160 ARCHITECTURE. 
style of the churches to which they belong. 7g. 38. represents the upper 
part of such a tower. The workmanship is exquisite, but the arrangement 
of the ornaments already denotes a grievous deviation from a natural perfec- 
tion, as is more clearly seen from jig. 386 representing a massive turret 
placed on a very slender column. 
The pointed-arch style is generally designated as the Gothicstyle. With 
much more truth and propriety it might be called the German style as has 
been proposed by Goethe, for it originated in Germany and: has in its 
characteristics nothing in common with the older styles that we have 
examined in the preceding pages, and least of all with the real Gothic style 
which originated in Italy during the supremacy of the Goths in that 
country under Theodoric. The prominent original features of the German 
style are: 1. The construction of cross-vaults whose ribs alone are of free- 
stone, grouped in the greatest variety of forms, the spaces between them 
being filled up with bricks not more than four to eight inches in size. 
2. The pointed arch over windows and doors. 3. The connexion of pillars 
and columns in the interior by pointed arches. 4. The extremely high 
naves and remarkably slender columns and pillars that support their cross- 
vault ceilings. 5. The profusely decorated perspective portals. 6. The highly 
finished perforated work in the high spires. 7. The proportionately thin 
walls of exquisite masonry, strengthened by buttresses at the points of 
lateral pressure of interior vaults. 
The oldest monuments of this style date from the 10th century, and are 
found in the very heart of Germany between the Elster and Saale Rivers, 
near the Elbe, where it would be absurd to suppose Romanesque, Byzan- 
tine, or Moorish influence, when the vast tracts of land that separate their 
site from the homes of these latter styles remained entirely unaffected, and 
had no buildings in the so-called Goruic, properly German pointed arch 
style until a century later. The fact that the church of St. Peter and St. 
Paul in Zeitz, dedicated in the year 974; the cathedral of Meissen, com- 
menced in 948; the cathedral of Merseburg, commenced in 968, and others 
which are in the purest pointed-arch style, are much older than any edifice 
of this style in France, England, Italy, and even in the rest of Germany, 
seems conclusively to prove that the pointed-arch style was invented and 
first employed in Saxony. It is therefore purely German, and it is a mis- 
nomer to call it Gothic. 
Having thus given an outline of the progress and development of Archi- 
tecture during the period of the pointed-arch style we offer in conclusion a 
short description of the most prominent of its monuments. 
1. Tue Miyster or Freypure iy Bapen. (Pl. 35, fig. 16, plan; jig. 17, 
view). This remarkable church was commenced in the year 1122. Its © 
construction was prosecuted with great zeal on the part of the princes and 
citizens, the latter mortgaging their property in order to raise money for 
the church. In the year 1146 it was so far completed that Bernard de 
Clairvaux could preach in it and exhort the people to join in the crusade. 
The edifice then, however, only comprised the tower a, the nave B, with 
the side aisles c c, and the transept p, to the small tower d. The spire 
160 
