Iron Work in France, Germany, Belgium, Italy and England.
Ornamental iron work was executed in France and in England before the Roman occupation of these countries, but any early remains of this work that have been found in either country are supposed to be of the Roman period. The Romans were not skilled in the working of iron, although well conversant with the manufacture of bronze objects.
Remains of iron hasps, escutcheons, window grilles, candlesticks, folding chairs, &c., have been found in France and in England, of the Romano-Gaulish and British periods, that have a great similarity of style, and, indeed, up to the fifteenth century the style and design of iron work in both countries were pretty much alike.
The most interesting examples of the blacksmith’s art of the Middle Ages—in England especially—are the hinges to the church doors. The first hinges were simple single straps of iron that passed from back to front of the door, the socket being formed out of the solid piece at the angle on one side. The front side of this strap by degrees was clawed out, or otherwise elaborated, to cover as much of the door as possible, so as to form an armour of defence against predatory robbers, such as the barbarous Norse pirates who were continually invading the British shores.
A favourite form of the hinge was the crescent shape; sometimes the hinge branched out in a simple crescent with curved and bifurcated endings that may have symbolized the snake or birds’ heads, and often two or three of these crescents branched out from a central bar. Between the hinges additional bars or straps were sometimes run across the door to strengthen it, and elaborate foliated crosses often occupied the central part, as in Fig. 199.
Fig. 199.—Hinges, &c., to Haddiscoe Church.
On some of the old Norman doors, in addition to the hinges, as at Stillingfleet Church, there are designs in iron work which consist of mystical signs of Danish origin, such as a viking ship or sun ship, the swastika or fylfot, moon signs, and rude images of the human figure.
The crescent hinge may have had a symbolical meaning, perhaps Scandinavian, or it may have originated in the Saracenic crescent, and may have been brought from Sicily, the birthplace of Norman architecture.
The art of the blacksmith in the Middle Ages was more developed in France than in any other country of Europe, and the art of stamping the leaves, stems, and rosettes with steel or chilled iron dies and punches was practised there earlier than the thirteenth century, and at a period a little later in England. The ornament was in style very little more than the Romanesque type of the conventional vine, or other leaf of a like nature—the cinquefoil, trefoil, rosettes, and scrolls, but these few elements were used in the most effective manner (Fig. 200).
The magnificent hinges on the Porte Ste. Anne of Notre-Dame at Paris show to perfection the French stamping on the leaves and other parts. These unrivalled hinges (Fig. 201) are of the Early French style of the thirteenth century. Nothing, however, is known of their origin, nor even the name of the smith who forged them. Each hinge is composed of six large scrolls springing from the central bar or stem, all of which are richly clothed with spirals, foliage, birds, and dragons; the whole design is supposed to represent the terrestrial Paradise.
Exceedingly rich, but not so elaborated as the hinges of the Church of Notre-Dame, is the herse, or grille, of English work of the same period, which surmounts the tomb of Queen Eleanor in Westminster Abbey (Fig. 202). This fine example of English smithery was made by Thomas de Leghtone in the year 1294. It is a clever adaptation of hinge-work to the design of a grille. Mr. Gardner supposes Leghtone to be connected with Leighton Buzzard, as the same kind of iron work as the Eleanor grille occurs in the hinges of the parish church door of that place, and also from the fact that similar work is found on many other church doors of the same period in Bedfordshire—at Eaton Bray and Turvey, for instance; also at Norwich, Tunstall, Windsor, Lichfield, and Merton College, Oxford, are examples of the same kind of work, which no doubt was executed by Thomas de Leghtone and his assistants.
Fig. 200.—Press Door in the Church of St. Jacques, at Liége. (G.)
After the end of the thirteenth century examples are scarce of genuine wrought-iron work, for the fashion changed at that time in the manner of working the metal. Sheets and bars of iron were cut in the cold state into various patterns by the use of chisels and files, the pieces being fastened together by rivets and small collars or ties of metal. Much of this work, was done in Italy, in imitation of marble and wood panelling, and a very common method consisted in making the grilles in Italy of riveted quatrefoils. A fine grille of this character is in the Church of Santa Croce of the date of 1371. In the churches and palaces of Venice, Florence, Verona, &c., there are many good examples of grilles that resemble in a great degree joinery work in iron.
Fig. 201.—One of the Hinges to the Porte Ste. Anne of Notre-Dame, Paris. (G.)
Fig. 202.—Grille or Herse on Queen Eleanor’s Tomb, Westminster Abbey; 1294. (G.)
In Germany the love for iron work was not developed so early as it was in France and England, and it was not until Gothic architecture took a firm hold in that country in the end of the thirteenth century that the first serious attempts were made in the use of decorative iron work, and, like their architectural forms, the German wrought-iron work was inspired by French examples.
German work in iron of the thirteenth century is very scarce: one of the best-known examples occurs in the iron work on the doors of the Church of St. Elizabeth at Marburg, near Cassel, which consists of branching scroll-work clothed with vine-leaf endings.
In the fourteenth century the Germans developed the French vine-work into lozenge-shaped leaves, and for a change interspersed them with fleurs-de-lis, and occasionally some tracery patterns, all of which were borrowed from the French. The stamped work of the English and French blacksmith was not developed in Germany.
In the fifteenth century German iron work was greatly influenced by the fine work which was being produced at this period in the Low Countries. Brussels had been noted for its extensive works in iron and steel from the fourteenth century. The brawny Flemish smiths were celebrated throughout Europe for their great achievements in moulded and hammered iron, such as in the spires of the cathedrals of Antwerp, Ghent, and Bruges, well-covers, railings, fonts, cranes, and grilles. The historical well-cover in front of the Cathedral of Antwerp has usually been ascribed to Quentin Matsys the painter, but as he was only twelve years old when this work was completed, it could hardly have been made by his hands. The explanation is that he has been confounded with another Quentin, a blacksmith and the son of Josse Matsys, the architect, smith, and clockmaker of Antwerp. The well-cover is more likely to have been the work of Josse Matsys. The design is Gothic in feeling and is very picturesque with its interlacing stems and vine-leaves, flowers, and figures. A rich font crane in iron work in the Cathedral of Louvain is said to be the authentic work of Josse, and a twelve-branched corona in the same church is ascribed to his son, Quentin Matsys. To the hand of the latter is also ascribed the rich Flemish gates of Bishop West’s Chapel in Ely Cathedral.
Brabant was celebrated for its iron work, particularly in pierced and filed work in such things as locks, hinges, candelabra, tabernacles, and guichets (little windows or wicket gates), most of these objects taking pronounced Gothic architectural forms, for the most part being composed of flamboyant tracery and little buttresses (Fig. 203). Much of the Brabaçon iron work found its way into England and Germany. This work is characterised by its flamboyant tracery, which is found on locks of doors and Flemish coffers, and in the design of the guichets, a fine specimen of the latter now being in the Kensington Museum. The locks of the doors in St. George’s Chapel, Windsor and in some other places are of Brabaçon workmanship. This Flemish style of lock work was imitated very much in England, but the workmanship was less refined although of a stronger character than the Flemish.
The Germans, especially of Augsburg, Nuremberg, and in the Rhine Provinces, more particularly at Cologne, developed the chiselled iron work to an astonishing degree of elaboration.
While the shapes of the lock-plates were of a decided Saracenic character, the design of the pattern ornamentation was either of an elaborate architectural composition, as in the large lock in the Klagenfurt Museum (Fig. 204), or of designs mainly developed from the thistle-plant.
Fig. 203.—Tabernacle Grille from Ottoberg, Tyrol; Fifteenth Century. (S.K.M.) (G.)
The thistle was distinctly characteristic of German iron work, and also the trellis-work pattern as seen on the doors of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries (Fig. 205). Armorial bearings fill the panels between the trellis-bands, with richly forged rivets or nail-heads on the lozenge intersections. Sometimes the decoration was gilt or silvered, and the ground underneath painted red or black. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the iron work in Europe and England partook of the character of the Renaissance, and towards the end of the former century had all the foliated character of that style.
Fig. 204.—Lock, 18 inches high, in the Klagenfurt Museum; German; Fifteenth Century. (G.)
The illustration (Fig. 206) shows a typical example of French work of the end of the sixteenth century.
Fig. 205.—Iron-bound Door in the Monastery of Krems; Late Fifteenth Century. (G.)
In Flanders, Holland, and in England, especially during the eighteenth century, decorative iron work was again in great demand, and some beautiful work in gates, grilles, and railings were executed. Among the finest works of this period are the celebrated gates or screens designed in the style of the Renaissance and made by Huntingdon Shaw for King William III. for his palace at Hampton Court. These gates, which are fine examples of hammered work, are now in the Kensington Museum. The iron gates and railings made in the reign of Queen Anne and later were often of beautiful design, in which the capabilities of the material were excellently expressed. Some fine examples still exist in the gates and railings of the old houses in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, and some good ironwork of this type may be seen in the screens in St. Paul’s Cathedral. This beautiful style died out during this century, when a more extended use of cast iron crept in, and if we except the work of the late Alfred Stevens and of a few other designers and architects, there has been nothing of an artistic value that one can point out in England in the domain of cast-iron productions. In fact, it is a curious but common expression to say of a bad design for almost anything that it “looks like cast iron.” Designers for cast-iron work might take some good hints from the old Roman or Pompeian bronzes.
Fig. 206.—Mirror, Wrought Iron; French Work; Sixteenth Century.