THK HISTORY OF ART. 



181 



THE HISTORY OF ART. 



VIII.-THE DAWN OF THE RENAISSANCE. 



THE great revival from whioh we date all distinctively modern 



. t Inn style of art in the midst of which we now live, is 



Known as the Renaissance ; that is to say, the " new birth " of 



art in Europe, after the long semi-barbaric period 

 . whioh followed the decline of the Roman Empire. 



The early Italian revival, with which we 

 have already dealt, was the first fore- 

 gleam of the Renaissance ; its full 

 artistic culmination was In the 

 famous days of Lionardo da 

 Vinci, Michael Angelo, and 

 Raffael, which we must 

 hereafter consider ; but 

 just now we must 



Our 



North, however in England, France, and Germany this pro- 

 gress was constantly retarded by war and the military spirit. 

 In our own country, for example, whenever we were not fighting 

 tin) French under Edward HI. and Henry V., or the Sootck 

 under Edward I., we were fighting among ourselves in the Wan 

 of the Roses. Hence the organisation of Northern 

 during all this period was wholly military and feudal, 

 nobles lived in great gloomy defensive castle*, 

 with narrow loop-hole windows, and heavy 

 portcullixes ; they gave up the greater part 

 of their time to military exercises, tourna- 

 ments, and training, and they cared 

 little for art in any way. Their 

 big halls were mere dining- 

 room* for themselves and 

 their soldiers, decorated 

 only with a little rude 

 tapeetry and a few 



THE ATXiRATIOJf OF THE MAGI. (Triptych by Fra Angtlico.) 



glance at the intermediate period which elapsed between the 

 date of Giotto and the rise of the three great painters above 

 mentioned. We have here to inquire into the origin of the 

 Renaissance. 



Art, we have already said, is an outgrowth of national de- 

 velopment, and the great modern revival of art is a portion of 

 the general modern European civilisation which has been 

 gradually growing up ever since the breaking up of the Roman 

 power. All through the Middle Ages, in every part of Europe, 

 alow progress was being made in many directions. In the 



trophies of hunting or of war. The manufacture of arms and 

 armour was almost the only native industrial art of any import- 

 ance. Under such circumstances as these, it is clear that 

 artistic life was almost impossible ; and aa a matter of fact, in 

 England and France, the great mediaeval cathedrals, like Salis- 

 bury, Lincoln, and Westminster Abbey, are almost the only 

 works of art which have come down to us from the Middle 

 Ages. 



In Italy, however, and along the Mediterranean generally, 

 civilisation had never died down as it had done in the Nortfc 



