HOUSE. 



HOUSE. 



760 



Romans had passed more thoroughly into the spirit of the nation than 

 it had done in the north ; and we accordingly find that the earliest 

 specimens of mediaeval house-architecture are to be met with iii Italy, 

 Spain, or in the south of France. Some of the earliest, and the best, 

 specimens of this phase of art are to be found in the town of Cluny, 

 in the Department of the Soane et Loire, and in Florence, Pisa, &c. in 

 northern Italy, where the houses though built in a sufficiently solid 

 manner to enable their proprietors to resist a sudden attack, were 

 evidently more adapted to the requirements of the civil life of modern 

 societies than the immense dwellings of the ancient Romans could, by 

 any possibility, have been made. In proportion as the middle classes 

 rose into power and influence, the domestic architecture of Europe 

 also assumed importance ; and indeed it may be received as a general 

 law that house building, in the meaning we usually apply to the word, 

 owes its origin in a secondary sense, to the development of the 

 municipal institutions which brought those classes into power at the 

 dawn of modern civilisation. About the 12th and 13th centuries 

 Venice, the Hanse towns, and the numerous cities of Flanders attained 

 the apogee of then- glory ; and the numerous beautiful houses of that 

 period may still be referred to with admiration, though of course the 

 improvements iu the means and appliances of domestic life have 

 rendered the domestic architecture of this particular period inapplicable 

 at the present day. The primary law of the development of domestic 

 architecture will be alluded to in the sequel. 



In fact, we may observe, the defective state of the municipal 

 organisation of the middle ages in all that relates to the police, to the 

 water supply, paving, anil lighting, and the relatively small sizes of the 

 towns, compared with those of modern times, rendered some details 

 in the disposition of houses indispensable, or at least not objectionable, 

 which would not now be tolerated. Thus for instance, the basements 

 of the houses were necessarily built in a substantial manner in order to 

 resist sudden attacks by thieves ; the shops, stables, magazines were 

 established on the ground floors, and too often actually on the ground'; 

 in the narrow-confined court-yards were placed the cesspools, and the 

 well ; and as may still be seen in the old houses of Bruges, Kouen, &c., 

 access was gained to the upper stories by means of narrow, dark, 

 spiral staircases. The fiscal regulations of the various states seem to 

 have led in some cases to peculiarities in the selection of the building 

 materials employed; as fur instance when the Dukes of Normandy 

 levied an octrui on stone, the inhabitants of Caen and Rouen adopted 

 the use of wood ; and, at a more recent period still when, during the 

 reign of Louis XIV. an urdwinance of the police limited the height of 

 stone walls facing upon a street, the system of wood roofs covered with 

 lead or slate, known as the Mansard roofs, was adopted. It is to be 

 observed that the houses built during the middle ages very rarely had 

 party walls, and that, like the houses in the modern Dutch towns, each 

 dwelling had its entire enclosure. Under these circumstances the 

 architecture of each particular house had greater scope for originality ; 

 and, as in the majority of cases the gable ends of the house face the 

 street, there is usually a very varied and picturesque sky outline in 

 the towns of the period thus referred to. The interiors of the houses 

 were, however, very rude, and we should now say, very uncomfortable. 

 Ceilings were not known, the upper floors were roughly executed with 

 wide planks nailed upon square beams ; and Erasmus even tells a sad 

 tale of the filth and abominations the floors were made to support. 

 The windows were not always glazed ; those of the shops especially 

 being left open by day and closed by shutters at night, (just as the 

 windows of the shops in Spain, or the less civilised nations, are at the 

 :t day) whilst heavy iron bars served to protect the openings 

 against nocturnal marauders ; signs swung over every shop, and the 

 water from the roofs was poured directly into the street through 

 grotesque gargoyles. 



An important law with respect to the development of the intimate 

 perception of icsthetical principles may be derived from the history of 

 house or of domestic architecture, namely, that precisely iu proportion 

 as the individual feeling, so to speak, of the members of society was 

 able to cast aside the trammels of the social tyranny inherent to the 

 political organisations of the ancient world, so were the moderns able 

 to develops a form of art which can hardly be said to have existed 

 at a period when the only classes were the masters and the slaves, and 

 personal liberty of action was sacrificed to the interest or to the 

 political system of the state. Thus, in Greece and Rome we find that 

 the palaces of the wealthy were replete with every description of 

 luxury, and that they were built in a manner sufKciently solid to last 

 to the present day ; wlu'lst hardly a trace can be discovered of the 

 dwellings of the middle classes, or of the poor. During the middle 

 ages, the feeling of individual responsibility which is the key-note, as 

 it were, of our modern civilisation, was gradually developing itself; 

 and'when the Reformation of the 15th century brought that feeling 

 home to its partisans and enemies alike, all the slumbering energies of 

 our race were urged into the feverish activity which is still carrying us 

 onwards. Domestic architecture, like every other branch of art, par- 

 ticipated in the movement ; and it is from the middle of the 16th 

 century that we may date the greatest improvements of this branch of 

 the art*. The houses of the period of our Elizabeth, of Henri IV., of 

 the early days of the Dutch republic, were as distinctly in advance of 

 the inconvenient and rudely constructed houses of the antecedent 

 nternal arrangements, as the best modern houses are 



in advance of them; and it is to be observed that the sesthetical 

 character of the buildings then erected began to assume the personality 

 of the artists, and to reflect the tastes, feelings, and modes of thought 

 of the parties erecting them. No doubt the houses of antiquity and 

 of the middle ages were in accordance with the spirit of their times, 

 but that spirit was a national, a political, or a theocratic spirit, no wise 

 a personal one ; nor was it until the period of the Reformation that 

 the style of art which gave rise to the dwellings of such towns as 

 London, Paris, and Berlin, or Munich, can be said to have arisen. And 

 it may also be observed that the peculiar expression of the art in every 

 country of modern Europe may be connected with its social and 

 political constitution ; and that they who know how to observe, may 

 easily trace the influence of national laws and national faith in every 

 detail of house architecture in nations possessing a decided autonomy. 



Without dwelling on this abstruse question, it may suffice here to 

 say that the modern houses of the civilised nations of Europe and 

 America may be divided into two classes, namely, those which are 

 specially intended to receive one family only, and those which comprise 

 several distinct residences under the same roof. Unquestionably the 

 former class of houses is for many reasons superior to the latter, so far 

 as regards the comfort of the inhabitants, and, it may be more than 

 suspected, as regards its influence upon the general tone of morals, for 

 the love of home can hardly co-exist with life in a kind of common 

 hive ; but at the same time, the larger houses which it is necessary to 

 build for the second class admit of a bolder and more ornate style of 

 handling, and of the introduction of a more palatial character. It thus 

 happens that the houses of England and of Holland, where the first 

 class of houses prevails, are deficient in grandeur of external character ; 

 and that those of France, Germany, and Italy, where the second class 

 prevails, in the large towns at least, are EO much more imposing. 



It would be impossible in a short article to trace the rules which are 

 usually adopted iu the construction of either of these classes of houses 

 with respect to their interior details ; because the requirements of the 

 tenants, their occupations, and their conditions of fortune, necessarily 

 introduce an endless variety ; and, moreover, the modifications of 

 climate itself render it necessary to adopt different arrangements in 

 one country from those which would prevail in another. There are, 

 however, some invariable rules to be observed in all good house-building, 

 which may be briefly stated as follows : 



1. The external walls must be constructed of such materials, and of 

 such thicknesses, as to protect the dwellers in the houses from the 

 inclemencies of the external atmosphere, and from the noise of the 

 streets, if possible, when the houses are built in towns. Precautions 

 must be taken to prevent damp from rising in the walls by the capil- 

 lary action of their materials, and to prevent the communication of 

 fire from house to house. None but the densest and most impermeable 

 bricks or stones should be employed in the external walls of town 

 dwellings, and the most decidedly hydraulic limes should be used in 

 connection with them. In country districts the old half-timbered 

 houses may be tolerated ; but neither they nor the cob-walled houses 

 are desirable : in order to keep the walls dry, the eaves of the roof 

 must be continued downwards beyond the top of the wall and pro- 

 jected from it. As far as possible, the openings for doors and windows 

 should be immediately over one another ; and it is desirable to avoid 

 constructing a fire-place or flue in an external wall. 



2. The materials used iu the interior works of houses should be of a 

 partially absorbent and non-conducting nature in cold damp climates ; 

 but in warm dry climates, on the contrary, the denser and more 

 rapidly conducting materials may be used. The openings made for the 

 sake of light should be filled in with the most transparent, but also the 

 least diathermal, glass. As far as it is possible to secure that arrange- 

 ment, the openings for air and ventilation should be made in the walls 

 exposed to the direct action of the sun's rays ; and windows looking 

 towards the north should be avoided, unless it be in tropical countries. 



3. The sizes and number of rooms in houses must be regulated by 

 the social condition and the number of members of the families 

 inhabiting them, with this simple rule, which is applicable to them all, 

 namely, that iu the sleeping apartments, not especially provided with 

 apparatus for producing artificial ventilation, a cubical capacity of not 

 less than 700 feet should be provided for each person. It cannot, 

 however, be too often repeated, that no sleeping room ought to be 

 constructed without some provision for the renewal of the air affected 

 by respiration ; and, therefore, if there should be no fireplace in the 

 room, ventilators must be provided. As a general rule, also, no 

 sleeping rooms should be constructed iu the roofs of houses, because 

 the materials of which the latter are composed are not usually able to 

 resist the effects of variations of temperature. In the best houses, the 

 kitchens, sculleries, and offices are detached from the living rooms ; 

 though in London, and indeed in the majority of English towns, they 

 are commonly placed in the basements, care being taken to prevent the 

 smell of the cookery from pervading the house. Under all circum- 

 stances, the water-closets, or other analogous conveniences, must be 

 erected in such i>arts of the building as to allow of their having free 

 communication w ith the external air. Wherever basements are used 

 for dwelling purposes, they ought to be constructed so as to leave at 

 least one-third of their height above the ground-line, and to present a 

 clear space in front of the external walk equal at least to the depth of 

 the floor-line from the ground-level. The floor, whether of wood or oc 



