I have carefully revised the book without altering its substance. I have also added an Appendix containing a few remarks on the Orders of Architecture, with illustrations of some of the best classical examples; believing that this would be useful, not only to carvers and modellers who have to execute enrichments on Architecture, but to all students.
The ornamented parts of the Greek and Roman Orders, figure sculpture apart, show how two cognate nations, each with transcendent abilities but of an entirely different range, abstracted the beauties of plants, and conferred them on stone and marble to emphasize and adorn the rigid forms of Architecture; how the Greeks seized on the exquisite beauties of flowers, and adapted them, so as to retain the greatest purity of form, and used them in the most sparing way; while the Romans, or Greeks working under Roman dictation, used them lavishly to procure magnificence; and eventually were so prodigal with their ornament as to defeat the end in view, as little of the architecture was left plain; to act as a foil to the enrichment; while from the quantity employed no time could be spared to perfect the ornament.
The power of abstracting and applying the beauties of floral form seems now to be entirely lost. The great art of the present day seems to consist in copying nature as exactly as it can be copied in hard materials to make a colourable imitation; but in such a way that its highest beauties are lost.
Mr. Ward has added several illustrations which his experience shows him will be useful to students, and he has added an Appendix on the construction of some geometrical figures, and the methods of drawing conic sections and spirals.
AUTHOR’S PREFACE
In the preface to the first edition of this book, I stated that the contents consisted of a series of class lectures given to art students. These lectures were not originally intended for publication. I was, however, strongly advised to publish them, and did so without any attempt at revision, under the title of Elementary Principles of Ornament. Although there are many excellent text-books on ornament published at the present time, there are none that exclusively treat of the theory, or what is known as the “principles of ornament”; this belief is shared with me by many of the principal art masters in the country, and by many gentlemen whose names stand high in the list of decorative artists, judging from the numerous letters and opinions I received after the publication of the first edition.
I was gratified to find that the book received a favourable recognition from the authorities of the Science and Art Department.
The present edition has been edited and revised by Professor Aitchison, A.R.A., the Government Examiner in the subject and Professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy. To that gentleman I here desire to record my grateful thanks for his invaluable services in connection with the book, and, I am sure I shall be right if I add, the thanks of all students in ornamental art. Professor Aitchison has also written the new introductory chapter.
I wish here also to express my best thanks to John Vinycomb, Esq., F.R.S.A.I., for his valuable suggestions to me in the chapter on symbolic ornament.