies; projection which, if the wall happened to slope inwards,

required not to be small. The thoroughly magnificent forms of cornice

thus developed by necessity in military buildings, were adopted, with

more or less of boldness or distinctness, in domestic architecture,

according to the temper of the times and the circumstances of the

individual--decisively in the baron's house, imperfectly in the

burgher's: gradually they found their way into ecclesiastical

architecture, under wise modifications in the early cathedrals, with

infinite absurdity in the imitations of them; diminishing in size as

their original purpose sank into a decorative one, until we find

battlements, two-and-a-quarter inches square, decorating the gates of

the Philanthropic Society.

§ IX. There are, therefore, two distinct features in all cornices of

this kind; first, the bracket, now become of enormous importance and of

most serious practical service; the second, the parapet: and these two

features we shall consider in succession, and in so doing, shall learn

all that is needful for us to know, not only respecting cornices, but

respecting brackets in general, and balconies.

§ X. 1. The Bracket. In the simplest form of military cornice, the

brackets are composed of two or more long stones, supporting each other

in gradually increasing projection, with roughly rounded ends, Fig.

XXXVIII., and the parapet is simply a low wall carried on the ends of

these, leaving, of course, behind, or within it, a hole between each

bracket for the convenient dejection of hot sand and lead. This form is

best seen, I think, in the old Scotch castles; it is very grand, but has

a giddy look, and one is afraid of the whole thing toppling off the

wall. The next step was to deepen the brackets, so as to get them

propped against a great depth of the main rampart, and to have the inner

ends of the stones held by a greater weight of that main wall above;

while small arches were thrown from bracket to bracket to carry the

parapet wall more securely. This is the most perfect form of cornice,

completely satisfying the eye of its security, giving full protection to

the wall, and applicable to all architecture, the interstices between

the brackets being filled up, when one does not want to throw boiling

lead on any body below, and the projection being always delightful, as

giving greater command and view of the building, from its angles, to

those walking on the rampart. And as, in military buildings, there were

usually towers at the angles (round which the battlements swept) in

order to flank the walls, so often in the translation into civil or

ecclesiastical architecture, a small turret remained at the angle, or a

more bold projection of balcony, to give larger prospect to those upon

the rampart. This cornice, perfect in all its parts, as arranged for

ecclesiastical architecture, and exquisitely decorated, is the one

employed in the duomo of Florence and campanile of Giotto, of which I

have already spoken as, I suppose, the most perfect architecture in the

world.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXVIII.]

§ XI. In less important positions and on smaller edifices, this cornice

diminishes in size, while it retains its arrangement, and at last we

find nothing but the spirit and form of it left; the real practical

purpose having ceased, and arch, brackets and all, being cut out of a

single stone. Thus we find it used in early buildings throughout the

whole of the north and south of Europe, in forms sufficiently

represented by the two examples in Plate IV.: 1, from St. Antonio,

Padua; 2, from Sens in France.

[Illustration: Fig. XXXIX.]

§ XII. I wish, however, at present to fix the reader's attention on the

form of the bracket itself; a most important feature in modern as well

as ancient architecture. The first idea of a bracket is that of a long

stone or piece of timber projecting from the wall, as _a_, Fig. XXXIX.,

of which the strength depends on the toughness of the stone or wood, and

the stability on the weight of wall above it (unless it be the end of a

main beam). But let it be supposed that the structure at _a_, being of

the required projection, is found too weak: then we may strengthen it in

one of three ways; (1) by putting a second or third stone beneath it, as

at _b_; (2) by giving it a spur, as at _c_; (3) by giving it a shaft and

another bracket below, _d_; the great use of this arrangement being that

the lowermost bracket has the help of the weight of the shaft-length of

wall above its insertion, which is, of course, greater than the weight

of the small shaft: and then the lower bracket may be farther helped by

the structure at _b_ or _c_.

[Illustration: Fig. XL.]

§ XIII. Of these structures, _a_ and _c_ are evidently adapted

especially for wooden buildings; _b_ and _d_ for stone ones; the last,

of course, susceptible of the richest decoration, and superbly employed

in the cornice of the cathedral of Monza: but all are beautiful in their

way, and are the means of, I think, nearly half the picturesqueness and

power of mediæval building; the forms _b_ and _c_ being, of course, the

most frequent; _a_, when it occurs, being usually rounded off, as at

_a_, Fig. XL.; _b_, also, as in Fig. XXXVIII., or else itself composed

of a single stone cut into the form of the group _b_ here, Fig. XL., or

plain, as at _c_, which is also the proper form of the brick bracket,

when stone is not to be had. The reader will at once perceive that the

form _d_ is a barbarism (unless when the scale is small and the weight

to be carried exceedingly light): it is of course, therefore, a

favorite form with the Renaissance architects; and its introduction is

one of the first corruptions of the Venetian architecture.

§ XIV. There is one point necessary to be noticed, though bearing on

decoration more than construction, before we leave the subject of the

bracket. The whole power of the construction depends upon the stones

being well _let into_ the wall; and the first function of the decoration

should be to give the idea of this insertion, if possible; at all

events, not to contradict this idea. If the reader will glance at any of

the brackets used in the ordinary architecture of London, he will find

them of some such character as Fig. XLI.; not a bad form in itself, but

exquisitely absurd in its curling lines, which give the idea of some

writhing suspended tendril, instead of a stiff support, and by their

careful avoidance of the wall make the bracket look pinned on, and in

constant danger of sliding down. This is, also, a Classical and

Renaissance decoration.

[Illustration: Fig. XLI.]

§ XV. 2. The Parapet. Its forms are fixed in military architecture by

the necessities of the art of war at the time of building, and are

always beautiful wherever they have been really thus fixed; delightful

in the variety of their setting, and in the quaint darkness of their

shot-holes, and fantastic changes of elevation and outline. Nothing is

more remarkable than the swiftly discerned difference between the

masculine irregularity of such true battlements, and the formal

pitifulness of those which are set on modern buildings to give them a

military air,--as on the jail at Edinburgh.

§ XVI. Respecting the Parapet for mere safeguard upon buildings not

military, there are just two fixed laws. It should be pierced, otherwise

it is not recognised from below for a parapet at all, and it should not

be in the form of a battlement, especially in church architecture.

The most comfortable heading of a true parapet is a plain level on which

the arm can be rested, and along which it can glide. Any jags or

elevations are disagreeable; the latter, as interrupting the view and

disturbing the eye, if they are higher than the arm, the former, as

opening some aspect of danger if they are much lower; and the

inconvenience, therefore, of the battlemented form, as well as the worse

than absurdity, the bad feeling, of the appliance of a military feature

to a church, ought long ago to have determined its rejection. Still (for

the question of its picturesque value is here so closely connected with

that of its practical use, that it is vain to endeavor to discuss it

separately) there is a certain agreeableness in the way in which the

jagged outline dovetails the shadow of the slated or leaded roof into

the top of the wall, which may make the use of the battlement excusable

where there is a difficulty in managing some unvaried line, and where

the expense of a pierced parapet cannot be encountered: but remember

always, that the value of the battlement consists in its letting shadow

into the light of the wall, or _vice versâ_, when it comes against light

sky, letting the light of the sky into the shade of the wall; but that

the actual outline of the parapet itself, if the eye be arrested upon

this, instead of upon the alternation of shadow, is as _ugly_ a

succession of line as can by any possibility be invented. Therefore, the

battlemented parapet may only be used where this alternation of shade is

certain to be shown, under nearly all conditions of effect; and where

the lines to be dealt with are on a scale which may admit battlements of

bold and manly size. The idea that a battlement is an ornament anywhere,

and that a miserable and diminutive imitation of castellated outline

will always serve to fill up blanks and Gothicise unmanageable spaces,

is one of the great idiocies of the present day. A battlement is in its

origin a piece of wall large enough to cover a man's body, and however

it may be decorated, or pierced, or finessed away into traceries, as

long as so much of its outline is retained as to suggest its origin, so

long its size must remain undiminished. To crown a turret six feet high

with chopped battlements three inches wide, is children's Gothic: it is

one of the paltry falsehoods for which there is no excuse, and part of

the system of using models of architecture to decorate architecture,

which we shall hereafter note as one of the chief and most destructive

follies of the Renaissance;[54] and in the present day the practice may

be classed as one which distinguishes the architects of whom there is no

hope, who have neither eye nor head for their work, and who must pass

their lives in vain struggles against the refractory lines of their own

buildings.

§ XVII. As the only excuse for the battlemented parapet is its

alternation of shadow, so the only fault of the natural or level parapet

is its monotony of line. This is, however, in practice, almost always

broken by the pinnacles of the buttresses, and if not, may be varied by

the tracery of its penetrations. The forms of these evidently admit

every kind of change; for a stone parapet, however pierced, is sure to

be strong enough for its purpose of protection, and, as regards the

strength of the building in general, the lighter it is the better. More

fantastic forms may, therefore, be admitted in a parapet than in any

other architectural feature, and for most services, the Flamboyant

parapets seem to me preferable to all others; especially when the leaden

roofs set off by points of darkness the lace-like intricacy of

penetration. These, however, as well as the forms usually given to

Renaissance balustrades (of which, by the bye, the best piece of

criticism I know is the sketch in "David Copperfield" of the personal

appearance of the man who stole Jip), and the other and finer forms

invented by Paul Veronese in his architectural backgrounds, together

with the pure columnar balustrade of Venice, must be considered as

altogether decorative features.

§ XVIII. So also are, of course, the jagged or crown-like finishings of

walls employed where no real parapet of protection is desired;

originating in the defences of outworks and single walls: these are used

much in the east on walls surrounding unroofed courts. The richest

examples of such decoration are Arabian; and from Cairo they seem to

have been brought to Venice. It is probable that few of my readers,

however familiar the general form of the Ducal Palace may have been

rendered to them by innumerable drawings, have any distinct idea of its

roof, owing to the staying of the eye on its superb parapet, of which we

shall give account hereafter. In most of the Venetian cases the parapets

which surround roofing are very sufficient for protection, except that

the stones of which they are composed appear loose and infirm: but their

purpose is entirely decorative; every wall, whether detached or roofed,

being indiscriminately fringed with Arabic forms of parapet, more or

less Gothicised, according to the lateness of their date.

I think there is no other point of importance requiring illustration

respecting the roof itself, or its cornice: but this Venetian form of

ornamental parapet connects itself curiously, at the angles of nearly

all the buildings on which it occurs, with the pinnacled system of the

north, founded on the structure of the buttress. This, it will be

remembered, is to be the subject of the fifth division of our inquiry.

FOOTNOTES:

[54] Not of Renaissance alone: the practice of modelling buildings

on a minute scale for niches and tabernacle-work has always been

more or less admitted, and I suppose _authority_ for diminutive

battlements might be gathered from the Gothic of almost every

period, as well as for many other faults and mistakes: no Gothic

school having ever been thoroughly systematised or perfected, even

in its best times. But that a mistaken decoration sometimes occurs

among a crowd of noble ones, is no more an excuse for the

habitual--far less, the exclusive--use of such a decoration, than

the accidental or seeming misconstructions of a Greek chorus are an

excuse for a school boy's ungrammatical exercise.

CHAPTER XV.

THE BUTTRESS.

§ I. We have hitherto supposed ourselves concerned with the support of

vertical pressure only; and the arch and roof have been considered as

forms of abstract strength, without reference to the means by which

their lateral pressure was to be resisted. Few readers will need now to

be reminded, that every arch or gable not tied at its base by beams or

bars, exercises a lateral pressure upon the walls which sustain

it,--pressure which may, indeed, be met and sustained by increasing the

thickness of the wall or vertical piers, and which is in reality thus

met in most Italian buildings, but may, with less expenditure of

material, and with (perhaps) more graceful effect, be met by some

particular application of the provisions against lateral pressure called

Buttresses. These, therefore, we are next to examine.

§ II. Buttresses are of many kinds, according to the character and

direction of the lateral forces they are intended to resist. But their

first broad division is into buttresses which meet and break the force

before it arrives at the wall, and buttresses which stand on the lee

side of the wall, and prop it against the force.

The lateral forces which walls have to sustain are of three distinct

kinds: dead weight, as of masonry or still water; moving weight, as of

wind or running water; and sudden concussion, as of earthquakes,

explosions, &c.

Clearly, dead weight can only be resisted by the buttress acting as a

prop; for a buttress on the side of, or towards the weight, would only

add to its effect. This, then, forms the first great class of buttressed

architecture; lateral thrusts, of roofing or arches, being met by props

of masonry outside--the thrust from within, the prop without; or the

crushing force of water on a ship's side met by its cross timbers--the

thrust here from without the wall, the prop within.

Moving weight may, of course, be resisted by the prop on the lee side of

the wall, but is often more effectually met, on the side which is

attacked, by buttresses of peculiar forms, cunning buttresses, which do

not attempt to sustain the weight, but _parry_ it, and throw it off in

directions clear of the wall.

Thirdly: concussions and vibratory motion, though in reality only

supported by the prop buttress, must be provided for by buttresses on

both sides of the wall, as their direction cannot be foreseen, and is

continually changing.

We shall briefly glance at these three systems of buttressing; but the

two latter being of small importance to our present purpose, may as well

be dismissed first.

§ III. 1. Buttresses for guard against moving weight and set towards the

weight they resist.

The most familiar instance of this kind of buttress we have in the sharp

piers of a bridge, in the centre of a powerful stream, which divide the

current on their edges, and throw it to each side under the arches. A

ship's bow is a buttress of the same kind, and so also the ridge of a

breastplate, both adding to the strength of it in resisting a cross

blow, and giving a better chance of a bullet glancing aside. In

Switzerland, projecting buttresses of this kind are often built round

churches, heading up hill, to divide and throw off the avalanches. The

various forms given to piers and harbor quays, and to the bases of

light-houses, in order to meet the force of the waves, are all

conditions of this kind of buttress. But in works of ornamental

architecture such buttresses are of rare occurrence; and I merely name

them in order to mark their place in our architectural system, since in

the investigation of our present subject we shall not meet with a single

example of them, unless sometimes the angle of the foundation of a

palace set against the sweep of the tide, or the wooden piers of some

canal bridge quivering in its current.

§ IV. 2. Buttresses for guard against vibratory motion.

The whole formation of this kind of buttress resolves itself into mere

expansion of the base of the wall, so as to make it stand steadier, as a

man stands with his feet apart when he is likely to lose his balance.

This approach to a pyramidal form is also of great use as a guard

against the action of artillery; that if a stone or tier of stones be

battered out of the lower portions of the wall, the whole upper part may

not topple over or crumble down at once. Various forms of this buttress,

sometimes applied to particular points of the wall, sometimes forming a

great sloping rampart along its base, are frequent in buildings of

countries exposed to earthquake. They give a peculiarly heavy outline to

much of the architecture of the kingdom of Naples, and they are of the

form in which strength and solidity are first naturally sought, in the

slope of the Egyptian wall. The base of Guy's Tower at Warwick is a

singularly bold example of their military use; and so, in general,

bastion and rampart profiles, where, however, the object of stability

against a shock is complicated with that of sustaining weight of earth

in the rampart behind.

§ V. 3. Prop buttresses against dead weight.

This is the group with which we have principally to do; and a buttress

of this kind acts in two ways, partly by its weight and partly by its

strength. It acts by its weight when its mass is so great that the

weight it sustains cannot stir it, but is lost upon it, buried in it,

and annihilated: neither the shape of such a buttress nor the cohesion

of its materials are of much consequence; a heap of stones or sandbags,

laid up against the wall, will answer as well as a built and cemented

mass.

But a buttress acting by its strength is not of mass sufficient to

resist the weight by mere inertia; but it conveys the weight through its

body to something else which is so capable; as, for instance, a man

leaning against a door with his hands, and propping himself against the

ground, conveys the force which would open or close the door against him

through his body to the ground. A buttress acting in this way must be of

perfectly coherent materials, and so strong that though the weight to

be borne could easily move it, it cannot break it: this kind of buttress

may be called a conducting buttress. Practically, however, the two modes

of action are always in some sort united. Again, the weight to be borne

may either act generally on the whole wall surface, or with excessive

energy on particular points: when it acts on the whole wall surface, the

whole wall is generally supported; and the arrangement becomes a

continuous rampart, as a dyke, or bank of reservoir.

§ VI. It is, however, very seldom that lateral force in architecture is

equally distributed. In most cases the weight of the roof, or the force

of any lateral thrust, are more or less confined to certain points and

directions. In an early state of architectural science this definiteness

of direction is not yet clear, and it is met by uncertain application of

mass or strength in the buttress, sometimes by mere thickening of the

wall into square piers, which are partly piers, partly buttresses, as in

Norman keeps and towers. But as science advances, the weight to be borne

is designedly and decisively thrown upon certain points; the direction

and degree of the forces which are then received are exactly calculated,

and met by conducting buttresses of the smallest possible dimensions;

themselves, in their turn, supported by vertical buttresses acting by

weight, and these perhaps, in their turn, by another set of conducting

buttresses: so that, in the best examples of such arrangements, the

weight to be borne may be considered as the shock of an electric fluid,

which, by a hundred different rods and channels, is divided and carried

away into the ground.