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GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 



GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 



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development. But Gothic architecture is now generally felt to be 

 unduly restricted when it is confined to that branch of it characterised 

 by the pointed arch. Gothic architecture, in fact, comprehends two 

 great branches Hound-Arched Gothic, known as Romanesque, and 

 Pointed-Arched, or that to which the term Gothic is popularly re- 

 stricted. 



The old vexed question of the origin of Gothic architecture, and of 

 the pointed arch, its assumed characteristic, loses much of its signifi- 

 cance under the view of its history now gaining general acceptance. 

 Gothic architecture it is seen in reality traces back its pedigree to the 

 architecture of the ancient Romans. As the empire became consolidated, 

 a style of architecture differing more and more from that of Greece was 

 developed. Its distinctive feature was that of the semi-circular arch, as 

 that of Greece was the horizontal beam. Until the utter ruin of 

 Roman nationality and civilisation, the arcuated as opposed to the 

 trabeated mode of construction continued to be practised. When the 

 nations which had formed a part of the Western Empire began to 

 emerge from the gloom which overshadowed them after its fall, the 

 churches they erected were imitations, however poor and feeble, of 

 the basilicas of ancient Rome. Gradually those features of the build- 

 ings, whether constructive or ornamental, which go to make up what 

 in the aggregate is called a style, diverged farther and farther from the 

 ancient models, and there was evolved what, from its evidently derived, 

 though ultimately independent character, has been designated the 

 Romanesque. In Italy, and the south of Europe generally, this style 

 continued to retain more resemblance to the original, whilst north and 

 west, where in fact the Germanic races prevailed, it underwent exten- 

 sive and comparatively rapid changes. Hence some writers would 

 retain the name Romanesque for the architecture of the nations of 

 Roman parentage, assigning that of Round-arched Gothic to the early 

 architecture of the German races." But this ethnological distinction 

 scarcely holds with sufficient tenacity to make it the basis of a separate 

 classification. The simpler and better course seems to be, to regard all 

 the round-arched styles of Mediaeval date, as Romanesque ; the so- 

 called Lombardic, Norman, &e., being merely national varieties of a 

 normal type. That form, which the divergence from the Roman type 

 assumed in the Eastern Empire, is a wholly distinct thing, and, for 

 the reasons assigned under BY/ANTINE ARCHITECTURE, fully entitled to 

 be regarded as a separate and independent style. 



Thus, then, we take as the starting-point in the history of Gothic 

 architecture the formation of the Romanesque style ; but to speak of 

 its full development, its distinctive features, and [esthetic character, 

 and to notice ever so cursorily the phases it assumed in different 

 countries, would swell this article to a very inconvenient length. We 

 shall defer, therefore, a general notice of the round-arched branch of 

 Gothic architecture to the article ROMANESQUE ARCHITECTURE, and a 

 more particular notice of that section of it which we are familiar with 

 in cathedrals and churches of our own country to the heading NORMAX 

 ARCHITECTURE ; and here confine our attention to Pointed Gothic 

 Architecture, and especially to English Pointed Gothic. 



The question of the origin of pointed architecture, as springing from 

 the invention of the pointed arch, or arch of two centres, was formerly 

 eagerly debated by writers on Gothic architecture. That such dis- 

 cussions were based on an erroneous assumption, we have seen in the 

 article ARCH. The pointed arch was known and used long before its 

 adoption by the Gothic architects. Its employment was forced on 

 them by constructive requirements, either in order to overcome the 

 difficulties arising out of the necessity of vaulting over large and 

 variously formed spaces, as Ware, Whewell, and other able writers 

 think, or, according to the views of Mr. Scott, in order to get rid of 

 the powerful outward thrust of a round arch of large span, or heavily 

 loaded. Be, however, the original inducement to ite use what it may, 

 its introduction was the commencement of an entire* change in the 

 character of Gothic architecture wherever that style was practised. 

 The pointed arch and arched vaulting became, in fact, the prime prin- 

 ciple of Gothic construction. Here, therefore, it may not be improper 

 to explain the different kinds of pointed arch, which are such that the 

 style named from it contains in that respect, owing to its being struck 

 from two centres, a source of variety unknown to any other ; for the 

 single centred, or round-headed one, can be varied only by making it 

 more or less than an exact semicircle, in which former case it approaches 

 the horse-shoe curve, and in the latter becomes a segmental or scheme- 

 arch. But arches struck from two centres, and therefore pointed by 

 the two curves meeting each other, may be of various degrees of acute- 

 ness, and exhibit great difference as to the proportion which the chord 

 or span of the arch bears to a vertical line drawn from it to the vertex 

 wn. In the semicircular or one-centred arch the span is inva- 

 riably equal to double the radius, or line drawn from the centre to the 

 intftulos, or curve bounding the aperture ; but in the narrow acute 

 lancet-arch, which is extra-centred (that is, is struck from centres on 

 .taide of the arch), the span is less than the radius, and the arch 

 onsequently narrow and tall, and more or less so in proportion as 

 stance between the centres is increased or diminished. In the. 

 teral arch, sometimes distinguished as that characteristic of pure 

 , the centres coincide with the extremities of the span, which is 

 to the radius, so that the chord and the two lines drawn from the 

 centres to the vertex form an equilateral triangle. This species of arch 

 is called by the Italians the tttto acuto, because the lines just mentionec 



are equal to the radius, or one side of a hexagon described within a 

 circle struck by it. When the radius is less than the span, or, iu 

 other words, the centres are on the span itself, the arch becomes an 

 obtuse-pointed one ; and it is hardly necessary to observe, that the 

 arch becomes more obtuse in proportion as the centres are brought 

 nearer each other ; for were they to unite, the arch would become a 

 single-centred and semicircular one. All these varieties may occur in 

 ,he same example ; because, if the mouldings be very numerous, and 

 occupy a great space, as is frequently the case in doorways, being all 

 concentric, some of the curves will describe inner-centred or obtuse, 

 others extra-centred or acute arches, as may be perceived by this 

 diagram, which, omitting the intermediate mouldings, will sorve to 

 exemplify the several varieties of the two-centred arch above defined. 



The centres in the intermediate figure (B) being at c c respectively, 

 and the line joining cc being also the chord or span, B is an equilateral 

 arch : A and c are respectively obtuse and acute arches, the centres in 

 the arch A being on the span, and in c being without it, as above 

 explained. The four-centred arch, so prevalent in our later or Perpen- 

 dicular Gothic as to be almost characteristic of it, is, on the contrary, 

 struck from two centres on each side, one on the span of the arch, and 

 the other below it, as will afterwards be explained. 



Pointed Gothic, as a distinct style, dates from near the close of the 

 12th century. Mr. Hope, in his ' History of Architecture," with many 

 of the older Continental as well as English writers on Gothic, considers 

 the pointed style to have originated in Germany, but its birthplace is 

 now more commonly admitted to be France. Some have indeed sought 

 to identify its origin with Suger, the famous church-building abbot of 

 St. Denis ; but this is at least doubtful. All that can with safety be 

 asserted is, that at this time France was the great centre of eccle- 

 siastical architecture, and that from her proceeded those new principles 

 which were eagerly adopted by the architects of other countries. But 

 the application of the pointed arch was not a sudden thought. For a 

 long time there had been a growing approximation towards those 

 characteristics of which the pointed arch permitted the full expression. 

 In the quadripartite vaulting of Romanesque crypts we see the first 

 application of that system of vaulting which assumed its full import- 

 ance in the pointed style ; and pointed arches not infrequently occur 

 along with semicircular ones in the later examples of Romanesque, of 

 what has been called the Transition style. But, in fact, Gothic archi- 

 tecture was always in a transition state ; and it should be borne in 

 mind when any particular style or form of Gothic is spoken of, that 

 the subdivision into styles, classes, or periods, is merely a matter of 

 convenience. Gothic classification has been dwelt on with very need- 

 less emphasis in this country. It has been attempted to define, not 

 only the broad divisions, but the minor subdivisions, and to separate 

 each by a distinct date of origin and termination. Now nothing is 

 more certain than that, during the whole period when Gothic archi- 

 tecture was practised, there was a continuous course of modification, 

 change, or transition, and that in some places the change advanced 

 much farther and more rapidly than at others. The true Gothic 

 architects seem never to have cared much for precedent. Those who 

 had advanced far in constructing a cathedral on the old round-arched 

 type, at the introduction of the pointed arch, without hesitation availed 

 themselves of it in completing their building. If a church of early 

 pointed date had subsequently to be altered or enlarged, they made 

 the new part in the style of their own day, not of that of the builders 

 of the church. Hence we see everywhere a comparatively brief period 

 during which a particular recognised style of Gothic was practised 

 with only such variation as may be readily accounted for by the 

 individuality of the designer, the necessities of the locality, and the 

 like ; but, then, on both sides of that middle period there is an admix- 

 ture more or less marked of the characteristics of the style wliich ia 

 passing away, or of that which is as yet only thus foreshadowed. 

 Thus, with tlie period before us, we may see in our own country 

 pointed Gothic arches, and other traces of the coming style, very 



