( 60 ) 
tect of Groote Schuur, the late Cecil 
Rhodes' house in tlie Cape Col«ny, on " The 
Origin of the Old Cape Architecture," in 
which he traces the development of the 
Dutch gable, and illustrates this, its most 
distinctive feature, from the Cape examples, 
and shows their similarity to examples in 
Holland and Belgium, in* which he ttiinks 
this form of gable had its origin. 
Thougii, however, I call this the Dutch 
gable, I do not think there was anything 
peculiarly Dutch about it in its origin. 
The same gable is to be found in use in 
most European countries soon after the 
birth of the architecture of the Renais- 
sance. In England it is a feature of what 
we call the Elizabethan style, and there 
is a good example of it, for instance, at 
Mettingham, near Bungay, in Suffolk. The 
drawing of " A Kentish Homestead," by G 
G Hait^, in The Architectural Review, vol. iii., 
p. 32, exhibits another.* The church at 
Gsteig, near Interlaken, has a saddle back 
tower with gables in the same style, the 
date being 1650 ; and no doubt many other 
examples might be mentioned both in England 
and on the Continent. But the Dutch, once 
having made the discovery of this_ form of 
gable, seem to have taken a special fancy 
to it, and to have reproduced it, both at 
home and abroad, over and over again, with 
every possible variation in detail, and to 
have stuck to it when other countries had 
abandoned it for more classica,! forms, or for 
no format all, as in our street architecture of 
the latter part of the eighteenth and first 
half of the nineteenth century. Streets 
and houses in Holland built at the same 
time would iiave been diversified by gables 
of every possible combination of curve and 
scroll work and moulding. This gable has 
accordingly come to be regarded as distinc- 
tively Dutch. As Mr Reid puts it, it is 
" dear to the heart of all true Dutchmen, 
and in the treatment of it they excelled," 
and they carried it with them to their 
colonies. Mr Baker finds three main types 
of it at the Cape, and Ave have probably as 
many in Ceylon. 
He describes what hfe thinks is an Amster- 
dam type, " two vertical bordering lines, with 
spreading scrolls at the sides." We have 
an example of this in the gables of the 
Wolvendahl Church, though the influence 
of the classicism then prevalent (1749) is 
seen in the substitution of a pediment for 
the wavy outline of an earlier period, 
the flat pilasters supporting it, and the 
breaking up of the surface of the wall by 
horizontal lines so as to suggest that it is 
constructed of blocks of stone. A variety 
of this gable is to be seen in a house in 
the Fort of Colombo. The date is prob- 
ably 1684. 
Mr Baker distinguishes another type of 
Cape gable by " its peculiar characteristic, 
the scroll running in graceful lines over 
the surface of the wall," and considers it 
admirably suited to plaster. He thinks this 
type " an undoubtedly original form," and 
• See also some " Kentisli Gables " at Kams- 
eateanfl Broadsiaira of 161E-1678, in The Architect, 
Vol. XXVI. (1881), p. 107. 
states that nothing exactly like it is to be 
found in Holland or Belgium, that " a 
similar type of gable existed formerly in 
Amsterdam, but none exist at the present 
day." It is, however, not peculiar to the 
Cape, for it is to be found in Ceylon, 
where, as at the Cape, all these gables are 
plastered over. A good example of it is to 
be seen in the gable of the Galle Church. Its 
origin, says Mr Baker, is to be found in 
Belgium, also "the same peculiar feature of 
the scrolls running over the walls can be 
observed in the monster fronts of the rich 
guild houses in Antwerp and in the 
simple plaster gables of the Cape farm- 
house—the rude . attempt of a colonial 
craftsman to copy what he remembered 
of the buildings of his native town." 
These features will be noticed also in the 
Galle example. In Ceylon at the present day 
we have no Dutch farms or country houses. 
If there were at any time in Ceylon houses 
of the Cape style showing one or more gables 
in the front elevation— and it seems probable 
that there were, as some of the Dutch 
officials had country houses standing in 
extensive grounds — they have disappeared, 
or have been modernised, and Dutch domestic 
architecture in Ceylon is the architecture 
of the street only. For the most part, 
except in the churches, the craftsman had 
to confine himself to the end gables of the 
houses of a street. The front elevation, 
consisting merely of a roof carried over a 
verandah supported by wooden pillars, 
afforded no scope for more elaborate work. 
Tlie commoner form of gable in Ceylon was, 
therefore, of a similar type. Each slope is 
formed of scroll-work, something in the shape 
of the ordinary " bracket " used in writing 
moulded in plaster. There is a vase, or a 
leaf, or a liall, on a pedestal at each end, and 
another similarly mounted caps the apex.* 
Another feature of the Oape gables which 
struck Mr. Bakt'r was "an unusual double 
scroll," as seen also in an Antwerp house. 
The same feature is found in the gable of 
the Galle church, and I think from this 
circumstance that its origin must be looked 
for not in Belgium but in Holland, the 
home of the Reformed Church. 
Simpler forms than any of the foregoing 
ate to be seen in the end gable of what is 
now a large European store in the Colombo 
Port, and in the gables of the church at 
Matara. In the latter, the tout ensemble 
strikes one at once as very Dutch. The 
date over the doorway is 1767, but this may 
be the date of its repair, as in the case of 
Batticotta, for the church certainly existed 
in Heydt's time. A still simpler form of 
gable, which, in mv opinion, is of very early- 
date, is to be seen in the facjades of the Batti- 
cotta and Kalpitiya Churches,! and in the 
* Mr. Baker notes that in the Cape gables 
" a vase is someSimes added where the scroll 
broadens out." 
t Tlie front porch or verandah of the Kal- 
pitiya Chnrch, which has a flat roof and is sup- 
ported by Corinthian pillars seems to be an 
addition made early last century. 
