Doorways differ in no degree, as to principle, from archways, excepting in having, at some point in the thickness of the wall, more or less recessed at pleasure, what Professor Willis calls the “doorway plane;” that is to say, one of the arch-orders so formed that the door may be hinged to it, and may shut against it. The actual opening of the door may or may not be stopped on this plane to a square heading, the arch over it being filled in with a tympanum, plain or sculptured; or it may be altered from the form of the main arch to some shape having less height. In all other respects the principles already stated apply equally to doorways as to archways. The interior, however, has to be varied if the door fills in the arch-form, with a view to facilitating its free opening; but this is a practical point not needful to be here gone into. The orders of arch-mouldings in a doorway often continue down the jambs, as in one of the magnificent doorways at Malmesbury Abbey: or they may be replaced by colonnettes or pilasters, or these methods may be united in the same doorway,—just as in another door at Malmesbury, continuous mouldings alternate with colonnettes,[36]—and the arches, jambs, and capitals, and even the shafts of the colonnettes, may receive any degree of sculptured enrichment.
The doorway being a point on which much architectural character was concentrated, and great depth being necessary to give the required effect, it was customary to thicken the walls at the doorways by various expedients, so as to obtain depth enough to give several orders of arch-mouldings; this increased thickness was covered over by gables, and by other means.
The width, too, of the jambs of doorways is often increased, and more space gained for enrichment, by giving to each order in the jamb a larger space than would otherwise be necessary of square face between the shafts ([Fig. 309]).
Fig. 309.
| Fig. 310. | Fig. 311. |
In some cases, also (as in the doorway in the Castle at Durham), there is a small arch-order which continues down the jambs between the principal orders, and adds much richness to the effect.
In later examples, two ranges of shafts were often introduced; the outer ones carrying the orders, and the inner ones having capitals lost under the main capitals, as if carrying an imaginary order hidden within the visible mass of the arch. These are, in fact, the parallels of the supernumerary shafts I have mentioned as often existing in clustered piers. Thus, in St. Leonard’s Priory, Stamford (a work of the twelfth century), we find two ranges backed by a plain splayed surface (Fig. [312]). In the Galilee at Ely (somewhat later), the second range is backed by large hollows between salient mouldings ([Fig. 310]); and again at Lichfield, the back range is, as at Stamford, placed against a splayed surface, but relieved by ranges of large toothed ornaments running up behind each of the front shafts ([Fig. 311]).