THE STYLE OF LOUIS XII. 1 9 



BLOIS Louis XII. WING. Further than this the royal family did 

 not play a very important part in promoting the Renaissance movement. 

 Louis XII. was conservative in his tastes, and more preoccupied with 

 war and politics than with art, while the Queen had a positive repug- 

 nance to foreign innovations. Yet, the family tombs erected by them 

 were almost exclusively the work of Italians and in some cases exe- 

 cuted in Italy. Beyond a languid continuation of Charles' buildings, 

 their chief contribution to the new architecture was the wing bearing 

 Louis' name at Blois, finished in 1503, and closing the court on the 

 east (Figs. 13 and 14). The dressings are in stone, while the walling 



V' 



15. CASTLE OF GAILLON FROM N.E. 



From a Drawing by J. A. Du Cerceau. 



is of red brick patterned with black. The features are spaced out 

 irregularly as in a mediaeval building, and the detail is, with minor 

 exceptions, Gothic, but a close inspection reveals Renaissance elements 

 in the elevations and internal features, such as a frame of dolphins or 

 an arabesque panel, capitals composed of scrolls and birds, or an egg- 

 and-dart member in a cornice. In juxtaposition to these are Gothic 

 corbels and gargoyles, Gothic tracery, cusping, and mouldings. 



GAILLON. It is, however, in the residences of ministers and nobles 

 that the most marked manifestations of the new movement are to be 

 found, and especially in the palace of Gaillon (Fig. 15), erected between 



