THE DECORATED STYLE.
The best examples of Gothic architecture may be said to have been
erected between the years 1180 and 1300, and from the latter year many
writers date the commencement of its decline. In England we owe nearly
the whole of such magnificent buildings as the cathedrals of Lincoln,
Salisbury, Worcester, and the abbey of Westminster to the 13th century,
and there is scarcely a cathedral or abbey that does not owe some
beautiful portion of its structure to the builders of the same period,
the transepts and lady chapel of Hereford Cathedral, the eastern
transepts of Durham, the nave and transepts of Wells, the transepts of
York, the choir presbytery, central and eastern transepts of Rochester,
the eastern portion of the choir of Ely, the west front of Peterborough,
the choir of Southwell, the nave and transepts of Lichfield, and the
choir of S. David's being a few of our most characteristic examples of
this period. The style which followed the Early English is known as the
Geometric or Early Decorated style, and it embraces roughly the end
of the 13th century and the first twenty or thirty years of the 14th
century, and continued in its later or Curvilinear form to near the end
of that century. Perhaps the most perfect example of the Geometric style
in the world is the cathedral church at Amiens, which is usually called
the _mother church_ of this style, and although she has many daughters,
none of them can be said to equal their parent in beauty.
In England the most perfect examples are not to be looked for in
cathedrals and large churches, but in their chapels, and the most superb
specimen we possessed, S. Stephen's Chapel, Westminster, has been
destroyed within comparatively recent years. Those left to us include
the chapel of the palace of the bishops of Ely, in Ely Place, Holborn,
now the Roman Catholic Church of S. Etheldreda, a building almost
identical in plan with the vanished chapel of S. Stephen. Trinity
Church, Ely, once Our Lady's Chapel, and Prior Crawden's Chapel,
in the same city, are lovely examples of the latest development of
the Curvilinear style, while the former is considered the most
highly-wrought building in England. Belonging to this period, also,
is the choir of Merton College Chapel, Oxford, and Luton Church.
The Decorated style may be divided as regards its windows into two
classes--Geometric and Curvilinear. The first has tracery evolved
entirely from the circle. The Curvilinear style is distinguished by
traceries formed by curved and flowing lines. _See pages 15 and 59._
[Side note: Decorated Windows.]
Decorated windows are usually large and contain from two to seven
lights, although one sometimes finds a window with a single light, but
of less elongated form than those of the Early English period.
As we have seen in a previous chapter, tracery originated from the
necessity of piercing that portion of the wall which was left vacant
when two lights were gathered under a single arched dripstone, and
therefore elementary tracery consisted merely of apertures in a flat
surface. As the possibilities of this ornamental feature became better
understood, the mullions were recessed from the face of the wall and the
fine effect thus produced was, as the art progressed, much enhanced by
the introduction of various orders of mullions, and by recessing certain
portions of the tracery from the face of the mullions and their
corresponding bars. The geometrical tracery, as we have seen, consists
of various combinations of the circle, as the trefoil, based on the
triangle, the quatrefoil on the square, the cinquefoil on the pentagon,
etc.
[Illustration: A Late Decorated Window in a Parish Church.
East Sutton, Kent. _Photograph Gardner Waterman._]
In Curvilinear windows the tracery, although based on the same forms and
figures, is yet so blended into an intricate pattern that each figure
does not stand out with the same individuality as in the Geometric.
Among our most beautiful Geometric windows are those of the Lady Chapel
at Exeter, Ely Chapel, and Merton Chapel, Oxford, and of the Curvilinear
our best example is probably the east window of Carlisle Cathedral.
It must be noted that beautiful as are Curvilinear windows, yet they
mark a certain decadence in Gothic architecture, in that it is an
irrational treatment of stone, and conveys the idea that the material
was bent and not cut into the required shape, it being a well-established
canon in art that when strength is sacrificed to mere elegance it marks
a decline in that art.
[Side note: Decorated Capitals and Piers.]
Decorated capitals as a rule follow the contour of the pier in clustered
columns, and are either bell-shaped or octagonal. They are frequently
only moulded, thus presenting rounds, ogees and hollows, on which the
prevailing ornaments of the period, the ball and the square flower,
are set. The foliated sculpture is most exquisite, and is gracefully
wreathed around the bell, instead of rising from the astrigal or upper
member of the capital, as in the earlier style.
[Illustration: Examples of Decorated Ornament.
Finial Capital Finial
(Wimborne Minster). (York Minster). (York Minster).
Square Flower.
Ball Flower.
Crocket Cornice Crockets
(Hereford Cathedral). (Grantham). (York Minster).
_Drawn by E. M. Heath._]
Almost every variety of leaf and flower is represented, the oak, the
vine and the rose being perhaps the most common, but the leaves of the
maple, hazel, ivy and strawberry are all so beautifully rendered as to
evidence their having been directly studied from nature. Plucked flowers
too, are not uncommon, and sometimes the little stalks and foliage
are accompanied by birds, lizards, squirrels and other creatures. The
columns of this period are much more elaborate than those of the Early
English style, and in plan have curved profiles with moulded members
between the shafts. These mouldings are very varied, but the hollows not
being so deeply undercut, the general effect is broader and less liney
than in the Early English; while the Decorated arches are less sharply
pointed than in the previous style.
[Side note: Decorated Doorways.]
The doorways of this style possess much the same features as the last,
but the mouldings, jamb shafts, etc., are more slender, and generally of
finer proportions, the hollows being often filled with the ball flower
and square flower instead of the dog tooth. Sometimes the doorways have
no pillars, being entirely composed of mouldings which are continuous
with those in the architrave. The large single doorways of this period
are nearly as large as the double ones of Early English date, and on the
sides small buttresses or niches are sometimes placed, and often one
finds a series of niches carried up like a hollow moulding, and filled
with figures. The figures of this period are not so good as in the
previous style, the heads seem too large for the bodies, and in the
female figures the breasts are represented as quite flat. Where there
are no figures double foliated tracery is often found hanging from one
of the outer mouldings, giving an effect of great richness.
[Side note: Decorated Buttresses.]
The buttresses (_see page 17_) in the Decorated style are nearly always
worked in stages, and a niche frequently figures on the face of the
buttress. Crocketed canopies and other carved decorations are common,
and in large buildings they usually terminate in pinnacles, which are
sometimes of open work.
A Gothic building attains its effect by the combination of numerous
parts, each possessing an individual character of its own. In its
loftiness, graceful outlines, and rich effect of light and shade, it
speaks of noble aspirations, of freedom, of intellectual thought,
of talent and skill, all generously given for a high purpose, the
foundation of which was a strong religious enthusiasm, combined with
an intense love of the work itself.
[Side note: Characteristics of Gothic Architecture.]
Having now arrived at the point where Gothic architecture reached its
climax, we may briefly sum up its leading characteristics. It is
essentially pointed or vertical; its details are mostly geometrical in
its window traceries, clusters of shafts and bases, but this geometric
quality is only one of construction and form and not of its inner spirit
and motive, for plants copied directly from nature were used in
beautiful profusion.
If we compare a large Gothic church with a comparatively small one, we
shall find the columns, windows, ornaments of the former are not so very
much larger than those of the latter, but that there are double or three
times the number of them. This is not the case in a classical building,
where each feature has to be enlarged in proportion to the size of the
building. It is the constant sub-division of a Gothic Church which adds
so to its apparent size.
Ornamentally, the Gothic is the geometrical and pointed elements
repeated to their utmost and afterwards combined with the elaboration of
natural objects, plants, flowers, etc., growing in the neighbourhood of
the work. This is a great feature, but the most striking point in all
good Gothic work is the wonderful elaboration of geometric tracery,
vesicas, trefoils, quatrefoils and an immense variety of other ornament.
In regard to the sizes of our great churches it may be of interest to
note that our longest English cathedral is Winchester. York and Lincoln,
although not so long as Winchester, are in superficial area very much
larger. The largest English church of a non-cathedral rank is
Westminster Abbey, which has, moreover, the distinction of being the
loftiest internally; the nave being 104 ft. in height. The largest
parish church is that of S. Nicholas, Great Yarmouth, which exceeds in
superficial area no fewer than eight of our cathedrals.
[Illustration: Examples of Perpendicular Ornament.
Panel. Crocket.
Tudor Rose. Portcullis. Fleur de Lys.]