THE BASES OF DESIGN
THE BASES OF DESIGN
BY WALTER CRANE
[Illustration]
LONDON
GEORGE BELL AND SONS
1902
First Edition, Medium 8vo, 1898.
Second Edition, Crown 8vo, 1902.
CHISWICK PRESS: CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO.
TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.
TO CHARLES ROWLEY, J.P. CHAIRMAN OF THE MANCHESTER MUNICIPAL
SCHOOL OF ART, TO WHOSE ENERGY, SYMPATHY, AND ENTHUSIASM THE
SCHOOL, IN ITS NEWER DEVELOPMENT, OWES SO MUCH, AND TO MY
FORMER COLLEAGUES OF THE TEACHING STAFF, AS WELL AS TO ALL
STUDENTS, I DEDICATE THIS BOOK.
PREFACE
THE substance of the following chapters originally formed a series
of lectures addressed to the students of the Manchester Municipal
School of Art during my tenure of the directorship of Design at that
institution.
The field covered is an extensive one, and I am conscious that many
branches of my subject are only touched, whilst others are treated in a
very elementary manner. Every chapter, indeed, might be expanded into
a volume, under such far-reaching headings, to give to each section
anything like adequate treatment.
My main object, however, has been to trace the vital veins and nerves
of relationship in the arts of design, which, like the sap from the
central stem, springing from connected and collective roots, out of a
common ground, sustain and unite in one organic whole the living tree.
In an age when, owing to the action of certain economic causes--the
chiefest being commercial competition--the tendency is to specialize
each branch of design, which thus becomes isolated from the rest,
I feel it is most important to keep in mind the real fundamental
connection and essential unity of art: and though we may, as students
and artists, in practice be intent upon gathering the fruit from
the particular branch we desire to make our own, we should never be
insensible to its relation to other branches, its dependence upon the
main stem and the source of its life at the root.
Otherwise we are, I think, in danger of becoming mechanical in our
work, or too narrowly technical, while, as a collective result of
such narrowness of view, the art of the age, to which each individual
contributes, shows a want of both imaginative harmony and technical
relation with itself, when unity of effect and purpose is particularly
essential, as in the design and decoration of both public and private
buildings, not to speak of the larger significance of art as the most
permanent record of the life and ideals of a people.
My illustrations are drawn from many sources, and consist of a large
proportion of those originally used for the lectures, only that instead
of the rough charcoal sketches done at the time, careful pen drawings
have been made of many of the subjects in addition to the photographs
and other authorities.
It may be noted that I have freely used both line and tone blocks
in the text and throughout the book, although I advocate the use of
line drawings only with type in books wherein completeness of organic
ornamental character is the object. Such a book as this, however,
being rather in the nature of a tool or auxiliary to a designer's
workshop, can hardly be regarded from that point of view. The scheme
of the work, which necessitates the gathering together of so many and
varied illustrations as diverse in scale, subject, and treatment as
the historic periods which they represent, would itself preclude a
consistent decorative treatment, and it has been found necessary to
reproduce many of the illustrations from their original form in large
scale drawings on brown paper touched with white, as well as from
photographs which necessarily print as tone-blocks.
I have to thank Mr. Gleeson White for his valuable help in many ways,
as well as in obtaining permission from various owners of copyright
to use photographs and other illustrations, and also the publishers,
who have allowed me the use of blocks in some instances--Mr. George
Allen for a page from "The Faerie Queene"; Messrs. Bradbury, Agnew and
Co. for the use of the "Punch" drawings; and Messrs. J. S. Virtue and
Co. for the use of photographs of carpet weaving and glass blowing,
which were specially taken for "The Art Journal." My thanks are also
due to Mr. Metford Warner (Messrs. Jeffrey and Co.) for the use of
his photo-lithographs of my wall-paper designs issued by his firm; to
Mr. R. Phené Spiers for the use of his sketch of the iron balustrade
from Rothenburg; to Mr. T. J. Cobden-Sanderson for photographs of two
of his recent bookbindings; to the executors of the late Rev. W. H.
Creeny for permission to reproduce two of the illustrations from his
"Monumental Brasses on the Continent of Europe" (now published by Mr.
B. T. Batsford); also to Mr. Harold Rathbone, who kindly allows me to
reproduce the cartoons by Ford Madox Brown in his possession; to Mr. J.
Sylvester Sparrow for the practical notes on painting glass; and to Mr.
Emery Walker for help in several ways in the preparation of the book.
WALTER CRANE.
KENSINGTON,
_November, 1897_.
AUTHOR'S NOTE ON THE PRESENT EDITION
THIS reprint of "The Bases of Design" gives me an opportunity to
correct a few errors which had inadvertently crept in on its first
appearance, and also to add a word here and there.
I venture to hope that the book may prove more useful and accessible to
students in its present form.
WALTER CRANE.
KENSINGTON,
_November, 1901_.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I OF THE ARCHITECTURAL BASIS 1
II OF THE UTILITY BASIS AND INFLUENCE 48
III OF THE INFLUENCE OF MATERIAL AND METHOD 91
IV OF THE INFLUENCE OF CONDITIONS IN DESIGN 123
V OF THE CLIMATIC INFLUENCE IN DESIGN--CHIEFLY IN REGARD
TO COLOUR AND PATTERN 160
VI OF THE RACIAL INFLUENCE IN DESIGN 191
VII OF THE SYMBOLIC INFLUENCE, OR EMBLEMATIC ELEMENT
IN DESIGN 222
VIII OF THE GRAPHIC INFLUENCE, OR NATURALISM IN DESIGN 259
IX OF THE INDIVIDUAL INFLUENCE IN DESIGN 302
X OF THE COLLECTIVE INFLUENCE IN DESIGN 350
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Three typical Constructive Forms in Architecture--Lintel,
Round Arch, Pointed Arch. 5
Gate of Mycenæ. 6
Imitation of Wooden Construction in Stone Tomb in Lycia. 7
Ornamental lines in the Frieze of the Parthenon 8
Metope of the Parthenon, showing relation and proportions
of the masses in relief to the ground. 9
The Parthenon. 11
The Parthenon--Eastern Pediment, sketches showing relation
of lines of sculpture to angle of Pediment. 12
The Parthenon--Elevation showing portion of Pediment,
Frieze and Columns. 13
Architectural influence in design of small accessories
(Greek). 15
Section of the Colosseum. 17
Hanging the Festal Garland--Visit of Bacchus to Icarius. 18
Arch of Constantine. 19
Mosaic, St. Apollinare in Classe, Ravenna. 21
Part of Interior of Dome of St. Mark's, Venice. 23
Mosaic of the Empress Theodora, St. Vitale, Ravenna. 24
Anselm's Tower, Canterbury. 27
Transitional Arcade, South Transept, Canterbury. 29
Typical Forms of Arches. 30
Typical Forms of Gothic Geometric Foliation. 30
Westminster Abbey, the Nave, looking east. 31
Wells Cathedral, West Front. 33
Westminster Abbey, Fan Tracery in Henry VII.'s Chapel. 35
The Five Sisters of York. 37
Details of Tomb, Winchelsea Church (1303). 38
Fourteenth Century Canopied Tomb, Winchelsea Church. 39
Wrought-iron Railing, Wells Cathedral. 40
Canopied Seat and Sideboard, French Fifteenth Century. 41
Carved Bench-ends, Dennington Church, Suffolk. 42
Brocade Hanging, from the Annunciation, by Memling. 43
St. David's Cathedral. 44
Structural lines of different periods in harmonious
combination, Canterbury Cathedral. 45
Matting. 49
Primitive Rush Mat. 50
Assyrian Border. 50
Assyrian enamelled Tile. 51
Greek Anthemion Ornament. 52
Wattled Fence. 52
Ancient Volute Ornament. 53
Types of Decoration derived from Thonging. 54
Frieze of the Temple of the Sybil at Tivoli. 55
Yoke of Oxen, Carrara. 55
Barge-board, Ightham Mote House. 57
Types of Gables. 57
Hazelford Hall, Derbyshire. 59
The Principle of the Dripstone. 60
Towers of San Gimignano. 61
Tower of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. 63
Tower with corner Turret, Axmouth Church, Devon. 64
Cut Brick Chimneys, Leigh's Priory, Essex. 65
Brick Chimney, Framlingham Castle. 66
Cast-iron Fire-dog, St. Nicholas's Hospital, Canterbury. 67
Cast-iron Grate Back, Bruges. 68
Fireplace with wrought-iron Crane, Church Farm, Hempstead,
Essex. 69
Candlesticks. 71
Brass Chandelier, German Seventeenth Century. 74
Details of above. 75
Lamps, Candlestick, and Snuffers. 77
Drinking Vessels, etc. 81
German Beer Mugs. 82
Italian Flasks and Bottle. 83
Pitcher from Rothenburg. 87
Plate and Dish Decoration. 87
Typical Border Systems. 89
Persistent Pattern Plans, Rectangular Basis. 89
Corbel, Fourteenth Century, Dennington Church, Suffolk. 92
Misereres, St. David's Cathedral. 93, 94
Scandinavian Clay Vessel. 95
Modern Egyptian Clay Vessel. 97
Bronze Statue of Louis XV. by Bouchardon, showing
internal Iron-work and Core. 99
The same, showing distribution of Ducts and Vents. 101
Wrought-iron Gates, St. Lawrence, Nuremberg. 103
Wrought-iron Fender, Tongs, Fire-dog and Shovel, Bruges. 103
Wrought-iron Altar Screen, St. Thomas's, Salisbury. 104
Wrought-iron Balustrade, Rothenburg, from a sketch by
R. Phené Spiers. 105
Lady at a Hand Loom, from Erasmus's "Praise of Folly"
(1676). 107
Diagrams showing the principle of the Loom. 107
Persian Carpet, South Kensington Museum. 109
Embroidery. 114
Facsimile of a page from the "Buch von den Sieben
Todsünden" (Augsburg, 1474). 117
Hans Baldung Grün, facsimile of a page from "Hortulus
Animæ" (Strassburg, 1511). 118
William Blake, "A Cradle Song". 120
Ceiling Papers. Designed by Walter Crane. 124, 125, 126
Repeating Pattern Wall-paper. Designed by Walter Crane. 127
Pattern Plans and Motives controlled by conditions of
Position and Purpose. 129
Floor Motive. Sketch design for inlaid wood,
by Walter Crane. 130
Drop Repeat Wall-papers. Designed by Walter Crane. 132, 134
Page Plans, showing various arrangements of Text and
Decorations. 137
Page from "The Glittering Plain" (Kelmscott Press). 139
Page from Spenser's "Faerie Queene" (Walter Crane). 140
Thirteenth Century Glass from the Sainte Chapelle, Paris
(South Kensington Museum). 142, 143, 145
Sixteenth Century Glass from Winchester College Chapel
(South Kensington Museum). 147
Thirteenth Century Glass Grisaille, Salisbury Cathedral. 151
Cartoons for Glass, showing lead design, by Ford Madox
Brown. 152, 153
Modern Glass, designed and executed by J. S. Sparrow. 157
Porch of Cathedral of S. Jacopo, Pistoia. 165
Primitive Egyptian House, after Viollet le Duc. 168
Column from Temple of Luxor. 169
Persian Capital, influenced by Primitive Timber
Construction. 170
Lotus Capital, Philæ. 171
Frieze in coloured and glazed Bricks, Palace of Susa
(from the Reproduction in the South Kensington
Museum), drawn by W. Cleobury. 173
Holy Carpet of the Mosque at Ardebil (South Kensington
Museum). 177
Arab Casement from Cairo (South Kensington Museum),
drawn by W. Cleobury. 181
Carved stone lattice Window from the Mosque of the
Palace of Ahmedabad. 183
Portion of the Alhambra, drawn by Gustave Doré. 187
Old House in Turnov, dated 1816. 188
Street in Eger. 189
Egyptian Hieroglyphics, Tomb of Beni Hasan (XIXth
Dynasty). 195
Altar with Offerings, Egyptian Mural Painting, Thebes. 196
Egyptian Wall-painting (British Museum). 197
Assyrian Tree of Life. 198
Assyrian Bas-reliefs (British Museum). 199, 200, 201
Assur Beni Pal, Assyrian Lions from the British Museum. 203
Lion modelled by Alfred Stevens and cast in iron. 205
Greek Stele or Head-stone. 206
Indian Flame Halo or Nimbus. 207
Persian Pomegranate forms, from a goat-hair Carpet
(South Kensington Museum). 208
Celtic design, from a Cross at Campbeltown, Argyllshire. 209
Typical ornamental Forms in Persian, Indian, and Chinese
designs. 211
Arabian Fourteenth Century carved and inlaid Pulpit,
Cairo (South Kensington Museum), drawn by W.
Cleobury. 213, 215
Panel in carved and inlaid Wood, from the Mosque of
Tooloon in Cairo, Fourteenth or Fifteenth Century
Saracenic. 217
The _Fylfot_ or _Sauvastika_, and its
incorporation in ornament. 224
Primitive Symbols, Sun, Fire, Water. 224
Polynesian Carved Ornament, from Hervey Island Paddle. 225
Polynesian Ornament--Evolution of the Zigzag. 227
Hindu Symbol of the Universe. 229
Examples of Egyptian Symbolism. 231
Il Nilo (Vatican, Rome). 235
Venus and Paris--the Apples of the Hesperides (from a
relief at Wilton House). 237
Christian Emblem: Stags Drinking (Mausoleo di Galla
Placidia, Ravenna). 240
Christian Emblem: Peacocks and Vine (Sarcophagus,
St. Apollinare in Classe, Ravenna). 241
Fra Angelico, Angel (Uffizi, Florence). 242, 243
Orcagna, Fiends from "The Triumph of Death," Fresco
(Campo Santo, Pisa). 245
Combat of King with Griffin (Ancient Persian Sculpture,
Persepolis). 247
Typical Forms of Shields and of Heraldic Treatment. 249
Sicilian Silk Tissue, Twelfth century (South Kensington
Museum). 251
Alciati's Emblems, designed by Solomon Bernard, _Ex
Bello Pax_, Fortune, Ambition, Avarice. 253, 254, 255, 256
Prehistoric Graphic Art of the Cave Men. 260, 261
Egyptian Treatment of Birds (from painted Mummy
Cases, British Museum). 264
A Fowler, Wall-painting, XIXth Dynasty (British Museum). 265
Japanese Graphic Art (from "The Hundred Birds of
Bari"). 266, 267
Egyptian Scribe, Portrait Statuette, Vth or VIth Dynasty
(Louvre). 269
Sculptured Frieze discovered in the Forum, 1872. 271
Auxerre Cathedral, Thirteenth Century Sculpture. 272
Amiens Cathedral, Fourteenth Century Sculpture. 273
Statue of St. Martha (St. Urbain, Troyes). 275
Memling, "Deliverance of St. Peter" (Grimani Breviary). 276
Memling, "David placing the Ark in the Tabernacle"
(Grimani Breviary). 277
Albert Dürer, "The Apocalypse". 279
Albert Dürer, Portrait of Erasmus (1526). 280
Albert Dürer, "The Cannon" (1513). 281
Albert Dürer, The taking down from the Cross ("Little
Passion"). 283
Hans Burgmair, Group of Knights from "The Triumphs
of Maximilian". 284
Horned Poppy, from Fuchsius' "De Historia Stirpium"
(1542). 287
Japanese Plant Drawing. 288, 289
Brass of Joris de Munter and Wife (Bruges, 1439). 291
Brass of King Eric Menved and Queen Ingeborg of Denmark
(Ringstead, 1319). 293
Charles Keene, Drawing from "Punch". 295
Linley Sambourne, Drawing from "Punch". 297
Phil May, Drawing from "Punch". 299
Simone Memmi, Fresco containing portrait of Cimabue
and Contemporaries (S. M. Novella, Florence). 307
Giotto, Portrait of Dante (Pretorian Palace, Florence). 309
Giotto, Frescoes (Arena Chapel, Padua). 310, 311
Giotto, Frescoes (Assisi). 312, 313
Niccolo Pisano, Pulpit (Baptistery, Pisa). 315
Orcagna, "Triumph of Death," Fresco (Campo Santo, Pisa). 317
Benozzo Gozzoli, Frescoes (Riccardi Chapel,
Florence). 318, 319, 320, 321
Botticelli, Detail from "The Adoration of the Magi"
(Uffizi, Florence). 323
Botticelli, "La Prima Vera" (Academy, Florence). 325
Mantegna, Bronze Monument (S. Andrea, Mantua). 327
Mantegna, "The Triumph of Julius Cæsar," from Andrea
Andreani's woodcut. 331
Leonardo da Vinci, "The Last Supper" (Milan). 335
Leonardo da Vinci, Study for the Head of Christ. 337
Bust of Michael Angelo (S. Croce, Florence). 339
Michael Angelo, Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel ("The
Creation of Man"). 341
Michael Angelo, Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. 343
Michael Angelo, The Delphic Sibyl (Sistine Chapel). 345
Michael Angelo, Tomb of Giuliano de Medici (Florence). 346
Michael Angelo, Tomb of Lorenzo de Medici (Florence). 347
Natural variation in Repetition of Ornamental
Forms--Primary School Children drawing on the
blackboard, Philadelphia. 356, 357
Axminster Carpet Weaving. 361
Tapestry Carpet Weaving. 362
Interior of the Atelier of Etienne Delaune, Paris, 1576. 364
Glass Blowing. 366
Interior of a Printing Office, Sixteenth Century, from Jost
Amman. 367
Gold-Tooled Bindings, by T. J. Cobden-Sanderson. 370, 371
OF THE BASES OF DESIGN
CHAPTER I.--OF THE ARCHITECTURAL BASIS
WHEN we approach the study of Design, from whatever point of view,
and whatsoever our ultimate aim and purpose, we can hardly fail to be
impressed with the vast variety and endless complexity of the forms
which the term (Design) covers, understanding it in its widest and
fullest sense.
From the simplest linear pattern, or bone scratchings of primitive
man, to the most splendid achievements in mural decoration of the
Italian Renascence--or, shall we say, from the grass mat of the first
plaiter to the finest Persian carpet: or from Stonehenge to Salisbury
Cathedral--the range is enormous, and were we to attempt to trace,
step by step, the true relation between the diverse and multitudinous
characteristics which such contrasts suggest, we should be tracing the
course of the development of human thought and history themselves.
When we stand amazed in this labyrinth--this enchanted and beautiful
wood of human invention which the history of art displays, we might be
content to gaze at the loveliness of particular forms there, and simply
enjoy, like children, the beauty of the trees and flowers; gathering
here and there at random, and casting them aside again when we were
tired, without a thought as to their true significance.
If, however, we desire to find some clue to the labyrinth--something
which will explain it in part, at least, something which will give us
a key to the relation of these manifold forms, and enable us to place
them in harmonious order and coherence, we shall presently ask:
(1) How and whence they derived their leading characteristics?
(2) Upon what basis have they been built up? and
(3) What have been the chief influences which have determined, and
still determine, their varieties?
Let us try to address ourselves to these questions, since, I believe,
even if we only end as we begin, by inquiry, that, in the course of
that inquiry, by study, by comparison, and careful observation, we
shall be able greatly to clear our path, and find much to help us as
individual students and practical workers in art.
(1) The first arts are, of course, those of pure utility, which spring
from the primal physical necessities of man: which are concerned in
the maintenance of life itself--the art or craft of the hunter and the
fisherman, the tiller of the soil, the hewer of wood and the drawer
of water: but seeing that next to securing sufficiency of food, the
efforts of man are directed towards providing himself with shelter,
both of roof and raiment, and since most of the arts of the creative
sort must be practised under shelter of some kind, and that all of
them contribute in some way towards the building or adornment of
such shelter, I think we shall find the true basis and controlling
influences, which have been paramount in the development of decorative
design, _in the form and character of the dwellings of man_ and their
accessories; from the temples he has raised to enshrine his highest
ideals--these temples themselves being but larger and more monumental
dwellings--to the tomb, his last dwelling-place. We shall find, in
short, the original and controlling bases of design in architecture,
the queen and mother of all the arts.
In asserting this one does not lose sight of the view that _all art is,
primarily, the projection or precipitation in material form of man's
emotional and intellectual nature_; but, being projected and taking
definite shape, it becomes subject to certain controlling forces of
nature, of material, of condition, which re-act upon the mind; and it
is with these controlling forces and conditions, and the distinctions
which arise out of them, that we are now concerned.
Such distinctions as exist, for instance, in the feeling, the plan and
construction of those patterns intended to be laid upon the floors (as
in carpets or tiles), and such as are intended to cover ceilings and
walls (as in plaster-work, textile hangings or wall papers), obviously
arise from the relative positions of floor, walls, and ceilings, and
the differences between horizontal and vertical positions; and these
conditions are necessarily part and parcel of the constructional
conditions of the dwelling itself.
The first shelter may be said to have been the shelter of nature
without art--the TREE and the CAVE, the first homes of man; although
he was probably not by any means the first animal to hide among the
woods and the rocks, since he had many and formidable foes to dispute
with or disturb him in possession. It is noticeable that such art as
is associated with this strange and remote chapter of man's existence
on the earth--the art-instinct which impelled the primitive hunter
to incise the bone and stone implements he used with the images of
the animals he hunted--is purely graphic, and does not show any
feeling of that adaptive ornamental quality characteristic of what
we call decorative design, which would seem to belong to a more
highly organized condition of society. "Among the primitive Greeks,"
remarks Messrs. Guhl and Köner in their Life of the Greeks and Romans,
"fountains and trees, caves and mountains, were considered as seats
of the gods, and revered accordingly, even without being changed into
divine habitations by the art of man." But, as proving literally that
art springs out of nature, the cave itself led to a development of
architecture, as in some early Greek tombs where the cave, or cleft
in the rocks, is utilized and added to by masonry; or where the rock
itself was carved and hollowed, as in the rock-cut temples of Egypt and
India. To which some trace the origin of columnar architecture.
The TENT of the Asiatic wandering tribes, and the wattled and wooden
HUT of the western and northern, come next in the order of human
dwellings, and not only may we trace certain types of pattern design
to both sources, but it would seem as if both the tent and the hut, and
perhaps the wagon of the Aryans, had had their influence upon the more
substantial stone structures which succeeded them. When tribes became
communities, townships were founded, and more fixed and settled habits
of life prevailed.
[Illustration: DIAGRAM TO SHOW THE THREE TYPICAL FORMS OF
ARCHITECTURE:
I II III
LINTEL. ROUND ARCH. POINTED ARCH.]
Now we may broadly group the principal types of architectural form and
construction in three principal divisions, following Professor Ruskin,
namely:
1. The architecture of the Lintel (or column and pediment).
2. The architecture of the Round Arch (or vault and dome).
3. The architecture of the Pointed Arch[1] (or vault, gable, and
buttress).
[1] Although such a classification may not be quite satisfactory from
the point of view of the constructive and historical architect, it
sufficiently serves the present purpose as regards the influence of
these main types in determining the form and character and controlling
spaces and lines of the decoration, both surface and sculptural design,
which accompanies them in ancient, classical, and mediæval work which
it is my object to trace.
Of the first we may find the simplest type in Stonehenge; we may find
it in equally massive, and almost as primitive form at Mycenæ, in
the famous Gate of the Lions, remarkable as being the earliest known
example of Greek sculpture: we may find it more developed in the Greek
temples of ancient Egypt, at Karnac, Thebes and Philæ, and we may see
it in its purest form in the Parthenon at Athens.
[Illustration: GATE OF MYCENÆ.]
The derivation and development of the Greek Doric temple from its
prototype of wooden construction has frequently been demonstrated,
and the tombs in Lycia furnish striking illustrations of this
close imitation and perpetuation in stone of a system and details
belonging to wood; and it is instructive to compare its features with
corresponding parts in the Parthenon, and to observe how closely they
agree. It is a curious instance of that love for and clinging to
ancient and traditional forms, that with the art and all the resources
of Athenian civilization, the form and construction of its temples
remained much the same, and may be considered as only glorified
enlargements in marble of their wooden predecessors, retaining all the
characteristic details of those primitive structures.
[Illustration: IMITATION OF WOODEN CONSTRUCTION IN STONE TOMB IN LYKIA,
[From GUHL & KONER].]
By these means, however, qualities of grandeur, joined with extreme
simplicity, subtle proportions, and sparing, severe, but delicately
chiselled ornament were gained; which, when heightened with colour
in the broad and strong sunshine of Greece, seemed all sufficient,
especially so when they formed the framework, or setting, of the most
beautiful and noble sculpture the world has ever seen, as in the
Parthenon.
To this sculpture, indeed, all the lines and proportions of the
building seem to lead the eye, while it remains, whether in pediment,
metope, or frieze, an essential part of the architectural effect, and
is strictly slab sculpture, or what may be considered as architectural
ornament, for, as I have elsewhere said, we may fairly consider
figure-sculpture to have been the ornament of the Greeks: just as
one might say that picture writing and hieroglyphic were the mural
decorations of the Egyptians.
[Illustration: ORNAMENTAL LINES IN THE FRIEZE OF THE PARTHENON.
WAVE MOVEMENT & SPIRAL CURVES IN THE FRIEZE.]
These sculptures were evidently designed under the influence of the
strongest architectural and decorative feeling, and were constructed
upon a basis of ornamental lines. There is a certain rhythm and
recurrence of mass, and line, and form in them throughout, and they
have all been carefully considered in relation to the places they
occupy.
[Illustration: METOPE OF THE PARTHENON, SHOWING RELATION & PROPORTIONS
OF THE MASSES IN RELIEF TO THE GROUND.]
It is to be noted, too, that the sculptures are placed in the
_interstices of the construction_; that is to say, not on the actual
bearing parts. On this point it is interesting to compare with the
earlier forms of pure stone construction at Mycenæ. The lions over the
Mycenæ Gate are carved upon a slab of stone placed in the triangular
hollow left above the lintel to prevent it breaking under the great
pressure of the heavy stones used. The triangular hollow may be
seen _without_ the slab in the doorway of Clytemnestra's house at
Mycenæ. Here we have an early instance of the interstice left by the
necessities of the construction being utilized as a decorative feature,
significant in its design, showing the protecting image of the Castle
of Mycenæ, much in the same way as we see the family arms sculptured
over the gateways of our English mediæval castles.
Returning to the Parthenon, we see that the same principle is
observable in the pediment and metope sculptures, the frieze of the
cella being really a mural decoration consisting of facing slabs of
marble. The building would doubtless stand without any of them, as a
timber-framed house would stand without its boarding, or filling of
brick or plaster; but it would be like a skeleton, or a head without
its eyes--much, indeed, as time, bombardment, ravage, and the British
Museum have left it now.
Before we leave the Parthenon, let me call attention to one
prevailing principle, characteristic of its design in every part; for
though following throughout the principles or traditions of wooden
construction, no doubt its proportions and lines were consciously and
carefully considered by the architect with a view to æsthetic effect.
It is _the principle of recurring or re-echoing lines_, a leading
principle, indeed, throughout the whole province of Design, and one
on the importance and value of which it is impossible to lay too much
stress.
[Illustration: THE PARTHENON [After MENGE].]
[Illustration: PARTHENON EASTERN PEDIMENT--SKETCH TO SHOW RELATION OF
LINES OF SCULPTURE TO ANGLE OF PEDIMENT.]
[Illustration: PARTHENON EASTERN PEDIMENT--SKETCH TO SHOW RELATION OF
LINES OF SCULPTURE TO ANGLE OF PEDIMENT.]
To begin with the pediment. The main outline is delicately emphasized
by the mouldings of the edge, which also serve as a dripstone--the
practical origin, probably, of all mouldings. The groups of sculptured
figures within the recess (which further serve to express the pitch
of the roof) re-echo, informally, in the lines controlling their
composition, as well as in the lines of limbs and draperies,
variations of the angle of the pediment. Thus, the groups of figures,
full of action and variety as they are, are united and harmonized with
the whole building; while, to avoid undue appearance of heaviness on
the crest of the pediment and on the angles were placed anthemion
bronze ornaments.
[Illustration: PARTHENON ELEVATION SHOWING PORTION OF PEDIMENT, FRIEZE
AND COLUMNS.]
The cornice, again, is emphasized by mouldings marking the important
horizontal lines of the building, re-echoed by the lines of the frieze,
and counteracted and braced by the emphatic vertical lines of the
triglyphs, and enriched by the little dentils below.
Then we come to the cap of the Doric column. It is simplicity itself.
A thin square block of marble forms the abacus. The capital is a
flattened circular cushion of marble, rounded at the sides in a
diminishing curve to the head of the column, which terminates in
a horizontal reeding. The column itself is delicately channelled
with a series of lines which follow its outline, and give vertical
expression to the idea of the support of the horizontal mass above, the
column gradually diminishing from base to cap, entasized or slightly
swelled in the middle to avoid the visual effect of running out of
the perpendicular. The Doric columns spring boldly from the steps
without base mouldings, the steps repeating the horizontal lines of the
building again, and giving it height and dignity. The other variants of
the Greek style will illustrate much the same principles in different
degrees, and we may trace the value of proportions, and recurring
lines, and different degrees of enrichment through the other four
orders.
As designers, then, we can at least learn some very important lessons
from lintel architecture generally, and from the Parthenon in
particular, and chiefest amongst these are:
[Illustration: MARBLE CHAIRS, THEATRE OF DIONYSUS, ATHENS.]
1. The value of simplicity of line.
2. The value of recurring and re-echoing lines.
3. The value of ornamental design and treatment of figures in low or
high relief as parts of architectural expression.
[Illustration: GREEK CHAIR.]
[Illustration: GREEK TABLE WITH VOTIVE OFFERINGS.]
[Illustration: END OF GREEK COUCH.]
[Illustration: GREEK LOW-BACKED THRONE.]
4. The value of largeness of style in the design and treatment of the
groups and figures themselves, both as sculpture pure and simple and as
architectural ornament.
When we come to examine the accessories of Greek life, furniture,
pottery, dress, we find them all characterized by the same qualities in
design as we have just been noting in the architecture; the fundamental
architectural feeling seems to pervade them. A simplicity of line,
balance, and reserve of ornament distinguishes alike their seats and
chairs and tables, caskets, vases and vessels, and the expressive lines
of their dresses and draperies falling into the lines of the figure
give life and variety, while they contrast with the severity of the
architectural lines and planes.
Now, so far we have been considering the architecture of the lintel,
and its bearing upon design, and the qualities and principles we may
learn from it generally.
With the use of the round arch--invented, it is said, by the Greeks,
but always associated with the Romans, who used it--quite different
effects come in, with different motives and ideas in design. The
Roman architecture, the round arch, fulfils the functions of both
construction and ornament, on the same principle of recurrence, or
repetition, we have noticed before; as, for instance, in the Colosseum,
where the tiers of round arches which support the outer wall of the
building serve both the constructive and decorative functions. With
the use of the arch the arcade becomes a constructive feature of
great decorative value, and takes the place in Roman and Romanesque
buildings, with a lighter and more varied effect, of the columned
Greek cella. Sunshine, no doubt, had much to do with its use, since a
covered arcaded loggia, or porch in front of a building, so frequent
in Italy, gave both shelter and coolness. The use of the arch led to
vaulting, and to the use of arch mouldings, enrichments, and to the
covering the vaults with mosaic and painting, and the vaulting led to
the dome, which, again, offered a splendid field for the mosaicist and
the painter.
[Illustration: CONSTRUCTIVE & DECORATIVE USE OF ROUND ARCH & PILASTER
FLAVIAN AMPHITHEATRE (COLOSSEUM) ROME.
(FERGUSON).]
The Romans borrowed all their architectural details from the Greeks,
and varied and enriched them, adding many more members to the cornice
mouldings, and carving stone garlands upon their friezes, to take the
place of the primitive festal ones of leaves which were hung there,
as in the relief of the visit of Bacchus to Icarius, a Romano-Greek
sculpture in the British Museum.
[Illustration: HANGING THE FESTAL GARLAND,
FROM A GRÆCO ROMAN RELIEF IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.]
They (the Romans) fully realized the ornamental value of colonnades
and porticoes, and they used the column, varying the orders, and
translating them into pilasters freely as decorations on the façades
and walls of their buildings, slicing up the peristyles of temples,
as it were, for the sake of their ornamental effect, cutting down the
columns into pilasters, and placing them, with intervening friezes, one
on the top of the other, masking the construction of the real building,
a favourite device with the Renascence architects.
[Illustration: USE OF DECORATIVE SCULPTURE IN ROMAN ARCHITECTURE: THE
ARCH OF CONSTANTINE.]
Roman architecture may be considered really as a transitional style.
While its true constructive characteristic is the round arch, every
detail of the Greek or Lintel architecture is used both without and
with the arch, and in the latter case the column frequently becomes a
wall decoration in the shape of a pilaster, as well as the cornice, and
is no longer made use of, as in true lintel construction, to support
the weight of the roof. In their viaducts and bridges and baths they
were great builders with the arch, but, like some modern engineers,
when they wanted to beautify they borrowed architectural ornament from
the Greeks.
Nothing very fresh was gained for design in these adaptations except
a certain heavy richness of detail in the sculptured cornices and
friezes, and coffered ceilings. The use of the flat pilaster, however,
led to the panelled pilaster with its elegant arabesque, which was
afterwards revived and developed with such extraordinary grace and
variety by the artists of the Renascence and carried from Italy
westward.
With the round arch, too, several important decorative spaces were
given to the designer, the spandrel, the panel, the medallion, all
of which, with the frieze, may be seen utilized for the decorative
sculpture on the arch of Constantine. The decorative use of
inscriptions is also a feature in Roman architecture, and the dignity
of the form of their capital letters was well adapted to ornamental
effect in square masses upon their triumphal arches and along the
entablature of their temples.
The Romans, too, brought the domed roof and the mosaic floor into use,
and were great in the use of coloured marbles; also stucco and plaster
work in interiors, the free and beautiful plaster work found in the
tombs on the Latin Way being well known; so that on the whole we owe
to them the illustration of the effective use of many beautiful arts,
which the Italians have inherited to this day, though it must be said
often with more skill than taste.
One might say, generally and ultimately, Roman art exemplified that
love of show, and the external signs of power, pomp, splendour, and
luxury which became dear as well as fatal to them, as they appear to
do to every conquering people, until they are finally enervated and
overcome as if by the Nemesis of their own supremacy.
[Illustration: MOSAIC, ST. APOLLINARE IN CLASSE, RAVENNA.]
The art of Greece, one may say, on the other hand, at her zenith
represented that love of beauty as distinct from ornament, and
clearness and severity of thought which will always cling to the
country from whence the modern world derives the germ of nearly all its
ideas.
But when the seat of the empire was transferred to Constantinople, and
Roman art, influenced by Asiatic feeling, and stimulated and elevated
by the new faith of Christianity, became transfigured into the solemn
splendour of Byzantine art, the architecture of the round arch and the
dome and cupola rose to its fullest beauty, and such buildings as St.
Sophia at Constantinople, and St. Mark's at Venice, with the churches
of Ravenna, mark another great and noble epoch in the arts of design.
Byzantine design, whether in building, in carving, in mosaic, or
goldsmiths' work, impresses one with a certain restraint in the midst
of its splendour; a certain controlling dignity and reserve appears to
be exercised even in the use of the most beautiful materials, as well
as in design and the treatment of form.
The mosaics of the Ravenna churches alone are sufficient to exemplify
this. The artists seemed fully to realize that the curved surfaces of
the dome, the half dome of the apse, or the long flat frieze above
the arch columns of the nave of the basilicas, like St. Apollinare
in Classe, afforded splendid fields for a splendid material, the
cross light from the deep-set windows enriching the effect, and that
everything might well be secondary to it. The same principle or feeling
is seen in St. Mark's where the architecture is quite simple, the
arches and vaulting without mouldings, nothing to interfere with the
quiet splendour of the gold or blue fields of mosaic varied with simple
typical figures, bold in silhouette, placed frankly upon them, emblems,
boldly curving scroll-work, and inscriptions. The execution, too, is as
direct and simple as the design. Such design and decoration as this
becomes an essential and integral part of the architectural structure
and effect.
[Illustration: SKETCH OF PART OF INTERIOR OF DOME, S. MARK'S, VENICE.]
[Illustration: MOSAIC OF THE EMPRESS THEODORA, T. VITALE, RAVENNA,
SIXTH CENTURY.]
Note the way in which the tesseræ are laid (in the head of the Empress
Theodora from St. Vitale at Ravenna, for instance). The cube is used as
much as possible, but the cubes vary much in size, and are set often
with very open joints, the cement lines of the bedding showing quite
clearly, and the surface of the work uneven, the tesseræ being worked,
of course, from the front and _in situ_, presenting a varied surface of
different facets which, catching the light at different angles, give
an extraordinary sparkle and richness to the effect as a whole. In the
head of Theodora the effect is enhanced by the discs of mother-of-pearl
used for the head-dress.
In the laying of the tesseræ, too, note that the system is followed of
defining the outlines with rows of cubes, and building up the masses
(as in the nimbus) with concentric rows, as a rule, making the lines of
the filling tesseræ follow as far as possible the line of the boundary
tesseræ. This, of course, would naturally result as the simplest and
most convenient, as well as most expressive, method of laying tesseræ,
in defining form by means of small cubes, and is one of the conditions
of the work, and when, as in these mosaics, so far from being refined
away, or concealed, or any attempt being made (as in later times) to
imitate painting, these conditions are boldly and frankly acknowledged,
we see how its peculiar beauty, character, and the quality of its
ornamental effect depends upon these very conditions.
This principle will be found to hold good and true throughout all
art. Directly, from a false idea of refinement, or with the object
of displaying mechanical skill, the craftsman is induced to try to
conceal the fundamental conditions of his craft, and to make it ape the
qualities of some totally different sort of work, he ceases to be an
artist, at all events. The true artist in any material is he who in
acknowledging its conditions and limitations finds in them sources and
opportunities of new beauty, and in being faithful to those conditions
makes them subserve his invention.
After the decorative splendour of the Byzantine architecture, the
Norman work left in our own land seems comparatively simple and plain
as time has left it, but its remains show its Roman descent in the
doorway and porch of many a quiet village church, as well as on a
greater scale in so many of our cathedrals, which often illustrate, in
a remarkable way, the transition or growth of one style out of another,
the new evolved from the old.
At Canterbury, for instance, one reads the signs which mark the
transformation of the Norman building into the Gothic. The first church
founded by St. Augustine was Saxon. This was enlarged by Otho (938)
as a basilica. This again was ruined by the Danes (1013). The Norman
part of the present building was constructed by Bishop Lanfranc (1070),
on to which was grafted, as it were, the thirteenth, fourteenth, and
fifteenth century Gothic which distinguish it.
There is a tower on the south side of the transept known as Anselm's
Tower (from Bishop Anselm, one of the Norman builders), and on the
lower part runs an arcading of interlacing round arches, the tower
itself being richly arcaded in several stories in round arches. But
this lower band shows the period of transition, from the use of the
round arch, to the pointed--the pointed lancet arches being formed by
the interlacing of the round, so that we have here the actual birth of
_the pointed arch_ (at least, as a decorative feature), which leads us
to our next typical division and characteristic epoch of architectural
style.
[Illustration: ANSELM'S TOWER, CANTERBURY.]
We need not go out of our own country to find abundant illustrations
of typical forms of pointed architecture. Almost any village church
will give us the main features--the characteristic plan of nave
and chancel, curiously following the plan of the ancient Roman
basilica--the public hall and law court in one, and perpetuating for
us the type of ancient dwelling or hall which may be said to have
prevailed from the time of Homer to the end of the Middle Ages, varying
chiefly in external features and architectural detail.
The severe lancet arch is characteristic of the first phase of the
Gothic, which gradually grew out of the severer Norman. The _gable_
took a higher pitch, and to support the weight and thrust of _towers_
and _spires_, _buttresses_ were used, and these became, also, a
striking and characteristic feature of the pointed arch, which
completed in the thirteenth century the period of its first development.
Lancet arch, high-pitched gable, buttress (plain and pinnacled), spired
and pinnacled tower--these are the leading constructive exterior
characteristics, the carved work, somewhat restrained, and chiefly
manifested in peculiar foliation of the capitals and corbels, and in
the hollows of arch mouldings in rows of sharp cut dog teeth.
In the interior clustered shafts took the place of the solid
round Norman piers, rising, as we see in our cathedral naves, to
support lofty vaulted roofs, the ribs moulded and covered at their
intersections by carved bosses.
Again we may note the principle of recurring lines which repeat
and emphasize the form of the arched openings and the structural
lines of the vaulting in the mouldings. This recurrence gives that
effect of extraordinary grace and lightness combined with structural
strength which is so striking a characteristic of thirteenth century
Gothic work, and of which there is no finer example than the nave of
Westminster Abbey.
[Illustration: TRANSITIONAL ARCADE, SOUTH TRANSEPT, CANTERBURY.]
[Illustration: TYPICAL FORMS OF ARCHES:
SEMICIRCULAR.
TRANSITION.
POINTED (EQUILATERAL).
POINTED (LANCET).
CUSPED.
OGEE.
TYPICAL FORMS OF GOTHIC GEOMETRIC FOLIATION.
[Ruskin].]
[Illustration: WESTMINSTER ABBEY: THE NAVE, LOOKING EAST.]
We noted that the Greeks used the interstices of their construction
for their chief decoration, their figure sculpture, and to some extent
the same plan is followed in Gothic architecture, where we find the
tympanums of doors, the spandrels of arcades (as in the Chapter House
at Salisbury or the angel choir at Lincoln), and canopied niches (as
at Wells), used for figure sculpture; but, at the same time, the
_structural features themselves are emphasized_ by ornament to a far
greater extent, as in caps, arch mouldings, the junctions of the
vaulting, and the like; and increasingly so in the succeeding Decorated
and Perpendicular periods, until we get vaulted roofs of fan tracery
like those of King's College Chapel at Cambridge, or Henry VII.'s
Chapel at Westminster.
But if we may say that the chief decorative glory of Greek architecture
was its figure sculpture, as mosaic was of the Byzantine churches, so
we may say that the traceried window, filled with stained and leaded
glass, became the chief decorative glory of Gothic architecture.
Unhappily great quantities of glass have disappeared from our
cathedrals and churches, from one cause or another, but from the relics
that remain we may form some idea of the splendour and quality of the
old glass.
The famous windows of the south transept at York Minster, called "The
Five Sisters," are good examples of the severer earlier style of
pattern and colour, consisting of fine scroll-work and geometric forms,
in which hatched grisaille patterns are heightened by bright points and
lines of colour.
[Illustration: WEST FRONT OF WELLS CATHEDRAL.]
Thirteenth century glass, where figures are used, is characterized by
the smallness of their scale in proportion to the window, and traces
of Byzantine tradition in their drawing, intricate design, and deep
and vivid colouring, the work being composed of small pieces of glass
leaded together; the effect of the jewel-like depth and quality of
the colour--deep crimsons, blues, and greens being much used--being
increased by the close network of leading.
As windows, in the course of the evolution of the Gothic style, were
made broader, or rather, the window opening proper from wall to wall
being greatly increased in width and height, they were supported and
divided into panels or lights by elaborate stone tracery, a tracery
which becomes almost as distinct a province of design as the design
of the glass itself--distinct from, yet in close relationship to the
architecture of the building. The comparative slight divisions of the
tracery, however, gave more scope to the stained glass designer, who
shows very emphatic architectural influence in the elaborate canopies
which surmount the figures occupying the separate lights of the windows
from the thirteenth to the end of the fifteenth centuries, as well as
in the general vertical arrangement of the lines of their composition.
He gradually increased the scale of his figures and gave more breadth
to his design, and brought it more into relation with the art of the
painter and the sculptor, at the same time acknowledging with them, in
the disposition of his figures in the space, and the disposition of the
draperies and accessories, that architectural influence under which the
artist and craftsman of the Middle Ages worked with extraordinary
freedom and fertility of invention, and yet in perfect harmony[2]--a
sign of that fraternal co-operation and the effect of the formation of
men into brotherhoods and guilds, which, coming in with the adoption
of Christianity and the organization of the Church, remained through
all the turbulence and strife of the time the great social force of the
Middle Ages.
[2] As I recur to the subject of glass design in Chapter IV.
illustrations are given there.
[Illustration: WESTMINSTER ABBEY, FAN TRACERY IN HENRY VII.'S CHAPEL,
FIFTEENTH CENTURY.]
It seems to me if we wish to realize the ideal of a great and
harmonious art, which shall be capable of expressing the best that
is in us: if we desire again to raise great architectural monuments,
religious, municipal, or commemorative, we shall have to learn the
great lesson of unity through fraternal co-operation and sympathy,
the particular work of each, however individual and free in artistic
expression, falling naturally into its due place in a harmonious
scheme. Let us cultivate our technical skill and knowledge to the
utmost, but let us not neglect our imagination, sense of beauty, and
sympathy, or else we shall have nothing to express.
Through the thirteenth century onwards to the fifteenth Gothic
architecture continued to develop, to pass through new phases, to take
new forms, a living and growing style moving with the wants and ideals
of men.
After the Early English comes the Decorated period, in which the
mouldings and foliation become fuller, broader, and more ornate. To
contrast decorated foliation and ornament with the earlier work, is
like comparing the opening flower with the bud. The ogee arch was
invented, the crockets of the pinnacles and canopies grew and increased
and became finer in form, the finials larger and more varied. The
carved canopies and tabernacle work grew richer and more intricate.
The foliage followed nature more closely. The figure subjects of the
carver were more freely treated, and dealt oftener with common life,
with phantasy, or humour. The effigies of knight and lady, or priest,
became more and more like portraits in stone or alabaster, the details
of their dresses more rich, delicate, and beautiful. The maker of
brasses showed a freer and more masterly hand, and greater sense of
ornamental effect in the spacing and treatment of his figures. The
work of the miniaturist and the scribe grew more and more delicate
and exquisite in form, colour, and invention. The stained glass
worker increased the scale of his figures, and varied the quality and
treatment of his colours. The glazier invented new lead patterns;
the wood carver revelled in stall work, screens, and misereres. The
recessed and canopied tomb enriched the chantries of churches and
cathedrals.
[Illustration: THE FIVE SISTERS OF YORK, THIRTEENTH CENTURY.]
[Illustration: DETAILS OF TOMB WINCHELSEA CH. 1303.
Finial.
Pinnacle.
Crocket.
Termination of Cusp.]
[Illustration: FOURTEENTH CENTURY CANOPIED TOMB, WINCHELSEA CHURCH.]
[Illustration: Wells Cathedral Architectural feeling & detail in iron
work.
Wrought-Iron Railing.
Tomb of Bishop Thomas De Bekynton 1464-5.]
Beauty and invention of extraordinary fertility and richness
characterized every form of art and handicraft associated with Gothic
architecture. We can trace in each variety the architectural influence
in every department of work. In some instances reproduction of actual
architectural details and characteristics, as, for instance, when the
wrought-iron railing of a bishop's tomb (at Wells Cathedral, 1464-5)
reproduced the battlement, buttress and pinnacle as motives, giving
them, however, a free and fanciful rendering suited to the material.
[Illustration: DRESSOIR OR SIDE BOARD 15th CENT. FRENCH
(from L. Roger Milès).]
[Illustration: CANOPIED SEAT FRENCH 15th CENT.]
Abundant instances may be found of the fanciful treatment of
architectural forms in furniture, textiles, in painting and carving,
and metal work--the canopies over the heads of figures in stained
glass, and inclosing figures upon brasses, are instances--shrines and
caskets in the form of arcaded, and buttressed and pinnacled buildings,
seats and chairs with canopied or arched backs, carved bench ends with
"poppy head" finials and arched and foliated panels, censers in the
form of shrines. The large gold brocaded stuffs used as hangings or
coverings, and represented in miniatures and pictures of the period.
Very beautiful specimens are to be seen in the pictures of Van Eyck and
Memling for instance.
[Illustration: CARVED BENCH-ENDS, DENNINGTON CHURCH, SUFFOLK.]
In all these things we find a re-echo, as it were, of the prevailing
foliated forms of Gothic architecture, repeated through endless
variations, the controlling and harmonizing element throughout the
design work of the Gothic periods, the form by which all seem to be
harmonized and related, as the branches are related to the main stem,
and as the plan of the tree may be found in the veining of the leaf.
The fourteenth century saw the development of a new phase of Gothic
called Perpendicular. It is found united with the Early English and
Decorated, as well as Norman, in nearly all our cathedrals.
[Illustration: BROCADE HANGING, FROM THE ANNUNCIATION, BY MEMLING.]
At St. David's, for instance, there is a remarkable instance of a late
Perpendicular timber roof, richly moulded and carved, with pendants,
covering a Norman nave of 1180. Yet the effect is fine, and one feels
glad that the restoring architect could find no authority for a Norman
stone vaulting, otherwise we might have lost the rich timber roof
for a modern idea of a supposititious Norman vault. The sketch (from
the south side of the choir at Canterbury, p. 45), too, shows how
harmoniously structural lines of different periods compose.
The chief characteristics of the late period of Gothic (Perpendicular)
are a lower pitched arch, an elongated shaft, many clustered; caps and
bases angular; ribs of vaulting richly moulded, or the vault covered
with fan-like foliation in late examples, as in Henry VII.'s Chapel.
Pinnacles begin to take the cupular form, details become smaller,
windows grow larger and are transversely divided by transoms or
horizontal bars of stone, connecting and solidifying the many vertical
mullions.
[Illustration: ST. DAVID'S CATHEDRAL.]
A certain refinement of detail and line with a feeling for emphatic
horizontals and verticals comes in; and this feeling may be the
indication of a reaction, as if the constructive and imaginative
faculties of man were beginning to prepare for the next great change
that was soon to sweep over the art of Europe.
[Illustration: STRUCTURAL LINES OF DIFFERENT PERIODS IN HARMONIOUS
COMBINATION, CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL.]
It might be said that gradually from that time architecture, as the
supreme organic and controlling influence in the arts of design,
gave up her prerogative of leadership, and since has rather been
on the whole displaced in artistic interest by the other arts; or
rather, with the change of the principle of organic growth out of use
and constructive necessity in architecture for those of classical
authority, archæology, or learned eclecticism, the different arts,
more especially painting, began an independent existence, and, with
the other arts of design, may be said to have been more individualized
and less and less related both to them and to architecture ever since,
reaching the extremest points of divergence perhaps in our own days.
It seems to me that, on the whole, there can be little doubt that
architecture and the arts of design generally have suffered in
consequence; and to bring them back to healthy and harmonious activity
we must try to re-unite them all again upon the old basis.
I will terminate here my short sketch of architectural style and its
influence, not attempting now to follow it in its later changes and
adaptations to the increased complexities of human existence. My
purpose has been rather to dwell upon the organic and typical forms of
architecture, in my endeavour to trace the relationship between it and
the art of design generally.
That relationship appears to me to consist chiefly in _the control of
constructive line and form_, which all design, surface or otherwise,
in association with any form of architecture is bound of necessity to
acknowledge as a fundamental condition of fitness and harmony. Those
essential properties of the expression of line, as they now seem, which
give meaning and purpose to all design, appear to be derived straight
from constructive necessities and the inseparable association of ideas
with which they are connected; as, for instance, the idea of secure
rest and repose conveyed by horizontal lines, or the sense of support
and rigidity suggested by vertical ones may be directly traced to
association with the fundamental principles of architectural structure,
to the lintel and its support, to the laying of stone upon stone, and
with this clue we might trace the expression of line through its many
variations.