CHAPTER VII.
Early Sixteenth Century—Coming of the Italian Influence.
It was during the sixteenth century that took place the most remarkable development in domestic architecture which occurred in England until the middle of the nineteenth century; and especially during the second half was this extraordinary advance particularly noticeable. Several causes produced this effect, chief among them being that great upheaval in thought which gave rise to the wonderful movement known as the Renaissance. The Renaissance stands not only for a revival of ancient forms in architecture, sculpture, and painting, but for a vast awakening in all departments of human enterprise, and the final abandonment of mediævalism with all its crude and crabbed methods and ways of thought. New ways were followed in science, in learning, in religion, in art; and the knowledge of these new ways was widely disseminated by the new invention of printing. So far as architecture was concerned, Italy was the fountainhead of the new stream of thought; and so far as England was concerned, it was in the reign of Henry VIII. that the stream first reached our shores, and affected our traditional methods of design.
The dissolution of the monasteries was another cause of the change which came over building, inasmuch as it transferred into private and secular hands much of the vast possessions hitherto held by the Church. The confusion into which religion was thrown put an effectual stop to church building, and consequently opened the way to increased house building. The abatement of civil strife and the general security of life and property under the strong and sagacious rule of Elizabeth was a further inducement towards the erection of comfortable homes. The rise of the new nobility which sprang from her recognition of talent in persons of comparatively obscure origin, led to the founding of some of the finest houses of which the country can boast. Finally, the desire for magnificence, which has already been noticed in a few instances in the preceding century, became general, fostered as it was by rivalry, the possession of wealth, and the sense of security from internecine strife.
Italy, being the home of the new manner in art, communicated her methods in course of time to her neighbours. Out of her superabundant craftsmen she spared some for other lands. They settled in France, they settled in England; at least they hardly settled here, but they visited us for longer or shorter periods, and left us a legacy in design. Our own craftsmen gradually, and with some reluctance, adopted their methods, and having become accustomed to the strange forms brought from the far south, they turned in later years with increased eagerness to their near neighbours the Dutch, who had themselves learnt the new lesson in their own stolid and unimaginative way.
The early steps in the change of design are of great interest. They appear at first infrequently and tentatively in insignificant ornament; then rather more freely; after a time they affect prominent features such as cornices; then the pediment appears; the pointed arch gives way to the semicircular, windows become square-headed; classic pilasters are introduced, sparingly at first, but afterwards with more freedom; symmetry of disposition in the plan of the house becomes more frequent. Yet beneath all these Italian adornments the body of the house is of the old English type; with all its foreign variations, the melody itself is native. It is an endless delight to watch the struggles of the English craftsman with his novel ornament. Sometimes they resulted in quaint applications of misunderstood features; sometimes in proportions which would have pained the eye of Palladio; but frequently in charming little bits of design, refreshingly simple and unobtrusive.
Meantime the plan of the house was continued on the old lines, and Henry VIII.’s reign saw no great or general development of accommodation. A large number of houses were built during his reign and that of his predecessor, and it is to this period that may be attributed a great proportion of the domestic work of late Gothic or Tudor character.
92. Plan of Horham Hall, Essex.
Horham Hall, in Essex, is a good example, moderate in size, of this period. It was built in the early years of the sixteenth century by Sir John Cutt, who died in 1520. The plan (Fig. 92) follows the ancient lines, the great hall being in its traditional relationship to the rest of the house. The old indifference to regularity is well illustrated by the passage, treated as a kind of bay window, which leads from the hall to the north wing. The windows in general have but one range of lights, but in the bay of the hall and in the passage, the lingering reluctance to adopt large windows is thrown away (Fig. 93), and we get a foretaste of that vast array of lights which was presently to become a distinguishing feature of domestic architecture. There is a large fireplace in the hall and a contemporary louvre in its roof; a somewhat curious combination, inasmuch as the louvre would be needless, either for the escape of smoke or (in view of the large bay window) for the admission of light.
