Fourteenth century glass belongs to the Middle or Transitional Gothic period. We call it “Decorated,” for the inadequate reason that its detail is naturalistic.
213. St. Remi, Reims.
Fifteenth century glass, with us “Perpendicular,” in France “Flamboyant,” in Germany “Interpenetrated,” may, for convenience’ sake, be taken to include so much of Gothic as may be found lingering in the sixteenth century.
The Sixteenth century is more properly the period of the Renaissance. It is better not to apply to it the Italian term “cinque-cento,” since the greater part of it is not of the purely Italian character which that would imply.
Seventeenth century glass is to be distinguished from that of the sixteenth mainly inasmuch as it shows more markedly that decadence which had already begun to set in before the year 1600. It may be conveniently described as Late Renaissance.
Eighteenth century glass is not of sufficient account to be classed.
It will be seen that the dates above given do not quite coincide with those of Winston, who gives Early English to 1280, Decorated to 1380, and Perpendicular to 1530. There is here no thought of impugning his accuracy; but it seems more convenient not to distinguish a new style until the work begins markedly to differ from what had gone before, especially when the marked difference happens conveniently to coincide with the beginning of a new century; and Winston himself says of Perpendicular work (and implies as much of Decorated) that the style “can hardly be said to have become thoroughly established” until the beginning of the new century.
We have thus a century of Middle Gothic, the fourteenth century. What goes before is Early Gothic or Romanesque, as the case may be; what comes after is Late Gothic, coœval for a quarter of a century or more with the Renaissance.