The nave of the cathedral at Arles, dedicated to St. Trophimus, is said to have been built by St. Virgil, and consecrated on the 17th May, 626. I am inclined to believe that we now see the original building. The vaulting is very obtusely pointed without groins. This church has aisles and no side chapels, but these aisles are vaulted only in a quarter of a circle, which forms a counterpoise to the thrust of the great arch of the nave; the openings into the side aisles are also very obtusely pointed. The windows are modern, and I suspect that no window was intended in the nave, except a small circular one over the principal entrance; how the choir was originally finished, I have not sufficient evidence to decide, but it is most likely that the building terminated in an apsis, as in the ancient churches of Rome, with the altar in front, and an inclosure for the choir before the altar.
Although in all the churches of this style, windows posterior to the date of the building have been opened into the nave, yet they almost always feel close, and have a disagreeable smell; this was very strongly the case at Arles, and perhaps contributed to my illness there. The bones of St. Trophimus were brought here in 1152, and it is not improbable that the porch was added on this occasion. It is very magnificent, consisting of a large and rich semicircular arch, with multiplied mouldings, supported on slender columns, and the whole adorned with a profusion of statues. Although of a style which terminated with the twelfth century, it is evidently an adjunct to the original building, but one to which it would be I believe, impossible to find a parallel. It is difficult to explain how it happens, that such a contradiction to good sense, as supporting a great arch upon little columns, can produce a pleasing effect, yet I must acknowledge that this porch is not only singular, but very beautiful. The porch at Tarrascon, already mentioned, was somewhat similar to this, but greatly inferior, and it has been much damaged during the Revolution, while that of Arles remains perfect.
The cathedral at Nismes has a simple nave, with groined and pointed arches and chapels, with semicircular arches on the sides. The west front bears evident traces of the Roman style of design; it has a pediment, and a cornice supported by modillions, with roses in the intervals, both on the upright face and on the soffite. Under the cornice is a continued frieze ornamented with a series of figures from the scripture history. This front has suffered much by repeated alterations; the part above described is certainly ancient, but lower down, the original form is become very obscure: it seems to have been a continued wall, ornamented with very slender shafts supporting small semicircular arches. The upper part of the western tower, for there is at present only one, is of the fifteenth century; the lower part is considerably more ancient. There is a gloomy passage behind the choir, and a ladies chapel, which is of later date. The church at St. Remi also partakes of this cavern style, and many of the village churches which I could not stop to examine seem to exhibit it, and are perhaps of the same early date.
The church at Valence is a very remarkable example, which must rather be classed with what is called Norman architecture, than with the edifices above described. Yet it must be confessed, that if it resemble the ancient buildings of our own country, in so many particulars as to be comprehended in the same term, it yet differs in others so much as to present an appearance by no means exactly similar. The ornaments in particular are all Roman; the only attempt at novelty in the earlier buildings of the middle ages, in the south of France, consisting in placing some of them topsy-turvy. The shape is a Latin cross, of which the foot is remarkably long, and the head short. The vaulting of the nave is waggon-headed, that of the side aisles is groined; all the vaults and arches are semicircular. The capitals are all nearly alike, and are only a step farther from the Corinthian than those of the inner archway of the church of Nôtre Dame de Dom. It is amusing to follow the steps of this degradation of the Roman architecture from one building to another; and here, though very much altered, there is still much more of the original form than we find in England, or in the north of France. The piers consist of four half columns of very slender proportions, united to a square pillar; and these half columns rise in one height, without any intermediate bands, from the small plinth on which they stand, to the underside of the vaulting. The arches of the side aisles rise nearly to the springing of the vault of the nave. The intersection of the nave and transept is surmounted with a dome, and the chevet finishes in a niche-head or semi-dome; it is earlier than any thing I know in the eleventh century, but the existence of a transept makes me unwilling to suppose its erection prior to the year 1000. The lower part of the tower is perhaps older; the upper is certainly more recent than the body of the church; yet it is still a sort of Norman, but with some Gothic ornaments, which do not seem to be additions. As the Norman, or something very like it, appears to have been the architecture of Charlemagne, it is possible that the cathedral at Valence is of the eighth century; but I find that I have freed myself from all those shackles about dates, which I had imbibed in England and strengthened at Paris; and now ramble through five or six centuries with very little light to guide me.
The church at Vienne which I have already described, is the last which retains any trace of this cavern-like style, and that rather in some of the accessories than in any of the principal parts. There we meet with something of Norman details, and something of a degraded Roman. The Norman may perhaps itself be called a degraded Roman, but the degradation has not always taken place exactly in the same manner. It is curious enough that in the latter imitations of Roman, they should frequently have reversed the ornaments, putting the eggs and darts, for instance, the wrong side uppermost, while at the expiration of the Gothic in the sixteenth century, we may sometimes find the trefoil ornament reversed in the same manner.
LETTER XII.
SOUTH OF FRANCE.
Geneva, 27th August, 1816.
In my last I ran through the architecture of the middle ages in the south of France, and have now only a few observations to add of a more miscellaneous nature. The church of Nôtre Dame de Dom is seated on a rock which rises immediately from the Rhone, above the rest of the town, to the height of about 120 feet: all the remainder of the country to the east of the river, is a plain, bounded at a moderate distance by rugged hills, and beyond these by Mont Ventou, a bulky mountain, estimated to rise 6,000 feet above the Mediterranean. On the other side of the river, rocky hills come down to the water’s edge, crowned in several places with picturesque ruins. In the middle of the Rhone is a large island shaded with trees; and extending half way across the nearest branch of the stream, are the ruins of the ancient bridge of St. Benezet; the first perhaps of any consequence built by the nations of modern Europe. It was begun in 1177, during the most flourishing period of Avignon, when the government of that city was republican. Notwithstanding the expense of the erection, we are told that in 1179, the magistrates declared the inhabitants free from all imposts on that account. The bridge consisted of twenty-two arches, and was 1,200 paces in length; but like all ancient bridges, very narrow, the road-way not exceeding nine feet in width. Each arch is composed of four ribs, or series of vault stones, not bonded together. Like the Pont St. Esprit, it forms an elbow towards the current. On the first pier of the bridge is a chapel for the passengers to pay their devotions. This custom was probably derived from times when there was only a dangerous ferry, and travellers performed an act of piety, that they might not die unprepared. The old chapel was entered by a descending flight of steps, but as this was found inconvenient, a vault was inserted at half the height, and a new chapel built at the top of the old one; the first has a semicircular apsis with little columns, much like the Corinthian; the other is polygonal.
When Louis XIV. visited Avignon, the inhabitants, to do him honour, spread the whole of the bridge with velvet, and covered it with a canopy of silk. They did it, perhaps, as sacrifices are performed to evil deities, in order to avert the mischief they may occasion: but Louis, struck with this appearance of wealth and prosperity, in a town which did not belong to him, and not to be propitiated by their hospitality, destroyed the bridge, surrounded the place with custom-houses, ruined its trade, and thus drove the manufacturers to other places; and the city, which once boasted a population of eighty thousand souls, is now reduced to less than twenty thousand.
Avignon was a republic from 1134 to 1251. The popes came here (Clement V.) in 1309, and abandoned it in 1376. Two sham popes were here till 1403, from which time Avignon was governed by a vice-legate, deputed by the popes, till the revolution, when it was finally taken possession of by the French, and I suppose stands no chance of being restored. Nor is it desirable that it should, since being inclosed in France, it must always be in effect, subject to the government of that country. There is a museum and a public library; and I visited the house of one gentleman in the place, who has a fine collection of casts, and some pictures; but I did not find any thing very interesting.