THE STYLE OF LOUIS XIV. 335 



CHURCH ARCHITECTURE. 



Two TYPES OF PLAN. Church architecture under Louis XIV. 

 is characterised not only by a change in the decorative system but also 

 by the consummation of the various developments set on foot in the 

 early years of the century. Two types of church plan occupied the 

 field: the Vignolan basilica type (see pp. 257-260), which may or may 

 not comprise a dome of minor importance, and the radiate type, which 

 embraces all those churches in which the dome provides the guiding 

 principle of the plan. The first is almost universal in parish and 

 cathedral churches. The second occurs chiefly in chapels attached 

 to institutions. The churches of the religious orders incline now to 

 one type, now to the other. 



The basilican type was capable of considerable variation without 

 losing its essential character. Its fagade, though usually conforming to 

 the Gesii type, might be varied in different ways, as, for instance, by the 

 introduction of towers. Its plan might be simplified by leaving out 

 the transepts. The dome over the intersection might be omitted 

 altogether, concealed in the roof or raised above it on a drum. 

 The idea of making the dome the keynote of the plan was slow in 

 developing in France, and, with rare exceptions, this feature bore a less 

 intimate relation to the design as a whole than is usual in Italy. The 

 desire for an important dome was satisfied in some cases by the attempt 

 to combine one of greater diameter than the nave with the basilican 

 plan. In other cases this plan was abandoned, and the dome-space 

 formed the centre of a square building. The instances of a true 

 radiating plan are rare. 



BASILICAN TYPE OF PLAN : FIRST INVALIDES CHURCH. In the 

 first church of the Invalides, which forms the centre of the whole 

 scheme, and was built with the rest by Liberal Bruand (1671-8), the 

 basilican type is reduced to its simplest expression. Its facade is 

 indicated in the court by orders and a pediment placed in front of 

 the piers of the arcaded loggia. It consists of a nave of nine bays 

 ending in an apse with aisles and galleries but without transepts or 

 dome. Its unbroken perspective, emphasised by the somewhat unusual 

 feature of a ridge rib, is distinctly impressive, and the fact that the 

 sober merits of this interior are generally overlooked is probably due 

 to the superior splendours of the later church. 



NOTRE DAME DES VICTOIRES, &c. Notre Dame des Victoires 

 (or Eglise des Petits Peres), begun by Le Muet (1656) and continued 

 by L. Bruand and Le Due, though without dome or galleries, is of 

 the usual conventual type, but its retro-choir with its semi-hexagonal 

 apse is curiously mediaeval in. plan. The interior is well proportioned, 

 the arcade finely detailed, and the slightly stilted vault springs from 



