Lectures on the rise and development of medieval architecture; vol. 2

by Sir George Gilbert Scott

What I have said of doors applies equally to windows, subject to some modifications arising from their practical requirements. The simplest form of an arched opening, going square through the wall, is eminently unsuited to a window; and this is so obvious that it has rarely been used at any period, for the square edges of a thick wall evidently prevent the light from diffusing itself in the interior.

The most favourable forms are those in which the jambs are sloped, either directly from the exterior inwards, or from some intermediate point, both inwards and outwards, so as to give the freest scope for the rays of light. In this respect I have nothing to say against the forms customary in the previous style.[19]

The Norman windows are of great variety. The simplest, which is prevalent in very homely buildings (as may be seen in many extremely humble churches on the cliff between Dover and Deal), is an opening with no external recess, but splaying at some 45 degrees inward, the glass being flush with the exterior. From this we have every variety of architectural grade; first, a chamfer or moulding added to the exterior; then, two orders, plain or moulded; or a shaft may be substituted for the outer order in the jamb, or the same repeated, as in doorways. Internally, the thickness of the walls continues to be splayed so as to diffuse the light, though in buildings of a high architectural class, mouldings or divided orders (with or without shafts) may enrich the inner angle, or may even take the place of the splay altogether.

In domestic windows two or more openings are often used externally, divided by a little column, the whole being internally united into a single opening. These are sometimes comprised on the exterior under a single arch to increase the architectural effect.[20] The same is also used for belfries and other positions where use dictates it.

I have now shown you that doors, windows, archways, arcades, and vaulting were generated, as to their architectural treatment, simply by the exercise of logical reasoning.

In the general treatment of the exterior of a building the same prevailed. The walls, being thick, needed little buttressing, and this little was supplied, and the flatness of the walls at the same time relieved, by a sort of pilaster or slightly projecting pier placed at reasonable intervals, which were united under the eaves, in many cases, by a row of corbels. The walls were further relieved by projecting base-courses, and string-courses under the window cills or elsewhere; and, in buildings of a higher class, by decorative arcading or other methods of raising its architectural character.

In all the foregoing particulars, it will be observed that I have stated nothing but what could be arrived at by simple and almost abstract reasoning, almost apart from anything which, strictly speaking, belongs to style of art. The results, indeed, apply equally to all the more perfect varieties of Romanesque, and follow from the mere thinking out of the subject; and if we desired to strike out some new variety of arcuated architecture, we could not do better than start from a point thus logically arrived at. To say that these are the leading characteristics of the Norman style, is saying at once too much and too little; for none of these characteristics would distinguish it from the Romanesque of Central France or Germany, which possess them equally with the Norman, while the latter certainly does possess features of its own, which would so distinguish it. These consist, however, for the most part, in the decorative details, and in the general composition of the buildings, but more particularly the latter; for, if the Rhenish, Central French, and Norman buildings were to exchange details, their composition would still distinguish them at a single glance, and each would be appropriated to its respective district in spite of any doubt about its details. The essential and logically derived elements are the same in all; the details, though united by a common bond of sentiment and feeling, differ in a certain degree,—while the customary forms of composition, though by no means contradictory, still differ so much as to leave no doubt about their being three, though evidently sister styles, or, rather, local varieties of the same great style.

Two very important features which Norman possesses, in common with other varieties of Romanesque, are, first, that, when a column is used for bearing weight, its diameter is made proportionate rather to its load than to its height; and, secondly, that columns are used also in a purely decorative capacity, and their diameter, in that case, is simply such as is best proportioned to their position; and most usually to the size of the arch-order they have, apparently, or really to carry.

We will now go into minor details.

The first purely decorative features which we may imagine to have been introduced,—if the logical scheme I have been supposing had been strictly followed out,—would be the base-course of a wall, the impost to sever the pier from the arch, and the drip, or label, to draw the line between the arch and the wall. These mouldings in their elementary forms are alike. In Anglo-Saxon they were usually square courses (Fig. [237]); in Norman, their simple form is the same with the angle cut off ([Fig. 238]).