How to Study Architecture

by Charles H. Caffin

This building served as a model for the Abbey of Fontevrault in Anjou.

In Burgundy the most renowned of the numerous monastic establishments was the Benedictine Abbey of Cluny. Until the building of the present S. Peter’s, its abbey church was the largest and most magnificent in Christendom. The plan was a basilica with double aisles, the east end terminating in a chevêt (shě-vay´); that is to say, an apse surrounded by a circular aisle, divided into chapels; in this case five in number. The nave was arcaded with pointed arches and spanned by an immense barrel vault. Groined vaulting, on the other hand, is supposed to have covered the aisles.

Groined vaulting takes the place of barrel-vaulting in the nave of the Church of Vézelay, and was also used in the ante-chapel, erected some thirty years later. But by this time the builders, in order to reduce the thrust, adopted a pointed section for the ribs—the first instance in France of the pointed groined vault, which was successfully developed later by the Gothic architects.

It is to be noted that the early vaulting, erected by the Clunisian architects, compelled the abandonment of the clerestory windows. The thrust of the great barrel vault of the nave was sustained either by high side aisles with either transverse or groined vaults over the bays, or by barrel vaults over the aisles, which in turn were supported by the massive outer walls. For the use of the flying buttress had not yet been adopted.

Meanwhile, the northern climate demanded the additional light provided by a clerestory, and the architects of Normandy applied themselves to the problem. It was to be solved later in Gothic architecture by the use of pointed groin vaulting, but, pending this discovery, a method of vaulting was employed which is known as sexpartite. For the square bay was crossed in the centre by another transverse arch, which, when cut by the two diagonals, produced a plan of six parts. This, however, necessitated two narrow skew vaults, meeting in the centre, which was awkward in appearance. The method is illustrated in S. Etienne, the great church of the Abbaye-aux-hommes and La Trinité of the Abbaye-aux-Dames, both in Caen. These and other churches of Normandy such as the Abbey church of Mont-St. Michel, are characterised by an adventurous spirit as well as logic of design, marking a distinct progress toward the Gothic.

ENGLISH ROMANESQUE OR NORMAN

The audacity and resourcefulness of the Norman builders found extensive opportunity after the conquest of England. But few remains survive of Anglo-Saxon architecture, and they suggest that the buildings were of a rude kind. They were constructed of rubble work, reinforced with engaged piers and ashlar masonry at the corners, arranged in what is called “long and short” courses. The columns were short, stumpy cylinders crowned with one or two square blocks, and the details of doorways and windows were roughly hewn with an axe, though in the case of certain belfry windows, jambs of baluster shape, seem to have been turned upon a lathe. The openings were either round-topped, suggesting a clumsy copy of the Roman style or else triangular, as if perpetuating a form of timber construction. The plan of the church appears to have been of the simplest, representing an oblong nave, separated by an arch from the smaller oblong of the chancel; the latter being lower than the nave and, on the inside, approached by two or three descending steps. The arrangement seems to have been derived from the example of the Celtic churches, as also was the habit of erecting towers, which, however, are not circular as in Ireland, but square without buttresses. One example of such a tower exists at Earl’s Barton, Northamptonshire, in which occur balustered windows.

The Normans, therefore, had a free field for their architectural enterprise and, while they immediately commenced the erection of castles to overawe the country, they also erected monasteries and cathedrals, designed to surpass in size and magnificence the ones in Normandy. While following the latter in a general way, the English examples were characterised, on the one hand, by a more massive and picturesque treatment, and, on the other, owing probably to the scarcity of skilled labour, by simpler and less refined details.

The capitals of columns, for instance, were usually of the cubic-cushion form, as may be seen in S. John’s Chapel in the Tower of London. The piers were often round and frequently clustered with columns, the round arches being recessed and framed with round mouldings. The latter, in the case of doorways and windows, were enriched with ornament carved in zig-zag, chevrons, billets, and beaked heads. The plan was apt to be longer than that of the French churches, and the elevations were proportionately lower. Vaulting was, for the present, confined to smaller churches and the side aisles of the larger; but the nave walls of the cathedrals were built sufficiently massive to support the vaulting which in some cases was subsequently added. The clerestory windows were set toward the outer part of the wall, the remaining space being occupied by a passageway, which, in front of the windows was screened from the nave by three arches.

While the Norman style, as the English-Romanesque is usually called in England, appears in many cathedrals, the character of it has been greatly modified by later additions. But the finest example still existing is that of Durham; next to which come Peterborough and portions of Norwich. The tower above the crossing, which became a distinction of English cathedrals and is so imposing a feature of Durham, was added much later. But the original nave (1096) is a remarkable example of massive Norman construction, the round piers having a diameter nearly equal to the span of the arches and being channelled with flutings and spirals. The vaulting was completed in 1133 and is said to be the earliest example of Norman vaulting in England. Another notable feature of Durham Cathedral is the so-called Galilee chapel, which, in imitation of the ante-chapel in Caen, takes the place of a porch at the west end. It was used by penitents.