46 On Architectural Colouring. 
mentions its use in architectural decoration of the eleventh or 
twelfth century thus: ‘If you wish to paint a column or 2 
stone, take white lead and grind it with oil.” He then describes 
the thin film of gesso or cement with which all finished architecture 
was covered, and adds: ‘“ You may then paint upon it in colours 
mixed with oil.” As he was the compiler of old Greek art tradi- 
tions, we may suppose him thus giving an account of oil painting 
used by Byzantine artists, and even by those of still greater anti- 
quity. But oil is a very bad vehicle for architectural painting 
where it cannot be protected by a varnish, on account of the gloss. 
That colour had its place in architectural effect, and that it was 
necessary to its perfection, had been a principle recognized in all 
times and countries. The fact of art having been unanimous in 
its greatest and purest age, whether of Pagan or of Christian times, 
on this subject, is a sufficient reason for our enquiry whether our 
preference for uncoloured objects is a purer taste, or whether it be 
not a simple deficiency of perceptive powers, aud the evidence of 
an elementary, inchoate, and limited taste. In the palmiest days 
of classic art, sculpture as well as architecture was coloured, the 
tone being mellowed without affecting the texture of the marble. 
The draperies were often coloured very powerfully, and gold, and 
even jewellery, used. Unpainted statues are mentioned by classic 
authors as exceptions. The buildings of the Greeks were also 
coloured, without regard to the materials. Every moulding of the 
Parthenon, of the purest marble, was ornamented with colour or with 
gold. The primary colours were generally used in the architecture 
of the Greeks, and often in great intensity. Vermilion, ultramarine, 
and yellow earth were common, and a bright green, probably the 
same as that of which our medieval painters were fond—viz.: the 
vert de Gréce, whence the colour is commonly called verdigris, the 
French name originating in its importation to England from 
Montpellier, the greatest emporium for colours in Europe in the 
middle ages. Works of classic art, at the greatest distance apart, 
witness to the same principle in colouring, that what the carver 
had brought out in the strongest relief should be still more strongly 
relieved by a bold use of the primary colours and of gold; and 
