103. AMIENS CATHEDRAL. CENTRAL PORCH OF WEST FRONT
104. AMIENS CATHEDRAL. STATUES IN THE SOUTH PORCH
105. AMIENS CATHEDRAL. CHOIR STALLS. CARVED ORNAMENT
The favourite themes of the thirteenth century had something in common with those of the Romanesque epoch, though there is a sensible difference of treatment and considerable progress in composition, which exhibited more of taste and learning and less of eccentricity. But the satiric power and delight in caricature of our forefathers still demanded an outlet. These found expression in many a caustic gibe at clergy, princes, and rich burghers, and took substance in many a quaint gargoyle. A luxuriant system of ornamentation, adapted from the vegetable kingdom, was auxiliary to statuary. The main subject was enframed by it, or relieved against it; while often the composition itself was enriched by its introduction to complete the decorative effect. Or such a system of decoration was the only sculpturesque motive employed; it was then used with the utmost elaboration, and developed at the expense of statuary. Such was the case in Burgundy and Normandy, in which provinces the latter art was of slow growth. The Byzantine character of the scrolls, carved bands, and fantastic foliage of Romanesque art disappeared; ornament took on a new independence, and began to seek its types among native plant forms.
The carved leafage ([Fig. 106]) of the cloister arcades in the Abbey of Mont St. Michel strikingly illustrate this departure. The very plants which inspired the thirteenth-century sculptors still flourish at the foot of the ancient abbey walls.
