§ VI. Now the entire treatment of the capital depends simply on the manner in which this bell-stone is prepared for fitting the shaft below and the abacus above. Placed as at a, in [Fig. XIX.], it gives us the simplest of possible forms; with the spurs added, as at b, it gives the germ of the richest and most elaborate forms: but there are two modes of treatment more dexterous than the one, and less elaborate than the other, which are of the highest possible importance,—modes in which the bell is brought to its proper form by truncation.
§ VII. Let d and f, [Fig. XIX.], be two bell-stones; d is part of a cone (a sugar-loaf upside down, with its point cut off); f part of a four-sided pyramid. Then, assuming the abacus to be square, d will already fit the shaft, but has to be chiselled to fit the abacus; f will already fit the abacus, but has to be chiselled to fit the shaft.
From the broad end of d chop or chisel off, in four vertical planes, as much as will leave its head an exact square. The vertical cuttings will form curves on the sides of the cone (curves of a curious kind, which the reader need not be troubled to examine), and we shall have the form at e, which is the root of the greater number of Norman capitals.
From f cut off the angles, beginning at the corners of the square and widening the truncation downwards, so as to give the form at g, where the base of the bell is an octagon, and its top remains a square. A very slight rounding away of the angles of the octagon at the base of g will enable it to fit the circular shaft closely enough for all practical purposes, and this form, at g, is the root of nearly all Lombardic capitals.
If, instead of a square, the head of the bell were hexagonal or octagonal, the operation of cutting would be the same on each angle; but there would be produced, of course, six or eight curves on the sides of e, and twelve or sixteen sides to the base of g.
| Fig. XXI. |
§ VIII. The truncations in e and g may of course be executed on concave or convex forms of d and f; but e is usually worked on a straight-sided bell, and the truncation of g often becomes concave while the bell remains straight; for this simple reason,—that the sharp points at the angles of g, being somewhat difficult to cut, and easily broken off, are usually avoided by beginning the truncation a little way down the side of the bell, and then recovering the lost ground by a deeper cut inwards, as here, [Fig. XXI.] This is the actual form of the capitals of the balustrades of St. Mark’s: it is the root of all the Byzantine Arab capitals, and of all the most beautiful capitals in the world, whose function is to express lightness.
§ IX. We have hitherto proceeded entirely on the assumption that the form of cornice which was gathered together to produce the capital was the root of cornices, a of [Fig. V.] But this, it will be remembered, was said in § VI. of [Chap. VI.] to be especially characteristic of southern work, and that in northern and wet climates it took the form of a dripstone.
Accordingly, in the northern climates, the dripstone gathered together forms a peculiar northern capital, commonly called the Early English,[47] owing to its especial use in that style.
There would have been no absurdity in this if shafts were always to be exposed to the weather; but in Gothic constructions the most important shafts are in the inside of the building. The dripstone sections of their capitals are therefore unnecessary and ridiculous.