GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE IN FRANCE, ENGLAND, AND ITALY by SIR THOMAS GRAHAM JACKSON, Bart., R.A., F.S.A. Hon. D.C.L. Oxford, Hon. LL.D. Cambridge Hon. Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford Asmocié de 'Académie Royale de Belgique Nec minimum meruere decus vestigia Graeca Ausi deserere et celebrare domestica facta, Hor. Ars Poetica, Cambridge : at the University Press 1915Cambeoge PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESSPREFACE LTHOUGH this book, which treats of a definite period of Post-Roman architecture, may be read independently, it is in fact a continuation of the history I published in 1913 of the Byzantine and Romanesque styles. I venture to hope that by the two books, taken in connexion with one another, the student may be helped to a consistent idea of mediaeval architecture, from its origin in the decay of Roman Art to its final stages in the 16th century. I have therefore not hesitated to refer frequently from this book to its predecessor. It is only by regarding the Art as a whole, tracing its career, following its steady and unbroken growth, and showing how it changed as the times changed, and kept pace with the progress of society that it can really be understood. Gothic architecture attained its perfect development in France and England. The styles of the two countries, like yet unlike, overlapped and influenced one another, though they diverged ever more and more widely as time went on. In Italy, though it was the cradle of Romanesque architecture from which Gothic sprang, Classic tradition was never lost, and Italian Gothic is Gothic with a difference. It has a charm of its own, depending perhaps NA 440 v3vi PREFACE rather less on architectural form than on lovely material, supreme technique of execution, refinement and delicacy of ornament, and above all on splendour of colour. I had intended an account of the Gothic art of the Low Countries and of Germany, but the present unhappy war has prevented a visit to those parts to revise my notes taken many years ago. German Gothic however is of minor importance in the history of the Art. It was an imported and not an indigenous style, and therefore has less to teach us. In my first chapter I have said that Gothic is mainly a Teutonic art, because it arose and flourished in Northern and Eastern France, in England, and in certain parts of Italy, where the older population had the largest infusion of Teutonic blood—Goth, Frank, Burgundian and Norman in France, Saxon, Dane and Norman in England, Goth and Lombard in Italy, Norman in Sicily and Apulia. Not that the mere Teuton was the author of the new style, but it seems to be the fruit of grafting a Teutonic element on an older stock’. Except in music the Germans, who claim to be unmixed Teutons, have not excelled in the Arts, nor indeed in the Sciences, as a creative race. Their part has been not to originate, but by patient research, like the Saracens of Southern Italy and Spain, to pursue and enrich the discoveries of others. They have produced but two painters of the first rank, no great sculptor, for the admirable metal work of Peter Vischer is on a small scale, their Romanesque architecture was imported from Lombardy, 1 If we are to believe Professor Sayce the Teutonic element in England has been over-estimated, and has long ago been absorbed; and we have now reverted to the Neolithic type. His theory however is not universally accepted.PREFACE vii and their Gothic borrowed rather late from France. Cologne Cathedral is based on Amiens, of which it exag- gerates the weak points. The style suffers from megalo- mania, the sure sign of a weak artistic sensibility. Cologne Cathedral is an example of this, especially since its completion by the monstrous twin steeples at the West end. At the same time German Gothic—especially that of South Germany—has its place in the history of the Art, and I regret its omission here, The Arts found a happier soil in which to flourish in Belgium and Holland, the land of the Van Eycks, Memling, Rembrandt, Van Dyck and Rubens. The necessary omission of some account of the fine churches, splendid town-halls, and rich domestic work in Belgium is the more unfortunate, because many of the buildings have already been destroyed, and many more will in all likelihood suffer by the systematic brutality of German warfare. The Cloth-Hall at Ypres, perhaps the finest municipal building in Europe, and the Cathedral have been demolished for no conceivable military purpose, Louvain has been deliberately destroyed out of revenge, Arras and Aerschot are in ruins. Antwerp and Brussels will be in peril when they come within the range of battle, and the same danger will overtake Ghent and Bruges in the like event. Similar disasters menace, and indeed have partly be- fallen the splendid architecture of North-Eastern France, the very flower of the style, which may already have become a thing of the past before these pages reach publication. Since the following chapters were written the Germans have battered the Cathedral of Reims, destroying much if not all of its inimitable sculpture : GA 6viii PREFACE Soissons is now undergoing the same treatment ; Senlis has been damaged; Noyon, Laon, S. Quentin, and Tournay, which are still in possession of the enemy, will be exposed to the artillery of both friend and foe, and the Germans have promised that if they are turned out of Alsace and Lorraine they will not leave a building behind them. Italy has now joined in the war, and the priceless treasures of her art are in danger. Bombs have already fallen near the Ducal Palace at Venice, and we may hear any day of their falling on S. Mark’s. With the destruction of that Church, and that of S. Sophia which during the Balkan war the Turks threatened to blow up if they were driven from Constantinople, one splendid chapter of European architecture would be deleted. Although it is only Germans who destroy works of art out of pure malevolence and spite it is difficult to see how any architecture is to survive modern methods of war. Buildings that have for hundreds of years looked down on changes of masters, and have survived battles and sieges during the Middle Ages and the Napoleonic campaigns, crumble into dust at the awful touch of modern engines of destruction, Unless wars should cease in all the world we may be the last who will see the wonders of ancient architecture. Some reviews of my former two volumes complained that the accounts of the buildings referred to were not complete: others pointed out that something might have been said about certain buildings which were not mentioned at all. But it was not my purpose to write a guide-book on one hand, nor on the other to give an exhaustive catalogue of examples. My object then, andPREFACE ix now, has not been to describe a number of architectural works, but to give a rational view of the style as a whole. To supply the reader in fact with a skeleton scheme which if he properly understood it, might be filled up from his own observation. For that purpose I have chosen for description such buildings or parts of buildings as are typical of the history and development of the art, and have described them only so far as was needed to illustrate the subject matter. More than that would not only encumber the book, but also distract the attention of the reader from its object. As a further limitation I have confined the examples almost entirely to buildings that I have myself studied, and among them, where the opportunity offered, those with which I have happened to be professionally connected. To write about architec- ture at second-hand from the accounts of others is, I am convinced, of very little value. For this reason I say nothing of the highly interesting Gothic of Spain, for I have never been in that country, and can add nothing of my own to what Street and others have told us. My drawings and notes have been made at various times during the last half century, but I have purposely revisited many of the buildings referred to, and have for the first time seen Sicily. So far as I could I have used original sketches for illustration rather than photo- graphs, which besides making a dull book often convey a false idea of the subject. Several of the drawings in Sicily are by my son Basil; those by others are duly acknowledged. My thanks are due to several friends who have - kindly helped me: to Mr Gerald Horsley for the use of his fine drawing of the interior of Milan Cathedral; to Mr W. S. Weatherley for leave to reproduce his beautiful ba