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

by Sir George Gilbert Scott

In reviewing the changes in the architecture of our own country, it may be wholesome to begin early:—to “look at the rock whence we were hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence we were digged.” A retrospect such as this gives rise to some curious reflections. At one time we feel perplexed by the depth of antiquity into which we are directing our view, and at another with the very reverse of this. When we go beyond the Norman Conquest,—beyond the destructive ravages of the Danes,—through the half-mythic times of the Heptarchy and the heroic age of the Pagan Saxons; and, again, beyond the destruction of the Roman arts; through the mystic and hazy age which intervened between the withdrawal of the Roman and the conquest by the Saxon; again, through the four centuries of Roman domination into the unknown abyss of prehistoric Britain, what a vast lapse of time does it represent! Yet the earliest period we thus reach is, nevertheless, some four centuries subsequent to the close of the Old Testament history and the period of Pericles and Phidias, and perhaps fifteen centuries subsequent to many of the great monuments of Egypt!

Archaic art seems to have the power of reproducing itself; and even the ages of heroic and barbaric myth may re-occur after periods in which society and civilisation may appear to have worn themselves out by over-refinement; and thus, when we attempt to trace out the early Christian architectural arts of the nations of Northern Europe, we find ourselves as much in the mist of antiquity as if we were prying into that which preceded the Pyramids or the earliest palace of Nimroud, though we are in reality examining works subsequent to the time when the empire of Rome fell to pieces from sheer old age.

In taking an enlarged view of Mediæval architecture, we must view it in two distinct but at the same time united aspects; we must view it as the architecture indigenous to the modern as distinguished from the ancient civilisation; but we must also view it as having been developed upon an antique nucleus.

There are also two other separate, though united, views which we ought to take of it. We should view it, on the one hand, as the work of men elaborating, as from the beginning, a new system of art on the mere reminiscences of an old and defunct system,—absolutely defunct as relates to the northern races,—but we should view it also as, all the while, aided by the yet living art of the Eastern Empire and by the smouldering embers of that of Rome itself.

In some districts there may have been a tradition remaining of some old method of building which had prevailed among the Pagan, Celtic, or Teutonic tribes; but the germ may generally be said to have been Roman or Byzantine, founded on reminiscences, and aided, from time to time, by direct communication.

The two great divisions of Mediæval architecture are, firstly, that which preceded, and, secondly, that which followed the great transition of the latter half of the twelfth century. The whole may be viewed as the one great development of arcuated construction into a style of art, and its two great divisions are the round-arched and the pointed-arched styles.

It is my purpose during the present session to limit myself very much to the former; but viewing it, not only in its own bearings, but also as the precursor of the latter. Though I intend to choose my illustrations almost wholly from buildings in our own country, it would be taking a very narrow view of our subject if we were to consider the great round-arched style otherwise than as a whole, and our own portion of it other than as a branch of that mighty bifurcated tree whose boughs, whether growing from its eastern or its western stem, spread themselves over the whole civilised world.

It has been well remarked, by Mr. Freeman, in his History of Architecture, that the ancient Roman manner of building was essentially an arcuated style, though its true character was artificially overlaid by the features belonging to the purely trabeated style of Greece; and that the whole course of change through which it, in after ages, passed, may be described as the gradual throwing off the trabeated overlayings and the perfecting into an architectural style its vital germ,—the arcuated system.

This process was carried on equally in the East as in the West, though under circumstances accidentally differing. The two great metropolises of the Christian Roman empire, commencing with the same architecture, gradually changed it into two distinct branches, though clearly belonging to the same great trunk. In both the changes or developments took for their starting-point the architecture, not of Greece, but of Rome. In the West, they continued to follow the natural suggestions of that style, influenced deeply by the changed religion, and subsequently curbed and held down, first by the removal of the seat of government to Constantinople, and then by the continuous waves of the northern invaders who gradually brought down to a very low ebb the civilisation and arts of the Western empire.

In the East, the influence of the Christian worship was at least equally deep; while the presence of the imperial court and government offered greater advantages to development, and the accidental preference for domed construction gradually gave a wholly new tone to the general character of the architecture, while the proximity of ancient Greek remains had a very strong influence on the ornamentation.