1919."! 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



65 



PULPIT OF SIENNA. 

 fWith an Engraving, Plate IV.^ 



In the olden times it was asserted that the master-hand of the 

 artist was to govern not merely the building but all its details , 

 and we believe no mediiBval cathedral was ever designed without 

 the architect settling at the same time the fashion and the work- 

 manship of all its fittings, so that a moveable belonging to 

 the altar furniture is now as good a type of the mediieval 

 styles as any of their architectural members. How times are 

 changed ! In these days, the moment an architect has finished 

 the shell of a building he is turned out, and it is consigned to the 

 house-painter and the upholsterer, who rule unfettered ; and the 

 architect may have the comfort of seeing a Greek building fitted 

 with Elizabethan furniture — with Louis Quatorze, Louis Quinze, 

 or anything but what is tasteful and appropriate. Mr. Pugin 

 having laboured for what he calls a Christian building, laments to 

 find it paganised, and his whole artistic aspirations frustrated and 

 betrayed. AVhatever may be done for the outside, however strictly 

 it may be Doric or Ionic, Vitruvian or Palladian, however closely 

 the authorities, legitimate or illegitimate, may have been followed, 

 the Goths and Vandals are sure to reign inside. We will not take 

 upon us to say that the architects, although so badly used, are 

 altogether blameless. \V'e believe they have given up more tlmn 

 the upholsterer, the paper-hanger, the house-painter, the iron- 

 monger, the silversmith, and the carpet-weaver have usurped ; 

 and in particular, that having excluded colour from their own 

 works, they have left those articles of furniture requiring the ap- 

 plication of colour entirely in the hands of the artisans. 



A better spirit is, it is true, now abroad ; but the architect has 

 to re-conquer his domain,— and we believe it wilLbe well worth Iiis 

 while, for the superintendence of the minor works will give a con- 

 siderable addition to his emoluments. We have often remon- 

 strated against barn-door architecture for churches ; but there has 

 been great improvement for the better since we begun our com- 

 plaints, though the clergy too often step into the place of tlie 

 architect. Still it is something to see better designed pulpits, 

 stalls, fonts, reading-desks, glass, tombs, and tiles. We do not, 

 however, wish these improvements to be limited to works in the 

 medieval styles; for we fear it may lead to barren coi)ying, while 

 it hinders the progress of the other styles. 



Whatever dispute there may be as to the responsibility of de- 

 signing other articles of church furniture, there ouglit to be none 

 as to tlie pulpit, for it is peculiarly a structural object ; and in the 

 great works of the middle ages it 'is treated as an independent de- 

 sign. It rises within the nave often to a greater heiglit than many 

 out-door monuments, so that on the plea of size the architect can- 

 not say that it is beneath liim. There is a staircase to the floor on 

 which the preacher stands, and above all rises a high canopy. 

 This may evidently be treated as a columnar or astvlar compo- 

 sition, with a Greek peristyle, or Gothic pinnacles, while it allows 

 ot all the varied resources of art being applied for its adornment. 



While there are particular objections to the adornment of the 

 altar in the churches of the Establishment and of the dissenters, 

 there cannot be so much objection to the decoration of the pulpit' 

 as it is not supposed that any worship will be paid to it. If there 

 should be any objection to statuary or painting, the decoration may 

 be purely architectural; but there are many figures and emblems 

 whicli have been allowed without objections in church decoration. 

 Tlie triangle, dove, I.H.S., angels' heads, cross, and even the 

 figures of the four evangelists pass muster with very strict people. 

 A well ornamented pulpit might, therefore be ventured upon as an 

 architectural decoration of the interior, which would add pleasingly 

 to its effect ; and being the centre to which the eyes of the con- 

 gregation are turned during much of the service, would not be 

 censurable on the ground of unfitness or want of purpose. 



'I'hose of our readers who have been no further from home than 

 Belgium, need scarcely be reminded of the wooden pulpits at Brus- 

 sels, Antwerp, and elsewhere, and which present some of the finest 

 specimens of wood-carving to be found. Those who have travelled 

 further, know that Italy presents many beautiful e.xamples in va- 

 rious styles. The one of which we now give an engraving, we 

 thought wortliy of the attention of our readers, though we do not 

 present it as a type of a class so various, or as the greatest work 

 of the kind._ It is the pulpit, in white marble, in the cathedral of 

 Sienna, in Tuscany. 



This pulpit is a work of the thirteenth or fourteenth century, 

 and is the production of Nicholas of Pisa, as tlie records of the 

 cathedral show. They state, likewise, the amount of his remune- 

 ration, which was eight sols a-day, six shillings in silver of the 



No. 138.— Vol. XII.— .March, 1819. 



present standard ; equivalent, perhaps, to thirty or forty shillings 

 in modern value. He was further paid four sols for his son John, 

 and six for his pupils. Tlie time employed was less than two vears. 

 By some accident the original staircase was destroyed, and that 

 now shown was executed three centuries later, by Balthazar 

 Peruzzi. 



CANDIDUS'S NOTE-BOOK, 

 FASCICULUS XCl. 



'* I must have liberty 

 Withal, as Urge a charter a>- the winds. 

 To blow on whom I please." 



I. One extraordinary merit of the medieval architects has 

 either been quite overlooked, or else purposely and very ungrate- 

 fully kept out of sight even by their most mouthy admirers. 

 That they planned and designed their buildings excellently, keep- 

 ing the immediate purpose for which tliey were erected strictly in 

 view, thereby securing for them appropriate character and natural 

 emphasis of expression, is not only admitted, but dwelt upon with 

 more of wonder than is called for; since more wonderful would it 

 have been if, employing a vernacular style — the only medium of 

 their architectural ideas — they expressed themselves naturally, 

 unaffectedly, and I may say, heartily. Their style of building 

 was almost as matter of course, racy and idiomatic, it being a 

 living one, therefore capable of freely admitting new modes of 

 treatment in order to meet circumstances not previously contemp- 

 lated and provided for. In their success so far, there is then 

 nothing very astonishing; but that they should have hit upon ideas 

 so exactly suited also to our purposes at the present day, that archi- 

 tects have now only to copy them as literally as may be, is nothing 

 less than marvellous, — equally marvellous whether it was through 

 sheer accident, or through foresight, coupled with the good-natured 

 intention of sparing us the trouble of thinking for ourselves. The 

 same remark applies to the originators and elaborators of other 

 styles, as well as to the arciiitects of the so-called medieval 

 period. Sansoviiui, for instance, provided out of his own brains, 

 designs for Pall-.Mall clubhouses, as well as for buildings by hiin- 

 self at Venice. Lucky fellow! to be able to "kill two birds with 

 one stone," after that fashion ! Whether the same will have to be 

 said of the servuin jwctis — I beg their pardon, tlie correct and or- 

 thodox intitati/rs o{ the present day — admits of question; a question 

 that may be left to the consideration of tliat priggish gentleman. 

 Count D'Orsay, to whom we are indebted for a second infliction of 

 Sansovino in Pall-Mail. 



II. What has just been said leads naturally enough to another 

 question — a somewhat delicate and ticklish one — viz., whethei 

 those who merely adopt a ready-made design from Sanso\ ino, or 

 San somebody-else, obtain the same remuneration, alias per- 

 centage, as is paid in the case of original or what passes foi 

 original design. If tliey do not, and remuneration is abated in 

 proptjrtion — for let us attend to "proportions," — something ni.iy 

 be said for the copying system on the score of economy. If, hoii- 

 ever, they liave the face to claim, and actually do obtain, just as 

 much for what is merely a leaf out of a book, as for a bond fide 

 design, we must conclude that design is not supposed to be paid 

 for at all, but something thrown in gratuitously by an architect 

 to his customers. In many articles of manufacture, fashion is 

 paid for as well as material and labour, since it has required some 

 talent, and taken time and study to produce such pattern or 

 fashion; but although architecture claims to be considered 

 something infinitely more dignified than manufacture, no account 

 is taken of quality of design, — be it bad or good, be it the produce 

 of the artihitect's own thought and study, or an arrant plagiarism, 

 — a tasteful artistic composition or a balaam medley of odds and 

 ends, it makes no difference; bad and good being paid for exactly 

 idike, and according to one invariable scale of remuneration. 

 Which being the case, we ought perhaps to wonder that talent has 

 not been altogether extinguished under the stupifying chloroform 

 influence of such a Laputun system of encouragement. 



III. What is called the Perpendicular might as well, or with 

 still greater propriety, be termed the Fanel/ed style of Gothic, it 

 deriving its peculiar character most decidedly from a system of 

 panelling. It is the division of surfaces into sunk moulded com- 

 partments, which is by far the more obvious and striking charac- 

 teristic of that mode of Gothic. The name of Perpendicular, on 

 the contrary, applies not so much to the general physiognomy as 



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