Of the Saxon, Gloucestershire boasts of two very perfect specimens at Elkstone and Quenington, both of which are engraven. Doorways of the early Normans are not unfrenently discoverable in monastic ruins. Those at Glastonbury, Malmsbury, and Castle Acre priory, Norfolk, are particularly fine. The rudely carved scriptural figures, which often occur in basreliefs, placed under the arches of door-cases, where the head of the door itself is square, indicate a Roman original, and are mostly referable to an æra immediately preceding the Conquest; but the very curious representation of the deluge, over the great doorway of the cathedal at Lincoln, seems to have been subsequent to it. These sculptures appear likewise upon fonts. That at Winchester cathedral, which Mr. Milner has discovered to mean the story of St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra, in Lycia, is cited among the most worthy of remark. "The Saxon large churches were divided into three tiers or stories, consisting of the arcade, galleries, and windows. Such was the soli dity of the walls and bulkiness of the pillars, that buttresses were neither necessary nor in usage. themselves, and to have extended not more than a century and a half below the Norman conquest. The two churches at Caen in Normandy, built by William and his queen, are the archetypes of many now remaining in England; but the most magnificent work of this kind was the nave of old St. Paul's, London. The vaults were void of tracery, and the towers without pinnacles, but ornamented with arcades, in tiers, of small intersected arches, on the outside walls. "The Norman æra may be stated to be from 1066 to 1154, that is, from the Conquest to the death of Stephen. In a general comparison with the other nations of Europe, in that dark age, historians consent, that the Normans were eminent, if not superior, with respect to civili zation and the arts. In architec tural science, as promoted by their religious zeal, they had made a great proficiency, and many grand struc tures had been raised to embellish their own province, before they had gained an absolute establishment in England. confu "Many discordant opinions have been advanced, concerning what really constitutes Norman architec ture; and it has been confounded "After the Norman conquest, with the Saxon by several able antithat style, called by the monks quaries. But a still greater Opus Romanum,' because an sion occurs when the pointed style, imitation of the debased architec- first practised in this kingdom in the ture of Italy, was still continued in reign of Henry II. is called Norman, England. The extent and dimen- The principal discrimination be sions of churches were greatly in- tween the Saxon and the Normal, creased, the ornamental carvings on appears to be that of much larger the circular arches and the capitals dimensions, in every part; plain, of pillars and pilasters became more but more lofty vaulting; circular frequent and elaborately finished. pillars of greater diameter; round Of the more remarkable specimens arches and capitals having of what is confounded under the mented carvings much more elabogeneral term of Saxon architecture, rate and various, adapted to them; the true æra will be found to be im- but a total absence of pediments or mediately subsequent to the Saxons pinnacles, which are decidedly pe orna. culiar to the pointed or Gothic style. Among the prelates in the early Norman reigns, were found men of consummate skill in architecture; which, aided by their munificence, was applied to the rebuilding of their cathedral churches, and those of the greater abbies. No less than fifteen of the twenty-two English cathedrals still retain considerable parts, which are undoubtedly of Norman erection, the several dates of which are ascertained. We have the following enumeration of Norman bishops, who were either architects themselves, or under whose auspices architecture flourished: Gundulf of Rochester (1077-1107), whose works are seen at Rochester, Canterbury, and Peterborough. Mauritius of London (1086-1108) built old St. Paul's cathedral. Roger of Salisbury (1107-1140), the cathedral at Old Sarum. Ernulf of Rochester (1115-1125) completed bishop Gundulf's work there. They were both monks of Bec in Normandy. Alexander of Lincoln (1123-1147) rebuilt his cathedral. Henry of Blois, bishop of Winchester (1129-1169), a most celebrated architect, built the conventual churches of St. Cross and Rumsey in Hampshire; and lastly, Roger, archbishop of York (1154-1181), where none of his work remains. By these architects the Norman manner was progressively brought to per fection in England; and it will be easily supposed, that the improvements made by any of them were adopted in succession. With equal extent and magnificence many of the churches belonging to the greater abbies were constructed in this æra. Few indeed have escaped their general demolition at the Reformation. The Conqueror's abbey, at Battel in Sussex, and those founded by Henry 1. 66 at Reading and Cirencester, doub less very sumptuous edifices, have scarcely left a wreck (rack) behind"-etiam periêre ruinæ.-Soins still exhibit their dilapidated fronts, and excite our admiration. Malmsbury in Wiltshire, Dunstable in Bedfordshire, Castle Acre in Norfolk, Wenlock in Salop, and St. Botolph's, Colchester, are still majestic in decay, and will be mentioned with pride, and visited with veneration, by the lover of Norman antiquities, as conspicuous examples. "The first transition from this Anglo-Norman style appears to have taken place towards the close of the reigh of Stephen (1135). It discovers itself in the arch, which had hitherto been round, becoming slightly pointed, and the heavy sin gle pillar being formed into a clus ter. This decoration had not long been adopted before instances occur, in which we may trace the arch as growing more and more pointed; and the clusters which were at first clumsy and ill-formed, acquiring a greater lightness and justness of proportion. Yet the facings of the arches still retain many of the ornaments peculiar to the earlier æra. This taste gradually prevailing, led, towards the close of the thirteenth century, to the formation of the slender pillar supporting the sharply pointed arch, which, from a certain resemblance, has been called the lancet.' It "In the reign of Henry III. this beautiful architecture had gained its perfect completion. Salisbury and Ely cathedrals, and Westminster abbey, have been generally adduced as the most perfect examples. may be supposed, that the two last mentioned were constructed upon the same plan, as there is a singular accordance in their chief proportions. Whether this early Gothic origi. nated "This particular style, whether allowed to be Saracenic or Gothic, was the parent of several others, in successive centuries, the progress of which was confirmed by certain discrimination; but the Anglo-Norman, having been once relinquished, was never again adopted either simply or with analogy. Until the close of the reign of the first Edward its prevalence was decided; and all previous confusion of the Anglo-Norman and the pointed styles had ceased, and was universally abandoned about this tué. With incredible lightness, it exhibited elegance of decoration and beauty of proportions in the multi nated in Palestine, or was borrowed from the Moors in Spain, has given rise to conjecture; but a more bold deviation from the established style could have been scarcely made. The Gothic or pointed arch (as it has been well observed) took its rise from the variations attendant upon all scientific pursuits. The principal feature of the first style was a combination of the circular with the pointed, an intermixture of ornaments, and a kind of contention between the two styles, which should prevail. To the enormous round pillar succeeded the slender shaft, insulated, or clustered into a single column, with narrow lancet windows, and roofs upon simple cross-plicity of the arcades and pillars, the springers. The arches were now sharply pointed, the window increased to three lights instead of one, and with small columns as mullions; and all the pillars, when of disproportionate length, broken into parts by fillets placed at certain distances, as observable in Worcester cathedral, the nave of which is very fine. "It will be contended by the French antiquaries, that this new mode was not exclusively our own, but that it appeared, if not earlier, at least in the same century, in the magnificent cathedrals I have noticed, as then recently erected in France. If the buildings in the Holy Land suggested ideas of this novel architecture, the French crqisaders had the same opportunities of introducing it into France as ours into England, for they were associated in the same expedition. It has been said, that in the church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem no pointed arch was seen, but that in Moorish structures equally obvious to those adventurers it is frequent; for which reason it may be more correctly described as "Saracenic" than as Gothic. latter being usually of Purbeck marble, each a distinct shaft; but the whole collected under one capital, composed of the luxuriant leaves of the palm tree, indigenous in Palestine and Arabia. A very favourable specimen of the manner which distinguishes the early part of the fourteenth century (1320), both as applied to roofs and arcades, is seen at Bristol, in the conventual church of St. Augustine, now the cathe dral. But previously to another style of known peculiarities, the ca pitals became more complicated, the vaults were studded with knots of foliage at the interlacing of the ribs, the western front was enriched with numerous statues, and the flying buttresses, formed of segments of circles in order to give them lightness, were rendered ornamental by elaborate finials. This exuberance tended to the abolition of the first manner; and at the beginning of the reign of Richard II. under the auspices of Wykeham, we have the bolest instance of that second manner, which in its eventual perfection attained to what is now distinguished as the pure Gothic. "The equally clustered pillar with a low sharp arch prevailed in the first part of the reign of Edward III. over which was usually placed a row of open galleries, originally introduced in the Saxon churches, and adopted, as far as the idea only, from them. Of the beauties which characterize the style of this æra in particular, a complete specimen offers itself in the octangular louvre at Ely, which, and the chapel of our lady attached to the cathedral, were the sole architecture of Alan de Walsingham, a monk, between the years 1322 and 1349. It is certain, that architecture was both studied and practised by ecclesiastics of all ranks in that age; and it is pleasing to rescue from oblivion the name of a single architect of such extraordinary merit. It is not improbable, that Becket's crown, in the cathedral at Canterbury, communicated the original idea to the architects of the louvres, both at Ely and Peterborough. Contemporary with Wykeham lived Rede bishop of Chichester, an adept in the science and practice of architecture: and many others of the prelates and abbots of that time prided themselves in exhibiting proofs of their architectural skill in rebuilding their churches, or very frequently adding to them, and giving them a pervading symmetry of style. The stupendous fabric of York cathedral, in its nave and choir, is of this æra, and its chief boast. Those of Winchester and Exeter were likewise partly rebuilt or reduced to a sameness of manner by the alteration of arches and windows, in so great a degree, as to obtain an apparently contemporaneous construction, in their relative parts. In the western fronts of Litchfield, York, and Peterborough, but particularly in the addi-1807. tions to that of Lincoln, which was preferred by lord Burlington to any in England, and in the interior of each of these cathedrals, we are so well satisfied with the proportions and the propriety of ornament, that we could readily dispense with the luxuriance of the successive æra and manner. To form some criterion of this pure Gothic, let me observe, that the pillars became more tall and slender, forming a very lofty arch, and that the columns which composed the cluster, were of unequal circumference. A more beautiful instance than the nave of the cathedral of Canterbury cannot be adduced. The general form of the arches became more open, and those attached to windows and niches were universally adorned with crockets tied at the top in a rich knot of flowers, resembling the blossoms of the euphorbium. The windows, especially those at the east and west, were widely expanded, and their heads ramified into infinite intersections with quatrefoils er rosettes, which bear on the points of the arching mullions. The roof hitherto had not exceeded a certain simplicity of ornament, and no tracery was spread over the groins of the vault, which rested on brackets or corbels, carved into grotesque heads of kings and bishops. "In this and the immediately subsequent reigns, the large and lofty central tower (for the more ancient belfries were usually detached) and the cloisters richly pannelled, having a most delicately fretted roof, were added to many of the cathedrals and conventual churches then existing. Within side, the canopies of tabernacle work over saints or sepulchral effigies, the shrines of exquisite finishing, repeating in miniature the bolder ornaments by which the building was S decorated decorated on a large scale, in the high altars and skreens of indescribable richness, continue to fascinate every eye by their richness, beauty, and sublimity. Even on the outside of these magnificent works, as the western fronts of Wells and Litchfield, and on bishop Grandison's skreen so placed at Exeter, there are embellishments of equal merit. The façade of the cathedral of Salisbury, although of the preceding age, in which the pointed style was frequently mixed with the round, and the ornaments of either indiscriminately used, is one of the most ancient, simple, and regular now remaining. The eye dwells with more satisfaction on a broad surface, relieved ouly, and not distracted, by ornament. Abbot Whetehamstede's skreen at St. Alban's, and that by bishop Fox in Winchester cathedral, exceed in richness or correct proportions, any specimen I could adduce of the first description. "To the crosses erected by Edward I. in honour of his beloved consort (evidently neither the work of Cavallini nor of abbot Ware) we may attribute the universal, if not the original, introduction of the elaborate canopies and minute ornaments used in tombs, sepulchral chapels, and the shrines of saints, commonly called "tabernacle work." "During the first æra of this style of Gothic, internal grandeur was produced solely by vast proportions contrasted by the multiplication of small parts, such as clustered pilasters and the mullions of windows; but about the period I have described, from the general introduction of this species of architectural refinement, the high altars, shrines, and sepulchral monuments, were combined to increase the richness of the whole interior to an eventual excess. The earliest instance of this minute workmanship, which has been termed " filligraine," is the choir of the cathedral at York, about the close of the fourteenth century. From this period no remarkable variety occurs. The grander members of the buildings continued their original dimensions and form, and the ornamental parts only be came distinguished by greater richness and exuberance." "About the middle of the fif teenth century, an ambition of novelty still invented a multiplicity of embellishment, and among many others which were capricious and without specific import, we may ob serve the perpetual recurrence of the armorial ensigns of honour upon roofs and the spandrils of internal arcades. From this fashion the antiquary collects decisive information, and is gratified by the certain sppropriation of the building to is founder or restorer. "These ensigns of honour were more commonly appendant on market-crosses and the great gateways of abbeys. Of the former the most remarkable, not only in point of the priority of erection, are the three which still remain, at Northampton, Geddington, and Waltham, built by Edward I. in memory of his royal consort. In imitation of these, few considerable towns were without a cross, which answered the double purpose of devotion and commerce. The more celebrated were at Abingdon, Coventry, Gloucester, Bristol, Winchester, and Chichester; the two last mentioned of which only are at this time entire, or unremoved. Upon all these were lavishy employed the arts of architecture, sculpture, and blazonry, after the richest Gothic model. "Of the abbey gates, there are several grand specimens still to be seen |