XII.
THE SOURCES OF ARCHITECTURAL TYPES.
When lately looking through the gallery of the Old Water-Colour Society, I was struck with the incongruity produced by putting regular architecture into irregular scenery. In one case, where the artist had introduced a perfectly symmetrical Grecian edifice into a mountainous and somewhat wild landscape, the discordant effect was particularly marked. "How very unpicturesque," said a lady to her friend, as they passed; showing that I was not alone in my opinion. Her phrase, however, set me speculating. Why unpicturesque? Picturesque means, like a picture—like what men choose for pictures. Why then should this be not fit for a picture?
Thinking the matter over, it seemed to me that the artist had sinned against that unity which is essential to a good picture. When the other constituents of a landscape have irregular forms, any artificial structure introduced must have an irregular form, that it may seem part of the landscape. The same general character must pervade it and surrounding objects; otherwise it, and the scene amid which it stands, become not one thing but two things; and we say it looks out of place. Or, speaking psychologically, the associated ideas called up by a building with its wings, windows, and all its parts symmetrically disposed, differ widely from the ideas associated with an entirely irregular landscape; and the one set of ideas tends to banish the other.
Pursuing the train of thought, sundry illustrative facts came to my mind. I remembered that a castle, which is more irregular in outline than any other kind of building, pleases us most when seated amid crags and precipices; while a castle on a plain seems an incongruity. The partly-regular and partly-irregular forms of our old farm-houses, and our gabled gothic manors and abbeys, appear quite in harmony with an undulating, wooded country. In towns we prefer symmetrical architecture; and in towns it produces in us no feeling of incongruity, because all surrounding things—men, horses, vehicles—are symmetrical also.
And here I was reminded of a notion that has frequently recurred to me; namely, that there is some relationship between the several kinds of architecture and the several classes of natural objects. Buildings in the Greek and Roman styles seem, in virtue of their symmetry, to take their type from animal life. In the partly-irregular Gothic, ideas derived from the vegetable world appear to predominate. And wholly irregular buildings, such as castles, may be considered as having inorganic forms for their basis.
Whimsical as this speculation looks at first sight, it is countenanced by numerous facts. The connexion between symmetrical architecture and animal forms, may be inferred from the kind of symmetry we expect, and are satisfied with, in regular buildings. Thus in a Greek temple we require that the front shall be symmetrical in itself, and that the two flanks shall be alike; but we do not look for uniformity between the flanks and the front, nor between the front and the back. The identity of this symmetry with that found in animals is obvious. Again, why is it that a building making any pretension to symmetry displeases us if not quite symmetrical? Probably the reply will be—Because we see that the designer's idea is not fully carried out; and that hence our love of completeness is offended. But then there come the further questions—How do we know that the architect's conception was symmetrical? Whence comes this notion of symmetry which we have, and which we attribute to him? Unless we fall back upon the old doctrine of innate ideas, we must admit that the idea of bilateral symmetry is derived from without; and to admit this is to admit that it is derived from the higher animals.
That there is some relationship between Gothic architecture and vegetable forms is a position generally admitted. The often-remarked analogy between a groined nave and an avenue of trees with interlacing branches, shows that the fact has forced itself on men's observation. It is not only in this analogy, however, that the kinship is seen. It is seen still better in the essential characteristic of Gothic; namely, what is termed its aspiring tendency. That predominance of vertical lines which so strongly distinguishes Gothic from other styles, is the most marked peculiarity of trees, when compared with animals or rocks. To persons of active imagination, a tall Gothic tower, with its elongated apertures and clusters of thin projections running from bottom to top, suggests a vague notion of growth.
Of the alleged connexion between inorganic forms and the wholly irregular and the castellated styles of building, we have, I think, some proof in the fact that when an edifice is irregular, the more irregular it is the more it pleases us. I see no way of accounting for this fact, save by supposing that the greater the irregularity the more strongly are we reminded of the inorganic forms typified, and the more vividly are aroused the agreeable ideas of rugged and romantic scenery associated with those forms.
Further evidence of these several relationships of styles of architecture to classes of natural objects, is supplied by the kinds of decoration they respectively represent. The public buildings of Greece, while characterized in their outlines by the bilateral symmetry seen in the higher animals, have their pediments and entablatures covered with sculptured men and beasts. Egyptian temples and Assyrian palaces, while similarly symmetrical in their general plan, are similarly ornamented on their walls and at their doors. In Gothic, again, with its grove-like ranges of clustered columns, we find rich foliated ornaments abundantly employed. And accompanying the totally irregular, inorganic outlines of old castles, we see neither vegetable nor animal decorations. The bare, rock-like walls are surmounted by battlements, consisting of almost plain blocks, which remind us of the projections on the edge of a rugged cliff.
But perhaps the most significant fact is the harmony that may be observed between each type of architecture and the scenes in which it is indigenous. For what is the explanation of this harmony, unless it be that the predominant character of surrounding things has, in some way, determined the mode of building adopted?