Transcriber’s Note

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain. Scale bars marked '1 in.' have been added to illustrations for which a scale is given (e.g. 50 ft. to 1 in.) to indicate the size of the image as printed in the original book. Ditto marks have been replaced by the text they represent. Some corrections have been made to the printed text. These are listed in a second transcriber’s note at the end of the text.

ELEVATION OF FAÇADE OF COLOGNE CATHEDRAL.

A
HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE
IN ALL COUNTRIES,
FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE PRESENT DAY.

By JAMES FERGUSSON, D.C.L., F.R.S., M.R.A.S.,

FELLOW ROYAL INST. BRIT. ARCHITECTS,

&c. &c. &c.

Section of the Parthenon, showing the Author’s views as to the admission of light.

IN FIVE VOLUMES.—Vol. I.

THIRD EDITION.

Edited by R. PHENÉ SPIERS, F.S.A.,

FELLOW ROYAL INST. BRITISH ARCHITECTS.

LONDON:

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET,

1893.

The right of Translation is reserved.

FERGUSSON’S ARCHITECTURE.

Third Edition, with 330 Illustrations, 2 vols., medium 8vo, 31s. 6d.

A HISTORY CF THE MODERN STYLES OF ARCHITECTURE.

By the late JAMES FERGUSSON, F.R.S.

A New Edition, Revised and Enlarged. With a Special Account of the

Architecture of America.

By ROBERT KERR, Professor of Architecture at King’s College, London.

BY THE SAME.

New and Cheaper Edition, with 400 Illustrations, medium 8vo., 31s. 6d.

A HISTORY OF INDIAN AND EASTERN ARCHITECTURE.

LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,

STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.

EDITOR’S PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

A sketch of the life of the late Mr. James Fergusson, and an article by Prof. Kerr on the peculiar qualifications with which he was endowed for the position he took as an architectural historian, having appeared in the preface of the third edition of the “History of the Modern Styles of Architecture,” published in 1891, it is not necessary to do more than refer to them. A brief summary, however, of the several works he published on the History of the Architectural Styles may possibly be of some interest here as a record.

Mr. Fergusson’s first work dealing with the History of the Styles of Architecture was a large octavo volume, published in 1849, under the title of “An Historical Enquiry into the True Principles of Beauty in Art, more especially with reference to Architecture.” About one-third of the volume was devoted to an introduction, to which Mr. Fergusson attached so much importance that, in his preface he stated he considered it to be the text, and the rest of the work (viz., the description of the various styles) merely the illustration of what was there stated. The pith of this introduction was subsequently published in his later works, and a valuable chapter added to it on “Ethnography as Applied to Architecture.” The work contained only the history of the Early Styles from Egyptian to Roman, but it had been the intention of its author to treat of the Christian, Pagan, and Modern Styles of Architecture in subsequent volumes.

This intention was never carried out, but the book formed the basis of another work published in 1855, entitled, “The Handbook of Architecture,” which included the history of the Indian, Chinese, Assyrian, Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Sassanian, and Saracenic Styles, in the first volume, and of Christian Art in the second. A second edition, a reprint only of this, appeared in 1859, and shortly afterwards, in 1862, a third volume was published, dealing with the History of the Modern Styles. On the revision and expansion of the work in 1873, this third volume became the fourth as hereinafter explained.

In 1865 and 1867 the materials of the “Handbook” were rearranged to form an historical sequence, instead of a topographical one, and a new work was published under the title of the “History of Architecture”; the first part devoted to Ancient Architecture from Egyptian to Roman; the second to Christian; and the third part to Pagan Architecture, including Saracenic, Indian, Chinese, and Mexican.

In 1874 a second edition of this work appeared (from which the whole of the Indian and Chinese sections were omitted and published separately in 1876 as a third volume, under the title of “Indian and Eastern Architecture”), and many additions were made to the Assyrian and Byzantine chapters.

In the present edition (1893), which constitutes the third edition of the “History of Architecture,” the editor has endeavoured to the best of his ability to follow the course which Mr. Fergusson himself adopted in publishing new editions, viz., to rewrite those portions which subsequent discoveries had proved to be either incorrect or doubtful. For instance, in Egyptian Architecture the accurate measurements of the pyramids made by Mr. Flinders Petrie, and his correction of Lepsius’s theories as regards the Labyrinth, have placed information at the editor’s disposal which was unknown to Mr. Fergusson. Corrections of this kind are inserted in the text. On the other hand, absolutely nothing new has appeared on Assyrian Architecture, and, therefore, Mr. Fergusson’s theories respecting the restoration of the Assyrian palaces have been retained; the tendency of the opinion of archæologists having, however, developed rather in the direction of vaulted roofs to the principal halls, footnotes have been appended giving the views of foreign archæologists on the subject, between which and Mr. Fergusson’s views the student is left to judge.

In Persian work the accuracy of Mr. Fergusson’s views respecting the arrangement of the plans of the Persian palaces, which were first promulgated in 1855, has been confirmed by later explorations at Persepolis, Susa, and Pasargadæ, and footnotes giving the records of the same are appended.

The results of recent discoveries in Greece and Italy have been recorded, sometimes in the text, sometimes in footnotes; and changes have been made in the chapter on Parthian and Sassanian Architecture, M. Dieulafoy’s photographs having enabled the editor to correct some of the woodcuts copied from Coste’s illustrations.

Important changes have been made in the Second Part, devoted to Christian Architecture; the Byzantine style has been placed first, not only for chronological reasons as the first perfected Christian style, but from the impossibility of otherwise following the development of the Early Christian styles in Italy during the fifth and following centuries.

The Romanesque, or Early Christian, style in Italy has been included in Book II., together with the later developments of style in that country; this has enabled the editor to bring the description of St. Mark’s, Venice, into the first chapter under Italy, to which chronologically it belongs, instead of placing it after the Pointed Italian Gothic style. The Italian Byzantine chapter has been omitted, and the two or three buildings described under it transferred to the Byzantine-Romanesque chapter. By the new arrangement it is possible now to follow almost chronologically the various phases of style in Italy.

In the Book on the Byzantine style, some of the examples in Jerusalem ascribed to Constantine have been transferred to Justinian’s time; but this has naturally followed another very important change—the description of the so-called Mosque of Omar, the Dome of the Rock, has been transferred to the Saracenic style. It is well known that Mr. Fergusson had few supporters in his theories respecting the builders of this structure, and Prof. Hayter Lewis’s work has now removed all doubt as to its having been the work of the Caliph Abd el Melik and his followers. This change has necessitated a complete revision of the description of the Holy Sepulchre, for which Prof. Willis’s and Prof. Hayter Lewis’s works have furnished the chief authorities.

Various corrections have been made in the dates ascribed to the Mosques in Cairo, and the French Expedition in Tunis has enabled the editor to add a plan and view of the great Mosque of Kerouan, the most sacred Mahomedan edifice after that of Mecca, and the one great early example of which scarcely anything was known.

About forty woodcuts have been specially prepared for this new edition, half of which are of subjects not before illustrated, the remainder replacing those which were defective or absolutely incorrect. In addition to these, various alterations where required have been made to other woodcuts.

The several authorities consulted have been acknowledged in the course of the work, but the editor desires here to express his obligations to Mr. Fitzroy Doll, Mr. G. H. Birch, and Mr. Arthur Hill for advice on the German, English, and Irish sections respectively.

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION.

During the period that has elapsed since the first edition of this work was published,[^[1]] no important work on the History of Architecture has appeared which throws any new light on either the theory or practice of the art, and, except in India, no new buildings have been discovered and no monographs published that materially add to our general stores of knowledge.

The truth of the matter appears to be that the architectural productions of all the countries mentioned in these two volumes have been examined and described to a sufficient extent for the purposes of the general historian. A great deal of course remains to be done before all the information required for the student of any particular style can be supplied, but nothing of any great importance probably remains to be discovered in the countries of the Old World, nor anything that is at all likely to alter any views or theories founded on what we at present know.

The one exception to this satisfactory state of things is our knowledge, or rather want of knowledge, regarding the history of the ancient architecture of the New World, treated of in the last few pages of this work. No important addition has lately been made to the little we knew before, and it is now to be feared that Mr. Squier’s long-expected work on the Antiquities of Peru may never see the light, at least not under the auspices of its author, and the Count de Waldeck’s work adds very little, if anything, to what we knew before. What is really wanted is that some one should make himself personally acquainted with all the various styles existing between the upper waters of the Colorado and the desert of Atacama to such an extent as to be able to establish the relative sequence of their dates and to detect affinities where they exist, or to point out differences that escape the casual observer. Photography may in the next few years do something towards enabling stay-at-home travellers to do a good deal towards this, but photography will never do all, and local knowledge is indispensable for the exact determination of many now obscure questions. The problem is in fact identical with that presented to Indian antiquaries some thirty years ago. At that time we knew less of the history of Indian architecture than we now know of American, but at the present day the date of every building and every cave in India can be determined with almost absolute certainty to within fifty, or at the outside one hundred, years; the sequence is everywhere certain, and all can be referred to the race and religion that practised that peculiar style. In America there are the same strongly marked local peculiarities of style as in India, accompanied by equally easily detected affinities or differences, and what has been done for India could, I am convinced, easily be accomplished for America, and with even more satisfactory and more important results to the history and ethnography of that great country.

The subject is well worthy of the attention of any one who may undertake it, as it is the only means we now know of by which the ancient history of the country can be recovered from the darkness that now enshrouds it and the connexion of the Old world with the New—if any existed—can be traced, but it is practically the only chapter in the history of architecture which remains to be written.

Notwithstanding this paucity of new material, the completion of M. Place’s great work on Khorsabad, Wood’s explorations at Ephesus, Dr. Tristram’s travels in Moab, with other minor works, and new photographs of other places, have furnished some twenty or thirty woodcuts to this work, either of new examples or in substitution for less perfect illustrations. More than this, the experience gained in the interval from reading, and personal familiarity with buildings not before visited, especially in Italy, have enabled me to add considerably to the text and to correct or modify impressions based on less perfect information. These, with a careful revision of the text throughout, will, it is hoped, be found to render this edition an improvement to a considerable extent over that which preceded it.

As mentioned in the preface to the volume containing the History of the Modern Styles of Architecture, the scheme of the present edition is that the two volumes now published shall contain a description of all the ancient styles of architecture known to exist either in the Old or New world, except India.

In the first edition the Indian styles occupied about 300 pages, and were illustrated by 200 woodcuts. In the present one it is proposed to double the extent of the text and to add such further illustrations as may be found requisite fully to illustrate the subject. When this is done it will form a separate volume, either the third of the general History of Architecture, or a complete and independent work by itself, and sold separately. If nothing unforeseen occurs to prevent it, it is expected that the work will be published before the end of next year (1875).

The History of the Modern Styles of Architecture, published last year, will then form the fourth and concluding volume of the work, or may be considered as a complete and independent treatise, and, like the volume containing the History of Indian Architecture, will be sold separately.

As stated in the preface to the first edition, it was originally intended that chapters should be added on what were then known as Celtic or Druidical remains. When, however, the subject came to be carefully looked into for that purpose, it was found that the whole was such a confused mass of conflicting theories and dreams, that no facts or dates were so established that they could be treated as historical. The consequence was that the materials collected for the purpose were, in 1872, published in a separate volume, entitled ‘Rude Stone Monuments,’ in the form rather of an argument than of a history.

As was to be expected, a work of that nature, and which attacked the established faith in the Druids, has been exposed to a considerable amount of hostile criticism, but nothing has yet appeared that at all touches the marrow of the question, or invalidates any of the more important conclusions therein arrived at. On the other hand, everything that has since come to light has tended to confirm them in a most satisfactory manner. Colonel Brunon’s researches, for instance, at and around the Madras’en, in Algeria, have proved that the tumuli in that cemetery belong to Roman times.[^[2]] In India sculptured and inscribed dolmens have been dug up and photographed, so that their age is no longer doubtful, and others, as archaic in form as any, are found belonging to reigning families of chiefs, and still used by them. Last, not least, Dr. Schliemann’s explorations at Hissarlik have deprived the prehistoric advocates of one of their most plausible arguments. At a depth of 81⁄2 metres from the surface he found the remains of a walled city, with paved streets, and rich in gold, silver, and copper, with their alloys electron and bronze, and every sign of a high civilization. Above this, through four or five metres of successive deposits, indicating probably a duration of twice as many centuries, no trace of metal was found, but, as he expresses, an “ungeheure menge,” and, in another place, a “kolossale menge,” an unlimited number of rude stone implements of every sort. Above this again, the remains of the Greek city of Ilium Novum.

If this were the case in Asia Minor in historic times, it is in vain to argue that, when the imported civilization of the Romans passed away, the Britons may not have returned to their old faith and old practices, and adhered to them till a new conquest and a new faith led to their being finally abandoned. It may, or it may not, have been so, but till some better argument than has yet been brought forward is adduced to prove that it was not so, the à priori argument of improbability will not now avail much. Whenever the facts, as stated in the ‘Rude Stone Monuments,’ are admitted, or any better set of conclusions substituted for them, their history may be added as a fifth volume to this work. Till then, people must be content with the hazy nihilism of the prehistoric myth.

FROM THE PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

Although the present work may in some respects be considered as only a new edition of the ‘Handbook of Architecture,’ still the alterations, both in substance and in form, have been so extensive as to render the adoption of a new title almost indispensable. The topographical arrangement, which was the basis of the ‘Handbook,’ has been abandoned, and a historical sequence introduced in its place. This has entirely altered the argument of the book, and, with the changes and additions which it has involved, has rendered it practically a new work; containing, it is true, all that was included in the previous publication, but with a great deal that is new and little that retains its original form.

The logical reasons for these changes will be set forth in their proper place in the body of the work; but meanwhile, as the Preface is that part of it which should properly include all personal explanations, I trust I may not be considered as laying myself open to a charge of egotism, if I avail myself of this conventional licence in explaining the steps by which this work attained its present form.

It was my good fortune to be able to devote many years of my life to the study of Architecture—as a fine art—under singularly favourable circumstances: not only was I able to extend my personal observations to the examples found in almost all the countries between China and the Atlantic shore, but I lived familiarly among a people who were still practising their traditional art on the same principles as those which guided the architects of the Middle Ages in the production of similar but scarcely more beautiful or more original works. With these antecedents, I found myself in possession of a considerable amount of information regarding buildings which had not previously been described, and—what I considered of more value—of an insight into the theory of the art, which was certainly even more novel.

Believing this knowledge and these principles to be of sufficient importance to justify me in so doing, I resolved on publishing a work in which they should be embodied; and, in furtherance of this idea, sixteen years ago I wrote a book entitled ‘The True Principles of Beauty in Art.’ The work was not—nor was it intended to be—popular in its form. It was an attempt of a young author to do what he thought right and best, without consulting the wishes of the public on the subject, and the first result, as might have been—and indeed was—anticipated, was that no publisher would undertake it. In consequence of this, only the first volume was published by Longmans in 1849, and that at my own expense and risk. The event proved that the booksellers were right. The book did not sell, and it became a question whether it was worth my while to waste my time and spend my money on a work which the public did not want, or whether it would not be wiser to abandon it, and wait for some more favourable opportunity. Various circumstances of no public interest induced me at the time to adopt the latter course, and I felt I could do so without any breach of faith, as the work, as then published, was complete in itself, though it had been intended to add two more volumes to the one already published.

Some years afterwards a proposal was made to me by Mr. Murray to utilise the materials collected for the more ambitious work in the more popular form of a Handbook of Architecture. The work was written in a very much more popular manner than that I had previously adopted, or than I then liked, or now think worthy of the subject; but the result proved that it was a style much better suited to the public demand, for this time the work was successful. Since its publication in 1855 a large number of copies have been sold; the work has now for some years been out of print, and a new edition is demanded. Under these circumstances the question arose, whether it would be better to republish the Handbook in its original form, with such additions and emendations as its arrangement admitted of, or whether it would not be better to revert to a form nearly approaching that adopted in the ‘True Principles,’ rather than that followed in the composition of the Handbook, as one more worthy of the subject, and better capable of developing its importance.

The immense advantages of the historical over the topographical method are too self-evident to require being pointed out, whenever the object is to give a general view of the whole of such a subject as that treated of in these volumes, or an attempt is made to trace the connexion of the various parts to one another. If the intention is only to describe particular styles or separate buildings, the topographical arrangement may be found more convenient: but where anything beyond this is attempted, the historical method is the only one which enables it to be done. Believing that the architectural public do now desire something more than mere dry information with regard to the age and shape of buildings, it has been determined to remodel the work and to adopt the historical arrangement.

In the present instance there does not seem to be the usual objection to such a rearrangement—that it would break the thread of continuity between the old and the new publication—inasmuch as, whichever method were adopted, the present work must practically be a new book. The mass of information obtained during the last ten years has been so great that even in the present volume a considerable portion of it had to be rewritten, and a great deal added. In the second volume the alterations will be even more extensive. The publication of the great national work on Spanish antiquities,[^[3]] of Parcerisa’s ‘Beauties, &c., of Spain,’[^[4]] and, above all, Mr. Street’s work,[^[5]] have rendered Spanish architecture as intelligible as that of any other country, though ten years ago it was a mystery and a puzzle. Schulz’s[^[6]] work has rendered the same service for Southern Italy, while the publications of De Vogüé[^[7]] and Texier[^[8]] will necessitate an entirely new treatment of the early history of Byzantine art. The French have been busily occupied during the last ten years in editing their national monuments; so have the Germans. So that in Europe little of importance remains to be described. In Asia, too, great progress has been made. Photography has rendered us familiar with many buildings we only knew before by description, and both the Hindu and Mahomedan remains of India are now generally accessible to the public. Colonel Yule’s[^[9]] work on Burmah and M. Mouhot’s[^[10]] on Siam have made us acquainted with the form of the buildings of those countries, and China too has been opened to the architectural student. When the Handbook was written there were many places and buildings regarding which no authentic information was available. That can hardly be said to be the case now as respects any really important building, and the time, therefore, seems to have arrived when their affiliation can be pointed out, if it ever can be, and the study of architecture may be raised from dry details of measurements to the dignity of an historical science.

In the present work it is intended that the first two volumes shall cover the same extent of ground as was comprised in the two volumes of the ‘Handbook,’ as originally published, with such enlargement as is requisite to incorporate all recent additions to our knowledge; and chapters will be added on Celtic—or, as they are vulgarly called, Druidical—remains omitted in the ‘Handbook.’ The ‘History of Modern Architecture’ will thus form the third volume of the work; and when—if ever—it comes to be reprinted, it is intended to add a Glossary of architectural terms, and other matters necessary to complete the book. When all this is done, the work will be increased from 1500 pages, which is the number comprised in the three volumes as at present published, to more than 2000 pages, and the illustrations will be augmented in at least an equal ratio.[^[11]] Notwithstanding all this, it is too evident that even then the work can only be considered as an introduction to the subject, and it would require a work at least ten times as large to do full justice even to our present knowledge of the history of architecture. Any one at all familiar with the literature of the subject can see at once why this is so. Viollet le Duc, for instance, is now publishing a dictionary of French architecture from the eleventh to the sixteenth century. The work will consist, when complete, of ten volumes, and probably 5000 illustrations. Yet even this will by no means exhaust the history of the style in one country of Europe during the five centuries indicated. It would require at least as many volumes to illustrate, even imperfectly, the architectural history of England during the same period. Germany would fill an equal number; and the mediæval architecture of Italy and Spain could not be described in less space.

In other words, fifty volumes and 20,000 woodcuts would barely suffice to complete what must in the present work be compressed into 500 pages, with a like number of illustrations.

Under these circumstances it will be easily understood that this book is far from pretending to be a complete or exhaustive history of the art. It is neither an atlas nor a gazetteer, but simply a general map of the architectural world, and—if I may be allowed the small joke—on Mercator’s projection. It might with propriety be called an abridgment, if there existed any larger history from which it could be supposed to be abridged. At one time I intended to designate it ‘An Historical Introduction to the Study of Architecture, considered as a Fine Art;’ but though such a title might describe correctly enough the general scope of the work, its length is objectionable, and, like every periphrasis, it is liable to misconstruction.

The simple title of ‘History’ has therefore been adopted, under the impression that it is entitled to such a denomination until at least some narrative more worthy of the subject takes its place. Considering the limits it thus became necessary to impose on the extent of the work, it must be obvious that the great difficulty of its composition was in the first place to compress so vast a subject into so small a compass; and next, to determine what buildings to select for illustration, and what to reject. It would have been infinitely easier to explain what was necessary to be said, had the number of woodcuts been doubled. Had the text been increased in the same ratio a great many things might have been made clear to all, which will now, I fear, demand a certain amount of previous knowledge on the part of my readers. To have done this, however, would have defeated some of the great objects of the present publication, which is intended to convey a general view of the history and philosophy of the subject, without extending the work so as to make it inconveniently large, or increasing the price so as to render it inaccessible to a large number of readers. The principle consequently that has been adopted in the selection of the illustrations is, first, that none of the really important typical specimens of the art shall be passed over without some such illustrations as shall render them intelligible; and, after this, those examples are chosen which are remarkable either for their own intrinsic merit, or for their direct bearing in elucidation of the progress or affinities of the style under discussion; all others being sternly rejected as irrelevant, notwithstanding the almost irresistible temptation at times to adorn my pages with fascinating illustrations. The reader who desires information not bearing on the general thread of the narrative must thus have recourse to monographs, or other special works, which alone can supply his wants in a satisfactory manner.

It may tend to explain some things which appear open to remark in the following pages, if I allude here to a difference of opinion which has frequently been pointed out as existing between the views I have expressed and those generally received regarding several points of ancient history or ethnology. I always have been aware that this discrepancy exists; but it has appeared to me an almost inevitable consequence of the different modes of investigation pursued. Almost all those who have hitherto written on these subjects have derived their information from Greek and Roman written texts; but, if I am not very much mistaken, these do not suffice. The classic authors were very imperfectly informed as to the history of the nations who preceded or surrounded them; they knew very little of the archæology of their own countries, and less of their ethnography. So long, therefore, as our researches are confined to what they had written, many important problems remain unsolved, and must ever remain as unsolvable as they have hitherto proved.

My conviction is, that the lithic mode of investigation is not only capable of supplementing to a very great extent the deficiencies of the graphic method, and of yielding new and useful results, but that the information obtained by its means is much more trustworthy than anything that can be elaborated from the books of that early age. It does not therefore terrify me in the least to be told that such men as Niebuhr, Cornewall Lewis, or Grote, have arrived at conclusions different from those I have ventured to express in the following pages. Their information is derived wholly from what is written, and it does not seem ever to have occurred to them, or to any of our best scholars, that there was either history or ethnography built into the architectural remains of antiquity.

While they were looking steadily at one side of the shield, I fancy I have caught a glimpse of the other.

It has been the accident of my life—I do not claim it as a merit—that I have wandered all over the Old World. I have seen much that they never saw, and I have had access to sources of information of which they do not suspect the existence. While they were trying to reconcile what the Greek or Roman authors said about nations who never wrote books, and with regard to whom they consequently had little information, I was trying to read the history which these very people had recorded in stone, in characters as clear and far more indelible than those written in ink. If, consequently, we arrived at different conclusions, it may possibly be owing more to the sources from which the information is derived than to any difference between the individuals who announce it.

Since the invention of printing, I am quite prepared to admit that the “litera scripta” may suffice. In an age like the present, when nine-tenths of the population can read, and every man who has anything to say rushes into print, or makes a speech which is printed next morning, every feeling and every information regarding a people may be dug out of its books. But it certainly was not so in the Middle Ages, nor in the early ages of Greek or Roman history. Still less was this so in Egypt, nor is it the case in India, or in many other countries; and to apply our English nineteenth century experience to all these seems to me to be a mistake. In those countries and times, men who had a hankering after immortality were forced to build their aspirations into the walls of their tombs or of their temples. Those who had poetry in their souls, in nine cases out of ten expressed it by the more familiar vehicle of sculpture or painting rather than in writing. To me it appears that to neglect these in trying to understand the manners and customs, or the history of an ancient people, is to throw away one-half, and generally the most valuable half, in some cases the whole, of the evidence bearing on the subject. So long as learned men persist in believing that all that can be known of the ancient world is to be found in their books, and resolutely ignore the evidence of architecture and of art, we have little in common. I consequently feel neither abashed nor ashamed at being told that men of the most extensive book-learning have arrived at different conclusions from myself—on the contrary, if it should happen that we agreed in some point to which their contemporary works did not extend, I should rather be inclined to suspect some mistake, and hesitate to put it down.

There is one other point in which I fancy misconception exists, of a nature that may probably be more easily removed by personal explanation than by any other means. It is very generally objected to my writings that I neither understand nor appreciate the beauties of Gothic architecture, and consequently criticise it with undue severity. I regret that such a feeling should prevail, partly because it is prejudicial to the dissemination of the views I am anxious to promulgate, but more because at a time when in this country the admiration of Gothic art is so nearly universal, it alienates from me the best class of men who love the art, and prevents their co-operating with me in the improvement of our architecture, which is the great object which we all have at heart.

If I cannot now speak of Gothic architecture with the same enthusiasm as others, this certainly was not the case in the early part of my career as a student of art. Long after I turned my attention to the subject, I knew and believed in none but the mediæval styles, and was as much astonished as the most devoted admirer of Gothic architecture could be, when any one suggested that any other forms could be compared with it. If I did not learn to understand it then, it was not for want of earnest attention and study. I got so far into its spirit that I thought I saw then how better things could be done in Gothic art than had been done either in the Middle Ages or since; and I think so now. But if it is to be done, it must be by free thought, not by servile copying.

My faith in the exclusive pre-eminence of mediæval art was first shaken when I became familiar with the splendid remains of the Mogul and Pathan emperors of Agra and Delhi, and saw how many beauties of even the pointed style had been missed in Europe in the Middle Ages. My confidence was still further weakened when I saw what richness and variety the Hindu had elaborated not only without pointed arches, but indeed without any arches at all. And I was cured when, after a personal inspection of the ruins of Thebes and Athens, I perceived that at least equal beauty could be obtained by processes diametrically opposed to those employed by the mediæval architects.

After so extended a survey, it was easy to perceive that beauty in architecture did not reside in pointed or in round arches, in bracket capitals or horizontal architraves, but in thoughtful appropriateness of design and intellectual elegance of detail. I became convinced that no form is in itself better than any other, and that in all instances those are best which are most appropriate to the purposes to which they are applied.

So self-evident do these principles—which are the basis of the reasoning employed in this book—appear to me, that I feel convinced that there are very few indeed even of the most exclusive admirers of mediæval art who would not admit them, if they had gone through the same course of education as has fallen to my lot. My own conviction is, that the great difference which seems to exist between my views and those of the parties opposed to them arises almost entirely from this accident of education.

In addition to this, however, we must not overlook the fact that for three centuries all the architects in Europe concurred in believing that the whole of their art began and ended in copying classical forms and details. When a reaction came, it was not, unfortunately, in the direction of freedom; but towards a more servile imitation of another style, which—whether better or worse in itself—was not a style of our age, nor suited to our wants or feelings.

It is perhaps not to be wondered at, that after three centuries of perseverance in one particular groove, men should have ceased to have any faith in the possibility of reason or originality being employed in architectural design. As, however, I can adduce in favour of my views 3000 years of perfect success in all countries and under all circumstances, against 300 years of absolute failure in consequence of the copying system, though under circumstances the most favourable to success in other respects, there seems at least an à priori probability that I may be right and that the copyists may be mistaken.

I may be deceiving myself, but I cannot help fancying that I perceive signs of a reaction. Some men are becoming aware of the fact that “archæology is not architecture,” and would willingly see something done more reasonable than an attempt to reproduce the Middle Ages. The misfortune is, that their enlightenment is more apt to lead to despondency than to hope. “If,” they ask, “we cannot find what we are looking for in our own national style, where are we to look for it?” The obvious answer, that it is to be found in the exercise of common sense, where all the rest of the world have found it, seems to them beside the mark. Architecture with most people is a mystery—something different from all other arts; and they do not see that it is and must be subject to the same rules as they all are, and must be practised in the same manner, if it is to be successful.

Whether the nation will or will not soon awaken to the importance of this prosaic anti-climax, one thing at least seems certain and most hopeful. Men are not satisfied with what is doing; a restless, inquiring spirit is abroad, and if people can only be induced to think seriously about it, I feel convinced that they will be as much astonished at their present admiration of Gothic town-halls and Hyde Park Albert Memorials, as we are now at the Gothic fancies of Horace Walpole and the men of his day.

NOTE.

Although every possible care has been taken in selecting the best authorities for the statements in the text of the work, as well as the subjects for illustration, still no one acquainted with the state of the literature of architecture will need to be told that in many branches few materials exist for a correct description of the style, and that the drawings which are available are frequently so inexact, and with scales so carelessly applied, that it is impossible at times to avoid error. The plans throughout the book are on too small a scale to render any minute errors apparent, but being drawn to a uniform scale of 100 feet to 1 inch, or 1⁄1200 of the real size, they are quite sufficient as a means of comparison, even when not mathematically correct. They suffice to enable the reader to judge of the relative size of two buildings by a mere inspection of the plans, as correctly as he could by seeing the buildings themselves, without actually measuring them in all their details.

As a general rule, the sections or elevations of buildings, throughout the book, are drawn to a scale double that of the plans, viz., 50 feet to 1 inch, or 1⁄600 of the real dimensions; but, owing to the great size of many of them, it has been found impossible to carry out this in all instances: where it has not been effected the departure from the rule is always noted, either below the woodcut or in the text.

No lineal dimensions are quoted in the text except such as it is believed can be relied upon, and in all instances these are reduced to English feet. The superficial measures also in the text, like the plans, are quite sufficient for comparison, though not to be relied upon as absolutely correct. One great source of uncertainty as regards them is the difficulty of knowing at times what should be included in the building referred to. Should, for instance, the Lady Chapel at Ely be considered an integral part of the Cathedral, or the Chapter-house at Wells? Should the sacristies attached to Continental cathedrals be considered as part of the church? or such semi-detached towers as the south-western one at Bourges? What constitutes the temple at Karnac, and how much of this belongs to the Hypostyle Hall? These and fifty other questions occur in almost every instance which may lead two persons to very different conclusions regarding the superficial dimensions of a building, even without the errors inherent in imperfect materials.

When either the drawing from which the woodcut is taken was without a scale, or the scale given could not be depended upon, “No scale” has been put under the woodcut, to warn the reader of the fact. When the woodcut was either too large for the page, or too small to be distinct if reduced to the usual scale, a scale of feet has been added under it, to show that it is an exception to the rule.

Capitals, windows, and details which are meant to illustrate forms or construction, and not particular buildings, are drawn to any scale that seemed best to express the purpose for which they are inserted; when they are remarkable for size, or as individual examples, a scale has been added; but this is the exception, not the rule.

Every pain has been taken to secure the greatest possible amount of accuracy, and in all instances the sources from which the woodcuts have been taken are indicated. Many of the illustrations are from original drawings, and of buildings never before published.

CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

INTRODUCTION.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

HISTORY

OF

ARCHITECTURE.

INTRODUCTION.

PART I.

Section I.

Like every other object of human inquiry, Architecture may be studied from two distinct points of view. Either it may be regarded statically, and described scientifically as a thing existing, without any reference to the manner in which it was invented; or it may be treated historically, tracing every form from its origin and noting the influence one style has had upon another in the progress of time.

The first of these methods is more technical, and demands on the part of the student very considerable previous knowledge before it can be successfully prosecuted. The other, besides being more popular and easily followed, has the advantage of separating the objects of study into natural groups, and tracing more readily their connection and relation to one another. The great superiority, however, of the historical mode of study arises from the fact that, when so treated, Architecture ceases to be a mere art, interesting only to the artist or his employer, but becomes one of the most important adjuncts of history, filling up many gaps in the written record and giving life and reality to much that without its presence could with difficulty be realised.

A still more important use of architecture, when followed as a history, is found in its ethnographic value. Every different race of men had their own peculiar forms in using the productions of this art, and their own mode of expressing their feelings or aspirations by its means. When properly studied, it consequently affords a means as important as language for discriminating between the different races of mankind—often more so, and one always more trustworthy and more easily understood.

In consequence of these advantages, the historical mode is that which will be followed in this work. But before entering upon the narrative, it will be well if a correct definition of what Architecture really is can be obtained. Without some clear views on the technical position of the art, much that follows will be unintelligible and the meaning of what is said may be mistaken.

A great deal of the confusion of ideas existing on the subject of Architecture arises from the fact that writers have been in the habit of speaking of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture as three similar fine arts, practised on the same principles. This error arose in the 16th century, when in a fatal hour painters and sculptors undertook also the practice of architecture, and builders ceased to be architects. This confusion of ideas has been perpetuated to the present hour, and much of the degraded position of the art at this day is owing to the mistake then made. It cannot therefore be too strongly insisted upon that there is no essential connection between painting and sculpture on the one hand and architecture on the other.

The two former rank among what are called Phonetic arts. Their business is to express by colour or form ideas that could be—generally have been—expressed by words. With the Egyptians their hieroglyphical paintings were their only means of recording their ideas. With us, such a series of pictures as Hogarth’s ‘Mariage à la Mode’ or ‘The Rake’s Progress’ are novels written with the brush; and many of our Mediæval cathedrals possess whole Bibles carved in stone. Poetry, Painting, and Sculpture are three branches of one form of art, refined from Prose, Colour, and Carving, and form a group apart, interchanging ideas and modes of expression, but always dealing with the same class of images and appealing to the same class of feelings.

Distinct and separate from these Phonetic arts is another group, generally known as the Technic arts, comprising all those which minister to the primary wants of mankind under such various heads as food, clothing, and shelter. Between these two groups is a third called the Æsthetic arts, forming, as it were, a flux between the Technic and Phonetic arts, fusing the whole into one homogeneous mass. They take their rise from the fact that to every want which the technic arts are designed to supply, Nature has attached a gratification which is capable of refining all the useful arts into fine arts. Thus the Technic art of agriculture is capable of supplying food in its simple form; but by the refinements of cookery and of wine-making, simple meats and drinks are capable of affording endless gratification to the senses. Simple clothing to keep out the cold requires little art, but embroidery, dyeing, lace-making, and fifty other arts employ the hands of millions, and the gratification afforded by their use, the thoughts of as many more. Shelter, too, is easily provided, but ornamental and ornamented shelter, or in other words architecture, is one of the most prominent of the fine arts. Music, though hardly known as a useful art, is the most typical of the Æsthetic arts, and, “married to immortal verse,” steps upwards into the region of the Phonetic arts, just as building, when used for ornament, is raised out of the domain of the Technic arts.

Like music, colour and form may be so arranged as to afford infinite pleasure to the senses without their having any phonetic value; but when used, as sculpture and paintings are and have been in all ages, to tell a tale or to express emotion, they rank high among the Phonetic arts; and though able to express certain impressions even more vividly than can be done by words, they cannot rise to the high intellectual position that can be attained either by Poetry or Eloquence when expressed only in that verbal language which is the highest gift of God to man.

II.—Beauty in Art.

The term Beauty in Art is little else than a synonym for Perfection, but perfection in these three classes of arts is far from being the same thing, or of anything like the same value, as an intellectual expression. The beauty of a machine, however complicated, arises mainly from its adaptability to use; while a mosaic of exquisite colours, or an elevated piece of instrumental music, raises emotions of a far higher class: and a painting or a poem may appeal to all that is great or noble in human nature.

If, for instance, we take a dozen arts at random, and divide them into twelve equal component parts, as they belong to each of the three divisions, Technic, Æsthetic, or Phonetic. If we further assign one as the relative intellectual value of the Technic element, two as that due to the Æsthetic, and three as the proportionate importance of the Phonetic, we obtain the index number in the fourth column of the table below, which is probably not far from expressing the true relative value of each. Of course there are adventitious circumstances which may raise the proportionate value of any art very considerably, and, on the other hand, neglect of cultivation may depress others below their true value; but the principles on which the table is formed are probably those by which a correct estimate may be most easily obtained.

The first three arts enumerated in the above table are evidently utterly incapable of Phonetic expression, and the first hardly even can be raised to the second class, though air combined with warmth does afford pleasure to the senses. Joinery may convey an idea of perfection from the mode in which it is designed or executed; while gastronomy, as above mentioned, does really afford important gratification to the senses, approaching nearly in importance to the plain food-supplying art of cookery. Jewellery may combine extreme mechanical beauty of execution with the most harmonious arrangement of colour, and may also be made to express a meaning, though only to a very limited extent. Clothing depends on both colour and form for its perfection more than even beauty of material, and may be made to express gaiety or sorrow, though perhaps more from association than from any inherent qualities. The arts of the potter can exhibit not only perfection in execution, but practically depend both in colour and form, especially the latter, to raise their products out of the category of mere Technic arts; while the paintings on them, which are indispensable to the highest class of ceramique, render them capable of taking their place among those objects which affect a Phonetic mode of utterance. As mentioned above, floriculture and landscape gardening may, besides their use, afford infinite pleasure to the senses and even express gaiety or gloom, and, from mere prettiness, may rise towards something like sublimity in expression.

Architecture is, however, the central art of the group, which in its highest form combines all the three classes in nearly equal proportions, but not always necessarily so. The Pyramids of Egypt, for instance, though Technically the most wonderful buildings in the world, have very little Æsthetic, and hardly more than one of Phonetic, value. The great temple at Baalbec,—and in fact all the Roman temples, may be classed as containing six parts of Technic value for mechanical excellence of size and construction, four for beauty of form and detail, but certainly not more than two parts for any expression of religion or intellect they may exhibit, making up twenty for the index of their artistic value. Cologne cathedral takes very nearly the same position in the scale, but Rheims, Bourges, and the more perfect Gothic cathedrals may be classed higher, as five Technic, three Æsthetic, and four Phonetic, making twenty-three altogether as their index; and they are only surpassed by such a building as the Parthenon at Athens, which, though not so large and imposing as some others, is, so far as we know, the most perfect building yet erected by man. It owes this perfection mainly to the equal balance of parts. There is nothing so difficult or startling in its construction as there is in most Gothic cathedrals; but what there is is mechanically perfect, both in design and execution. Its form is nearly perfect, combining stability with simplicity and at the same time avoiding monotony or any appearance of greater strength than is absolutely necessary. Its details are all as exquisite in form as the Temple itself, and it was at one time coloured to an extent we can hardly now realise, but which must, when complete, have made it one of the most perfect examples of Æsthetic art. The walls of the cella were almost certainly covered with Phonetic paintings similar to those in the Lesche at Delphi; and the pediment, the metopes, the friezes, were all sculptured to such an extent as to render the Phonetic expression of the building at least equal to either its Technic or its Æsthetic excellence. It is easy to conceive a building, such as a trophy or a mausoleum, in which painting and sculpture shall be relatively more important than they are in this instance, and in which consequently the index may be raised above twenty-four; but if this were so, it ought probably to be classed among works of sculpture or painting rather than as an object of architecture.

In music the Æsthetic element naturally prevails over the other two, but Technic cleverness of execution often affords to some as much pleasure as the harmony of the sounds produced; and, on the other hand, in its power of expressing joy or sorrow and of exciting varied emotions at will, it rivals frequently the more distinct and permanent power of words themselves, when unaccompanied by Æsthetic forms of art. It is of course, however, in the outpourings of his imagination or in the logical products of his reason that man rises highest, and stands most distinctly apart from the rest of created beings; and though all may not be capable of appreciating it, it is when both Technic and Æsthetic adjuncts are laid aside, and man listens only to the voice of reason, that he reaches what, as far as we can now see, is the highest form of his artistic development.

Of course there are many other forms in which this might be expressed, and many will be inclined to dispute the correctness of the figures assigned to each art. They are, in fact, only approximations, and as a first attempt can hardly be expected to meet all the conditions of the problem. The truth of the matter is, it would have been better to use algebraic symbols and to allow every one to translate them into numbers according to his own fancy, but in the present state of matters such an attempt would have savoured of affectation. The art of criticism is not sufficiently advanced for this, but if two or three would follow up what is here indicated it might be placed on a basis from which to proceed higher. Meanwhile, perhaps the annexed diagram may serve to explain the relation of the three classes of art to one another, and the way in which they overlap and mix together so as to make up a perfect art. Like the preceding table, it will require several editions, the work of several minds, before it can be perfected, but it probably is not far from representing the truth as at present known.

There is still another relation of these arts to one another which must not be overlooked before proceeding further, as a knowledge of it is indispensable in forming a correct judgment of their respective merits. Like the Sciences, the Technic Arts hardly depend, after the first steps have been taken, on individual prowess for their advancement. An astronomer, a chemist, or a natural historian, now starts from the highest point reached by any of his predecessors, and he has only to observe and calculate, to analyse and put together again, in order to advance our knowledge. A giant may of course make a rapid stride in advance, but a hundred dwarfs will, if they persevere steadily in the right path, not only overtake him, but probably advance far beyond anything the most gigantic intellect can accomplish in science. So it is also in the mechanical arts. The immense strides that have of late years been made in improving all the machines employed in manufactures have not been made by the greatest intellects, but by thousands of men suggesting new contrivances and acquiring skill by steady improvement in manipulation. In ship-building, for instance, one of the most complex of the useful arts, no one can tell who the men were who converted the rude galleys in which our forefathers sailed to Crecy and Agincourt into the gigantic commercial steamers and war-ships of the present day. It was the result of thousands of intellects working steadily towards a well-defined aim, and accomplishing a triumph by a process which must always be successful in the Technic arts when persevered in long enough.

Diagram No. 1.

The case is somewhat different with the Æsthetic arts. Some men are insensible to the harmony of colour and are not offended by the crudest contrasts. Others do not perceive concords in music, and the most violent discords give them no pain; others, on the contrary, are endowed with the utmost sensibility on these points, and are consequently not only able to appreciate the beauty of the arts arising out of colour or sound, but of advancing what to those who cannot understand them is an inexplicable mystery.

When from the Æsthetic Arts we turn to the Sciences and Technic Arts, we find, as just pointed out, that the individual becomes much less important and the process everything. Every astronomer now knows more than Newton; every chemist than John Dalton. Any ordinary mechanic can start from a higher point than was reached by a Watt or an Arkwright or a Stephenson, and can surpass them. But no man can mount on the shoulders of such men as Handel or Mozart or Beethoven, and surpass them; and the higher we ascend in the scale of arts the more important does the individual become and the less so the process. A Phidias, a Raphael, a Shakespeare, are yet unsurpassed, and possibly never may be. All men may be taught to carve, to colour, and to write mechanically, and may even be instructed to practise these processes so as to afford pleasure to themselves and others; but when from this we rise to Phonetic painting, sculpture, or poetry, and the still higher region of philosophy, the individual becomes all in all, and his special genius there stamps the true value on the production.

In this respect, again, Architecture is singularly happy as a means of study. As a Technic art it is practised in the same progressive principles as all its sister arts, irrespective of individuality. As an Æsthetic art it is hardly so individual as music, because its forms and colours are permanent and capable of being repeated with such improvements as each experiment suggests in every subsequent building; but when it attempts Phonetic forms of utterance, these are seldom so absolutely integral that they cannot be separated from the building and judged of apart. A Greek Temple or a Mediæval cathedral without painting and sculpture may be poor and inanimate, but still so beautiful in its form, so grand from its mass, and so imposing from its durability, that in its Technic-Æsthetic form alone it may command our admiration, more perhaps than any other work of human hands, except of course, as said before, the highest intellectual forms of Phonetic art. Architecture thus combines in itself the steady progressive perfectibility of a Technic art quite independent of the intellectual capabilities of the architect, combined with the Æsthetic appreciation of form and colour which is mostly universal, and can at all events be generally inculcated and learned. But its greatest glory is that it can enlist in its service the higher branches of Phonetic sculpture and painting, which can be exercised only by specially gifted individuals. It is difficult to conceive all these qualities being equally combined in the person of any one architect, and in practice it is by no means necessary for success that it should be so, though, if possible, the combination would no doubt be advantageous. In criticising, on the contrary, it is always necessary to separate and distinguish between the mechanical, the sensuous, and the intellectual part of a design. Without this an intelligent appreciation of its merits or defects can hardly be obtained.

Notwithstanding all that has been pointed out already, and the advantages of its central position among the sister arts, combined with its own intrinsic merits, Architecture would never have attained to the high position it now occupies had it not been fitted with an aim which raised it far above all utilitarian feelings. In all ages, though certainly not among all nations, Architecture has been employed as one of the principal forms of worship. The desire to erect a temple to their Gods worthy to be their dwelling-place has exalted even the rude arts of savages into something worthy of admiration, and when such a nation as the Egyptians were inspired with the same desire, they produced, even in the earliest ages, temples which still excite feelings of admiration and of awe. Had the practice of architecture been restricted to supplying only the ordinary wants of mortals, it never would have risen to be the noble art it now is. Neither the palaces of the greatest kings, nor the wants of the proudest municipalities, nor the emporia of the richest commerce would have supplied that lofty aim which is indispensable for any great intellectual effort. But when, freed from all trammels of use or expense, the object is to erect a casket worthy to enshrine the sacred image of a god whom men feared but adored, the aspiration elevates the work far beyond its useful purpose. It is when men seek to erect a hall in which worshippers may meet to render that homage which is their greatest privilege and their highest aspiration, when all that man can conceive that is great and beautiful is enlisted to create something worthy of the purpose, that temples have been erected which rank among the most successful works man has yet produced. Had any exigencies of use or economy controlled the design of the Parthenon, or of any of our Mediæval cathedrals, they must have taken a much lower place in the scale than they now occupy. Their architects were, however, in fact as free from any utilitarian influences as the poets who composed the ‘Iliad’ or ‘Paradise Lost.’

III.—Definition of Architecture.

If what has just been said above is understood, it may be sufficient to make it possible to give a more definite answer than has usually been done to two questions to which hitherto no satisfactory reply has been accorded in modern times. “What,” it is frequently asked, “is the true definition of the word Architecture, or of the Art to which it applies?” “What are the principles which ought to guide us in designing or criticising Architectural objects?”

Fifty years ago the answers to these questions generally were, that Architecture consisted in the closest possible imitation of the forms and orders employed by the Romans; that a church was well designed exactly in the proportion in which it resembled a heathen temple; and that the merit of a civic building was to be measured by its imitation, more or less perfect, of some palace or amphitheatre of classic times.

In the beginning of this century these answers were somewhat modified by the publication of Stuart’s works on Athens; the word Grecian was substituted for Roman in all criticisms, and the few forms that remain to us of Grecian art were repeated ad nauseam in buildings of the most heterogeneous class and character.

At the present day churches have been entirely removed from the domain of classic art, and their merit is made to depend on their being correct reproductions of mediæval designs. Museums and town halls still generally adhere to classic forms, alternating between Greek and Roman. In some of our public buildings an attempt has recently been made to reproduce the Middle Ages, while in our palaces and clubhouses that compromise between classicality and common sense which is called Italian is generally adhered to. These, it is evident, are the mere changing fashions of art. There is nothing real or essential in this Babel of styles, and we must go deeper below the surface to enable us to obtain a true definition of the art or of its purposes. Before attempting this, however, it is essential to bear in mind that two wholly different systems of architecture have been followed at different periods in the world’s history.

The first is that which prevailed since the art first dawned, in Egypt, in Greece, in Rome, in Asia, and in all Europe, during the Middle Ages, and generally in all countries of the world down to the time of the Reformation in the 16th century, and still predominates in remote corners of the globe wherever European civilisation or its influences have not yet penetrated. The other being that which was introduced with the revival of classic literature contemporaneously with the reformation of religion, and still pervades all Europe and wherever European influence has established itself.

In the first period the art of architecture consisted in designing a building so as to be most suitable and convenient for the purposes required, in arranging the parts so as to produce the most stately and ornamental effect consistent with its uses, and in applying to it such ornament as should express and harmonise with the construction, and be appropriate to the purposes of the building; while at the same time the architects took care that the ornament should be the most elegant in itself which it was in their power to design.

Following this system, not only the Egyptian, the Greek, and the Gothic architects, but even the indolent and half-civilised inhabitants of India, the stolid Tartars of Thibet and China, and the savage Mexicans, succeeded in erecting great and beautiful buildings. No race, however rude or remote, has failed, when working on this system, to produce buildings which are admired by all who behold them, and are well worthy of the most attentive consideration. Indeed, it is almost impossible to indicate one single building in any part of the world, designed during the prevalence of this true form of art, which was not thought beautiful, not alone by those who erected it, but which does not remain a permanent object of admiration and of study even for strangers in all future ages.

The result of the other system is widely different from this. It has now been practised in Europe for more than three centuries, and by people who have more knowledge of architectural forms, more constructive skill, and more power of combining science and art in effecting a great object, than any people who ever existed before. Notwithstanding this, from the building of St. Peter’s at Rome to that of our own Parliament Houses, not one building has been produced that is admitted to be entirely satisfactory, or which permanently retains a hold on general admiration. Many are large and stately to an extent almost unknown before, and many are ornamented with a profuseness of which no previous examples exist; but with all this, though they conform with the passing fashions of the day, they soon become antiquated and out of date, and men wonder how such a style could ever have been thought beautiful, just as we wonder how any one could have admired the female costumes of the last century which captivated the hearts of our grandfathers.

It does not require us to go very deeply into the philosophy of the subject to find out why this should be the case; the fact simply being that no sham was ever permanently successful, either in morals or in art, and no falsehood ever remained long without being found out, or which, when detected, inevitably did not cease to please. It is literally impossible that we should reproduce either the circumstances or the feelings which gave rise to classical art and made it a reality; and though Gothic art was a thing of our country and of our own race, it belongs to a state of society so totally different from anything that now exists, that any attempt at reproduction now must at best be a masquerade, and never can be a real or earnest form of art. The designers of the Eglinton Tournament carried the system to a perfectly legitimate conclusion when they sought to reproduce the costumes and warlike exercises of our ancestors; and the pre-Raphaelite painters were equally justified in attempting to do in painting that which was done every day in architecture. Both attempts failed signally, because we had progressed in the arts of war and painting, and could easily detect the absurdity of these practices. It is in architecture alone of all the arts that the false system remains, and we do not yet perceive the impossibility of its leading to any satisfactory result.

No. 2.

Bearing all this in mind, let us try if we can come to a clearer definition of what this art really is, and in what its merits consist. Let us suppose the Diagram (Woodcut No. [2]) to represent an ordinary house, such as is found in many of our London streets. The first division, A, is the most prosaic form of building, no more thought being bestowed on it than if it were a garden wall. The second division, B, is better; the cornices and string-course indicate the levels of the several floors into which the building is divided; the quoins of the door and windows are emphasized by the use of a better or different coloured brick, and the arched forms given to door and window on ground floor suggest increased strength. In the third division, C, this has been carried still further; the rustication of the stonework on the lower storey gives an appearance of greater solidity, and the importance given to the cornices, the addition of architrave mouldings round windows, with pediments to those of the first floor, and the decoration of the parapet carry the house out of the domain of building into that of architecture. The fourth division carries this still farther; the whole design is here divided into three stages—the ground floor being treated as a podium or base to the two floors above, the whole being crowned by an attic storey; greater importance is given to the front by the slight projection of two wings; the entrance doorway is emphasized, and by means of cornices, quoins, and pilasters, a play of light and shade is given to an elevation which virtually lies in one plane. In this instance not only is a greater amount of ornament applied, but the parts are so disposed as in themselves to produce a more agreeable effect; and although the height of the floors remains the same, and the amount of light introduced very nearly so, still the slight grouping of the parts is such as to produce a better class of architecture than could be done by the mere application of any amount of ornament. The diagram deals with one phase of the subject, “a town house,” and with the elevation only, the style being that generally known as Italian; if it is admitted that the last division is an object of architecture, which the first is not, it follows from this analysis that architecture commences when some embellishment is added to the building which was not strictly a structural necessity. The value of the embellishment, from an architectural point of view, depends on—the extent to which, in its application, the structural features have been recognised,—the appropriateness of the ornament,—the careful study of proportion and balance of the several parts, and,—in a certain measure, the extent to which some known precedent has been followed.

Recurring, for instance, to the Parthenon, to illustrate this principle farther. The proportions of length to breadth, and of height to both these, are instances of carefully-studied proportion and balance; and still more so is the arrangement of the porticoes and the disposition of the peristyle. If all the pillars were plain square piers, and all the mouldings square and flat, still the Parthenon could not fail, from the mere disposition of its parts, to be a pleasing and imposing building. So it is with a Gothic cathedral. The proportion of length to breadth, the projection of the transepts, the different height of the central and side aisles, the disposition and proportion of the towers, are all instances of proportion and balance, and beautiful even if without ornament. Many of the older abbeys, especially those of the Cistercians, are as devoid of ornament as a modern barn; but from the mere disposition of their parts they are always pleasing and, if large, are imposing objects of architecture. Stonehenge is an instance of ornamental construction wholly without ornament, yet it is almost as imposing an architectural object as any of the same dimensions in any part of the world. It is, however, when ornament is added to this, and when that ornament is elegant itself and appropriate to the construction and to the purposes of the building, that the temple or the cathedral ranks among the highest objects of the art and becomes one of the noblest works of man.

Even without structural decoration, a building may, by mere dint of ornament, become an architectural object, though it is far more difficult to attain good architecture by this means, and in true styles it has seldom been attempted. Still, such a building as the town hall at Louvain, which if stripped of its ornaments would be little better than a factory, by richness and appropriateness of ornament alone has become a very pleasing specimen of the art. In modern times it is too much the fashion to attempt to produce architectural effects not only without attending to ornamental construction, but often in defiance of, and in concealing that which exists. When this is done, the result must be bad art; but nevertheless it is architecture, however execrable it may be.

If these premises are correct, the art of the builder consists in merely putting materials together so as to attain the desired end in the speediest and simplest fashion. The art of the civil or military engineer consists in selecting the best and most appropriate materials for the object he has in view, and using these in the most scientific manner, so as to ensure an economical but satisfactory result. Where the engineer leaves off, the art of the architect begins. His object is to arrange the materials of the engineer, not so much with regard to economical as to artistic effects, and by light and shade, and outline, to produce a form that in itself shall be permanently beautiful. He then adds ornament, which by its meaning doubles the effect of the disposition he has just made, and by its elegance throws a charm over the whole composition.

Viewed in this light, it is evident that there are no objects that are usually delegated to the civil engineer which may not be brought within the province of the architect. A bridge, an aqueduct, the embankment of a lake, or the roof of a station, are all as legitimate subjects for architectural ornament as a temple or a palace. They were all so treated by the Romans and in the Middle Ages, and are so treated up to the present day in the remote parts of India, and wherever true art prevails.

It is not essential that the engineer should know anything of architecture, though it is certainly desirable he should do so; but, on the other hand, it is indispensably necessary that the architect should understand construction. Without that knowledge he cannot design; and although it has been conceived by some that it would be better to delegate the mechanical task to the engineer, and so restrict himself entirely to the artistic arrangement and ornamentation of his design, such a course would be fatal to the development of architectural style. It is true that in some of the works above stated, it is generally thought desirable to confide them to engineers; but in the few cases in which architects have been called in to co-operate with them, as in the roofs of the Great Western and Midland Railway Stations, the result has been so satisfactory as to suggest the advantage of such combination. In the Great Exhibition of 1851, the happiest feature, the semicircular roof of the transept, was suggested by the late Sir Charles Barry, and the developments of that form in the nave and transepts of the Crystal Palace constitute still the most beautiful features of that building. In works of a monumental character, such as town-halls, museums, or public galleries, which are designed to last for centuries, the strict economy of material, which is sometimes deemed necessary in engineering works, is not advisable, because mass, stability, and durability—three elements into which we enter later on—are of the very essence of their architectural character. In these and other works of a simple character, such as private houses, the calculations are not of so elaborate a nature as to be outside the architect’s knowledge; and although of late years the use of iron girders, stanchions, and columns has introduced a new factor among building materials which occasionally may call for the assistance of an expert to substantiate the architect’s calculations, it has hitherto been the custom to conceal these features, so that they have not entered the phase of architectural design. In course of time, when an increased knowledge of the properties of iron is acquired, we may hope to see a great development in its artistic treatment, so that it may eventually rise to the dignity and assume the character, which in the architectural styles of bygone times, all other materials have reached.

In addition, however, to the convenient arrangement and artistic treatment of a building, and its proper and sound construction, there is still a third element which requires the special endowment of an artist for its exercise. No architectural object can be considered as complete, or as having attained the highest excellence till it is endowed with a voice through the aid of phonetic sculpture and painting.

In a few words, therefore, a perfect building may be defined as one that combines:—

1st, as Technic principles:

Convenience of general arrangements,

Proper distribution of materials and sound construction.

2nd, as Æsthetic principles of design:

Artistic conception combined with

Ornamented construction, and

3rd, for Phonetic adjuncts:

Sculpture, or

Painting, employed as voices to tell the story of the building,

and explain the purposes for which it was designed, or those

to which it is dedicated.

Besides these, however, which are the principal theoretic characteristics of architecture, there are several minor technical principles which it may be convenient to enumerate before proceeding farther.

It may also be well to give such examples as shall make what has just been indicated theoretically, clearer than can be done by the mere enunciation of abstract principles.

IV.—Mass.

The first and most obvious element of architectural grandeur is size—a large edifice being always more imposing than a small one; and when the art displayed in two buildings is equal, their effect is almost in the direct ratio of their dimensions. In other words, if one temple or church is twice or three times as large as another, it is twice or three times as grand or as effective. The Temple of Theseus differs very little, except in dimensions, from the Parthenon, and, except in that respect, hardly differed at all from the Temple of Jupiter at Elis; but because of its smaller size it must rank lower than the greater examples. In our own country many of our smaller abbeys or parish churches display as great beauty of design or detail as our noblest cathedrals, but, from their dimensions alone, they are insignificant in comparison, and the traveller passes them by, while he stands awe-struck before the portals or under the vault of the larger edifices.

The pyramids of Egypt, the topes of the Buddhists, the mounds of the Etruscans, depend almost wholly for their effect on their dimensions. The Romans understood to perfection the value of this element, and used it in its most unsophisticated simplicity to obtain the effect they desired. In the Middle Ages the architects not only aspired to the erection of colossal edifices, but they learnt how they might greatly increase the apparent dimensions of a building by a scientific disposition of the parts and a skilful arrangement of ornament, thereby making it look very much larger than it really was. It is, in fact, the most obvious and most certain, though it must be confessed perhaps the most vulgar, means of obtaining architectural grandeur; but a true and perfect example can never be produced by dependence on this alone, and it is only when size is combined with beauty of proportion and elegance of ornament that perfection in architectural art is attained.

V.—Stability.

Next to size the most important element is stability. By this is meant, not merely the strength required to support the roof or to resist the various thrusts and pressures, but that excess of strength over mere mechanical requirement which is necessary thoroughly to satisfy the mind, and to give to the building a monumental character, with an appearance that it could resist the shocks of time or the violence of man for ages yet to come.

No people understood the value of this so well as the Egyptians. The form of the Pyramids is designed wholly with reference to stability, and even the Hypostyle Hall at Karnac excites admiration far more by its massiveness and strength, and its apparent eternity of duration, than by any other element of design. In the Hall all utilitarian exigencies and many other obvious means of effect are sacrificed to these, and with such success that after more than 3000 years’ duration still enough remains to excite the admiration which even the most unpoetical spectators cannot withhold from its beauties.

In a more refined style much of the beauty of the Parthenon arises from this cause. The area of each of the pillars in the portico of the Pantheon at Rome is under 20 feet, that of those of the Parthenon is over 33 feet, and, considering how much taller the former are than the latter, it may be said that the pillars at Athens are twice as massive as those of the Roman temple, yet the latter have sufficed not only for the mechanical, but for many points of artistic stability; but the strength and solidity of the porticos of the Parthenon, without taking into consideration its other points of superiority, must always render it more beautiful than the other.

The massiveness which the Normans and other early Gothic builders imparted to their edifices arose more from clumsiness and want of constructive skill than from design; but, though arising from so ignoble a cause, its effect is always grand, and the rude Norman nave often surpasses in grandeur the airy and elegant choir which was afterwards added to it. In our own country no building is more entirely satisfactory than the nave at Winchester, where the width of the pillars exceeds that of the aisles, and the whole is Norman in outline, though Gothic in detail. On the other hand no building of its dimensions and beauty of detail can well be so unsatisfactory as the choir at Beauvais. Though it has stood the test of centuries, it looks so frail, requires so many props to keep it up, and is so evidently an overstrained exercise of mechanical cleverness, that though it may excite wonder as an architectural tour de force, it never can satisfy the mind of the true artist, or please to the same extent as less ambitious examples.

Even when we descend to the lowest walks of architecture we find this principle prevailing. It would require an immense amount of design and good taste to make the thin walls and thinner roof of a brick and slated cottage look as picturesque or so well as one built of rubble-stone, or even with mud walls, and a thatched roof: the thickness and solidity of the one must always be more satisfactory than the apparent flimsiness of the other. Here, as in most cases, necessity controls the architect; but when fettered by no utilitarian exigencies, there is no safer or readier means of obtaining an effect than this, and when effect alone is sought it is almost impossible for an architect to err in giving too much solidity to his building. Size and stability are alone sufficient to produce grandeur in architectural design, and, where sublimity is aimed at, they are the two elements most essential to its production, and are indeed the two without which it cannot possibly be attained.

VI.—Durability.

As the complement to stability, the length of time during which architectural objects are calculated to endure confers on them an impress of durability which can hardly be attained by any of the sister arts. Sculpture may endure as long, and some of the Egyptian examples of that art found near the Pyramids are as old as anything in that country, but it is not their age that impresses us so much as the story they have to tell. The Pyramids, on the other hand, in the majesty of their simple Technic grandeur, do challenge a quasi-eternity of duration with a distinctness that is most impressive, and which there, as elsewhere, is one of the most powerful elements of architectural expression.

When Horace sang—

“Vixêre fortes ante Agamemnona

Multi, sed omnes illacrimabiles

Urgentur ignotique longâ

Nocte, carent quia vate sacro,”

he overlooked the fact that long before Troy was dreamt of, Egyptian kings had raised pyramids which endure to the present day, and the Pharaohs of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth dynasties had filled the valley of the Upper Nile with temples and palaces and tombs which tell us not only the names of their founders, but reveal to us their thoughts and aspirations with a distinctness that no sacred poet could as well convey. From that time onward the architects have covered the world with monuments that still remain on the spot where they were erected, and tell all, who are sufficiently instructed to read their riddles aright, what nations once occupied these spots, what degree of civilisation they had reached, and how, in erecting these monuments on which we now gaze, they had attained that quasi-immortality after which they hankered.

Sculpture and painting, when allied with architecture, may endure as long, but their aim is not to convey to the mind the impression of durability which is so strongly felt in the presence of the more massive works of architectural art. Even when ruined and in decay the buildings are almost equally impressive, while ruined sculptures or paintings are generally far from being pleasing objects, and, whatever their other merits may be, certainly miss that impression obtained from the durability of architectural objects.

VII.—Materials.

Another very obvious mode of obtaining architectural effect is by the largeness or costliness of the materials employed. A terrace, or even a wall, if composed of large stones, is in itself an object of considerable grandeur, while one of the same lineal dimensions and of the same design, if composed of brick or rubble, may appear a very contemptible object.

Like all the more obvious means of architectural effect, the Egyptians seized on this and carried it to its utmost legitimate extent. All their buildings, as well as their colossi and obelisks, owe much of their grandeur to the magnitude of the materials employed in their construction. The works called Cyclopean found in Italy and Greece have no other element of grandeur than the size of the stones or rather masses of rock which the builders of that age were in the habit of using. In Jerusalem nothing was so much insisted upon by the old writers, or is so much admired now, as the largeness of the stones employed in the building of the Temple and its substructions.

We can well believe how much value was attached to this when we find that in the neighbouring city of Baalbec stones were used of between 60 and 70 ft. in length, weighing as much as the tubes of the Britannia Bridge, for the mere bonding course of a terrace wall. Even in a more refined style of architecture, a pillar, the shaft of which is of a single stone, or a lintel or architrave of one block, is always a grander and more beautiful object than if composed of a number of smaller parts. Among modern buildings, the poverty-stricken design of the church of St. Isaac at St. Petersburg is redeemed by the grandeur of its monolithic columns, whilst the beautiful design of the Madeleine at Paris is destroyed by the smallness of the materials in which it is expressed. It is easy to see that this arises from the same feeling to which massiveness and stability address themselves. It is the expression of giant power and the apparent eternity of duration which they convey; and in whatever form that may be presented to the human mind, it always produces a sentiment tending towards sublimity, which is the highest effect at which architecture or any other art can aim.

The Gothic architects ignored this element of grandeur altogether, and sought to replace it by the display of constructive skill in the employment of the smaller materials they used, but it is extremely questionable whether in so doing they did not miss one of the most obvious and most important principles of architectural design.

Besides these, value in the mere material is a great element in architectural effect. We all, for instance, admire an ornament of pure gold more than one that is only silver gilt, though few can detect the difference. Persons will travel hundreds of miles to see a great diamond or wonderful pearl, who would not go as many yards to see paste models of them, though if the two were laid together on the table very few indeed could distinguish the real from the counterfeit.

When we come to consider such buildings as the cathedral at Milan or the Taje Mehal at Agra, there can be no doubt but that the beauty of the material of which they are composed adds very much to the admiration they excite. In the latter case the precious stones with which the ornamental parts of the design are inlaid, convey an impression of grandeur almost as directly as their beauty of outline.

It is, generally speaking, because of its greater preciousness that we admire a marble building more than one of stone, though the colour of the latter may be really as beautiful and the material at least as durable. In the same manner a stone edifice is preferred to one of brick, and brick to wood and plaster; but even these conditions may be reversed by the mere question of value. If, for instance, a brick and a stone edifice stand close together, the design of both being equally appropriate to the material employed, our judgment may be reversed if the bricks are so beautifully moulded, or made of such precious clay, or so carefully laid, that the brick edifice costs twice as much as the other; in that case we should look with more respect and admiration on the artificial than on the natural material. From the same reason many elaborately carved wooden buildings, notwithstanding the smallness of their parts and their perishable nature, are more to be admired than larger and more monumental structures, and this merely in consequence of the evidence of labour and consequent cost that have been bestowed upon them.

Irrespective of these considerations, many building materials are invaluable from their own intrinsic merits. Granite is one of the best known, from its hardness and durability, marble from the exquisite polish it takes, and for its colour, which for internal decoration is a property that can hardly be over-estimated. Stone is valuable on account of the largeness of the blocks that can be obtained and because it easily receives a polish sufficient for external purposes. Bricks are excellent for their cheapness and the facility with which they can be used, and they may also be moulded into forms of great elegance, so that beauty may be easily attained; but sublimity is nearly impossible in brickwork, without at least such dimensions as have rarely been accomplished by man. The smallness of the material is such a manifest incongruity with largeness of the parts, that even the Romans, though they tried hard, could never quite overcome the difficulty.

Plaster is another artificial material. Except in monumental erections it is superior to stone for internal purposes, and always better than brick from the uniformity and smoothness of its surface, the facility with which it is moulded, and its capability of receiving painted or other decorations to any extent.

Wood should be used externally only on the smallest and least monumental class of buildings, and even internally is generally inferior to plaster. It is dark in colour, liable to warp and split, and combustible, which are all serious objections to its use, except for flooring, doors, and such purposes as it is now generally applied to.

Cast iron is another material rarely brought into use, though more precious than any of those above enumerated, and possessing more strength, though probably less durability. Where lightness combined with strength is required, it is invaluable, but though it can be moulded into any form of beauty that may be designed, it has hardly yet ever been so used as to allow of its architectural qualities being appreciated.

All these materials are nearly equally good when used honestly each for the purpose for which it is best adapted; they all become bad either when employed for a purpose for which they are not appropriate, or when one material is substituted in the place of or to imitate another. Grandeur and sublimity can only be reached by the more durable and more massive class of materials, but beauty and elegance are attainable in all, and the range of architectural design is so extensive that it is absurd to limit it to one class either of natural or of artificial materials, or to attempt to prescribe the use of some and to insist on that of others, for purposes to which they are manifestly inapplicable.

VIII.—Construction.

Construction has been shown to be the chief aim and object of the engineer; with him it is all in all, and to construct scientifically and at the same time economically is the beginning and end of his endeavours. It is far otherwise with the architect. Construction ought to be his handmaid, useful to assist him in carrying out his design, but never his mistress, controlling him in the execution of that which he would otherwise think expedient. An architect ought always to allow himself such a margin of strength that he may disregard or play with his construction, and in nine cases out of ten the money spent in obtaining this solidity will be more effective architecturally than twice the amount expended on ornament, however elegant or appropriate that may be.

So convinced were the Egyptians and Greeks of this principle, that they never used any other constructive expedient than a perpendicular wall or prop, supporting a horizontal beam; and half the satisfactory effect of their buildings arises from their adhering to this simple though expensive mode of construction. They were perfectly acquainted with the use of the arch and its properties, but they knew that its employment would introduce complexity and confusion into their designs, and therefore they wisely rejected it. Even to the present day the Hindus refuse to use the arch, though it has long been employed in their country by the Mahometans. As they quaintly express it, “An arch never sleeps;” and it is true that by its thrust and pressure it is always tending to tear a building to pieces; in spite of all counterpoises, whenever the smallest damage is done, it hastens the ruin of a building, which, if more simply constructed, might last for ages.

The Romans were the first who introduced a more complicated style. They wanted larger and more complex buildings than had been before required, and they employed brick and concrete to a great extent even in their temples and most monumental buildings. They obtained both space and variety by these means, with comparatively little trouble or expense; but we miss in all their works that repose and harmony which is the great charm that pervades the buildings of their predecessors.

The Gothic architects went even beyond the Romans in this respect. They prided themselves on their constructive skill, and paraded it on all occasions, and often to an extent very destructive of true architectural design. The lower storey of a French cathedral is generally very satisfactory; the walls are thick and solid, and the buttresses, when not choked up with chapels, just sufficient for shadow and relief; but the architects of that country were seized with a mania for clerestories of gigantic height, which should appear internally mere walls of painted glass divided by mullions. This could only be effected either by encumbering the floor of the church with piers of inconvenient thickness or by a system of buttressing outside. The latter was the expedient adopted; but notwithstanding the ingenuity with which it was carried out, and the elegance of many of the forms and ornaments used, it was singularly destructive of true architectural effect. It not only produces confusion of outline and a total want of repose, but it is eminently suggestive of weakness, and one cannot help feeling that if one of these props were removed, the whole would tumble down like a house of cards.

This was hardly ever the case in England: the less ambitious dimensions employed in this country enabled the architects to dispense in a great measure with these adjuncts, and when flying buttresses are used, they look more as if employed to suggest the idea of perfect security than as necessary to stability. Owing to this cause the French have never been able to construct a satisfactory vault: in consequence of the weakness of their supports they were forced to stilt, twist, and dome them to a most unpleasing extent, and to attend to constructive instead of artistic necessities. With the English architects this never was the case; they were always able to design their vaults in such forms as they thought would be most beautiful artistically, and, owing to the greater solidity of their supports, to carry them out as at first designed.[^[12]]

It was left for the Germans to carry this system to its acme of absurdity. Half the merit of the old Round arched Gothic cathedrals on the Rhine consists in their solidity and the repose they display in every part. Their walls and other essential parts are always in themselves sufficient to support the roofs and vaults, and no constructive contrivance is seen anywhere; but when the Germans adopted the pointed style, their builders—they can hardly be called architects—seemed to think that the whole art consisted in supporting the widest possible vaults on the thinnest possible pillars and in constructing the tallest windows with the most attenuated mullions. The consequence is, that though their constructive skill still excites the wonder of the mason or the engineer, the artist or the architect turns from the cold vaults and lean piers of their later cathedrals with a painful feeling of unsatisfied expectation, and wonders why such dimensions and such details should produce a result so utterly unsatisfactory.

So many circumstances require to be taken into consideration, that it is impossible to prescribe any general rules in such a subject as this, but the following table will explain to a certain extent the ratio of the area to the points of support in sixteen of the principal buildings of the world.[^[13]] As far as it goes, it tends to prove that the satisfactory architectural effect of a building is nearly in the inverse ratio to the mechanical cleverness displayed in its construction.

At the head of the list stands the Hypostyle Hall, and next to it practically is the Parthenon, which being the only wooden-roofed building in the list, its ratio of support in proportion to the work required is nearly as great as that of the Temple at Karnac. Spires only wants better details to be one of the grandest edifices in Europe, and Bourges, Paris, Chartres, and Salisbury are among the most satisfactory Gothic cathedrals we possess. St. Ouen, notwithstanding all its beauty of detail and design, fails in this one point, and is certainly deficient in solidity. Cologne and Milan would both be very much improved by greater massiveness: and at York the lightness of the supports is carried so far that it never can be completed with the vaulted roof originally designed, for the nave at least.

The four great Renaissance cathedrals, at Rome, Florence, London, and Paris, enumerated in this list, have quite sufficient strength for architectural effect, but the value of this is lost from concealed construction, and because the supports are generally grouped into a few great masses, the dimensions of which cannot be estimated by the eye. A Gothic architect would have divided these masses into twice or three times the number of the piers used in these churches, and by employing ornament designed to display and accentuate the construction, would have rendered these buildings far more satisfactory than they are.

In this respect the great art of the architect consists in obtaining the greatest possible amount of unencumbered space internally, consistent in the first place with the requisite amount of permanent mechanical stability, and next with such an appearance of superfluity of strength as shall satisfy the mind that the building is perfectly secure and calculated to last for ages.

IX.—Forms.

It is extremely difficult to lay down any general rules as to the forms best adapted to architectural purposes, as the value of a form in architecture depends wholly on the position in which it is placed and the use to which it is applied. There is in consequence no prescribed form, however ugly it may appear at present, that may not one day be found to be the very best for a given purpose; and, in like manner, none of those most admired which may not become absolutely offensive when used in a manner for which they are unsuited. In itself no simple form seems to have any inherent value of its own, and it is only by combination of one with another that they become effective. If, for instance, we take a series of twenty or thirty figures, placing a cube at one end as the most solid of angular and a sphere at the other as the most perfect of round shapes, it would be easy to cut off the angles of the cube in successive gradations till it became a polygon of so many sides as to be nearly curvilinear. On the other hand by modifying the sphere through all the gradations of conic sections, it might meet the other series in the centre without there being any abrupt distinction between them. Such a series might be compared to the notes of a piano. We cannot say that any one of the base or treble notes is in itself more beautiful than the others. It is only by a combination of several notes that harmony is produced, and gentle or brilliant melodies by their fading into one another, or by strongly marked contrasts. So it is with forms: the square and angular are expressive of strength and power; curves of softness and elegance; and beauty is produced by effective combination of the right-lined with the curvilinear. It is always thus in nature. Rocks and all the harder substances are rough and angular, and marked by strong contrasts and deep lines. Among trees, the oak is rugged, and its branches are at right angles to its stem, or to one another. The lines of the willow are rounded, and flowing. The forms of children and women are round and full, and free from violent contrasts; those of men are abrupt, hard, and angular in proportion to the vigour and strength of their frame.

In consequence of these properties, as a general rule the square or angular parts ought always to be placed below, where strength is wanted, and the rounded above. If, for instance, a tower is to be built, the lower storey should not only be square, but should be marked by buttresses, or other strong lines, and the masonry rusticated, so as to convey even a greater appearance of strength. Above this, if the square form is still retained, it may be with more elegance and less accentuation. The form may then change to an octagon, that to a polygon of sixteen sides, and then be surmounted by a circular form of any sort. These conditions are not absolute, but the reverse arrangement would be manifestly absurd. A tower with a circular base and a square upper storey is what almost no art could render tolerable, while the other pleases by its innate fitness without any extraordinary effort of design.

On the other hand, round pillars are more pleasing as supports for a square architrave, not so much from any inherent fitness for the purpose as from the effect of contrast, and flat friezes are preferable to curved ones of the late Roman styles from the same cause. The angular mouldings introduced among the circular shafts of a Gothic coupled pillar, add immensely to the brilliancy of effect. Where everything is square and rugged, as in a Druidical trilithon, the effect may be sublime, but it cannot be elegant; where everything is rounded, as in the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates, the perfection of elegance may be attained, but never sublimity. Perfection, as usual, lies between these extremes.

X—Proportion.

The properties above enumerated may be characterised as the mechanical principles of design. Size, stability, construction, material, and many such, are elements at the command of the engineer or mason, as well as of the architect, and a building remarkable for these properties only, cannot be said to rise above the lowest grade of architectural excellence. They are invaluable adjuncts in the hands of the true artist, but ought never to be the principal elements of design.

After these, the two most important resources at the command of the architect are Proportion and Ornament; the former enabling him to construct ornamentally, the latter to ornament his construction; both require knowledge and thought, and can only be properly applied by one thoroughly imbued with the true principles of architectural design.

As proportion, to be good, must be modified by every varying exigence of a design, it is of course impossible to lay down any general rules which shall hold good in all cases; but a few of its principles are obvious enough, and can be defined so as to enable us to judge how far they have been successfully carried out in the various buildings enumerated in the following pages.

To take first the simplest form of the proposition, let us suppose a room built, which shall be an exact cube—of say 20 feet each way—such a proportion must be bad and inartistic; and besides, the height is too great for the other dimensions, apparently because it is impossible to get far enough away to embrace the whole wall at one view, or to see the springing of the roof, without throwing the head back and looking upwards. If the height were exaggerated to thirty or forty feet, the disproportion would be so striking, that no art could render it agreeable. As a general rule, a room square in plan is never pleasing. It is always better that one side should be longer than the other, so as to give a little variety to the design. Once and a half the width has often been recommended, and with every increase of length an increase of height is not only allowable, but indispensable. Some such rule as the following seems to meet most cases:—“The height of a room ought to be equal to half its width, plus the square root of its length.” Thus a room 20 feet square ought to be between 14 and 15 feet high; if its length be increased to 40 feet, its height must be at least 161⁄2; if 100, certainly not less than 20. If we proceed further, and make the height actually exceed the width, the effect is that of making it look narrow. As a general rule, and especially in all extreme cases, by adding to one dimension, we take away in appearance from the others. Thus, if we take a room 20 feet wide and 30 or 40 feet in height, we make it narrow; if 40 wide and 20 high, we make a low room. By increasing the length, we diminish the other two dimensions.

This, however, is merely speaking of plain rooms with plain walls, and an architect may be forced to construct rooms of all sorts of unpleasing dimensions, but it is here that his art comes to his aid, and he must be very little of an artist if he cannot conceal, even when unable entirely to counteract, the defects of his dimensions. A room, for instance, that is a perfect cube of 20 feet may be made to look as low as one only 15 feet high, by using a strongly marked horizontal decoration, by breaking the wall into different heights, by marking strongly the horizontal proportions, and obliterating as far as possible all vertical lines. The reverse process will make a room only 10 feet high look as lofty as one of 15.

Even the same wall-paper (if of strongly marked lines) if pasted on the sides of two rooms exactly similar in dimensions, but with the lines vertical in the one case, in the other horizontal, will alter the apparent dimensions of them by several feet. If a room is too high, it is easy to correct this by carrying a bold cornice to the height required, and stopping there the vertical lines of the wall, and above this coving the roof, or using some device which shall mark a distinction from the walls, and the defect may become a beauty. In like manner, if a room is too long for its other dimensions, this is easily remedied either by breaks in the walls where these can be obtained, or by screens of columns across its width, or by only breaking the height of the roof. Anything which will divide the length into compartments will effect this. The width, if in excess, is easily remedied by dividing it, as the Gothic architects did, into aisles. Thus a room 50 feet wide and 30 high, may easily be restored to proportion by cutting off 10 or 12 feet on each side, and lowering the roofs of the side compartments, to say 20 feet. If great stability is not required, this can be done without encumbering the floor with many points of support. The greater the number used the more easily the effect is obtained, but it can be done almost without them.

Externally it is easier to remedy defects of proportion than it is internally. It is easier than on the inside to increase the apparent height by strongly marked vertical lines, or to bring it down by the employment of a horizontal decoration.

No. 3.

If the length of a building is too great, this is easily remedied by projections, or by breaking up the length into square divisions. Thus, A A is a long building, but B B is a square one, or practically (owing to the perspective) less than a square in length, in any direction at right angles to the line of vision; or, in other words, to a spectator at A’ the building would look as if shorter in the direction of B B than in that of A A, owing to the largeness and importance of the part nearest the eye. If 100 feet in length by 50 feet high is a pleasing dimension for a certain design, and it is required that the building should be 500 feet long, it is only necessary to break it into five parts, and throw three back and two forward, or the contrary, and the proportion becomes as before.

The Egyptians hardly studied the science of proportion at all; they gained their effects by simpler and more obvious means. The Greeks were masters in this as in everything else, but they used the resources of the art with extreme sobriety—externally at least—dreading to disturb that simplicity which is so essential to sublimity in architecture. But internally, where sublimity was not attainable with the dimensions they employed, they divided the cells of their temples into three aisles, and the height into two, by placing two ranges of columns one above the other. By these means they were enabled to use such a number of small parts as to increase the apparent size most considerably, and at the same time to give greater apparent magnitude to the statue, which was the principal object for which the temple was erected.

The Romans do not seem to have troubled themselves with the science of proportion in the designs of their buildings, though nothing can well be more exquisite than the harmony that exists between the parts in their orders, and generally in their details. During the Middle Ages, however, we find, from first to last, the most earnest attention paid to it, and half the beauty of the buildings of that age is owing to the successful results to which the architects carried their experiments in balancing the parts of their structures the one against the other, so as to produce that harmony we so much admire in them.

No. 4.

The first great invention of the Gothic architects (though of Greek origin) was that of dividing the breadth of the building internally into three aisles, and making the central one higher and wider than those on each side. By this means height and length were obtained at the expense of width: this latter, however, is never a valuable property artistically, though it may be indispensable for the utilitarian exigencies of the building. They next sought to increase still further the height of the central aisle by dividing its sides into three equal portions which by contrast added very much to the effect: but the monotony of this arrangement was soon apparent: besides, it was perceived that the side aisles were so low as not to come into direct comparison with the central nave. To remedy this they gradually increased its dimensions, and at last hit on something very like the following proportions. They made the height of the side aisle half that of the central (the width being also in the same proportion); the remaining portions they divided into three, making the triforium one-third, the clerestory two-thirds of the whole. Thus the three divisions are in the proportion of 1, 2, and 3, each giving value to the other, and the whole adding very considerably to all the apparent dimensions of the interior. It would have been easy to have carried the system further and, by increasing the number of the pillars longitudinally and the number of divisions vertically, to have added considerably to even this appearance of size; but it would then have been at the expense of simplicity and grandeur: and though the building might have looked larger, the beauty of the design would have been destroyed.

One of the most striking exemplifications of the perfection of the Gothic architects in this department of their art is shown in their employment of towers and spires. As a general rule, placing a tall building in juxtaposition with a low one exaggerates the height of the one and the lowness of the other; and as it was by no means the object of the architects to sacrifice their churches for their towers, it required all their art to raise noble spires without doing this. In the best designs they effected it by bold buttresses below, and the moment the tower got free of the building, by changing it to an octagon and cutting it up by pinnacles, and lastly by changing its form into that of a spire, using generally smaller parts than are found in the church. By these devices they prevented the spire from competing in any way with the church. On the contrary, a spire or group of spires gave dignity and height to the whole design, without deducting from any of its dimensions.

The city of Paris contains an instructive exemplification of these doctrines—the façade of the Cathedral of Notre Dame (exclusive of the upper storey of the towers), and the Arc de l’Etoile being two buildings of exactly the same dimensions; yet any one who is not aware of this fact would certainly estimate the dimensions of the cathedral as at least a third, if not a half, in excess of the other. It may be said that the arch gains in sublimity and grandeur what it loses in apparent dimensions by the simplicity of its parts. The façade of the cathedral, though far from one of the best in France, is by no means deficient in grandeur; and had it been as free from the trammels of utilitarianism as the arch, might easily have been made as simple and as grand, without losing its apparent size. In the other case, by employing in the arch the principles which the Gothic architects elaborated with such pains, the apparent dimensions might have been increased without detracting from its solidity, and it might thus have been rendered one of the sublimest buildings in the world.

The interior of St. Peter’s at Rome is an example of the neglect of these principles. Its great nave is divided into only four bays, and the proportions and ornaments of these, borrowed generally from external architecture, are so gigantic, that it is difficult to realise the true dimensions of the church, except by the study of the plan; and it is not too much to assert, that had a cathedral of these dimensions been built in the true Gothic style, during the 13th or 14th century, it would have appeared as if from one-third to one-half larger, and might have been the most sublime, whereas St. Peter’s is now only the largest temple ever erected.

It would be easy to multiply examples to show to what perfection the science of proportion was carried by the experimental processes above described during the existence of the true styles of architecture, and how satisfactory the result is, even upon those who are not aware of the cause; and, on the other hand, how miserable are the failures that result either from the ignorance or neglect of its rules. Enough, it is hoped, has been said to show that not only are the apparent proportions of a building very much under the control of an architect independent of its lineal dimensions, but also that he has it in his power so to proportion every part as to give value to all those around it, thus producing that harmony which in architecture, as well as in music or in painting, is the very essence of a true or satisfactory utterance.

XI.—Carved Ornament.

Architectural ornament is of two kinds, constructive and decorative. By the former is meant all those contrivances, such as capitals, brackets, vaulting shafts, and the like, which serve to explain or give expression to the construction; by the latter, such as mouldings, frets, foliage, &c., which give grace and life either to the actual constructive forms, or to the constructive decoration.

In mere building or engineering, the construction being all in all, it is left to tell its own tale in its own prosaic nakedness; but in true architecture construction is always subordinate, and as architectural buildings ought always to possess an excess of strength it need not show itself unless desired; but even in an artistic point of view it always is expedient to express it. The vault, for instance, of a Gothic cathedral might just as easily spring from a bracket or a corbel as from a shaft, and in early experiments this was often tried; but the effect was unsatisfactory, and a vaulting shaft was carried down first to the capital of the pillar, and afterwards to the floor: by this means the eye was satisfied, the thin reed-like shafts being sufficient to explain that the vault rested on the solid ground, and an apparent propriety and stability were given to the whole. These shafts not being necessary constructively, the artist could make them of any form or size he thought most proper, and consequently, instead of one he generally used three small shafts tied together at various intervals. Afterwards merely a group of graceful mouldings was employed, which satisfied not only the exigencies of ornamental construction, but became a real and essential decorative feature of the building.

In like manner it was good architecture to use flying buttresses, even where they were not essential to stability. They explained externally that the building was vaulted, and that its thrusts were abutted and stability secured. The mistake in their employment was where they became so essential to security, that the constructive necessities controlled the artistic propriety of the design, and the architect found himself compelled to employ either a greater number, or buttresses of greater strength than he would have desired had he been able to dispense with them.

The architecture of the Greeks was so simple, that they required few artifices to explain their construction; but in their triglyphs their mutules, the form of their cornices and other devices, they took pains to explain, not only that these parts had originally been of wood but that the temple still retained its wooden roof. Had they ever adopted a vault, they would have employed a totally different system of decoration. Having no constructive use whatever, these parts were wholly under the control of the architects, and they consequently became the beautiful things we now so much admire.

With their more complicated style the Romans introduced many new modes of constructive decoration. They were the first to employ vaulting shafts. In all the great halls of their Baths, or of their vaulted Basilicas, they applied a Corinthian pillar as a vaulting shaft to the front of the pier from which the arch appears to spring, though the latter really supported the vault. All the pillars have now been removed, but without at all interfering with the stability of the vaults; they were mere decorative features to explain the construction, but indispensable for that purpose. The Romans also suggested most of the other decorative inventions of the Middle Ages, but their architecture never reached beyond the stage of transition. It was left for the Gothic architects freely to elaborate this mode of architectural effect, and they carried it to an extent never dreamt of before; but it is to this that their buildings owe at least half the beauty they possess.

The same system of course applies to dwelling-houses, and to the meanest objects of architectural art. The string-course that marks externally the floor-line of the different storeys is as legitimate and indispensable an ornament as a vaulting shaft, and it would also be well that the windows should be grouped so as to indicate the size of the rooms, and at least a plain space left where a partition wall abuts, or better still a pilaster or buttress, or line of some sort, ought to mark externally that feature of internal construction.

The cornice is as indispensable a termination of the wall as the capital is of a pillar; and suggests not only an appropriate support for the roof, but eaves to throw the rain off the wall. The same is true with regard to pediments or caps over windows: they suggest a means of protecting an opening from the wet; and porches over doorways are equally obvious contrivances. Everything, in short, which is actually constructive, or which suggests what was or may be a constructive expedient, is a legitimate object of decoration, and affords the architect unlimited scope for the display of taste and skill, without going out of his way to seek it.

The difficulty in applying ornaments borrowed from other styles is, that although they all suggest construction, it is not the construction of the buildings to which they are applied. To use Pugin’s clever antithesis, “they are constructed ornament, not ornamented construction,” and as such can never satisfy the mind. However beautiful in themselves, they are out of place, there is no real or apparent use for their being there; and, in an art so essentially founded on utilitarian principles and common sense as architecture is, any offence against constructive propriety is utterly intolerable.

The other class, or decorative ornaments, are forms invented for the purpose, either mere lithic forms, or copied from the vegetable kingdom, and applied so as to give elegance or brilliancy to the constructive decoration just described.

The first and most obvious of these are mere mouldings, known to architects as Scotias, Cavettos, Ogees, Toruses, Rolls, &c.—curves which, used in various proportions either horizontally or vertically, produce when artistically combined, the most pleasing effect.

In conjunction with these, it is usual to employ a purely conventional class of ornament, such as frets, scrolls, or those known as the bead and reel, or egg and dart mouldings; or in Gothic architecture the billet or dog-tooth or all the thousand and one forms that were invented during the Middle Ages.

In certain styles of art, vegetable forms are employed even more frequently than those last described. Among these, perhaps the most beautiful and perfect ever invented was that known as the honeysuckle ornament, which the Greeks borrowed from the Assyrians, but made so peculiarly their own. It has all the conventional character of a purely lithic, with all the grace of a vegetable form; and, as used with the Ionic order, is more nearly perfect than any other known.

The Romans made a step further towards a more direct imitation of nature in their employment of the acanthus leaf. As applied to a capital, or where the constructive form of the bell beneath it is still distinctly seen, it is not only unobjectionable, but productive of the most pleasing effect. Indeed it is doubtful if anything of its class has yet been invented so entirely satisfactory as the Roman Corinthian order, as found, for instance, in the so-called Temple of Jupiter Stator at Rome. The proportions of the order have never yet been excelled, and there is just that balance between imitation of nature and conventionality which is indispensable. It is not so pure or perfect as a Grecian order, but as an example of rich decoration applied to an architectural order it is unsurpassed.

With their disregard of precedent and untrammelled wildness of imagination, the Gothic architects tried every form of vegetable ornament, from the purest conventionalism, where the vegetable form can hardly be recognised, to the most literal imitation of nature.

While confining himself to purely lithic forms, an architect can never sin against good taste, though he may miss many beauties; with the latter class of ornament he is always in danger of offence, and few have ever employed it without falling into mistakes. In the first place, because it is impossible to imitate perfectly foliage and flowers in stone; and secondly, because if the pliant forms of plants are made to support, or do the work of, hard stone, the incongruity is immediately apparent, and the more perfect the imitation the greater the mistake.

No. 5.

No. 6.

In the instance (Woodcut No. [5]), any amount of literal imitation that the sculptor thought proper may be indulged in, because in it the stone construction is so apparent everywhere, that the vegetable form is the merest supplement conceivable; or in a hollow moulding round a doorway, a vine may be sculptured with any degree of imitation that can be employed; for as it has no more work to do than the object represented would have in the same situation, it is a mere adjunct, a statue of a plant placed in a niche, as we might use the statue of a man: but if in the woodcut (No. [6]) imitations of real leaves were used to support the upper moulding, the effect would not be so satisfactory; indeed it is questionable if in both these last examples a little more conventionality would not be desirable.

In too many instances, even in the best Gothic architecture, the construction is so overlaid by imitative vegetable forms as to be concealed, and the work is apparently done by leaves or twigs, but in the earliest and purest style this is almost never the case. As a general rule it may be asserted that the best lithic ornaments are those which approach nearest to the grace and pliancy of plants, and that the best vegetable forms are those which most resemble the regularity and symmetry of such as are purely conventional.

Although the Greeks in one or two instances employed human figures to support entablatures or beams, the good taste of such an arrangement is more than questionable. They borrowed it, with the Ionic order, from the Assyrians, with whom the employment of caryatides and animal forms was the rule, not the exception, in contradistinction from the Egyptians, who never adopted this practice.[^[14]] Even the Romans avoided this mistake, and the Gothic architects also as a general rule kept quite clear of it. Whenever they did employ ornamented figures for architectural purposes, they were either monsters, as in gargoyles or griffons; or sometimes, in a spirit of caricature, they used dwarfs or deformities of various sorts; but their sculpture, properly so called, was always provided with a niche or pedestal, where it might have been placed after the building was complete, or from which it might be removed without interfering with the architecture.

XII.—Decorative Colour.

Colour is one of the most invaluable elements placed at the command of the architect to enable him to give grace or finish to his designs. From its nature it is of course only an accessory, or mere ornament; but there is nothing that enables him to express his meaning so cheaply and easily, and at the same time with such brilliancy and effect. For an interior it is absolutely indispensable; and no apartment can be said to be complete till it has received its finishing touches from the hand of the painter. Whether exteriors ought or ought not to be similarly treated admits of more doubt.

Internally the architect has complete command of the situation: he can suit his design to his colours, or his colours to his design. Walls, roof, floor, furniture, are all at his disposal, and he can shut out any discordant element that would interfere with the desired effect.

Externally this is seldom, if ever the case. A façade that looks brilliant and well in noonday sun may be utterly out of harmony with a cold grey sky, or with the warm glow of a setting sun full upon it: and unless all other buildings and objects are toned into accordance with it, the effect can seldom be harmonious.

There can be now no reasonable doubt that the Greeks painted their temples both internally and externally, but as a general rule they always placed them on heights where they could only be seen relieved against the sky; and they could depend on an atmosphere of almost uniform, unvarying brightness. Had their temples been placed in groves or valleys, they would probably have given up the attempt, and certainly never would have ventured upon it in such a climate as ours.

Except in such countries as Egypt and Greece, it must always be a mistake to apply colour by merely painting the surface of the building externally; but there are other modes of effecting this which are perfectly legitimate. Coloured ornaments may be inlaid in the stone of the wall without interfering with the construction, and so placed may be made more effective and brilliant than the same ornaments would be if carved in relief. Again, string-courses and mouldings of various coloured stones or marbles might frequently be employed with better effect than can be obtained in some situations by depth of cutting and boldness of projection. Such a mode of decoration can, however, only be partial; if the whole building is to be coloured, it must be done constructively, by using different coloured materials, or the effect will never be satisfactory.

In the Middle Ages the Italians carried this mode of decoration to a considerable extent; but in almost all instances it is so evidently a veneer overlying the construction that it fails to please; and a decoration which internally, where construction is of less importance, would excite general admiration, is without meaning on the outside of the same wall.

At the same time it is easy to conceive how polychromy might be carried out successfully, if, for instance, a building were erected, the pillars of which were of red granite or porphyry, the cornices or string-courses of dark coloured marbles, and the plain surfaces of lighter kinds, or even of stone. A design so carried out would be infinitely more effective than a similar one executed in materials of only one colour, and depending for relief only on varying shadows of daylight. There is in fact just the same difficulty in lighting monochromatic buildings as there is with sculpture. A coloured painting, on the other hand, requires merely sufficient light, and with that expresses its form and meaning far more clearly and easily than when only one colour is employed. The task, however, is difficult; so much so, indeed, that there is hardly one single instance known of a complete polychromatic design being successfully carried out anywhere, though often attempted. The other mode of merely inlaying the ornaments in colour instead of relieving them by carving as seldom fails.

Notwithstanding this, an architect should never neglect to select the colour of his materials with reference to the situation in which his building is to stand. A red brick building may look remarkably well if nestling among green trees, while the same building would be hideous if situated on a sandy plain, and relieved only by the warm glow of a setting sun. A building of white stone or white brick is as inappropriate among the trees, and may look bright and cheerful in the other situation.

In towns colours might be used of very great brilliancy, and if done constructively, there could be no greater improvement to our architecture; but its application is so difficult that no satisfactory result has yet been attained, and it may be questioned whether it will be ever successfully accomplished.

With regard to interiors there can be no doubt. All architects in all countries of the world resorted to this expedient to harmonise and to give brilliancy to their compositions, and have depended on it for their most important effects.

The Gothic architects carried this a step further by the introduction of painted glass, which was a mode of colouring more brilliant than had been ever before attempted. This went beyond all previous efforts, inasmuch as it coloured not only the objects themselves, but also the light in which they were seen. So enamoured were they of its beauties, that they sacrificed much of the constructive propriety of their buildings to admit of its display, and paid more attention to it than to any other part of their designs. Perhaps they carried this predilection a little beyond the limits of good taste; but colour is in itself so exquisite a thing, and so admirable a vehicle for the expression of architectural as well as of æsthetic beauty, that it is difficult to find fault even with the abuse of what is in its essence so legitimate and so beautiful.

XIII.—Sculpture and Painting.

Carved ornament and decorative colour come within the especial province of the architect. In some styles, such as the Saracenic, and in many buildings, they form the Alpha and the Omega of the decoration. But, as mentioned above, one of the great merits of architecture as an art is that it affords room for the display of the works of the sculptor and the painter, not only in such a manner as not to interfere with its own decorative construction, but so as to add meaning and value to the whole. No Greek temple and no Gothic cathedral can indeed be said to be perfect or complete without these adjuncts; and one of the principal objects of the architects in Greece or in the Middle Ages was to design places and devise means by which these could be displayed to advantage, without interfering either with the construction or constructive decoration. This was perhaps effected more successfully in the Parthenon than in any other building we are acquainted with. The pediments at either end were noble frames for the exhibition of sculpture, and the metopes were equally appropriate for the purpose; while the plain walls of the cella were admirably adapted for paintings below and for a sculptured frieze above.

The deeply recessed portals of our Gothic cathedrals, their galleries, their niches and pinnacles, were equally appropriate for the exuberant display of this class of sculpture in a less refined or fastidious age; while the mullion-framed windows were admirably adapted for the exhibition of a mode of coloured decoration, somewhat barbarous, it must be confessed, but wonderfully brilliant.

The system was carried further in India than in any other country except perhaps Egypt. Probably no Hindu temple was ever erected without being at least intended to be adorned with Phonetic sculpture, and many of them are covered with it from the plinth to the eaves, in strong contrast with the Mahomedan buildings that stand side by side with them, and which are wholly devoid of any attempt at this kind of decoration. The taste of these Hindu sculptures may be questionable, but such as they are they are so used as never to interfere with the architectural effect of the building on which they are employed, but always so as to aid the design irrespective of the story they have to tell. There is probably no instance in which their removal or their absence would not be felt as an injury from an architectural point of view.

It is difficult now to ascertain whether Phonetic painting was used to the same extent as sculpture in ancient times. From its nature it is infinitely more perishable, and a bucket of whitewash will in half an hour obliterate the work of years, and, strange to say, there are ages, both in the East and the west, where men’s minds are so attuned that they consider whitewash a more fitting decoration than coloured paintings of the most elaborate and artistic character. While this is so we need hardly wonder that our means of forming a distinct opinion on this subject are somewhat limited.

Be this as it may, it is still one of the special privileges of architecture that she is able to attract to herself these phonetic arts, and one of the greatest merits a building can possess is its affording appropriate places for their display without interfering in any way with the special department of the architect. But it is always necessary to distinguish carefully between what belongs to the province of each art separately. The work of the architect ought to be complete and perfect without either sculpture or painting, and must be judged as if they were absent; but he will not have been entirely successful unless he has provided the means by which the value of his design may be doubled by their introduction. It is only by the combination of the Phonetic utterance with the Technic and Æsthetic elements that a perfect work of art has been produced, and that architecture can be said to have reached the highest point of perfection to which it can aspire.

XIV.—Uniformity.

Considerable confusion has been introduced into the reasoning on the subject of architectural Uniformity from the assumption that the two great schools of art—the classical and the mediæval—adopted contrary conclusions regarding it, Formality being supposed to be the characteristic of the former, Irregularity of the latter. The Greeks, of course, when building a temple or monument, which was only one room or one object, made it exactly symmetrical in all its parts; but so did the Gothic architects when building a church or chapel or hall, or any single object: in ninety-nine instances out of a hundred, a line drawn down the centre divides it into two equal and symmetrical halves; and when an exception to this occurs, there is some obvious motive for it.

But where several buildings of different classes were to be grouped, or even two temples placed near one another, the Greeks took the utmost care to prevent their appearing parts of one design or one whole; and when, as in the instance of the Erechtheium,[^[15]] three temples are placed together, no Gothic architect ever took such pains to secure for each its separate individuality as the Grecian architect did. What has given rise to the error is, that all the smaller objects of Grecian art have perished, leaving us only the great monuments without their adjuncts.

If we can conceive the task assigned to a Grecian architect of erecting a building like one of our collegiate institutions, he would without doubt have distinguished the chapel from the refectory, and that from the library, and he would have made them of a totally different design from the principal’s lodge, or the chambers of the fellows and students; but it is more than probable that, while carefully distinguishing each part from the other, he would have arranged them with some regard to symmetry, placing the chapel in the centre, the library and refectory as pendants to one another, though dissimilar, and the residences so as to connect and fill up the whole design. The truth seems to be that no great amount of dignity can be obtained without a certain degree of regularity; and there can be little doubt that artistically it is better that mere utilitarian convenience should give way to the exigencies of architectural design than that the latter should be constrained to yield to the mere prosaic requirements of the building. The chance-medley manner in which many such buildings were grouped together in the Middle Ages tells the story as clearly, and may be productive of great picturesqueness of effect, but not of the same nobility as might have been obtained by more regularity. The highest class of design will never be reached by these means.

It is not difficult to discover, at least to a certain extent, that the cause of this is that no number of separate units will suffice to make one whole. A number of pebbles will not make a great stone, nor a number of rose-bushes an oak; nor will any number of dwarfs make up a giant. To obtain a great whole there must be unity, to which all the parts must contribute, or they will remain separate particles. The effect of unity is materially heightened when to it is added uniformity: the mind then instantly and easily grasps the whole, knows it to be one, and recognises the ruling idea that governed and moulded the whole together. It seems only to be by the introduction of uniformity that sufficient simplicity for greatness can be obtained, and the evidence of design made so manifest that the mind is satisfied that the building is no mere accumulation of separate objects, but the production of a master-mind.

In a palace irregularity seems unpardonable. The architect has there practically unlimited command of funds and of his arrangements, and he can easily design his suites of rooms so as to produce any amount of uniformity he may require: the different heights of the different storeys and the amount of ornament on them, with the employment of wings for offices, is sufficient to mark the various purposes of the various parts; but where the system is carried so far in great public buildings, that great halls, libraries, committee-rooms, and subordinate residences are all squeezed into one perfectly uniform design, the building loses all meaning, and fails from the opposite error.

The rule seems to be, that every building or every part of one ought most distinctly and clearly to express not only its constructive exigencies, but also the uses for which it is destined; on the other hand, that mere utility, in all instances where architectural effect is aimed at, ought to give way to artistic requirements; and that an architect is consequently justified, in so far as his means will admit, in producing that amount of uniformity and regularity which seems indispensable for anything like grandeur of effect. In villas and small buildings all we look for is picturesqueness and meaning combined with elegance; but in larger and more monumental erections we expect something more; and this can hardly be obtained without the introduction of some new element which shall tell, in the first place, that artistic excellence was the ruling idea of the design, and in the next should give it that perfect balance and symmetry which seems to be as inherent a quality of the higher works of nature as of true art.

XV.—Imitation of Nature.

The subject of the imitation of Nature is one intimately connected with those mooted in the preceding paragraphs, and regarding which considerable misunderstanding seems to prevail. It is generally assumed that in architecture we ought to copy natural objects as we see them, whereas the truth seems to be that we ought always to copy the processes, never the forms of Nature. The error apparently has arisen from confounding together the imitative arts of painting and sculpture with the constructive art of architecture. The former have no other mode of expression than by copying, more or less literally, the forms of Nature; the latter, as explained above, depends wholly on a different class of elements for its effect; but at the same time no architect can either study too intently, or copy too closely, the methods and processes by which Nature accomplishes her ends; and the most perfect building will be that in which these have been most closely and literally followed.

To take one prominent instance:—So far as we can judge, the human body is the most perfect of Nature’s works; in it the groundwork of skeleton is never seen, and though it can hardly be said to be anywhere concealed, it is only displayed at the joints or more prominent points of support, where the action of the frame would be otherwise unintelligible. The muscles are disposed not only where they are most useful, but so as to form groups gracefully rounded in outline. The softness and elegance of these are further aided by the deposition of adipose matter, and the whole is covered with a skin which with its beautiful texture conceals the more utilitarian construction of the internal parts. In the trunk of the body the viscera are disposed wholly without symmetry or reference to beauty of any sort—the heart on one side, the liver on the other, and the other parts exactly in those positions and in those forms by which they may most directly and easily perform the essential functions for which they are designed. But the whole is concealed in a perfectly symmetrical sheath of the most exquisitely beautiful outline. It may be safely asserted that a building is beautiful and perfect exactly in the ratio in which the same amount of concealment and the same amount of display of construction is preserved, where the same symmetry is shown as between the right and left sides of the human body—the same difference as between the legs and arms, where the parts are applied to different purposes, and where the same amount of ornament is added, to adorn without interfering with what is useful. In short, there is no principle involved in the structure of man which may not be taken as the most absolute standard of excellence in architecture.

It is in Nature’s highest works that we find the symmetry of proportion most prominent. When we descend to the lower types of animals we lose it to a great extent, and among trees and vegetables generally find it only in a far less degree, and sometimes miss it altogether. In the mineral kingdom among rocks and stones it is altogether absent. So universal is this principle in Nature that we may safely apply it to our criticism on art, and say that a building is perfect as a whole in proportion to its motived regularity, and departs from the highest type in the ratio in which symmetrical arrangement is neglected. It may, however, be incorrect to say that an oak-tree is a less perfect work of creation than a human being, but it is certain that it is lower in the scale of created beings. So it may be said that a picturesque group of Gothic buildings may be as perfect as the stately regularity of an Egyptian or classic temple; but if it is so, it is equally certain that it belongs to a lower and inferior class of design.

This analogy, however, we may leave for the present. The one point which it is indispensable to insist on here is, that man can progress or tend towards success only by following the principles and copying, so far as he can understand them, the processes which Nature employs in her works; but he can never succeed in anything by copying forms without reference to principles. If we could find Nature making trees like stones, or animals like trees, or birds like fishes, or fishes like mammalia, or using any parts taken from one kingdom for purposes belonging to another, it would then be perfectly legitimate for us to use man’s stature as the modulus for a Doric, or woman’s as that of an Ionic column—to build cathedrals like groves, and make windows like leaves, or to estimate their beauty by their resemblance to such objects; but all such comparisons proceed on an entire mistake of what imitation of Nature really means.

It is the merest and most absolute negation of reason to apply to one purpose things that were designed for another, or to imitate them when they have no appropriateness; but it is our highest privilege to understand the processes of Nature. To apply these to our own wants and purposes is the noblest use of human intellect and the perfection of human wisdom.

So instinctively, but so literally, has this correct process of imitating Nature been followed in all true styles of architecture, that we can always reason regarding them as we do with reference to natural objects. Thus, if an architect finds in any quarter of the globe a Doric or Corinthian capital with a few traces of a foundation, he can, at a glance, tell the age of the temple or building to which it belonged. He knows who the people were who erected it, to what purpose it was dedicated, and proceeds at once to restore its porticos, and without much uncertainty can reproduce the whole fabric. Or if he finds a few Gothic bases in situ, with a few mouldings or frusta of columns, by the same process he traces the age, the size, and the purposes of the building before him. A Cuvier or an Owen can restore the form and predicate the habits of an extinct animal from a few fragments of bone, or even from a print of a foot. In the same manner an architect may, from a few fragments of a building, if of a true style of architecture, restore the whole of its pristine forms, and with almost the same amount of certainty. This arises wholly because the architects of former days had correct ideas of what was meant by imitation of Nature. They added nothing to their buildings which was not essential; there was no detail which had not its use, and no ornament which was not an elaboration or heightening of some essential part, and hence it is that a true building is as like to a work of Nature as any production of man’s hands can be to the creations of his Maker.

XVI.—Association.

There is one property inherent in the productions of architectural art, which, while it frequently lends to them half their charm, at the same time tends more than anything else to warp and distort our critical judgments regarding them. We seldom can look at a building of any age without associating with it such historical memories as may cling to its walls; and our predilections for any peculiar style of architecture are more often due to educational or devotional associations than to purely artistic judgments. A man must be singularly ignorant or strangely passionless who can stand among the fallen columns of a Grecian temple, or wander through the corridors of a Roman amphitheatre, or the aisles of a ruined Gothic abbey, and not feel his heart stirred by emotions of a totally different class from those suggested by the beauty of the mouldings or the artistic arrangement of the building he is contemplating.

The enthusiasm which burst forth in the 15th century for the classical style of art, and then proved fatal to the Gothic, was not so much an architectural as a literary movement. It arose from the re-discovery—if it may be so called—of the poems of Homer and Virgil, of the histories of Thucydides and Tacitus, of the Philosophy of Aristotle and the eloquence of Cicero. It was a vast reaction against the darkness and literary degradation of the Middle Ages, and carried the educated classes of Europe with it for the next three centuries. So long as classical literature only was taught in our schools, and classical models followed in our literature, classical architecture could alone be tolerated in our buildings, and this generally without the least reference either to its own peculiar beauties, or its appropriateness for the purposes to which it was applied.

A second reaction has now taken place against this state of affairs. The revival of the rites and ceremonies of the mediæval Church, our reverent love of our own national antiquities, and our admiration for the rude but vigorous manhood of the Middle Ages,—all have combined to repress the classical element both in our literature and our art, and to exalt in their place Gothic feelings and Gothic art, to an extent which cannot be justified on any grounds of reasonable criticism.

Unless the art-critic can free himself from the influence of these adventitious associations, his judgments lose half their value; but, on the other hand, to the historian of art they are of the utmost importance. It is because architecture so fully and so clearly expresses the feelings of the people who practised it that it becomes frequently a better vehicle of history than the written page; and it is these very associations that give life and meaning to blocks of stone and mounds of brick, and bring so vividly before our eyes the feelings and the aspirations of the long-forgotten past.

The importance of association in giving value to the objects of architectural art can hardly be overrated either by the student or historian. What has to be guarded against is that unreasoning enthusiasm which mistakes the shadow for the reality, and would force us to admire a rude piece of clumsy barbarism erected yesterday, and to which no history consequently attaches, because something like it was done in some long past age. Its reality, its antiquity, and its weather stains may render its prototype extremely interesting, even if not beautiful; while its copy is only an antiquarian toy, as ugly as it is absurd.

XVII.—New Style.

There is still one other point of view from which it is necessary to look at this question of architectural design before any just conclusion can be arrived at regarding it. It is in fact necessary to answer two other questions, nearly as often asked as those proposed at the beginning of Section III. “Can any one invent a new style?”—“Can we ever again have a new and original style of architecture?” Reasoning from experience alone, it is easy to answer these questions. No individual has, so far as we know, ever invented a new style in any part of the world. No one can even be named who during the prevalence of a true style of art materially advanced its progress, or by his individual exertion did much to help it forward; and we may safely answer, that as this has never happened before, it is hardly probable that it will ever occur now.

If this one question must be answered in the negative, the other may as certainly be answered in the affirmative, inasmuch as no nation in any age or in any part of the globe has failed to invent for itself a true and appropriate style of architecture whenever it chose to set about it in the right way, and there certainly can be no great difficulty in our doing now what has been so often done before, if we only set to work in a proper spirit, and are prepared to follow the same process which others have followed to obtain this result.

What that process is, may perhaps be best explained by such an example as that of ship-building before alluded to, which, though totally distinct, is still so nearly allied to architecture, as to make a comparison between the two easy and intelligible.

Let us, for instance, take a series of ships, beginning with those in which William the Conqueror invaded our shores, or the fleet with which Edward III. crossed over to France. Next take the vessels which transported Henry VIII. to his meeting with Francis I., and then pass on to the time of the Spanish Armada and the sea fights of Van Tromp and De Ruyter, and on to the times of William III., and then through the familiar examples till we come to such ships as the ‘Wellington’ and ‘Marlborough’ of yesterday, and the ‘Warrior’ or ‘Minotaur’ of to-day. In all this long list of examples we have a gradual, steady, forward progress without one check or break. Each century is in advance of the one before it, and the result is as near perfection as we can well conceive.